Home stretch, finally, for Alki pump station project

| Utilities | West Seattle news

Wondering how much longer you’ll see all that on the east end of the main stretch of Alki Beach? When last we got an estimated end-of-project date from King County Wastewater Treatment for the Alki pump station project, they expected it would wrap up this month. With the month almost over, we checked back. The project is now in what you might call the home stretch – it’s in the “commissioning” stage, which means a lot of testing to make sure it works, but that could take a few more weeks before you start seeing the equipment pull out, according to county spokesperson Martha Tuttle. She also said they hope to set up a public open house at the site for people “to be able to go down the stairs and take a look,” but no date’s set yet. The work was expected to take about 20 months when it started in early 2008; so far it’s lasted almost 22.

pz November 28, 2009 (8:10 am)

I’m sure the folks working on this project have done a great job, but the neighbors by Bar-S fields will NOT miss the workers who drive at record speeds on residential streets in the morning and afternoon going to and from the Sewage Treatment plant. We are so lucky no child/family or pets have been hit with their speeding.

marty November 28, 2009 (11:36 am)

I can’t imagine why this project has taken two years to complete!!!!

chas redmond November 28, 2009 (2:00 pm)

Marty – it’s because it was a King County project – did you hear, King County is inefficient, wastes money and is way, way over-budget. No surprise here. You should see how far behind they are on the awesome debt-ridden project Brightwater. Your tax dollars NOT at work. We can only hope that Dow does something to improve efficiency because there’s rampant waste.

jcricket November 28, 2009 (7:33 pm)

I love all the idiot comments about government workers (see chas). So this project was expected to take 20 months, and it’s going to end up taking 22-23. A whole 10% overage.

Having been in the private sector my entire career I’ve seen tons of projects come in 100s of percent/months over budget.

Sure, the government wastes money sometimes, or does things wrong, but their track record is probably better than most private organizations – and they have more difficult conditions to contend with. You try building something in the middle of an already built-up area and dealing with just about every kind of residential complaint you can get – and that’s after all the permitting, design process, public comment period, etc.

Yes, periodically there are audits that show horrendous waste in one government agency or another, but the overall government (DOT esp.) track record is pretty good.

Will November 29, 2009 (10:46 pm)

I went to several planning meetings for this project and the project manager promised that the public would be able to stay on the water side except in unusual situations. Seems like the unusual turned to usual as folks have had to cross the street twice to get around the construction for the last several months.

on board December 16, 2009 (11:10 am)

The project seems to keep a 5 hour work day so it is no wonder it took two years. During this time they created a serious safety hazard and did not do what they could to keep a path open on the water side.

I really hope they don’t do a botch job of repaving the trail. Typically these are repaved with a rougher surface than the rest of the trail.

on board December 28, 2009 (11:44 am)

Still no response from the County, and no update to the project website. They seem unconcerned with reopening the trail, and equally unconcerned with communication for the surrounding community.