South Park Bridge: Councilmember Bagshaw’s life-extending idea

| Safety | South Park | Transportation

(Photo courtesy Dale Brayden, from the “Captain Dave river tour” last weekend)
Wednesday night of last week, City Councilmember Sally Bagshaw was at the second of two consecutive-night meetings in South Park (WSB coverage here), talking with – and listening to – community members regarding the county’s scheduled shutdown of the deteriorating South Park Bridge. She promised them, “I’ll be here with you.” One week later, after she wrapped up an appearance last night at the Delridge Neighborhoods District Council meeting, we caught up with her to ask what’s happened since then. She mentioned meetings with other key elected officials – but most notably, a new idea she’s exploring: Since the bridge’s biggest safety issues come from the wear and tear of repeated openings and closures for marine traffic, she’s trying to find out if there are vessels based south of the SP Bridge that could be moved upstream (north) for a year or so – till a new bridge could be built. If the bridge didn’t have to open for marine traffic, Bagshaw says, it could have an extended life of availability for vehicle and pedestrian traffic. She emphasizes that a lot of research has to be done to see if this would be feasible, including conversations with the Port of Seattle and the Coast Guard.

john fox March 18, 2010 (2:23 am)

Sally was a vigorous supporter of the mercer corridor project which essentially sucked away all available federal stimulus dollars needed for the south park bridge. The mercer project was/is a colossal waste of the regions limited transportation dollars for a project that by their own studies actually makes traffic worse. It only serves to move traffic away from Paul Allen’s properties. We close a vital bridge serving freight and a whole community in South Park so mercer can proceed. Sally could have helped prevent this by opposing mercer plans and by speaking out against use of stimulus funds for it. Her belated overtures now for the bridge are disingenuous to say the least when viewed in that light. That we take stimulus dollars desperately needed for the bridge and funnel into south lake union is truly outrageous. If Ms. Bagshaw really cared about the South Park Bridge, she would have joined us in fighting such an egregious misuse of resources.

CB March 18, 2010 (6:49 am)

Um, paging Mayor McGinn…. Sir, your job is to help these people. Oh wait, you and your Sierra Club buddies don’t want to see any infrastructure improvements… even if it endangers people and livelihoods.

nunya March 18, 2010 (8:53 am)

Great idea, except for the impact to marinas and that small boatbuilder, Delta Marine.

publicadministrator March 18, 2010 (10:50 am)

The political decision to favor Mercer over the South Park Bridge as the regional shovel ready project to go after federal stimulus dollars occurred before Sally Bagshaw took office. Certainly the influence of economic class was at play in that choice, but she is not the villain.

In seeking federal dollars it wasn’t realistic to expect $99 mil. of the $153 mil. cost of a new bridge. Not enough local funds were ponied up. Which with a safety rating of 4 on scale of 100 you’d think electeds could’ve made this a priority… but Bagshaw was only sworn in 10 weeks ago, and there’s plenty of blame to go around.

David Miller March 18, 2010 (1:50 pm)

John, is the South Park Bridge considered a shovel-ready project? I know there are cost estimates, but I don’t remember there being any construction plans created yet.

JM from rat city March 18, 2010 (3:37 pm)

I’ve wondered about that option too but making the river non navigable south would certainly hurt a number of people and businesses. The Marina is kind of integral to the community flavor there. But weigh that against the interests of the rest of SP community. Its worth exploring and looking into that ratio in detail.

Mercer vs SP and other needs…typical result for Seattle which has been way more accommodating to the big money and developers than real community needs. Thats why I voted to go with Burien!

Eugene Wasserman March 18, 2010 (4:29 pm)

I have been heavily involved in the South Park Bridge issue for the last ten years as a representative of the South Park Business Association.
Then candidate McGinn wrote a letter of support for the federal Tiger grant to fund the South Park Bridge. If I remember correctly he did not write such as letter for Mercer.
Three City Council members from last year signed a letter of support for the grant, Conlin, Licata and Clarke.

Delta Marine a major boatyard that makes expensive yachts and has hundred employees sits south of the bridge. The South Park Bridge needs to open for their yachts.

Federal law protects their rights to the river, so if the bridge cannot open, it must be removed.

dsa March 18, 2010 (10:02 pm)

Why is there so much money to replace private light bulbs (1.7 million dollars) and none yet for this valued bridge?
https://westseattleblog.com/2010/03/seattle-city-light-plans-door-to-door-light-bulb-installation#comments

“The project is being paid for with $500,000 of federal stimulus package money and about $1.2 million from City Light.”

Travis March 19, 2010 (4:57 am)

dsa, Seattle City Light and Federal Stimulus money, going toward Energy Efficiency have nothing to do with the South Park Bridge.
That’s like asking why money going to Public Health isn’t being spent on a permanent generator for the sewage treatment plant.
Completely different ends of the spectrum and totally unrelated.

dsa March 19, 2010 (1:52 pm)

Travis, I knew the answer. It just seems so ridiculous to have so much money in one pot and not the other.

South Park denizen March 21, 2010 (9:10 am)

Is there really no way the bridge can even be kept open for foot and bike traffic?

People who live in South Park, work at Boeing, and cross the bridge to get there will now have to get in their cars and drive the long way around to one of the other bridges.

There is no other safe path to walk out of South Park to any other neighborhood.

Please don’t close the bridge to foot traffic without justification.

Scott March 24, 2010 (8:34 am)

Is the bridge going to close permanently on June 30 or not? As one of hundreds of Boeing workers in South Park, such a closure will cause enormous hassles and expense but it will be much worse if we are strung along with false hopes then the bridge is suddenly shut anyway. Planning is essential; someone in a position to know please give us the straight scoop and now.

This entire situation is stupid and political and should have been avoided. If this is the Montlake Bridge or the Fremont Bridge, this conversation isn’t happening. If you think Seattle cares about you, watch what they do and not what they say.

WSB March 24, 2010 (8:47 am)

Right now, the official line is, yes, it’s closing June 30th.
.
Whether an 11th-hour solution to stop that is found, much talk is happening now – see two stories we’ve done since this one. And we’ll have another one later today, as I’m covering a multi-agency meeting this morning in South Park.

Sorry, comment time is over.