(Photo by Eddie, substituted at 3:58 pm)
11:02 AM: West Seattle’s last tower crane – for now, anyway – is coming down.
The Whittaker – almost 400 apartments @ 4755 Fauntleroy Way SW – at one point had two. The first one was removed some months back. Today and tomorrow, the portable crane in our top photo is bringing down the second one after 15 months, the last one at any West Seattle project.
(This photo and next by WSB’s Patrick Sand)
There’s still plenty of construction activity in West Seattle, but no others, currently, of the size that requires a crane. The Whittaker is seven stories; WS zoning maxes out at 8, for now. It’ll be a while before the next project of that height gets going – there’s one planned right across the street, at the former Capitol Loans pawn-shop site, and a 6-story project at 4532 42nd SW, just north of Capco Plaza.
Our archives of recent tower-crane presence in West Seattle go back to at least 2007, when we chronicled the arrival of the crane for Capco Plaza at 41st/42nd/Alaska, just a block west of The Whittaker; there was a year-long gap when the Capco crane came down in February 2009, until the crane for Link in The Triangle arrived in January 2010.
History aside, while The Whittaker’s crane-removal operation is under way today and tomorrow, 40th SW is closed to traffic between SW Alaska and SW Edmunds. That includes the Seattle Fire units from temporary Station 32 – we saw them staged along Alaska by Bank of America earlier this morning.
The Whittaker has two buildings – the south, at Fauntleroy/Edmunds, will open first. The north is the one that will include a Whole Foods Market; we just checked in with WF a few days ago, and a spokesperson reiterated that they’re on track to open in fall of next year.
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