UTILITY WORK: Mile-long gas-main replacement project ahead for Beach Drive

| Utilities | West Seattle news

In routine checks of city permit files, we noticed several mentions of Puget Sound Energy planning a pipeline-replacement project in the Beach Drive SW right-of-way. We asked PSE – which provides natural-gas service in our area – for details, and got them today:

Puget Sound Energy will be replacing 5,049 feet of a gas main line on Beach Dr. SW. starting in May with work expected to last about 90 days.

This is part of a project to improve the infrastructure in the area and provide safe and reliable natural gas service.

During the project, about 100 customers will have their gas turned off due to a service replacement of their line or their service lines being reconnected to the new gas main.

When possible, the gas main installation will be directional drilled to limit some of traffic issues on that street.

PSE is working with the Seattle Department of Transportation and will use flaggers to keep traffic moving.

All customers impacted will be notified before their service is interrupted.

Though the response from PSE doesn’t include specific locations, the permit files mention addresses where the service pipes to the residence will be replaced as a result, and those range from the 5000 block to the 6700 block. Site maps also label this as a project to replace DuPont-made pipe; a PSE document (page 15 here) notes that’s the result of a Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission directive for utilities to replace certain types of pipe that could be at higher risk of failure.

Lura March 24, 2022 (4:47 pm)

Oh my goodness.

WS Res March 24, 2022 (5:57 pm)

Everybody count your blessings that this line is being replaced for safety reasons, as much of a pain as it is. The alternative is something no one should have to live through. Or die from.

Eddie March 24, 2022 (8:31 pm)

How about pavement restoration along where they will undoubtedly penetrate at least 100 spots through the pavement? Are they going to be allowed to just patch all the holes or will they be required to restore the pavement? A lot of Beach Drive has fairly recent asphalt work and is in ecent shape. So was Avalon before the last couple years of construction punched a bunch of holes that got crappy patches.

John March 24, 2022 (9:50 pm)

Unfortunately the city of Seattle has extremely low standards, compared to other cities, that they require contractors to follow for road repairs/paving both during utility work and after completion. Which is one major reason we have such an awful patchwork of roads. Luckily – if this work will be completed by PSE vs a contractor – the actual utility will do MUCH better work because they are required to finish with higher standards (as an example, take a look at the pavement where that sewer line break & repair occurred a few weeks – on lower Beach Drive – it’s beautiful, actually better than before they opened it up). Fingers crossed this is an in-house project.

Dan March 25, 2022 (6:24 am)

Hopefully those 100 customers will not be without gas for the full 90 days. I suspect alot of those customers have gas hot water heaters, dryers and stoves.

Todd March 27, 2022 (1:55 am)

The introductory paragraph mentions the Beach Drive SW **right-of-way** specifically. Does anyone have any more details on this? We have a permitted driveway (for which we pay SDOT an annual fee) that extends through SDOT’s right of way from the sidewalk onto our property… worrying how horribly this gas line project will affect us… Thanks for any info you may have!

Todd March 28, 2022 (10:36 am)

@WSB — any chance you may have more info on my above question? Thank you so much!

WSB March 28, 2022 (10:51 am)

What you want to do is search on your address in the Seattle Services Portal (use Beach Dr rather than Beach Drive, they screwed up the search feature recently) and see if anything specific has been filed. (You also should be able to ask PSE for more info. That’s why we wrote this … saw the various filings and guessed, apparently correctly, that this hadn’t been announced to the neighborhood yet.) – TR
- Todd March 29, 2022 (12:08 am)
  
  Thank you, I will take a look, But you wrote “Beach Drive SW right-of-way” in the intro, but your quote from the city only mentions Beach Drive SW, not the right-of-way. Do you know what if anything is intended for the right of way? That’s what scares the heck out of me given that our driveway (and pretty much all of the driveways in our stretch of Beach Drive SW) occupy SDOT’s right-of-way.Thanks for sharing any context you may have gleaned about the right-of-way specifically.
  - WSB March 29, 2022 (12:43 am)
    
    Right-of-way most commonly means street or sidewalk. I don’t know where the main that’s being replaced is, nor where the individual lines that’ll be replaced are. I looked up all the extra info I could find – PSE’s reply didn’t include anything about the DuPont line, for example, I discovered all that via extra research. Haven’t found a project map or schematics, but one house, for example, had a roughed-out plan from PSE that suggests at least in that block (5900) the main is under the street …TR

Todd March 29, 2022 (10:56 am)

Ah, I assumed right-of-way in this context meant SDOT’s right of way from the sidewalks onto properties.Thank you (as always) for your generosity with answering questions like mine and for your incredible reporting. You are a treasure to our community.

classicJuice April 1, 2022 (8:03 pm)

This is a great opportunity to switch their houses off of gas completely. Each component has a better alternative, and nothing feels better than losing that $13/mth connection fee.