West Seattle, Washington
29 Friday
(WSB photo)
By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor
Our area has an Aviation High School – so why not a Maritime High School?
Seattle Port Commissioner Fred Felleman talked up the value of jobs in the maritime industry, and the need to educate people about that, as part of his speech to the West Seattle Chamber of Commerce last Thursday. It was the Chamber’s annual “State of the Port” lunch meeting, outdoors at port-owned Jack Block Park.
We recorded his humor-peppered remarks, which in part reflected on his first four-year term on the commission, coming to a close as he runs for a second. (See the video here.)
He noted the park’s proximity to West Seattle’s Terminal 5, and recalled the controversy in which it was mired while he was running four years ago, as T-5 hosted vessels intended for Shell‘s Arctic oil drilling.
(From project fact sheet)
After a reader messaged us to say that “crazy vibrations have been rumbling our windows and house on the east side of Hiawatha,” we just verified with the Port of Seattle/Northwest Seaport Alliance that – as per this reminder last Friday – pile-driving has begun for the Terminal 5 project. Today is the first day of a six-month window during which in-water work, such as pile-driving, is allowed; the other six months, it’s prohibited “to minimize effects on migratory fish.” If you have a comment or question:
• Terminal 5 community phone line: 206-787-6886
• Email: Terminal5_Outreach@portseattle.org
Phase 1 of the project, including the north berth, is expected to be finished by early 2021; then the south-berth work starts in Phase 2.
(Display from July 10th ceremonial groundbreaking at T-5)
The Port of Seattle/Northwest Seaport Alliance is reminding neighbors today that the window for pile-driving on the Terminal 5 modernization project is about to open. From the letter they’re circulating:
In-water work, including in-water pile driving, is limited to the period between August 15 and February 15 in order to minimize effects on migratory fish. Upland pile driving can and will occur outside the time frame for in-water pile driving.
The Terminal 5 permit conditions restrict pile driving to the following times:
• 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. weekdays
• 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturdays
• 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sundays and legal holidays for vibratory pile driving only
• No impact pile driving is allowed on Sundays or federal holidays (except for two Sundays within each August 15 to February 15 period, restricted to 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.).
For comments and questions, the port offers these contact methods:
• Terminal 5 community phone line: 206-787-6886
• Email: Terminal5_Outreach@portseattle.org
It’s been a month since the project’s ceremonial groundbreaking (WSB coverage here). The first phase of the project is expected to be complete in 2021, and that’s when T-5 will resume handling international cargo.
Story, photos, video by Tracy Record and Patrick Sand
West Seattle Blog co-publishers
“It’s not every day we get to break ground on a half-billion-dollar project!”
So enthused Port of Seattle Commission president Stephanie Bowman during today’s ceremonial groundbreaking event for the megaproject that will modernize West Seattle’s Terminal 5.
No ground was broken during the event, which featured a half-hour of speeches under a tent on the dock followed by participants signing one of the concrete piles that will soon be driven as part of the project to make T-5 “big ship ready.”
Here’s video of everything that preceded the signing:
The Seattle/Tacoma partnership Northwest Seaport Alliance is the entity under whose auspices the T-5 project is happening, so NWSA CEO John Wolfe emceed the by-invitation event.
That big tent at Jack Block Park is where the Port of Seattle/Northwest Seaport Alliance invites you to visit until 11:30 am to get information/answers about the modernization project they’re about to start at nearby Terminal 5.
Easels are set up with the toplines on everything from project basics to the plan for handling concerns from air pollution to noise.
The entrance to the park is at 2130 Harbor SW, just southeast of Salty’s on Alki (WSB sponsor). Groundbreaking on the project to make the terminal “big-ship ready” is expected next month.
(Added: Photo of containers, courtesy Clayton LaPlant)
Thanks for the inquiries about the helicopters over the north end of the Duwamish River. They were TV choppers checking out an incident about which we have just obtained information. A spokesperson for Matson tells WSB:
Two shipping containers – both empty – were knocked into the water this afternoon at Port of Seattle T-5 during discharge (unloading) of our vessel Mahimahi.
No injuries and no reports of damage. We’re working on recovering the containers now. Vessel operations/schedule were unaffected and apparently no impact on waterway navigation / harbor ops.
(WSB photo: Matson’s Mahimahi, photographed from westbound West Seattle “low bridge” this afternoon)
Matson moved its weekly Seattle calls to T-5 back in April as an interim tenant while the terminal modernization project gets going. (Speaking of which, tomorrow is the Jack Block Park open house for info about the project, 9:30-11:30 am Saturday.)
By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor
When the Terminal 5 modernization project starts construction next month, Pigeon Point is one of the neighborhoods that will have a front-row view.
So it was one of three major topics when the Pigeon Point Neighborhood Council met this week at Pathfinder K-8.
TERMINAL 5 BERTH MODERNIZATION PROJECT: Before a project recap from the Port of Seattle/Northwest Seaport Alliance, they reminded the PPNC of the pre-construction open house June 22nd at Jack Block Park, 9:30-11:30 am (first noted here a week ago).
Q&A was interspersed with briefing points.
First question was about shore power. No, ships will not be required to plug in. They hope they’ll choose to, “when they have the capability.” They now expect more than 50 percent of the arriving cargo vessels will be shore-power-capable, up from the original 30 percent projection. They are also looking at policies for making it available at other terminals.
What about light pollution? One row of T-5 lights has to be “adjusted significantly,” was the reply. They added that work already has been done to keep the lights aimed down.
On Monday, we noted we were checking on an “open house” plan briefly mentioned in the slide deck for the Northwest Seaport Alliance managing members’ Tuesday briefing on the Terminal 5 project. We’ve since confirmed with spokesperson Peter McGraw that the June 22nd open house is a public event, 9:30-11:30 am at Jack Block Park (2130 Harbor SW; map). The event annoucement says, “Members of the Terminal 5 project team will be on hand to discuss the project, including the scope and environmental mitigation measures for noise, traffic, and air emissions.” Work is expected to start by midsummer.
That’s the slide deck for a briefing on the Terminal 5 modernization project, planned for tomorrow’s meeting of the Northwest Seaport Alliance managing members – aka port commissioners for Seattle and Tacoma. Some notes of interest in the slides and the accompanying memo (PDF):
–Orion Marine was successful (and lowest) bidder at just under $160 million, $24 million below the engineering estimate for the project. Four others submitted higher bids, highest at $200 million.
-The construction-management team is now working in the Administration Building at the site
-An “open house” is scheduled later this month and groundbreaking in July; we’re checking to see if either will be a public event
The briefing is scheduled toward the end of the agenda for tomorrow’s meeting, which starts at 11:30 am at the Sea-Tac Airport Conference Center and includes a public-comment period in the early going.
The photos are from David Hutchinson, one of several people we heard from who wondered about the signage at Jack Block Park. Since the park is owned by the Port of Seattle, we asked port spokesperson Peter McGraw about the situation. He replied: “We believe a vessel hit and damaged the pier recently. We’re hoping to have the required permitting in the next few weeks, then begin repairs and have it back open as soon as possible after that.”
We asked if they’re trying to figure out which vessel did it. McGraw says, “It will be very difficult to ascertain who exactly was responsible, unless someone witnessed it, unfortunately.”
Two video clips from last night’s Delridge Neighborhoods District Council meeting:
TERMINAL 5: The Port of Seattle/Northwest Seaport Alliance reps continue making the rounds to answer community questions about the T-5 modernization project. (For extensive text coverage, see our report on the Southwest District Council appearance two weeks ago.)
CITY COUNCIL DISTRICT 1: The DNDC had planned to hear from two of the remaining four who had announced campaigns for D-1, but only Phil Tavel showed up. Isaiah Willoughby had confirmed about two weeks ago, DNDC chair Mat McBride said, but didn’t show up. With one day left in filing week, he hasn’t filed, so we may be looking at a three-candidate race. The other two, Brendan Kolding and incumbent Lisa Herbold, are booked for the DNDC’s next meeting, 7 pm June 19th, Neighborhood House High Point, 6400 Sylvan Way SW.
By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor
The half-billion dollar project that’s about to start on West Seattle’s eastern shore was the first of two big focuses at this month’s Southwest District Council meeting.
That’s the slide deck from the briefing on Terminal 5 (see it here in full-size PDF).
The Port of Seattle/Northwest Seaport Alliance sent a team of five for the occasion, almost equal to the SWDC attendance. They offered more construction details than we’ve heard in previous briefings, as well as other updates about T-5 activity, including Matson having moved its weekly cargo calls to T-5 as of last week (as reported here).
(WSB photo, last Friday)
Bids are being reviewed now and work is set to start soon on what ultimately will be a half-billion-dollar project – counting private as well as public investment – at Terminal 5. If you have questions, consider coming to the Southwest District Council‘s May meeting on Wednesday (May 1st), 6:30 pm at the Senior Center of West Seattle (4217 SW Oregon). Also at Terminal 5, its second container-ship call since the Matson move will be a brand-new ship that the cargo line has just put into service; at today’s West Seattle Chamber of Commerce Westside Awards breakfast, Northwest Seaport Alliance deputy CEO Kurt Beckett said Matson’s new Kaimana Hila is due in Friday (its first Seattle call was week before last at T-30).
(Port of Seattle photo)
The 850-foot-long ship and its sibling Daniel K. Inouye are the largest container ships ever built in the U.S., Matson says.
(WSB photos, taken from Jack Block Park)
Just arrived at Terminal 5: The 860-foot Matson container ship Mahimahi, first call of Matson’s new lease to use part of T-5 while modernization work gets going on another part of it.
Mahimahi sails weekly between Seattle and Hawaii. The last regularly scheduled container operations at T-5 were in 2014.
Matson previously called at T-30 on the south end of the downtown waterfront.
There are now three candidates in the running for the countywide Port of Seattle Commission seat that Courtney Gregoire is leaving. The first of those three to send an announcement is Dominic Barrera:
South King County may soon have representation on the Seattle Port Commission again, as Fire Commissioner, airport union leader, and environmental advocate, Dominic Barrera announced his intention to run for the open position being vacated by Courtney Gregoire.
Barrera has served as an elected Fire Commissioner for the North Highline Fire District since 2015, where he represents about 10,000 constituents in the communities of White Center and Boulevard Park. There, he was the driving force behind station improvements that increased workplace safety, helped craft an innovative joint-operation plan with a neighboring district to improve service and increase efficiency, and has twice amended and passed state legislation to protect low-income tax payers in his district.
“I’ve worked to balance budgets and restore the District’s economic stability without compromising the well-being of our employees or the communities we serve,” Barrera said. “I bring unparalleled experience, not only leading a public agency, but also working on the frontlines of a major Port facility, fighting for worker protections, and advocating for our environment. The Port of Seattle needs this kind of strong, well-balanced leadership in this critical time of growth.”
Barrera’s father, born in Tokyo to Mexican and Japanese parents, was an aircraft mechanic at Sea-Tac. Barrera himself has worked for Alaska Airlines for seven years, both in airport operations and accounting. Throughout his tenure, he has been a proud member of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAMAW) Local 2202 and currently serves as a union shop steward to his peers at Sea-Tac.
Barrera was part of a successful grassroots campaign in 2015 to save the Myers Parcels, an environmentally critical wetland that feeds into the Duwamish River, from industrial development. He was later selected to lead PlantAmnesty, an environmental nonprofit that works to protect Seattle’s greenspace, as their Executive Director.
He and his fiancé, Andrea, live in the Highline-area, directly under Sea-Tac’s northern flight path and within earshot of seaport operations.
“I would bring a voice for people living in the areas most impacted by Port activities,” Barrera said. “I know firsthand how crucial it is for the Port of Seattle to be a good neighbor.”
Barrera also served on the North Highline Unincorporated Area Council board. The other two candidates who have registered Position 2 campaigns with the Public Disclosure Commission so far are Ali Scego and Preeti Shridhar, but we haven’t yet received an announcement from either. Position 5 is also up for election this year; so far incumbent Fred Felleman is the only registered candidate. The formal filing period is in mid-May; the primary election is August 6th.
(Added: Saturday evening photo, before Norwegian Joy moved to Harbor Island)
1:53 PM: Though cruise-ship season doesn’t officially resume until May 4th, a big ship is at Pier 66 today and will then be at Harbor Island for a while. Port of Seattle spokesperson Peter McGraw tells WSB that the 3,804-passenger-capacity Norwegian Joy will move from the downtown dock to Vigor “for some minor interior work” before it returns to 66 for the May 4th departure. (This report indicates that’s the final phase in a “refit” as the two-year-old ship shifts to Alaska cruises after starting out in Asia.)
SUNDAY MORNING UPDATE: MarineTraffic.com shows the Joy is now off Harbor Island.
ADDED: Thanks to Max for the photo:
Two ships that Elliott Bay-watchers will see soon:
FIRST CRUISE SHIP ON MONDAY: Though regular weekly cruise-ship departures don’t start until May, the first call of the season will be on Monday (April 15th), when the Celebrity Cruises ship Eclipse stops at Pier 66. It will be on its way to Vancouver, B.C., where it will depart on a 12-night one-way cruise to Hawaii two days later. After that, the next arrivals aren’t scheduled until May 4th. See the full schedule here; the port’s 2019 cruise-season one-sheet is here.
MATSON’S MOVE: We’re following up on all the changes set in motion by last week’s vote approving short-term and long-term leases for West Seattle’s Terminal 5. The former, Matson, will have its first T-5 call on April 26, according to the Northwest Seaport Alliance, whose spokesperson Katie Whittier adds, in response to our inquiry, that “Matson yard equipment will be delivered to T-5 between now and April 22. The gate will open for receiving cargo on April 22.” According to the Matson website, that Hawaii-bound vessel should be the Mahimahi.
By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor
After almost five years of near-emptiness, Terminal 5 in West Seattle has container ships in its future again.
Seattle and Tacoma port commissioners, meeting as managing members of the Northwest Seaport Alliance, gave their approval today to an entwined package of leases that shuffle some other terminals as well as setting up T-5 for a $300+ million modernization project starting soon. Memos and overviews are all linked from the agenda – here’s the main one used by a series of presenters before the vote:
The vote wasn’t unanimous – two Tacoma reps expressed a variety of concerns – but it was emphatic.
Just before the vote, which followed a 3-hour briefing/discussion in the Sea-Tac Airport Conference Center, Seattle commissioner Peter Steinbrueck declared that it was no less than a question of “Are we a seaport of the future or a seapart of the past?” He said the plan is evidence “we’re thinking of the future … efforts to produce one of the best seaports on the West Coast” and proclaimed it “grand” as well as “overdue.”
(Terminal 5 photo from portseattle.org)
Tomorrow (Tuesday, April 2nd), Seattle and Tacoma port commissioners meet as managing members of the Northwest Seaport Alliance, voting on a variety of documents key to the future of West Seattle’s Terminal 5. Among them, a sheaf of leases, from the two-phase lease with SSA Terminals to be the T-5 tenant post-modernization, to an interim lease that will move Matson‘s Hawaii service there, to leases that don’t directly involve T-5 but are part of the overall shuffle. Included in those, the plan for the Port to develop another cruise-ship terminal on the downtown waterfront, as noted in our February coverage. Also to be discussed/considered, the latest on the T-5 modernization project, for which agenda documents say bids are expected to be opened April 10th. Those documents and others the commissioners will consider tomorrow are all now linked from the agenda for the meeting, which starts at 11:30 am Tuesday at the Sea-Tac Airport Conference Center. There’s a public-comment period too.
We’ve received a few questions about why the Washington State Ferries vessel Puyallup is docked at Terminal 5 in West Seattle. No, it’s not waiting for space at nearby Vigor Industrial (where it was built). WSF spokesperson Ian Sterling explained when we inquired, “Puyallup is in for light maintenance for minor wear and tear on the car deck, as well as some work on the electrical systems.” He added that this is being done by Foss Maritime, which, you’ll recall, has had an interim lease for space at T-5 for the past few years: “We’re excited to have more options when it comes to maintenance and repair of the state fleet. Puyallup is expected to be at T-5 until the end of the month.” It’s usually on the Edmonds-Kingston run.
As reported here Thursday, the Northwest Seaport Alliance hasn’t finalized all the details of the new Terminal 5 lease package, so it postponed plans for managing members – port commissioners of Seattle and Tacoma – to vote on it next week. Now the new date is set: April 2nd, in a special 11:30 am meeting at the Sea-Tac Airport conference center.
In case you’re keeping track: The vote on new leases for West Seattle’s Terminal 5 has been postponed again. It was first expected on March 5th; while the Northwest Seaport Alliance managing members (port commissioners from Seattle and Tacoma) voted that day to authorize sending the T-5 modernization project out to bid, a vote on the leases first outlined last month was postponed until next Tuesday (March 19th). Then last night the NWSA changed that to “postponed/TBD.” So we checked today to see why. NWS spokesperson Nick Demerice tells WSB that some of the details are still being finalized, noting that the plan centered on SSA taking a berth at T-5 post-modernization isn’t just one lease but multiple leases, multiple parties, from multiple nations. They’re hoping the special vote meeting can be rescheduled for later this month. (When it is, you’ll see that here.)
(2015 photo of Terminal 5 by Long Bach Nguyen)
As previewed here Monday, Seattle and Tacoma port commissioners – meeting as the Northwest Seaport Alliance‘s managing members – voted Tuesday on soliciting bids for the Terminal 5 modernization project. They voted to authorize staff to proceed with that, and are now moving toward a March 19th vote on leases for T-5, following a briefing back on February 5th. Video from this week’s meeting is viewable here, where you’ll also find documents from the meeting. If the bidding process for the $340 million project proceeds as planned, work could start as soon as June. Before then, if its lease is finalized, Matson will move its operations to T-5 starting in April. According to Tuesday’s briefing, while SSA‘s lease as the long-term tenant of T-5 also would start in April, its rent payments wouldn’t start until 2021 – assuming Phase 1 of the modernization project is done by then.
P.S. If you see this before 6:30 pm, a reminder that a port rep is on the agenda at tonight’s West Seattle Transportation Commission meeting to talk about T-5. The meeting’s at Neighborhood House-High Point, 6400 Sylvan Way SW.
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