Home › Forums › West Seattle Rants & Raves › What’s that smell?
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April 3, 2008 at 6:00 pm #586678
CMPParticipantCan anyone identify the source of that awful smell at the Spokane St/Harbor intersection under the West Seattle Bridge? It’s absolutely disgusting and even wafted into my bus yesterday…I’d rather deal with smokers than whatever this scent is. When I ride my bike home in the summer, I try to breathe as little as possible during that 200 yard+ stretch of road b/c it makes me want to vomit. If someone can pinpoint the source, I’d love to have a word with whoever is causing it. Thanks!
April 3, 2008 at 8:02 pm #620857
WSBKeymasterFolks in Delridge have written us from time to time about odors from the industrial area on the Duwamish. I have had a long running investigation going on that; the project the most recent complainants though was involved, turns out not to be happening, so I hit a dead end — TR
April 3, 2008 at 8:36 pm #620858
CMPParticipantThe problem area is the northeast corner of Harbor and Spokane, close to the Work Space lofts. I wonder if it’s from the recycling plant, but that’s the wrong side of the street. I don’t know how the cat adoption facility can stand it!
April 3, 2008 at 8:40 pm #620859
JeffroMemberI’ve smelled this a lot whenever I ride my bike that way, and I feel like it’s coming from whatever that area north of the steel mill is. Like you said, it lasts for a couple hundred yards, stronger towards Harbor Ave. The smell reminds me of really sour milk, or at the very least rotting garbage.
April 3, 2008 at 8:47 pm #620860
CMPParticipantThe smell kind of reminds me of cooked hamburger meat from Wendy’s. Other times, plain old garbage. But you’re right, it definitely has a rotten food element to it which mystifies me even more. You’d think there was a landfill over there or something.
April 3, 2008 at 8:53 pm #620861
JenVMemberwe were riding our bikes last year near there and smelled the worst thing ever- it turned out to be a truck trailer full of what I can only assume was rotten fish….
April 3, 2008 at 9:04 pm #620862
kParticipantwhile riding the bus last year, someone seated next to me said that it was from the recycling plant. it gets exceptionally bad whenever the air starts to warm up.
April 3, 2008 at 10:05 pm #620863
swimcatMemberThe stink you are referring to is worse than the ‘aroma from tacoma’! When I would commute on my bike, it would smell like a mix of feces and rotting trash. I always felt like it was coming from right below that area but couldn’t stop to look over the railing due to how stinky it was. Whatever is causing it has to be a health code/ environmental violation.
April 4, 2008 at 3:09 pm #620864
AlkiMacParticipantThe entire area where the rail yard now exits was once a landfill/garbage dump until sometime in the mid 1960’s.
When I was a child, the stink was unbearable. I would try to hold my breath as we drove over the old West Seattle bridge and into or out of West Seattle. Hundreds of seagulls circled continuously over the dump.
I don’t know if this is the cause of the recent smells, but it’s a possibility.
April 12, 2008 at 1:49 am #620865
bailecyclistParticipantWalked through this area on Wednesday morning, and the smell was pretty strong. Very unpleasant. Smells a little like rotting seafood. I don’t know how the residents and the business folks in the area can tolerate it.
April 12, 2008 at 4:05 am #620866
RonMParticipantThat area was indeed a tide flat and garbage dump from at least the 20’s through the 50’s. You couldn’t give land away anywhere near and that million dollar property today could have been had for pennies then! All of that area was covered with fill dirt and what we’re smelling today may very well be something perculating to the surface. The Lake Union Gasworks Park suffers fromt the same malidy from time to time.
April 12, 2008 at 4:37 am #620867
CMPParticipantThanks for the history lesson on that area AlkiMac and Ron! The mystery is solved and now that definitely makes me not want to ride my bike along that stretch when the weather warms up. I didn’t realize that Gas Works has the same problem, but I don’t spend much time up there. I wonder if there’s any way to fix the problem and who would be responsible for it?
April 14, 2008 at 2:31 am #620868
SGParticipantI work on Avalon. And the smell is nasty. Last year at this time I started getting sick. About the same time the smell started. I didn’t smell it all winter but it has started again. And I have been feeling sick again.I’m thinking this is not a coincidence. It’s kind of scary.
July 9, 2008 at 11:06 pm #620869
swimcatMemberHas anyone noticed that this stink is so bad now that it can be smelled from the high bridge?? Last night when I was driving home I caught a whiff and the stink stayed in my nose until I got past 35th. I feel really bad for the businesses and home owners around that area.
July 9, 2008 at 11:10 pm #620870
austinMemberThe high bridge, and now my backyard atop the hill. How can people stand to eat outside at the luna park cafe?
July 9, 2008 at 11:15 pm #620871
elgregoMemberI went to Luna Park for lunch today and didn’t notice it, but I have smelled it before while driving by.
July 10, 2008 at 4:22 am #620872
JanSParticipantwow…well, I cleaned out my refrigerator today…maybe tomorrow will be better? :)~
July 10, 2008 at 5:54 am #620873
celeste17ParticipantJan I know that my fridge could qualify for the stick o meter right now. I can’t wait until we can move in all the new appliances and be able to get rid of some of the things in my fridge.
July 13, 2008 at 9:15 pm #620874
glocsonMemberThere is another bad smell right a 1st and Edgar Martinez Blvd.
July 13, 2008 at 9:55 pm #620875
JanSParticipantglocson…baseball fan? Hey, they won this afternoon…no complaints ;-)
July 14, 2008 at 2:32 am #620876
KarlMemberMay I suggest a combination of low tide, temperature, and “brownfield” source material (40 percent trash, 30 percent construction waste and 30 percent is oil in soils and dredged sediment from Elliott Bay. Originally the dump contained about 400,000 tons of waste, it was closed in 1968). Emmett Watson is chuckling somewhere…
July 14, 2008 at 4:23 am #620877
JanSParticipanthey, Karl, wasn’t Emmett Watson a West Seattle boy? Or is my mind playing tricks?
July 14, 2008 at 4:42 am #620878
KarlMemberHope I am not violating any usage agreements ;)
July 14, 2008 at 4:48 am #620879
JoBParticipantJuly 14, 2008 at 4:49 am #620880
JanSParticipantKarl, thanks…I remember hearing about him living in West Seattle..and he did, at least for a little while. What a curmudgeon he was :)
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