Last week, officials from the Washington Department of Transportation updated the House Transportation Committee on its two Seattle-area mega projects, but the presentation did little to assuage the frustrations of the committee’s ranking Republican Rep. Ed Orcutt.
Julie Meredith, program administrator for the 520 floating bridge, was enthusiastic about the project and said part of it will be open next year. Thus far, WSDOT has spent about $2.9 billion dollars on the new floating bridge, but $1.5 billion is still needed to reach Seattle and connect to Interstate 5.
Project manager for the troubled Highway 99 replacement tunnel Todd Trepanier said the $2 billion project is 70 percent complete, but he wouldn’t speculate on a completion date. Bertha, the drilling machine, is still stuck underground, and the contractor is digging a pit in downtown Seattle to dismantle and repair it.
In addition to finishing the west end of 520, WSDOT is planning two other huge projects in Spokane, Puyallup.
Orcutt said he thinks state money could be better spent on a smaller scale to help jumpstart rural economies, rather than continue feeding into a handful of urban areas.
“These mega projects will suck all the money out of the state,” Orcutt, R-Kalama, said. “These projects will get done and the congestion is going to be right back where it was because Seattle just keeps growing and growing.”
He cited the need for an Interstate 5 interchange for the industrial park at TransAlta as an opportunity to “open up hundreds of acres” for less than $40 million.
“There are examples like that all over the state,” he said.
He said he hasn’t yet seen a transportation package that he can support. He also said that if the state wants to tackle more transportation projects, it needs to do a better job avoiding project overruns.
“We’ve gotta get good controls on costs and I think the public is demanding a fix for the problems on costs,” he said.
