By JOEL CONNELLY
P-I COLUMNIST
Bus travel in Seattle is neither speedy nor charming, but old No. 2 enjoys a decided weight advantage in jockeying to get past the disruptive, seemingly endless construction mess at Fifth and Seneca.
With its variable lane closures, the “Seneca Squeeze” has become a downtown driving challenge for car and bus alike. At times, it has turned into the “Seneca Veer.”
“The Veer” is a phrase best known to college football fans, describing an option offense developed by University of Houston coach Bill Yeoman and deployed for 25 years.
In downtown Seattle driving, however, “The Veer” is when a closure forces you to change lanes to the left, and then construction in the next block forces you over to the right.
No competently run city should allow something this dangerous, and neither should Seattle.
After negotiating “The Veer” on three downtown streets, I used a pre-election phone conversation with City Councilman Tom Rasmussen to suggest municipal oversight.
He agreed, citing a recent bus trip. Passengers had been let off on a blocked-off sidewalk in the midst of construction on Fourth Avenue at the edge of Belltown.
The City Council is talking up a storm lately about installing secret and not-so-secret cameras for purposes of catching and fining scofflaw motorists.
Rasmussen has advocated adding cameras at 20 intersections to those that watch my every move (when not aboard No. 2) at Denny Way and Fairview Avenue North. Last week, Councilwoman Jan Drago touted a $170,000 bus that will secretly photograph speeders in school zones.
For all the planned motorist tracking, we’ve had pretty nasty construction-related accidents of late. And some folks at City Hall are finally noticing lax supervision in a city on the build.
Until recently, we had a benchmark not far from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer Building.
Western Avenue becomes a three-lane northbound commuter route from 3 to 6 p.m. Parking ends. Apparently, privilege does not. Over a period of months, a large trash bin blocked the right lane — with a tube snaking down from construction higher on the building. The blockage continued long after work was done.
Like Rome, Seattle is a city built on several hills. We’ll never be called the “Eternal City,” but those using our streets face perennial problems.
Hilltop surprises are a case in point. Drive over the lip of a hill and — without warning — construction has a lane or two blocked. A simple sign or signs, “Construction Ahead” or “Lane Closures Ahead,” would allow people to slow down or turn off to outflank the mess. Not in the Emerald City.
At a Seattle Department of Transportation budget presentation in late September, Councilman Richard Conlin posed a series of questions.
Based on SDOT’s answers, City Auditor Susan Cohen has asked “if there is any council interest in an audit on this subject.” Rasmussen sent over the memo of his exchange with Cohen after the budget presentation.
Cohen cites a recent whistle-blower investigation of the Street Use Permit section of SDOT by Wayne Barnett, executive director of the Ethics and Elections Commission.
“Specifically, (Barnett) noted inefficiencies of the Street Use Permit process and low employee morale,” Cohen wrote to council members. “SDOT is unable to track the life cycle of a permit from application to final billing.
“Unless construction work in City rights-of-way is properly authorized and inspected, the city cannot ensure that the areas are safe for public use, nor can they ensure that the location of utility lines is properly documented for official records.”
Residents, cars and bicycles can get banged up, but the city, too, is at risk.
People who get injured on city property, especially by badly marked or unmarked dangers, can sue the city.
And construction could hit and damage improperly recorded utility lines beneath downtown streets.
Cohen cites past, positive interaction between the city and developer/contractors. “Working with the Washington Mutual contractor, they reduced the number of lanes and sidewalk closure time to the extent that the permit costs were reduced by 200 k’s.”
But that was then, and Cohen goes on: “SDOT needs to be proactive with the developers. From my walks down Fifth Avenue, they do not appear to be using the planning tools or being proactive.”
Amen from Fifth Avenue and Seneca Street.
Rasmussen told me he has voiced his concerns to SDOT — and been ignored.
He thinks an audit would be a good idea and urged Cohen to expand its scope.
“Periodically, I receive complaints about city sidewalks and lanes being allowed to be closed for construction without adequate warnings or options to drivers or pedestrians,” he wrote back.
We’re less than 48 hours from the Christmas shopping surge — oops, political incorrectness, holiday shopping spree — that draws thousands of visitors downtown. It’s the bright lights-big city season.
Amid the obstacle course of torn-off sidewalks and blocked-off lanes, locals and visitors alike should ask a question:
Is the city doing an adequate job of keeping people safe as they move about downtown?
Heck no!