Posted on 02/24/2019 1:15:04 PM PST by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Seattle and Boston have a lot in common: they are both cities on the water, homes to higher learning institutions and hubs for tech companies. They are connected by Interstate 90 and memories of a Superbowl both cities can’t forget. Now Seattle and Boston are both home to big tunnels that run under the downtown core.
Seattle’s tunnel will now face a new challenge: avoiding the problems that plagued Boston’s Big Dig long after it opened.
The Big Dig Backstory
The Big Dig began as a project to replace the Central Artery, an elevated 6-lane highway that was structurally unsound and horribly congested. The state of Massachusetts decided to build an 8-to-10 lane underground expressway, a system of tunnels and four major highway interchanges. However, costs and the construction schedule ballooned out of control.
When Seattle was planning the Highway 99 tunnel, Boston’s troubled Big Dig represented everything that could go wrong. Opponents rallied against the Seattle tunnel, holding signs reading, “No Big Dig.”
In 2009, then-Washington Governor Christine Gregoire vowed to investigate what went wrong in Boston and make sure that any and every lesson that can be learned would be learned.
Seattle Tunnel vs. Big Dig
Infrastructure experts point out that construction was different on the two tunnels.
"Seattle had the benefit of not having an 8-lane super highway that it had to bury,” says Dan McNichol, a former Big Dig spokesperson who has written books about Boston’s tunnels. He says, in terms of scale, the Big Dig was the equivalent of burying I-5.
McNichol points out that Seattle chose a different construction method: tunnel boring versus cut-and-cover.
"The Big Dig was much shallower; therefore, the whole city was ripped up. They call that kind of construction cut and cover,” he explains . . .
(Excerpt) Read more at king5.com ...
"It would be cheaper to raise the city than to lower the highway".
over budget and behind schedule...that’s waaaaaaaay different.
Costly mistakes were on purpose to keep the job continuous and on going for years guaranteeing fed money another boondoggle rat scam where everyone makes money, politicians, contractors, unions, and everyone in between. High speed rail dream in California comes to mind another siphon
Without the Mafia and corrupt politicians the Big Dig would have avoided problems with the Big Dig.
Bloom County, Elvis Presley decided to fake his death and work road construction because what other job pays as much to stand around eating donuts?
Love the animation. Thanks for posting it.
Yes, crooked politicians...like deaddy Kennedy who led the charge to over ride President Reagan’s veto
In reading about it at the time, I thought that the real reason for the problems with the boring machine was that they never assembled it at the factory and tested it. It was assembled for the first time in the dig hole.
Yes, it took awhile, but they did get the union coffers back-filled with money and 'viola', it got unstuck.
“It looks so bizarrely out of place, but apparently the owner refused to sell regardless of price.”
I’m surprised it didn’t “burn down,” or have some other kind of “unfortunate accident.”
Boy, no kidding. It is the kind of place that might have happened, too!
Wow! far cry from when i was in China in 1981!!!
Mistakes? The Big Dig had to be the most successful expansion of graft, corruption, featherbedding and any possible kind of public works project overrun in history! By the time it was done, there was wasn’t a pol, bureaucrat, or union thug that hadn’t made out like a bandit.
The Big Dig was projected to cost $2.6 billion. The final price tag was nearly $15 billion, and it was 8 years behind schedule.
Seattle’s viaduct replacement project was expected to cost $3.1 billion. Right now, the Washington State Department of Transportation has budgeted $3.3 billion. It is 3 years behind schedule.
Sort of correct. IIRC, I believe they tested it once at the factory and blew out the bearing. Reassembled it - and sent it overseas to Seattle with no design change!
I know a guy that was/is involved in the tunneling. He said that in the Los Angeles, CA area he has worked on all sorts of tunnels. And all sorts of old abandoned oil wells. He said they would just tunnel through them with no problem.
He did say that some think that the lighter metal and smaller diameter of the test boring casing was not cut through - but rather bent and crimped and wrapped into the cutters and affected the seals and the bearings.
But - he wasn’t buying that explanation.
I have to admit - I didn’t think they would get it done. If it weren’t for the bearing failure (it was the largest boring machine by far at the time), they would have come out okay.
The viaduct was a death trap waiting to happen in the next large earthquake. And yes, Seattle traffic will probably just get worse.
> “If it weren’t for the bearing failure (it was the largest boring machine by far at the time), they would have come out okay.”
That is sort of like Custer saying that “If it weren’t for the Indians, they would have come out okay.”
And despite an 8-to-10 lane underground expressway, the most expensive highway in US history, it is far too small.
It's not your imagination. Your Boston commute is getting worse
From https://www.boston.com/cars/news-and-reviews/2015/01/05/can-we-talk-rationally-about-the-big-dig-yet
the truth is that engineers in the late 1980s already knew it was a $12 to $14 billion project. They told everybody who would listen—including the politicians—and those people kept it quiet.’’
With interest, the project could ultimately cost around $24 billion, finally getting paid off in 2038.
Aggregate Industries would later pay a $50 million penalty to the state for its role in providing 5,700 truckloads of substandard concrete.
and ...a $26 million settlement from the largest contractor on the Big Dig and a bolt distribution company,
Though the Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff joint management firm had all criminal charges dropped, they had to pay more than $407 million to resolve the civil and criminal liabilities in connection with project defects.
I'm impressed. Part of the "Big Dig" goes under Boston Harbor. How did they manage to do cut and cover there?
They dug a pit, ran the boring machine into it and lifted it for repairs. It’s been open for about three weeks.
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