How to prevent a boondoggle, on the waterfront and beyond

Interesting article…should generate lots of response. While making the usual suspects accountable for these “boondoggles” after the fact is a good idea, it would be an even greater achievement if the Fourth Estate would actually report the obfuscations, lies, spin, poor judgment and back-room deals as they are happening, so as to avoid the resulting damage and waste. These boondoggles don’t happen by accident. The truth is the only real defense that the community has against irresponsible leadership.

Retrofit, anyone?

In case someone mentioned the obvious.

Cost estimating on public works has gotten way more conservative in the last decade. That's roughly when Sound Transit turned it around, and they have a good record since. WSDOT too. And seemingly every other public agency. Often they appear to be TOO conservative, with projects routinely bidding 20-30% under their estimates.

My industry is building/renovating buildings, not tunnels or transit. Either way, I view the "90% have overruns" crowd as woefully out of date.

Show me a study that's not based on ancient history, and then it's a worthy conversation.

Brightwater, an ongoing case of underestimating and cost overruns in our own back yard. The rates and capacity charges will be the "gift that keeps on giving" for decades.

A good tab for this piece would be "Kids Say the Darndest Things". I used to talk like this myself, when I was six.

What fascinates me about all of this is the socio-pathology displayed. Any other city, offered the chance to transform the existing central waterfront, would be gung ho! Seattle, as we have seen from the defeat of the Commons proposal, has an installed base of nattering nabobs of negativity.

And get over yourself, Knute- I've lived here as long as you have. If you're missing that Doghouse dining experience, try Jimmy D's in Gorst. Just sayin.

So, cue the barking dogs. In most places the mind-numbing stupidity of this idea would leave readers speechless, but in Seattle it should get lots of thumbs up. After all, we all hate irresponsible politicians who saddle us with boondoggles- right?

I suspect the SLUT would fall into the overrun category.

Putting assets on the line is probably not realistic, but pension payments may be.

You make a very good point about how there could well be cost overruns on any of the possible approaches, including a rebuilt, a cut and cover trench tunnel, surface transit plus improvements in I5, etc. This is a really hard thing to estimate!

It is worth nothing though: Sound Transit said "no go" to the tunnel to First Hill because in their perception, the soil conditions were too problematic. I do not know what the difference is between the soils of First Hill and those between Capitol Hill and wherever the tunnel ends in the Roosevelt area. Will all the people who are raising red flags about the DBT raise the same concerns about the light rail tunnel? It will be interesting to see.

It would be one thing if the deceitful proponents of the Sound Transit ballot measures were financing that grossly expensive and largely-useless infrastructure the way peer regions do. Everyplace else uses mostly federal grants, and maybe some modest new progressive taxing. Then the pre-vote lies and deceptive half-truths would amount to a “no harm, no foul” situation.

Instead, in a stunning show of cynicism, and with a callous disregard to the financial harm it causes the most vulnerable half of our community, the financing plan for ST was designed to impose entirely excessive amounts of the most regressive tax there is.

The fact that the monorail authority intended to use junk bonds isn’t what made that financing plan abusive. The debt service cost increase over investment grade bonds wouldn’t have been that much. What made the monorail authority’s financing plan abusive was that it stretched out the financing plan period by decades AFTER the vote. That is what made that plan abusive. The capital costs of that monorail financing plan were to be $2.1 billion, and there were to have been financing costs of about $11 billion because the financing plan stretched out decades longer than voters were told to expect:

“Comparisons will be made to the Seattle Monorail Project's short-lived, 50-year finance proposal, whose $11 billion total (to pay off a $2.1 billion Green Line) torpedoed the project's political support two years ago.”

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2003733560_transpodebt04m.html

Well guess what, boys and girls . . . Sound Transit is pulling exactly the same stunt.

What were voters told before the ST2 vote about when the bonds would be paid off? Here’s ST’s finance director Brian McCartan, six weeks before the Nov. 2008 vote:

“Sound Transit staffers estimate the tax will raise enough money to pay off the bonds in 2038, an estimate that finance director Brian McCartan calls ‘pretty solid.’”

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/380438_transitcost25.html.

Here is a new “ST financial plan” that just was disclosed:

http://crosscut.com/static/static_file/2010/04/20/soundtransit1.pdf

That document shows the capital costs of ST1 and ST2 now would be $18 billion. The total revenues of the financing plan through 2040 are shown on that document as $65 billion. As there is now expected to be a $7 billion debt obligation remaining at that time (see the footnote), the $3 billion per year ST will be taking in in revenues as of 2040 will need to continue. Assuming a very modest inflation of the tax revenues over the subsequent decade, and assuming defeasance of the final bonds by 2050, we’re looking at a $100 billion financing plan.

A $100 billion financing plan for $18 billion worth of capital spending? That total is 5.5 times the construction tab alone. Hmm, what might that be called? How about worse than the monorail’s financing plan, and “ludicrous”:

“The total [$11 bln.] also is more than five times the construction tab alone [$2.1 bln.] for the monorail. State Treasurer Mike Murphy has called that ratio "ludicrous." The typical principal and interest payments on a state project amount to double the construction cost of the project, he said this week.”

http://www.seattlepi.com/transportation/229677_monorail23.html

Sound Transit’s lawyers and financing team are identical to the ones the monorail authority used. It’s a cookie-cutter operation, even the deceit about tax costs is the same.

And good luck trying to hold anyone accountable for ST’s lousy performance – that government was designed to be completely impervious to any control by people.

I seem to recall the Seattle firehouse build program went well over budget too. Can it be included in the overrun category?

Tiresome politician bashing, Skip. I think you need a vacation. A long one.

Is Seattle suffering from the heartbreak of "selective boondoggle opposition"? Let me count the ways. A lot of it is the underlying dynamics of herd mentality. There is surely an apparent erratic quality to green politics -- everything is either all good or all bad, and the pendulum often swings from one pole to the other based on fairly flimsy evidence.

Or no evidence at all: it's more a matter of competing fantasies. The monorail fantasy was all about inspired grassroots activism creating a modestly priced transportation network in defiance of the expensive, bureaucratically ponderous and elitist Sound Transit. The appeal was not based on what the monorail was, but what it wasn't. Once attention turned to what the monorail proposal on its merits actually entailed,....poof!

The connecting link among the fantasies is obviously not a uniform set of aesthetic, financial or environmental values and priorities resulting in a rigorously consistent and objective analytical framework. Nope, not that. No, it's the same old movie about Cowboys and Indians. The conversation is not being driven by the merits of any given proposal but by the perceived social and political defects of whoever is supporting or opposing it. What the Tea Baggers are doing on the right, the Greenies are doing on the left. It ain't a pretty sight.

Oh and by the way, Jimmy D's is really easy to find. It's right at the SR-3/SR-16 interchange, snuggled cozily up against the south-to-west offramp. You can't miss it.

I have a difficult time believing that these politicians are as disinterested in the long term result of their political decisions as you make them seem to be Knute. Politics, for most, if not all, local politicians is about doing what they feel is best for the city because their simply isn’t a ton of money in government for these politicians. Of course this means appeasing to the masses and big business and making compromises at times in order to stay in office and protect the people’s interests (as they perceive them) in the long run. Therefore I don’t think tying politicians to their choices financially as well as politically is necessary or good and would probably cost us chances to have strong successful projects when big boondoggles are necessary for fear of risk. The AWV as you pointed out will be something of a boondoggle no matter what choice is made and could fall into the boat of missed opportunities if your hypothetical provision were real.

I do agree wholeheartedly with Knute’s point that people either be more or less pro-boondoggle or more or less anti-boondoggle (I find myself in the latter camp), and that self interest or political ideology shouldn’t be a barrier to fiscal prudence or on the other side of things making important expenditures. Personally I consider myself very pro transit, but I disliked the Monorail (once the finances got figured out) and disliked Sound Transit 2 from the get go due to bond and cost verses benefit considerations.

As for the specific scenario of the AWV I support the surface street option not because it’s more transformative, but simply because it’s clearly the lesser of the two boondoggles in terms of cost and risk. Furthermore, I believe, and I don’t think I’m the only surface street supporter who believes this, that the tunnel is NOT transformative or necessary (and therefore is not worth the cost) far more than I believe, as you put it, that the surface street option is or could be transformative. And specifically with regards to the perceived necessity of the highway for freight mobility, a common calling card of tunnel supporters, the solution is to simply add freight only lanes (or better yet freight and transit only lanes) to Alaska Way or Western Ave to combat the difficulties of freight getting stuck in traffic. This solution could turn a significant time delay into a marginal one, while keeping us from throwing good money down a hole.

Personally I think turning Downtown into a highway ("freight lanes" on Western and Alaskan?!) is the biggest cost risk of all. Downtown Seattle is the #1 economic driver of our quarter of the US...ruining it would be costly.

Buried in The Stranger article after pages on risk and cost was the speculation that the environmental impact analysis would show that the tunnel was not even a very good option w.r.t. traffic flow (due to costs and lack of downtown exits few would use it.) This is what jumped out at us at my house.
Anybody have any ideas about that? True?

One man's boondoggle is another man's city landmark. The famous Opera House in Sydney, Australia was massively over budget, on a scale that makes the Big Dig look like a bargain. It is now a World Heritage site and the signature building of Sydney.

Making politicians financially responsible for cost overruns on government projects is stupid. The private sector leader that take use from one boom-bust cycle to the next usually aren't held responsible, so why should public leaders.

Anyway, as someone else noted, WSDOT's recent cost projections have been pretty good.

BTW, where is the plan for the surface option with real budget proposals and photo-realistic computer animations of what it will look like? If the folks for the surface option think that it would work so well, you would think that they would put this kind of material out so everyone can see how brilliant their proposal is. (I personally believe that this is because they haven't really worked out how it will work and the plan depends on a lot of crossed fingers.)

Instead, they follow the standard, modern practice of complaining about the thing that they don't like and not really offering an alternative. Liberal, public transit supporters are just as good as conservative, Tea Party supporters.

The point of the tunnel is through traffic, not those heading for Downtown, or even for Interbay. I think it's a foregone conclusion that it'll be heavily used. In fact, with two lanes each way (like the current tunnel, but with room for breakdowns), it should have a healthy tension between replacing the current tunnel and not being so large that it encourages driving. If the tolls scare some drivers off, then traffic will be lighter, which will result in more traffic using the tunnel instead of the streets.

Portland has the right idea. They have two north-south freeways along the edges of their downtown (one rebuilt across the river when the demolished their waterfront freeway), and resultingly they have fewer cars on the surface streets, which is a big part of their liveability, walkability, and transit-friendliness.

The Stranger piece might refer to peak oil. But connecting that to reduced driving is (unfortunately) not really likely.

First, peak oil theorists generally predict a stable or slowly declining supply, combined with increased competition from around the world, particularly from China and India as they modernize. Nobody is predicting that oil will go away.

In the US, we could easily cut our auto-related fuel use by probably 1/3 or 1/2 through nothing more than fuel-efficient cars. As other products like plastics get more expensive, we'll buy less of those.

Of course, it would be more realistic to drive less in addition to going for efficiency. Both were part of our reaction to the 2008 price spike.

So we'll probably drive less per capita. But wait...this region is growing in population, and pretty much always has, except for a brief multi-year stabilization (including a short-lived, miniscule drop) around 1970. Figure, conservatively, 1% annual growth going forward.

Then there's the issue of alternate supply rising as the "easy" oil supply reduces. If current standard methods fall in 20 years to 60% of current supply (for example), does anybody doubt that oil shale or some other dangerous yet profitable method will make up a significant percentage of the difference? As for allowing environmental disaster, has everyone seen poll data for allowing offshore drilling these days?

Personally I'd guess that we might stabilize with 2/3 or 4/5 of the oil supply we currently have. Higher prices and other pressures (aided by strong environmental laws, I hope but don't expect) will keep demand lower than it is now. At that time oil will be more expensive. US driving habits might be more European, with more efficient cars, fewer long trips, etc. But Seattle will have just as much driving.

(This is depressing for a no-car activist like me...)

There are 4 main concerns with this project, in this order: engineering, environmental impact, risks, and costs LAST. The replacement has to achieve the main objective of managing traffic, minimizing environmental impact, incur inherently few risks, and be affordable.

There are 4 basic replacement options for the AWV: A Cut/cover tunnel, the surface/transit option, an elevated replacement viaduct, and the deep bore tunnel.

In every concern, compared to all replacement options, the deep bore tunnel is the worst choice. Worst engineering, worst environmental impact, most risk, most likely to be the most expensive. Deep bore tunnel supporters conspire to keep the discussion limited to issues of cost and more important issues ignored.

The monorail failed because of its poor engineering and high environmental impact, NOT its shakey financial arrangements.

Natural gas will become a significant fuel for transportation in the U.S. We have huge domestic reserves and it's cleaner and cheaper. As soon as demand brings the cost of conversions down a bit, and the distribution channel matures it will happen fairly quickly.

Cars aren't going away.

Anything that removes the blight of a freeway over Seattle's waterfront is worth a few billion.

I'm not sure the best word to describe the reporting in the Stranger is "sober."

You can find the budget proposals and design mockups of I-5/Surface/Transit here:
http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/NR/rdonlyres/FAF9612A-D0D4-4D0C-824D-8C879E457D0B/0/AWV_I5SurfaceTransitHybrid_FactSheet_Dec08.pdf

Is this supposed to be a fact-based article or an attempt at an opinion piece?

Not sure where you get the statistic that "90%" of mega-projects are over budget. In the last 10 years, it is a fact that 90% of WashDOT roads projects came in on or under budget. The safeguards that you propose to make sure projects are closely managed and monitored are already being put in place by WashDOT. Might be worthwhile to pick up the phone and talk with them as to what they are actually doing.

Given that the article references "optimism bias" "lies" designed to "alarm and divide Seattleites" "over-optimism" "outright deception on the part of politicians" and something that "You might call lying" and of course the ever pervasive "strategic misrepresentation," why would you pick up the phone ? Who would you talk to ? How would you ever find out what they are really doing ?

David Brewster: in undertaking big projects, you should "Double the budget and double the estimated time. And remember, it's usually worth it, if you somehow get it built."
Ah, you mean like the original viaduct?
Surely the worst infrastructure mistake in Seattle's history (or a close second to tearing down Denny Hill.)
But hey, maybe we can go one better!

Sierra Girl: The figure is from the findings of Prof. Bent Flyvbjerg who has studied mega-projects worldwide (defined as projects costing over $1 billion). Here's a link to an article that lays out many of his findings.

http://www.miller-mccune.com/business-economics/derailing-the-boondoggle-4334/

"In a worldwide study of 258 rail, bridge and road projects over 70 years, Flyvbjerg found that nine of 10 went over budget."

In other words, ancient history.

A fewe points to consider:

1. When I-5 was being planned, the AWV was in place and handling the N/S traffic needs of Seattle and environs. Local access was added (Columbia and Seneca ramps) after Downtown interests demanded improved access/egress to/from the Viaduct.

Given that construction of I-5 was being driven by Eisenhower's domestic military transport stragety, it was not then envisioned to provide the best access to downtowns of America. In fact, the reason Downtown has such poor access from I-5 is because new access was dependant on the ramps from 99 being kept in service.

So, the question remains, if the Viaduct no longer provides access to Downtown, what will traffic on 1-5 look like when it's two lanes create the mother-of-all-jams that will make I-5 useless.

Oh, and don't forget the increased traffic coming from a new 520 bridge.
Have downtown interests really throught this Tunnel idea through as a benefit to downtown and it's workers? Perhaps everyone will instead get out of their SOV's and ride transit.

2.Let us not forget that all individuals working on or leading this Tunnel effort can leave the scene at any time and not be held accountable for any mistakes, fiscal or otherwise. To quote Henry Petrosk's "To Engineer Is Human: The Role Of Failure In Successful Design,"1985, he lists the possible components to failure:

"1. Ignorance

Incompetent men in charge of design, construction, or inspection

Supervision and maintenance by men without necessary intelligence

Assumption of vital responsibility by men without necessary intelligence

Competition without supervision

Lack of precedent

Lack of sufficient preliminary information

2. Economy

In first cost

In maintenance

3. Lapses, or carelessness

An engineer or architect, otherwisecareful and competent, shows negligence in some certain part of the work

A contractor or superintendant takes a chance, knowing he is taking it

Lack of proper coordination in production of plans

4. Unusual occurrences - earthquakes, extreme storms, fires and the like"

All of these classifications apply to the Tunnel.

Anyone taking odds?

3.Ultimately, it is the taxpayers who have to make this decision. A public vote is the only way to get the equitable voice of the citizens who will carry the burden of overruns, etc. No action by any leaders should be taken until this is done.

After a decade of discussion, conflict, polarization and name-calling, shouldn't we all take on this responsibility, especially for mega projets?

We shouldn't be afraid of checking our pulse on this controversal project.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P91H-l9QCfU&feature;=player_embedded

You guys should watch this video. Notice something different about it?

It's the Sept 2007 version of a 'stacked' 6-lane cut/cover from Parsons/Brinkerhoff. The more recent treatment for reconnecting the grid above a lowered Aurora could be applied instead. Capping the open blocks through Belltown (completely concealing SR99 there) should be depicted. It may be better to eliminate the ramps to the Battery Street Tunnel at Western for that purpose. Otherwise, this version of Tunnelite is the best engineering, the least environmental impact and least risk. Cost and construction disruption are still factors, but the main concerns are achieved with Tunnelite.

Another thought provoking article by Knute. However, I totally disagree with his solution. Can you imagine running for City Council knowing that any cost overruns for any project would be coming out of your pocket??? Rather than preventing boondoggles, it would merely prevent elections. Who would possibly run for office under such circumstances?

I agree with Knute that the Stranger leading the anti-tunnel charge is amusing... and bizarre. Erica Barnett tried to make this point on KUOW. However, it blew up in her face since she was one of the cheerleader reporters at the Stranger when the Stranger became the Propaganda outlet of Joel Horn and the monorail boondogglers. As one of her targets, I was particularly amused when I heard her comment.

She criticized me as a 'light rail fanatic' all through the monorail days up to and including the night we had our victory party to celebrate the death of the monorail after wasting $200 million.

http://slog.thestranger.com/2005/12/post_11

In this SLOG post, "This Isn’t a Victory Party”, she even criticized us for having a post-monorail party. Her comment was "the people who killed it might display a little humility."

So she was the protector of the monorail right up to the end.. and even afterwards.

Knute's solution seems to be to require that elected officials be more honest. Why not require that the MEDIA be the watchdogs they are supposed to be?? That's their JOB, or at used to be. Only the media is mentioned in the U.S. Constitution, which certainly shows the absolute importance that our Founders had for the press. What we have today is 'reporters' like Barnett who willingly sell their soul to the government agencies they are supposed to watchdog.

Perhaps the KUOW roundup can talk about how they're watchdogging projects instead of acting as lapdogs. KUOW also was one of the lapdogs for the monorail.

As Richard notes, no honest person would run for office under Knute's rule. What Knute is really proposing here is the end of representative government, and rule by large corporations and the military. Because, as we all know, the military never have cost overruns.

The only elected leaders Seattlers have representing their best interests with the DBT are Mikes McGinn and O'Brien. I fear the discussion is limited to the issue of cost overruns because well-dressed highway department honchos, henchmen and cronies are misanthropic thugs whose crimes would worsen if they were hauled before a court of law. The deep bore tunnel is the worst replacement option for the doomed AWV in terms of ably managing traffic, minimizing environmental impact, avoiding extreme risk, and keeping the cost affordable. The replacement option that best achieves all objectives is some version of the cut/cover Tunnelite, followed by the surface/transit option, then another elevated replacement, then the DBT dead last. Mercer West is completely bogus and the current redesign for Alaskan Way boulevard must go back to the drawing board before the proposed waterfront promenade design work can continue. I've explained my analytical rationale for opposing these projects dozens of times on these and other Seattle forums, but DBT cheerleaders absolutely refuse to give them the least consideration.

Serial, you said it best. That's exactly what would happen. The people running for office would be people from Goldman Sachs, British Petroleum, Hedge Fund managers and other millionaire and billionaires. It would probably have exactly the opposite effect that Knute wants. These people would come into office and privatize Seattle City Light, the Water Works and everything else publicly owned. Costs to the public would soar and it would be nearly impossible to get rid of these billionaires. Knute's rule is pure folly.

Yes, I found it interesting trying to think of somewhere in the world where Knute's plan had been tried. Dictatorships are something like that, because the dictator loses everything when he is overthrown, unless he manages to escape to a Swiss bank account and chalet.

Pullman's planned city for his workers was also something like Knute's plan (maybe Knute didn't really think about this, but his plan is basically for someone to "own" the project), but, quoting Wikipedia (see Pullman Strike) "A national commission formed to study causes of the 1894 strike found Pullman's paternalism partly to blame and Pullman's company town to be "un-American". In 1898, the Illinois Supreme Court forced the Pullman Company to divest ownership in the town..."

Of course, the kings of England sometimes made this work in a top-down direction, forcing barons and lords to give up what they owned because of some dereliction, and the lords and barons in turn taking it out of the commoners because the commoners had no way to resist.

All things considered, I'm pretty happy with the government we have today.

Corporations and the various industrial complexes don’t need to hold office to exercise control over the country. They already determine the agenda regardless of who is elected or what party is in power. We just witnessed one of the largest thefts in the history of the planet and no one seems very upset about it. The last I heard the Justice Department was cancelling Wall Street investigations by the dozens. And it’s not because the cases lacked merit. Wonder how that happened?

Until Corporations cease to be people and dollars cease to be votes, our system will continue to morph into something that was not originally intended. But who knows, maybe what comes later will be better.

Yes, it is very conscientious for Seattleites to worry about an overrun of a billion on a 50-year project, when we're spending $500 billion per year on the military. Kinda like patching the roof as the house is washed away by the flood.

I agree catowner. But that would be a different topic. My concern is less about costs and more about spending it on the wrong project.

I think they call it "suboptimization."

Count me as one of the people who believes that the only solution to bring the Corporate leeches under control is to amend the U.S. Constitution. The Constitution needs to be amended to say that Corporations like BP are not people and that their billions of dollars of money is not 'speech'. Only by amending the Constitution can the people of the country make it clear to our corporate-controlled Supreme Court that Corporations are legal entities, not 'people'.

Here's a site that explains alot more: www.MoveToAmend.org

The tunnel tolls are already at $7.5 RT or $2000 a year if you use it to commute to work. Yeah, I think it is going to be roomy in there.

We will have spent 2.4 billion in additional dollars we all paid at the pump to handle less than 30% of the current traffic.

Without the viaduct lower queen anne/mercer will become a dead zone for business.

So the commuter is not the winner. Neighborhood businesses are not the winner. Let's think...who are the winners? Can anyone find a major engineering firm or public relations firm in town who is not on the dole? Who got the DBT from being off the table (see David Dye report)to suddenly the centerpiece?

Too bad there are no journalists in this town.

Not only does Mayor McGinn support a vote on the tunnel, he was in fact the force behind the effort to bring it to a referendum. The mayor is an obssessive single issue activist and is unfit for public service. He is also, quite frankly, a liar and is completely wrong on this issue. If the Mayor wants to reduce the carbon footprint of automobiles he should (a) make Seattle more bicycle and pedestrian friendly, which he is doing (b) make Seattle a leader in electric car adoption (c) help create more public transit options and (d) perhaps try to encourage a higher gas tax at the state level. The tunnel will improve our regions economic competitiveness and quality of life. The argument that the tunnel creates auto exhaust could be used to encourage the removal of the 520 bridge, rather than replacement, and all other kinds of absurdities. His position is nonsensical and he is deceitful. The referendum I would like to see is one for his empeachment.