Ken at The Urban Blog is a Seattle resident who usually writes about Reno. So pretty much the exact Bizarro version of what I’m doing with Seattlehound. But he does have rare posts about Seattle, like this post with a Flickr slideshow of his neighborhood on Capitol Hill, and this post about the Viaduct. I know the Viaduct can be a thorny issue with some people, but I have to say I agree with Ken on the subject. The viaduct needs to be replaced with another viaduct. It’s the only solution that will work. I know the car haters want to erase that freeway all together, and replace it with another signaled street, but that will only drive more traffic onto I-5, which is not what the city needs. And the tunnel is the best solution in theory, but in the real world the thing would have to be built and that could be one of the biggest headaches ever seen on Puget Sound. And a ground-level freeway isn’t even one of the options being put out there, because it’s just patently silly. So a viaduct it has to be, as ugly as it may be and as much as it “cuts off” Seattle from its waterfront. There needs to be two freeways in town, and if not on the waterfront then where?

“Traffic flow is more important than aesthetics,” as I said in a comment to that post, as sad as it may be. The trick, then is to make the viaduct sort of attractive and the space under it useful, and it seems like some people have some ideas on how to do that.

And speaking of Ken, how’s this for a view out your back window?

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