Sinkholes on the Seattle Waterfront

Seattle's waterfront is getting ready for a renovation with a new transit tunnel and surface beautification. Just in time.

Seattle's seawall on the waterfront was built on mudflats. The fill material supporting the viaduct and adjacent structures has been know to be unstable and likely to shift over time. Small marine creature have been boring through the seawall for years, reducing its strength and affecting the subjacent support of the street and sidewalks along the waterfront piers.

This week, a visitor to the waterfront fell into a sinkhole that opened up in the sidewalk. As the man was walking neaar the pier in the early morning, the 4-inch sidewalk concrete gave way to an empty pocket formed by the shifting of soil fill. Although the man was rescued right away, the incident could have been far worse.

There will doubtless be engineering studies done ad nauseum before the new tunnel is built. Seattle is known as a city that values process over results. We vote 5 times before we do anything. Let's hope that we get the best analysis possible, and we put that analysis to work quickly. Our waterfront needs some work, and fast.

Seattle Real Estate on the Waterfront