by LINDA BRILL / KING 5 News
KING5.com
Posted on January 18, 2011 at 6:08 PM

SEATTLE -- Plans to build a deep bore tunnel under downtown Seattle may have hit a roadblock from the federal government. The tunnel that will replace the Alaska Way Viaduct is planned to go under the historic Old Federal Office Building, but the feds may not allow it. Built in the early 1900's, the Old Federal Office Building, between Western Avenue and First, and Madison and Marion, is a landmark. It is the original site of the Great Seattle Fire in 1889.
"Any slight changes in ground movement, especially from a 58-foot boring machine, could cause significant problems," says Seattle City Council Member Mike O'Brien. The Washington State Department of Transportation can't bore under the Federal Building without permission from the federal government. The tunnel would run directly beneath or through the foundation piers that support the building. In letters to the state from the General Services Administration, the feds are concerned about the support piers. GSA writes, they "would place this historic building and its occupants in permanent jeopardy."
In an April letter, GSA went so far as to prohibit WSDOT from entering the property. "We will not be granting any further access to the federal property to the project team, their contractors, or possible bidders," they wrote. WSDOT'S tunnel manager, Ron Paananen, says the problems can be mitigated. 
"There are ways to do things to the soil in advance so the tunneling won't effect it at all," he says.
The state says boring under the Federal Building is the safest route for the tunnel. Negotiations with the feds are continuing. 

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

By CHRIS GRYGIEL SEATTLEPI.COM STAFF

Letter details worries about possible structural damage to federal building

Uncle Sam has some problems with plans to run the tunnel replacement for the Alaskan Way Viaduct under a downtown building owned by the federal government.
The General Services Administration on Dec. 13 wrote a letter to the state Department of Transportation, citing several issues about the tunnel route following the publication of a draft environmental impact study. PubliCola first reported about the letter Monday.
The federal government owns the Federal Office Building at First and Marion. In the letter, the GSA cites worries the current tunnel route beneath the surface "place both this historic building and its occupants in permanent jeopardy." There are concerns about structural damage and "methane gas build-up" that was discovered in the space between the ground and parking level floor slab of the federal building.
"What is the proposed method for monitoring and mitigating any methane gas-build up within the tunnel and specifically around the Federal Office Building?" the letter asks.
As of right now, the federal government has not granted permission to dig under its property until all its concerns are addressed.
"We have posed a number of questions to the State of Washington regarding the impact of the tunnel project on our property. We are working with the State to obtain answers to these questions and once we receive the answers, we will be able to provide a response to the State," Ross Buffington, spokesman for the GSA, Northwest/Arctic Region, told seattlepi.com.
Speaking to the Seattle City Council Tuesday morning, Ron Paananen, who heads up WSDOT's tunnel team, said the state had met with federal officials after the Dec. 13 letter was sent.
"We believe we can satisfy all of their concerns," he said. "The letter was a good indication of their concern to protect federal property, we take that seriously."
Paananen said now that there's a specific plan and contractor it will be easier to address federal questions.
Earlier this month state officials signed a nearly $1.1 billion contract to build what would be the world's largest diameter deep-bore highway beneath Seattle.
Construction on the 1.7-mile tunnel, which can't begin until approval by the federal government, is expected to begin later this year. Eventually, a 57-foot diameter boring machine would burrow beneath downtown, starting from Alaskan Way in Sodo, and lay the framework for a tunnel that will have two road decks and be the world's largest soft-ground tunnel when it opens in 2015 or 2016.
Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn has objected to the tunnel plans, specifically concerns about potential cost overruns. A provision in state law, which many believe to be unenforceable, says city taxpayers would have to pick up the costs of any overruns.
Aaron Pickus, a spokesman for McGinn, said the mayor's office was unaware of the correspondence between the federal government and the state regarding the Federal Office Building.

January 2011 Vol: 18 No: 02 by: Abigail Guay , Contributing Writer

Viaduct project forces demolition of 1910 building that houses artists and their work

On the First Thursday Art Walk in January, artists and viewers mill in the stairwell at 619 Western. WSDOT recently informed residents — an enclave of more than 100 artists ­— that the structurally unsound building will be demolished due to the viaduct project.

Visiting 619 Wester Avenue-Artwalk Evening
Photo by: Joshua Huston , Contributing Photographer

Artists don’t often clamor to media events organized by the state Dept. of Transportation.
But on Jan. 6, when Washington State Transportation Secretary Paula Hammond signed a $1.35 billion contract with Seattle Tunneling Partners, a conglomerate of construction firms, to build the controversial deep-bore tunnel under downtown, they showed up alongside more typical attendees — proponents of ballot initiatives 101 and 102, which seek, respectively, to ban the use of city right of way for tunneling and to protect city taxpayers from cost overruns.
The artists had a stake in the proceedings, too. They represented 619 Western, a Pioneer Square warehouse-cum-studio enclave that is home to more than 100 artists and the only structure along the tunnel route WSDOT has deemed at risk for structural damage during the tunnel drilling process. The decision to update or demolish 619 Western was to be included in a final environmental impact statement, which is due in early June.
But on Mon., Jan. 10, WSDOT made a recommendation to the City Council that the building be domolished, which means the artists are being kicked out. They must vacate the building by March 2012.
Now WSDOT must submit an application to the city for demolition. The department will initiate a conversation about the teardown with the Pioneer Square Preservation Board.
Built in 1910 of reinforced concrete, 619 Western (also known as the Western Building) is a six-story warehouse that sits on the corner of Yesler Avenue, shouting distance from the viaduct. It initially served as a storage and light manufacturing facility for local merchants, but when Edd Cox, Barbara McAusland and Jim Reiben rented the south side of the fifth floor in 1981, it was largely empty. Over 30 years, they and hundreds of subsequent artist tenants have established a self-governing artist colony, one of the largest in Seattle, and they open their colony to the public during the first Thursday of every month as part of the Pioneer Square Art Walk (also dating from 1981).
In December 2009, WSDOT completed a survey of soil and buildings along the proposed tunnel route, drilling over 100 holes to depths of 100-300 feet, and in February of last year the department alerted building owners in these neighborhoods that the tunnel could potentially pass beneath their buildings.
In October 2010 WSDOT released a document, the Supplemental Draft Environmental Impact Statement and Draft Section 4(f), with the findings of the soil and buildings survey. The report identified a dozen buildings, all either designated historic or eligible for historic designation, likely to be affected by settlement during construction. The report said WSDOT will take measures to prevent permanent damage at the sites (old architecture erected on landfill), either by shoring up the buildings in advance of drilling or making the anticipated minor repairs after the construction is completed. The only hitch is 619 Western, about which the survey found: “Mitigation measures to protect the building may not prevent the need for demolition to avoid the possibility of collapse.” The building, which already shows the visual signs of settling — uneven floors and dramatic roof-to-ground cracks in exterior walls — is also sitting on 50 feet of fill and rotting timber piles.
The public comment period for the statement ran from October 29 to December 13. Three days later, on Dec. 16, WSDOT had its first formal meeting with the building residents. Although many residents were aware of the state’s report — indeed, some residents have for years anticipated the closing of their beloved, but aging building — the timing of the meeting precluded the artists’ involvement in the public comments period.
“We should have been invited to participate,” said Chris Sheridan, a painter, who has rented a space in the building for six years. Realistically, I know the outcome would be the same, but the basis of a community is the ability to participate in these processes. The stripping away of the process is the stripping away of community.”
The transcript from the Dec. 16 meeting showed that the department had not ruled out the possibility of retrofitting 619 Western, an effort the state, city, and Pioneer Square historic preservation boards, along with WSDOT and the owner, would have weighed against permanent relocation. If the building had been retrofitted, it would have been turned back over to the building owner, who would have determined its use.
The building is a popular destination during the monthly First Thursday Art Walk, which encompasses about 90 arts, shopping and dining venues in Pioneer Square. Painter Marie Gagnon, who works in the building, said that the city’s arts culture will suffer with the building’s demise. “It is a loss to many who come to the 619 building on First Thursday because, for some, it is their first contact with art,” said Gagnon. “In talking with folks, I’ve discovered how art can be intimidating to people, and the 619 offers an accessibility not found in galleries.”
With event foot traffic totaling 400-800 individuals each month, the building is a hub of Art Walk activity, rivaled only by the draw of the Tashiro-Kaplan Building and the adjacent strip of galleries on Third Avenue. While closing the building would not doom the Art Walk, it would perceptively change its character. The large number of studio spaces and the convivial atmosphere makes the Western Building unique. Its residents attract and reward visitors (lots of them) wary of the white walls and commerce of the galleries above First Avenue.
In the coming months, Western Building residents will be tasked by WSDOT to fill out paperwork to determine their eligibility for relocation assistance. To get the full buffet of subsidies — complete compensation for expenses associated with moving and limited reimbursement of rental expenses above the Western Building rates — each artist will need to prove business activities. WSDOT will work with the City’s offices of Economic Development and Arts & Cultural Affairs to find relocation opportunities in Pioneer Square.
Above all, the 619 Western artists say they want to stick together and stay in Pioneer Square, where the audience vital to their commercial success is located. WSDOT, although it is not bound by law to do so (and so ultimately may take no action), has responded by pledging to work with the residents and the City of Seattle to identify an alternative location nearby.
Pioneer Square is no longer the center of Seattle’s commercial activities. Instead it’s home to an unlikely combination of industries: arts and design, tourism, business week lunch venues, and human services. The neighborhood is also home to a lot of empty real estate. The Elliott Bay Book Company’s move to Capitol Hill has tangibly reduced foot traffic and vehicular traffic is expected to increase exponentially during and after the tunnel construction. The loss of the 619 Western artists will take a little more shine off an already struggling neighborhood.

Meet the Hundred Artists the Tunnel Bureaucrats Don't Care About Displacing.
by Jen Graves

Last Wednesday afternoon at the 619 Western building, fat daubs of oil paint sat out on palettes, barely drying at all in the unheated air. The artist, a Vietnam vet, sat in the room—high ceilings, one wall all windows revealing the industrial red cranes of the working waterfront behind the curve of Seattle's dilapidated viaduct—and told stories.
He told about that uncommonly beautiful year in Saigon, where he had a Vietnamese girlfriend he shared an apartment with on the sly. About discovering in 1981 this abandoned warehouse, at 619 Western Avenue, with rice and coffee beans and dust strewn everywhere, sitting right at the base of the Seattle street that coined the term "skid row." His studio is dotted with mosaics using colored glass collected from buildings that have been demolished in Pioneer Square over the years. One night recently, asleep in his studio—where he's slept and eaten without heat or private running water for 30 years—one of his own windows broke mysteriously, like a premonition. He never found the big shard of 100-year-old glass that fell. Ever since then, there's been only air between his bed and, across a narrow street,
On the floor directly below this was another artist telling stories—everybody was feeling nostalgic, because less than a month ago, the artists of 619 were told they're being evicted in March 2012. Some have already jumped ship, scrambling to get what affordable studio space is left in the city before it runs out. Others want to protest but wonder whether they should apply for the relocation assistance money that may be available from the government—which is taking applications this month already—since it's the city and the state that say the artists have to be out, the 100-year-old building demolished, to make way for the underground tunnel to replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct.
"This is one of the oldest all-arts buildings on the West Coast," said Johnny O'Brady, an artist on the fourth floor. "There's a good chance the tunnel won't even happen, but people are already packing up. There's tons of confusion."
The confusion comes from the fact that the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) told the building owner about the eviction six months ago, but he didn't tell the artists. The artists found out in a meeting that was advertised with only a few days' notice—and by the time the meeting was held, the "public comment period" for the tunnel's environmental review process had already lapsed. In reviewing the environment, the state left out the heart of the heart of Pioneer Square: the artists.
O'Brady is a generation younger than the Vietnam vet. He wears combat boots and remembers SoHo in the '80s. His stools are made of skateboards broken into halves; he sat hunched over the floor, which was covered in canvases depicting the faces of old-time pinup girls. There were so many canvases that he had to step on them. It was the day before art walk—the city's original art walk and still its biggest, the one that has been held the first Thursday of every month in Pioneer Square for the better part of 50 years. Pioneer Square's art walk is said to be the oldest in the United States.
The 619 Western building is not about sheer ambition. O'Brady is not about to be on the cover of an art magazine, and only some of the 100 or so who rent at 619 Western are "about to be" anything at all. They simply are artists. Occasionally they sell something. Maybe they teach this month, wait tables on the side, or have an entire modest daytime career. (This raw place does not attract anyone accustomed to wealth.) But no matter what else is going on, they make pictures and objects within these walls and show them every month—and that alone makes 619 Western, for lots of people, the best part of the original American art walk.
After the white cubes of the commercial galleries close at 8:00 or 9:00 p.m., everybody heads over to 619. The floors creak, the elevator is painted steroidal eggplant colors (and contains a blurry painting of the Cheshire Cat), and closing time is unknown. The nearby Tashiro Kaplan Artists Lofts building was developed in 2004 as a replacement for 619, but it is a qualitatively different place, containing galleries and hosting open studios only once a year. At 619, in spades, is what every museum and gallery wants just a dose of: messy, living art energy.
The art is all over the place. It runs down the hallways and staircases. You can show anything: Japanese animation drawings, dour geometric abstraction, black-and-white photos of your mother, garish paintings of lecherous old men being breast-fed tequila shots by naked green women. That latter scene is meant to be a satire; it was made by an older artist called Johnny Wow!, who's been at 619 for several years, and all of his paintings are, well, like that.
The longest-running tenant is Edd Cox, who's been at 619 since 1981. He makes highly skilled photo-realistic paintings of flowers and people in old-fashioned cars, and he also makes looser, New Guinean–influenced scenes he calls his "jazz" style. Maikoiyo Alley-Barnes, a founder of the Capitol Hill gallery/collective pun(c)tuation, rents here; so does street artist Weirdo, whose latest project (made possible by a small grant and Weirdo's cheap rent at 619) is a mural wall available to emerging artists that spans the length of a city block nearby, across from the historic Smith Tower. The businesses at Second Avenue and Yesler Way, including contemporary art gallery Howard House, have closed. The giant mural—vibrant orange, yellow, green, blue, and red—is the only thing lighting up the block besides the crackheads.
The 619 building has one non-art tenant in the upper floors where the studios are (the first of the six floors, available for retail, bears multiple FOR LEASE signs). The non-art tenant is the U.S. office of the Tibetan Nuns Project, an international nonprofit run by the Dalai Lama's sister-in-law that's supported Tibetan nun refugees in India for 20 years. Just outside its office is the crack, inches wide, that runs down the center of 619 Western and that widened during the 2001 Nisqually earthquake; in some places, you could pass a kitten from one floor to another through this crack. The building has settled in parts; spray-paint cans roll toward wavy, slumped windows. Firefighters who were visiting the building once told the Tibetan Nuns staffers that in case of fire, the wooden stairs and the fire escapes (not firmly attached) should be avoided, and advised them instead to jump out their fourth-floor windows. They laugh when they tell this story; they would rather take their chances than move to someplace duller than 619.
If you did jump out of 619, you might see the name "SU JOB" in cornflower-blue letters on your way down. Job was a redheaded artist and the soul of 619 for more than 15 years before she died in 2008 of cancer at age 52, and her name is stenciled on the building; also tattooed in out-of-the-way places on 619's skin are names like "CRIS BRUCH," another beloved Seattle artist.
It's a typical story: What makes 619 special is what makes it vulnerable when accountants, engineers, and bureaucrats come around. The tunnel is set to kill the living, breathing organism that is 619 Western.
The city council could intervene, but it has shown scant interest in doing anything but pushing the tunnel, even though voters rejected a downtown tunnel in 2007. After being contacted by the artists, a few council members visited the building recently. Tom Rasmussen, chair of the council's Transportation Committee, said he was not able to go and has never been to the building but is planning to meet with the artists soon. "We want to help," he said. But he had no specifics yet, and he recalled the deeply discouraging situation at Magnuson Park's Building 11, where 24 artists were kicked out in 2008 to make way for a commercial development in the public park.
Even though the environmental impact study is still incomplete, WSDOT signed contracts with a construction company for the multibillion-dollar project on January 6. O'Brady went to the signing. He raised his hand and asked that the artists be considered part of the environment. The ink dried anyway. WSDOT didn't respond to an interview request for this story.
Pioneer Square is a federally named historic district, eligible for strict protections. But the "council has blown us off again and again," said Cary Moon of the People's Waterfront Coalition. "It's maddening because it's not like they have to do anything controversial or difficult. They just have to hold WSDOT accountable to the laws that have existed for this purpose for decades." At the very least, "the city should demand from WSDOT that even if the building is demolished, the use is preserved" through funding or other support, Moon said.
The same environmental study that buried the pending displacement of a hundred artists also buried the fact that an additional 65,000 to 70,000 vehicles will flood downtown streets, including Pioneer Square, because the tunnel will have no exits north of King Street and will have tolls up to $4 each way. "The tunnel project could destroy Pioneer Square in several ways," Moon said. "The interchange [at King Street] is huge, suburban-scaled, and completely out of context with this fine-grained fabric." The state says this is the city's problem; it certainly is. The council has no money and no plan to deal with it.
The plight of the 619 artists is the first symptom telegraphing who's going to bear the brunt of the city's failure to protect and envision Pioneer Square. If the council won't do anything, an angel would have a legal case against WSDOT, said attorney David Bricklin. "Oh, yeah—WSDOT has been trashing the environmental law in their rush to get this project done. I think they're very vulnerable if somebody mounts a timely challenge." The state is prohibited from even choosing a tunnel—let alone displacing artists and signing contracts—before the environmental study is complete.
Will anybody stand up for the misfits of 619?
"Getting to be here has been an honor," said Carl Faulkner, who with his girlfriend, artist Redd Walitzki, shows his own and others' works in curated group shows in their 619 studio. When they moved in, the manager told them they could do anything besides throw a couch out the window. That had happened before. Anything else, he said, goes.

RESIDENTS OF ONE OF THE OLDEST ALL-ARTS BUILDINGS ON THE WEST COAST

Photography by Alice Wheeler

The graffiti artist Weirdo and photographer Jen Vertz.

Edd Cox wearing his Smith Tower Suit

Susanne Peterson and Tibetan Nuns Project

Jeff Jacobson 'Weirdo' with his portrait of Otis the Cat

by OWEN LEI / KING 5 News Posted on December 23, 2010 at 7:37 PM

SEATTLE -- Chipped paint, an empty storefront and some tarnished windows make the building look, even by Pioneer Square standards, old. Then again, 619 Western, built in 1910, is old.
It's not until you step into the old-fashioned sliding gate elevator and see bright green and purple paint adorning the cab that you realize something is different about this building.
Once a six-story warehouse, 619 Western is now home to more than a hundred artists and one non-profit group helping Tibetan nuns, a place where hallways look like art galleries and apartments look like photo studios.
"It's one of the biggest artist residences on the West Coast," said Edd Cox, an oil painter who was among the first tenants. "I moved here in 1981. It's probably the most amazing studio any artist could ask for."
But 29 years after he settled here, something settling just outside is changing Edd's life again.
"The tunnel's going right underneath this building," he said. "Basically we have 15 months to make the transition."
Out of 169 buildings along the proposed $1.9 billion Alaskan Way Viaduct and Seawall Replacement Project, the Washington State Department of Transportation said it's concerned about the structural integrity of the artists' conclave. "We've drilled over 100 [soil testing] holes along the tunnel alignment,"said Ron Paananen, administrator for the project. " We've done very thorough inspections and structural reviews, and we know this is the one building we have a problem with."
He said the building, which already has large cracks running up and down the inside, likely can't handle the shifting soft soil that will occur when deep-bored tunneling begins. The problem is compounded because the proposed tunnel begins only four blocks south, meaning it hasn't reached its full depth by the time it runs underneath 619 Western.
"It is the problem child, it's 100 years old, not much has been done with it since the day it was been built," said Ron Paananen, administrator for the tunnel project. "It's gone through three earthquakes and it's in pretty poor condition as it sits."
That leaves only two options: a major retrofit of the building, which includes shoring up the soil underneath the foundation, or demolition. But both options have one result. "Regardless of whether we fix the building or demolish it, they would have to vacate in March of 2012," Paananen said.
That means Edd Cox will reluctantly part ways with 619 Western, something he said he's resigned to, but nonetheless dreads. "Being here so long, having a studio like this, there's really no way to duplicate it," he said.  "I feel incredibly thankful to have this type of building for the length of time that I did. Artists don't get that kind of gift very often."
WSDOT said it is working with the building owner and the Pioneer Square Preservation Board to determine the fate of the 619 Western.  Paananen said they will make a decision by mid- to late- January. 
They did not have estimates for the cost of either option, but did say tenants will be compensated for their move.

Art lofts in Western Building May Be Too Unstable to Withstand the
Boring of the Alaskan Way Viaduct Tunnel
Dana Rebik Reporter 7:19 p.m. PST, December 22, 2010

SEATTLE —
More than 100 artists in Pioneer Square are looking for a new home after WSDOT alerted them it may need to demolish the century old Western Building.
Engineers are worried once the boring of the tunnel starts, the structure will settle unevenly. The Department of Transportation (WSDOT)  says the building has significant structural problems with floors separating from walls, decayed timber pilings and it is built on soft soil.
619 Western Avenue is home to more than 100 artists who lease studio space, including painter Edd Cox.
"It's been a training ground, a time for people to get on their feet artistically in a group and that's really rare," says Edd Cox.
Ron Paananen with WSDOT says the worry is that once construction starts, the building would settle unevenly and make it unsafe.  WSDOT says it inspected all 169 buildings along the tunnel route, and this is the only one they may have to demolish, but crews will have to strengthen the soil around some of the others.
"It sits on very soft soils that were placed 100 years ago on the waterfront.  It has timber piles that are rotting so that combination of things with its basic construction makes it very vulnerable," says WSDOT Administrator Ron Paananen.
"Why now why are we just learning about this now?" asks Q13 FOX News reporter Dana Rebik.
"It doesn't do us any good to get out there too early when we don't know enough or before we have refined the design of the tunnel so I think we're being proactive," says Paananen.
WSDOT is working with the city of Seattle's historic preservation office and the owner of the building to find new space for the artists.  Edd Cox understands the safety concerns but says he is heartbroken over the end of an irreplacable era. 
“It's a group of 100 people coming together to be creative.  It's really rare.  It's been fantastic.  To find another space, there's no way you can duplicate it," says Cox.
If crews choose not to tear down the building, it will have to go through a structural rehab.  Either way, the artists have been ordered out  by March 2012.

December 21, 2010 at 12:46 PM | by Corey Kahler

619 Western, the historic structure located in Pioneer Square, well-known for the over 100 artists who currently inhabit the building as a workspace or gallery, is set to be to evacuated over the next fifteen months, due to structural concerns related to the construction of the Alaskan Way viaduct tunnel.
At the moment, it is unclear whether the building will need significant reinforcement or will be demolished.
The news came unexpectedly last week when the Washington State Department of Transportation informed the tenants that regardless of the pending decision on the building's future, they needed to be relocated by March 2012. 
One of the biggest concerns among the artists is the effect the move would have on the culture of Pioneer Square, which hosts the popular of First Thursday Art Walk and is still reeling from the loss of Elliott Bay Book Company last year. 
"The fact that we all have to vacate in fourteen months was presented to us as a done deal," said tenant and visual artist Johnny O'Brady, "If the building is reinforced and then reopened after the tunnel is complete, it would be up to the building's owner to allow the artists to return."
Speaking with Ron Paananen with the Alaskan Way Viaduct Program by email, he stated that the project is currently working with numerous preservation groups because of the historical value of the building.
As for the artists, he stated: "We recognize the unique contribution that these tenants make as a group, and are going to work with them, along with the City of Seattle, in this effort. It is yet to be decided if tenants will relocate in the Pioneer Square neighborhood, but that is our goal."
A second tenant meeting will be held in January to provide further information to the building's residents. Until then, 619 residents have created a Facebook group to help coordinate their plans and WSDOT can be reached for further questions by email.
A final evaluation of the building's structural soundness will be determined later as the tunnel project continues to develop. 

By KATIE ZEMTSEFF
Journal Staff Reporter
The Western Building at 619 Western Ave. will either get a thorough structural rehab or be demolished as crews prepare to bore an almost two-mile tunnel under downtown to replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct. The building's fate will likely be decided by the end of January.

With a 57-foot diameter, the machine needed to dig the proposed tunnel would be the largest boring machine in the world.

The Western Building sits on about 50 feet of soft fill. It has pilings that are rotting and is in poor structural condition.

The tunneling machine will work under 137 buildings but Ron Paananen, administrator of the Washington State Department of Transportation project team, said this is the only one that may need to be demolished. “This is the one that we're most concerned about.”

Paananen said one of the challenges is the risk of settling. The machine would drill beneath one side of the Western Building. Combined with the soft fill, settlement could occur more on one side than the other. Without any mitigation, the west side of the building could settle up to 2.4 inches, compared to almost no settlement on the east side.

The top of the tunnel would pass between 70 and 90 feet below the building, through hard soil. The tunnel work is expected to begin around King Street, about four blocks away from the Western Building. The machine would likely pass under the Western Building in the first or second quarter of 2013.

WSDOT will work with the Mayers family, which owns the building, as well as the state's historic preservation office, Seattle's historic preservation office, the Pioneer Square Preservation Board and others to decide whether to remove or rehab the building.

Rehabbing would require cross bracing, steel framework, new piles and extensive foundation work. Paananen said it would take at least a year of work before the building could survive tunneling.

The rehab would be similar to work done previously on the Polson Building next door, which is also owned by the Mayers family. Benjamin Mayers launched Ace Novelty Co. in the Polson Building decades ago.

Paananen said they hope to make a decision by the end of January because it must be included in the state's final environmental impact statement, which is due in early June.

Either option would require WSDOT obtain a temporary construction easement.

WSDOT would pay to retrofit the building or would buy and demolish it, leaving the owner to redevelop the site after the viaduct project is complete.

WSDOT also needs to get subsurface property rights from the owner.

Regardless of which option is chosen, tenants have been told they must vacate the Western Building by March of 2012.

More than 100 artists now rent space in the building. Each tenant will receive compensation and relocation assistance. Paananen said WSDOT officials hope to keep the artists in Pioneer Square.

Kay Kirkpatrick is a mixed-media, sculpture and installation artist who does public art. She has rented space in the building since 1988 and says the news isn't surprising.

“I was in this building during the (2001) earthquake and I totally think that it has to go,” she said. “It's probably better served to just get rid of it and put in a new version.”

Kirkpatrick said 619 Western has served as an incubator for up and coming artists. There are other places artists can go but many have long wait lists for space or higher rents. Whatever happens, she doesn't think artists will be able to afford space in a new or rehabbed building on the site.

WSDOT has done studies on all buildings along the tunnel route and says no others will pose similar problems. The design-build team will have extensive monitoring to make sure buildings aren't negatively affected.

Kirkpatrick is more concerned about Pioneer Square. With the loss of Elliott Bay Book Co., the loss of artists now in 619 Western and the downsizing of First Avenue for utility work related to the viaduct replacement, she said small businesses will have a tough time.

“I just feel like the square is just doomed for 10 years,” she said. “For patrons of the arts or anything in the square, it's just going to be grim. It's just going to be the lunch crowd for a few years.”

By Erica C. Barnett, Monday, December 13, 2010 at 3:43 PM

At a tunnel-centric press availability this afternoon, Mayor Mike McGinn said that although he hadn’t signed either of two anti-tunnel initiatives, he would “encourage” people to sign a Sierra Club/Real Change-sponsored initiative that would bar the city from signing any agreements with the state to allow state projects in the city (i.e., the tunnel) to move forward without assurance from the state that the city is not responsible for any cost overruns.

“I don’t have a policy against signing initiatives [and] I think it’s completely appropriate for the city not to sign agreements with the state” without assurances on cost overruns, McGinn said.

He said he didn’t know if he could support an earlier initiative filed by Seattle Citizens against the tunnel not because it’s backed by activists who want to rebuild the viaduct but because he hasn’t read it yet.

“I think it’s great that there are initiatives out there and I’m not allowed to sign one 20,000 times, so I would encourage others to sign them,” McGinn said.

As we’ve noted previously, the Sierra Club initiative would have little weight against the tunnel if the council has already signed the three agreements it must sign for the project to move forward, which they plan to do in February or March, well before the initiative could make it on the ballot. Asked whether the council should wait to hear what voters think of the initiative, McGinn said, “Yes. The council should wait. … We’ve learned a lot of new information with the draft [environmental impact statement. … I remain hopeful that the city council will join me in asking those hard questions.

”McGinn’s latest sound bite is that the proposed tunnel would cost more than $2 billion and carry fewer cars (between 40,000 and 45,000) than the Ballard Bridge (which carries around 60,000 cars a day). I asked him whether, given that light rail cost more than $2 billion and carries fewer than 30,000 riders a day, he believes light rail was a waste of money. His response: No, because light rail will eventually carry more riders than it does today. “As the system expands, we expect that network to expand … and there will be much higher ridership numbers.”