The Cables are Rotting

Our Floating Bridges are tied to the bottom of Lake Washington by steel cables. Why do we use steel? Ropes are susceptible to damage from water borne hazards such as motor boats.


Steel also has a characteristic that causes it to deteriorate in water. It gets wet.

So WashDOT likes to replace several cables regularly so that they are all fresh and no older than their useful life. In the case of the Evergreen Point Floating Bridge they will replace 15 of 58 cables this year.

These cables get attached to anchor blocks securely stuck on the bottom of the lake. The other end is snaked into the pontoons and cinched up to 65 tons tension. That provides a stable and motion free bridge. It won’t bounce up and down in heavy waves like those second rate floating bridges.

The process requires replacing one cable at a time. First they detach the old cable and haul it off to the scrap yard where it will be returned to the steel mill. Then it gets made into consumer goods such as toasters. Now I know why my toast is always soggy.

The high paid divers paddle down in 200 feet of water dodging rainbow trout and giant octopi to reach the bottom anchor. Using a Swiss Army knife they snip off the old cable. This is only done on the first one. The rest will have their 65 tons of tension released before being snipped off in 200 feet of water.

The upper anchor is inside a pontoon. It takes several days studying engineering drawings to figure out how to get into one of those things. Then they release the tension and slip the cable out so the divers can snip the lower ends.

Once the old cable has been pulled from the water and loaded on the scrap barge they get to work installing the new one. The process takes one day per cable. After the initial week or so fumbling with the first one, that is.

You probably think it’s a waste of time replacing cables on the SR 520 bridge since it’s due to be replaced very soon. By the year 2000 I think is the goal. Well those WashDOT folks are realists. They know this bridge replacement process could take years. They don’t want the cables rusting out and allowing the old bridge to break loose and float up to Kirkland.

Besides they need to keep the old bridge in use for most of the construction period to maximize the toll revenue. It wouldn’t do any good to stick a toll on it and then close it right away.

So my suggestion is that if you like that bridge then you need to go drive on it right now before they get the tolling installed and before they close it off for 12 years.

The Seattle mayor, Mike, wants to delay the replacement and revise the plans to add tracks for future light rail and make the HOV lanes for transit only – no car pools. He says allowing a lot more cars into Seattle from the north Bellevue area will cause a shortage in parking places in Seattle.

Actually Seattle parking shortages are self correcting. They just increase the cost to park in Seattle until the number of cars equals the number of spaces. So reducing the current number of cars on those bridges would just be a matter of raising the parking rates. Simple solutions for simple minds. Just before they close it for the replacement they could raise parking fees in Seattle to $100 a day and $120 in Bellevue. Everyone would switch to transit on I-90.

Please don’t share this with any elected officials because they might think it’s a good idea.

Another thing the steel mills make with the old cables is steel for transit vehicles. So get ready to ride a bus made out of old floating bridge cables. Don’t you just hate the damp seats?

Al

Fun with the ORCA Card

Driving downtown and parking in Seattle are getting pretty bad. You need to haul a pile of cash or perhaps a credit card. They have these little stands that spit out a card you tape in your passenger side window.


The other alternative is to find a parking garage. There are two kinds. One kind you get to park your own heap. The other kind you hand your keys over to some kind of freaky looking dude who allegedly parks it for you. When you get it back half the gas is gone. Don’t touch the tires because they’ll be real hot.

There’s another way. Park free in one of the palatial Park and Ride lots in suburbia. They have a little more room between cars so you don’t have to climb out through the sunroof like you do in a downtown lot.

The next thing you do is get on a bus. That’s an adventure you have to enjoy. You might as well enjoy it because all those parking lot valets ride the bus too. It’s real cozy.

I use the ORCA pass. It’s one of those rfid enabled devices. Works a lot like the GoodToGo Pass (or EZPass for you easterners). You get on the bus and just pass the card in front of the reader. Don’t even have to “swipe” it like a credit card. The LCD shows you have much you paid. Lots less than parking downtown.

Now I have two rfid cards. My driver’s license is rfid. I can go to Canada. I still have to get out of my vehicle and sit in Canadian Customs for an hour but at least I can come back to America.

On a recent errand I decided to see if Glen, the Lake Boren Carp, needed anything from the big city. He said that place gives him the willies. Ever seen a giant carp with the willies? That’s give me the willies.

He said last time he went to Pike Place Market they tossed him around and he ended up on a pile of fresh produce from Snohomish County.

He gave me a check to turn in at the King County Court House. He was paying off a ticket from a non-motorized citation. After reading it over we both decided it would not be in our best interest to appeal. He said he had a headache. Here’s what it said:

START OF CITATION

Dear Mr. Carp;

Please remit $20 fine to King County Superior Court for the following offence:

Subject, named in citation, has been known to frequent establishments where certain activities heretofore have been banned in alternative venues however notwithstanding are unacceptable given a specific set of guidelines not generally practiced by the general population in general based on the prevailing meteorological currents and vectors owing to unmentioned established parameters not excluding those previously delineated frequently in as yet unwritten tenets not defined at the present time insofar as it has been previously documented in various prognostications not yet uttered in these domains based on the preponderance of evidence insomuch as could conceivably be anticipated by a fictitiously reasonable practitioner of such prognostications and random pusillanimous prevaricators.

Thanks you for your attention to this notice:

Signed; Super Prosecutor, King County, Washington, USA, Earth, Solar System, Milky Way Galaxy. (Unreadable signature goes here)

END OF CITATION

Speaking of ORCA cards you can ride five bus lines, three ferry systems, any Sound Transit train, and more. Glen is a little leery of a card that’s named for something that would eat him. So don’t look for Glen on the bus.

Oh, how did my errand go? Well I got to the courthouse and paid the $20 for Glen. The clerk stared at me like I was from outer space. Oops, he used a carp check. Those things don’t translate to human money. So I quickly handed over a Jackson and got quick smile.

Then I forgot the other reason I was downtown so I just wandered around admiring all the big buildings. Seattle can be both interesting and intimidating at the same time. At one point I spotted the parking enforcement officer and decided to have a little fun.

I read about this in an email a few months ago. I walked up as the ticket was being written. I began to rant about how unfair it was for Seattle to victimize senior citizens with these outrageous parking fees. I called the officer a Fascist and that earned a second ticket under the wiper. At that point I began calling attention to the fact that the officer was on the verge of popping uniform buttons and something about how it’s amazing they could find a hat big enough for such a fat head. The car got a third ticket.

I thanked the officer for our nice little chat and walked away.

Then I remembered the original errand I went to town for. I need an iPad. OK, I don’t really need one but what’s the difference? It was about then I also remembered the current models don’t have 3G. So I need to wait.

Back to the bus tunnel for the ORCA ride to Bellevue. It only took me an hour to find my heap in the Park and Ride lot. Made it home in time for Dancing. Another glorious day in retirement land.

Al

Light Rail East Link Route Revision and on

Sound Transit insists on going ahead with the new East Link light rail route. We just don’t know where it’s going yet.


Bellevue City Council sent in a proposed preferred route and now the Sound Transit Capital Committee has another proposed route. It’s called B2M. These routes have code names. Not real sure what they stand for. It’s alphabet soup.

B2M is slightly different from B3M because it stays on 112th rather than looping around the Bellevue Club. Hence you can subtract the Bellevue Club and end up with a 2 instead of a 3. New Math. That one little number is expected to save $50 to $100 million. Wow, that’s some little difference.

Part of the savings comes from not having to run the line through the Red Lion. Dang, that would have been something to see. Get a room at the Red Lion and your USA Today would be delivered outside your door by light rail. These people take the fun out of staying at a motel.

There are other numbers as well. C9T includes a tunnel under 110th Ave which is what the Bellevue City Council wants. Then there’s the C11A alternative that runs on the surface of 108th Ave. I like my R7Al proposal that requires a cable stay bridge over I-405 at the I-90 interchange. We need a soaring bridge icon to distract people from the demolition of the ancient Bellevue Trestle.

In the mean time I-90 is getting some changes in preparation for light rail. They recently added an HOV left lane from Bellevue to the middle of Mercer Island. This is to ease the sting of the eventual loss of the express lanes. Next they’ll add an HOV lane east bound from Mercer Island to Bellevue.

They expect this to wrap up in 2012 and people will have to get used to it. In 2014 they begin the light rail line installation on the Express lanes. Unless the lawsuit puts a stop to it. I haven’t heard much about that one lately. Was it thrown out? Don’t know. If you recall the suit claimed you can’t put light rail on a highway that was built with gas tax funds because the law says those funds can only be used for roads.

The next step in this long march to 2050 is to install those HOT lanes everywhere. That’s where you get a Good-To-Go pass and you can pay a toll to drive alone on the HOV lanes. Unless you’re hauling a car load of illegals then you don’t have to pay.

The Good-To-Go pass will work on any toll facility that’s part of the same network. The Tacoma Narrows Bridge and soon the SR 520 Bridge will be in that network. But I don’t know how far it extends. Can I use my pass in Chicago?

Chicago has the I-Pass and the EZPass. EZPass is mostly on the Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Mass, etc toll roads (some are called turnpikes or Thruways). There are also numerous bridges and toll roads from Maine to Virginia. Check it out: https://ezpassmaineturnpike.com/EZPass/info/facilities.jsp Will the Good-To-Go pass work on their system? Will EZPass work here? These are examples of questions.

Will my fake pass work anywhere? Now that the world is controlled by photo surveillance I imagine any cheating like that would result in a costly fine. This makes my fake pass a collectors’ item. Now I can charge more. Hooray!

Well we still don’t know what route light rail will take in downtown Bellevue. After they finally realize they can’t use I-90 and switch all the effort to SR 520 we’re looking at a line being built in about 40 years. By that time everyone will be driving electric cars and they’ll be controlled digitally. After you leave your house and pick up the carpool you pull out on the ramp and let go of the steering wheel. You take control again when you reach the off ramp distribution point at your destination. Drop off your carpool riders and deflate the car and fold it into your briefcase.

Who needs public transit? Why waste all that steel making old fashion rails? Get those smelly old busses into museums and give us our inflatable electric cars.

Al

Antiques and How to Tell

Covered wagons at the Oregon Trail Museum in Baker City, Oregon

Americans live in an old country. It’s true! How many governments do you know of that are older than ours? If you guessed England you got it.

Drive down any country road in America and sooner or later you’ll pass an antique store. Or if my sister’s in the car you’ll stop.

1938 Packard Club Sedan, Sixteen Series, Maine Coast RR Museum

That’s because we like old stuff. It reminds us of simpler times, like that time the cocktail waitress … No, no, no wait! OTHER simpler times. Like this:

When many of us were younger a car would stop along the road and the driver would get out and open the hood. The proper posture was to scratch ones head while staring at the engine. Somebody would stop and after a little discussion and “that looks loose” type comments they’d get it running again. Today if there’s a car stopped along the road it’s because the driver has a phone call. Nobody stops anyway because most of us have no clue how cars work since about 1980.

That’s not the point. The point is old mechanical stuff is interesting to millions of us. Because of this interest there are thousands of organizations dedicated to “historical” preservation and restoration.

There are clubs dedicated to most makes of cars and some even specialize in certain decades. For example there’s probably a club for 1950’s Nash Rambler. There are also clubs that focus on tractors, trucks, motorcycles, streetcars, and riding lawnmowers.

1907 Stanley Steamer in Wells Auto Museum, Maine

Look in your AAA guidebooks. Most states have railroad museums. Shore line states have boat museums. Tractor museums are scattered all over. In Auburn Indiana there’s the Auburn, Cord, Duesenberg Museum. (Highly recommended, by the way)

Most of the museums have a membership arrangement. You send some money every year and they send you a card for your wallet. In many cases you get a magazine or newsletter. If you like the museum enough to send money then you’ll like the magazine because it includes pictures.

Third Avenue Railway B in Seaside Trolley Museum, Kennebunkport, Maine

Maine, another place where “Portland” is a city, has a Seashore Trolley Museum. It’s near Kennebunkport. Coastal people like to include “port” in the names of their towns. You won’t see “Mystic Seaport, Montana.”

The Seaside Trolley Museum has a collection of public transit vehicles from the last millennium. There are busses and streetcars from many cities across America and some international locales. It’s very interesting. You can ride an old trolley with lots of clatter and rattle just like back when people rode to work on those things.

Your assignment is to find a museum or society that preserves your favorite old mechanical vehicles and join up. That’s all there is to it.

Conductor on Trolley Ride, Seaside Trolley Museum, Kennebunkport, Maine

How do you tell if it’s a true antique? One way is how long ago the last time you saw one of those was. When you are in an antique store and they have an exhibit of the appliances in your kitchen it’s time to re-think. Either you need new appliances or you’re not in a real antique store.

Worse yet is remembering much of the contents of a museum as stuff that was in your parents home when you were growing up. And how odd it looks. Ever see an old radio that you recognize as one you wanted but couldn’t afford? It’s in the museum because nobody could afford it back then and it was still in unused condition when it was found in a warehouse.

Try your antique 3D movie glasses on these photos.

Al

Al's Handwritten Blog

Rusting Tractor in Kansas Field

For a few years now I’ve been trying to chronicle the buildup of unstoppable forces bringing a world class transit facility to the shores of Lake Boren in Newcastle, WA. Writing about local events is a part time hobby. Nobody asks me to and nobody pays me.


The process is I write the story and then send it out as email to selected friends, acquaintances, and relatives. Provides evidence that I’m still alive while giving me with a therapeutic vent. A lot of it is based on real events with my added slant.

Then I upload that same story to my Lake Boren Rapid Transit Report blog. Sometimes I add photos and change the title. I’m a definite rooky formatting a blog and/or web page. I can get photos uploaded and I figured out how to re-open a post to fix a minor error.

One thing I can’t figure out how to get a background design working. I’ve had some help and found some hints but I still don’t know how to cause that “code” to actually get into the internet and make a background. You’d think I could do it. Everyone says it’s simple. I’m kind of simple too. It may be simple but you have to know what to do to make it happen.

A real event came along and kind of made my blog premise moot. Newcastle and Sound Transit spent a lot of last year installing a “Transit Center” at the main crossroads in Newcastle. Essentially it’s a bus stop. Paint on the street says “BUS ONLY” and some tiny rain shelters were added. The intersection got new pavement and new poles for traffic lights. Newcastle is very proud. However it’s not the palatial edifice envisioned in the Lake Boren Rapid Transit Report. I call it the “interim transit center” providing service until the real one is built in the future.

In the mean time there are many other interesting things going on. I’m a man of leisure these days and I like to follow what’s happening. Lbrtr sometimes branched out to discuss other public and transit related construction projects. Some of these are getting stale. Maybe it’s me getting stale.

The Lake Boren Rapid Transit Report will add a cousin. Transit rants will still be sent to the lbrtr email distribution list. The Lake Boren Rapid Transit blog will continue with random updates. Light Rail on the eastside and various other local road and transit projects will continue to be found in email and in the blog. The new cousin will not have an email component.

My working title for the new cousin blog is “Al’s Handwritten Blog.” By not including the email I’ll have more flexibility to include photos referenced in the words and links to pertinent web sites. The blog building tools (although I don’t understand a lot of it) seem to be getting better allowing more items and hopefully more interesting visuals.

For now I'll be including these posts in my current blog rather than open a new one. I expect you’ll be able to tell the difference. Especially if you read both the email and blog versions – you won’t see the “Handwritten” posts in email. If you are particularly interested in reading what I write but only use email maybe this will encourage you to get the RSS feed. It’s easier than email and you’ll see all the photos, links, and confused logic.

On the other hand if you like reading what I write you need to visit a library. It’s full of stuff written by people who are actually good at it. Some of them use the correct words and form sentences way gooder then I ever done.

Downtown Bus leaving bushes at the Seaside Trolley Museum in Maine

Transit is still one of my prime interests. The evolution of transit vehicles has been amazing. Probably a subject for the Handwritten blog. What was that bus doing in the bushes?  I like history and the history of transportation is particularly fascinating. The “Handwritten” reference means these new posts will be even more along the lines of what I’m up to and where I’ve been. "Handwritten" in the sense that I do all the labor rather than gleen stuff from other sources.  I took that photo.  If you recall I’ve written about birding, photography, and maritime museums in the past. These are examples of subjects that will fall under “Handwritten” in the future. Pretty clever, eh?

Therefore, if you have questions, suggestions, a sense of wonder, or you’re just annoyed please feel free to let me know via the comments button below. I don’t know how it works, but I think all you need is a Google account – it’s free. It’s part of planet Google. When you send a comment I’ll read it (unless the “subject” has been flagged as spam in my gmail account).

I’m still not comfortable publicly ranting about national politics or the entertainment industry so you won’t see that stuff. Sports and “news” don’t hold my interest much either. Also my three rules will apply to the Handwritten posts: Accuracy – optional; Plagiarism – I’m not above it; Frequency – whenever.

The second one was from my college days. Several of us were putting our heads together on some project that was due very soon. One of the guys was a paragon of virtue, a well spoken stiff collar type who expended extra effort to obey all the rules. He spoke in complete sentences and used adverbs correctly at all times. Another guy suggested we could speed up the project if we were to copy a small section from a library book. Someone pointed out that copying was plagiarism. Mr. Straight Guy in his usual precise speaking voice immediately said, “I’m not above it.”

Just in case you’re curious, I still intend to maintain my own point of view. “What were they thinking?” Or “Could they possibly have made it any harder???” However, Glen, the Lake Boren Carp, will most likely stay with the Rapid Transit Report.

My other intention is that photos in these posts will mostly be my own. In the past I’ve borrowed web photos as a way to punch up stories. I’m not above it. That will probably continue in the transit posts. But the Handwritten posts should be more about the interesting stuff I find on my own. You’ll see some 3D photos. Dig around and find the red/cyan 3D movie glasses. You’ll need them. Again, if you have any comments please feel free.

Al

Portland Shows the Way

Down south of Newcastle in a state called ‘Oregon’ they have a city called Portland. It’s the main city in Oregon. Haha, get it? ‘Maine’ city? Try and keep up.


Portland also claims to be a west coast port city (hence the name) serving hundreds of thousands of cargo ships between America and Asia. I suppose. Who really knows?

Portland knows how to run a city. Look on Topeka (formerly Google April 1, 2010) and you find the city of Portland has its own web site. Hell, I have one, so it’s no big deal. I just don’t have a clue what good it is for me to have a website.

Anyway, right on the home page of the Portland Oregon website they give you a chance to “pay online.” How cool is that? Pay what? It doesn’t matter – just send some money and see what happens. Maybe you’ll get better water in your house.

If you navigate to Transit Options there are 15. Walking is the first one. Skates and skateboarding is the last one. Somewhere near the middle is Mass Transit.

The recent Trains Magazine says Portland is a Transit Friendly City. They should name it that to avoid the confusion with Portland, Maine. “Visit Transit Friendly City, Oregon and be sure to bring your umbrella” might be their slogan.

Portland operates a light rail system that’s been in place for years. It’s called “MAX” for some reason. Oh, it stands for Metropolitan Area Express. Express has been revised to start with X since MAE would sound a little wimpy.

Right now MAX has four lines. They are the Blue, Red, Green, and Yellow lines. That’s pretty good. Most painters can get along with these four colors because you can mix them and get most of the other colors.

Portland has a big advantage over Seattle. First of all Renton is about 200 miles north of Portland but its right next to Seattle. Second the body of water that splits the city is only a river. They can build bridges over the river. None of them are floating bridges. Thus very few have sunk over the years.

MAX is getting a new cable stay bridge over the river in Portland. It will be for the light rail, buses, bikes, and pedestrians. No cars. Fords and Chevys have to use the old bridges.

This is progressive and innovative. It won’t happen in Seattle. Lake Washington is no river. It’s 40 miles wide more or less and current neighbors say they can’t build a bridge unless it floats. Actually they don’t want any bridge at all. Thus our only Lake Washington bridges are floating. At least at the time of this writing they still are. That keeps them under the “view” that everyone is so worried about.

Portland is showing the way. Their light rail system, MAX, will be the primary user of the new cable stay bridge. It will not allow cars. Why is that significant? Cost. Cars require multiple lanes and shoulders where the police can pull you over for talking on a cell phone. That means a big wide bridge. Transit bridges are narrow. One lane each way. Pedestrians and bikes are much lighter than a big Diamond T.

The new cable stay bridge design is one people seem to like. It needs to soar way up over the river to allow ships to pass underneath. Cable stay is picturesque in keeping with the ambiance of shimmering Portland.

We want one of those. Lake Boren could use a picturesque cable stay bridge. It could link the library to the transit center. Pedestrians and bikes only. Glen, the Lake Boren Carp, will not allow any bridge that carries vehicles.

Al