520 bridge project may go another $128 million over budget

Taken from Monday’s edition of The Dori Monson Show.

State officials say construction delays and redesign costs could use up the Highway 520 bridge’s $100 million in reserves and eventually send the project another $128 million into the red.

The news of the $128 million more in overruns was released on the WSDOT website on Friday. That’s when you dump bad news because they hope and pray that everybody in the media will forget about the story by the time Monday rolls around.

Sorry WSDOT, I remembered.

I also remembered there’s a huge transportation funding package that they want to put to the voters this fall. Who is going to get that money? The department of transportation that cannot come close to making budget.

They are going to be billions over on the 520 bridge. They are going to be billions over on the downtown Seattle tunnel. Their solution is, let’s get more money. Give us more money so we can improve transportation.

How about you figure out how to spend what you’ve already got?

What is remarkable about this revelation by the WSDOT on Friday is that just last month they held a news conference saying this wasn’t going to happen again.

“WSDOT has acknowledged responsibility for the pontoon design error that led to the repairs we are performing now, and the agency has taken major steps to ensure these types of issues are not repeated,” said new Transportation Secretary Lynn Peterson.

The state reportedly doesn’t have concrete plans for finding more money if the project requires it.

How can we trust them with a gigantic multi-billion dollar transportation package that they’re asking for this fall, when they cannot do the projects that are on the table now without running billions over?

Why am I the only one asking these questions about them? It’s unbelievable to me.

Taken from Monday’s edition of The Dori Monson Show.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Related:
520 bridge design errors add up costs, delays

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