Mayor Durkan unveils plan to fund Seattle waterfront post-viaduct
Jan 3, 2019, 2:25 PM
During a busy day, Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan unveiled plans for funding the city’s “Waterfront for All” initiative.
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Mayor Durkan was effusive during Thursday news conference in her praise for the vision of the waterfront’s future after the removal of the Alaskan Way Viaduct.
“I think this waterfront will be one of the global destinations that everybody talks about,” she said. “When this viaduct is torn down, there will be a collective gasp to see the reality of what this city is like without that freeway separating us from our heart and soul: The waters of the Puget Sound.”
The post-viaduct plan for the area includes a 20-acre park and public space, and a new elevated pathway connecting Pike Place Market and downtown to the waterfront.
According to Durkan, funding for this project will total over $700 million, with Seattle taxpayers fronting $248 million of the costs. Over $110 million will come from the Friends of Waterfront Seattle nonprofit, over $193 million will come from the state government, and $160 million from the downtown property owners’ Local Improvement District (LID).
LID is a funding tool that has property owners pay to fund public improvements that directly benefit them. As Mayor Durkan put it, it’s “a device we use so that those property owners that benefit most from improvements that the rest of the public supports actually support it.”
Durkan went on to assure the public that these property owners are behind this additional financial burden, categorizing them as “very supportive” of the LID.
For this project, the typical downtown condo owner would pay about $7 a month, or $84 a year over 20 years, totaling $1,700 each. Commercial properties would be responsible for $3,500 each over 20 years, or $24 a month.
The LID will need to go in front of the Seattle City Council for final approval.
RELATED: City council approves LID process for Seattle waterfront
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