Outnumbered, ignored
What a great piece of research and writing on your third runway story ["Risky runway," 9/28]. The timing couldn't be better. Those of us living down here in this community, and representing them in Olympia, have long felt outnumbered and ignored. Your journalistic efforts have helped balance the picture. Thank you very much.
REP. KAREN KEISER
33RD DISTRICT
Choked, silenced
A million thanks to the Seattle Weekly and Roger Downey for your outstanding cover feature "Risky runway" [9/28]. You hit three homers here: hilarious cover art, hip photos, and well-researched copy. Downey gave a voice to the airport communities, choked and silenced by the years of indignities heaped upon it by the Port of Seattle.
More importantly, the Weekly understands how the unchecked power of the Port of Seattle Commission is truly a threat to the democratic will of the people of the Puget Sound region.
Should the third runway fail and the Port of Seattle go bankrupt, I hope that we can find one last flight out of Sea-Tac, to send these arrogant fools on a long, one-way trip.
CHRIS GOWER
NORMANDY PARK
Cost, schedule
Roger Downey's reporting of the Port of Seattle's third runway ["Risky runway," 9/28] is the best factual, clearly written summary of the project that I have read in the eight years of following the fiasco. I thank him very much for the effort he put into it.
However, I do think there is another investigation and story that should be reported regarding the runway. That is the cost and schedule. Roger stated in his report that the cost is now $773 million, the number given to the public by the Port in June 1998. It was not generated via a task-by-task estimate of work, but by escalating the cost of money from the $217 million given in 1992. The $773 million was also quoted before many the environmental problems were discovered and before the "Sea-Tac Wall."
The completion schedule is another story. If it has currently slid from 1996 to later than 2006, which is also a fictitious date (but a 10-year slide), the solution to the air transportation problem also slides 10 years. The state of Washington needs to do better. The Port of Seattle is better qualified to organize a WTO conference than plan a third runway in the worst possible location in the Northwest region.
JIM BARTLEMAY
DES MOINES
Cows, pigs
Bravo to you (and frankly, I'm in shock) for being willing to question the most sacred of all Puget Sound cows (a.k.a. pigs)—the Port of Seattle's precious third runway ["Risky runway," 9/28]. Duplicity abounds when the Seattle City Council can tell Eastern Washington they should remove their dams for salmon while closing their eyes to the equivalent of a dozen dams being constructed; thereby, sealing the fate of Des Moines and Miller Creeks, not to mention the standard of living for major communities. I guess since the third runway is in South King County and outside of Seattle City limits, the implications are just not close enough for them to care.
MARIA LITTLE
SEATTLE
Usual suspects, disaster
Roger Downey wrote an eye-opening account of the shenanigans going on at the Port of Seattle in trying to promote their billion-dollar boondoggle, namely the Sea-Tac third runway ["Risky runway," 9/28]. However, he really didn't address the issue of who was responsible for keeping the project going in the '90s, despite the insurmountable problems.
If one were to explore who were the boosters of this flawed plan, some of the usual suspects surface: Paul Schell (now the mayor of Seattle); Doug Sutherland, (now running for state land commissioner); Gary Locke (now the state governor); Pat Davis, (still a Port of Seattle commissioner), and Norm Rice, (ex-mayor of Seattle). These are the players that gave you stadiums you didn't ask for, sponsored the WTO, supported public money for private parking garages, and cajoled the Puget Sound Regional Council to give the green light to the third runway.
Is it any wonder that we may have another economic and environmental disaster on our hands? It's clearly time for new leadership to talk about siting a regional airport, outside King County, now.
JANE MITCHELL
VIA E-MAIL
D'oh! D'oh!
Washington would not be first to have a pair of female senators should Cantwell beat Slade with a spade [Uffda, "Last stand for Cyanide Slade?" 9/28]. Unless either Barbara Boxer or Dianne Feinstein has some deep secret no one knows (or wants to know) about, California has had the honor of having two female senators for some time now. It's time to row that boat ashore, Canute [sic].
FRED KETTEMAN
VIA E-MAIL
Eds. note: Many thanks to the 1,034 readers who wrote in to point out this grievous mistake. Another astute reader notes that some other state (Maine, if we recall) also has two women senators. Knute Berger has resigned in shame over his error; see his farewell.
Scorpion, rock star
Ralph Nader ["Ralph rocks Seattle," 9/28] negative as a scorpion? Well, there's an awful lot of bullshit to call on the prevailing parties. Like a rock star? Yeah, I hear that he finally did buy one new suit to replace his old one. That Ralph, what a prima donna!
