The viaduct is shutting down in a few months, and all scenic vistas for you commuters will be gone. We ask for your viaduct memories.
Are you going to miss the Alaskan Way Viaduct?
Admit it; you will.
There are only a few months left before it’s forever shut down (best guess, sometime in the fall, the state’s Department of Transportation says).
After that, you’ll be driving in a tunnel in which you’ll never see sunshine, and which will never give you that magnificent view of Elliott Bay.
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It’s time to give due to that gray structure that unflinchingly moved at least 3.7 billion people in those 6½ decades.
Time to share your goodbyes and remembrances.
You know who you are.
The commuter making that daily grind from South King County, traffic stalled, but then … that vista suddenly is there.
The van driver going on business calls up and down the corridor, stressed out, keeping track of this and that, coffeed up, but then …
Even the casual driver who every once in a while takes that route, but then …
For 65 years, ever since the viaduct had its grand opening on April 4, 1953, it’s used its concrete pillars to offer drivers those view.
Now, those views will be turned over to those who can afford the downtown condos or have their corporate offices facing the water.
Try and beat this, printed in this paper only a few months after that 1953 dedication, in an unbylined column called “Strolling ‘Around” that kind of took a creative-writing tone:
“ … who can resist admiring Seattle’s front-window view … A trim ship — gleaming white, as ships from the tropics should be — moves slowly toward the West Waterway with a cargo of bananas … An Alaskan ship and a Hawaiian ship, temporary neighbors, are tied up at adjoining piers …
“The sun enriches the blue of the bay and the greens of Bainbridge. Beyond are the misty blues of the Olympics …”
Include your name and phone number (not for publication), and email them to Erik Lacitis at elacitis@seattletimes.com.