Motorists and businesses losing patience with delayed Rainier Avenue project, originally scheduled to finish this week

Even on the off-peak hour of 10:30 AM, traffic on Rainier Ave is grid-locked through multiple stoplights by a lane reduction near Airport Way.

The Rainier Avenue Phase 4 improvement project was originally scheduled to be completed this week, but after multiple delays it’s now expected to continue until at least October.

Delays identified in Change Order for Joint Use Trench (JUT)

The last major delay was approved by City Council last summer, when the Council authorized a change order that added about four million dollars and 129 extra work days to the contract.  Utility franchises will pay the $4,000,000 in additional charges, but Renton’s motorists and businesses are paying for the delays through their lost time, idling, frustration, and lost business revenues.

This latest delay was specifically caused by installation issues with a Joint Use Trench (JUT) that will be used for utility routing by PSE, Lumen, and Comcast.  Because of unexpected conflicts with other in-ground utilities, the JUT has had to be installed at a depth of ten feet underground instead of the planned 5 1/2 feet.  The extra 4 1/2 feet of depth significantly increases the cost of the worker protection shoring in the trench, requiring excavator placing of heavy steel frames instead of the hand-placed steel sheets. The extra depth also put the trench deeper into the water table, requiring pumping and loose sand management.  Making matters worse, some of the extra soil being removed has some minor petroleum contamination (probably from old service station activities), and the soil has to be taken to a special site.

The 31-month construction project will update the street, sidewalks, signals, planting areas, and utilities

While I understand that utilities can cause delays, I think there could have been more effort placed on minimizing the number of days with lane closures.

In past years Renton Council passionately debated every proposed lane closure; Council used to typically restrict lane closures to hours, not weeks or months, and Council tracked them.  When asked about a planned lane closure, or how long a prior lane closure had lasted, former Public Works Director Gregg Zimmerman always had the answer. Mr. Zimmerman usually knew immediately because he had been personally overseeing the work site.  In the previous (southern) phases of Rainier Ave improvement under Gregg Zimmerman’s management, he famously committed to keeping five lanes of Rainier Ave continuously open. And Council helped Mr. Zimmerman hold the contractor to it.  As quoted in the Renton Patch in 2012 ” Renton Public Works Administrator Gregg Zimmerman’s promise to keep at least five lanes of traffic open throughout construction drew heavy applause and whistles from a crowd of more than three dozen attendees”

Minimizing lane closures should be a requirement in all future road projects.  Even if it makes the job more laborious to keep moving cones and steel plates in and out of position when a lane closure is needed (as opposed to leaving the lane perpetually closed), the extra labor can easily pay off.  Rainier Ave typically carries about 40,000 cars per day.  Many motorists are reporting delays of ten minutes from these lane closures, and google maps confirms this.  If every car suffered ten minutes of delay, that would represent 6,666 hours of lost car/driver productivity per day.  Assuming $50 per hour for a car and driver (the Uber hourly rate), this amounts to $333,000 per day.  (The real losses are people being late for work or school, paying extra for daycare, taking time from family, etc, but these are harder to put a price on.) Whether the delay actually costs $333,000 per day, or half of this, the point is still the same. It’s worth investing $5000-$10,000 per day moving cones, signs,  and steel plates to keep the lanes open when work is not being performed in them.

A Facebook user recently asked about this project on a group page, and the question attracted over 70 passionate responses.  Here is just a small sample:

“QUESTION???? at RAINIER and RENTON AVE
Would anyone care to share why it’s taking so long for the Road / infrastructure project to move forward? It’s been several years and not a single person was working. It’s an absolute inconvenience to all, and taxpayers should know.”

“I have empathy towards construction workers and don’t blame them specifically. Lots of hands at play here. But as someone who travels this intersection at least 4 times a day, it’s absolutely an inconvenience. Is it convenient to have to wait up to 10 minutes to get through a light? Not an exaggeration, has happened multiple times and not only when the power was out. I’m pretty patient and do like city improvements but this project should have been planned better or the city should somehow help navigate the delays.”

“The entire project is an embarrassment to take this long. It would be interesting to know why it has been taking years upon years.”

“Very sporadic as to when they will be working and when they aren’t. Majority of the time not.”

“It shouldn’t be left like it is for the time being. I drive a lifted truck and it feels like I’m out off of exit 38 going through the mountains on Rainier. It’s sick”

“It’s inexcusable and not professional nor is the city functioning in the best interest of it citizens. You don’t just leave it a mess for years. They could at minimum reconfigure the traffic and the ridiculous lane closure if they’re going to do nothing for another six months.”

“I read somewhere that it was due to delays from companies that own the lines in the ground that need to be moved. I’m assuming power, internet, etc. The companies have to do the work on their side before the contract workers can finish up the job. If I remember correctly it’s delayed at least another 6 months. I agree it’s very frustrating. Especially when there are extreme traffic delays, signals not working, lane closures and not much visible progress. There have been many times when a traffic director was greatly needed.”

“These aren’t “lengthy lane closures”. This is a mutli-year lane closure with narrow, confusing, poorly marked and misaligned “temporary” lanes on awful pavement. The traffic lights have not been updated to handle the current configuration, and there is absolutely NO SIGNAGE about which lane you need to be in to go your desired direction. The adjacent area is not dug up, but simply coned off. It should become a textbook example of how NOT to do a road project.”

“Council Member Ryan McIrvin is Chair of the Transportation Committee. He can request an update from staff which would be very helpful to the public. From this conversation, it’s obvious the City needs to communicate information ASAP.”

“The bulk of the project cost, work and timeframe is taken up by complete rebuild of all fiber, electric, gas, water, sewer lines in an area with heavy utility infrastructure intersections which takes significant dependency planning and coordination, often most of it occurring overnight. Everyday folks driving by don’t see this. The bulk of this work is now complete as scheduled and the physical above-ground road rebuild begins soon. This is essentially the last step….its kinda like doing the final paint job on a house after building it. Appreciate all engineers, project planners and front-line crew on this one!”

“As a business owner ON Rainier Ave S, directly affected by this I can tell you it’s been an absolute nightmare! They’ve had problem after problem with the JUT (Joint Utility Trench) it’s been finger-pointing after finger-pointing. The city about 3-4 months ago sent out mail to each land owner asking for their opinion of shutting one lane of Rainier Ave S – the northbound direction. I called EVERY SINGLE business north of mine and talked to either the senior most manager or the business owner and every single one of them said heck not way, one said he really didn’t care because most of their business is wholesale furniture, when I called in and talked city rep, handling the job (no names because I just don’t want to do that, it’s all researchable) and was told that the only NO email they got was mine. It’s slated to be finished at the end of 2025, hopefully! They’ve damaged my building physically, it’s hugely impacted business and when we, as small business owners ask for some financial assistance we’re all told no, that there’s only one state in the USA that does that, Washington isn’t one, write your congressmen. … What I can tell you or ask you…PLEASE go to the businesses on Rainier…it’s been a brutal year and a half watching them dig up that trench multiple times! Also, for reference, the project from 3rd st to Grady was finished AHEAD of time! Any questions? fire away!”