Viaduct | Tunnel's price tag may top $3 billion

Alaskan Way Viaduct

Funding sources: $2.8 billion from the Legislature, but at least $1 billion already spent on other viaduct projects; possible federal, state and local funding; possibly tolling and naming rights.

Decision-making process: Two to three finalists to be released in early December. The final decision by year-end by Gov. Christine Gregoire, Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels and King County Executive Ron Sims.

Estimated completion date: Depends on what is chosen; range is 5 to 9-1/2 years.

Options for the Alaskan Way Viaduct

THE EIGHT OPTIONS, costs and features:

A. $800 million: Four-lane boulevard on Alaskan Way, with stoplights. Price tag for three surface options will be appealing, but travel on surface streets is slowest of options.

B. $800 million: Four-lane boulevard on Alaskan Way, with more transit, downtown street improvements and about 80 feet of open space along waterfront.

C. $900 million: Six-lane Alaskan Way-Western Avenue grouping: three northbound lanes on Western with three southbound lanes on Alaskan Way. Would create 110 feet of open space on waterfront.

D. $1.6 billion: Four-lane elevated viaduct similar to existing viaduct, but with lanes side by side, not stacked. Seattle voters last year rejected both an elevated viaduct and a tunnel, but that viaduct had stacked lanes. Many in Seattle's industrial community like this option and it seems affordable. Others, including Mayor Greg Nickels, want to take an elevated viaduct off the waterfront.

E. $2.2 billion: Four-lane elevated viaduct covered by a park, with buildings underneath. The city hates it, and it's uncertain whether House Speaker Frank Chopp, who suggested it, could find tenants for the space. This cost estimate includes the roadway and park on top, but not the mile-long building that would contain it.

F. $3.5 billion: Four-lane bored tunnel starting near Qwest Field and running under Western Avenue and Post Alley, with only offramp at King Street. The price alone could doom this option.

G. $2.7 billion: Cut-and-cover tunnel along the waterfront, with four lanes, an elevated roadway at Stewart Street and a surface street by Pike Place Market. This may be too expensive, but many of the region's political leaders, including Nickels, want to replace the viaduct with a tunnel.

H. $1.9 billion: Four-lane lidded trench, two lanes in each direction, with openings in the cover for ventilation and signals on streets north of the Battery Street tunnel. This is a possibility and the price tag is close to the available funds.