[I-Hate-Hulse]

OK, I know that $700M is a lot of money but this just sounds like a mess in all regards:

The train connection with the future southeast LRT would emerge from its 2nd Street tunnel at 3rd Avenue, and instead have a curbside station in Chinatown on 1st Street S.W., Lea said.

Then, the train would have to slowly turn at 90 degrees before it starts scaling the Centre Street Bridge.

So the route would be this:

- Lose a block of roads between BP Center and the old Japanese Village on 2nd st SW between 4th and 3rd ave (by the old French Maid) due to the train surfacing from the tunnel.
- The train will then trundle along 3rd Av between Jameison Place and the International Hotel.
- Turn north for one block onto 1st SW past the Chinese Cultural Center
- Turn east onto 2nd ave and run past the Sakana Grill/ old folks home.
- At that point it has to wait for a light to turn left north onto Center Street and finally cross the bridge.

EDIT- here's a diagram of what I mean:



There are 4 turns between the tunnel and bridge - what happens at those intersections? Signals? This will run right through quiet part (albeit dumpy) of Chinatown and turn it into a transportation corridor (I'm picturing the 7th Ave / 10th St NW no mans land). And really pretzel traffic coming off of the lower deck of the Center Street Bridge since it has no where to really go other than east.

So you get all of this mess, plus losing 2 lanes of traffic across the center street bridge and much of center street? I know it's $700M but this is just plain terrible.

I thought we had learned after the airport tunnel to do things right....this isn't it.