Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 5.2
A sample of statistics from Seattle regrading projects
Location
Maximum cut depth (feet)
Soil removed (million cu. yd.)
Denny Hill
110
5.4
Jackson Street
84
3.4
Dearborn Street
108
1.6
Source
: Dimcock 1928; Dorpat and McCoy 1998.
mounds would be erased, fulfi lling Thomson's master plan of creating a
rationalized landscape for economic growth. The regrading projects are
the embodiment of Promethean hubris working to perfect nature through
technology, as refl ected in Beaton's sympathetic description of the projects:
“The hills raised themselves in the paths that commerce wished to take.
And then man stepped in, completed the work which Nature left undone,
smoothed the burrows and allowed commerce to pour unhampered in its
natural channels.”
75
The regrading activities in Seattle can be understood as part of a long
history of reworking the landscape for human ends, a practice that would
reach its zenith with experiments in “geographical engineering” in the
1950s and 1960s with the moving of vast quantities of earth and rock
via nuclear explosions.
76
Estimates on the total volume of soil moved
during the regrade projects vary, with some fi gures as high as 50 million
cubic yards or about one one-eighth of the Panama Canal excavation, the
measuring stick for large engineering projects at the time.
77
The regrad-
ing projects illustrate the tight connection between urban development,
landscape alteration, and technological progress.
78
An irony of the regrade
projects is that improved building and transportation technologies were
introduced while the regrading projects were underway, making the re-
duced grades in downtown Seattle unnecessary. Specifi cally, the emergence
of the automobile and more durable paving materials meant that the
previously impassable hills could now be easily navigated.
79
The regrades
were seen as ultimate, permanent solutions to engineer the city, but they
could not keep up with continually evolving technological, environmental,
and social conditions.
Rationalizing the Boundary between Land and Water
Removing the hills of Seattle had multiple consequences. Thomson sold
the regrading projects as a means to unite the city's divided neighborhoods
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