Spencer Jack Back From Utah With Skagit River Flooding

Spencer Jack and his dad are back home in Washington, after Thanksgiving in Utah. David, Theo and Ruby and their parental units are also back in Washington, after Thanksgiving in Arizona.

Spencer Jack and his dad got back to Mount Vernon just in time to help the valley deal with the Skagit River in flood mode for the first time this flood season. I began seeing drone videos of the flooding Skagit yesterday, with those videos showing the Skagit in the downtown zone of Mount Vernon, which is like New Orleans, as in, below river level when the river goes high.

A few years ago Mount Vernon decided to copy a bigger town in the south called Fort Worth when Mount Vernon developed its virtual Skagit River Vision, only with Mount Vernon's vision being an actual legitimate economic development scheme, combined with an actual vitally needed flood control scheme.

Minus corruption and nepotism. In other words, Mount Vernon did not give the unqualified son of the local congressperson the job of director of the Skagit River Vision, in order to motivate the parent to secure federal funds to pay for the project. Mount Vernon did what towns wearing their big city pants do, as in mostly paid for the project itself and hired qualified adults to oversee the project.

Hence the Skagit River Vision's timely completion.

As in, unlike Fort Worth Trinity River Vision's ill-planned scheme, Mount Vernon's is up and running. And, apparently, currently saving downtown Mount Vernon from a disastrous flood.

Prior to the Skagit River Vision and its flood control aspect, when a flood threatened downtown Mount Vernon a literal army of locals sandbagged for hours to build a wall to hold the river back.

Post Skagit River Vision a Dutch-designed flood wall can now be put in place in a couple hours by a handful of workers. The new flood wall is what you see holding back the river in Spencer Jack's photo documentation above.

On the right side of that flood wall is another aspect of the Skagit River Vision, a long riverwalk type attraction, complete with a plaza, or two. I do not think, unlike Fort Worth, the plazas have Japanese car company sponsors.

I remember twice helping sandbag downtown Mount Vernon. The most dramatic incident was in the early 1990s. A warm front had melted the mountain snowpack. The lowlands were drenched in hours of downpour. All the rivers of Western Washington went into flood mode. One of Washington's floating bridges sank.

I was at home, in far east Mount Vernon, high above the river, watching Seattle TV cover the situation live in Mount Vernon. About one in the morning the news started to make the situation sound dire. The National Guard was arriving. All possible help was being asked to come to downtown Mount Vernon to the staging area by the library.

I woke up my house and soon the occupants were at the downtown library, which was a beehive of action. Soon we found  ourselves part of a bucket brigade of sandbaggers, building a sandbag wall where today there is that Dutch flood wall.

At some point maximum sandbag height was reached. We were told to retreat, and that the anticipated flood crest would be about 11 that morning. At that point in time, myself and many others, flooded the high points above downtown Mount Vernon to see if the sandbag wall was going to save downtown Mount Vernon.

We could see the water start to crest over the sandbags.

And then, suddenly, the water level dropped, instantly, it seemed.

What just happened everyone wondered.

Soon all hell was breaking loose. Sirens, helicopters in the air. I do not remember how long it was before we learned the dike protecting Fir Island breached, flooding the island, and taking pressure off the river, hence the sudden drop.

For those of you reading this in Fort Worth. Fir Island is what is known as a real island, surrounded by water, two sides of which are forks of the Skagit River, the third side being the Skagit Bay of Puget Sound.

And there are two bridges connecting the Skagit mainland with Fir Island, both built over the rapid moving water of the Skagit River. Neither promoted as being signature bridges. Both built in a fraction of the time Fort Worth has been spending trying to build three simple little bridges over dry land to connect the Fort Worth mainland to an imaginary island, which could never suffer a catastrophic dike breach such as what Fir Island suffered. Twice. Because Fort Worth's imaginary Panther Island will never be what any sane person would call an island ....

Spencer Jack On Mount Vernon's Skagit River Vision Flood Control Riverwalk & Plaza

That would be Spencer Jack looking happy to be walking on my old home zone's newly finished Skagit River Vision Flood Control and Riverfront Development.

Part of this project provides a long walkway along the river, as in that on which Spencer Jack is waving.

There is also a plaza and other amenities.

Including a flood wall that can be erected quickly should a rampaging Skagit River threaten downtown Mount Vernon, a situation which previously required an army of volunteer sandbaggers to save downtown from a New Orleans in a hurricane type fate.

Yes, unlike another town which comes to mind, the Skagit River Vision actually fixes an actual flood problem.

I believe that is part of the new plaza we are looking at below. It looks to be a nice open area which likely will come in quite handy when the next Skagit Valley Tulip Festival takes place next spring.

Below we get a closer look at Spencer Jack and part of the plaza. I like how giant boulders are incorporated into the design. In the HUGE versions of these photos, which Spencer Jack's dad, my favorite nephew, Jason, sent me last night, you can much more clearly make out details, such as the giant boulders.

That thing sticking up into the air above Spencer Jack is known as the Tulip Tower. Every spring the Skagit Valley has a month long Tulip Festival, with downtown Mount Vernon being one of the festival sites. The Skagit Valley Tulip Festival attracts over a million visitors to the valley every spring. These are real actual visitors, not an imaginary 10 million visitors like that which Fort Worth propagandists claim visit Fort Worth's imaginary Sundance Square every year.

Fort Worth's propagandists have used that bogus 10 million visitors to Sundance Square number in falsehood filled submissions to get awards no one has ever heard of so the Fort Worth propagandists can then make embarrassingly absurd claims, such as Fort Worth has the Top Downtown in America.

Those of you reading this who do not know anything about Fort Worth, let alone its downtown, Sundance Square is what the Fort Worth propagandists years ago named a 36 block area of Fort Worth's downtown which was, apparently, in dire need of revitalization. After a couple decades of confusing Fort Worth's few tourists, who thought Sundance Square was the parking lots at the heart of downtown, Fort Worth finally added an actual square on those parking lots, then goofily named the new square Sundance Square Plaza.

Continuing on, a broader view of the picture above, below in the distance you can see the Skagit River bridge which connects downtown Mount Vernon to west Mount Vernon. It is a big bridge, built over water, in less than four years.

The above picture sort of gives you an idea of the size of Mount Vernon's Skagit River Vision. Unlike Fort Worth's Trinity River Vision the Skagit River Vision had a project timeline, a qualified project engineer, was fully funded, was completed on schedule and did not hire the unqualified son of a corrupt local politician in order to try and motivate a corrupt local politician to secure federal pork barrel money to help pay for the project.

Below another look at part of the plaza, the Tulip Tower and the Skagit River Bridge.

Unlike Fort Worth's Trinity River Vision, eminent domain was not abused to take people's property to build the Skagit River Vision. The businesses and buildings which had to be removed were removed after this thing called "negotiating a fair price" took place with the owners, leaving no one feeling abused, unlike what has happened in Fort Worth.

We end this look at Mount Vernon's newest attraction looking southwest across the new plaza, which I doubt has a goofy name, at the sun setting on a Pacific Northwest fall day.

Spencer Jack Wishing Us A Mighty Fine Fall From The Skagit River Vision

On the day before the Autumnal Equinox, Spencer Jack took his dad to Ground Zero of the Downtown Mount Vernon Revitalization Project, also known as the Skagit River Vision, to take a Happy First Day of Fall photo for his Great Uncle.

Spencer Jack is standing before a Get Ready sign which depicts what the Skagit River Vision will look like when it can totally be seen in a week or two.

If that sign behind Spencer Jack were not blocking the view you would be looking at the signature bridge which crosses the Skagit River, connecting West Mount Vernon to Downtown Mount Vernon. That signature bridge was built in less than four years and was built over a wide, fast moving body of water, with water elevation changes, cyclically throughout the day, to varying degrees, due to tidal action a few miles downstream.

When the Skagit River Vision's re-built riverfront opens to the public the public will be enjoying a plaza which dwarfs a recently opened plaza in another town about which I am familiar, a town with a population about 25 times bigger than Mount Vernon's.

I am still unclear how the new flood wall works. The flood wall is the key ingredient which instigated the Downtown Mount Vernon Revitalization Project, also known as the Skagit River Vision. When the Skagit River goes into flood mode Downtown Mount Vernon finds itself in a New Orleans type situation,  as in below the level of the river.

A big sandbag wall has saved Downtown Mount Vernon multiple times from a raging Skagit River. The big sandbag wall took hours to build, with hundreds helping. It takes just a few people a few minutes to put up the new flood wall.

Knowing what it is like to have lived in a town with serious flood issues, seriously addressed, is part of what makes it perplexing to me to currently live in a town with imaginary flood issues, goofily, irresponsibly addressed.

Yes, perplexing.

Very perplexing.....

Nephew Jason & Spencer Jack Look At The Skagit River Vision While I Look At The Trinity River Vision Boondoggle

Spencer Jack's dad, my nephew Jason, emailed me some photos this morning, along with some email text which got me thinking about Fort Worth's Trinity River Vision Boondoggle.

In part nephew Jason's email said...

En route to school today, via a dad transport from his mother's home in West Mount Vernon, we stopped to survey the seasonally high river water levels. Took some photos I thought you may enjoy seeing.

Western Washington has been soaked the last week with a lot of rain!

As you can tell, Mount Vernon’s Waterfront Revitalization Project Phase II is nearing completion. The old buildings that use to house the first Skagit County video rental store, restaurants and many lawyer and other professional offices, as well as the revetment were bulldozed down. A long time tavern that use to sit on the revetment was knocked down as well.

Do you remember the old Moose Lodge that used to sit on the south end of the revetment overlooking the river? It's now gone too.

In addition to photos of the Skagit River running a lot of water there were a couple photos of bulldozers bulldozing and the current state of the Skagit River Vision project, which is known to the Mount Vernon locals as the Waterfront Revitalization Project.

Unlike Fort Worth's Trinity River Vision Boondoggle, the Skagit River Vision addresses an actual real flood issue. When the Skagit River goes into severe flood mode the river bank in downtown Mount Vernon has to be sandbagged. I've been part of the sandbagging operation more than once. Twice Mount Vernon escaped disaster when levees broke downstream, taking pressure off the sandbags just as the river was about to top them.

The Skagit River Vision project installs a permanent flood wall which will render sandbags and the National Guard no longer needed when the Skagit River goes wild. Along with the flood wall the waterfront revitalization will connect downtown Mount Vernon to the river in more of a San Antonio Riverwalk way than the old way, which was pretty much a parking lot, known as the revetment, which stuck out over the river.

You may have noticed the list of buildings, businesses and restaurants that have been removed to make way for the Skagit River Vision.

Eminent Domain was not abused to take these properties, unlike what the Trinity River Vision has done in the Eminent Domain Abuse capital of the world.

The old Moose Lodge to which Jason referred did do some negotiating over the value of their property. I do not believe people in Mount Vernon, or other locales on the west coast would tolerate the cavalier way in which a citizen's property rights can be negated in some locations in Texas. Like Fort Worth. And Arlington.

The Skagit River Vision came into being well after the Trinity River Vision began. The Skagit River Vision had a project timeline, unlike the Trinity River Vision, with the Skagit River Vision nearing completion, while the Trinity River Vision seems to really have no vision regarding where the project is going, hence the boondoggle reputation.

The Skagit River Vision was, and is, fully funded, which may have something do with it being an actual functioning project with an actual scheduled time of completion, unlike the un-funded Trinity River Vision Boondoggle which relies on more than half the project being funded by federal money which is very unlikely to appear.

Another possible reason why the Skagit River Vision is a successful project, unlike the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle, is that no local  politician's unqualified son was hired to run the Skagit River Vision project....

Boring Bertha Got Me Wondering Again About The Trinity River Vision Boondoggle's Project Schedule Timeline

This morning whilst perusing various news websites I came upon two articles which eventually had me thinking about the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle.

In today's Seattle Post-Intelligencer there is an article titled Seattle Tunneling Machine Digs Out Of Launch Pit.

The tunneling machine has been nicknamed Bertha, after a long ago Seattle mayor. Why? I do not know. Bertha the Mayor was way before my time on the planet. Did Bertha the Mayor like to dig?

In part the article in the P-I said.....

"Bertha," the massive tunnel boring machine, is expected to spend the next 14 months drilling a two-mile tunnel to replace the 60-year-old Alaskan Way Viaduct. The world's largest tunnel boring machine is creating a tunnel nearly 58 feet in diameter as part of the $3.1 billion project to replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct, the double deck highway along the downtown Seattle waterfront.

Reading that it is going to take Bertha 14 months to bore this tunnel had me wondering what the timeline schedule is for the entire project. More on that further  down.

The other article that had me thinking about the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle was in my old hometown of Mount Vernon's online news source called Go Skagit. In part the Go Skagit article said....

MOUNT VERNON — The second phase of the downtown floodwall project, designed to revitalize Mount Vernon’s economy as well as provide better flood protection from the Skagit River, will move along this week with installation of conduit for the lighting system. The parking lot west of Main Street is still being graded, and contractors will pour sidewalk and curbing in the parking lot this week. Floodwall foundation construction will continue for the next few weeks. The project is on schedule to be done by September 2014.

So, Mount Vernon's Skagit River Vision is scheduled to be completed by next September, and is actually a needed flood control project which will result in revitalizing Mount Vernon's economy.

Back to Bertha.

Reading that Bertha had finally bored her way out of her launching pit had me wondering how long it will be before cars are using that new tunnel to get under Seattle. Googling brought me to the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) website where I saw that you can follow the progress of Bertha through multiple  stages til its completion.

At the WSDOT website I also found a Project Schedule section where I read the following and saw the project timeline you see below the text....

Schedule

The Alaskan Way Viaduct Replacement Program is led by WSDOT in partnership with the Federal Highway Administration, King County, the City of Seattle and the Port of Seattle. It includes more than 20 projects that will work together to reshape the SR 99 corridor.

Construction on the first project started in 2008, when crews stabilized four viaduct columns that settled following the 2001 Nisqually Earthquake. Since then, more than a dozen projects have been completed, with several more in progress or set to break ground soon. The below timeline includes major accomplishments along the road to viaduct replacement.

Since 2008 more than a dozen projects have been completed? With more in progress or ready to break ground? And from the above timeline I learn by late 2015 the new tunnel will be open for traffic.

The Trinity River Vision Boondoggle has been boondoggling for well over a decade. Has anyone seen any sort of timeline schedule of the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle of the sort you see above of the Alaskan Way Viaduct Replacement Project?

After well over a decade of the TRV Boondoggle what do we see? The Cowtown Wakepark, the Woodshed Smokehouse, The Coyote Drive-In, an incoming ice rink, happy hour inner tube floating at a venue preposterously called Panther Island Pavilion, a lot of destruction due to eminent domain abuse and no construction of the much needed flood control project that will save Fort Worth from the flood control levees that have done their job for over a half a century.

Boondoggle.

And why is there no project schedule timeline for the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle?

Supposedly 3 bridges to nowhere will soon be being constructed over the yet to be constructed, or funded, un-needed flood diversion channel.

Boondoggle.

Oh, I already said that. Never mind.....

The Lone Granger Wonders About Trinity River Vision Boondoggle Nepotism

This morning an incoming blog comment amused me...

The Lone Granger has left a new comment on your post "The Skagit River Vision Has Me Freshly Perplexed Regarding The Trinity River Vision Boondoggle":

Is the son of Mount Vernon's Representative in Congress running the Skagit River Vision? Or do you have ethical rules regarding nepotism up north?

That is the Lone Granger, above. I do not know if the Native American with the Lone Granger, above, is the Apache historic ground blesser employed by J.D. Granger when he needs a new erection blessed.

To answer the Lone Granger's question, I don't know if there are any ethical rules regarding nepotism, up north. What I do know is there is a surplus of common sense up north that prevents something outrageous, like the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle's nepotistic appointment of Congresswoman Kay Granger's unqualified son to run a public works boondoggle that the public has never voted for.

The thing is, I would hazard to guess that the vast majority of those who live in the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle Zone could not tell you what nepotism is, or why it is considered wrong in civilized parts of the world or how hiring J.D. Granger to manage the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle is a classic example of nepotism.

The Skagit River Vision Has Me Freshly Perplexed Regarding The Trinity River Vision Boondoggle

No. In the image on the left you are not looking at an artist's rendering of what Fort Worth's Trinity River Vision Boondoggle will look like if it ever becomes anything anyone can see.

What you are looking at is an artist's rendering of what my old hometown of Mount Vernon's Skagit River Vision, known as the Downtown Mount Vernon Flood Protection and Revitalization Project, will look like when Phase II of the Skagit River Vision, which had its groundbreaking ceremony this past Saturday, is completed by Fall of 2014.

In an extremely significant difference between the Skagit River Vision and the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle, the Skagit River Vision includes public restrooms, of the modern plumbing sort, not the outhouse sort favored by Fort Worth's Trinity River Vision Boondoggle.

Unlike when some minor aspect of the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle has a ground breaking ceremony, such as what was recently held for the future site of the Major Ripley Allen Arnold Monument and the John V. McMilllan Plaza, I don't believe any historic ground blessing from a local Native American took place in Mount Vernon, even though there are three tribal nations in the Skagit Valley, those being the Swinomish, the Skagit and the Samish.

The Skagit River Vision appears to have what is known as a construction timeline.

Phase I was completed in October of 2010. Phase II is now under way, and includes a floodwall engineered to protect historic downtown Mount Vernon, 1,650 linear feet of floodwall, 24-ft wide riverwalk and trail connections to the regional trail system and 30,000 square foot Public Riverfront Park.

Imagine that, a River Vision that includes an actual much needed flood control project.

Twice in the 1990s I joined the throngs sandbagging downtown Mount Vernon in the middle of the night. The Trinity River has gone into flood mode several times since I've been in Texas. I don't recollect there ever being a call out for sandbagging help in the downtown Fort Worth Trinity River Vision Boondoggle zone where millions are proposed to be spent to prevent floods where no flood has happened for over a half a century.

Meanwhile, I have read, more than once, of sandbagging operations in Fort Worth's next door neighbor town of Haltom City. But, the Tarrant Regional Water District has no vision for Haltom City that might mitigate flooding.

Phase III of the Skagit River Vision gets under way in 2014. It includes more floodwall, a section of earthen levee, more riverwalk and trail connections to the regional trail system.

How come there is no timeline for the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle? Or is there and I've not heard of it? No timeline has ever shown up in any of the TRV Boondoggle's quarterly propaganda mailings.

I've blogged about my perplexation regarding the apparent lack of a TRV Boondoggle timeline previously, in a blogging titled Can Anyone Find A Timeline Schedule Of Construction For The Trinity River Vision Boondoggle?

Can you imagine how the locals might have reacted if in, I don't know, let's say 2006, the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle propaganda shared a timeline that showed in 2010 the world's premiere urban wakeboard lake would open, in 2011 a restaurant would open, in 2012 Happy Hour Inner Tube Floats  would start up on the Trinity River in some make believe thing called Panther Island Pavilion, which would make Fort Worth into a world class music venue and in 2013 the world's first drive-in movie theater of the 21st century would open?

Would not this information, in a 2006 timeline, have made the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle into the laughingstock, with the locals, which it richly deserves to be?

If the TRV Boondoggle published a project timeline in 2013, what would we see? We know about the non-signature bridges that are supposedly going to be under construction, soon, across the un-needed flood control diversion channel. What will we be seeing in 2015? The world's biggest trampoline park? Another restaurant? A paintball park? The longest go-kart track in the world?

So, really, what is the timeline for the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle? What phase of this un-needed flood control project are we at now? Does anyone know? The TRV Boondoggle is well over a decade old now. Should there not be something more to see in the vision than a wakeboard lake, a restaurant, inner tubes floating, a lame music venue, a drive-in movie theater and a lot of property taken by abusing eminent domain?

Is there any sort of concise project description of the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle of the sort that describes the Skagit River Vision? Such as.....

The Downtown Mount Vernon Flood Protection and Revitalization Project will protect Mount Vernon's historic downtown from flooding with FEMA certified flood protection and serve to revitalize the historic downtown area. The project will remove the downtown from the FEMA 100-year base flood elevation and will release pent up economic opportunities that are so important to our region. The project is the key component of the comprehensive downtown redevelopment plan that is being used to guide public and private investments over the next 20 years. The Project, which features a river promenade, trail system and public riverfront park, is being done in three phases.

Below is an artist's rendering video of the Skagit River Vision. Does such a video exist of the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle? Mount Vernon has a population of around 30,000. Fort Worth has a population approaching 800,000. How is it that Mount Vernon appears to be wearing big city britches whilst Fort Worth is still in knee pants? It is very perplexing....