The City's Claim to the Tide Flats
The state Supreme Court rules that Seattle can extend its streets across tide lands, reshaping the city's waterfront development.
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Olympia, May 10 — The Supreme Court today handed down a decision in the case of the Columbia & Puget Sound Railroad Company versus the City of Seattle, involving the right of the court to declare whether or not a certain part of the tide lands within the limits of Seattle is a public street. The Supreme Court decided that under the constitutional provisions and the act of the legislature, a city can extend any of its streets in a direct course across the tide lands, and that when it has done so, no private person can prevent its taking possession of and improving the same.
“A city can extend any of its streets in a direct course across the tide lands, and that when it has done so no private person can prevent its taking possession of and improving the same.”
This ruling was pivotal for Seattle’s growth, as it solidified the city’s power to control and build over the vast, muddy tide flats that then defined the waterfront. It laid the legal groundwork for the massive regrades and infill projects that created the modern downtown and industrial districts we walk on today.
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