Building a Seawall to Save the Waterfront
A proposal to use excavated earth from new construction to extend the city's harbor, protecting the waterfront while expanding valuable land.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The excavation for the new Safe Deposit building will cause the removal of a very considerable quantity of earth, which will be dumped on the street lots behind. There, by the action of the tide, it will be spread and injury rather than good done by it. A certain amount of filling along the waterfront will be of benefit to the city, and no better matter can be used than that from the locality referred to. The limit for this filling should be marked by a wall, however, that the filling may not extend into the harbor and so do damage. The building of this wall can be accomplished at comparatively small expense; the Yesler and Commercial Company mills can easily build it of slabs, precisely as they have already done much boarding. With such a wall on the tide, the filling could go on indefinitely and a beginning then made on a waterfront which in time would be invaluable to the city. Why not begin the work in 1884?
“A certain amount of filling along the waterfront will be of benefit to the city, and no better matter can be used than that from the locality referred to.”
This editorial proposed an early version of Seattle's massive land reclamation projects, which eventually transformed the tidal flats into the industrial SoDo district. The tension between private development and public harbor management remains a cornerstone of Seattle's modern urban planning debates.
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