The Tug-of-War Over the Main Street Slip
Local contractors and industrial giants clash over the city’s limited waterfront access.
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.
At a City Council meeting, a heated dispute arose between Mr. Potvin and Colonel Haines of the Oregon Improvement Company regarding the placement of a slip at the foot of Main Street. Potvin, a contractor, argued that he had already begun work on the slip and that the city was obligated to keep faith with him, citing the need for local contractors to have water access to unload materials for the massive construction projects following the fire. Colonel Haines countered that the company needed the space at the foot of Main Street for ocean steamers and suggested Jackson Street would suffice for Potvin. The council eventually compromised: they granted the Oregon Improvement Company the right to build at Jackson Street, but mandated that the city reimburse Potvin for the expenses he had already incurred at the Main Street site.
“He knew that the Oregon Improvement Company would suffer by the slip going in there, but he thought that the interests of the city were paramount to those of the company.”
This civic struggle reflects the eternal tension between private industrial monopolies and small-scale developers in Seattle's waterfront development—a conflict that defined the city's regrade era and continues to shape its shoreline today.
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