If you’ve been in the vicinity of 12th Ave. and Yesler recently you’ve no doubt noticed some pretty serious excavation.
The Seattle Housing Authority is doing “brownfields cleanup” on four parcels it owns on the west side of 12th just north of the building on the south end of the block. Specifically, the site is 109 to 117 12th Avenue.
SHA plans to develop a mixed use building on the site (including the parcel of the building at the south end of the block, which parcel is inot inlcuded in the brownfields cleanup. Plans for the future building have not been prepared, according to the Housing Authority.
On the parcels in the past were a dry cleaning establishment and underground oil storage tanks. In 2004 SHA discovered petroleum and solvent-contaminated soil on at least two of the parcels.
The cleanup plan for the site includes the removal of existing underground storage tanks and the “excavation and removal of accessible soil exceeding regulatory limits for identified contaminents.” (in the words of the “Brownfields Fact Sheet” for the site distributed by SHA.)
Following soil removal, and disposal at facilities permitted to receive contaminated soil, the excavation will be filled with uncontaminated soil. SHA will then conduct groundwater compliance monitoring to confirm a successful cleanup.
SHA has received two Brownfields Grants from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in the amount of $296,000 to help pay for the cleanup.
The SHA program manager for this effort is Paul Fitzgerald, 206 615-1515, [email protected].