Three-to-seven-hour commute. WSDOT not concerned

You might have been concerned about taking forever to traverse Seattle in the snow. But it was no big deal to your state transportation officials. We took almost five hours to get from downtown Tacoma to Lake Forest Park, north of Seattle. But we lost much of it on the Alaska Way Viaduct; its tunnel was closed which slowed traffic so the climb from the surface to elevated got all frozen; that stranded about ten vehicles on the incline, making it treacherous to every car that passed - single file. No big deal - First, State DOT Director Linda Hammond says she caused much of the mess by not reversing the Seattle I-5 express lanes to northbound, as is done every day. Why? Because it would take a crew 60 to 90 minutes to de-ice on ramps, etc. And furthermore, they would just have to reverse them at night for the morning commute. Why bother? That's their reasoning to hugely cut the highway capacity out of Seattle. Why bother??? Because it cost thousands of people hours of their time. Duh. Seattle Times quotes their official position:

... Kris Olsen, a spokeswoman with the DOT, said Monday afternoon that officials weren't too concerned about affecting the evening commute because it seems many people are out of town for the holidays.

Read the comments there to learn of 3.5 hours commutes within the city limits, seven hours to Lynnwood and more.