On January 11, traffic and commuting in downtown Seattle is going to change forever. Why? Because the Alaskan Way Viaduct will close for good.

It’s being replaced by a brand new tunnel that’ll have four lanes running from SoDo to South Lake Union — but it won’t open immediately. The Washington State Department of Transportation hopes to open the tunnel the week of February 4.

Nervous about what you’ll do for those three weeks before the tunnel opens? Let’s answer a couple questions you drivers and transit riders might have…

I never use the viaduct. So what’s the big deal?

If you’re one of the I-5 drivers who spends, on average, 55 hours a year stuck in gridlocked traffic, we have some bad news for you: Traffic’s going to get worse.

“Our transit system is very fragile,” says Heather Marx, the Seattle Department of Transportation’s director of downtown mobility. “When you take something like the viaduct out of commission — that’s 90,000 travelers a day who use it — those trips will have to go someplace else.”

Many drivers are expected to go to I-5, our city’s other major north-south corridor, or other busy streets in downtown like 1st Avenue and 5th Avenue. And that traffic headache’s expected to last until 2024.

For context: In 2016, the viaduct was shut down for nine days while our tunnel was bored below. During that closure, we saw a 30 percent increase in traffic times with rush hour traffic starting earlier and lasting longer. Those traffic delays spread out to Everett, Bellevue, and Federal Way, said Laura Newborn, a WSDOT spokeswoman. Nearly 20,000 more people have moved here since then, so … oof.

I ride public transit. That means I’m safe, right?

Wrong. 😀 Busing or riding light rail is going to keep you from the worst of it, but your commute’s still going to be longer (and likely more cramped) than it is now, Heather and Laura said. So get to that bus stop early, folks.

Twelve bus routes from West Seattle, Burien, and White Center, which currently cross the viaduct, will be detoured through SoDo during the three-week closure. The buses will eventually have to mix with surface street traffic, so that will be fun.

What’s the city doing to help us through all this?

King County Metro will have 20 extra buses on standby in North and West Seattle. The water taxi will also run a second boat between West Seattle and downtown on weekdays during the closure. Metro has more helpful transit tips here. The city also plans to launch a new program to help West Seattleites hail shuttle vans to the water taxi or buses in the Alaska Junction starting Monday.

A word of caution from Heather: Traffic might not be terrible the first Monday after the Viaduct shuts down January 11. But the more drivers who decide to brave gridlock the next two days, the worse those rush hour commutes will be.

What can I do to make my commute less 💩?

🚲 Bike or take public transit when you can. Even if you’re still stuck in traffic on a bus, you’re taking up less space on the road.

💪 Practice. Get familiar with your nearby bus and train routes and do a practice run before the viaduct shuts down on January 11. “Don’t make the Monday after the closure your forced experiment,” Laura said.

👥 Bring a buddy or three. If you have to drive into the city, carpool with friends so there’s fewer cars on the road.

🚗 Change how and when you work. If your employer’s flexible, Laura and Heather recommend shifting your work hours so you start earlier or later — a.k.a. avoid rushing to work during peak traffic times. Or let your boss know why January is the perfect time to try working from home.

Want to get into more of the traffic nitty gritty? Check out The Seattle Times’ in-depth Q&A series about the viaduct closure — Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3. Send more of your Qs to ‘em here. For traffic alerts, be sure to follow @SDOT and @WSDOT on Twitter.

The bright side to January’s traffic hell: More people might decide that solo driving just isn’t worth it. That, at least, is the hope of transit advocates who see much more walking, biking, and bus- and light rail-riding in our city’s future, and want us to get there fast. One group — Move All Seattle Sustainably — put out a set of priorities for the city to boost its transit game while it snarls up downtown. “With climate catastrophe looming and population growth continuing,” they wrote, “we have no other responsible choice.” (Crosscut)

The Phoenix Suns in Seattle, huh? The owner of the Phoenix Suns NBA team is using our city to scare his own. Phoenix’s city council isn’t so sure it wants to move ahead with a big renovation of Talking Stick Resort Arena, where the Suns play. So Suns owner Robert Sarver told one council member he isn’t so sure he wants the team to stick around, and threatened to move the Suns to Seattle or Las Vegas. Could that really happen? The Stranger’s Charles Mudede doesn’t think so. To him, this is just another example of a sports team owner using Seattle “as a stick to beat other cities into submission.” (Arizona Republic, The Stranger)

Bike bandits. While we Seattleites change how we get around, Seattle thieves are changing how they get away. A man and woman who police think held up a couple of people in Capitol Hill last weekend got outta there by hopping onto a pair of Lime bikes. But “since there are thousands of them strewn about Seattle,” wrote some amused staffer at MyNorthwest, “that did little to narrow things down.” 🚲 (MyNorthwest)

Throw axes over beers. We go to bars to drink and talk. We go to the 23 bars on this handy list to drink, talk, and play darts, board games, pinball, corn hole, mini golf, ping pong, axe throwing, and even old school video games. “Grab an on-tap sour beer and some vegetarian pub food,” Aimee Rizzo writes of Georgetown Liquor Co., “and rediscover how hard Donkey Kong Country actually is.” (Infatuation Seattle)

THAT’S ALL FOR TODAY

We’ll see you tomorrow.

Beep beep. 🚗 — The Evergrey