Infrastructure

How is King County doing?

Providing and maintaining physical infrastructure is an essential service of government. Infrastructure is critical to the economic vitality of the county, safeguarding public health and safety, maintaining and improving mobility, and accommodating future growth. National, state, county, city and other governments must work to ensure that infrastructure is kept in good condition not only to meet day-to-day public needs, but also to maximize and protect the investment of public funds. Maintenance, repair, upgrades and, when necessary, replacement of infrastructure also helps enable essential public facilities to better withstand emergencies such as earthquakes, floods and severe winter storms, as well as the ongoing effects of exposure to the elements.

King County residents rely on many types of physical infrastructure, such as drinking water, wastewater and runoff control systems, solid waste transfer stations, levees, airports, roads, bridges and transit vehicles.

King County maintains nearly 500 aging flood protection facilities totaling nearly 119 linear miles, which have not been adequately repaired or maintained over time due to significant budgetary limitations. Future floods will likely exceed the capacity and protective abilities of these flood protection facilities, threatening property, lives, major transportation corridors, communities and the regional economy for which these flood protection facilities protect. When inspected following the November 2006 flood event, 78 facilities were identified as having sustained approximately $30 million in damages.

Transportation infrastructure in King County facilitates efficient and safe movement of people and goods. Many components of the transportation system were built over 50 to 100 years ago. Road Services is responsible for the maintenance of 185 bridges owned or partially owned by King County. Only three of these bridges have load restrictions on them.The health of the Information and Telecommunication (IT) infrastructure is also vital to the functioning of county programs and services. An innovative and effective IT system throughout the county's functional areas contributes to efficient service provision as well as ease in accessibility and use by King County's partners, stakeholders and residents.

What else influences these indicators?

Infrastructure condition is influenced by a number of factors, including the age of the infrastructure, the design and quality of initial construction, the type of material, amount of use, frequency of maintenance, weather conditions, and damage due to natural disasters or other unanticipated events.

Regular maintenance is essential to get the maximum amount of service out of existing infrastructure. Limited financial resources and rising costs can affect jurisdictions' ability to make the necessary investments in infrastructure.

What role does King County government play?

Timely maintenance of infrastructure is essential to meeting condition standards and getting the most service (at the lowest cost) out of existing facilities. King County government is responsible for the maintenance of roads and bridges (excluding interstate and state highways) in the unincorporated area, as well as sewer lines and levees throughout the county. When facilities have significant deterioration, are damaged, or reach the end of their lifecycle, the county needs to invest in retrofit, rehabilitation or replacement projects to ensure infrastructure condition goals continue to be met.

The county's Road Services Division performs both routine maintenance tasks, such as pothole patching, ditch and drainage system cleaning, guardrail repair, mowing and grading shoulders, and more extensive undertakings, such as pavement overlay, repair or replacement of broken or worn bridge components, bridge painting, and seawall/bulkhead repair.

King County flood facilities protect property with an estimated assessed value of over $7 billion. The Metropolitan King County Council established the King County Flood Control Zone District in April 2007 to help protect public health and safety, regional economic centers, public and private properties and transportation corridors through the implementation of comprehensive flood protection projects and flood risk reduction programs. The newly created District will address the backlog of maintenance and repairs to levees, acquire repetitive loss properties and other at-risk floodplain properties, and improve countywide flood warning and flood prediction capacity.

The Wastewater Treatment Division (WTD) operates 335 miles of pipes and tunnels and has over $10 billion in replaceable assets. WTD monitors and evaluates the remaining service life of assets to forecast schedules for replacement and renewal.

The Office of Information Resources Management provides IT services for King County agencies, including: operation, maintenance and support of the county's IT infrastructure; development, integration and maintenance of business applications for customers; planning, implementation, operation and maintenance of the county's wireless communications systems (excluding the Metro Transit system) and management of the county's telecommunications franchises.