A tunnel-boring machine will start carving a 14-foot-diameter tunnel in south Snohomish County by the end of this month.
The six-mile dig is part of a 13-mile, $210 million tunnel that will move sewage through the new Brightwater sewage treatment plant.
Construction starts Aug. 28.
King County is building the $1.62 billion plant near the intersection of Highway 9 and Highway 522. It is scheduled to open in 2010.
In a related matter, Snohomish Country Superior Court Judge James Allendoerfer on Wednesday said he’s likely to decide today whether to accept legal paperwork aimed at blocking construction of Brightwater.
Allendoerfer, who earlier rejected a city of Woodinville land-use claim against Snohomish County and Brightwater, is being asked to accept a friend-of-the-court brief and petition from about 20 opponents of the sewage treatment plant.
The petition asks the judge to accept the legal papers with the idea of convening a grand jury to investigate the process by which permits for the plant were granted.
In the alternative, the citizens want an ombudsman to be appointed to examine the process or an attorney appointed at taxpayer expense to represent the opponents.
Grand juries can be convened if the majority of the Superior Court judges in a county decide such a panel is needed.
Only two grand juries have ever been convened in Snohomish County, the last in the 1970s to investigate alleged county corruption.
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