I was wondering if any of you Washingtonians or Seattle-lites could answer a question for me. I've been doing some google checking but not really finding the answers I was looking for.

Do Tugboats operate on Lake Union/Lake Washington? Do big commercial ships? or does the size of the locks/canal system prevent big ships from moving from the Puget Sound into the lake system?

Could you take a warship like...I dunno a Destroyer or something, and move it through the canal system and park it in Lake Washington?

You can if you upgrade it with LTA!

I believe Lake Washington is set only for Commercial Watercraft, the shipping Lanes that feed into Lake Washington from the Puget Sound can be pretty narrow in some areas, making large ships like Destroyers or Carriers less likely to get there, beyond that, I believe most of the bridges that cross the Lake are solid bridges, meaning if you don't fit the clearance, you aren't getting passed them. There are also some bridges (one I recall offhand) in Washington that sit directly on the water using buoyancy to keep them afloat as car's drove along it. All in all, I don't think a Destroyer could make it into Lake Washington.

As far as a Tugboat, it could feasibly make it I think, they aren't really that big. but most Commercial fishing is done in the Puget Sound or further out.

(not 100% certain on everything, haven't lived in Washington in awhile)

Yes.

How big do you mean? The canal is pretty small and not used for a whole lot of cargo transit these days. It's mostly small pleasure craft on Lake Washington now. You're not going to fit a container ship in there, not a chance. The ship canal locks are 150' long and 30' wide for the small ones.

It's never really been described in Shadowrun, and they could have done anything in the intervening decades. I doubt it though.

Tugboats, yes. They're really not that big. Big commercial ships, no; the ship canal isn't that big, and it's mostly used for pleasure craft and fishing vessels (kinda like the ones on Deadliest Catch, several of which are based in Seattle).


I'm not sure how big a destroyer is nowadays, but I know back in the old days, they used to send them through. There's pictures of destroyers going through the Locks at the visitor center, mostly from the pre-WWII days. A carrier wouldn't fit, but probably a small, older destroyer (like the size of the Arizona) could still make it.

Edit: Here's the Wikipedia page on the Ballard Locks, which is the choke point for the Ship Canal. The bigger one is about 80ft/24m wide, so anything thinner than that should be able to make it. A Burke class destroyer is listed as a beam of 66ft/20m, so while it'd be a tight fit, it could squeeze through.

So yeah, I figured the international cargo ships or the like stop off at a port in the Puget Sound, and then get put onto smaller ships that take the stuff more inland, assuming they don't just use trucks or such. Google satellite maps seem to show some decent sized commercial seeming ships, through Lake Union and Portage bay, like longer than 10 sedans length. But not so much past that.

Are you refering to some other ship called the Arizona, because the most famous Arizona warship was a battleship and quite a lot bigger than a destroyer?

The one at Pearl Harbor is about 180 m long and 29 m wide. As I recall, the Arizona is very narrow, so I was eyeballing it. Technically it's too big, but only just.

It sounds like you have the makings of a cool story. Just go with your idea and suspend the realism.

The really big cargo vessels use the Port of Seattle or Port of Tacoma. Military vessels use one of the many naval bases scattered around Puget Sound. There are no active military bases that I know of on Lake Washington anymore, though. Sand Point was the last, and it closed about thirty years ago (although I believe NOAA is still based from there).

there are actually several small ports along the Puget Sound & such that offload cargo that gets driven further inland by trucks more often than not.

Yeah; I actually still know a truck driver who works for one of the Port facilities. Truck and train is how most cargo is carried inland; I can't recall seeing major cargo being transported through the locks in my lifetime.

Edit: That said, there are maritime museums on Lake Washington and Lake Union. An old decommissioned destroyer could easily be sitting there.

me either, I spent 12 years in the Everett Area, but my father worked out of the Everett Naval Base & in the trips I made south to Seattle, I don't recall much in the waterways, mostly smaller vessels.

Indeed... I remember visiting family there in 1982, and remember seeing a Destroyer going through the locks (my parents have a picture of it somewhere). ~32 Years ago (wow, that many years ago?).

The larger lock is 80 ft × 825 ft. That's more than enough for a modern destroyer. It's enough for some of the smallest aircraft carriers too!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiram_M._Chittenden_Locks

Other than (<1950s) logging and bridge construction, Lake Washington is almost completely recreational.

Lake union has some mid-size dry docks, but not much else. Again, mostly recreational.

In terms of what they can get through those locks, check this out:
http://blog.friendsoftheballardlocks.org/2...ber-4-1975.html

I actually remember that. There's also photos of this at the Visitor Center to this day. I always wondered how they convinced people to let them take it through.