The Seattle Monorail Project involved the complex insertion of a new 14-mile elevated rapid transit system through many existing neighborhoods, in a city that is now a world leader in sustainable building. Inherent to its planning and identified early on as a fundamental project goal, sustainability was a clear and comprehensive policy that governed the Seattle Monorail Project. Our role, as Sustainability Lead for the project, was to create a system of sustainability measurement that would translate into a performance-based model for a Design-Build-Operate-Maintain (DBOM) contract.

The goals of the system were to be planned, constructed, operated and maintained using the most cost-effective practices available that simultaneously provide the greatest environmental benefit without adverse effects on the construction schedule. The contract documents encouraged contractors to contribute innovative ideas that help to improve the project's environmental performance. Committed to finding ways to make the most impact with the least effort, i.e., the "low-hanging fruit", the agency promoted integrated design strategies based on longer-term cost-benefit through:

• coordinating the environmental efforts of all parts of the project into an integrated vision.
• understanding the linkages of sustainability choices on the project schedule and budget.
• picking the strategies that are most effective for the least cost.
• developing a strategic environmental plan for design, construction and operations including ongoing performance benchmarking strategy.

We identified a wide variety of strategies intended to enhance the overall environmental performance of the project during its design and construction phases, and during the ongoing life of the system for the operations and maintenance. Our role as Sustainability Lead empowered the collaborative discussion of the project's sustainability goals with a wide-ranging group of City officials, utility representatives, train systems engineers, project designers, permitting specialists, legal counsel, and neighborhood residents. Used in this way, the project's ambitious sustainability initiatives were a powerful integrative measure that created goodwill, cooperation, and political support for the sometimes controversial project.