The Montlake Cut is the easternmost section of the Lake Washington Ship Canal, which passes through the

city A city is a human settlement of notable size.Goodall, B. (1987) ''The Penguin Dictionary of Human Geography''. London: Penguin.Kuper, A. and Kuper, J., eds (1996) ''The Social Science Encyclopedia''. 2nd edition. London: Routledge. It can be def ...

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

, linking Lake Washington to

Puget Sound Puget Sound ( ) is a sound of the Pacific Northwest, an inlet of the Pacific Ocean, and part of the Salish Sea. It is located along the northwestern coast of the U.S. state of Washington. It is a complex estuarine system of interconnected ma ...

. It was completed in 1916 and is approximately long and wide. The center channel is wide and deep. The path along the cut was designated a National Recreation Trail as Montlake Cut National Waterside in 1971. The Cut provides a connection between Union Bay, part of Lake Washington, to the east and

Portage Bay Portage Bay is a body of water, often thought of as the eastern arm of Lake Union, that forms a part of the Lake Washington Ship Canal in Seattle, Washington. To the east, Portage Bay is connected with Union Bay—a part of Lake Washington— ...

, an arm of Lake Union, to the west. It is spanned by the

Montlake Bridge The Montlake Bridge is a double-leaf bascule bridge that carries State Route 513 (Montlake Boulevard) over Seattle's Montlake Cut—part of the Lake Washington Ship Canal—connecting Montlake and the University District. It is the easternmo ...

, a bascule drawbridge carrying Montlake Boulevard ( State Route 513). Most of the land on the north shore of the Cut is occupied by the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW, simply Washington, or informally U-Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1861, Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast; it was established in Seattl ...

, its medical school to the west and its stadium parking lot to the east; residences and a recreational trail occupy the south bank, which is part of the Montlake neighborhood. It is the site of the annual Windermere Cup crew regatta and the Seattle Yacht Club's Opening Day Boat Parade, both of which take place on the first Saturday in May. The cut lowered the water level of Lake Washington by 8.8 feet, drained the wetlands around the lake, and lowered the lake below the outflow at the Black River (at the south end of the lake in Renton). The Montlake Cut's original name was Erickson Cut. Contractor C.J. Erickson commenced the big project in turning on his big steam shovel in celebration of the October 27, 1909, post A-Y-P Exposition era, in the final push to complete the Lake Washington Canal project. At the ceremony were Judge Roger S. Greene, Judge Thomas Burke, J.S. Brace and John H. McGraw who turned the first shovel of dirt that day. The

Duwamish Duwamish may refer to: * Duwamish tribe, a Native American tribe in Washington state * Duwamish River, in Washington state * ''Duwamish'' (fireboat) See also * Elliott Bay Elliott Bay is a part of the Central Basin region of Puget Sound. It is ...

called the area "Carry a Canoe" (

Lushootseed Lushootseed (txʷəlšucid, dxʷləšúcid), also Puget Salish, Puget Sound Salish or Skagit-Nisqually, is a language made up of a dialect continuum of several Salish tribes of modern-day Washington state. Lushootseed is one of the Coast Salis ...

: sxWátSadweehL). Indigenous people had been portaging between the lakes for centuries, either carrying canoes or shoving them along an intermittent creek that appeared when Lake Washington overflowed. "The Cut" is home to the University of Washington Rowing Teams, serving as the final 500 meters of the 2000 meter race course.

References

External links

Montlake Cut (Seattle)
at

HistoryLink HistoryLink is an online encyclopedia of Washington state history. The site has more than 8,100 entries and attracts 5,000 daily visitors. It has 500 biographies and more than 14,000 images. The non-profit historical organization History Ink prod ...

{{Lake Washington Ship Canal Buildings and structures in Seattle Water transport in Seattle Montlake, Seattle