a deep bore tunnel to replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct. The City of Seattle began studying the possibility of bringing streetcars back to the city center in late 2012. The locally preferred alternative for this project adopted in late 2014 supported a route along 1st Avenue and not Alaskan Way. James Corner Field Operations, the Manhattan-based landscape-architecture firm hired to recommend a new vision for the Seattle waterfront once the Viaduct has been demolished, also recommended the Streetcar not be returned to Alaskan Way, but to nearby First Avenue instead. While future plans for the line were determined, the streetcars were stored in an old warehouse in SoDo for more than a decade. In 2015, the Federal Transit Administration informed King County that if the streetcars are not put back in service soon, Metro would need to pay $205,000 to compensate the agency for its remaining investment in the cars. At the same time, the warehouse used to store the streetcars was in poor condition and the land needed for expansion of a neighboring bus base. In January 2016, it was announced that a private venture, Friends of the Benson Trolleys, was intending to raise the money required to retrofit two of the streetcars to allow them to be used on the future Center City Connector on 1st Avenue. The plan closely mirrors one suggested in May 2009 by then Seattle Mayor, Greg Nickels. The remaining three cars were sold by King County to St. Louis, for use on their heritage Delmar Loop Trolley, for which they will need several modifications before they can be used. Only one car has been retrofitted (by Gomaco) for service in St. Louis; the other two remain in storage for possible future use. The specific cars sold to St. Louis were Nos. 482, 512, and 518, and they left Seattle in early June 2016. The streetcars retained by King County Metro are Nos. 272 and 605 (along with 525, which never entered service, and has been kept only as a source of parts). Because the warehouse in which they had been stored since the end of Waterfront Streetcar service in 2005 was due to be torn down, to make way for expansion of a Metro bus garage, the streetcars were moved out in early June 2016, to a private site in Arlington, Washington, where they will be stored indefinitely, awaiting possible future developments in