Seattle Gum Wall (Photo: Pike Place Market) 
 
 SEATTLE -- Big changes are coming for the famous Gum Wall in Seattle's Pike Place Market. 
 
 For the first time in 20 years, the market plans to clean all the gum off the wall. Pike Place Market says a total scrub down is needed because of the sugar in the gum. 
 
 Market Theater's walls in Post Alley will be steam cleaned starting Nov. 10. The cleaning is expected to take multiple days due to the volume of gum on the walls. 
 
 Once the wall is clean, people will be allowed to put gum back up again. 
 
 The Gum Wall has grown to eight feet high and over 54 feet wide, with approximately 150 piece of gum per brick. 
 
 According to Pike Place, an estimated one million gum wads cover the wall. 
 
 The Gum Wall is located in Post Alley, under the market. It was started 20 years ago by people waiting in line for a late night improv show. 
 
 Before the clean-up begins, Pike Place is holding a contest for Gum Wall photos. You can find more information here. 
 
 Read or Share this story: http://www.king5.com/story/news/2015/11/03/gumwallscrubdown/75080416/ 

 The gum wall at Pike Place Market was started 20 years ago by audience members waiting in line for our late night improv show. 
 
 For the first time in 20 years, the Pike Place Market gum wall will get a major scrub, market staff said. 
 
 The steam cleaning of the wall and adjacent walls in Post Alley will begin at 8 a.m. Nov. 10 and is anticipated to last until Thursday, November 12 or November 13 due to its multi-ton volume, staff said. 
 
 “The gum will be allowed back within the boundary of the original wall, which is left (north) of the Market Theater,” market spokeswoman Emily Crawford said. 
 
 The gum wall was started 20 years ago by audience members waiting in line for our late night improv show. 
 
 Did you know the Pike Place Market gum wall isn't the only one of its kind? Check out the others! >>kiro.tv/GumWallPICS 
 
 “Since then, it has been cleaned and recreated three times,” said Kent Whipple, Marketing and Development Director for Unexpected Productions, the improv theater troupe that operates the Market Theater in Post Alley. “The Wall is like the art that takes place behind it, constantly changing from the sharing of its participants. And, like a good improv story, has a beginning, middle and end. The Wall is ready to start a new story. We are excited to see the new incarnation.” 
 
 The Market also is hosting a photo contest celebrating the Gum Wall, which has more than 80,000 tagged posts on Instagram. 
 
 “We recognize the Gum Wall is one of the most photographed locations at Pike Place Market,” said Crawford, who is Director of Communications and Marketing for Pike Place Market Preservation and Development Authority. “The photo contest provides an opportunity for fans around the world to share their Gum Wall memories.” 
 
 For people who want to stick one last piece of gum on the wall before it is cleaned, the Gum Wall photo contest runs from Tuesday, November 3 to Monday November 9, 2015. Voting ends on Thursday, November 12, 2015 with the winner announced the next day. 
 
 Photos can be posted to the Pike Place Market Facebook page or the contest web page. 

 The popular, sticky Pike Place Market attraction will get a heavy-duty scrubdown next week. Officials know the gum is sure to come back, but they’re hoping it will be contained to a smaller area. 
 
 Once named the world’s second-germiest tourist attraction, Pike Place Market’s gum wall will soon be scrubbed of 20 years’ buildup of sugary stickum. 
 
 Emily Crawford, a spokeswoman for the Pike Place Market Preservation & Development Authority (PDA) said the gum wall is cleaned “every other month” by the PDA with a steamer, but this will be the first time all the gum is removed from the original wall. 
 
 Related: Where will all of the gum go? 
 
 The PDA has hired a contractor, Cascadian Building Maintenance, “because it’s going to be a very large job,” Crawford said. 
 
 Kelly Foster, of Cascadian Building Maintenance, said the gum will be removed with an “industrial steam machine that works like a pressure washer.” 
 
 The machine will melt the gum with 280-degree steam; it will fall to the ground, and a two- to three-man crew will collect the gum in five-gallon buckets. 
 
 “This is probably the weirdest job we’ve done,” Foster said. 
 
 Crawford said the PDA estimates 1 million pieces of gum are adhered to the walls of Post Alley, and the buildup is in some places 6 inches thick. The cleaning job is expected to cost $4,000. 
 
 More accurate figures on the amount of gum could be forthcoming. 
 
 “We want to weigh it,” she said. 
 
 Crawford said the gum needs to be cleaned off the walls to preserve the historic buildings in the Market district. 
 
 “It was never part of the charter or the history of the Market to have the walls covered with gum,” she said. “Gum is made of chemicals, sugar, additives. Things that aren’t good for us. I can’t imagine it’s good for brick.” 
 
 Crawford said cleaning will begin Nov. 10. The job will likely take three or four days. 
 
 Colorful globs of salivated chew will no doubt return shortly, the PDA expects. 
 
 “We’re not saying it can’t come back,” Crawford said. “We need to wipe the canvas clean and keep (it) fresh.” 
 
 The PDA hopes that fresh start hinders gum-wall sprawl. In recent years, Crawford said gum has advanced to new turf “far beyond the original wall.” 
 
 Her theory: “It’s so gross,” she said. “People don’t actually want to touch or get near the gum wall. They’re looking for empty surfaces.” 
 
 The PDA plans to place more public art in the alleyway and hopes having 20 years of gum removed will keep future visitors more targeted when in placing their gum. 
 
 Meantime, the Market is holding a photo contest on its Facebook page, where people can vote on favorite gum-wall pictures.
– One of America's grossest tourist attractions is getting a scrub-down. Seattle's gum wall in Pike Place Market, which has been collecting wads of chewed gum for 20 years, will be reduced to plain old brick beginning Tuesday courtesy of a contractor with an industrial steam machine, reports the Seattle Times. The area's Preservation and Development Authority says the wall has attracted 1 million pieces of gum, spread eight feet high by 54 feet wide, and the gunk is six inches thick in spots, per KING 5. And though it's cleaned every other month with a light steaming, officials say it's time the gum is removed to preserve the Market district's historic buildings. Won't people just create a new gum wall? Probably, the PDA admits. But the hope is that it will be contained to the original wall, since the stuff has moved "far beyond," a rep says. "Gum is made of chemicals, sugar, additives. Things that aren't good for us. I can't imagine it's good for brick," she adds. "It was never part of the charter or the history of the Market to have the walls covered with gum." The attraction actually started accidentally, when audience members waiting in line for a late night improv show at the Market Theater found the wall was a great place to leave their gum. "The wall is like the art that takes place behind it, constantly changing from the sharing of its participants. And, like a good improv story, has a beginning, middle and end," a rep for the improv theater troupe tells KIRO. "The wall is ready to start a new story. We are excited to see the new incarnation." Workers will use 280-degree steam to melt the gum, which will then be collected and weighed. (Click for more icky tourist attractions.)