Why fix dangerous bridges when you can build new pet projects?
In the aftermath of the Minneapolis bridge collapse, it's apparent that local politicians would rather earmark dollars for sexy new transit lines and highways than stick to basics. Seattle's coming roads-and-transit vote is a classic illustration of this pattern.
A front page New York Times article of Aug. 7, which appeared shortly after the collapse of the Interstate 35W bridge in Minneapolis, is pertinent to Proposition 1, metro Puget Sound's November roads-and-transit vote: "Despite historic highs in transportation spending, the political muscle of lawmakers, rather than dire need, has typically driven where much of the money [for inrastructure] goes. That has often meant construction of new, politically popular roads and transit projects rather than the mundane work of maintaining the worn-out ones." One of the diversions of money, the article adds, has been "a boom in rail construction that, while politically popular, has resulted in expensive transit systems that are not used by a vast majority of American commuters."
A similar point, but one aimed at the Minneapolis story, was made by Joel Kotkin in an Aug. 28 Wall Street Journal essay: "Government officials in Minneapolis spent mightily on a light-rail system that last year averaged barely 30,000 boardings daily. It did not focus nearly as much on overstressed highway bridges, or the bus systems serving the bulk of its mostly poor and minority transit riders. Most other light-rail systems, built in cities with highly dispersed employment, also have minuscule ridership, but consume a disproportionate share of transit funds that might go to more cost-efficient systems, including bus-based rapid transit."
Is Seattle an example of such misplaced priorities? Let's look first at the roads-and-bridges component of the big Proposition 1 package we'll be voting on. While advocates for the program were quick to say that the Minneapolis bridge disaster proves the importance of passing the roads-and-transit package, the lesson of Minneapolis is to be more skeptical of the components of such packages, forged as they are out of many political interests and compromises.
Clearly, the Seattle region's transportation infrastructure is wearing out, and it's not well-maintained. The Cascade Chapter of the Sierra Club, which opposes Proposition 1, notes that there are 34 bridges in the central Puget Sound region with federal safety ratings of less than 25 on a 0-100 scale. They each serve more than 1,000 daily trips; combined, they serve 440,000. The bridge in Minneapolis had a safety rating of 50. The Alaskan Way Viaduct stands at 9. The existing Highway 520 floating bridge across Lake Washington is rated at 45. During the Initiative 912 effort to rescind a new 9.5-cent gas tax in 2005, the pro-tax side warned that the "520 Bridge will likely collapse or be rendered inoperable by another major earthquake." Keep the tax and replace the bridge, was the implied message.
What will Proposition 1 do to address this situation? The Regional Transportation Investment District (RTID) funding will correct merely one of the 34 local bridges in acute need of repair or replacement, the South Park Bridge over the Duwamish River. As the Sierra Club's Mike O'Brien points out, "The federal evaluation criteria tells us they are at higher risk, and with RTID we have elected to make expansion the priority, rather than structural safety."
As for the 520 bridge-replacement project, RTID has budgeted some money to help but not enough to do the job. The estimated total cost is $4.4 billion. RTID has allocated about $1 billion, the state gas tax can contribute another billion, some emergency state money for the Alaskan Way Viaduct could be transferred to the 520 bridge, and then there's the prospect of tolling the users of 520, aided by a federal grant. It still isn't enough, and no official entity has spelled out where the balance of the money will come from. The RTID's campaign promises that "a vote for the Roads and Transit plan is a vote for [520] bridge replacement." Not really.
The Sierra Club complains that $1.3 billion is allocated to add lanes to Interstate 405 – money that could have been used to close the gap and enable a new 520 bridge to be built, rather than just started. Similarly, Sound Transit will spend huge sums to modify the I-90 floating bridge to accommodate trains. This is a role for which it was not designed and is ill-suited. The conversion will narrow safety margins and reduce the capacity of the I-90 bridge.
So it is reasonable to ask, concerning the 33 local bridges with safety ratings below 25 and that serve more than 400,000 trips per day, why aren't they given priority status, ahead of costly new highway and rail expansion projects? The 520 bridge handles 120,000 daily trips, and there isn't enough money to do that job. The Alaskan Way Viaduct serves 110,000, and the need to devise some way to handle that traffic – whether a surface solution, rebuilt viaduct, new viaduct, or tunnel – is designated no RTID funds.
There is another way to go, rather than follow the patterns of spending on new and politically popular projects. A new study by the Government Accounting Office, "Strategies Are Available for Making Existing Road Infrastructure Perform Better" (July 2007, GAO-07-920 [2 MB PDF]), outlines how, with prudent investments and innovations, existing service can be maintained, and more service could be extracted from existing transportation infrastructure, and provides numerous illustrations.
Comments:
Posted Mon, Sep 10, 8:55 a.m. inappropriate
basics?: Better public transit IS "sticking to the basics"!
Posted Mon, Sep 10, 10:47 a.m. inappropriate
Atlanta?: Surely you can't be serious in comparing Atlanta's transportation problems with those of Seattle.
The bulk of Seattle's commuters, being constrained by large bodies of water, follow a rather simple pattern - north/south on I-5 or 405, and east/west on 520 or I-90. Rail works when you have highly trafficked corridors.
Atlanta, as anyone with a passing interest in transportation issues is aware, has an arbritary and sprawling layout with no real business centers. Every day its commuters set out in scores of different directions via scores of different routes. There are no traffic corridors, or I suppose you could say there are nothing but traffic corridors. Given the lack of any coherent development pattern, the only solution to Atlanta's traffic problems is to raze the city and try again.
Also, it's probably worth pointing out that in Minneapolis, they consider the first few baby steps of their rail system to be a whopping success, with further expansion planned.
Posted Mon, Sep 10, 11:10 a.m. inappropriate
depends what you mean by "basic": There is nothing "basic" about a six-mile light rail subway tunnel at $500 million per mile.
There is nothing "basic" about running passenger trains on the I-90 floating bridge with 5 miles of empty right-of-way between each train.
There is nothing "basic" about running a passenger railroad service with over 250 four-car, 35 mph trains per day -- each longer than a football field -- through 18 ungated road crossings in a dense urban neighborhood.
There is nothing "basic" in Sound Transit asking for a doubling of its taxes to build "maximum rail" when they have at least two more years of work spending the existing taxes before the initial, minimum rail to SeaTac Airport is in operation.
Inventive? Insensitive? Insane? Sure. But not "basic."
Oh, did I forget to mention the mixed stream of trains and buses in a tunnel under downtown Seattle? That's one we ought to see in successful operation for a few years before doubling Sound Transit's taxes in Prop 1.
Posted Mon, Sep 10, 11:39 a.m. inappropriate
an accounting issue: total cost of ownership: One missing item from our "investment" decisions is the total cost of ownership. This includes both up front construction, maintenance and operations costs, and then eventual replacement or rebuilding.
WSDOT does have information about the costs of replacing bridges, but we voters are not presented with this and said "we have a choice: maintain and eventually rebuild what we have, or build something new." I think Emory's right that lots more people benefit from new construction spending than from taking care of what we have.
I do wonder where the money will come from to replace and rebuild existing roadways. Another sales tax increase? Another gas tax increase at a statewide level seems unlikely. More MVET? Or user fees? I think user fees are the only way to keep up with inflation of building materials.
Our present approach seems similar to a family that knows at some point they're going to need a new roof on their house. Instead of saving their money, or at least preserving their flexibility by not taking on debt, instead they are taking out 100% of their home equity via a loan to partially finance a vacation home, with the rest of the funding for the vacation home coming from a mortgage that maxes out their borrowing capacity. Will they be able to then fund the new roof?
And will our region have enough money to finish off the roads that are a part of this ballot measure, the flexibility to cover any operations shortfalls if ridership doesn't meet projections on rail, and also fund the rebuilding that eventually will be needed on other existing infrastructure?
Posted Mon, Sep 10, 12:19 p.m. inappropriate
ST - Big Dig v.2: Sound Transit is absolutely screwing the public. What ST is doing - failing to manage the light rail project properly - is exactly what happened with Boston's Big Dig.
It is the exact same story. A $3 billion project in 1995 turns into a $14 billion project. Why? Lousy management by the authority that is supposed to be overseeing it. Well, that and Parsons Brinkerhoff.
PB is the general contractor for most of the light rail construction work - just like it was the GC on the Big Dig.
Sound Transit is repeating all of the problems that plagued the Big Dig because of its too-cozy relationship with PB:
------------
Boston Globe Big Dig Story
In his remarks, Mead also suggested that the close relationship between the Turnpike Authority, the state agency that oversees the Big Dig, and project managers Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff led to a lack of proper oversight on the project. The Big Dig would have benefited from having an outside party charged with quality and cost control over the massive project, he said.
----------------
Same problem here with ST and BP's light rail work. No one outside of ST has any authority to oversee what is going on. And nobody inside ST wants the gravy train to end.
Anyone read the Seattle Times story about the problems tunneling under Beacon Hill? BP screwed up the Big Dig up too:
--------------
http://www.tollroadsnews.com/node/3042
The off-concrete is a penny-antsy scam compared to the claims of malpractice being pursued by the feds and the state against the joint venture project manager Bechtel and Parsons Brinckerhoff (B/PB) where a settlement in the high hundreds of millions is in negotiation. The Boston Globe reported recently that a B/PB settlement could be as much as $1 billion on the $15b project.
Also woeful has been the Massachusetts Turnpike's mismanagement of the project in employing the engineers on a send-us-the-bills basis.
Bechtel and PB are both highly regarded international engineering companies with some of the world's greatest engineering talent. Trouble was they apparently didn't send it to the Boston job. That is because in a project based on an unlimited budget of government handouts, the more they messed up, and the longer the project took, the more they could bill. You send your dregs to jobs set up like that.
--------------
We got the dregs from BP out here working on light rail. That's why it isn't getting done, and ST keeps writing big checks to BP. NO WAY should any more money go to ST at this point, with BP effectively in charge and reaming the taxpayers here.
Posted Mon, Sep 10, 12:55 p.m. inappropriate
Straw men abound: Once again Crosscut has chosen another dinosaur thinker to speak on the transportation package before us. Emory Bundy was a former newsman of great repute. It is sad to see that he no longer has any dedication to presenting a responsible review of the evidence on the issue. Instead he uses fragments of stories to build a case without offering any real world solutions.
First he claims that the Minneapolis starter rail line is a failure. This is despite solid public support for a future network there. Most voters know intuitively that we can not build enough lanes to get ourselves out of congestion. And most people know that trains can carry far more people than automobile lanes can in the same space.
Then he cites the misleading Sierra Club statistic on bridges needing repair in the Puget Sound region. There is no analysis of whether there are plans or other funds to repair those bridges or even what bridges there are that need repair. Without that analysis, the statistic is meaningless. Many of those bridges will be repaired/replaced by existing county road funds in the coming years.
Similarly, 520 is another straw man. 520 is a STATE highway and a STATE responsiblity. The RTID contribution is a more than generous regional contribution towards this project. And we still haven't decided what we will eventually build there.
Then he proceeds with a bunch of unsubstantiated claims about MARTA in Atlanta which I believe represent one point of view, but by no means the only point of view about MARTA. He implies that rail is to blame for Atlanta's sprawl and congestion. This all but ignores the massive growth in the Atlanta region over the last twenty years and the historically weak zoning laws in the South. Once again Bundy's argument is meaningless.
Finally, Bundy trots out the biggest straw man of them all and is echoed by fellow CETA rail-hater John Niles. This is the bait and switch argument that we can do better with bus rapid transit. When they talk about the lesser cost they don't account for dedicated bus lanes. But when they talk benefits they act like buses will continue to glide around the region without getting caught in traffic.
This is intellectually dishonest.
It is clear that the real agenda of Bundy and the like is to support more lanes and space for cars today, not to plan for the people of tomorrow.
Posted Mon, Sep 10, 4:14 p.m. inappropriate
In the hundreds of thousands of words of garbanzo beans that have been written about transportation policies and politics, the following by Emory Bundy are a handful of the wisest and best:
"...these planning bodies and local politicians prefer sexy, wasteful projects that facilitate bureaucratic empire building, the rich flow of money to vendors, and a reward system for the helpful political leaders in the form of reciprocal campaign contributions and constituency support. Those pork projects, with political payoffs, bear an uncomfortable resemblance to our local roads-and-transit package."
Monuments to the folly of men and women is what light rail will become. And at a cost that will suck the life blood out of ordinary citizens who already consider this area in which it's too expensive to live and raise a family.
One of the sinister realities of the so-called "Seattle process" of interminable debate and the inability to make a decision is dangerous postponment of the urgent and necessary. What will it take for local "leaders" (I use the term advisedly) to get off the dime and address real problems? Instead, what they do is fiddle in advance of Rome burning.
Now, there are some who are lone prophets crying in the wilderness, but they usually get scorned by their fellows for the embarrassment to the ditherers they provide. One Eastside legislator with whom I've had beaucoup conversations on this topic comes to mind. This person and I have many philosophical differences, but on transportation a better, more clear voice you will not hear. Problem is...nobody's listening.
The recent I-5 repair detours shouldn't be seen as anything insightful except that people are willing to make unpleasant adjustments for a brief period of time. Had commuters been told this was to be their lot in life from here on out, there would have been a hue and cry. But WSDOT and others did a decent job of letting people know what was coming and what were the options. Let's just not make it a habit, OK?
The Piper
Posted Mon, Sep 10, 4:23 p.m. inappropriate
RE: Straw men abound: "Most voters know intuitively that we can not build enough lanes to get ourselves out of congestion."
Surprise! I totally agree with Tommy.
That's why I'll be voting NO on Prop 1. We know we can't build our way out of it. And it is just plain stupid to spend $8 billion on new highways to prove this fact once again.
Instead of new road projects, we need to make our existing roads and bridges work better. Two simple steps: 1) implement congestion pricing and 2) use the money for maintenance.
Posted Mon, Sep 10, 9:06 p.m. inappropriate
RE: Atlanta?: It is a gross oversimplification to say that the bulk of Seattle's commuters follow a simple pattern, north/south or east/west. In fact, there are plenty of diagonal commutes, Georgetown to Redmond, Auburn to downtown Seattle, etc. Some of our region's most congested roads and interchanges show the oversimplified model's flaws, e.g. Highways 167 and 169, or the I-5/I-405 and I-405/167 interchanges. A set of fixed rail lines north and south requires connections at both ends of the run to serve these commutes, while bus lines can serve these commutes more directly.
The bus isn't as sexy, it's not quite as fast as a rail line serving the exact same route, but it has far more route flexibility and costs far less per seat or per passenger mile at any reasonable projection of ridership.
Once bus service capacity can no longer be increased on a route, when there simply isn't enough road capacity for all the buses that would be needed, there's finally enough route density to justify rail. But most of King County is far from that point.
Posted Mon, Sep 10, 11:27 p.m. inappropriate
dedicated bus lanes: Many hundreds of miles of semi-dedicated, partially-dedicated, or sometimes-dedicated bus lanes provide better geographic coverage and more service than a few dozen miles of light passenger rail.
For each billion dollars you want to spend on public transit, there is a choice -- a few miles of light rail (that you ride on the bus to get to), or hundreds of miles of improved bus service that take you directly from where you start to where you want to go.
The train goes faster than a bus, but what matters is the speed of the door-to-door trip that a person wants to take. Not everybody will live and work near a train station.
But let's say you still think light rail is a good deal. The timing of Sound Transit asking more money now makes me suspicious. Sound Transit is at least two years away from finishing the fully-funded light rail to the airport, and yet the agency wants to double its tax revenue to build more light rail. The Sound Move phase one plan approved and funded in 1996 was to build from U District to S 200th below the Airport to see how it works, and build more if it does work.
The train to the airport hasn't been finished, yet Sound Transit says pay more. What's the rush?
Construction of the Seattle light rail subway to Husky Stadium is completely funded according to Sound Transit, so delaying a new tax authorization to this agency shouldn't have to delay this work in progress. Furthermore, Sound Transit has excess cash that is dedicated to East King County, so light rail to Bellevue can continue to be planned with existing tax levels.
Posted Tue, Sep 11, 5:55 a.m. inappropriate
RE: basics?: I am not an opponent of Public Transit.
However you are a fool if you actually believe that the 'powers that be' have put together a package that is the right thing - every bit as much as a Republican who believes that we are in Iraq to get rid of that nasty naughty boy Saddam.
The motive for both is control. The only reason that 'they' have put so much money into the transit budget is that 'they' can pull so much more off the top and manipulate the supporters. Such as yourself, mon frere.
Cars, nor for that matter, individual actions, are not evil. Like guns though, or the abuse of power, they certainly can be. The question is how to make individualism, whether it be political or transportation, work to the betterment of society.
Are you up to that challenge or not? It isn't easy, that's fer sure.
-Douglas Tooley
Tacoma, WA (Lincoln District)
Posted Tue, Sep 11, 6 a.m. inappropriate
RE: Proposition 1 - Sucks to be us!: Amen!
Unfortunately though I do believe we are going to have outside of the State to actually see this wisdom implemented.
-Douglas Tooley
Lincoln District, Tacoma
P.S. - The same strategy might help improve the UW too.
Posted Tue, Sep 11, 1:09 p.m. inappropriate
RE: dedicated bus lanes: Mr Niles and Mr. Bundy ask you to accept their assertion that a BRT network could be built that would continue to serve this region for the next 100 years with no evidence that this is true without expensive dedicated bus lanes.
We have added perhaps twenty new miles of roads in Puget Sound region in the last twenty years. We have expanded a few others, but we have little space to do more. The population of this region is expected to double in the next twenty years. Cars are about 15 feet long and most carry one person. Most people drive cars as their primary mode of transportation. Each year the number of new cars registered in this area grows by the thousands.
So, unless you build dedicated lanes everywhere including downtown areas, buses will get caught in traffic. And if you build those dedicated lanes you lose much of the cost savings claimed. This is classic bait and switch.
Then Mr. Niles says not everyone will live near a train station. Well, if the population is going to double in this region we have two choices. One is to continue to sprawl building more and more single family homes and keeping our region dependent on the automobile. The other is to plan denser, more walkable neighborhoods in planned urban centers to relieve the pressure and target where you want growth to go.
The second choice is what most of us prefer for this beautiful region. And this is where rail dramatically outperforms buses. Developers love the fixed nature of rail and people love the reliability. You only need to tour the country to anyplace with rail to see the new vibrant urban centers that develop around station areas.
Finally, Mr Niles asks us to wait to see how light rail works before we commit to building more. But light rail is hardly new technology and most of the people at Sound Transit have been involved in many other projects. He also knows that Sound Transit is a far better agency than it was in its early difficult years. He knows that they are fairly conservative by industry standards in their current financial practices and planning. He knows that they get very good professional peer reviews as an agency today. Yet he still tries to paint a picture of a Sound Transit out of control. Once again, Mr. Niles fails to tell the whole truth.
Mr Niles also knows that if this measure fails it will be difficult for Sound Transit to keep employing the talented staff that they have worked to develop over ten years. Make no mistake, Mr Niles does not really want to wait to see how light rail works, he simply wants to kill it. Once again, bait and switch...
Posted Tue, Sep 11, 2:55 p.m. inappropriate
Some comments: Re "So, unless you build dedicated lanes everywhere including downtown areas, buses will get caught in traffic. And if you build those dedicated lanes you lose much of the cost savings claimed. This is classic bait and switch."
Actually, the dedicated bus lane already exists. It is called the bus tunnel. A second "almost dedicated" lane exists as well. It is called third avenue. The "bait and switch" was Sound Transit saying the bus tunnel would not need to be retrofitted.
Now how much would a dedicated bus tunnel instead of a rail tunnel cost, say going from downtown to the UW? We don't know. However, we do know it would be a lot less and because the buses don't impact the UW Science buildings with vibrations the way trains do.
==
next one
>>>>Then Mr. Niles says not everyone will live near a train station. Well, if the population is going to double in this region we have two choices. ... sprawl ... denser neighborhoods
Comment: Belltown is doing quite nicely, without rail stations. There may be a significant number of tax breaks at the "transit oriented developments" in other cities. The full picture is very complex. Is New Holly "dense enough" to really make the numbers work? How much density is needed near rail stations? How does that compare with what we have so far? And realistically, how many locations near a train station can this new wonderful density be built? Some are commercial only.
==
Next one
>>Finally, Mr Niles asks us to wait to see how light rail works before we commit to building more.
A question: do ridership levels count? or is the only thing that matters the concept, not a quantifiable return on investment with alternative comparisons of alternatives?
By all accounts, ridership from Everett on Sounder had been far below projections, and therefore the subsidy per rider has been much higher than forecasted. So, what if it turns out the ridership projections are way off on light rail? Maybe voters would think differently. Or what if we get new cost data, for example when the revised bids for Seatac station are presented, and learn ooops, we can't go to Tacoma, or even Fife, we're just going to get to 320th within the next 30 years.
Under this ballot, there appears to be zero opportunity for voters to go back and say "you lied to us, you were wrong, whatever the reason, this does not make sense after all." That in turn creates a great incentive for the project proponents to say whatever they need to say in order to "sell this to the stupid voters" and get 51.000001 % of the votes.
==
last one
>>Yet he still tries to paint a picture of a Sound Transit out of control.
This looks like a straw man assertion, designed to defocus readers from the key question I think he and Mr Bundy raise: what's the best use of limited resources? What are the "must dos" and where's the money for those going to come from? Are we going to let the bridges in medium to poor shape collapse the way they did in Minnesota, then go to DC for a handout? Specifically on 520, what combination of tolls, money from Olympia, DC or local taxes is going to be able to pay for the bridge, with the tolling also covering I90, and possibly 405 as well?
Speaking of tolling I90, if the center lanes are taken out for light rail, removing bus and carpool traffic, then what happens to the revenue projections for toll income on 520/I90? Presumably it drops. How then does this impact overall finances?
There are tons of unknowns, and unfortunately, very little opportunity for the board to remake itself because of the way it is chosen. Voters on the monorail at least could vote on a partial representation, and make their wishes known. This is not the case with Sound Transit.
Posted Tue, Sep 11, 3:33 p.m. inappropriate
RE: Some comments: This was supposed to be a reply to Tiptoe Tommy's comments to Jniles above, not a separate comment.
Posted Tue, Sep 11, 6:55 p.m. inappropriate
RE: Straw men abound: Tiptoe Tommy, you sound like a Sound Transit apologist. That's okay, but how about some numbers and rational discussion instead of ad hominem attack?
Bundy didn't say the Minneapolis starter line was a failure. He questioned whether it was a wise investment in light of bridges falling apart and people dying! This is not unlike questioning the "investment" of lives and hundreds of billions in Iraq. GW has a "starter line" there too.
You say "Many roads and bridges will be replaced by existing county road funds in the coming years." You say the Sierra Club statistics are misleading, but then give us the vague "someday" of KC doing work on "many" bridges in coming years.
Then you say that 520 is a state problem and a "straw man." It's clearly a regional problem too, and of significant importance and cost. Calling it a "straw man" is like punting on third down. If I give $1000 to the State and $1000 to the RAT, that's $2000 out of my pocket. Maybe 520 is a straw man, but my money isn't made out of straw.
You said "He implies that rail is to blame for Altanta's sprawl and congestion." His point is that rail didn't prevent sprawl and congestion. I'm not sure how that makes Bundy's argument "meaningless" and makes it an "unsubstantiated claim."
Then you go back to the the ad hominem attack. John Niles is a "CETA rail-hater." Jeez. Is that the level of discourse of all light rail thinkers? I guess we're to surmise that John Niles is an "evildoer" because he doesn't drink the Sound Transit Koolaid and DOES actually compare and analyze alternatives.
Next is the old "intellectually dishonest" charge. Emory Bundy did not say,
"BRT is a less expensive, more flexible viable alternative to steam engines chugging around Puget Sound burning coal and spewing sulfurous toxic fumes into the air, aggravating global warming, melting the polar ice caps and raising sea level to drown every man, woman and child in the RTID."
Rather, he said,
"Imagine if the region systematically guided, supported, and implemented those opportunities, and crafted incentives (such as demand management and tolling, or subsidies for vanpooling and bike commuting) to accomplish that end."
He also said of Atlanta's light rail,"Rail transit absorbs funds that could support more efficient bus transit, or vanpools."
Not exactly a crazed BRT zealot.
You then talk as if light rail is the only mass transit alternative, in spite of ST's failure to do the state mandated least-cost planning that would show that alternatives to light rail are attractive from a cost-benefit point of view. This is hardly "bait and switch." What is bait and switch is the initial ST ballot proposition: later and less than promised at twice the cost that was promised. The ST 2 RAT Proposition #1 is the Goliath of bait and switch. It's almost Bushian in its misunderestimation of the public and in its financial vacuity. Maybe you think that $157 billion on roads and transit is well spent? Do you buy bread for $100 a loaf? Water for $50 a gallon? Transit tickets for $50 a ride? In my view light rail is an unaffordable vanity. Build the system out of user fees and then I'll strew daisies on your favorite rail tracks. Until then, I'd rather give to charity, build more schools, and keep our bridges from falling down.
Maybe my problem is that the religion of light rail doesn't do it for me. I know that in theory the rail cars will be filled with seventy-seven virgins, but I just don't believe the numbers. Seven I might believe. And by the time the rail cars come rolling down the track -- judging from the half century of taxing authority -- these particular virgins will be 50 years old.
Posted Tue, Sep 11, 9:29 p.m. inappropriate
Original corridor investments are needed: If we had invested in High speed rail on the original corridors,instead of a Utopian socialized mass transit system,we would get a higher ridership,and redirect focus back to the original corridors where most of our crumbling infrastructure exsist.
The viaduct is a perfect example. It is an original corridor that should have been replaced by now with a modern structure that included High speed rail lines to the next city centers.
Instead Seattle centrics sold the formula of Global Warming = intercity gentrification=higher square footage rates=higher sales tax=higher retail sales sales taxes=higher property tax=mass relocation of crime and poor was pushed by Seattle centric politicians that took control of our political process..
Original corridor investments stand in the way of the Intercity revenue stakeholders that benefit from gentrification.
If The revenue Stakeholders,some disguised as greenie groups(100 friends of futurewise)had not taken control of the political process ,we might have been able to invest in the original corridors.
As it is now we are stuck with the gentrification of Seattle and have no choice but to fill in the corridor,which was planned,Thanks to Seattle centric's revenue stakeholders.
One seattle centric even came out and said as much,Margaret pageler.
"Quote" People are too stupid to understand what we are trying to do.If we screw things up so bad they will have no choice but to fill in the intercity corridors.
Cyntia Sullivan made comments about attracting investments with sound transit,heck even Sims ,Nickels Norm Rice all gave away their lust for gentrification of Seattle with transportation dollars.
The reason why the Seattle centrics push for Grand boulevards and Transit corridors,is not to save a whale,Salmon or frog,The reason is to generate reveue for the city to spend.
They could not let gentrification be done naturaly with long term leases taken to the bank for rebuilding funds because of the lack of profitable business concepts under long term lease.
So Transit boondogles were the only way to achieve gentrification for Seattle.
So that is where our investments have been made,SOME 700 MILLION THE LAST 5 YEARS.
We must break free of the Seattle centrics gentrification push,and invest in the original corridors.
High speed rail needs to lead the way in getting local traffic back to the original corridors and free up the interstates.
If we really wanted to save a whale, salmon ,or frog that is what we would do even if it tips over the seattle centrics gentrification= revenue apple cart.
Posted Wed, Sep 12, 9:53 p.m. inappropriate
Who is Emory Bundy?: And what's with his stupid rantings?
The guy seems wound up like a top when it comes to light rail and reaching for any shred of evidence, no matter how flawed, to flail at it.
His article reads like he needs to get a life.
Posted Thu, Sep 13, 9:18 a.m. inappropriate
When you don't have the facts on your side...: There's an old saying about strategies in an argument - attacking your opponent when facts and the law are not on your side is your last, best, option. It's use can be considered a symptom of desperation - and, if the user has any power, a definite warning of dangerous waters ahead.
Perhaps the most extreme example of this strategy in post-enlightenment history are accusations of insanity followed by civil committment, if not an actual lobotomy.
In the more modern world the recent strategy was accusations of racism - this is now rapidly giving way to sexual predation, though the ties between the two still exist.
Ever wonder why Christine Gregoire and her supporters made their careers accusing others of degeneracy? Or for that matter why Gingrich and Rove did the same? Even more curious is the similarities in political strategy between the Republicans nationally and local Democrats. Most tragic is the infiltration of these techniques into the public and private worlds that most of us live in. Heck, they even teach it at the UW - it is the current basis for their 'elevated' postion in society - and questioning it is the only sure way to lose the benefits of a degree.
As far as I'm concerned, harrassment law is actually a good thing - but how about we apply it to those that actually ABUSE their power than running forward a bunch of scapegoats, some petty and guilty, others not petty, not guilty, and actually calling those in power to accountability.
That's called applying the facts and the law to the situation. That is something this country is rapidly losing its ability to do.
Draw your own conclusions...
-Douglas Tooley
Lincoln District, Tacoma