Jackson Browne sang this song so much more concisely: "Don't remind me of my failures, I have not forgotten them."

Don't worry Doug, Hope and Change Central Planning Authority is on it's way. They will simply withold funding until the region complies. Local input is only valuable when it supports the decision of the Planning Authority, right Doug? Maybe we can eliminate EIS and SEPA along with the individuals right to take legal action too...afterall the State knows best. Think of the Millions of man hours and Billions of Dollars wasted driving planning, zoning and infrastructure decisions to the local level and seeking consensus when State can divine the "Final Solution".

If the Nisqually earthquake had not happened, and no attention needed to be given to the Viaduct, we would have ALL agreed that the Replacement of the 520 bridge would still be our States highest and most urgent priority transportation project. With the shaking of the Viaduct, and repairs required, and had the Governors (Lock & Gregoire)just stuck to their transportation focus, they would have Retrofitted the Viaduct (which they new they had to do since the 1989 San Francisco earthquake), and moved on.

But, in the Governors delayed that action, and let this economical transportation project become an urban design fiasco by giving Seattle
a not so subtle veto over this State transportation decision. And the rest is history.
I for one say, let's get real. Our economy is in the toilet, jobs are being lost, SR 520 is still at risk and unfunded and procrastination on the viaduct fix has endangered the public safety.
So, let's get on with an economical Retrofit solution and eliminate the risk, causing NO disruption and NO reduction in traffic volumes or speeds while continuing to serve the fragile communities who depend on the Viaduct for their livelihood. The law suits and initiatives will disappear! And it will be finished in three years.

Seattle has always done long range planning with little to no implementation. Seattle is good at short term solutions and implementation, which, while being piecemeal, keeps the finger in the dike. That is more than most Cities in this country.
In these ever-changing times and quick changes at that, we shouldn't invest big bucks in short term fixes and give quality-of-life improivements in our communities the highest priority. Or, we may have the most expensive wiz-bang technology without anyone being able to afford to live here.
Unfortunately, that trend has already been seen. It can be curbed though, with responsible spending and focus on other priorities like affordable housing, family housing to attract families back into the city so no schools need to be closed, and unite what has become a fractured city of communities that only come together when they can vote on an itiative and then show their anger for being ignored and lied to by their leaders.

Start the ball roling and RETROFIT the Viaduct. It can be under construction in 6 months and perhaps attract Federal stimulus money, reserving local and State funds for other needed projects....like 520.

Art

Doug: Good summary of where we are and what is needed. You know better than anyone, from your tenure running WSDOT, how difficult it is to resist bad ideas sponsored by politically influential interests with ties to
elected officials.

The Rice-Stanton proposal to create a directly elected governing body to
manage regional transportation would be a strong improvement over the present system in which Sound Transit, governed by appointees rubber-stamping ST plans, has been able to push through a horrificly expensive and inefficient regional light rail system. The I-90 light rail retrofit, which you mention, is illustrative of what we are getting.

Mainly we need governors, state legislators, county executives, county council members, mayors, city council members and others who will pay
at least lip service to the kind of comprehensive planning and budgeting which you suggest. Careless officeholders, elected by complacent and inattentive voters, add up to the expensive chaos we are now experiencing.

A centralized, regional plan is a great idea and it is the way it should be done. It is also largely unrealistic. It involves process, lots of process, process which goes on for years and, when it is completed, history shows that some important constituency will be unhappy and argue that "the plan" is flawed and insist on a "new plan" or "a vote of the people." Financing, environmental, and other issues will be raised to parts of "the plan" and the fact that compromises are built into "the plan" will be decried as "deal making" and the plan will lack "transparency" and be "incapable of being financed." A tighter, more structured, realistic process and some steel in our electeds decisionmaking might make "the plan" doable but unfortunately the likelihood of that happening is small. So go with what we have and that is an imperfect regional plan but will get the viaduct replacement behind us.

Good analysis. The megaprojects soak up our attention and dollars, while local streets and local transit decline. This makes it much harder to meet our long-term economic and environmental goals.

It's funny (in an ironic way) that the issue of governance is revived just when I'd given up on it -- at least for the current session.

The key to avoiding a duplication of all-process-all-the-time is to focus on the MOBILITY of people and goods, design a SYSTEM that provides that mobility. Looking at transportation from that perspective, it's clear that our old performance measures won't do. Any set of replacement metrics has to go 'way beyond even the current ideas for multi-modal concurrency.

No doubt, we will eventually re-engage on this topic. As usual, good job, Doug.

Deb Eddy

"...A centralized, regional plan is a great idea and it is the way it should be done. It is also largely unrealistic..."

Really? Tell that to the people in Portland, which has had just such an agency (called Metro) for like, what, 40 years? When I lived down there, it seemed to work rather well.

The fetishization of transportation is the problem here. Roads, bridges, buses, trains, etc. exist to get people from point A to point B. Period. All this other stuff that all these groups that are able to create an acronym and raise some money are gnashing their teeth and rending their garments about is more a function of their egos and their delusions...

Message to Ms. Eddy:

"It's funny (in an ironic way) that the issue of governance is revived just when I'd given up on it -- at least for the current session."

I'm told that you are a state legislator and member of the transportation committee. But this is hard to believe if you really mean what you say above. I seem to recall that getting elected usually involves promising to lead on crucial issues. If as Mr. Van Dyke reminded us,(and Mr. MacDonald failed to mention while caught up in gee whiz tecnical solutions)the problem is governamce, then where is your readiness to lead on this issue? We've been batting around the need to fix our dysfunctional regional transportation planning and decision making process for years with no progress. Just more piecemeal fixes as Mr. MacDonald indicates. So how about it. Why not show some leadership, form a regional legislative caucus, and pass a governance system this session?

Doug,
I have often wondered why the Puget Sound Regional Council exists other than to provide homes for wayward bureaucrats and provide another whirpool for public funds wherever they may come from. Can you help me understand if they have a meaningful role in this process?

MacDonald is right on the money with this piece, but way to much of a diplomat to assign blame for the current problems. We have transportation planners that are quite skilled at these subjects - Mr. MacDonald's own exhibited skill is a product of this network of folks.

The problems are from certain folks who think they themselves have the embodiment of will in this region and use their ability to trump process as proof of their power. Some of these people are politicians, some are not.

And they all need to go.

-The Other Doug
http://motleytools.com/blog

When it comes to leadership on transportation issues, including reform of transportation governence, no one can hold a candle to my good friend Rep. Deb Eddy. I'm here to tell you that this woman has been there, done that on these issues as long as she's been in the legislature.

But it's not a one-woman show - when it comes to the legislature, it takes a ton to tango, so to speak. So don't lay the blame for the failure of others at the feet of someone who was a lone voice crying in the wilderness when it wasn't fashionable.

Debo and I have had many a long conversation on this subject. We don't fully agree on how to do it (I'm all for chucking the PSRC over the side and starting tabula rasa), but I know she's thinking about it all the time.

When it does eventually percolate up to the top of the legislative slag pile, I know who'll be the one who got it there.

The Piper

The proof, as they say, is in the pudding. If Ms. Eddy is a great leader on regional transportation,what is the number of her bill to reform transportation governance? How many cosponsors does it carry among regional legislators? Who refused to sign on so that we will know if our legislators are assisting or are part of the problem?

There is no natural jurisdiction for Debo's idea, or that of the story writer.
If it were just transportation, and much of this story I have written myself here and other places, but this is subject to a larger topic.
I suggest that we should all go back and read David Brewster's end of the year 2008 Essay 1 to capture a greater theme running through so many stories. The transportation mishmash exhibits symptoms of other silos of decisions made within different levels of governmental empires. The Chunnel is just big enough, and popular enough, for all of us to be able to point out the multi-million, billion, dollar poorly aligned contributions mistakenly called a solution.

I wish I did not have to own a car, the way things are, or have been proposed, I will still have to own that car, only it will cost me at least $100 a year more. Between my employer, and a student, I could have a bus pass completely paid for, too bad I have I would have to take 3 busses, or a car and two busses, or . . . I could walk more than a mile and take two busses, all one way.
An hour of my life every day I can't get back.

dn - HB 2101 was the bill sponsored by then-Rep Fred Jarrett and me. SB 6803 was an early attempt by Sen. Ed Murray, but he later abandoned the effort. We tried re-writing that bill, but ended up focusing on our own HB 2101. While we had a lot of (quiet) support, our bill diverged from the Stanton-Rice proposal in some important ways, especially the make-up of the regional body and expectations thereof.

This is not easy stuff. If you're going to make a new entity really WORK (instead of just moving the chairs around), you've got to get down in the weeds and work the details.

Major opposition came from Sound Transit, whose lobbyists saw the entire effort as inimical to their existence, power, whatever. The Sound Transit board continues to have a legislative "plank" opposing anything having to do with rationalizing transportation without their Board's approval. If that isn't "turf", I don't know what is.

And ST convinced TCC, WCV, others in the environmental community, that the effort in 2007-2008 was anti-environment, which is a shame -- because it's not.

I'm elected to lead, and I surely do try. But even I am no match for ST's billions of dollar (public money, by the way) and teams of staff and contract lobbyists.

Deb Eddy

Ms. Eddy may be the greatest legislator ever but the current governmental organizational relationships are not conducive for comprehensive solutions.

The governo, county exec, and city mayor all decide-ish a tunnel, then Frank Chopp, then Ms. Eddy, then maybe the voters again, then maybe back to the legislators, if the mayor, county exec and governor can live with the answer.
If all of the parties that get to decide are not in the decision then nothing was decided, it was an opinion.

Back to that unnatural jurisdiction problem, all of the government bits that touch Seattle should get their stories straight.

And I'm pleased to see that all those conversations with Scott have borne fruit. He gets it!! At least when he's willing to concede my points.

Ms. Eddy, everyone is elected to lead, and the sure do try too, but the method for solving this problem, for example, is the creation of a new stand alone entity that is different then the way things are, but this is a symptom to the nature of the relationships on a variety of subjects.
This the growing problem of growth.

Yes, we all agree, it's broken.

Now what?

We don't have a "plan" because we keep looking in the wrong places and waiting for some PAC, Blue Ribbon Panel, or inspired leader to show us the way. The primary mission of state government is to grow citizenship. Forget that and it takes a supreme occasion such as getting on the other side of the Great Recession to return common sense to the fore and coordinate efforts. The twist of fate that doomed Doug MacDonald to dependence on public transit has also advanced us considerably. To my eye he spells out the essential common sense basics of effective coordination:

Economics seeking governance:
"The state gas tax, long-shared between state and local needs (a little understood fact), used to be a good rough justice way of setting up the connection with many users, while sales and excise taxes helped on the public transportation side. But modern transportation finance has to be re-aligned with lowering, not increasing, fossil fuel consumption. And roads and transit are no longer separate systems but linked parts of overall approaches to getting people around."

Solutions seeking a problem statement:
"Our current fixation with one-off solutions deliver us exactly what we deserve. We’ll get, at best, a jumble of projects that haven’t been planned or prioritized in relation to one another. And diverting all that money to these projects means we’ll likely see continued neglect of the ordinary streets, sidewalks, and workhorse bus and electric trolley lines that must also be taken care of and improved if we want a serviceable transportation system."

Masterstroke, Training Wheels, or what?
"Of course, there is a way that the new viaduct plan might fairly be called a masterstroke and a bargain. Its price tag for an important highway, streets, a new seawall, and earthquake-proof utilities for downtown (plus a new waterfront and the end of the viaduct safety risk) is under $5 billion. That’s less than the price voters have endorsed for taking out two lanes for buses, cars, and trucks on the I-90 floating bridge to Bellevue in favor of light rail, so that just 10,000 people a day can be added to the level of Eastside transit ridership that would be there in any case by 2030.

That increase from light rail to the Eastside is a drop in the ridership bucket considering that public transportation across the region will be trying to carry more than 500,000 people a day. And remember, much of that increase in public transportation we still have no idea today how we’ll pay for — except for a modest infusion of promised help from the viaduct project."

Neal Peirce ST 1.25.9 "Wow, not just opinions, but judgements based on clear, objective information? What a radical idea." (Re: Change.org et al proposal for citizen engagement)

Or we could just keep voting in the dark.

debo:
"ST convinced TCC, WCV, others in the environmental community, that the effort in 2007-2008 was anti-environment, which is a shame -- because it's not.
I'm elected to lead, and I surely do try. But even I am no match for ST's billions of dollar (public money, by the way) and teams of staff and contract lobbyists."

The latest high crime: greenwashing the greens.

After the Nisqually struck in 2001, WsDOT leaders essentially revealed their intention to ONLY build a replacement viaduct by promoting the most expensive tunnel they could imagine, roughly $15 Billion, knowing it would be rejected. Over the next year and some arm-twisting, they grudgingly brought that cost down, in steps to the simplest, supposedly least expensive Cut-n-Cover design. A year later, WsDOT brought forth the even less expensive (surprise) 'Lidded trench' after voters rejected their original wet dream viaduct replacement monstrosity, the 6-lane behemoth. The Cut-n-Cover was also rejected on that vote, most likely because WsDOT presented its construction as an absolutely intolerable disruption of waterfront business.

Now Doug McDonald proposes a gee wiz technofix tolling system that looks more like a gold-plated fee-for-all than transportation and regional planning.

Speaking of regional planning, Sound Transit directors proudly boasted about saving a whopping three minutes travel time from the airport to downtown Seattle on the Link light rail if the 'regional' district Southcenter was bypassed, the nearest stations 2-miles distant. And from PSRC, not a peep. Neither Sound Transit nor PSRC will dare mention the possibility of a light rail spur line running through Southcenter to Renton where the Lake Washington RR line lay awaiting abandonment and destruction by suburban sprawl and green-wash bike trail.

It is possible and desirable to actually reduce long-distance travel demand via regional planning. Doug mentions 'regional economies', but I doubt he actually understands how they are constructed nor how they can be conducted without requiring an excessive and growing amount of long-distance travel and transport to be arranged via highways.

A word to Washingtonians: Don't trust Doug McDonald, period.

Dino Rossi? Unbelievable.

Dear Ms. Eddy,

It appears that you've thrown in the towel on transportation governance. Sound Transit, the 1000 pound gorilla, is always going to be around protecting its prerogatives. And it got stronger with the passage of Prop. 1. But at the same time, the context under which it and its environmental supporters, and all the rest of us operate changed too. As Mr. MacDonald ably points out, the region is clearly in a major bind over how to sort through all of the transportation projects on the table and decide on priorities and where to find the money in the midst of the fiscal meltdown. If this isn't the time for reform of the process, then I don't know when it will be better. Do you?

My advice is, if you're seriously interested in governance change, that you keep filing your bill and at the same time work your regional legislative colleagues and the voters. It's always helpful to get more than two sponsors on a bill as you did in the case of HB 2101. And it's also helpful to make your case directly to the public. I'm not sure that was done, and I pay particular attention to transportation issues. Rice and Stanton did, and the Seattle Times was a strong supporter of their efforts.

As you say, one needs to "get down in the weeds and work the details." I would add: "persistently".

I don't get it, Douglas. You start out suggesting that we're investing in short-sighted and misguided projects, yet the only suggestions you offer have to do with how to finance them.

If the tunnel and rail are such bad ideas, please share with us your comprehensive, wholistic vision for a regional transportation system. We're all waiting.

>>Major opposition came from Sound Transit, whose lobbyists saw the entire effort as inimical to their existence, power, whatever. The Sound Transit board continues to have a legislative "plank" opposing anything having to do with rationalizing transportation without their Board's approval. If that isn't "turf", I don't know what is.<<

Debo,
And there you have it. ST is huge in terms of the dollars it controls. I actually believe it's important to have such an agency to oversee regional transportation that covers three counties and countless cities. But somehow their power needs to be reined in and held acountable to the electorate.

Keep fighting the good fight!

Doug starts with the flase premise that people are incensed about a la carte decisions. People just voted for Sound Transit and reject Tim Eyman's latest stunt?

Polls show that most people think there is a regional plan for transportation. Turns out, most people are right.

Maybe a computer wrote it?

Doug unfortunately hides a good idea within a tirade: a tolling authority similar to what's working in the Bay Area. That tolling authority is housed at the Bay Area's version of the PSRC, based in Oakland. The people of nine counties voted to increase tolls on Bay Area bridges and the BATA. The promised improvements are well underway. The people who use the bridges pay for them.

The Golden Gate Bridge in not part of the BATA. That iconic structure represents an a la carte decision like Doug complains about. The Golden Gate authority is its own district - extending from San Francisco to Mendicino, and based in Larkspur, Marin County. It works. So does BATA.

Either path could be a good path here.

I am incenced. "people" did just vote for more of the mishmash paid with sales tax, and now we are getting a second dose of bus/streetcar with car tabs.
Before, during, and after I will still be Mr. Car/bus/bus, I may get to change my name to Mr. Car/train/bus
Lucky me.
I live in the other Seattle, where streetcars never, ever, ever are planned to go, ever.
Where the sidewalk may arrive in 60 years, the road does not have a painted line, and my taxes per actual value of house will be the highest they have ever, ever, ever been.

Every "leader" has their own "holistic vision" of a regional transportation system, none actual has authority of more than 1 chunk of pie.
I could have written the story, it was true to me in every detail.
When the others who live north of 85th that voted the sales tax to solve the transportation system one way, get tagged with car tabs/tolls for that tunnel I suspect will walk outside to where the open drainage ditches are, and a sidewalk will be 60 years from now, and throw themselves into the ditch, and wait for the crows.

We do not have A plan, if I do not have A plan, and I am expected to pay for all of the competing PLANS.
There is no natural jurisdiction to develop a plan. If it is ST then Simms/Drago/Eddy should find other things to do. If it is not ST, and something like this does not exist then that is the problem.
Telling people they do not have a problem because there are so many "options" is not a solution.

I wish this was isolated to just transportation.

If you want to see bad transportation solutions, just about 140 miles south and across the river is the Northwest's second city.
Mt Hood Expressway-Dead; this could have significantly improved traffic from the east side of the city.
I-5 improvements-Dead; Over the past four years I travel to Portland at least 10 times a year and don't recall a time when I-5 south in north Portland wasn't backed up for several miles
A decent light rail plan-not every worthy of comment
A new Columbia River bridge-ideas that go beyond stupid. Bike lanes instead of vehicle lanes? There is also discussion about only three lanes in each direction. Isn't that how many there are now. A $4B bridge with only three lanes? stupid, stupid, stupid!!!!
Seattle and Sounders, count your lucky stars. While the regional transportaion woes are considerable, it pales in comarison with the "planning" going on in the PDX metro area.

In all of these words about transportation issues and regional planning, the word "Ferry" doesn't appear.
These icons of the region move more folks per day than all the light rail, Sounder and Cascade trains, monorail, and streetcars combined. Instead of a 70 mile drive, Bainbridge is a 1/2 hour boat ride. Bremerton an hour, Southworth 45 minutes. One boat at a time, a couple of thousand walk-ons, lots of bikers, a couple of hundred cars. No roads, rails, or bridges to maintain.
The state Constitution identifies them as an integral part of the state highway system.
80% of the cost is paid by the riders. What percent are the riders paying for Metro, Light Rail, the tunnel, 520 bridge, etc? Are the proposed road tolls going to come even close to paying for them?
The bare bones cost to replace the 40-50 year old ships is around $3 Billion for the next 20 plus years. The cheap plan 'B' proposed to the Governor is gonna cut routes, force the counties to ante up for foot ferries and leave the West Sound paddling our own canoes to get to work, ball games, and the East Sound amenities.

Since you don't consider the West Sound part of the "solution", and we're not even discussed as part of the "plan", leave us out of the PSRC.

WxMan doesn't know beans about Portland planning. The Mt Hood Freeway would have demolished 1700 homes in a fully developed SE Portland neighborhood and left thousands more on the edge of the freeway cut. Instead, Portland reconfigured the Banfield Freeway wider and straighter(for safety) and added MAX light rail. A MAX spur line north along I-205 to the airport has been added, and another spur south along I-205 will soon cross the area to be served by the Mt Hood Freeway.

The plans for replacing the 'old' I-5 bridges across the Columbia River are down to 8, 10, or 12 lanes (not 6 lanes). The 12-lane version has a HOV lane in the far left. Two extra lanes are necessary solely for entrance and exit ramps between Vancouver, Jantzen Beach and North Portland. I-5 narrows to 6 lanes in North Portland, so the HOV lane would have to end there. It's arguably safer while crossing the river to not have to deal with any extra lane changes as I-5 narrows to 6-lanes, so my guess is that the 10-lane version will get the nod.

Seattle planners do have Portland as a fine example, but either they don't learn from Portland or they go out of their way to disregard Portland's successes. It's probably just a matter of greed, the gold rush hangover.