I actually made it through the whole thing with a single cup of coffee.

I'm not sure the headline matches the story.

It appears that people continue to be attracted to lower cost homes at, or near, the edge of the urbanized parts of the region. But, the more central cities are also holding their own in terms of housing more people. In order to make the link to transportation, it seems like you also need to show where people work, in addition to where they live. This piece doesn't do that, adequately. But it is a really good read.

This does not appear to reflect a losing battle against sprawl, but a mixed bag. At least we finally have a plan to measure against - a big step forward from past efforts. What gets measured is far more likely to be managed. even if it happened about 20 years after the enactment of the Growth Management Act.

Kudos to MacDonald for all of his attention to this subject. It matters.

For those 20 years, a whole bunch of land has been grandfathered as immune from "management." That's probably one big reason we're seeing a lot of growth on the edge (in Pierce County and Snohomish), or outside of it. It would be good to know how much more grandfathers we are dealing with. And if you really want to do something about this profoundly important topic, maybe you'd pass a law to manage growth in those grandfathered places.

Well, as usual, a really fine piece of work from Doug. Again, this piece hints at the need to deal with transportation systemically as opposed to the haphazard way we do know. Everyone's deadly earnest in pushing their piece of the puzzle, but the puzzle still doesn't quite work as a picture. (Oh, boy, I'd better go have that second cup of coffee.)

That grandfathering may or may not be significant, Jan, but I DO know that the tension between extremely local land use control and state/regional objectives is responsible for much of the lag between vision and results.

Doug, can't you write a shorter paper and say the same thing with fewer words?

Before we spend another dollar on lightrail, we need to go BACK to the original RTP recommendation which was MORE BUSES, MORE PLACES, MORE OFTEN, estimated to need a $1+ Billion funding source. That has to be accomplished in order to create an efficient,convenient (ten minute headways) and thouough transit system in our region.

Other than that, we need to address the ongoing fact that auto ownership continues to be at an all time high in America. We need to address our auto-dependant lifestyle of the great masses and put the owness back on the corporate entities and federal government.

We need more fuel efficient vehicles, alternative sources of fuel that isother than oil and non-polluting, safe state-of-the-art vehicles. We need to address the need for smarter roadways, whether it's HOV networks, fast lanes, and systems that create the maximum efficiencey of movement and reduce mishaps. This while maintaining our roadway system.

We are who we are! No 19th century fix, plan or attitude will work in contemporary America.

Telecommunications, live-work community developments, family friendly developments, larger sized housing to better accomodate families at affordable rates, quality integrated education and pride of ownership, all send residents in a different direction than the Urban Planning mindsets that prevail.

I say, switch horses and build on the strength of the great majority's choices. Let's fill in the blanks rather than derail those current and future choices. Let's remember that whether high or low density, we are all good people who want to participate in guarenteeing a quality of life for all.

If we don't, we will condemn ourselves to perpetual disappointment and ailenation.

Art.

Another great MacDonald piece. I'm a ST fan, but the Vision 2040 analysis is worthy of serious discussion by PSRC and regional leadership. Will be a test of that leadership to see if people take MacDonald's arguments seriously and assess the need to adjust our assumptions or growth management approach. Mr. Drewel, what's the next step in the discussion?

Art,
How about this?

The Puget Sound Regional Council has responsibility under federal and state law for transportation planning,
economic development and growth management. Guided by planning staff, elected officials from four member
counties, 72 cities, and various other agencies conduct a multilayered-layered, rather opaque decision-making process. Recently the Council replaced its Vision 2020 with Vision 2040 and in so doing signed the region up for a growth pattern, unlike the original, quite foreign and decidedly ill-suited to the region. For the first nine years of the plan, the reality has been the opposite of the concepts, that is the solutions remain the problem, and consistently so.

Given the motive: save the planet, the Council's lack of concern is inexplicable. This raises the question of whose needs are really being served? The growing social disparity suggests an old wolf—mega-
redevelopment— in fancy new clothes. Truly saving the planet mean openly examining unintended consequences and actually getting on with the most worthy of the most doable
intentions. To do otherwise is far from harmless.

Comparing the Washington State Office of Finance and Management's 2009 Estimates of Regional Growth with the Puget Sound Regional Council's Vision 2040 shows the following for the period 2000-2009:

?Actual total growth in “Met Cities” is HALF Vision 2040's target for percent-of-region.

?Actual total growth in “Small Cities” is TWICE Vision 2040's target for percent-of-region, and consistently so.

?Actual total growth in “Core Cities” and “Larger Cities” is consistent with Vision 2040's target for percent-of-
region, but individually very irregular,

?Actual total growth in Unincorporated Areas coincides with Vision 2040's target for percent-of-region,
however:
—unincorporated Pierce County growth is over twice the Vision 2040 target,
—unincorporated Kitsap is overshooting by 1.4 times, but an unincorporated “city” complicates matters,
—the proportion in all four counties occurring outside Urban Growth Areas is unknown .

I leave to Doug a summary of the transportation side of the equation.

sorry for the lack of formating above

A few quick points...

We should provide more state leadership on growth management, and require counties like Thurston to tighten their boundaries.

Even in King Co, growth management took a while to make a difference in actual land use patterns, due to factors such as grandfathering and developers taking a while to adjust their focuses. Developers are now focused on infill, and the amount of grandfathered developments should be dropping...

The 80/20 bus thing is rediculous. The focus seems to be giving "access" to as many far out suburbs as possible...places not designed for efficient transit. It's sensible to provide at least some service to those areas. But that means little to land use. We should provide "trunk line" service to major suburban nodes and corridors (the sort of thing we've been voting for), and "carpet bomb" inner neighborhoods with service. Once again, why can't the City of Seattle do a separate funding measure to support bus service, much as we've done to for schools? Why can't Seattle fund Metro in the same way Washington funds Amtrak?

I don't understand MacDonald's logic here. According him, our bus- and highway-centric transportation network has failed to generate the needed density. So rather than break with that paradigm, MacDonald's solution is more of the same.

I just don't understand the attitude of self-identified transit "advocates" like MacDonald. He wants to contain sprawl, but spends all his time slagging density-supporting infrastructure like light rail. Meanwhile, highway spending -- which dwarfs light rail spending and actually encourages sprawl -- gets a free pass. It's fitting for the former head of the state highway department, that never saw a problem that couldn't be solved by pouring more asphalt.

Here's a link to the data:
http://www.ofm.wa.gov/pop/april1/default.asp

It is depressing.

However, it's probably worth pointing out that the "Housing Change by Structure Type by County" table shows that King Co added more multifamily units (50,638) than single-family (39,827) from 2000-2009. I'm not which category townhomes would fall under, since they're sold as single units. It's too bad the stats don't break out the cities and urban centers. There are some 2007 estimates on Seattle's Urban Centers embedded in each the Neighborhood Planning draft status report here:
http://www.cityofseattle.net/planningcommission/

By the way, there are no "new high rises" in Cascade, only lowrise apartment buildings. The high rise condos on Vulcan land are in Denny Triangle, and yes they target only one market segment. For example, back in 1992 Vancouver required 25% of new units meet their "High-Density Housing for Families with Children" guidelines. Seattle has no such guidelines.

I thought this was a compelling piece, and raises several serious questions about growth patterns and transportation. But most of all don’t these statistics prove that you cant force people to live someplace they don’t want to? Density strategies, perhaps even transportation routes, can’t force people to move into areas they don’t like, or live lifestyles they don’t want.

Cheap gas may be the main culprit. Last year’s gas bubble probably wasn’t long enough to significantly affect growth statistics, but it would be interesting to find out it did, either through numbers of housing starts, or some kind of occupancy survey. We know if affected transit ridership. Perhaps a significant rise in the state or regional gas tax would do more to stem exurbian growth than anything else. That could be money used to help bus service, and maybe even contribute to the unfunded transit plans of ST etc.

Ooops, forgot , We have to find a politician with the ... ok lets say "bravery" to suggest it.

A lot of people want to live more centrally but don't because the costs per square foot tend to be much higher. Why are they higher...because of the high demand most of all. When people move to the fringes, they often quote cheaper housing as the reason. This doesn't sound like a suburban love thing to me. Obviously a lot of people prefer the fringes, and particularly having yards or even big yards, and obviously a lot of infill is related to a desire for proximity rather than lifestyle, but clearly location choices aren't all about people's ideals.

Expensive gas will help this equation significantly. The chain of cause and effect and cause and effect will be complicated, but basically the fringes will be less desired on average, and it won't make as much economic sense to build houses there. The big challenge will be that lots more poor people will live in these less desirable fringe neighborhoods, and they'll want transit. Maybe the 80/20 thing will halfway make sense then...

joshuadf,

Townhomes are considered single-family.

George, where are you seeing that? Different agencies have different definitions and I'm not finding it on the OFM site. Of course the dividing line is subjective in vernacular use.

People make decisions to their own liking and values. Not because there is a bus line nearby, but because they define their needs by their own vision of how they want to live. That may in fact be greatly influenced by the housing/lifestyle they grew up with.
Let's not tamper with the desire to find the best fit, but offer alternatives so responsible choices can be made.

Art

I'd actually say that the statistics prove that you CAN force people to live someplace they don’t want to. About 50 percent of the population likes suburban life; unfortunately about 80 percent of the housing has been built that way, and it will take a long time to get caught up:
http://www.infrastructurist.com/2009/02/10/how-to-save-the-suburbs-an-interview-with-christopher-leinberger/

I have several personal anecdotes of friends with kids who moved to the suburbs because they couldn't find any in-city options. The article mentions the main problem: urban developers concentrated on the small but potentially high-profit luxury condo market.

Doug's idea of redeveloping strip malls would be a great start. It's become clear (even to the Federal DOT and HUD) that neighborhood retail, sidewalks, and housing options have a lot to do with transportation:
http://t4america.org/blog/2009/04/29/transportation-secretary-affirms-smart-principles-for-us-transportation-system/

mhays,

Sorry for not clarifying. King County's Assessor data regards townhomes as single-family (residential) dwellings. Condos are on the whole considered commercial property, but they have tables where you can separate the units out and define them as condos. My assumption was that OFM would be using King County's data as to what was constructed. This assumption could be an error, but I doubt it.

I suspect that assessors, land use code, and the Census Dept. have substantially different systems. Since townhouses come in many forms, there are plenty of places to put a dividing line between single-family and multifamily. For example, apparently when you do an integrated garage at the base of a townhouse project, it kicks you into another section of code that makes the whole project substantially more expensive.

Mr. MacDonald, thank you for this excellent analysis of our region’s continuing efforts to control growth and development.

Given the Puget Sound region’s relatively short history with growth management it is instructive to learn that the Portland region (which has a much longer history implementing GMA style policies) has also experienced mixed results attempting to direct and concentrate growth into urban centers. In fact, a 2005 article by Oregonian reporter Randy Gregg noted similar concerns to those being discussed here. It seems the Portland area’s designated urban centers, much like their Puget Sound equivalents, haven’t been growing any faster than the “non-center” areas which surround them.

The problem is largely one of economics. As the OFM has noted much of the region’s growth has bypassed urban centers. There are probably several reasons for this, most notably there is currently plenty of land available for the construction of single family homes within our urban growth areas. When this land is exhausted one of two scenarios will play out. Either the cost of available single family homes will increase to such an extent that those who would normally prefer this type of housing will be forced to consider other higher density options; or, political pressures will cause elected officials to expand the amount of land available for low density development.

Clearly neither of the scenarios identified above is desirable. One involves forcing people to accept a housing type they don’t want, while the other would allow for continued sprawling development. Which begs the questions; why aren’t more people choosing to live in urban centers? I believe the answer to that question can be found in OFM’s own numbers. Clearly the most successful urban centers are the most “urban” in nature. Accordingly, the extent to which urban centers will succeed in attracting development will be largely determined by our ability to create amenity rich environments out of suburban parking lots. Not an easy task by any means.

Mr. MacDonald’s concern that we have planned on building more transportation projects than we can afford is well taken. While the GMA mandates the development of “capitol facilities plans” the actual requirements are quite weak, and in reality most jurisdictions pay only lip service to specific funding plans. In order to be truly effective, the GMA should be amended to require that money be available to pay for all planned infrastructure prior to land being released for development. There is a world of difference between identifying “potential” funding sources and actually coming up with the cash.

Clearly, some major steps must be taken if the PSRC’s well intentioned planning efforts are to be realized. Hopefully the current economic downturn will provide the Puget Sound region with the opportunity to assess what has happened, what should happen, and how to go about making it happen.

I am curious on the argument that the growth of outlying areas is a preference issue and not a supply issue. As I've mentioned my family of 4 and several of our friends prefer a walkable lifestyle over low density, but we've seen very few options as most new housing seems to be outlying tracts.

It is entirely possible that we are a minuscule minority, but forecast surveys such as at williamsmarketing.com and research from Brookings seems to support the idea that too many loan-fueled subdivisions have forced people (especially young families) out of urban areas. It's also backed up by the relative success of Vancouver's False Creek North carefully planned megadevelopment, which includes a lot of open space and a school.

Am I off base here? I'd love to hear arguments either way.

(We rent in the U-District, by the way.)

I think that if anything, this update shows that we do in fact need to be more agressive about how we treat cars if we are going to achieve our 2040 goals. Why wouldn't people drive when they have cheap gas, subsidized parking, toll free roads, and high speed freeways through neighborhoods? Putting higher costs (financially and time-wise) onto personal vehicles would truly be the easiest way to limit exurban growth in our region.

We complain that growth management isn't working but then we're up in arms if a 50 mile commute takes 5 minutes longer.

Here are a few of my dusty complaints about Seattle's regional planningk.

The Southcenter District should NOT have been bypassed by Link LRT. There were a few route options through the district, but discarded by PSRC, ST and other agencies, some "boasting" about saving a whopping 3 minutes travel time between Seatac Airfield and downtown Seattle, and I forget how many millions saved, but not a bargain in the long run. The only explanation for the bypass that makes sense is 'political strings pulled'.

Nix the tunnel extension north indefinitely. Instead, direct these billions to Link extensions south to Federal Way, the I-90 line through Bellevue and Redmond, and a spur through Southcenter possibly as far as Renton. Doug MacDonald's article is enough of an explanation why this makes sense for regional planning considerations. I should add that Capitol Hill and UW are fully developed inner-city districts with little potential for infill (without resorting to bulldozing existing and historic buidings) and are already well-served with transit.

Metro bus maps crack me up. They're indecipherable. There are many corridors where dozens of lines converge. It's duplicative; more buses than necessary and at the same time, not enough.

Lessons "learnable" from LRT spring from how bus lines are rerouted to rail stations. The shorter the bus line, the easier to gage its optimal frequency of service. Transit systems must incorporate transfers. There's no getting around it. Bus/rail integration forces transfers. This lesson of forced transfers should be applied to Bus to Bus routes. Efficiencies should lead to savings.

The potential amount and character of development along bus lines that lead to LRT stations is greater than at the rail stations. Bus/rail integration creates rail route options that can reduce cost and impact.

Blah blah blah.

The data in this report show a disconnect between our stated goals of creating and sustaining cologically and economically sustainable communities and the extent to which we are actually achieving these goals. The following provide some interesting food for thought on why this is the case and the long term costs of failure to curb sprawl:

The Cul de Sac Syndrome http://www.culdesacsyndrome.com/

The Tragedy of Suburbia: http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/james_howard_kunstler_dissects_suburbia.html

The End of Suburbia: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3uvzcY2Xug

Most all of the commenters are wrong. Are you all planners?

First of all, most people I know would not want the "compact, walkable" dense and crowded lifestyle that planners love to push. People want quiet and privacy, with a little "elbow room" thrown in, plus they want to own some land.

Thus the "dense is good, sprawl is bad" hooey is just that. One mans 'sprawl' is another mans dream.

This whole idea of central planning that is manifested in the Portland and Seattle land use schemes is absolutely contrary to individual free choice. That is why it is not working.

Plan and growth manage all you want. It won't change what most people want, that special place in the sun.

Wilderness and farmland are worth saving. That's more important than people's freedom to waste, beyond a reasonable point.

Yes growth management is working. It's reducing sprawl in counties where the restrictions are tight. (If it's not working, why are you complaining?)

eastkingcountyrednecklogger, I agree that there are a lot of people who really like low density living. However, that's 80% of what's been built the past 50 years or so, which is simply too much. Some people want walkable, which is why is there such a long waiting list for UW's family oriented courtyard apartments at Blakeley Village.

Rednecker has been told by his 'authority sources' that planners intend to move everyone into urban centers like NYC and San Francisco. He's told his choice is being removed. Rather, he's being offered more choice, not less. Rednecker should learn how he and like-minded conservatives/libertarians are being lied to by these trusted authorities, some wearing an oft-bleached garb of holiness.

The summary here is that if, as Doug MacDonald says, only 5% of transportation is public transit by the year 2040, nothing else he's said will matter. That 5% marketshare only comes if we ignore AGW, and if we do that, by 2030 the game is lost, and by 2040 people are realizing that having children involves an agonizing decision about bringing a child into a dying globe.

Nor, in fact, does MacDonald ever talk turkey about how suburbia developed, with "free" highways to vacant land, and 50 years of American dominance in financial and oil markets.

It would hardly be surprising if people continued to move to Algona and Gig Harbor- the Baby Boomers are retiring, there are a lot of them, and the PNW has a reputation as a nice and fairly liberal place. They don't need to go to work every day, so why wouldn't they retire where they want to?

Nor is it a shock that people who want to live in a city are moving to Seattle, but not to Everett or Tacoma. This is just a powerful reminder that a real city is different from the suburbs.

The US has come up against a problem that can't be solved by torturing people to get false confessions or launching missiles at villages. One way or the other, what happens next will not result in people of the year 2040 happily commuting in cars as they have in the past.

Here's the real issue:

People living in the sub/exurbs, live an incredibly subsidized life. That is, since there is a large area to cover and less people, utilities, fire service, police service, road construction and repair, public transportation, schools, are all paid for by a greater tax base then just the immediate neighborhood. The way this can happen is that people in denser communities use much less in utility costs so their excess tax bases can be used to pay for these large, sparse areas.

Now I understand this isn't entirely true and for a much more nuanced discussion we would have to get into demographics and taxing authorities. But nonetheless it is quite obvious in some circumstances. For example, the Alaskan Way Viaduct and 520 are new freeways subsidized by the whole but used primarily by the few. Similarly the 40/40/20 bus agreement is largely funded by Seattle but benefits South and East King County. Rural King County is another good example of a place consistently funded by Seattle and Bellevue for fire and police service.

So basically what we have is large numbers of people choosing to live farther and farther out because its a much better deal. You get all the benefits without the costs while in dense areas you get the benefits but you also pay for the benefits of ex/suburbanites. So in terms of economics people know that living way out pans out to be more bang for your buck.

So even if we take out the whole enviromental thing, the PSRC understands that in terms of local governments providing service, dense living is much more economically efficient and allows them to do much more with their tax bases.

Throw the environmental benefits on top of that and it becomes clear that we need to push for denser living. Thus Vision 2040 is born. If anything its goal is to change the subsidy system so that dense, compact living is a better deal than living in the ex/suburbs.

Unfortunately many of the members of the PSRC are politicians representing these ex/suburban communities. For them, any amount of changing the system would mean political suicide so they fight hard to continue the status quo. Who can blame them, this is what they are elected for. I don't know the details but either they have substantially more political clout then their percent of regional population, or the PSRC is bogged down with the same Seattle Process of finding perfect solutions to difficult problems. But regardless what this study shows is that the PSRC has failed in the last 10 years to change any of these subsidy systems. 40/40/20 is a perfect example.

What this update also shows is that there are no easy answers and to truly accomplish the goals of 2040 we are going to need some strong political wills that can stand up to the scrutiny and outcry that will inevitable come from making the right changes.

The ‘race’ we’re losing is to understand the real world, in contrast to the planners’ utopia. In the real world, at least ¾ of jobs are not suited for and cannot survive in downtowns or major centers, and at least ¾ of people, and not only in families, prefer modest densities and single family homes (even if small and closely spaced) to a dense urban life in apartments. The fact that most urban growth remains at the edge is a predictable consequence of market preferences, and the result is not evil or inefficient. Paris, London, New York, Boston and San Francisco may have spectacular dense cores, but their suburbias in fact ‘sprawl’ over vast areas. The key is to stop trying to force the unwilling into apartments because it is good for them, but to work on urban designs for denser family housing, that respects the need for private space, indeed such as many parts of Seattle well provide. Trains? Sigh, I well understand their symbolic allure, but if anyone believes they will yield significant net economic returns, I condemn him or her to cost-benefit analysis 101.
And, I see in today's crosscut,a story of ADU (accessory dwelling unit). Why not? much better than tearing down perfectly good homes for miles of ugly 3-story apartment houses.

I think the #1 problem is exemplified in this quote:

...only 16 percent of the population lives in Seattle, although about a quarter of the jobs are in the region's biggest city. That’s why there are many commuters, including lots of people living in Seattle who work at jobs outside the city.

From my perspective down here in Tacoma, I can't believe how many billions are being spent to make it easier for Tacoma residents to commute to their jobs in Seattle. It isn't healthy for those commuters who must spend 2 hours/day on the road or rails, away from their families and communities. And it isn't healthy for Tacoma, which loses out on all sorts of business taxes, development opportunities, and downtown life. Yet the City of Tacoma is in full support of jumping on the Link line!

I just wonder what would happen if those same dollars were spent on improving itself to draw jobs and people to the city. It would not only benefit Tacoma and its residents, it would benefit the whole region by decreasing demand (and wear) on roads and transit systems.

I'm using Tacoma as the example because it's the second-biggest player here, and because I know it best, but the same ideas apply throughout Puget Sound. Decentralize jobs and you don't have to spend so much money moving people around.

MHD @ Aug 27, 10:44 a.m. FTW

DMorrill,

I think I agree with you about the preferences of 75% of the population, but for the most part the market is not providing moderate density, it's providing low density. The little moderate density that we have is in very high demand: Seattle's "streetcar suburb" neighborhoods and other walkable places like Kirkland. Supposedly the master-planned Issaquah Highlands is moderate density (and diverse), but I've got no reason to go all the way out there myself:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/realestate/2003809247_realneighborhood29x.html

"In 1967 planner and architect Albert Mayer wrote that “Trend is not destiny”. This seemingly simple concept is one which continues to elude a great many people and is in fact the primary rational behind comprehensive planning efforts. That is, to arrest trends deemed socially harmful and promote alternative patterns of development. As a corollary I would add that if “Trend is not destiny”, neither is wishful thinking." bjohn

"Our very humanity rebels against being subjected to all-encompassing rational controls. This rebellion frequently expresses itself politically, to the great surprise of the rationalizing elites who cannot understand why the putative beneficiaries of great programs of rational improvement are so recalcitrant.”

"Another way of putting it is to say that the modern challenge is how to live with uncertainty. The basic
fault lines today are not between people with different beliefs but between people who hold these beliefs
with an element of uncertainty and people who hold these beliefs with a pretense of certitude.... Epistemological modesty means that you believe certain things, but you're modest about these claims.”
Peter L. Berger

I think the key to growth-management-like outcomes at this point in our cultural development is to ensure that sprawl and growth pay their own way. Every cost we can rightly put on the backs of growth and sprawl will beget thousands of improved market choices. This also seems to me an easier case to argue to the public than growth management via fiat.

afreeman - thanks for citing Berger, uncertainty and social constructionism that follows

"Rural King County is another good example of a place consistently funded by Seattle and Bellevue for fire and police service."

Mr. Mahar, How is Bellevue and Seattle paying for my police and fire service?

Isaquah Highlands is a travesty. Its proponents may call it high-density, but it affords only one mode of access - automobile. It's high hillside setting completely discourages walking and bicycling. Mass transit? Forget it. It's all housing. The State of Washington encourages real estate development high on hillsides. It's just another way we rape nature so that we can preposterously enjoy what we don't rape.

Joshuadf: I have no problem with people who exercise their choice to live a walkable compact life. I do have a problem when these 'planners' decide thats the way I am going to live.

Y'know, we keep hearing about how people want to live in suburban homes. But a mere 75 years ago, as can be plainly seen by a drive through Seattle, people preferred to live in urban neighborhoods with very small lots. And if you go to places like NYC it seems like millions of people want to live in residential skyscrapers or brownstones. How does that work?

The only real conclusion to be drawn is that people are adaptable, don't care that much about what kind of house they have compared with other factors, and probably buy houses in suburbia because of our tax policies, transportation policies, and generous doses of good old propaganda which we call 'advertising'.

Suburban housing is great for recent transplants who have no roots, don't care much about the land (because they'll be moving again soon) and regard a house as an investment, a tax break, and something they buy with an eye to resale. None of this is crazy, but whether it reflects what people really want is a different matter.

For all the talk of sprawl and density there has been comparatively little discussion of the pattern and legibility of our street networks, the scale of our political units, or the basic quality of the environments which we are creating. The challenge then, is to avoid converting our entire region into a single undifferentiated amorphous, mass. Preventing this unhappy occurrence will require a basic reordering and restructuring of the means by which we control urban development. The urban form must be broken into units which possess unique qualities, can be understood by residents and visitors alike, and which allow citizens the opportunity to involve themselves directly in decisions which affect their lives. Unless these concerns are addressed by our planning efforts we will indeed lose the war against sprawl.

Seattle will face continuing degredation if it does not normalize itself with the ring of Puget Sound exurbs from Issaquah, to Renton, to Kent.

Seattle, as is, is too big, to centralizing, to "urbish" to fit in the changing landscape of productive sprawl. People like big houses and free parking. They don't want Habitrail Condoes and billion dollar rail boondoggles.

To wit, Seattle needs to divide itself up into 3 or 4 ex-urbs. I suggested: Seattle North -- from 45th Street on up; Seattle South -- from Columbia on down -- and Seattle Central -- everything in between. Oh yeah. West Seattle. They secede too.

Right now Seattle just doesn't fit. It's too dense. It's too money intensive and its infrastructure is too tightly packed to be efficient. It can't support the warehouse/mall style of goods distribution that leads to the high efficiency of the suburbs such as Kent.

Worse of all, Seattle is a taker. It basically uses King County Government as its own private nursing bottle...creating ever more arcane "projects" that supposedly benefit the region -- but end up only siphoning tax monies to the center city elites.

Seattle -- divided you stand.

Jabailo-

You hit the nail on the head about Seattle being money intensive, but I don't think infrastructure can be too tightly back to be efficient. "Efficient" being the key word. I suspect you mean given how complex Seattle is, any infrastructure repair on improvmement is darned expensive because everything is a "bowl of spaghetti" of pipes, wires and roads.

I could be wrong, but it seems to me, though, that once the infrastucture is in place, it's fastastically efficient to deliver services.

Isn't Seattle a "next exporter" of taxes to the rest of King County and the state?

One footnote to MacDonald's latest essay for Crosscut is that he also wrote an 11-page lawyer-speak version for the attention of the Puget Sound Regional Council (PSRC), delivered last July 31.

In this letter he notes that PSRC's draft, not-yet-approved Metropolitan Transportation Plan for year 2040 with five future investment alternatives does not meet the legal requirement of having an achievable baseline no-action alternative with no-new-taxes and no-new-tolls.

This point is illustrated by the trends MacDonald notes in his Crosscut piece above, but if you read his letter, you'll see that the news is even worse.

At the conclusion of the letter, MacDonald calls for a serious re-write of the baseline, which stands as the foundation for thinking about investing additional billions for 2040.

The letter is posted full text for download at http://psrc.org/projects/trans2040/comment/Comments%20Only/item_8202.pdf.

The New York Times just announced the launch of a new magazine, called National Affairs magazine. National Affairs magazine is a news journal, and it will be heavy on the social science angle. This isn't reading for people that read celebrity gossip magazines. (It rhymes with "schmidiots.") The magazine is more or less a continuation of an older magazine, The Public Interest. The Public Interest ran for forty years, from 1965 to 2005, but had to close down for various reasons. Well, now it's back – with a new name. Perhaps to re-launch The Public Interest, the owners decided that ignominy wasn't good enough, and repackaged it as National Affairs Magazine and got some mortgage loan restructuring. Apple announcement is another breaking news. There's new iPods and other products to get, too, and each Apple announcement leads to people getting payday cash to buy more stuff.

Read more: http://personalmoneystore.com/moneyblog/2009/09/09/apple-announcement-iphones-cameras-itunes/

eastkingcountyrednecklogger-

"I do have a problem when these 'planners' decide thats the way I am going to live."

Yet another example of acute persecution syndrome by a libertarian cultist.

Look, planners don't want to evict you from your unabomber cabin. Developers do. As a treehugger, seeing your 5 acre parcel subdivided for starter castles would be yet another tragic loss in the battle to preserve our region's quality of life.

"How is Bellevue and Seattle paying for my police and fire service?"

Because I pay more taxes and receive less benefit whereas you pay less and receive more. Your choice of lifestyle, god bless you, is subsidized by urbanites. Our reward for such generosity? Your hatred. I don't expect a "thank you". But not biting the hand that feeds you would be a good start.

serial_catowner-

"we keep hearing about how people want to live in suburban homes."

As a newly wed with child, we bought in "Rentaquah" because that's what we could afford. The commute (home -> daycare -> work -> daycare -> errands -> home) was brutal.

I prefer to live in urban or rural areas. Both have communities. Where you know your neighbors. Both encourage a person to be outside. Many suburban developments isolate you from both your neighbors and the outdoors. They're dehumanizing.