Posted Wed, Apr 4, 11:07 a.m.

Unlike many of you, I think the Seattle PI made the right choices for a web publication. The Seattle Times is more like a printed page put up on the web. The PI adopted the bloggy-posty style that is more appropriate for an audience that wants to check in and ...

Posted Mon, Mar 5, 7:09 p.m.

@animalal And I bet of those 620,000 residents, 400,000 of the would rather live in a much smaller community/town like Kent. I mean, what good does it for a family of four who live in Northgate, and who commute to Boeing jobs in Everett to have a 10 story library ...

Posted Mon, Mar 5, 7:06 p.m.

@coolpapa "symphony, library, opera, ballet, government office buildings, sports stadia, train station, and multiple universities. Seattle has significant public resources and infra-structure" Yes, and that its probably one of the major causes of the current state budget woes. Seattle is a "Rotton Urb"...it sees itself as first among equals instead ...

Posted Sun, Mar 4, 7:10 p.m.

Well, yeah, the argument isn't that we can't have "cores" it's just that we don't have to have one single gigantic core force everyone to herd into it every day to live and work. What is being said the "metro area" is itself sprawling, as there are pockets of density ...

Posted Sun, Mar 4, 5:46 p.m.

The Evolving Urban Area: Seattle --from the new geography blog "Despite the pre-2010 census media and academic drumbeat to the effect that metropolitan areas were no longer dispersing, the census revealed a totally different and even inconvenient truth. This does not mean that both residents of the entire metropolitan region, ...

Posted Fri, Feb 17, 4:19 p.m.

Washington State as Greece...fabulous parallel...and oh so true! The number of people riding the gravy train is so immense its only going 3 mph and the boiler is about to blow off its bolts!

Posted Fri, Feb 17, 4:17 p.m.

We spend all this money to fix the Mercer Mess, and pave a golden route right to the Key Arena and now they want to put a new stadium in Palookaville?

Posted Thu, Dec 22, 2:39 p.m.

One of the problems is WA law is unclear who has the right of way. If you are already in the crosswalk, cars are supposed to leave at least a lanes distance before turning. However, the law also says that pedestrians are not supposed to rush into a crosswalk in ...

Posted Thu, Dec 22, 2:28 p.m.

U.S. Population Grows at Slowest Rate Since 1940s ::quote The population of the United States is growing at its slowest rate in more than 70 years, the U.S. Census Bureau said on Wednesday. The country's population increased by an estimated 2.8 million to 311.6 million from April 1, 2010 to ...

Posted Thu, Dec 8, 3:50 p.m.

People grow, and get wiser. Some want us always to stay the same. I'm hoping Mitt keeps the good values of acceptance while loosing the confines of liberal dogma like density and urbanism that have wrecked the American lifestyle in the last 30 years.

Posted Thu, Sep 22, 11:30 p.m.

Great...now we can start generating hydrogen from the waste water. Hydrogen Fuel Breakthrough Uses Bacteria http://www.energydigital.com/green_technology/hydrogen-fuel-breakthrough-uses-bacteria Researchers use bacteria, and an electrochemical reaction between saltwater and freshwater to produce hydrogen fuel ", the bacteria used aren’t particularly picky when it comes to the source of acetate they require. In fact, ...

Posted Thu, Sep 22, 11:50 a.m.

If you want to see a retail economic success story...visit 108th Avenue on Kent East Hill. The key to its success? Strip malls. These provide low cost commercial rentals for new shop owners to set up business, and hire people at moderate wages. Affordable housing is nearby in the apartment ...

Posted Thu, Sep 15, 11:43 a.m.

Washington State needs to encourage more bike riders and not let "cyclists" dominate the image. Look at the bike-centric cities of Copenhagen or Amsterdam. Do you see lycra clad Tour de Francers speeding around past red lights at 30 mph? No...you see smartly dressed professionals on 3-speeds with high handle ...

Posted Thu, Sep 15, 11:39 a.m.

Most people moved here to get away from density. That is the argument against density.

Posted Fri, Sep 2, 10:53 a.m.

Doesn't the emergence of SLU pretty much eviscerate the arguments of Pro-Density Advocates? As in, what Paul Allen did was essentially create an "exurb" inside the old urb! The bitter broken Old Downtown has given way to drug pushers and mobile mental outpatients. So, he moved everyone to a new ...

Posted Fri, Sep 2, 10:50 a.m.

A key prediction of "Climate Science" back in 2007 was increasingly powerful hurricanes. Yet, since then, and even at that time, fierce hurricanes have all but disappeared, becoming low speed tropical storms before landfall. Isn't the value of "Science" in its predictive power? The problem is the Pop Science brand ...

Posted Fri, Sep 2, 10:48 a.m.

Something like 11 of the best schools in the United States are in Bellevue. They are just simple, basic suburban schools in low density neighborhoods where parents and kids can have local measure of ownership and control. You can forget all the claptrap about "reforming" and "charter schools". Seattle is ...

Posted Fri, Sep 2, 10:45 a.m.

Earthquake! "Hurricane" (well, Tropical Storm really)! The Fear: Shut down the subway. Evacuate New York! The Reality: One busted up road in Vermont.

Posted Fri, Sep 2, 10:44 a.m.

Once the prices normalize, the exurbs will become the new Seattles.

Posted Fri, Sep 2, 10:44 a.m.

20 years of Pro-Density advocates in office has just about destroyed the quality of life in Western Washington.

Posted Sun, Aug 7, 7:41 a.m.

None of these expensive abominations do what the majority of people (in Seattle and outside of Seattle) want. Reduce congestion on I-5. I-5 is the key...speedy personal transit is the desire.

Posted Sun, Aug 7, 6:52 a.m.

For the growing and prospering exurbs that ring it, Seattle is simply a clog in the drain. Seattle's digging its heels in the mud provincialism is preventing the rest of Western Washington from having speedy and low cost Personal Transit served by automobiles and augmented by taxis. What we need ...

Posted Sun, Aug 7, 6:46 a.m.

Right, let's make our model a repressive Communist dictatorship that forces the relocation of millions of people off their land and into concrete silos just so they can have a workable "transit" system. I'm sure this is the thinking behind all Seattle Liberals.

Posted Wed, May 18, 10:29 a.m.

Sounds like the police could benefit from sharing ideas using a "social network" that would let them talk peer to peer. While I didn't like the shooting of John T. Williams (notice, I use the word "like" not "condone") I felt the leadership collapsed around the officer whose actions -- ...

Posted Wed, May 18, 10:26 a.m.

What do you mean "if" ?

Posted Wed, May 18, 10:24 a.m.

Seattle is a case of trying to make the mountains, the earth and the sky "more beautiful". The density crowd has been creating ever more arcane structures, imported from LA, NY and SF -- with little regard to the existing natural beauty. At this point, we should be taking things ...

Posted Sun, May 15, 9:55 p.m.

This article doesn't actually make any sort of point using data. It says there's more "transit" (and there has been...for years now...even when it was just buses and Amtrak). Yet, when it comes time to actually describe the fantastic "changes" I'm am perplexed as to what he refers to. I ...

Posted Mon, Apr 11, 11:21 p.m.

Here's the problem for WA State...we put on a party...and nobody came! The new census shows that state population grew 13% between 2000-2010; however tax revenues grew 50%! We went from a state that was highly regarded for its fiscal solvency to bankrupt, crooked, imperial government that has disconnected so ...

Posted Sat, Apr 9, 5:12 p.m.

To: ArrowSmith Yes, I know. That is the humor of it all...

Posted Sat, Apr 9, 5:11 p.m.

That these plans were made "long ago" is ever more the reason to re-evaluate them! The Washington and Seattle of pre-2007 is nothing like the Seattle and Washington of post-2007. This is a different world...a de-leveraged world...one where we may actually be building a true sprawling middle class, rather than ...

Posted Thu, Apr 7, 11:48 a.m.

A person with $1 Billion dollars, can buy 1,000 one million dollar homes. She can buy 4000 $250,000 homes or condos. The population of Vancouver is about 1/2 a million. 500 billionaires with a space billion could buy ALL the houses in Vancouver. Think about that.

Posted Thu, Apr 7, 11:02 a.m.

This is why the network of cul-de-sacs in the suburbs is far more natural and a better traffic softener than the "urbist grids" that the density hucksters keep pushing. Learn from Kent, Seattle.

Posted Thu, Apr 7, 11:01 a.m.

Does Seattle really need nine other six-figure officials when it already has a Mayor?

Posted Thu, Apr 7, 11 a.m.

It was all great and fantastic, but really, isn't it time to move on. Check out the new analog processors. The 21st century is here, but Seattle is still listening to grunge.

Posted Thu, Apr 7, 10:58 a.m.

"a different, more process-oriented, more citizen-involved form of city planning" Right, one where the Governor decides everything by fiat power, and when she doesn't get her way, goes over the head of a popularly elected Mayor and subverts plebecites and referendums.

Posted Thu, Apr 7, 10:55 a.m.

Sounder north is like your piece. Brilliant artistry...but not a solution to any pragmatic issue.

Posted Tue, Mar 29, 10:51 p.m.

2/3rds of the poll takers gave McGinn a PASS rating. No really sure what is driving Crosscut's comparison....

Posted Tue, Mar 29, 5:11 p.m.

Mike McGinn ran on one plank. Anti-tunnel. It took more than 50 percent of the people to elect me. McGinn's election was a referendum...one in which the people declared: No Tunnel.

Posted Tue, Mar 29, 5:10 p.m.

For all practical purposes, these are not "wars". The arab states are client states, artificial constructed by us and the British. They are more like Puerto Rico than France, a kind of US territory. That said, we owe it to the people there to finally make things right and give ...

Posted Tue, Mar 29, 5:07 p.m.

"Just fair" is as much a positive rating as a C is a passing grade. Much as the liars at crosscut would like to spin this, two-thirds gave McGinn a passing grade. And my guess is that most of them are waiting to see if he does what he was ...

Posted Tue, Mar 29, 5:05 p.m.

Who wrote this article...Don Rickles?! Commenting on the "communication skills" of an entire group of people just based on their ethnic origins?? I can't believe the amount of racism implicit in Seattle Liberals!

Posted Tue, Mar 29, 5:03 p.m.

The best thing Real did was Rhapsody. And they're an independent company now.

Posted Tue, Mar 29, 5:02 p.m.

The government has declared itself a foreign presence, subverting the clearly declared will of the people.

Posted Tue, Mar 29, 4:59 p.m.

Seattle shouldn't be annexing anything. Instead, it should be splitting itself up into at least four (4) manageable sub-cities to bring it into line with the suburbs and exurbs that have surrounded and surpassed it.

Posted Tue, Mar 29, 4:58 p.m.

The Tea Party is right. Government has become a foreign intrusion. It is operating out of the bounds of popularly elected Mayor, multiple plebecites and referendums.

Posted Tue, Mar 29, 4:57 p.m.

The poll said two thirds gave McGinn a postive rating: Fair, Good, Excellent. Only 1/3 said poor. These are great numbers for McGinn who has turned into Jimmy Stewart in Mr. Smith goes to Washington (State)...fighting the insiders, liars and crooks (present company included).

Posted Fri, Mar 25, 3:42 p.m.

As I was saying... "New York City’s Population Barely Rose in the Last Decade, the Census Finds" http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/25/nyregion/25census.html?_r=2&src;=me So, why was it you urbists want to spend all the state's tax money "reurbanizing" when all its done so far is ruin neighborhoods, left half empty condoes and unrentable office buildings, ...

Posted Fri, Mar 18, 9:54 a.m.

Since Good2Go is already operating on 167, why not 405 and 5? It seems like its a win situation. However, I do feel that if I'm paying extra for something, I should get better customer service and input into the "business" of running things. For example, I was inconvenienced yesterday ...

Posted Fri, Mar 18, 9:49 a.m.

The recent (near) enactment of the Vulnerable Users bill shows that mainstream Republicans and Democrats are willing to vote together on popular bicycle and pedestrian projects. Surveys show that the majority of Americans want government to spend something like 25 percent of roadway funding on bike-ped projects. The only anti-voices ...

Posted Fri, Mar 18, 9:43 a.m.

"The city is obsolete; ask the computer." Marshal McLuhan, 1969

Posted Wed, Mar 16, 11:19 a.m.

In fact, all toll monies should be used to reduce general taxation. So, it seems that every lane should be a toll lane of one sort or the other -- first class, business class, coach.

Posted Sun, Feb 27, 11:21 a.m.

We, we, we... Maybe the 10s should be called the We Generation. Somehow each great new program of work of "infrastructure" by the Commissariat is supposed to be good for each and everyone no matter that some pigs are more special than others.

Posted Sun, Feb 27, 11:18 a.m.

Cities are obsolete and unaffordable. Enslaving an entire populace with tax to satisfy the mad dreams of a few retrograde centrists is retrograde.

Posted Sun, Feb 27, 11:14 a.m.

The Towns such as Kent already live in the 21st century. It is the taxaous "Rotton Urbs" that are dependent on overvalued "infrastructure" that have been running the con for too long that are destined to fall.

Posted Sun, Feb 27, 11:10 a.m.

The real leader right now in Washington is the 2010 Census. The numbers are telling us that the old centralized model of Snow White (Seattle) and the Seven Dwarfs (exurbs and East) is decaying. The color of Washington in South King is changing and disenfranchised groups that don't want to ...

Posted Sun, Feb 27, 11:04 a.m.

I'm looking forward to being able to live in Kent and be able to take a 300 mph maglev to Yakima for some wine tasting. Of course they'll have to build a chunnel through the Cascades.

Posted Fri, Dec 3, 1:47 a.m.

We pay farmers not to plant land.

Posted Fri, Dec 3, 1:44 a.m.

It's amazing, that Seattle is surrounded by suburbs and malls that do breakneck business, and which serve millions of happy middle class customers each and every day with trendy shops, indoor walkways and fantastic food courts, but somehow the cry is ever that we must "reurbanize". Maybe someone should read ...

Posted Fri, Dec 3, 1:42 a.m.

Mass transit = Mass slavery. People have been fleeing the taxation of the city and shackle holds of buses and subways for a century now. Personal Transit is an evolutionary process -- given the person high efficiency, direct access to goods, and shortest path travel. Mass transit is yet another ...

Posted Fri, Dec 3, 1:39 a.m.

The book "Free Lunch" released last year also illustrates the effect of government taxing the average person and giving that money away to cronies of the party in power. That coupled with a monetary system which is actually a form of counterfeiting -- allowing people to sell worthless paper in ...

Posted Fri, Dec 3, 1:36 a.m.

As an acquaintance of one of the former directors of SAM, who argued for spending money on art -- rather than bricks and mortar -- I say the heck with the current people. They sold their soul decades ago and now they want more money? No.

Posted Fri, Dec 3, 1:34 a.m.

The problem of the Washingtonian is simple -- he demands premium public service while being only willing to pay bottom dollar. Not only is the Washingtonian not willing to pay for these services himself, he whines and rants about making others pay (1098)! Thus the productive people are saddled with ...

Posted Fri, Dec 3, 1:29 a.m.

So you're definition of "working together" means kowtowing and giving into every demand from Olympia and selling out on the one issue on which he was elected? Maybe you should write for Tunnelcola since you seem to find it your defining publication.

Posted Mon, Nov 22, 9:55 a.m.

If you want to know how much Government is not part of the Problem -- but is the Problem, read the book "Free Lunch". http://www.amazon.com/Free-Lunch-Wealthiest-Themselves-Government/dp/1591841917 Free lunch illustrates how the many projects and subsidies that are sponsored by Government end up creating inequities. Those who have their hand in the ...

Posted Mon, Nov 22, 9:50 a.m.

Yes, Google has pretty much said "the App is the Browser". This is its strategy for Chrome as well. They correctly envision a light weight browser type platform on the client, with the Cloud hosting "apps". As you may have seen, it is quite easy to simulate a Desktop using ...

Posted Mon, Nov 22, 9:48 a.m.

Looks like the High Density Scam Artists keep on a-rolling. No matter how many vacant buildings. No matter how many neighborhoods ruined. No matter how many "re-urbanizing" projects that end up areas just as crime ridden and derelict, they find a welcoming hand and access to public till in the ...

Posted Mon, Nov 22, 9:44 a.m.

Washington State is very, very dependent on the Government for jobs, aid, support. Washingtonians expect superior Government services, yet pay something like 25 percent of the property taxes that major East Coast states do. So, in effect, Washington state lives off handouts and redistributions from the Federal Government and hence ...

Posted Tue, Nov 16, 7:52 p.m.

Women in Paris can wear burlap bags and Converse All Stars. Because they're hot. Totally hot!

Posted Tue, Nov 16, 7:49 p.m.

The tunnel cannot be understood as project in and of itself. It is doomed to fail, will give no benefit to traffic and will probably end up making things worse. It's really a faux property tax. Tunnel per se means "tax Seattlites". "Cost overruns" means "tax everyone in the state". ...

Posted Fri, Nov 12, 1 a.m.

This summer my son (who lives with his mom in Colorado) was visiting me in Kent and we drove down to San Francisco. He was about to get his license so it was a good chance for me to help him get his road legs. I don't think people realize ...

Posted Fri, Nov 12, 12:56 a.m.

I'm always amazed at how the people who write and talk about "Seattle" know so little about it. All the "Real City" stuff...that was a blink of the eye in the city's history. To me, Puget Sound is about very iconoclastic people working late in their homes and doing their ...

Posted Fri, Nov 12, 12:53 a.m.

The next scam is the forced use of battery cars and the fiat to install "charging stations". Government would like nothing better than to have us all pumping electricity into these sieves 8 hours a night, driving electric rates through the roof. And last I heard, 80 percent of power ...

Posted Fri, Nov 12, 12:51 a.m.

Bush 2000 was the Revolution. Obama 2008 was the Reaction. Tea Party 2010 was the Restoration...Bush won. Presidents must be Bush or lose.

Posted Fri, Nov 12, 12:49 a.m.

Butter is like 5 dollars now! Did the cows get a COLA or something?

Posted Fri, Nov 12, 12:49 a.m.

Yeah. And? What's the problem...of course the Rest of State shouldn't be charged for this boondoggle.

Posted Fri, Nov 12, 12:48 a.m.

What can anyone in Olympia be trusted to do? The subverted the will of the entire state to curtail spending twice, and the regularly use fiat power to serve whatever master is pulling their leases.

Posted Fri, Nov 12, 12:46 a.m.

A new stadium funded against the voters will, a phoney urbist dream of Sodo as Greenwich Village and lots of horrible seaons later, the guy still never saw any rings. That's the sadness of it.

Posted Fri, Nov 12, 12:44 a.m.

"Poor" is a relative term. You could also say that Urbist Seattle is grossly overpriced, and no rational person would waste his money living there, unless he was somehow enticed by all the hype about how it was once a "place to be" back in the Nineties. Once all the ...

Posted Sun, Oct 31, 1:45 p.m.

The problem for both planners and cyclists is that the thinking is trapped in the same high density, central hub thinking that is so retrograde. The bicycle works well in a linear city situation...where low density amenities are spread out along a flat line with many access paths to a ...

Posted Sun, Oct 31, 1:42 p.m.

The problem for Seattle and all of Washington is that people here demand premium Government services, yet pay on 25 percent the property tax of states that offer same. This is the same situation for California and its Prop 13. Here in Washington there are 4 covenants that prevent properties ...

Posted Sun, Oct 31, 1:32 p.m.

Someone needs to tell those Salmon that "overfishing" has destroyed any hope of seeing fresh seafood in the Northwest ever again. They aren't obey Global Alarmist orders.

Posted Sun, Oct 31, 1:16 p.m.

The 1098 is a big by Insiders...for Insiders. It masks a huge asset tax giveaway under faux populism. It's not just a tax on the Productive Classes -- it's a tax on the Newcomer. Washington State -- because of the Prop 13-ish covenants, is unable to fairly asset and tax ...

Posted Sun, Oct 3, 8:18 a.m.

"Restoring sanity to the nation's dialogue". Does that mean that Al Gore will stop calling Climate Questioners "Deniers"?

Posted Sun, Oct 3, 8:08 a.m.

On the other hand, Seattle is the center for infantile adults...whiny 29 year olds who think that SCC is a job. And in the suburbs most "programs for kids" are handled by the schools. And when kids want to "do something" they don't go to some state sponsored "Kids Fest" ...

Posted Sun, Oct 3, 8:03 a.m.

McGinn needs a herd of Viking to come in and slash and burn a hoary overpaid bureaucracy that has ruined the Puget Sound for years to come and bankrupted the tax structure. All these pie-in-the-sky dreamers would be better places somewhere in academe to keep them away from the piggy ...

Posted Sun, Oct 3, 8 a.m.

This region needs cheaper and more pervasive taxi service. It's the only "transit system" that really fits where people want to go. I recommend looking at Weeels, a social network for cab sharing: http://www.weeels.org/ "Weeels offers people with mobile phones a fast, easy and affordable way to order taxis and ...

Posted Sat, Oct 2, 10:01 a.m.

1098 cuts property taxes. WA residents do not pay fair, or equitable property tax. 1098 makes the middle class shoulder an even greater burden. Vote no on 1098...it's a bad bill. And lets reform property tax first...the right way.

Posted Sat, Oct 2, 9:55 a.m.

I have lived here since 1986 and I have seen time and time again that some Big Budget construction was going to "save the city". First it was the bus tunnel. Well, I look at the surface avenues in downtown, and for most of the day they are empty. Even ...

Posted Sat, Oct 2, 9:49 a.m.

The tragedy of 1098 is that it masks a very significant property tax cut under the guise of being some kind of Robin Hood-esque "Tax on the Rich". It is quite the opposite! Real tax reform in Washington State would require a change in both our state Constitution and in ...

Posted Sat, Oct 2, 9:41 a.m.

What century, exactly! We are about 10 years away from having self-driving autonomous cars. Yet all the planners seem hell bent on an 18th century, fixed track, low speed, linear topology technology -- rail. And yet Puget Sound -- heck, all of Washington State -- is a dispersed, multi-nodal, rural/suburbo ...

Posted Sat, Oct 2, 9:37 a.m.

How come when it was 50-48 Murray, it was a significant lead, but now at 49-48 Rossi it's a "dead heat". It took time, but Washington voters realize the situation will not correct itself with business as usual. Rossi is the first step, then we'll get Didier in as our ...

Posted Fri, Jul 30, 8:47 p.m.

The City is obsolete. I live in an apartment by a road way. I have the internet. I go to mall for culture. Yesterday I saw an African drum band at a park. The park was no where near what you would call a "downtown". The only war is between ...

Posted Sun, May 23, 3:11 p.m.

Here's what I want to boycott -- Copper River Salmon. It's $35 dollars a pound! Let's break the Copper River Salmon combine!!

Posted Sun, May 23, 3:10 p.m.

Seattle needs to be more like Pittsburgh and build a whole bunch of pedo-bike cable cars that are free rides up and down the hills. In fact, all over Puget Sound, like up and down Kent East Hill, Beacon Hill, Capitol Hill.

Posted Tue, Mar 2, 4:35 a.m.

With High Speed Rail, I don't see why all the "transit" is being crammed into the few hundred square miles of Puget Sound. 200 mph trains means instead we can: 1) Live in Spokane and work in Seattle. Or vice versa. 2) Build a "chunnel" through the Cascades and have ...

Posted Tue, Mar 2, 4:31 a.m.

I don't understand the equation of density=transit. It's more like transit = 1/density. Good roads let us move to better places to live and have more work choices and options. Good transit allows us to have beneficent sprawl, where people can live in nice, low density neighborhoods with little crime, ...

Posted Tue, Mar 2, 4:21 a.m.

Haiti? I thought the current "We Are the World" was Chile?

Posted Tue, Mar 2, 4:20 a.m.

The Puget Sound should be planning for self-driving cars, which will appear in the next 10 years. At that point, we can abandon "mass" transit and have "personal" transit. Self-guided taxis on demand, that operate with very low cost, and run on hydrogen made from solar, wind and hydropower.

Posted Tue, Feb 2, 2:27 p.m.

On of the best things UW could do is to sell its property and move to Central Washington. The current location is far too valuable for research and students and could be better used for residences. I would relocate to a low cost, low density area like Tri-Cities or further ...

Posted Tue, Feb 2, 1:51 a.m.

I just finished reading the book "The Silver Factory" so I was all full up on freaky New York avant garde types from the 70s. Maybe next year...

Posted Tue, Feb 2, 1:49 a.m.

Wow...are you finished yet? You just summed up everything that's been wrong with discourse in the last 6 years. "The Science is Settled". "They are Deniers." "Obstructionists". Anyone who raises a legitimate concern -- or just a concern that he is going to be billed for someone else's party -- ...

Posted Sat, Jan 23, 12:47 p.m.

For MLK day I make it a point to listen to at least one of his speeches in its entirety. This year it was the American Dream speech...and here he really was preaching to his audience of Southerners with the knowledge everyone was listening. Things that stand out: those speeches ...

Posted Sat, Jan 23, 12:28 p.m.

The main problem for Washington State is that its in the hands of a 50 year unbroken rule by Democrat ideologues who refuse to join the 21st century. More than a decade ago, Bill Gates, Sr, released report telling us that aerospace would no longer make up as big a ...

Posted Sat, Jan 23, 12:19 p.m.

The years 2008-2010 might be looked on as nothing more than nostalgia for a liberal past that never existed. Plus 65 age hippies, took one last charge at "The Establishment" to try and "Bring Down The System". What they found is that most people are still trying to become part ...

Posted Mon, Dec 21, 4:42 p.m.

Must as I respect tradition, one of the big drawbacks of "native Seattlites" are all the hoary insider history. Look, something like less than 20 percent of the population today know or understand or all this "history" or care about it. I'm glad that 50 years ago, a bunch of ...

Posted Mon, Dec 21, 4:36 p.m.

The worst part of the Seattle Symphony is Benaroya Hall. It's in a terrible decrepit part of town. It's hard to reach by highway or even bus (schedules peter out after 9 pm). It costs lots of money for parking, eating places are limited. Downtown is the highest crime area ...

Posted Mon, Dec 21, 4:32 p.m.

Seattle is like the bedridden wealthy aunt of the Salish Sea who hoards all the tax money. The younger inheritors of Kent, Lynnwood and Issaquah, want their inheritance so they can do what what is right for family and friends. As much as they love her, they wish Auntie Seattle ...

Posted Wed, Dec 2, 9:31 a.m.

Of course this would be appreciated by most people, but the High Density crowd represented by Nickles who sought to drive up the cost of real estate and drive people off their land into cubby hole condos are still running around turning neighborhoods into concrete cell blocks. Preserving Low Density ...

Posted Mon, Sep 14, 8:07 p.m.

Seattle needs to prepare for a less dense future. It can only survive if it normalizes itself with the surrounding ring of Puget Sound exurbs...Kent, Lynnwood, Bellevue. Seattle has to step down off its pedestal and pick up a rope and start carrying some of the burden. Instead of being ...

Posted Mon, Sep 14, 8:03 p.m.

Obama and his Democrats are the proverbian Scorpions who asked the Frogs (American mainstream voters) for a ride on their backs. "We're moderates" said the Scorpions, "We're not the tools of special interests". Climb aboard said the voters. Now midstream, the scorpions reveal their sting -- funneling 2 trillion to ...

Posted Mon, Sep 7, 8 p.m.

The politics of Seattle is very simple: Gimme. The person who wins is not an ideologue, but a Boss Tweed, who courts the elites and spreads the tax booty among his followers. When you see the "activity" for these candidates, it's not solid citizens standing up for what they "believe", ...

Posted Mon, Sep 7, 7:54 p.m.

I love World's Fairs, however the problem here is the Seattle-centric view of this region. Western Washington is no longer a series of farms with Seattle as its cow town. Puget Sound is a ring of exurbs each with a population and government that represents its people more than "Seattle". ...

Posted Mon, Sep 7, 7:37 p.m.

A technology can be applicable in one place but not another. What I find amusing in this article, is that the author has his own predefined concept and ignores the evidence. Can a sharerow make sense? Yes, if for nothing better than to warn motorists that there are bikes on ...

Posted Tue, Sep 1, 10:50 p.m.

What you call "Smart Growth" is a little like a Smart Car -- half the car for twice the money. Gimme my 2007 Kia I bought for $8500...a nice little "Dumb Car" and I'll leave the Smarts to soon to be penurious Seattlites. Smart means finding the sweet spot. I ...

Posted Tue, Sep 1, 10:44 p.m.

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. ...

Posted Wed, Aug 26, 5:49 p.m.

I once was evaluating some software called ArcView. Its a sophisticated graphical database for marketing that shows characteristics of neighborhoods -- regions within zip codes. It can resolve data to a few blocks. What I noticed is that there are only two high density (using its legend) regions in Western ...

Posted Fri, Aug 21, 9:02 p.m.

I surprised at how many people there are who think they know Seattle and yet begin, like tourists, telling tales about the Space Needle or Light Rail. I grew up in New York City. If you asked a real New Yorker to tell you a real New York story, it ...

Posted Fri, Aug 21, 8:58 p.m.

This wasn't too hard to understand. The situation changed once the jobs dried up, the housing crashed and the stock market sank. It went from "we're all getting rich together" to "what's in it for me". When Joe Seattle looked at what was in it for him...a light rail he'll ...

Posted Sat, Aug 15, 11:14 a.m.

Population implosion will take care of "traffic congestion". Try taking I-5 on a non-game night...it's already a ghost town.

Posted Sat, Aug 15, 11:12 a.m.

How in the world can you expect some Government agency which would want to bring in GS-10 scientists earning $55,000 a year to a place surrounded by 2 million dollar houseboats and Vulcan-inflated condoes that take two lawyer's salaries to afford? People have no sense of reality. None of the ...

Posted Sat, Aug 15, 11:07 a.m.

Been reading your fantastic book "Pugetopolis" and recommended it highly! Being "Mayor of Seattle" is part of what I call the "Frasier View" of Seattle/Puget Sound. The point of this area with its crappy old houses, and crappy weather is not to be some high mucky-muck or live the high ...

Posted Sat, Aug 15, 11:02 a.m.

I'm stunned. A realistic view about the real probabilities for growth, which may turn out to be shrinkage instead.

Posted Sat, Aug 15, 11:01 a.m.

If we got rid of regulation like GMA, the high taxes and other restrictions on the market, these people could afford houses. Half of all housing costs in Puget Sound are due to Government impositions.

Posted Mon, Mar 9, 12:42 a.m.

The most beautiful city in America, the one that all cities should aspire to is Detroit. The reason is that all cities are overly dense and overly expensive. The suburbs are just a way station towards I term "Agraria". With wireless internet, new technologies like hydrogen fuel cells, we are ...

Posted Mon, Mar 9, 12:39 a.m.

Everyone wants things, but no one wants to work for them. The problem with our economy has more to do with too many "coasters" who were riding the hedge wave rather than productive people earning wages that matched their true value. So, you have people selling over inflated stocks and ...

Posted Mon, Mar 9, 12:36 a.m.

One of the best ways to spur innovation is to decrease or eliminate all such usage fees until business regroups and starts creating jobs. Allowing people to travel far and wide to new jobs, cheaper housing, or to transport goods without egregious and unwaranted taxation are all proper actions during ...

Posted Mon, Mar 9, 12:32 a.m.

Obama is a one-night stand. Unfortunately for most voters (not me), that night was the first Tuesday of November. Now that the sleep is falling from people's eyes, they are vaguely remembering an elderly man from Arizona saying "I know how to fix it". Meanwhile, El Presidente is still floundering ...

Posted Tue, Feb 3, 11:43 a.m.

Light Rail Loons of the Rotten Urbs use big capital projects to enslave the exurbs with taxes. There is no justification. What the exurbs of Kent, Renton, Covington need is highways. There are no valid East West highways north and south of I-90. Somehow Washington "forgot" to build the interstates ...

Posted Sun, Jan 25, 2:22 p.m.

TARP money should all be directed into unemployment insurance. Whether the person without a job is a Wall Street banker or a Main Street welder, all are owed the same -- a paycheck to put food on their table and keep the house -- and nothing more! Bailing out companies ...

Posted Sun, Jan 25, 2:19 p.m.

Almost anything that Olympia does will hasten the departure of mass amounts of population from Western Washington. SF rentals have increased by an order of magnitude on Craig's list. All over the country there are $38,000 and $65,000 houses that have three bedrooms, are modern and have some land. For ...

Posted Sun, Jan 25, 2:17 p.m.

Seattle was the poster child for globalism. Instead of producing real value, you guys stapled together parts built with cheap labor or unloaded things into your docks and then jacked up the price. Sorry to say, it doesn't work any more.

Posted Sun, Nov 2, 2:42 p.m.

Big City Dallies are in a collapse mode. They have desperately glommed themselves onto Demo-Lib policies in an attempt to speak to a very narrow base of bitter urban leftists. However, because of their historic place and name recognition, they command a broader mindshare than actually readership. This election is ...

Posted Sun, Nov 2, 2:39 p.m.

Myth #1: The problem can be solved by adding more buses. This is true. Here in the exurb of Kent, bus service is well used. The problem is that too much of it is focused on exurb to downtown (which is the only route that light rail follows). Yet, surveys ...

Posted Sun, Nov 2, 2:27 p.m.

The Democrats are running one of the most overleveraged media campaigns in history. Barack Obama has not won a single big state primary. He has two years in the Senate. Yet, somehow every Big City newspaper endorsed him. Why? Because their circulations have shrunk down to the inner core of ...

Posted Sun, Nov 2, 2:24 p.m.

Seattle has pulled the wool over peoples eyes long enough. It's just not value priced for regular people or new business. The weather is terrible. The politics is corrupt. The taxes, especially the tyrannical light rail taxes, are overburdening.

Posted Sun, Nov 2, 2:22 p.m.

All over the world, neighborhoods and businesses are becoming loosely-coupled from the traditional grid using fuel cells. Metro King County recently set up a demo system in Tukwila using wastewater heat to produce electricity. Rather than worrying about creating more big ticket electrical generation communities should be thinking about local ...

Posted Sun, Oct 19, 12:18 p.m.

What seems irrational to you, seems obvious to many. That is because people vote for the person who's best for them....basically, the guy who gets them the most money. Liberals are forever "hurt" by a working class that doesn't rise up and rally round their Progressive proposals. That's because people ...

Posted Sun, Oct 19, 12:15 p.m.

It was funny that Washington "won" this award just as the Bike-Walk conference was being held at the Convention Center. Let's see if it follows it to the next state host. Also, I tracked down the rating system, and it seems to be based on towns. So, a college town ...

Posted Sun, Oct 19, 12:01 p.m.

You need 50 percent to win. Obama can't break 49 and he's fallen to 46. Welcome to the McCain-Palin Presidency.

Posted Tue, Oct 14, 6:07 p.m.

I think not. I think Wamu was and is still a hero. The reason is that most of us are not wasting the planet. Most of us, even a middle class person, uses up very, very little energy, resources and so on. This is a world where 3 percent of ...

Posted Tue, Oct 14, 11:19 a.m.

Someone posed a theory that the economic health of a region is inversely proportional to the success of its pro-sports teams. We must be doin' ok.

Posted Tue, Oct 14, 11:13 a.m.

This sounds like a great idea -- but they'll probably price them at $750,000 for a 2 bedroom to attract "high lifestyle" types. Call me when they're selling for $75K. The real worth of a condo in Issaquah.

Posted Tue, Oct 14, 11:11 a.m.

The only way to reduce congestion is to get rid of GMA. We need to build on and over the mountains.

Posted Tue, Oct 14, 11:09 a.m.

While it may sound crazy, I think that long term the best "solution" for Seattle is to depopulate and normalize with the ring of exurbs that surround it. The entire bent of the Sims-Gregoire-Nickles troika is to bet on high growth, high density for the center city -- trying to ...

Posted Tue, Oct 14, 11:03 a.m.

Maverick, eh? He pretty much washed his hands of Light Rail calling it "wrong for the region". So is he going to buck the egregious 20 billion tax levy and bring sense to transit (that is, shut down the light rail and fund buses)? Yeah...right...

Posted Tue, Oct 14, 11:01 a.m.

The problem is too many obnoxious idiots moved to Seattle. In days of old (the 80s), a person could cross Broadway on Capital Hill in the middle of the street without a crosswalk, and the "traffic" (ie, one or two cars) would halt to let you pass. Now 45th Street ...

Posted Tue, Oct 14, 10:57 a.m.

The real problem is the need for inflation. Tight Federal money policies for 30 years left Wall Street "inventing" capital to meet demand. That collapsed, and now Bernanke is running the printing press night and day. That, in sum, is the best thing they can do and it will lift ...

Posted Mon, Oct 6, 4:34 a.m.

Hiding Under A Rock: Every year that goes by Patty Murray has become more and more invisible. It's like her electorate is on automatic, just voting to vote (or is she being "helped" into office by the same King County bureaucrats who ballot stuff for Gregoire)? It's it time to ...

Posted Mon, Oct 6, 4:32 a.m.

Remember Obamas 2 week trip?: Just after Obama was made the Democrat nominee, it was painfully apparent that he has zero experience and had zero foreign policy on his resume. So, they sent him to Europe for two weeks. That's it. 2 weeks in Europe. Less than the average high ...

Posted Mon, Oct 6, 4:26 a.m.

Taxis -- The Best Solution: Taxis are probably the best "mass transit" solution for the Puget Sound, but taxophilic liberals have regulated them so that only those on business accounts could afford them. The insane pricing makes what should be a cheap trip from, say, Wallingford to downtown, become unaffordable ...

Posted Wed, Oct 1, 5:09 p.m.

Even The French Get It Right!: Bus Rapid Transit. Not Light Rail. Cheap. Flexible. Integrated. Here's a video from Streetblogs about Mobilien, the excellent bus rapid transit (BRT) system in Paris that launched in 2004...

Posted Thu, Sep 11, 2:54 p.m.

The Willing: What Americans want to see is a willingness to fight when necessary. That is what commanding an Army is about, not just marching in uniform. Does a President have the decision making, power and stamina to launch an operation. Would Joe Biden? Would Barack Obama? I think not. ...

Posted Thu, Sep 11, 2:51 p.m.

Cuck-koo for Cocoa Puffs: I don't know who is crazier...Darcy Burner or an electorate that would even consider her as a rival to Dave Reichert.

Posted Thu, Sep 11, 2:48 p.m.

All Wrong: The growth estimates for Seattle are all wrong. If anything, it will lose population. The high growth came at a time of low housing prices, when people could sell a house in CA and spend 1/3rd of it for home in WA. Now WA is among the highest ...

Posted Tue, Aug 19, 5:42 p.m.

Top Ten Facts About Hydrogen: Must read if you want to understand next decade of energy changes: http://www.h2andyou.org/tenThings.asp "1. Did you know that the world produces enough hydrogen right now to fuel 180 million fuel cell-electric vehicles (FCEVs)? More than 56 billion kilograms of hydrogen are produced globally each year ...

Posted Tue, Aug 19, 5:39 p.m.

Hydrogen Changes Game: What you see in the suburbs is the problem of extending the current grid system -- and by grid I mean any of the interchanges of energy, money, traffic -- from the old urb to the new exurbs. Basically the rubber band can't stretch any more because ...

Posted Tue, Aug 19, 5:32 p.m.

Urbs Are Dead: This is not an issue in Kent...or Redmond...or Issaquah. It's only the dense inner core of the rotting inner city where all these "problems" occur. When you think about it, inner cities are money hogs. There's all this effort spent to try and remake them, when you ...

Posted Tue, Aug 12, 5:20 p.m.

Stop asking those nasty questions!: Obama looked great...until McCain raised the real issues that the press omitted and exposed the shallowness of the whole Democrat nomination.

Posted Tue, Aug 12, 5:19 p.m.

She Spent Your Salary on Light Rail: Got a complaint? Fire Gregoire. $2.7 billion equals the cost of the boondoggle Lite Rail system (which not there's higher unemployment will be used by even less people).

Posted Tue, Aug 12, 5:17 p.m.

Mr. Douglas, I have for you a gen-u-wine...: I know that Seattle is cute and fey and....well, whimsical and all, but it seems like half the time it's being that way, some local yokel is picking my pocket either with high fees, or charging me twice what the thing would ...

Posted Fri, Aug 8, 3:51 p.m.

Overpriced: Seattle is overpriced. I saw a show on cable where a couple bought virtual 3 bedroom mansion for $220,000 in Wilmington, DE. It's only a matter of time before there's a stampede for the exits.

Posted Fri, Aug 8, 3:41 p.m.

Yell and Scream: People should be yelling and screaming. Living in the Puget Sound over the past 15 years is like being the frog in the slowly burning water. We just looked around and our skin is burning! You can't dump 1 million new people in a place designed for ...

Posted Mon, Jul 21, 9:47 p.m.

The Bailo Stationary Plan: We are always being asked to choose a "transit" plan...which assumes that people always need to travel. How about a Stationary Plan...how about a plan that seeks to find ways to keep people where they are so they don't have to travel so much? Whatever happened ...