The risk to children, and everyone is far beyond the conscience of the cost that it would take to remedy the situation. That it has been that way for 100′s of years is remarkable, to say the least. How many people have been hurt or killed in those tunnels from such negligence?

Easy to answer, not paying enough attention … distracted in some way.

Driver distraction is a big safety issue. The U.S. Secretary of Transportation is holding a “summit” on the topic Sept 30 – Oct 1.

http://www.rita.dot.gov/distracted_driving_summit/ .

Overall, RIDING aboard transit is safer for drivers than driving. Riding on the streets in any big vehicle is safer for the rider than riding in a small vehicle.

The per passenger mile fatality counts for light rail and for driving speak for themselves at http://www.bettertransport.info/pitf/linksafetycertification.htm .

Martin Duke’s note at the top, “we trade safety for convenience and cost all the time,” is precisely right.

Rich Borkowski saying of me that I think “the government should take care of you and you, as a pedestrian, carry no responsibility for your behavior” is deeply wrong. As a child, I was run over by a car at a guarded school crossing and put in a hospital for months. I am deeply aware of personal responsibility when crossing streets or RR tracks on foot, and I think everybody should be very careful.

Finally, as one who does oppose the construction of more light rail and trolley cars in Seattle, I want to be clear that the hazard issue is by no means the biggest argument for my opposition.

His solution? Nothing. He has none. He’s never proposed one in any detail other than “bus rapid transit”.

It’s also strange how someone like Mr. Niles completely ignores the responsibility of people who are involved in light rail accidents. Instead, he thinks the government should take care of you and you, as a pedestrian, carry no responsibility for your behavior.

Perhaps a more interesting discussion would be how can anyone NOT see a train coming and not avoid a train coming at them? How is that possible?

Confirming what I found five years ago when I first did this, the fatality rate for light rail has always been greater than for urban driving throughout the past ten years, up to three times higher.

I posted a chart with the year by year results of the calculations at http://www.bettertransport.info/pitf/linksafetycertification.htm .

See my previous post on the subject to see what I think about “blaming the victim”.

Put an obstacle in the way, and transgressors will focus on getting past the obstacles. Rather than keeping an eye out for oncoming trains.

Might have been true for him, and maybe two or three other monorail activists – but the record shows Friends of the Monorail’s mission was to destroy light rail so their fantasy transit league movement could “prevail”. Indeed, the entire monorail movement was couched in anti- light rail sentiment. In the end, it was this knee-jerk reactionary base which ultimately doomed the Green Line – a project I supported.

I would invite Mickymse to name more than a select few monorail activists who also supported light rail – just to price my comments go beyond the threshold of political rhetoric. I’ve got a long list of monorail adherents (such as John Niles) who tried to kill off light rail in this city – and I would be happy to put them up against Mickymse’s anemic smattering of names.

Why on fricking earth should mass transit be built AROUND solo drivers in automobiles?

A huge elevated light rail structure down MLK would have done nothing but preserve the strip mall/ auto-centric culture which has destroyed much of the valley’s community fabric.

Which explains why so many right wing road warriors signed up for the John Niles & Mickymse monorail.

An elevated or tunneled line would not have spurred as much density near rail stations, either (‘social engineering in Niles’ Kemper Freeman social circles)

After seeing the positive results of light rail in the Rainier Valley, it boggles the mind that monorailians are still spending all their waking hours trying to suck-up to automobile culture.

Apparently, Martin didn’t notice his ranting about “blaming the victim” (drivers who violate the law).

Snake oil may taste ok after the first sip. But, if Martin had any idea about the intellectual depths Niles is capable of…he probably wouldn’t be so sympathetic.

It would also be nice to know when emergency vehicles “jump the tracks”. Was the maneuver necessary in terms of life saving seconds or did a cop pull a U-turn just because he can?

The city that complained the most (and nearly cost me my job with the firm I consulted for at the time) caused their community to lose the arterial alignment that would have best served them in my opinion.

Sounds like Tukwilla and the International Boulevard alignment.