Below is a summary of bills of interest that are currently working their way through the House and Senate Transportation Committees. Like last year there are a litany of bills that limit or ban red light running cameras and this year there are a good number of bills related to tow trucks. If you would like to take a look at other active bills working their way through the legislature follow this link.

HB 1217 – This bill would allow cities to lower speed limits to 20 mph on non-aertierial roads without an engineering study, which is currently required. This bill has already been unanimously passed by the House and has more momentum in the Senate where it stalled last year.

HB 2252 – This bill essentially tidies up language related to proof of payment systems for transit agencies clarifying the language and bringing it up to date with ORCA.

HB 2370 - “Expands the existing goals, objectives, and responsibilities related to the operation of an efficient statewide transportation system to include the health of the state’s citizens.” This is a good bill that will help to add health and active transportation as a major goal of the states transportation system. The bill has a large number of co-sponsors include Rep. Clibborn, chair of the House Transportation Committee, which is always a good sign.

HB 2601 – This legislation allow Regional Transportation Planning Organization (RTPO), in our case PSRC, to establish “transit service overlay zones”. These zones must have frequent bus service, minimum current or planned employment densities, minimum current or planned housing unit density, or be a regional center. These thresholds would be set by the RPTO.

The original bill included a categorical SEPA exception for developments within the overlay zone which had fewer  than 150 residential units or fewer than 100,000 sq ft of commercial space. This provision has since been removed from the bill. From my understanding, the provision was included as an incentive for development within the overlay zone, however with removal of the SEPA exception, this bill is essentially only enabling legislation that allows inter-governmental planning work between local and regional agencies in areas around high quality transit. The legislation does specifically say “frequent bus service” which would exclude Link. I don’t know if that was an intentional decision are just slopping language.

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Sightline has some interesting information about the impact of Gregoire’s proposed “Barrel Fee”, which would be the major revenue source for her proposed transportation package.

If you’re out to raise money for transportation projects, one of the more clever methods is the so-called “barrel fee” that is the centerpiece of Governor Gregoire’s new transportation package. It’s structured in such a way that it minimizes impacts on Washington by effectively off-loading the costs to oil companies and out-of-state drivers. In fact, my back-of-the-envelope estimate is that for every dollar residents pay, the state will net roughly $2.20 in revenue.
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Here’s where it gets interesting: Washington refines about twice as much oil as it actually consumes, and the governor’s barrel fee pointedly applies to petroleum products that are sold for consumption outside the state. That means Washington’s coffers can benefit from fees on twice as much oil as Washington consumers will actually pay for. (It’s similar, in some ways, to the way that some natural resource-producing jurisdictions benefit from extraction fees on products that are ultimately used elsewhere.)

So who picks up the other half of the tab?

For products that are refined in Washington but consumed elsewhere, the burden of the fee will fall on some combination of out-of-state consumers and oil refiners (and perhaps some oil distributors or marketers to a small extent). Certainly, the oil companies will try to pass the cost of the fee along to their customers, but in markets that are competitively supplied by other sources of fuel, it may be difficult for them to do so. That means the oil firms will have to carve the cost out of their profits.

Go here for the full post.

A while ago in response a piece that Roger wrote, commenter BGCity wrote this:

“People like the quiet neighborhoods that they live in and the fact is that most of our city consists of, and most people live in these single family zones that resemble the suburbs in oh so many ways. The Urban faction, of which I count myself one, is in the minority…. Can anyone accurately claim that Seattleites want their quiet neighborhoods to be as urban as Belltown?”

Not to pick on BGCity, but I find this a common and inaccurate refrain when talking about density in Seattle. Let me unpack why I disagree. (more…)

Washington's Capitol via elden

Transportation Advocacy Day is fast approaching and TCC is trying to get as many people to turn out in Olympia to speak with their legislators. I would especially encourage those that are outside Seattle to make the extra effort to turn out, as your legislators are likely more of a swing vote on the issues we care about than Seattle legislators. Info below the jump. (more…)

It's Your Waterfront

Starting later this month the waterfront design project will kick-off a series of topical meeting relating to specific interaction elements of the design. Readers will probably be most interested in the February 8th meeting, Mobility and Access, but I personally find the other topics, specifically the first and last much more unique and interesting. Information below the jump.

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Route 255 on NE 160th St by Oran

Travel has continued to be treacherous all day, with ice causing problems for Link and SeaTac. For travel and disruption information follow the links; King County Metro, Sound Transit, Pierce Transit, Community Transit, WSDOT, SDOT, SeaTac. We’ll be tweeting and retweeting information throughout the day.

[Update from Sherwin 3:41pm - The National Weather Service has issued a Winter Weather Advisory for the region until 4am tomorrow morning. The freezing rain has now turned to snow for most areas, so expect more delays into the evening and tomorrow as well.]

Metro's Alert Page

It’s been snowing around the region for the last few hours with an expected 1-2 inches of snow falling today. All signs indicated that tomorrow will see the heaviest snow with between 5-14 inches of snows starting to fall in the early morning. For snow information follow the links; King County Metro, Sound Transit, Pierce Transit, Community Transit, WSDOT, SDOT, SeaTac. We’ll be tweeting and retweeting information throughout the day.

[UPDATE: Metro sent out a press release notifying riders of additional planned cancellations for Wednesday:

Due to the weather forecast for treacherous and impassable roadways, Metro is scaling back some service Wednesday to be able to operate the rest of its system safely and as reliably as possible. The routes scheduled to be canceled for Wednesday are: 2EX, 38, 42, 45, 46, 51, 53, 79, 114, 161, 162, 175, 192, 193, 197, 205, 210, 215, 216, 219, 224, 237, 251, 268, 277, 316, 355, and the Center Park Shuttle. [...] But, service on those routes could be restored depending on overnight weather forecasts and actual travel conditions tomorrow.

– Bruce]

Section 6 of HB 2527

Republican legislators in Olympia have introduced House Bill 2575, a bill which would do many of the same things that Tim Eyman’s failed I-1125 initiative would have done.

The bill, which to me looks to be DOA due to lack of sponsorship from any Democrats, would limit the use of toll revenues only to paying for capital construction costs, require that tolls be removed once bonds are paid off, would not allow the transfer to toll revenues from one facility to another (I-90 to SR-520 for example), and would eliminate WSDOTs ability to use variable tolls.

All of these changes are for the worst and fly in the face of adopted long range regional transportation policy.

All of King County is on snow routing. Check out the Metro’s transit alerts here. I’ll be retweeting information furiously over at our twitter account. Remember tracking tools like OneBusAway do not work when buses are on snow routing.

Bob Ferguson

[Update 2:50pm] For those interested in details about traffic safety in Washington State check out WSDOT Strategic Highway Safety Plan. Of traffic fatalities from 2006-2008 in the state 13% involved impairment only, 8% involved impairment and speeding, 10% involved impairment and run-off-road, and 17% involved all three factors.  Of all fatalities, 48% of involved impairment as a contributing factor (see page 15,20 of report).

We don’t often dive into issue related to the Attorney General  but today’s press release from Attorney General Candidate Bob Ferguson piqued my interest. Ferguson, who is currently on the King County Council, and is running against Reagan Dunn, who is also on the Council and voted against the Congestion Reduction Charge (CRC), is calling for tougher penalties and treatment of DUI offenders, backing up his proposal with some shocking statistics.

SEATTLE, WA – Candidate for Attorney General and Chair of the King County Law and Justice Committee Bob Ferguson today announced a plan to Protect Washington Families on our Roads. The plan calls for new laws to hold Washington’s most dangerous DUI offenders accountable.

“Washington currently has a higher percentage of DUI-related deaths than 43 other states,” said Ferguson. “As Attorney General, I will fight to make our roads safer and protect families traveling on our roads. The time has come to take a tougher approach.”

In the past five years, nearly 2,000 people have been killed as the result of drunk drivers on Washington State roads. Among the 50 states, Washington ranks number 7 in the highest percentage of DUI-related deaths.

Read the rest of the press release below the jump. (more…)

Little Niece in pram in bus in Copenhagen (Storebukkebruse via Flickr)

Yesterday, Alyse Nelson over at Sightline had a great post about how public transit systems in the US and abroad accommodate (or don’t) parents with strollers. While I have about zero experience with parenting, I have actually though about this a fair deal since one of my best friends while living in Stockholm was preparing to have a kid and stroller shopping, which are also called “prams” especially the old and large styles, became a running joke of ours. The sight of parents pushing huge prams around European cities, especially northern European cities is so utterly normal you don’t even think twice about it. In some ways the social norm of using large, unfoldable strollers in addition to good accommodations of transit, especially buses, make transit use easier than driving for parents with strollers, a dynamic which is reversed here.

An excerpt of Alyse’s piece below the jump: (more…)

Capital Bikeshare Kiosk

The transition of fare payment on public transit systems away from cash and towards digital payment methods always brings up issues of access for individuals who don’t have access to bank accounts, the internet or both. The typical solution to this problem, excluding some developing countries and the most developed countries,  is to work with private companies like grocery stores and corner stores to create locations in which fare media can be purchased or recharged using cash. While this works for transit, it doesn’t work for bike sharing which require collateral to ensure that bikes are returned.

DC is trying solve this problem in an interesting way, that if it works could both increase use of Capital Bikeshare, bring “unbanked” people into the system, and provided an extremely low cost means of transportation to those that likely need it the most. Atlantic cities reports, after the jump.

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SR 520 Toll Sign (WSDOT)

Tolls started today at 5:00am but it will take weeks, or more likely months to get an idea of how SR-520 tolls will create a new “normal” for transportation in the central puget sound region. Regardless what was your experience like today?

How are you, friend and coworkers adjusting to tolls? Personally, I have become the commute trip advisor at my office in Totem Lake, where about a third of my co-workers live in Seattle. I expect transit ridership in the peak direction to grow but be constrained by Park & Ride capacity and I expect significant growth, as a percentage, in reverse peak transit ridership. Talking to coworkers I see reverse commute trips generally being much more “innovative” since transit service to employment centers on the Eastside is worse than to downtown Seattle.

What was your experience?

"German Streetcar in the Snow" by Carl Stork

• Last day to drive across 520 un-tolled.
• SR 167 HOT lanes now turning an operating profit. Usage is up, but also because overhead costs are now shared with SR520.
• Seattle Pedestrian Advisory Board looking for members.
• Metro’s proposed 2012 restructure: less than 4,700 daily riders on reduced or deleted routes, 137,000 daily riders on routes with improved service.
• Fewer teen drivers’ licenses and underrated benefits of transit.
• This is a new low for spurious arguments against road diets. These are explicitly about safety, and now they’re worrying about microscopic increases in response time?
• Madrid buries a highway, creates a park.
• Seattle Councilmember Conlin on the Roosevelt Rezone.
• Overbuilt apartment market is good for housing affordability, Seattle Times worries about that.
• Chicago builds first cycle track, already has as many bicyclist as cars.
• Issaquah approves large rezone near transit center, envision dense and walkable new neighborhood.
• 2011′s biggest transportation failures, Viaduct comes in at #4.
• Making schedules “visible” and easy to remember, the Swiss model. A far cry from Link’s ridiculous “hidden” schedule.
• What BRT really is about.
• Reflection on American society through architecture of civic buildings, an interesting Seattle exception.

This is an open thread.

Eastside BNSF Trail for Purchase (Seattle Times)

[Update 12/14 The city council voted unanimously to acquire the corridor despite some concerns about how to fund that purchase.]

The Seattle Times reports that tonight starting at 6 pm the Kirkland City Council will determine whether to buy a 5 and 3/4 mile segment of the Eastside BNSF rail corridor stretching from the South Kirkland P&R at 108th Ave NE to 132nd Ave NE, less than a block away from where Bradley Nakatani was killed while riding his bike last Friday.

The corridor is currently owned by the Port of Seattle, with ownership transitioning to King County sometime next year. However, due to King County’s ongoing financial tightness, ownership by the City of Kirkland would likely lead to faster development of a multi-use trail in the corridor. This type of agreement is not without precedent. In 2002 Juanita Beach Park was transfer from the ownership of King County (which had close the park in 2001 due to lack of funding) to Kirkland, which has since spent millions of dollar on improving the park. Purchase of the BNSF trail by Kirkland would likely allow Kirkland to do the same thing.

While no official plans for how the corridor would be developed have been made, it will certainly involved a multi-use trail of some sort and could include transit along some or all of the corridor in the future. As part of the purchase agreement Sound Transit will have a standing easement on the corridor for future high capacity transit, which will be negotiate between the City of Kirkland and Sound Transit when plans for transit service are developed. The corridor would need to conform to the national Raibanking standards that often makes development of transit in the corridor more expensive than many might think.

In my opinion this corridor is a game changer for bicycling in Kirkland, especially between SR-520 (and the future regional trail across the bridge), Downtown Kirkland and Totem Lake. The trail will provide a flat, high-quality north/south spine, which it currently lacks, and could eventually tie well into the Burke Gilman trail on the north, and the future Bell-Red corridor TOD on the south. For transit the corridor has potential although not as much since the corridor skirts the eastern edge of downtown Kirkland, requiring any future transit on the corridor to leave it to serve downtown. The corridor could however greatly improve the connection between Downtown Kirkland and Totem Lake via transit, which are the cities designated growth centers and important transit demand generators.

Council study packet here. The council meeting starts at 6:00, with consideration of the agreement at 7:30. The video stream can be viewed here.

This morning a cyclist was struck and killed in Kirkland at NE 124th St and 132nd Ave in the Totem Lake area of Kirkland. The driver of the vehicle that stuck him has been arrested on suspicion of driving under the influence. The Seattle Bike Blog has more details.

This is close to my work and where I lived in high school and I have biked this road many times, mostly on the sidewalk because I find this road particularly unsafe even with bike lanes. For some context this is the only connection between the Burke Gilman trail and Kirkland between NE 145th and NE 85th St (roughly the distance from UW to Northgate), so its more heavily used than many people might expect. NE 145th and NE 85th are also fairly indirect and don’t have any bicycle facilities either.  While I don’t know where the cyclist was going it is fairly common for cyclist to use Slater Ave and NE 116th west of 132nd Ave since they have bike lanes and NE 124th doesn’t and NE 124th has very high vehicle volumes. I think it is also worth noting that last year a cyclist was killed on NE Juanita Dr which is the other commonly used route from Kirkland to access the Burke Gilman trail.

The only thing I have to say besides my condolences to the family and friends of the victim is actually a request. Don’t use the word “accident” when you really mean “collision”. Accident implies lack of fault, randomness and inability to control, when all collisions are in fact someones fault. To call something a “unfortunate accident” as the police officer quoited in the story did, takes the underlying message to a whole new level, ie “there was nothing that could have been done to prevent this collision and we should just get used to cyclist getting killed on our roadways.”

As a society, we need to be crystal clear about what are preventable road fatalities and injuries. To call collisions an accident validates and reaffirms a culture of irresponsibility and unaccountability, and that is the last thing our roads need.

Archived Video Stream Player

STB readers are a pretty detail oriented and inquisitive bunch so it surpised me to find out that many people in Seattle don’t know about the Portland State University Transportation Seminar. It is probably the best source for academic level presentations about transportation issues. Think of them as the TED talks of the transportation world.

The presentations, part of a lecture series offered through the Center for Transportation Studies, are given by researchers, international experts and practitioners alike and cover many topics in the transportation-land use world including some obscure but never the less interesting research. The class is primarily for graduation students in transportation engineering, urban planning, and public administration tracks so the presenters assume a good understanding of the fundamentals of transportation and land use, perfect for STB readers.

Presentations from this quarter can be viewed here. Archived presentations are organized by date and topic. There are too many video for me to highlight now. If people would like me to post specific video to prompt discussion I’m open to the idea.

Personal Aside: Since I’m plugging PSU I feel I would be remiss if I did not also put in a plug for programs at my alma mater, UW which are similar, for those looking to pursuing a career in transportation. Both Sherwin Lee and myself did our undergraduate degrees in Community, Environment and Planning within the College of the Built Environment, and Oran Viriyincy and myself did a our masters in Transportation Engineering in the Civil and Environmental Engineering department, which has an amazing foreign exchange study program, the Valle Exchange, which I was also lucky enough to do.

Tonight TRU is holding its second meeting. Details below.

The Transit Riders Union orientation meeting will be tomorrow tonight, Tuesday, starting at 7 pm at the 2100 Building, 2100 24th Avenue S. The room we’ll be using is on the 3rd floor, all the way to the end of the hall and to the right. We’ll put a sign up.

In the first part of the meeting we’ll go through our Mission and Principles, followed by discussion and questions. In the second part, we’ll give a brief run-down of how the TRU has been organized thus far, roughly how we’re hoping to grow, and what some of our ideas are for new projects and campaigns, with an emphasis on specific ways people can get involved – again, to be followed by discussion. We’ll try to wrap it up by 8:30 or so.

You can view a video from the first meeting here.

For those that were off enjoying their long Thanksgiving weekend here is a roundup of our posts since Wednesday.

• Mudslide season begins with heavy rain
• News Roundup: East Link moves forward, RapidRide gets federal funding, etc
• Building a Seattle Subway, getting the conversation started (with a bang I might add)
• Musing about how people form opinions for the sake of Thanksgiving dinner harmony
• First U-Link tunnel is bored between Capitol Hill and Downtown
• September and October Link ridership numbers
• Fixing Washington State’s constitutional debt language
• Let ORCA know what you like/dislike
• Sunday Open Thread: London Streets Traffic Control Centre