Month: May 2007

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Erica Barnett reports that the RTID will go through without the Cross Base Highway, which environmentalists oppose. It’s a risky move, since Pierce County exec (and current Sound Transit chair) John Ladenburg really wants the highway and has said he’ll fight the ballot measure if the Cross Base is eliminated. It’s hard to see how having the chair of Sound Transit actively working against the organization would be a good thing for anyone. But maybe he’ll realize he’s outgunned and move on.

It would be a huge coup for environmentalists if the highway doesn’t make the final cut.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

KPRC Houston has some footage of light rail trains nearly colliding. Well, not really. One train got switched onto the opposite tracks, meaning that it could have potentially collided with an oncoming train. The operator halted the train in time.

Just FYI, you can expect these sorts of quasi-hysterical reports once Link Light Rail opens in Seattle: “passengers scared,” “investigation ordered,” “transit official to resign,” etc., etc. Of course, tens of thousands of people actually die in car crashes every year, so keep it in perspective.

Train collisions are dramatic, and one can blame them on some mythical, distant bureaucracy, whereas car crashes are just deadly and are usually the fault of regular citizens.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

(with apologies to James Brown)

More TransitNow changes are coming this weekend, including more service in South King County. We’re also getting the Fremont Bridge back: bus service there will also resume on Saturday.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Yes, Virginia, even rail has environmental impacts, especially rail tracks that were built a hundred years ago along pristine Puget Sound shoreline:

Many environmentalists call the BNSF Railway, built on 26 miles of beachfront between Seattle and Everett, one of the worst environmental problems for Snohomish County’s shoreline.

The railroad creates what amounts to a wall between the land and the shore. It hampers beach access, disrupts salmon creeks and prevents sediment from eroding down to the beach, starving beaches of sand and gravel, they say.

Now, efforts are under way to restore pockets of shoreline along the railroad line. Some planners and environmentalists have hailed the restoration projects — including opening up creek mouths, nourishing beaches with sand, and restoring tidal marshes — as pilots for a future approach to a healthier shoreline.

Of course, as the article notes, the tracks aren’t going anywhere. in fact, Sound Transit is widening the right-of-way in some places to allow for more Sounder trains. But they’re also opening up creeks and doing lots of other environmental mitigation to try and revitalize the corridor to the extent that they can.

Having the BNSF line where it is is a net positive. Otherwise you’d have to run it along the I-5 corridor, which would be ridiculously expensive, if it was even possible. BNSF’s presence also takes a lot of trucks off the roads.

Sounder, on the other hand, has its limits. It’s a relatively cheap way to build transit — the tracks are already there, you just have to operate the trains. But it’s limited to a few runs a day since it shares right-of-way with Amtrak and BNSF. Once Light Rail goes all the way from Everett to Tacoma, it will be interesting to see how successful Sounder is. Certainly for folks in Edmonds, Kent, and Auburn, Sounder will continue to be important, but Link Light Rail, running every 10 minutes or so, will be increasingly appealing even for medium distance (i.e. Everett-Seattle) travel.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

KNDO/KNDU, the Tri-Cities NBC affiliate, is running this wonderful bit on their site. As any savvy restaurant-goer knows, more dollar signs means it’s MORE EXPEN$$$IVE!

Seattle-are voters facing $$$38 billion roads-transit decision
Associated Press – May 30, 2007 1:25 PM ET

Corrected Version

SEATTLE (AP) – The Regional Transportation Investment District is expected tomorrow to approve a $$15 billion tax request to voters in King, Pierce and Snohomish counties.

If approved in November, the regional taxes would help pay for projects like a new four billion dollar Highway 520 floating bridge over Lake Washington. Tolls will be part of the funding package, and planners say the toll could be $$6 round trip by 2018 when the new span could be finished.

The road proposal would be paired with a $$23 billion plan to expand Sound Transit to Tacoma, Bellevue and nearly to Everett.

Both multi-billion dollar proposals must be approved to take effect.

Of course, they don’t even bother to explain that that $$$38B [sic] includes 30 years of finance charges, which, as we’ve noted before, is incredibly misleading.

On the plus side, at least it’s the corrected version. I’d hate to see what the uncorrected version looked like. My guess? It had more dollar signs!

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Reading about the businesses on Capitol Hill that will be displaced by the Sound Transit station made me want to take a look at the designs for the station itself. I guess I didn’t realize that the station is going to take over the lots on both sides of Denny Way.

This cross-section sort of gives you an idea of how expansive the underground station will be.

Of course, that makes perfect sense — it should be about as big as any of the downtown transit tunnel stations, except without the extra space for buses, of course: