This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.
The Seattle Times on the state of the RTID:
In an Elway poll in June, 57 percent of voters surveyed backed the ballot measure. The poll also found that the road and transit proposals drew more support together than individually.
Elway said he was struck by the level of support “even though most people thought the costs are high, thought it would not be a significant improvement and thought there are many unknowns about the future.”
That suggests, he said, that people are so sick of being stuck in traffic that they’ll vote for just about anything.
The support has dipped a bit from 61 percent in the last Elway poll to 57 now, but that’s within the margin of error. Without a well-funded, unified opposition, It’ll be interesting to see how they stop this train (pun intended).
Speaking of which, one of the most curious paragraphs is at the very end, in section discussing what happens if the measure fails:
It’s possible light rail would reappear on the ballot fairly quickly, but fixing the region’s highways is another matter. Legislative leaders predict few people would want to touch the issue in 2008 because it’s an election year.
That would push any highway proposal off until 2009…
Explain something to me, election wonks: why is highway funding a non-starter in an election year but light rail is not?