Image from bgtothen from the Seattle Transit Blog flickr pool.
The big question continues to be whether we’ll get a transit initiative on the ballot this year, and if so, which one. This Tacoma News Tribune editorial has a round up of the situation. The News Tribune doesn’t like the .4% sales tax increase plan, saying it does too little, or the 20-year .5% plan (essentially the same plan from last year’s prop. 1), saying the time frame is just too long. Do they like the .5% 12 year plan? They don’t really say.
I understand that the News Tribune is concerned about the 20-year time frame, and I understand the feeling that the .4% 12 year plan does too little. But is the .5% 12 year plan just right? I don’t live in Tacoma, so I don’t know whether the plan to expand Tacoma Link is popular, though I would guess from the Tacoma Streetcar movement that it is, or whether more Sounder runs are enough to entice them. Sadly, with .5% you can’t get light rail to Tacoma any faster. But if a 20 year proposal is too long, why not think about an acceleration measure a few years later? What else can make them happy?
If it wasn’t for sub-area equity, we could tax the other areas more for their light rail to bring it faster!
Seriously, why does it take so long to build a light rail line? This isn’t a rhetorical question – I bet one of the contributors to this blog could answer at length, and I would be interested to read the explanation.
Simple. ST isn’t collecting a billion a year in taxes – it’s collecting only a few hundred million a year. Sound Transit doesn’t pay for everything in bonds – they split it, with some payment being from “saved up” money and some being from bond money.
Right now, they collect .4% in sales taxes. They’ve issued bonds based on most of that revenue (the rest goes to operations and maintenance). When ST increases their tax recovery with ST2, they’ll be able to issue some bonds right away for North Link and East Link, but we still have to wait until they have some money saved as a cushion.
This region isn’t really that big – Sound Transit only collects from some 1.1 million households – maybe 300m a year, or less.
Also, tunnel boring (like for North Link) is not fast work. ST was expecting 50 feet a day for Beacon Hill, but the contractor only produced 15-20 feet a day. Thankfully, they had six months of float in the schedule. With I-90, we have to wait for the state to build the R8A HOV lane project first. Contracts also have to be allowed to stay open for bidding for some time so plenty of companies have a chance to submit. Notices of proposed land use action have to be up at sites for comment periods for certain amounts of time. We have to wait for multiyear leases to expire on the properties ST purchases (like the QFC at Roosevelt, who has a lease until 2010 – thankfully, ST started negotiating with them in 2006).
Mostly, though, it’s that they just don’t get money that quickly. ST uses really safe financial practices (which I’m sure is part of why their bond rating is so high), and part of that means not using debt for all of their construction money.
oh, I see. So it _is_ a local problem….
Thanks for the explanation – I’m always a bit skeptical of people saying “oh bit _our_ region is so different from all those other places that did this successfully already” but I guess in this case it applies.
Not really, no. Everything I just listed applies pretty much everywhere in the US – if it weren’t R8A, it would be some other state’s corridor project. If it weren’t tunneling, it would be an eminent domain fight with a major land owner, or something else. It’s always complex, we just don’t hear the specifics about other regions as much as we hear the specifics about our own.
In most cases, state governments also offer matching grants. Our state government can’t stand to even talk about transit. Portland is basically the same as we are, but their state government gave several grants in the hundreds of millions to MAX projects.
Re: Ben: That’s why we need to elect state legislators that are strong on transit and that vow to support Sound Transit when we vote for ST2 2008.
Oh, wait. One, most state legislative spots are even more cushy jobs for incumbents, often running unopposed. Two, we have to deal with legislators from Eastern Washington who are often “waaah! This is Seattle-based PORK! Waaah!”
Morgan, believe me, I know…
The best solution for now is to get ST as far as we can locally to help it protect itself. The state legislators will come around when public opinion goes pro-transit (read – after a few years of Link).
So Washington State doesn’t offer any moneys to transit? Or just to bus operations?
The state offers some small bus grants – WSDOT actually has a newsletter that mentions them – but we’re talking about a few hundred thousand dollars here and there, maybe a total of $5m annually – a drop in the bucket for capital projects.
What’s hilarious is that Gregoire’s panel on climate change stressed reducing vehicle miles traveled as Washington’s best method for reducing carbon dioxide emissions, but she won’t even say the word transit.
Okay, I’m voting against Gregoire in the primary now, even if she’s running against no other Democrats or if all her opponents are even worse on transit, resorting to write-ins if need be and possible, just to send a message that she better be strong on transit.
Is there a primary in her race?
I’m still happy to vote for her in the general – she’s great on most other issues.
Uh, Andrew?
• The ambitious mix of projects that was rejected by the voters last November, which included the extension of light rail from Sea-Tac airport to the Tacoma Dome over a 20-year period. This looks like a nonstarter. Even $6 gasoline might not do much for a plan that wouldn’t deliver some of the goods until 2027.
• A fairly modest 12-year plan financed by a 0.4 percent sales tax increase. This would extend light rail – but not very far to the north and south. On this end, the trains would reach only to South 200th Street.
• A larger 12-year expansion that would get light rail to Highline Community College at South 240th.
Isn’t the third bullet the 0.5, 12-year plan?
Anyway, I feel like there’s a huge disconnect between Pierce and Snoho elites and voters. The elites seem to want to build everything right away, while the actual voters recoil from anything that large.
The third bullet is the .5% 12-year plan. But they criticised the .5% 20 year plan, the .4% 12-year plan but say nothing other than that there is a .5% 12-year-plan.
And now we know where the Seattle “elites” stand, don’t we Martin?
(your word, not mine)
Brad, how is that in any way constructive?
On the backs of the suburban peons, sure sure we get it.
You’re just lucky that Seattle isn’t the region’s most important urban center, otherwise I’d… oh, wait. It IS the region’s most important urban center.
Tell me again why we shouldn’t invest in central city improvements, aside from “so we can better shoulder the infrastructure drain the suburbs cause”?
I’m kinda confused as to why Tacoma is being so mum on exactly what they want– they’re the second city of this region, and I’d imagine they would be very vocal at this point with the prospect of a vote coming.
Do they have any meetings planned to clarify their position?
“they’re the second city of this region”
To me Bellevue is the second tomato, but we can all have our opinions…
It’s not really an opinion, though. While Ron Sims would like to advance the notion that Bellevue is the shining jewel and a “close” second to Seattle, it’s nowhere near the truth.
Tacoma has continued viability in its sea port, land port and airport, three things that Bellevue does not have. It continues to grow at a modest rate and does not require annexation or developer incentives to give it a fleeting explosive growth like Bellevue has experienced.
Tacoma is denser than Bellevue, better aligned with tranportation options and more progressive in its attitudes toward integrating itself into the region.
Bellevue just has better advertising.
… but enough of the threadjack.
Bellevue may have the second best skyline, but Tacoma has more residents, more workers and better transportation options.
Bellevue’s existence as an urban center is basically because of the bottleneck across I-90. They have no port, no creative industry, nothing internal causing them to grow. They’re basically a suburban center serving people who lived a long way away from Seattle and are affected by congestion.
Ben- You are posing the question to the wrong person. Track back the use of the phrase “Pierce and Snoho elites” and you’ll find the source of the snark.
You guys can’t have it both ways. Throw around name-calling and finger-pointing and then immediately run to the high ground.
But of course, I ‘don’t get it.’
Brad, I have no idea what you’re trying to say. If I were dictator, I’d be with the Snoho/Pierce “elites”: build everything, everywhere, fast, damn the expense. But I don’t think it’d actually pass if put to the ballot.
The TNT, Ladenburg, et al supported prop 1 and are opposed to anything that doesn’t get to Tacoma this time around.
Most post-election analysis says that the main problem for voters was that the project was “too big”.
You can’t have a “small” project that quickly gets from Seattle to Tacoma and Everett. So do we listen to what the TNT wants, or what the voters wanted in 2007? That’s not a rhetorical question, I’m really wondering.
In Seattle, that tension doesn’t exist, because if you go small you still get about the same level of service in the city.
You seem desperate to construe everything I post into some sort of deep hatred of the suburbs, but there’s just nothing there. My purpose is to get transit service out there, not the reverse!
I’m saying use of the word ‘elites’ is divisive.
If we want a regional solution, we need to seek common solutions, not make it an ‘us vs them’ scenario.
Alright, if you find “elites” offensive, then substitute “political leaders and media”.
My point has nothing to do with what “should” happen, but what can happen given electoral realities. We’re getting two different signals from the other counties, and it’s not clear what relative weights we should assign to the two when assessing which measure has the best chance of passing.
To the median Pierce County voter, what’s best? Expensive, high-quality service that takes a long time to deliver, or a cheaper, quicker, but less-fancy solution?
At some point, Sound Transit was looking at extending Tacoma Link into residential sections of Tacoma, which seems like it might be better value for Pierce County than connecting to Central Link would be. Does anyone know why that plan was axed in favor of more Central Link construction? Were the ridership estimates for a more Tacoma-centric plan just too low?
A couple of those projects are actually in the .5% 12 year proposal.
Tacoma residents have been very vocal about extending Tacoma Link using streetcar standards (not light rail standards). The Tacoma City Council on the other hand has been woefully silent about this issue, mainly letting Federal Way scream at the top of their lungs for ST to construct the southern segment of light rail.
Tacomans are mainly interested in in-city transit coupled with an expansion of Sounder and ST Express. Light rail to the airport and Seattle is so impractical and expensive in relation to the ridership potentials in addition to their applicability in the year in which they will be completed. Who is going to be able to pay for an airline ticket in 2028 when oil is $600 a barrel?
What Tacoma is being offered by ST for Link in this new package is a paltry ~$80 million in “matching funds” for potential extensions. I find that amount a little insulting as it pales in comparison with what Seattle has got/is projected to get with this new ballot measure. We’re the second largest city in the Puget Sound, we have a need for transit funds to boost our ridership to feed into the larger regional system, and to help us transform vacant inner city land into sustainable transit oriented development, but instead ST is focused on billions for light rail to connect Federal Way to the Airport.
What about the doubling of Sounder service?
Federal Way connection to downtown Seattle is pretty important. A lot of commuters come from Federal Way to Tacoma, too.
80m is enough for another mile – it’d nearly double the length of the existing system.