Month: January 2015

A few weeks ago I attended the TCC organized Transit Talk. Along with transit champions Marko Liias and Jessyn Farrell, WSDOT Public Transit Division’s Stan Suchan rounded out the panel. During the Q&A I brought up the failure of our HOV system and asked what could be done, specifically mentioning HOV 3+ as a possibility in those stretches where even WSDOT admits the HOV lanes aren’t meeting reliability standards.

In my opinion, the answers were underwhelming. Senator Liias stated that it was very hard for a politician to take away something from a constituent without giving back something in return. Representative Farrell seemed to agree.

WSDOT’s Stan Suchan basically said the agency needed more time to study the situation. The agency has questions on whether moving to HOV 3+ would result in breaking down some current 2 person carpools into 2 SOVs, thus increasing congestion. To my mind the obvious question is if WSDOT’s definition of congestion is looking at person throughput or only vehicular.

Multiple times both Mr. Suchan and Senator Liias stated that we need to wait for the I-405 widening project to finish up and the results studied before anything could be done on other corridors. Considering that in many places our HOV lanes are worthless right now during peak hours, being no faster than the general purpose lanes, I found the need to wait years to fix the situation disappointing.

That was just my impression from an on the spot answer so I wrote Mr. Suchen in order to make sure I got the whole story. He was gracious enough to write back with substantive responses. Below are my questions and his full responses.

Continue reading “HOV 3+ not happening any time soon”

4th & Battery (SDOT Photo)

• Rampant bus-lane violations continue, but SDOT’s request to SPD for more enforcement appears to have been drafted but never sent.
• The Legislature is rightly looking to expand the distracted driving ban to include email and web browsing ($), not covered by the 2007 law.
• Republican Senators troll Governor Inslee, dropping a bill to kill Bertha and cancel the project. Just as quickly, Senate Transportation Committee Chair Curtis King (R-Yakima) kills it. ($)
• Publicola looks at the political process for ST3
• HB 1180 (ST3 authority) was heard yesterday by the House Transportation Committee (video here). Overwhelmingly supportive testimony runs from 15:30 to 93:00.
• Car vs. Link crash in Columbia City last Sunday. The scene was cleared in less than 10 minutes, and delays were minimal. Bravo!
• Mr Kubly Goes to Ostrava: frustrated by First Hill streetcar delays, SDOT Director Scott Kubly will make to trip to the Czech manufacturer. (Meanwhile, one of the streetcars is at sea near the Azores.)
• Under a new lease deal, Metro will pay the City of Renton 50% more for 25% fewer Park & Ride spaces at Renton Transit Center.
• Parts of NE 43rd and Brooklyn Ave NE have reopened to traffic.
• “A person walking their dog, and the dog takes a dump on your front lawn, you expect them to clean up after themselves.” – Senator Hasegawa on why Sound Transit should pay for residential parking permits. Thankfully, Martin follows that quote with something much more sensible.
• What is the future of Sea-Tac Airport? Another terminal? More satellite gates? ($)
• No more Route 2 misery. Spring St to get bus lanes this summer between 3rd and 6th.
• What do you think of a Swiss style tram from Port Angeles to Hurricane Ridge?

This is an open thread.

Tom Rasmussen has opted not to seek re-election to City Council.  According to The Stranger, transit advocates are “dancing on his grave.” Having attended the last STB board meeting, I can say with certainty that no grave dancing occurred, but it’s true that Rasmussen belongs to the camp who’d rather improve the existing bus network than spend money on streetcars.  He wrote thoughtfully on this site about his bus commute and how it might be improved.

West Seattle is at an interesting junction (ahem) in terms of transit: RapidRide C is quite popular and will be expanded with Prop 1. Development in the urbanized areas is continuing, despite the usual protests.

With expanded bus service in motion, the most immediate transit issue facing the new Council District 1, which covers West Seattle, is light rail and ST3.  Sending Link over the Duwamish will be geographically difficult and possibly unaffordable within Sound Transit’s self-imposed $15B regional package cap. On the other hand, federal grant money is always possible, the district has some well-connected residents, and keeping West Seattle in the fold is part of Seattle’s strategy to present a unified front in advance of a possible vote in 2016.

District 1 residents will get a sneak peek at potential candidates on February 5. I’d encourage our West Seattle readers to attend and let us know what you think.  It will be an interesting few years for whomever wins the seat.

At December’s Sound Transit Board Meeting*, Mayor Murray offered an interesting amendment to the “building blocks” section of the long range plan (79:30):

T18. In addition, as part of implementing a regional transit system, Sound Transit can explore policy and funding alternatives to address significant regional facilities, such as tunneling for future core system capacity through downtown Seattle; operations, maintenance and storage facilities; and transit vehicles.

The introduction began a bizarre sequence where Mr. Murray immediately left for another event, leaving Mike O’Brien to defend the measure; a series of board members stating that a second tunnel was an ST 4 or 5 discussion and therefore premature; and it finally going to defeat 6-8 (O’Brien, Constantine, Balducci, Phillips, Peterson, and Strickland voted yes).

This would have been the first (small) step to suspending subarea equity when funding a second downtown tunnel. This train of thought goes way back to the Mayoral campaign, where candidate Murray critiqued Mayor McGinn’s potentially city-only rail plans by saying that Seattle couldn’t afford light rail alone, and that tweaking subarea equity was the only way to build it. And in fact, if you define the minimum Seattle light rail increment as serving Ballard and West Seattle, that may be an accurate statement given the agreed revenue limits of the next package.**

Continue reading “Murray Suggests Regional Funding of Second DSTT”

In contrast to the awesome Senate Bill 5128, on which Senator Marko Liias (D – Mukilteo) collected the signatures of 19 Democratic colleagues to support granting Sound Transit authority to take a new package to the voters (commonly referred to as “ST3”), Senator Bob Hasegawa (D – Beacon Hill) found a way to get a hearing for his Senate Bill 5343: Go ask the committee chair who decides which bills get hearings in that committee.

Indeed, Sen. Curtis King (R – Yakima, and Chair of the Senate Transportation Committee) is signatory #2 on SB 5343. Smart move.

This bill is textually identical to last year’s SB 6489, which STB covered extensively.

The bill would make Sound Transit pay for the cost of residents’ parking permits in Restricted Parking Zones, which are created by cities, at the request of area residents, within the general area (undefined) of Sound Transit facilities and construction sites. Residents would be privatizing the public asphalt in front of their houses, making Sound Transit pay the City for this privatization, and not having to pay a dime for storing their cars on the public right-of-way, while denying non-residents the ability to park in the neighborhood.

Seattle has a low-income rate for parking permits of $10 per vehicle (for two years), answering objections that RPZ fees hurt low-income residents. The legislation is incompatible with the City’s program that sabotages the feasibility of this bill because there is no limit on the number of vehicles for which a resident can get a permit.

Meanwhile, Sound Transit is taking a much larger step to improve affordability for residents living around light-rail stations by introducing a $1.50 low-income fare on Link Light Rail, starting March 1.

SB 5343 merely subsidizes car ownership in these neighborhoods, and does nothing for the poor. It is being heard in committee Tuesday afternoon (January 27) at 3:30.

We continue to reach out to Sen. Hasegawa’s office for comment on the issue, but all requests have been ignored for nearly a year. For the record, I am a constituent of Sen. Hasegawa’s, I donated to his first State House campaign, and I have voted for him every time his name has been on my ballot.

Most observers believe that additional Sound Transit taxing authority is inevitably attached to the larger state transportation package. However, some intrepid legislators have sponsored a standalone bill that provide enough capacity, given voter approval, to fund a substantial amount of new light rail. Were this bill were to somehow avoid the shoals of the process, it would separate the region’s self-funded transit needs from the ongoing debate about statewide taxes and highway spending.

The Senate Bill is SB 5128, and its counterpart is HB 1180. The Republican-controlled Senate is generally perceived to be the main obstacle to passage, obviously. In the Senate there are currently 20 sponsors, leaving it five short of a majority, which are all among the 24 Democrats.

These sponsors include every Democratic senator that represents part of the Sound Transit District, save Mark Mullet (D-Issaquah/North Bend), who told me via email that “Nobody asked me to sign the legislation but I do support it.”

The three other Democrats are outside of the ST District: James Hargrove (D-Port Angeles), Brian Hatfield (D-Aberdeen), and Tim Sheldon (D-Shelton)*. I have not yet asked them about their position.

The Democratic votes are not only insufficient on the floor, but by exercising next to no leverage on Transportation Chair Curtis King (Yakima), they cannot bring such a bill to a vote. That is not true of the Republican members who represent part of the ST District. I emailed Sens. Andy Hill (R-Kirkland/Duvall/Sammamish), Steve Litzow (R-Mercer Island/Newcastle/Bellevue), Joe Fain (R-Covington/Auburn), Pam Roach (R-Sumner/Enumclaw), Mark Miloscia (R-Federal Way), Bruce Dammeier (R-Puyallup/Fife), and Steve O’Ban (R-University Place/Ft.Lewis) to ask their position. Not one bothered to reply over the span of a week.

These seven senators — a few of whom are likely to have Light Rail or other major transit projects actually in their district in ST3 — are the center of gravity for such a bill. If you are a resident of any of these districts (check here), a handful of constituent emails and/or phone calls could make a big difference. If you are not, a note of thanks to your Senator (and a reminder to your House members to support HB 1180) is a gesture of often underestimated importance.

Furthermore, for the Olympia-inclined the House Transportation Committee will take up 1180 on January 28th at 3:30pm.

* Sen. Sheldon caucuses with the Republicans.

EMC Research conducted a poll in December on Sound Transit and the region’s appetite for more mass transit. The results are overwhelmingly positive for transit supporters. Some highlights:

• Overall optimism in Puget Sound is higher than it’s been in years
• Sound Transit has a 66% approval rating, higher than the legislature or [glossary]WSDOT[/glossary]
• Traffic and mass transit are the #1 and #2 concerns on voters’ minds, displacing the economy (the environment jumped from 2% to 9%) as the employment picture improves
• 82% support expanding light rail
• 68% want new taxing authority and that number goes up to 70% when voters hear the $15B price tag and the cost to them

Put another way:

Hopefully these numbers will boost efforts to secure funding authority this transportation session.  PubliCola has more coverage from the ST board meeting.

• City Council races reshuffling: Licata will retire this year, freeing O’Brien to run in District 6; Sawant gets two challengers in District 3 (1, 2); the total tally of declared candidates is now 24; only Bagshaw remains unopposed.
• On the heels of the City Council’s expansion of free-floating carsharing, BMW DriveNow announces its entry into the market ($).
• Lots of great things are on Sound Transit Board’s agenda today: ST3 polling data, an East Link update, Sounder North Service Protocols, System Planning principles (how Long Range Plan projects will be selected for an ST3 measure), approving March ’17 for completion of the Point Defiance Bypass, and more.
• Are Vulcan’s plans to develop an 8th Avenue North woonerf a good opportunity for placemaking or an attempt to cede public ROW for a ‘corporate office park’?
• KUOW takes a look at Bellevue’s Spring District and the history of suburban/interurban rail in the Seattle area.
• If you live in North Seattle or Shoreline, or especially adjacent neighborhoods such as Jackson Park, please attend tonight’s 145th Link Station Area Open House.
• There is “No Plan B”  if Vancouver BC rejects the spring transit referendum that would authorize $7.5B worth of new transit projects.
• Do lower gas prices depress transit ridership? Not necessarily, says the LA Times.
• Early reviews for the Atlanta Streetcar are about as you’d expect for a line that takes 35 minutes to go 2.5 miles.
• If you’re an aspiring reality TV star, take note: going for ‘action shots’ near trains will get you killed.

This is an open thread.

Friday, Jan 9th, TCC hosted a brown bag preview of the 2015 legislation session as it relates to transit. While the session has already kicked off, the main points of the discussion are relevant going forward.

Most importantly, the two legislative champions on the panel, Marko Liias and Jessyn Farrell, were pretty upbeat about transportation package passage. Senator Liias said he was much more optimistic now than he was even a few months ago. Ironically, Governors Inslee’s strong support for a VMT/carbon tax has forced Republican’s to come out strongly in support for a “large” gas tax increase instead, something they have not done historically.

Senator Liias spent a lot of time explaining what it meant being in the minority. He went so far as to say that the initial bill he will likely vote out of the Senate will only be 70% acceptable. It will be up to the House to get it to something palatable. He made this point a couple times a couple different ways. This actually makes me pretty optimistic as I picked up a definite ‘Please don’t crucify me for my vote’  vibe, which he wouldn’t be worried about if he didn’t think a vote would happen.

On the House side, Representative Farrell assured the crowd that no package will make it out that doesn’t get the Puget Sound what it needs (more transit). She said she would not vote for a package that doesn’t help her district, where pedestrian safety in particular is a high-priority issue. Representative Farrell also stressed that she would like WSDOT to continue to evolve its practices, including a reexamination of traffic forecasting. She also believe that the State has a clear interest in transit, including capital and operating funds, especially along corridors like I-5 where transit improvements improve the efficiency of state facilities.

Overall, the sentiment seemed to be that a package will get done, it will have funding authority for Sound Transit and Community Transit, but it will not be the package that changes the trajectory of the state’s transportation spending.

The Seattle Times reports ($) that the people who have tried to stop rail to the Eastside at all costs have found yet another pretext to sue:

Indeed, the petition that Bidwell, [Kemper] Freeman’s company, former Bellevue Mayor Don Davidson and the Building a Better Bellevue organization filed last month with the Shorelines Hearings Board to vacate the permits could tie the permits up until at least May. After the board issues a decision, the case could be appealed in court.

But to Bidwell, the petition isn’t about attacking light rail. It’s about preventing environmental damage to the Mercer Slough Nature Park, which he’s fought to protect for at least 30 years. Bidwell also co-founded the committee that fought to establish the park in the 1980s.

I can’t speak to the legal merits of this case, although I presume the long list of (failed) previous legal actions the article enumerates were more promising. And I certainly won’t guess what a judge will decide. However, I also presume the relevant environmental laws were intended to protect the environment. And in the big picture any environmental law that discourages alternatives to driving is perverse.

Moreover, for the specific welfare of Mercer Slough it’s clear that the thousands of cars passing by on the freeway and arterial every day, pouring the gunk and litter into the water there, are vastly more impactful than trains. Any serious attempt to protect the Slough would close the I-90 highway spans, not obstruct light rail. But of course environmental concerns are only used to obstruct environmentally sound projects, not to mess with anything important like the right to drive anywhere, alone, for free, at high speed.

I was happy to be included with some fine company in the Seattle Times’ profile of “newcomers” changing the face of the city. After 15 years here, I’d quibble with the term “newcomer,” but hey. Speaking of quibbles, I’d like to revise and extend my remarks here:

And he keeps spinning visions for an even better future Seattle. “I can see a day coming when we can ban car ownership in the city, make everybody hail a driverless car to get around. They did a study on this in Singapore . . . they could have a 250,000-car fleet and the maximum wait for anyone would be 30 minutes.”

For the record I’m pretty sure I didn’t say that I want to ban cars in the city. If memory serves, I was riffing on this study from MIT, which had just come out at the time and got a lot of attention. I do think there’s a good chance that services like it will eventually have a place in lower-density areas. For major urban areas, of course, simple geometry will necessitate some kind of high-capacity transit service that doesn’t require encasing each commuter in 2,000 pounds of glass and aluminum every morning.

Anyway, the article itself was written by the delightful Fred Moody. If you haven’t read Seattle and the Demons of Ambition, do yourself a favor and get it. It’s a great way to understand this city’s psyche.

Capitol Hill Seattle:

It may be time to add the First Hill Streetcar to the list of Seattle transit projects facing serious setbacks. After the Seattle Department of Transportation pushed back the launch date from fall 2014 to “early” 2015, CHS has learned that the SDOT now expects the Capitol Hill-to-Pioneer Square streetcar won’t be in service until at least August.

Inekon is apparently paying $25K $1K for every day of delay. At this rate, if the streetcar is delayed another 10 years or so, they’ll be picking up the tab for the whole line. Much more at the CHS link.

Wow. Almost eight years since our first post. A lot has changed since then. Seattle’s gone from a sleepy backwoods village to the fastest growing ‘big city’ in the nation. From a bus only system to adding Swift, Rapid Ride, and Link; a system with BRT and true mass transit.

Just as the region and transportation system has grown, so has this blog. Since those early days we’ve not only grown into the platform for transit activism in the state, but we are probably the first organization out there to be recognized as Government News Reporting of the Year by mainstream civic organization the Municipal League and Blog of the Year by the alternative press Seattle Weekly.

As we move forward, we’ed like to know what you want from Seattle Transit Blog. In order to do that we’re conducting our second (semi)annual reader survey.  We want to know what you want and how you want to receive it and interact with it.

The survey takes just a minute to complete – it’s only 10 questions! So if you wouldn’t mind, click the link and fill it out? Thanks!

Southbound Rainier Avenue between Jackson and Dearborn can be quite a little bottleneck, and hurt reliability for buses headed into the Rainier Valley. Additionally, the pedestrian crossing headed to and from Goodwill is not nearly as safe as it could be.

SDOT is reworking the intersection this spring in an effort to improve the situation for pedestrians and riders. We’ll see new curb ramps and a wider sidewalk, among other pedestrian improvements. For buses, SDOT is planning a unique 24/7 bus-only lane in the center of the roadway. The bus stop itself will move north towards King street to make this possible. Left turns onto Dearborn will be banned, which doesn’t really matter since Dearborn isn’t an arterial East of Rainier and SDOT doesn’t want through traffic going that way anyway.

Expect northbound lane closures on Rainier Avenue between Charles Street and King Street. Construction begins in March.

Footage courtesy of DemocracyNow.Org

Tomorrow, the Seahawks will be playing for their second consecutive conference championship, in their final home game of the season, against the Green Bay Packers. Kickoff is set for 12:05 at Century Link Field.

For fans flying in, your ride from the airport is Link Light Rail, which comes every 10 minutes or better, all day. Be sure to buy a train ticket at the station. The best deal is to buy a day pass between Seatac Airport Station and Westlake Station — the full length of the line — for $5.50.

The game will also be served by Sounder trains. Two Sounder trains will take off from Lakewood Station at 8:50 and 9:30, arriving at Century Link Field at 9:57 and 10:43. A third train will take off from Sumner Station at 9:37, arriving at the CLink at 10:19. North Sounder Service, weather permitting, will take off from Everett Station at 9:15 and 9:30, arriving at 10:14 and 10:29. The full schedule is available here. In a departure from past practice, the final return train each direction will depart 75 minutes after the game is over, to allow the crowd to linger for the potential post-game awards ceremony and celebration.

As usual, there will be $4 cash-only shuttle buses from Northgate Transit Center, Eastgate Park & Ride, and South Kirkland Park & Ride.

This is in addition to the usual plethora of weekend bus and ferry service.