All posts by Matt Gangemi

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

The plan is set. In a few years, the tunnel will be under construction. Assuming we can dig really deep for funding, around 2018 the state will have a new car bypass past Seattle. After that, the viaduct will be taken down. Many dislike this decision. I agree. And Dan Bertolet at hugeasscity has put into words exactly why this is such a terrible idea.

So what do we do about it? The die is cast, the decision is made. But wait, that’s a long time from now. What if we can convince Seattle and our state that the Viaduct isn’t needed. San Francisco did this with the Embarcadero – they tore it down with the plan of building a tunnel, but then things worked out so well they decided not to build a tunnel.

My proposal: Let’s tear the Viaduct down now. If we can build enough support, couldn’t we convince the city or state to close the Viaduct? It is terribly unsafe, after all. Yes, there will be many complaints about slowing down traffic, but we can make the argument that it’s only a short-term decision. We’ll have a tunnel soon, don’t worry.

After the Viaduct is gone we’ll be able to see if it really affects the city, and to what extent. If it grinds things to a halt, then we’ll have a new way through soon enough. But if not… we could save $4 billion to be used on something more useful.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Cleaner air over the past two decades has allowed Americans to live an average of 21 weeks longer. In areas such as New York that have dramatically changed air quality this has gone up to 43 weeks longer.

Of course, we also know the cancer rates along freeways and highways are dramatically worse than elsewhere in Seattle.

The relevancy to this blog is left as an exercise for the reader.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

I’m planning on taking the bus almost every day for at least a month, which is a first for me (cue claims of transit hypocrisy). This means I can actually buy a bus pass for once, which is something I’ve been coveting for a while. So today I searched to find out how much I’ll save with a bus pass. February will have new rates, so that’s $2 a way. Commuting every day, 5 days a week, with a trip a week replaced by another form of transportation (wife picking me up on her way elsewhere, or riding my bike if these sunny days keep going), that’ll be worth $64 to me. Looking into the bus pass to find out my savings it looks like it costs… $72?!

I suppose this comes with the benefit of exploring the city a bit on the bus, the reason I was excited about having the thing. And I won’t have to have a constant supply of $1’s (the huge benefit of raising the fare is removing all of those damn quarters). But I guess I’m a little bit disappointed that you really have to be a hard-core bus rider to benefit from the pass system.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

The Seattle City Council released their priorities for 2009. Call me a cynic, but they looked vague and predictable. Focusing only on the transit items, I see:

“Take major steps forward on the replacement of the Alaskan Way Viaduct and the Central Waterfront Public Space Design.”

How many years has that been on your agenda? A specific goal would have been nice.

“Implement new transit opportunities to provide greater access to public transportation, including Sound Transit light rail to the University and Northgate, expanded bus service, and the First Hill streetcar.”

Apparently not including a new Seattle Streetcar network? This is just a list of items Seattle has little control over and lies within someone else’s budget.

“Revise zoning in key areas of the City where greater height and density will promote the public interest.”

Ah, this is the one piece of gold in the pile of rocks. It’s measurable, has a specific goal, and lies within the power of the council. It’s also very important at a time when we’re building light rail, since rail and density should go hand in hand.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Much blog space has been taken up lately over Seattle’s Ride Free Zone. Erica Barnett says we should get rid of it, and John Jensen says we should hold onto it for now, and get rid of it later. There are reasonable arguments to both of these positions, but I think both overlook at least one basic fact.

A one mile ride should not cost the same as a 14 mile ride. We’re looking at $3.50 for a round trip ride of exactly one mile downtown. Now, downtown trips are much different than cross-town trips. A cross-town trip is generally a commute trip – a way of moving from home to work. There’s value in that trip – you don’t have to drive, park, fight traffic, etc. In my book that’s worth $3.50.

But a one mile trip is a different animal. The alternative does not involve the high cost of car travel, but consists of walking for 15 minutes, paying $5 for a cab ride (ok, $10 round trip, but if traveling as a group of four this is a $2.75 round trip), or simply not traveling (for example, shopping downtown instead of in the International District or just not shopping).

Can we squeeze $3.50 per round trip out of would-be pedestrians? For many/most, likely not. There goes Erica’s source of funding light rail.

If the RFZ is removed, then the only way to actually collect much money from the downtown area would be to charge a lot less than full fare. One fair and profitable method would be charging per mile, rather than per trip. This would encourage local transit use in Rainier Valley as well (a good thing).

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Weren’t we ready to break ground on the Monorail before it failed? That must mean we have construction-ready plans for the thing – we just didn’t have enough money. Where do I apply for stimulus funds?

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Just consider this me backseat driving our bus system…

By perhaps the 2nd or 3rd day of snow and only after a painful learning curve, buses in Seattle seem to have settled into a comfortable routine. Sure it’s a routine where half of the buses aren’t running, and most routes are unpredictable in terms of pickup and travel times, but at least the routes have settled down. However, these routes don’t look much like their published adverse weather routes (for example the 13 adverse weather route – had planned on still making it up the hill). And during the first days of snow people were stranded without even knowing which bus stop to wait at or which bus to take.

I humbly submit to the Internet my weather plan for the next snow season.

1. Find the most level, drivable route to serve a neighborhood. One way of doing this is to look at the routes as they exist right now. Now name these routes something easy, like #1S replacing the #1 (S for snow).

2. At the first hint of snow, announce to every media outlet you can that Seattle will be switching to snow routes. This shouldn’t be hard, since news reporters love this sort of thing. And don’t overlook the “first hint of snow” piece of this – buses are no good to anyone if they’re broken down on hills.

3. At every stop list directions to the nearest snow route stop, the snow route number, and a phone number to call if you need assistance (for those that can’t walk down a snow-covered hill).

4. Every non-articulated bus that serves a route that is canceled should now join these snow routes. This is critical, since we need to keep frequency high on these now overloaded routes.

5. 4×4 shuttle buses can ferry people up and down hills where required.

6. I’d have the city send someone around to shovel snow off of at least a few walking routes from each hill.

Yes, this will result in people that live on hills having to do a little more walking in the snow. But I’m sure I’m not alone in thinking an extra 10 minute walk to a reliable and predictable bus beats the current system hands-down.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

After the bus system failed me yesterday, and others at the bus stop told me they’d been waiting an hour with no bus in site, I thought I’d walk home. I realized the streetcar would save me a bit of time on this walk, and hopped on board. But when I went to pay, there was a sign telling me it’s free until Dec. 26. So I thought I’d share the news.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

There’s news this morning that a bit of work that was estimated to cost $29.4M was bid at $19.6M. There were six bids – a very good sign. Now cost estimates are just estimates and they could have overvalued the cost of the work, but this may be a first hint at how cheap infrastructure projects can be during a recession.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Well, maybe not “suck”, but the Seattle Times story we had already figured this out. Their other major point was that we need fewer cars on the road.

So what’s the solution to this “too wide” problem? Dan Bertolet suggests a new line of buildings on the east side of the plaza, which I think is a good idea. Does anyone have access to this report? Maybe they have recommendations.