All posts by Matt Gangemi

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Searching for a good definition of “human scale” with regard to street design, I came upon an unlikely source: an Oregon Dept. of Transportation document from 1999.  It’s a great reference about how to take the noisy dangerous highway that runs through your town and turn into a comfortable pedestrian-friendly main street.  One particular segment jumped out:

Bypass

The idea of a bypass often comes up in discussions where there is heavy traffic on main street. It’s often seen as the one big solution to get through traffic out of downtown. However, in many cases traffic studies have shown that most of the trips on main street are local and may not be attracted to a bypass…

Bypasses are very expensive and generate much debate. The controversy that goes on while the community discusses a bypass may detract from other issues. If approved, people often think the problem will be solved and they don’t need to support other improvements to main street.

Also, if a bypass removes too much traffic, the economic vitality of the main street can suffer.

But of course it wasn’t all about why you shouldn’t build a tunnel.  They identify all kinds of good street design that is completely lacking on WA highways.  Starting on page 14 they talk about human scale, street ratios, and many other street design concepts that are really important for walkability.  They recommend 25mph speed limits in a main street area. 

Take a drive up Aurora from downtown – inside WA’s largest city – and you’ll see examples of everything ODOT recommends against.  Following Oregon’s laws this area would be a business district and have a speed limit of 20mph.  It would be designed for that speed  with a connected grid, no massive parking lots fronting streets, limited curb cuts, and appropriate street ratio.  I guess I’m just surprised because I had assumed every state’s road-building agency would be like WSDOT.  But it turns out even our closest neighbor has human scale figured out.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

I have friends that live in the far suburbs, and spend quite a bit of time in their cars.  They each drive seperate cars far away to work in the morning after dropping their kids off for school in a different direction, drive far for groceries, etc.  Financially they just get by every month, and going grocery shopping with them at a big box store is a significantly different experience than going shopping with my wife at Trader Joe’s or the Met (both an easy walk from our house).  I never thought twice about this difference – they make less than us and have more kids, and I’ve certainly had to make due with simple and cheap groceries at different points in my life.  But today I saw this graph:

Notice the size of the food wedge next to the transportation wedge for the average American family.  Pinching pennies on large blocks of low-quality cheese is less effective than just driving a bit less.  If they had only settled for a smaller home (for the same price) in a dense area, it would have had a much larger effect than years and years of choosing low-quality food.  I know people love their yards.  But I don’t think most people realize they’re making a choice between more yard space and, well, everything else in the world they love but costs money.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Dear Washington,

I know, we’ve started getting good at saving energy, and that’s a good thing – keep at it.  Except maybe wait a month or two.  You see, because we had a huge amount of snow this year we actually have too much energy – not a problem we’re used to having in our modern world.  Our dams are so full that not only has the Bonneville Power Administration (the folks in charge of these things) cut off coal and natural gas plants, but they’ve even started cutting off wind farms.  The issue is that unless we generate a whole lot of electricity using our dams, we’ll have to “spill” water, or allow it to bypass our generators, and that apparently oxygenates the water and is bad for fish.  Of course that’s a terrible deal for the wind producers who have gone and invested in a renewable power source just to be told to turn off their wind turbines for a while.

So, for a limited time only, don’t bother line drying your laundry.  Power wash the driveway like you’ve been meaning to for years.  Take a few long hot baths (assuming you have an electric water heater).  But enjoy it while it lasts.  Your local wind farmer will thank you.

(I actually think the best thing they could do is announce a statewide one month rate reduction.  That will keep those wind farms in business.  Or even better – use smart meters for real-time pricing, to let you know hour by hour what your electricity costs and let you – or your next generation super-smart dishwasher – base your usage on how strong the wind is blowing on the other side of the state. )

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Martin on Seattle Transit Blog posted a priority list and spreadsheet about how Metro is planning to potentially cut service, given the current funding problems.

I love how this group just dives right in and lists 174 (and counting) long comments describing how they’d improve on the experts’ work.  We can do this because we’re all experts – so are you if you ride a bus with some frequency.  I’d be willing to bet that this group can come up with ideas that a room full of transit experts would have never thought of.  Don’t get me wrong – the real experts add value as well, and they’re needed.  But I think the collective knowledge of a large group of people, whatever their expertise, has a great potential to find solutions.

I’m still rolling with creating a build a gondola system in Seattle campaign, and when I get a bit further I plan on using the collective power of the Internet (specifically those on the Internet in the Seattle area who are interested in transit) to come up with some initial routes.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

I talk about density because it’s good for the environment, good for reducing resources, protects natural environemnts and farms, and builds a better city.  But I don’t love density just because it’s good for me.  I’ve found living and working close to others to be far more enjoyable than the alternative.

The best living arrangement I’ve experienced were college dorms, and remember those days fondly. We were packed 2 to a tiny room, around 50 to a floor with a shared bathroom on our floor and a cafeteria downstairs. But the human interaction that created was amazing – we all (all 50) acted like a family and kept our doors open to be able to wander in and out of our neighbors’ rooms and to hear what’s going on nearby.

The most fun and most productive office environment I’ve had was in small cubicles where we could talk freely with those around us while working.  We could ask questions and share information effortlessly, but also joked and formed strong personal bonds.

I currently live in the best neighborhood I’ve lived in.  It’s an old “streetcar suburb” with 30′ lot lines. I can walk to 3 grocery stores, dozens of restaurants, bars, drug stores, parks, libraries etc. I can ride my bike to work in 10 minutes.  I have a bus line a block from my house that can get me most anywhere. 

The worst neighborhood experience, living arrangement, and office experience I’ve had was when I lived in the suburbs. I commuted long distances to a large office with walls and a door, where I’d have to get up and walk into a coworker’s office – if we wanted more than two to talk we’d both have to go to the next office (this rarely happened).  At home I barely knew my neighbors – and even then it was just the people next to me. I couldn’t walk to any stores or services and had to drive everywhere.  My commute distance left me with barely any free time, and I lived for the weekend – and even then much of my time was taken up with mowing the large lawns.

So that’s what’s built my opinion of density – ignoring all of the social, economic, and environmental benefits. I think it might come down to personality type. If you like people, density is for you. If you like to be left alone, maybe you’re a suburbanite.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

180sf.  2 people.  2 beds, 2 tables, 1 small closet.  Shared bathroom with 30 others.  Shared coin-operated laundry room.  No kitchen.  Rented 2’tall refrigerators (for beer).  2nd hand store smelly microwave (for popcorn).  1 small window with 2-pipe wall unit for heat and cooling.

My dorm room was spartan, but I loved it.  The high density that comes with such small quarters gave me near live-in closeness with 30 other people on my floor, and most became good friends at a time when I had nobody.  Everyone would prop their door open for constant interaction with neighbors.  The feel of the place was somewhere between a family and a party.

It’s currently illegal to build “apodments” in Seattle less than 120sf.  If I hadn’t wanted a room-mate my dorm would have been 90sf.  And that would have been just fine.  A while back the City Council ran presentations showing what terrible lives people must have to only afford such small units, as if making these units illegal would have magically allowed them to afford some place bigger.  I’m glad that effort has seemed to have gone nowhere. I wish they would remove the 120sf minimum.

Coming up: 180sf A’pod’ments (sorry, paywall – I haven’t read it myself) near Seattle U.  Sounds about right to me.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Please excuse my recent gondola craze, but here’s a little daydream. 

Imagine you have a half day stopover as Seatac and are looking for something to do.  The information desk gives you a few tips, and you find this route interesting.  Start by hopping on the light rail and riding it to Westlake.  Go up the stairs and ride the streetcar.  When you get to SLU, transfer to the Galer St. Gondola.  After your scenic trip up the hill, explore upper Queen Anne for a bit, then head down the hill via Kerry Park and our historic stairs (or take a trolley bus down, if you prefer).  Head to the Seattle Center to look at the fountain and the Space Needle, then hop on the Monorail to get back.  Extra time?  Check out the Pike Place Market and maybe even the waterfront.  If not, hop back on the light rail to the airport.

Man, you think, Seattle has their transportation system figured out.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

1. Bike racks.  You probably only need one for every 5th car or so, but it should be easy to add.  Would probably get more use up hills than down.

2. Perth Australia is renovating its waterfront, and has just proposed a $30M gondola system to connect it to Kings Park (called a “cable car” in the image here). 

3.  In considering if such a system is appropriate for our city, it’s useful to look at what it can do.  Here’s a great list of aerial trams and gondolas that are the highest, shortest, etc.  Some useful numbers:  tallest support pillar is 373′ tall, and longest run is 2.8 miles and takes 15 minutes (in New Mexico).  The longest unsupported span is at Whistler at 1.9 miles.  I’m not sure of the world’s fastest – the Genting Highland claimed to be the fastest at 13.4 miles/hour, but Whistler is 15.7 miles/hour and there may be faster ones out there.

4. Capacity.  Medellin has a capacity of 3,000 passengers per hour per direction at 12 second spacing.  Assuming 100 passengers per bus, that’s 30 buses an hour capacity.  I would guess that beats our bus demand between any two points in the city.  We can start with wider spacing to save money, but design in the ability to add cars in the future.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Seattle is a wonderful city for walking.  Each of the neighborhoods have interesting lively main streets, beautiful old houses, parks, pools, libraries, and many other amenities.   However, thanks to our hub-and-spoke commuter-based bus system it can be very difficult to get from neighborhood to neighborhood without a car.  Connecting our neighborhoods with grade separated high speed transit would be ideal, but the cost of such a system could take a long time and quite a bit of money to build.

Or, we could build one immediately at a cheap price.  A dozen cities in South America have embarked on urban gondolas.  And cities all over the world are following suit, and for good reason:

The technology was cheap, fast and safe and it furthermore eliminated all topographical challenges. The initial line opened in 2006 – at only 2 km in length – and now moves up to 40,000 commuters per day, equivalent to Toronto’s famed Queen Streetcar Line; one of the busiest and longest in the world… The industry learned how to implement multi-station systems, long lines, full-integration with existing transit technologies and how to accomplish extreme turns.

Urban gondolas are a perfect fit for Seattle.  They can connect any of our hills to transit stations, downtown, or to other hills.  We can fly from Magnolia to Queen Anne, or from Queen Anne down to South Lake Union then back up to Capital Hill.  We can calm West Seattle’s Viaduct fears by either connecting them to the Sodo Station or directly to the downtown ferry building.

All this can be built in a small handful of years and at pennies on the dollar of rail systems.  Trips will take only a minute or two and rather than waiting 15 minutes for the next bus you would wait seconds for the next tram.

And imagine having a ski lift during the next Snowpocalypse.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

There’s a great set of data that deserves a link.  It turns out that a BC bridge is failing to pay for itself through tolling, and the Columbia River Crossing project might not pay for itself.  Why?  Because traffic volumes have been falling in the Pacific Northwest.  Clark Williams-Derry presents data showing that driving has gone down in Seattle, Portland, Washington, and Oregon by no small amounts and in at least one case before the financial crisis or fuel spikes hit.

And in one of the comments, a private company in Queensland filed for bankrupcy because instead of tolled traffic growing from 60,000 vehicles to 100,000 vehicles it dropped off to 20,000 even when they cut their toll in half.  This might point to an internation trend away from the car.  Or at least a lesson for us before we start building an expensive tunnel that is expected to pay for itself using tolls and future car volume growth.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

As Seattle cuts school bus service, I thought I’d point out the upside.  Costal states – especially western costal states – seem to spend a lot less of their leisure time inactive than most of the rest of the country.  Maybe a bit of walking to school will help us keep ahead on the activity front. 

(the following map has been included for entertainment purposes only)

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Several months ago I compiled some census data regarding WA, King County, and Seattle and concluded that the Growth Management Act is broken.  Since then I’ve been pointing to this data from all over the Web.  Today, someone helped me realize that my numbers may be misleading.  They are correct, but too granular, looking only at census data (every 10 years).  Looking at year-by-year data for the last decade we get a completely different picture.

First, my original chart:

Now, let’s zoop in on those last 10 years and look at annual data:

Ok, that graph was boring.  That’s because populations don’t change very quickly.  However, let’s look at the percentage change each year:

Look at that.  Starting in 2006 WA population growth began decelerating.  But Seattle has been acelerating since 2005. 

What does that mean for growth management?  I don’t know.  The GMA has been around for 2 decades and it would be strange for it to just start working in 2005.  This probably has more to do with the economy than anything else.  I ended my piece claiming “our only hope of keeping Washington green is to make that Seattle line match the rise of the WA line.”  We’re still a ways from having that happen.  But at least we’ve started heading in the right direction.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Upzone.

One of the arguments that comes up when debating Seattle’s zoning laws is that we’re in a recession, and nobody’s going to build no matter what we do right now.  I’d argue the opposite: if we upzone we can get people to build right now despite the fact that we’re in a recession.

Housing prices have dropped in Seattle recently (as with everywhere else), but they’re still well above surrounding areas and dwarf suburban prices.  Why hasn’t development in Seattle continued if there’s such a market?  Because of zoning.  There’s some profit in tearing down a one story business and building a 3-on-1 mixed use structure (to take a common example), but that’s offset by the loss in value of tearing down that one story business that the developer has just bought.  You get the new value of 3 stories of new homes, but you had to pay the construction price of 4 stories plus land.  Unless housing values are very high, a developer won’t make money on this deal.

Now consider an upzone.  If we raise the legal height for that parcel to 6 stories, then you have the value of 5 stories of new homes for the construction cost of 6 stories plus land value.  That’s two extra stories worth of profit and will push many projects from being losers to being winners.

Another benefit of upzoning in a weak market is that change happens more slowly.  The clear winning projects will be done right away, and the less profitable projects will become more profitable as the market recovers.  This will tend to make neighborhoods change slowly, which is more comfortable for neighbors.

There are a whole lot of unemployed architects, engineers, and contractors out there right now.  Upzoning can make a large dent in those numbers almost immediately.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Today there was a discussion on Seattle Transit Blog about the benefits and drawbacks of cutting off bus service from the south to downtown Seattle and instead shuffling everyone onto LINK trains.  The core of the argument is cost savings vs. speed, and considering KC Metro is going through major cuts it’s time for unpleasant conversations about where and how we’re going to degrade service.  The huge savings involved is what makes this particular cut attractive.

That discussion is interesting, but isn’t what caught my eye.  One compromise solution was to use some of the money saved and keep or add express buses to downtown.  But if the express bus was faster, what would get people to take the non-express to a slow transfer to the train?  The way we do things now we’d use capacity to limit supply – once more people can’t cram on the express bus, they’ll wait for th local.  But that’s not the logical market approach – we’re leaving money on the table.  We could be limiting supply using fares.  Bump up express service a few dollars, and we not only increase revenue but we also sort out the issue of limited capacity on express buses. 

Commuters that need to get to work quickly will pay the extra money.  More cost sensitive riders will take a bit more time to get around.  And let’s not just do this for south-end routes, but for routes throughout the region.  This will free up capacity on express routes, and we can use the added revenue to keep more service overall.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

And the winner is: “Seattle Tunneling Partners”  (whoever that is) with a bid within 0.02% of the maximum and a grade of C- (losing bidder was also within 0.02% of the maximum and had a grade of F). 

The Slog has the only coverage I’ve seen so far, but there will be more… oh yes, there will be more.

Update: WSDOT has published their contract award process (PDF here).  Bidders can win by either submitting the low bid or receiving a high enough score (each point reduces their effective bid by $1, up to $100M).  This actually gives us an insight into WSDOT’s priorities:

• 10% management
• 20% schedule
• 20% increasing roadway clearance inside the tunnel
• 40% boring machine design and ground settling plan
• 10% everything but tunneling (design of both ends, interior of the tunnel, cut and cover section, and operation building)

This means it’s far more important to WSDOT if you, say, increase the size of the tunnel bore than if you decrease the size and impact of the massive tunnel entrances. 

 Bidders were paid $4M each just for submitting responsive bids.  Not bad for a few months of work.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

If our cities density and economic strength were measured in tall skyscrapers, then we’d be failing. 

“America’s share of the 100 tallest buildings will fall from 80 percent in 1990 to 18 percent by 2012.” (DJC, expensive registration required*)

So I ask: are we afraid to build tall buildings because of terror**?  Is it our weak economy?  Or is it thanks to businesses moving outside of cities thanks to sprawl?

* I haven’t even read the article, just the headline.  I might have time to swing by the library to read it at lunch.  If anyone wants to get me a DJC subscription, it would be my favorite xmas gift.

**I love to play the “afraid because of terror” card – will our grandchildren respect us like we respected the WWII generation?  I doubt it.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

LaHood gives money to three projects that will tear down their elevated highways and replace them with bike lanes and sidewalks. 

Oh wait, we’re not really tearing down our highway to build pedestrian and bike paths.  We’re moving our highway down to ground level, then adding a second highway underground at a cost of billions.  Never mind.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

I just wanted to share a simple chart I’ve made using WA population data.  What does it tell us?  It tells us that our efforts to channel growth into reasonably dense urban environments are failing miserably.

Notice:

1. Seattle is all but flat.  We set up restrictive zoning laws long ago, and have only slowly relaxed them.  Restrictive zoning acts like a big “Keep OUT” sign posted on our city.

2. King county is growing moderately.  This is generally good, as I’d rather have growth in suburbs than in exurbs.  But suburban homes are still terribly inefficient compared to city life.  Also, infill in a city means replacing parking lots with housing.  Infill in the suburbs means replacing trees with homes and fossil-fuel-fed lawns.

3. Check out WA as a whole.  This is bad.  Ideally we’d keep new construction limited to urban areas – Seattle, Bellevue, Tacoma, etc.  But compare this line to the example dense urban line (Seattle) and the example less-dense but still reasonably urban county line (King).  What you’re seeing here is clear-cutting trees and wilderness and building large new homes.  You’re seeing new roads to serve these new homes.  Along with new sewer systems, new electrical systems, water to keep the lawns green, landfills, schools, shopping malls, and transit-free road-based corporate campuses.  This is sprawl.  Green, natural WA is being paved to make way for sprawl.

I flew over WA today, and was discouraged by the number of new housing tracts set up in the middle of nowhere (many of them still undeveloped, just plowed and set aside for the next bubble).  Each of these new homes will have a worker that will drive for hundreds of hours a year to get to work.  They’ll drive hundreds more hours a year to go shopping, drop their kids off at soccer practice, to pick up dinner, etc.

If peak oil hits, most of those that live on that WA line above are screwed.  If it doesn’t hit (in the near term – it must hit sometime), then all of these people are driving global warming just by living their lives.

How do we fix this?  Dramatically relax our zoning restrictions.  Allow the market to turn our acres and acres of single family homes into apartments and condos.  People want to live in the city (if you believe prices are a proxy for desire), so let’s let them.  Sure there will still be those that want to live in the middle of nowhere.  And we should keep working on our growth management rules.  But our only hope of keeping Washington green is to make that Seattle line match the rise of the WA line.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Human Transit just posted an excellent graph, showing how strongly what country a city is in influences its use of public transit.

Why is the US so low on this graph?  It’s not like we’re comparing to Europe or Asia – this is Canada and Australia, the two countries most like the US that I can think of.  Jerrett believes it’s our decentrallized business parks.  I agree, but what caused those?  What makes the US so special when it comes to wanting our offices out in the middle of nowhere?  Surely urban land is more expensive than suburban land in other countries as well.  Is this yet another effect caused by our subsidized freeway system?  Or is this just a cultural effect, perhaps caused by executives wanting their work near their home?

In his post, Jerrett also mentions the power of the stick to get people on transit.  Sydney is up near Canadian levels partly because parking downtown can be $60 a day.  I propose that’s partly the reason the four US cities named are so high above our average.  They’re all geographically constrained, and therefore are difficult and expensive to drive to and park.

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Dear New London,

I know we’ve just met, and I’m leaving in a few days.  But I find criticism is easiest to take from strangers.  Let me be honest – you’re not living up to your potential.  You were built with all of the right elements.  You have narrow streets, a well planned downtown, wonderful history, narrow storefronts, beautiful buildings (ok, a few too many giant churches for your own good, but not the worst flaw to have), you’ve got a nice train station, a waterfront view, and you’re a major ferry stop.   But it’s clear you’ve let yourself go.

Don’t get me wrong – I know it’s not your fault.  You saw all of the other towns growing and getting rich.  However, say it with me, you’re not Mystic and you’ll never be Mystic.  It’s just impossible to compete with an 80’s movie starring Julia Roberts and a waterfront that isn’t cut off by a train.  But Mystic is shallow anyway, with it’s giant parking lot for the tour buses and its Disneyland-like renovated homes and sailboats.

I know you saw Mystic and believed all you needed was a giant parking structure of your own, and to widen your streets, and to tear down all of those buildings that weren’t so pretty and put in more parking.  But you were so close to perfect.  Now instead of beautiful old shops that are walkable, pedestrians can’t carry a conversation over the 30mph traffic flying by.  And parking lots have eaten up most of your downtown.  And instead of revising your zoning to let infill bring new buildings with new people to shop at your downtown you kept your old zoning rules.  Then you let in that condo where the first two floors are parking lots.  And to bring in some cash you were desperate for you let that developer put in that block wide concrete office building in the middle of downtown without any retail – just blank walls.

I hope you didn’t really think you’d lure drivers out of their cars by adding big parking lots.  How did that work out for you?   Did you intend to have your main street filled with porn shops and bars?  Are those new streetlight banners helping?  How about the security cameras?

But it’s not too late, New London.  Sure you’ll never approach the beauty of your namesake in my lifetime or perhaps a dozen lifetimes, but with a bit of work you can be a thriving city again.  Start with a serious road diet.  Yes, people want to cut through your downtown to get to the freeway, but that doesn’t help you at all.  I’ll let you keep that parking structure for now, but replace that block wide and five block long parking strip with human scale retail and housing.  Change your zoning just outside downtown to let homes be built close to one another and end your parking requirements.  Up your height maximums to four stories – you don’t have to be a suburb if you start acting like a city.

I wish you luck.  Call me if you find the willpower to change.

-Matt

P.S.  Ok, I took another trip to your city, and I have to give you some credit.  State Street looks reasonably nice.  It’s 2-way with slow moving traffic, which has resulted in some nice shops.  I also realized that you’ve suffered from the same state-inflicted torture as other cities, as the nearby freeway and bridge most likely created your perceived need of wider roads downtown.  But I urge you: ignore this freeway.  Put your road on a diet and don’t fast-track potential visitors right through your downtown.

(sorry about the off-topic post, but it shouldn’t be too hard to find parallel arguments about Seattle)