Please, put down your drink. Then read Michael van Baker’s post about gondolas. It is hilarious yet intelligent, stringing history together with current events to come up with a possible future. It’s genius. I don’t love the recent criticism that Amazon isn’t philanthropic enough – that’s their business, and I believe that social services should be provided by the government. That said, the Seattle Center to SLU to Capitol Hill line likely benefits Amazon more than any one entity. And considering how slow our tax-averse state is to build infrastructure, a helping hand from the private sector would be appreciated.
I wonder if stringing a fiber optic line on the thing would be useful.
Considering how important peak oil is to our society and our future, I’m constantly amazed at how few people have heard of it, much less understand it. I’m no expert on the subject, and most of the information in this piece comes from the Internet – I won’t even bother to reference much, you can get it all from Wikipedia. But I thought a brief summary of the issues involved might raise the level of debate when the issue comes up.
What is peak oil? Peak oil is simply the point at which petroleum production is at its historical and future maximum. It is not an end to oil production, only a point in time when the market changes dramatically. In fact, it’s roughly the point at which half of all oil that will ever be extracted has been extracted. The consumption of oil has increased almost continuously from the day a use for it was discovered, and at the point of peak oil this will have to change. Continue reading “The Peak Oil Post”
On Tuesday, I was correctly admonished for not providing data in an opinion piece where I criticized another opinion piece for not having data. Sorry about that. As penance, here’s some data about the neighborhoods that have recently increased paid parking hours from 6pm to 8pm.
SDOT published a very detailed report (34MB PDF) from two large parking surveys. The first was performed in November 2010, before rates were increased. The second was performed in June of 2011, after rates increased. The report was intended to show the effect of this rate increase, but I’m more interested in the shape of the curves to see if charging for parking after 6pm could be beneficial. Of course the real useful data, comparing parking rates and turnover before and after the longer parking hours were implemented isn’t available yet.
Let’s start with Capitol Hill, the area discussed in the original Times piece:
When I read the headline “Parking fees drive diners away” in Seattle’s largest car-loving paper, I expected some sort of evidence to back this claim up. But it turned out to be an opinion piece without adding any facts to the debate. Skimming past the usual logical but flawed argument of higher parking rates = fewer customers, I came to the final argument. That employees are having to pay more for street parking.
For those who must drive, the additional two hours of paid parking require them to spend another $6 to $8 per shift. This amount is not trivial to our employees.
Let me be very clear: street parking in retail areas is not for workers. It is not for residents. It is for retail customers. If your business relies on a substantial amount of business from people that drive, parking space that’s less than a block from your business is very valuable resource. The greater number of people you can get in and out of that space within a day will directly translate into more business for you. Having your employees parking in those spaces the entire time they’re working in your restaurant is a terrible idea. Charging for parking encourages people to move their cars quickly. Charging more than private lots encourages people to park in private lots if they need to park for a long amount of time. If your employees are encouraged to switch to a private lot, this is good for your business.
Martin recently posted about the lack of success Seattle’s food trucks. There’s plenty of good discussion in the comments about whether food trucks are even a good idea. I thought I’d take a step back and look at what the best system would be, and how to best approximate that system.
If I had a magic wand that could change downtown Seattle exactly how I’d want it, when it came to restaurants we’d have a lot more areas that look like this:
In my last piece, I looked at a system that uses just one tool: buses, buses, buses. Let’s take a look at a system that does the opposite.
Istanbul is an ancient city, built and rebuilt on Greek and Roman ruins. It is geographically constrained, and has an unfortunate highway running through it that connects Asia to Europe. But despite these constraints they’ve built a wonderfully functional transit system. Continue reading “The Right Tool for the Job: Istanbul”
Inspired by Roger’s post, I thought I’d look at whether downtown makes sense from a pedestrian standpoint. Here’s the map:
1/2 mile and 1 mile radius from 3rd and Spring
Green Circle: 1/2 mile radius.
Using 3rd and Spring as roughly the center of the city, I first drew the green circle. I consider 1/2 mile the distance a person would walk rather than look for alternate transportation. You can see immediately why downtown works so well. All of downtown fits in this circle, making it easy to hop between offices for meetings or to head out for lunch. The waterfront is in this circle, as is Pike Place Market, Pioneer Square, the Convention Center, the ferry dock, and many large hotels, which make this also a great place for tourists. There is that pesky I-5 cutting through the right side, which cuts off most of what’s east of there from easy walking. But luckily 99 is above ground within this circle, so it doesn’t get in the way too much. Continue reading “Downtown Walkable Radius”
Kemper Freeman’s lawsuit has failed to make it past summary judgement. The Superior Court of Kittitas County filed a summary judgment on Freeman’s lawsuit against the State of Washington, finding the use of part of the highway for light rail is allowed under state law.
The issue in question stems from the 1944 Amendment under the state’s constitution stating:
All fees collected by the State of Washington as license fees for motor vehicles and all excise taxes collected by the State of Washington on the sale, distribution or use of motor vehicle fuel and all other state revenue intended to be used for highway purposes, shall be paid into the state treasury and placed in a special fund to be used exclusively for highway purposes. Such highway purposes shall be construed to include the following:
(a) The necessary operating, engineering and legal expenses connected with the administration of public highways, county roads and city streets;
(b) The construction, reconstruction, maintenance, repair, and betterment of public highways, county roads, bridges and city streets; including the cost and expense of (1) acquisition of rights-of-way, (2) installing, maintaining and operating traffic signs and signal lights, (3) policing by the state of public highways, (4) operation of movable span bridges, (5) operation of ferries which are a part of any public highway, county road, or city street;
(c) The payment or refunding of any obligation of the State of Washington, or any political subdivision thereof, for which any of the revenues described in section 1 may have been legally pledged prior to the effective date of this act;
(d) Refunds authorized by law for taxes paid on motor vehicle fuels;
(e) The cost of collection of any revenues described in this section:
Provided, That this section shall not be construed to include revenue from general or special taxes or excises not levied primarily for highway purposes, or apply to vehicle operator’s license fees or any excise tax imposed on motor vehicles or the use thereof in lieu of a property tax thereon, or fees for certificates of ownership of motor vehicles.
Freeman argued that since I-90 was built with motor vehicle taxes, it cannot be leased or sold to Sound Transit for use with light rail. The court disagreed, stating:
The court agrees Article 2, Section 40 restricts the use of motor vehicle excise taxes to the use for highway purposes but it does not restrict the State from eventually declaring the highway surplus and then using it for non-highway purposes, provided, however, that the motor vehicle funds used to constuct the highway are in effect repaid to preclude any allegation that the State is circumventing the intent of Article 2, Section 40.
The Gondola Project has responded to d.p.’s claim that Seattle should not want to be the first North American city with a gondola system, because of the effort and expense required to be a first mover. They make the case that:
If it’s rational for Seattle to wait for other cities, it’s just as rational for other cities to wait for Seattle. The result is that nothing gets built.
It’s arrogant to dismiss the heavy lifting done by places like Caracas, Medellin and Rio de Janeiro (and I’d add Algeria) simply because they’re poor.
Seattle has already placed itself in the extremophile position (sorry, my fault). Other cities will look to us to be the first mover.
Great arguments. But I think they missed one point. Sometimes it’s great to be the first mover. The Pacific Northwest, and Seattle in particular, is very good at being cutting edge. And we profit from being first.
Let’s take the example of green buildings. The Pacific Northwest leads the US in green buildings, specifically LEED buildings though we’re going much beyond LEED into net-zero and Passivhaus. Being on the leading edge has grown our architects, engineers, and construction firms into sustainability experts. This expertise is highly valuable, and our services are in demand throughout the US and the world. There are now 1.8 billion square feet of LEED certified commercial space in the world and as early adopters we’ve been one of the go-to cities for expertise. Similar examples can be found in airplanes, software, and even coffee.
Sure, gondolas may not go anywhere. It might just be one weird system that Seattle has that nobody else wants to touch – perhaps it may even fail before we get that far. Or it can be one more symbol that Seattle is still an innovative city that’s not afraid to be out in front of the pack.
