combine the viaduct package, the bus package, the RTID, all into one big transit package, and get the voters to understand the importance of the investment. this is key stuff.

i havent seen numbers on something like that, so i dont know if you would be hanging some albatross (RTID) around the neck of some politically viable options (Viaduct/tunnel, busses). Clearly, though, people want to see a vision. They want to know what the solution to this mess is.

One last thought:

One of the best answers to all these problems is housing. If people live closer to where they work, and if we have truly mixed-income communities, then traffic will be eased. Imagine if all the service workers in downtown seattle could live in downtown seattle, as opposed to communting in from Kent in their crappy Honda. Fewer breakdowns, less traffic, more cohesive families, a better life for everybody.

But that requires density, affordable housing requirements and subsidies. You listening Mr. Mayor? What about you Mr. & Ms. Councilmember?

The time for expensive, large-scale, future-proof, cohesive plans and projects is over. Our leaders need to step up and implement relatively quick fixes wherever possible. They need to step up now.

The key word is quick. The initiative process allows the public to shoot down, second guess, or create delay-causing uncertainty. Any project needs to be well on its way to completion before our initiative happy populace can get its hand on it.

First reaction by many forward thinkers is that a quick fix is more expensive and less effective in the long run. This is very possible, but doing nothing during the next 5 – 10 years will be far more costly to our economy and environment.

Increasing bus service and decreasing parking are about our only options now. We need to implement dedicated bus lanes throughout the city (much like what is on Aurora, but full time and on a greater scale). We need to increase frequency of buses. We need to increase neighborhood connections. “Transit Now” (I like the nickname) has the potential to accomplish much of this.

How to pay for this? Again, the initiative process makes this far harder then it should be. An increase in the sales tax seems to be the only viable alternative. The gas tax has already been raised once in the past year and had to suffer through an initiative that delayed construction and increased costs. Increases in car tabs are also violently opposed. At least an increase in sales tax is a tax write-off for rich republicans and democrats (thus removing some of their thunder), unlike the gas tax. I’d be for taxing (or an increase in taxing) for parking as well, but I’m not sure what would be involved in passing that.

Assuming the sales tax increase becomes reality, it is crucial that Metro acts quickly and affectively with this new money, otherwise we will loose whatever public good will is left. If significant construction on BRT lanes doesn’t begin within three months, Transit Now will be in jeopardy.

I also mentioned decreasing parking as an option. Adding dedicated bus lines will decrease parking options, which is a good thing. Seattle is also considering reducing the minimum required parking requirements for new construction. I say take it all the way. It costs us nothing to go the San Francisco route and impose a maximum parking space limit, allowing developers to eliminate costly parking from new construction if they desire.

Overall, Transit Now isn’t a perfect solution; buses are still at-grade and will still get stuck in traffic with everyone else in dense areas such as downtown. (I’m all for adding BRT lanes downtown…but watch business cry over that--you thought the monorail controversy was bad. Save that battle for Transit Now 2.)

However, less parking and more buses will get the city moving in a sustainable direction. Perhaps some day it will become trivial to live in Seattle without a car, much like NYC, Boston or Washington DC.

First of all: yes to more buses!

At the same time, as someone who rides the bus to work daily in the ride free zone, I believe there should be a minimum fee for bus riders in all areas. The reason is that there are people who ride the bus in the ride free zone who are not going anywhere. They are unfortunately often homeless, too often drunk, and sometimes act aggressively to other riders.

While I deplore the fact that so many people are homeless in Seattle (and I know a lot has been written on these pages about their plight and about Seattlites not doing enough for them), buses are not homeless shelters, and they are not the solution to that problem.

I wouldn't want to discourage bus riding among people who need it for transit, so the fee should be very low, like $0.10, or $0.25, but there should be some barrier to getting on the bus so that people only board if they actually need to go somewhere.

I certainly don't have enough data to know how many buses a fee of $0.25 in the ride free zone would pay for, but I assume it would pay for at least some new buses. The rest of the revenue will need to be raised through other sources.

Brodeur unwittingly answers my parking tax question... apparently the Mayor has hinted at a parking tax:

you can read this article.

"How to pay for this? Again, the initiative process makes this far harder then it should be. An increase in the sales tax seems to be the only viable alternative. The gas tax has already been raised once in the past year and had to suffer through an initiative that delayed construction and increased costs.

the difference with Transit Now is that it will be King County only (if I understand it right). King County consistantly votes against Emyman-ish Initiatives and votes to raise its own taxes. i agree with you that we need some quick fixes on top of long term planning.

i'd like to see King County fund this by either raising the gas tax in the county or keeping a car tab tax for the county once the monorail is paid off. we should tax those who use the roads (including myself, who drives to work everyday!) to encourage using mass transit.

a parking tax increase would be fine with me, too. infact, now that we've gone to hi-tech parking meters, i think we should have peak hour rates on parking (from 9am-10am and from 5pm-7pm) downtown to discourage uneccesary travel in the downtown corridor during rush hour.

i can see a benefit to having a huge package (ah hem... no, not that) on transit being put towards the voters. however, RTID & ST2 are region wide, while Transit Now is just King County. So, from a "marketing" standpoint, I don't see how that helps voters in luke-warm transit support areas (Snoho & Pierce) support a major transit package.

isn't the state already packaging RTID & ST2 together to prevent a mass transit coalition from stopping RTID?

i agree that any major transit solution needs to address affordable housing and density downtown.

where's our generations Forward Trust? (no.. not that, either!)

Wait...I mean...

Interseting points, it would be even more interesting to look at support numbers for each initiative broken down by voters in particular counties.

Keep your eyes peeled for some big new action on affordable housing this summer. Those of us in the field will be putting out some pretty cool ideas/platforms that we hope will create a new rallying cry. either that or we're just wanking...oh crap, i did it again.

You're onto something there Will. As the guy who wrote the piece about Homelessness that caused a small stir, I am definitely sensistive to the effect of changes like you suggest for homeless people. On the other hand, i think we need to work very quickly and thoughtfully to make sure that Seattle stays a mixed-income city.

In San Francisco you can find either the very very rich (not unexpectedly) or the very very poor living in downtown or close in neighborhoods. Thats because land prices in SF are so high that all the houses, appartments and condos are super expensive. At the same time, SF is very liberal, so they build tons of housing for the homeless and extremely low income (those whose only income, basically, is SSI and TANF-aka welfare). This leaves a huge donut hole of housing opportunities for the low and moderate income workers. IF you make $30k to $50k a year in SF, you probably live many miles outside the city.

Seattle needs to make sure that doesnt happen here. THe challenge is, we need to make it pleasant to live and work downtown or in close-in neighborhoods, and we need to create housing options that work for the extremely vulnerable (homeless, ill, etc) as well as those who make $30 - $50k per year. Those housing opportunities are disapearing.

Making our downtown bus service easier to use, more attractive and a little more friendly might be an OK step in that direction. As long as we dont go hurting vulnerable people to do it.

I would also rather see gas and parking taxes instead of a sales tax. And I would make sure parking taxes include private lots, not just street parking (which often disappears in some downtown corridors during rush hour(s) anyway).

But, can another gas tax increase make it through King County hot on the heals of the last one? I'm not sure, but I would be surprised...people, even King County people, can be irrational when it comes to gas prices.

I assume the county has did some homework around the easiest way to get funding through an election and came up with sales tax.

Not to go too far off topic in this thread...but what's up with the average $19/sqft affordable housing fee for new downtown residential construction? All I've been able to figure out is that it just goes into some fund for future projects...

http://www.seattlechannel.org/news/detail.asp?ID=6025&Dept=28

all it does is deposit $ into a fund, tp be allocated by the city Office of Housing to nonprofit affordable housing developers through a competitive bid process.

the problem is that we need to get some rela requirements in plavce, and soon, in order to capture some of the development poewr of this building cycle. the 19$ fee is part of a voluntary approach and therefore really wont create that many units. until the city creates a mandatory standard (if you want to build any kind of condo/appartmentr/whatever you have to set aside 20% of the units for low-moderite income people) we wont see real improvements in the affordability of seattle living.

With the Puget Sound region growing at a pace of 100,000 people a year, and new transit funding woefully behind schedule, the timing couldn’t be better for increasing the sales tax in King County by one tenth of one percent for new METRO service.

King County Executive Ron Sims is right to move forward on this proposal in 2006 in advance of the tri-county regional investment in Sound Transit 2, and the Regional Transportation Investment District (RTID) that is being planned for 2007. Unlike the new regional funding next year, the funding for buses is restorative, making up for the gutting that happened to local transit agencies with the passage of Transit Enemy #1 Tim Eyman’s Initiative 695 in 1999.

The political football in the middle of the effort to create new METRO funding, is not a new issue at all, and we’ll see it played out on the County Council in the lead up to the ballot measure, scheduled for November’s election. Finding the balance between the transit needy suburbs and the high-ridership and strong public support for transit funding in the city, will be a difficult balance to achieve.

The often overlooked player in this, is the city of Seattle, and the foot dragging that often happens when it comes to giving METRO buses the priority they need to move through the city and to have adequate layover space. This Seattle City Council and Mayor can talk all they want about the environment and global warming, what they need to do is put the money where their mouth is, and become a full partner with METRO.

Urban Transit

Transit Now News Release

No intitiatives. Just do it. if we put it to the people it will be handled in the same stupid Seattle way. We need rent control, not housing set aside for low income service workers in their crappy Hondas. I could never hope to afford to live downtown off of what I make, which is less than 30,000 a year. I take the bus almost everywhere, so BRT makes sense to me, especially dedicated lanes that CARS CANNOT TURN IN! Do you feel me on that one? Seriously, this should not be on the ballot. Our leaders should have the sack and foresight to just do it, and tell the people that it's going to hurt, but eventually you'll thank us.

especially about the turn lanes...my wife swears very little, but those cars that jump in and out of the HOV lanes when they shouldnt be, they get her swearing like a sailor.

rent control would be great, but a little frightening in implemenatation, then again maybe everything is...but i'm with you. we need leaders who will drive change, no matter how it compares to the "seattle process."

Hello, I admit I am not a Liberal. O.K. I am a real conservative. However I also ride the buses every day. I tell you that Metro is horriable. There is no accountabality, no requirement to keep the schedule and if you live outside Seattle it is just bad. The King County Executive for the city of Seattle Ron Sims does not care about the bus services outside Seattle. If this passes I guarentee you that only Seattle will benefit. I know I deal with it every day.