Most (though not all) of the Seattle City Council members are now "troubled" by the Monorail. Welcome aboard.
The Monorail is the single biggest issue in front of the City Council, and it should be the most important litmus test for this year's Council candidates. Incumbents Jan Drago and Nick Licata, who are perceived to be the most fervent cheerleaders for the Monorail on the council are still not troubled. They're both up for re-election this fall, but unfortunately neither has a credible opponent yet. Then there is Robert Rosencrantz, who is running against incumbent Richard McIver. I once thought Rosencrantz could have been a credible Council candidate. But his posititon on the Monorail reveals him to be either a craven fence-sitter or totally brainless:
"I don't believe the public needs to accept an unaffordable monorail, nor does it need to kill the project,"Rosencrantz doesn't like the financing, so his solution is to put the Monorail back for a rebid. Unfortunately, a new bid might tweak the details or the price slightly, but won't fix the financing. Rosencrantz gets The GONG.
Meanwhile, the City Council is defunding bus service in order to subsidize the South Lake Union Street Car.
[Mayor] Nickels hailed the council's action. "The South Lake Union streetcar is public transit that makes sense. It will link thousands of workers and residents to buses, light rail and monorail stations downtown," Nickels said in a written statement.Which once again demonstrates why Greg Nickels is a suitable mayor for "The City That Is Not Living In The World As It Exists" Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at June 28, 2005 10:51 AM | Email This
They know they can't justify it, they can't afford it, and that it's morally, ethically, and legally wrong, but they do it anyway?
Didja ever notice how similar they look to Seattle city government officials?
Posted by: alphabet soup on June 28, 2005 11:08 AMFor the council to kill the monorail would require them to admit that it is a boondoggle. That will never happen because it goes against their liberal, know-it-all, self-important dogma.
Posted by: Danny on June 28, 2005 11:26 AMIn the Ranier Valley, the 42 will no longer be needed North of Ranier Beach, and the 48 could be cut back to Columbia City. That is a lot of service hours freed up.
Posted by: MASSTRANSITFAN on June 28, 2005 11:42 AMI say go for the 70 year plan and stick it to the taxpayers of Seattle for generations to come. After they default on the bond payments and eventually cancel the whole stupid thing when it's 1/2 built they'll have all those ugly concrete towers to stare at :-) WPPS-2 in the making.
Posted by: Tucker on June 28, 2005 11:49 AMHe should fun his toy train street car himself - he can probably afford it.
One more point - How many commuters park downtown and take transit to the outer edges of town? I don't know of any.
Posted by: Jeffro on June 28, 2005 12:10 PMBecause, Metro is more efficient than Pierce Transit, they have to be, they serve such a larger area. Metro serves ALL of King County, but forgets their Ridership base is in Seattle.
Also, Metro knows that the City can contract out the operation of the Waterfront Streetcar, if they wanted. They used to operate the Seattle Center Monorail.
I think the South Lake Union line is too short, but it is a more conservative approach to have it just go to Fred Hutch.
In Portland, the Pearl District Line serves an area that did not exist before streetcar construction was started. It was a rail yard, made surplus by the Southern Pacific-Union Pacific merger.(Portland was at the Northern extremities of both railroads).
I think that streetcars can replace the needs for Routes 2, and 70. In the case of the 42, the best idea to keep it running is to shift in onto Ranier, which already has a very good route, just add some extra service(perhaps increase the frequency to every 5 minutes), and combine the Skyway portions of Route 7 and 42 into one route. Seattle will gain a new trolleybus route out of it. Metro could have piggybacked onto an order for new Trolleybuses in San Francisco if they wanted, but they did not. They did buy from the San Francisco area, by buying 100 bodyshells from Gillig, taking the motors form the 900 series Trackless Trolleys, refurbishing them, and putting them in the new bodies. Now Metro is using the old tunnel buses as pure trolleybuses. They could have replaced the 4000 series by piggybacking onto Vancouver's order for Low Floor Trolleybuses, but they chose the cheaper option. Metro, in 1973, inherited a fleet of 50 trackless trolleybuses from Seattle Transit, that were built between 1940 and 1944. They were retired in 1978 when replaced by 109 new buses. The last of the PCF-Brill, Twin-Coach and Pullman-Standard buses that were retired in 1978 were between 34 and 38 years old. When Metro retired their replacements in 2003, they were up to 25 years old. I have no idea when the 4000 series trackless trolleys will be totally withdrawn from service, but in the 25 years that the AMGs were in service, Metro went through three major purchases of 40ft coaches, and 2 major purchases of 60ft coaches. A diesel bus, if bought with Federal funds, must be kept for at least 12 years, and Metro has shot for 15, but sometimes it was more like 18-20. I like the efficiency of the trolleybuses over diesel buses. The overhead power distribution system only has 36 people maintaining it, and that also includes stringing new wire for extensions, such as the new layover loops for the split 7.
Posted by: MASSTRANSITFAN on June 28, 2005 12:29 PM
(Used to be an opponent and scared of Nuclear Power, now I am a fan of that too, especially the one plant at Hanford).
He is, of course, out of touch with reality. The best thing he could do for global warming is to deal with his own methane production problem.
Posted by: BananaLand (aka Iguana) on June 28, 2005 12:41 PMEyesore and a half! I worked for an architectural firm while the EMP was completed. Not one of the architects cared for it. Of course, we all weren't intellegent enough to fully understand it. yeah right!
I don't live in Seatlle either, but I know we'll all end up paying for Seattle's flights of fancy.
Drago and Lacata - Hmm, no disrespect meant to the Italian community, but maybe these two are connected (if ya know what I mean). Mafia and the constuction industry has also been connected. Just ask Jimmy Hoffa.
Posted by: Jeffro on June 28, 2005 12:48 PM$11 Billion could be better spent on:
1)Fixing up the Backlog of street maintenance that the city has only been able to do $30 million of a year. The Backlog is $500 million. Then set some aside in a road maintenance trust fund for future use.
-Re-widen SR 167(Ranier Ave between Ranier Beach and Renton
-Put streetlights on Lake Washington Boulevard and a few other safety improvements on tight curves(keep the curves, put in a small concrete block about 3 feet tall, and surrounded by bushes.)
-A new bridge connection to Delridge to be a backup route in case of a collapse of the West Seattle Bridge(It may never happen, but imagine if it does).
2)Light Rail:
-A Starter segment from International District Station to Ranier Ave and I-90 Freeway Station.
-From Northgate to NE 145th
-From the Central Link line to Lake City(laying the foundation of a line in the SR522 corridor).
-A Light Rail line from Downtown Seattle to Ballard and North Seattle(Green Line Corridor), as orginally proposed in Sound Transit Long Range Planning.
-First Leg of a SR520 Light Rail line.
(All of these stop at the Seattle City Limits, because the Monorail is a Seattle Only Project)
3)Streetcar
- Extending South Lake Union Line from Fred Hutch to U-District.
- A Line along 45th St to connect Ballard LRT with U-District.
-Streetcar Circulators in areas all along Central Link, such as Lake City, Downtown Seattle.
-Connecting South Lake Union Streetcar with Waterfront Streetcar.
4)Enhanced Bus/Bus Rapid Transit
-Extending Seattle's Trackless Trolley Network, with more buses to add frequencies to heavily used routes such as the 2,3,4, and 7.
-Using Fuel Cell Stacks to power the grid, at least partially.
-Priority Lanes for heavily traveled bus routes.
-Enhancing Heavily Used Bus Stops into Super Stops.
-Bus Rapid Transit on key lines that feed into High Capacity Transit Lines.
5)Commuter Rail
-Sounder Station at Pier 70, connecting Streetcars with Sounder, and North Downtown Seattle.
-Sounder Station at Interbay.
-Sounder Station at Ballard.
-Sounder Station near Shoreline.
-Sounder Station at Georgetown.
-Sounder Station at King County International Airport/Boeing Field.
6)Water Taxi
-Making the Elliot Bay Water Taxi Year round. Have it be a redundant link in case a repeat of June 11, 1978 happens again, that could be worse.
This is just one possibility of what the money could be better spent on than the Monorail, assuming what the P-I is saying is right.
Posted by: MASSTRANSITFAN on June 28, 2005 01:07 PMmonetary savings go right back into the coffers for bigger tent cities and huge compensation fund for "fair value" confiscations (progressive development) of your house a-la the latest SCOTUS case; There--I solved it in 5 minutes;
Posted by: Jimmie-howya-doin on June 28, 2005 01:12 PMA true believer, believes that Monorail, Light Rail, with full faith in the precepts of their religion.
It is Heresy to opposes the Monorail, the religion of Mass Transit worships as one of it's gods, Monorail. To question the intentions, motivations, and logic of the acolytes of Monorail is to be a heretic.
Nothing that is contrary to the faith of Mass Transit is even acceptable in the discussion, only true believers allowed.
Prepare to be burn at the stake as a sacrifice to the god Monorail.
Posted by: JCM on June 28, 2005 01:13 PMMan you must be so filthy rich if you are putting Paul Allen down for be a bad business man. PA has only billions, you must have so much more, given you are so much better a businessman!
BTW Sports franchises make plenty of money, creative accounting helps them, along with tax supports.
Posted by: fred on June 28, 2005 01:16 PMHow long from the State Treasurer's "dump it" to the time the Mono-bureaucracy is disbanded or no longer draws a paycheck? Time's a tickin'.
Posted by: Jimmie-howya-doin on June 28, 2005 01:17 PMI am a supporter of Amtrak Cascades too, and think it should be plugged into every airport within a radius of 2 miles of the line capable of supporting commercial traffic, that means Sea-Tac, Boeing Field, and Paine Field. I have been asking around on Railfan boards about how small of a platform would be needed at the Passenger Terminal for King Coutny International Airport, and they said that just an ADA mini-high level platform and long enough to handle three cars would be good.(That is what I asked specifically). They went further, telling how their are a few commuter rail platforms in the Northeast that are way smaller than the platforms at Grand Central or Pennsylvania Station, these are so small, that they are long enough to accomodate just one set of doors.
Posted by: MASSTRANSITFAN on June 28, 2005 01:22 PMWHY IS SOUND TRANSIT RUNNING REDUNDANT EXPRESS SERVICE TO 9th & COMMERCE , WHEN THE LIGHT RAIL ALREADY SERVES IT?
This impresses me as further evidence that ST has no intention of spending the public's money wisely. Furthermore since we have the Light Rail "up and running" why continue tying up traffic and tearing up the roads in downtown Tacoma by operating bus service that duplicates the rail service.
I myself am not a businessman and never will be. I have a couple of very successful MBA friends that slam his business savy and his business sense. If you take a look at PA's business ventures since MS - you will see many more failures than successes. Doesn't matter though, he'll never even come close to spending/losing all his billions, especially with the tax paying serfs financing his ventures.
Be very suspicious of anything called a Public/Private Partnership if it involves Seattle/KingCo and PA.
I am a 'Hawks fan though.
I have been consistent on being against one-seat rides. If a Seattle Resident that is taking the bus to do some buisness in North Seattle(I go to the Apple Store @ U-Villiage to get my computer fixed), has to change buses up to 4 times to get there, then somebody from Enumclaw, or Tacoma should not have a one-seat ride to Seattle.
Posted by: MASSTRANSITFAN on June 28, 2005 01:39 PMLike that is going to end this colossal waste. I contacted EVERY SINGLE ST OFFICIAL and EVERY SINGLE ELECTED OFFICIAL in ‘America’s #1 Weird City’ ant NOT ONE OF THEM SAW THIS WASTEFUL PRACTICE AS ‘A PROBLEM.’
Every stinking one of them either defended the practice or did not respond.
Prior to me taking you and the rest of your ilk seriously waste like this would have to be taken seriously enough by you that you would do more than just run your mouth about it.
Posted by: JDH on June 28, 2005 01:57 PMCall a special session of the legislature. Triple the MVET in the City of Seattle from 1.7% (which also includes 0.3% for Sound Transit) to 5.1%. Use 1.4% of this MVET increase to double the monorail revenues, and allow this relatively useless project to be paid off in 25 years for less than $4 billion without junk bond financing. Use the other 2.0% of the MVET increase to replace the Alaskan Way viaduct with an expensive tunnel – since the gas tax increase will be repealed in November.
This plan only needs a simple majority of the legislature to be adopted. Not a single member from Seattle needs to vote for it. Every GOP member can support it without fear of political backlash, since none of them are from Seattle. The people of Seattle have no right to vote on this proposal. It can only be reversed by a statewide vote.
Have the legislature put in an emergency clause, so that a referendum cannot be held on the matter. It will take an initiative to reverse it, which requires 250,000 signatures – nearly every single registered voter in Seattle.
Make the initiative impossible in any event. Make the new law effective immediately, and sell bonds for the monorail and viaduct the same day the new 5.1% MVET takes effect in Seattle. That way, even if enough signatures to qualify an initiative are gathered, and even if the statewide electorate decides to give Seattle a reprieve from its liberal masochism – the initiative will still be void, since the bonds will have already been sold, and repealing the 5.1% MVET would impair contractual obligations
I would really love to see the rich liberal Democrats of Seattle paying over $4,000 per year in MVET on their Mercedes and BMW’s at the new 5.1% rate …
Posted by: Richard Pope on June 28, 2005 02:41 PMLove it!
Posted by: Jeffro on June 28, 2005 02:58 PMThe Portland Streetcar began with predictably sufficient ridership before developing the abandoned railyards. Unlike Portland, there isn't sufficient ridership to begin with on the route from Westlake Mall to Lake Union.
Lake Union has a far greater transportation need: fixing the Mercer Mess. There is no rational plan laid out to fix it; only talk of fixing it, and some ideas for fixing it that seem ridiculous. Fix the Mess and then talk about a streetcar, for cryin out loud.
Similarly, the proposed Green Line monorail doesn't have sufficient ridership base to justify construction or extensions, let alone its exorbitant cost.
For example: revealed in the latest monorail details - it will have a track switch on the south side of Seattle Center near the TV studio, so that trains can run south through downtown more frequently. If this switch were installed at the next station north, Key Arena, many more riders from Queen Anne destinations is a no-brainer if the planners actually cared about serving the most people. The route on 2nd Avenue through downtown won't serve the most people. Nor will the Interbay route serve as many people as the East Alternative route to Ballard.
We should care about the cost, which is criminally exorbitant. But, we should also care about how the line is built, especially because it is not built to even minimal standards.
Un-frickin-believable!
Masstransitfan, I liked your list of more useful transit investments. How about another: Make all transit in King County free. Of course this would increase ridership, which would increase costs as well as eliminating fare revenue ... but I bet it would take more vehicles off the streets -- and do more for quality of life -- than the monorail, and maybe more than light rail.
Posted by: Bruce on June 28, 2005 03:36 PMFeel your pain. Love having my money spent on garbage only to have it shoved down my throat. Born and raised in Seattle - moved to the Eastside 10 years ago and have never looked back. If I still lived in Seattle I'd be registering my wheels outside the city or drive a POS.
Here's an idea, sell residence addresses outside of Seattle for 25% less than the MVET.
Any takers?
Posted by: Jeffro on June 28, 2005 03:50 PMThe only thing that I would add is very stiff penalties for anyone found skirting the new/improved MVET. Similar to what they do for folks in my neck of the woods that have OR plates but live in WA. Much, much stiffer fines.
Posted by: Jim in Clark County on June 28, 2005 04:04 PMI have an aquaintence who lives (just less than enough to be considered a resident)in California. His 'residence' is in Tahoe and it is 100% paid for by his tax savings over having California be his 'residence.'
If you think that people with enough money to drive a vehicle worth $60 to $100 grand are going to pay Much of any MVET you are a damn fool. They can also afford a vacation place that is not located in Seattle which is where they will 'keep' and register their second their first car will be a 1986 Ford Granada and the similar Plymouth Volare'for the wife.
So there suckers, since you can't afford the vacation place in the Olympics, it's YOU who will pay. ROTFLMAO at you and anybody that thinks they can vote for other people to pay for what they want too, 'The Ritch' are smarter thant you think.
Posted by: JDH on June 28, 2005 04:07 PMIt's even worse than your comments. The people most likely to use the monorail - those without automobiles - don't have to pay anything. Those least likely to use it - those with cars - shoulder the entire burden. It's just another big income-redistribution scheme.
Furthermore, after paying in thousands of dollars per household, will Seattle residents get a discount to ride the Monorail? No way - Seattle residents will pay exactly the same Monorail fare as Spokane residents visiting the city.
It's a bigger boondoggle than the Big Dig.
Posted by: Larry on June 28, 2005 04:12 PMhttp://www.king5.com/topstories/stories/NW_062805WABmonorailfiguresEL.558c7c9a.html
What? The number don't add up! Imagine that!
The money line:
"KING 5 asked the SMP for documentation and it faxed over a spreadsheet. But a couple of financial officers said these numbers aren't the actual amount they borrowed and the monorail's calculations are not numbers they're familiar with."
SMP playing fast and loose with the numbers? This keeps getting better all the time.
Posted by: JCM on June 28, 2005 08:41 PMSharkansky knows that a wrongs are being committed with the monorail, but he says very little about it other than liberals are to blame. Don't you characters ever feel like you're being conditioned into conformity?, trained to accept simplistic answers?, herded like sheep? Baaaaaaa! Baaaa! Look out! Someone's a-comin with a pair of sheers! Must be a liberal.
Posted by: Artie on June 28, 2005 10:06 PMWhy don't you prove your notion that we're being "conditioned into conformity". Show us your evidence of "rich conservative businessmen establish(ing) monopolies, practice(ing) extortion" yada yada yada. Reveal for us the rampant corruption that you would have us believe rivals the scurrilous democraps infesting Seattle.
Do you think you could stop picking your nose long enough to do that?
Or are you just another witless, feckless boob?
How 'bout put up or STFU?!!
Posted by: alphabet soup on June 28, 2005 10:46 PM'Or are you just another witless, feckless boob?'
From my vantage point it appears that the libs see this being a ‘witless, feckless boo’ as synonymous with leading a virtuous life. Just look at their wrapping their arms around 'Super Size Me' as their latest woe is me, I am a victim bla bla bla yada yada yada march to victim hood.
STFU and take responsibility for something you pathetic loser leftist POSs.
The business leaders in the US and Seattle are conservative, period. Their main object is profit, not serving the public. Whether they call themselves liberal or conservative, they can be judged by their deeds. When their deeds are corrupt profiteering, then the ideology behind them is free market conservatism.
I do not expect a single response to my latest post to be different from so many others: simplistic, coarse and meaningless.
The vile, corrupt, hypocrit conservative sons of bitches that run this country are the reason Osama bin laden attacked us.
Posted by: Artie on June 29, 2005 01:35 PM