Today's Seattle Times has an article on the Beacon Hill light rail station, buried 165 feet (about the height of a 16 story building) beneath the hilltop, "Underground Link station a beacon of engineering":
"It is probably the most challenging construction project along the whole Link light-rail line," said transit-board member Larry Phillips, a Metropolitan King County Council member from Seattle, during a tour Sunday morning. "The methods used to mine out this station have never before been used at this depth. We are standing here in an engineering and construction marvel that will be known throughout the world."Known throughout the world, perhaps, but mainly as an appallingly inefficient use of transportation funds. Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at June 25, 2007 10:59 AM | Email This
But on message, I am afraid of elevators. So, sorry, I can't use the station. Do you have a bus I can use instead?
Posted by: swatter on June 25, 2007 11:43 AMI want to be there at rush hour to watch a few hundred worker bees, 10 or so at a time, be transported the height of a 16 story building to catch a train that is supposed to run a on a tight schedule. The back-up should extend hundreds of feet from the top side elevator. Below, the screams of anguish when missing the connection will be heard at ground level.
Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!
Stop it man, you're killing me!!
Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!
Idiots.
Posted by: Yadda Cubed on June 25, 2007 02:01 PMNow you are laughing harder, eh? So what if they are over double what they promised; by definition, they are not overbudget.
I think you will find evergreen is a ST employee.
Posted by: swatter on June 25, 2007 02:07 PMAnd you think so - why? Anyone else find it a little, well, you know, odd, that NO AUDIT EVER of the agency has found any blown budgets? But swatter here thinks he's rooted out some some big issue. HMMMM.... ok, PROVE IT. What were the voters promised that ST now is "over double" on? Let me guess, you're going to go run back around your mother's skirts and hide now that somebody asked you a question. We KNOW you won't be able to back up what you've posted with facts.
Posted by: evergreen_rails on June 25, 2007 02:18 PMSee, I got the facts, Jack. You don't.
Posted by: evergreen_rails on June 25, 2007 02:20 PMAgain, you obviously are not looking at the dates of what Bundy posted. His arguments claims may have been close to the mark in early 2001, but the numbers he used are at least six years out of date. That is why the light rail line was scaled back. The numbers in Bundy's "articles" simply don't reflect what the recent audits do - no budgets have been blown. That is an urban myth.
Posted by: evergreen_rails on June 25, 2007 02:51 PMWe were told the money would do xyz but instead we are getting xyz less .....
That, my friend, is the only budget that matters. Go back to work.
Posted by: swatter on June 25, 2007 03:19 PMIt became clear that costs people were told, and reassured were true, were set by Sound Transit at a level calculated to get people to approve projects they would not have approved had they known the truth. Then the ballot measure deceptively conveyed to the agency the authority to spend without limit, and as long as it liked, for the putative $3.9 billion Ten-Year Plan people thought they had approved:
"Q: When does light rail bust the budget?
"A: Last week the cost for the 21-mile line was estimated at $3.6 billion. A year ago the estimate was $2.3 billion. But there is no set budget for the project. Voters from King, Pierce and Snohomish counties endorsed taxes to pay for Sound Transit in 1996, but the ballot measure did not set a spending limit for light rail. That was intentional, because no one knew exactly how much it would cost." (Seattle Times, 12.17.00)
That billion dollar cost overrun was but a modest part of what was ahead. The portion now known as Initial Segment was projected to cost $1.565 billion at that time, December 2000 -- including its share of the billion dollar increase for Central Link. By the next fall, 2001, it was $2.1 billion. In December 2002, $2.44 billion.
That additional $875 million overrun, just for the cheaper portion of Central Link, occurred on Joni Earl's watch -- and no media outlet has ever reported it, nor has the Citizen Oversight Panel. Once honest cost estimates for Central Link from downtown to north Seattle are forthcoming, and from South 154th to the Airport and the South 200th terminus, the total cost for Central Link will exceed $6 billion, and likely will surpass $7 billion.
@ 16 - what you have in italics is not correct, in particular the following is completely false: "Then the ballot measure deceptively conveyed to the agency the authority to spend without limit." The ballot measure did not convey to ST the authority to spend without limit. Whoever wrote that does not know the truth. You shouldn't believe everything you read. Go ahead, look at the ballot measure. NOWHERE does it convey open-ended spending rights. If you think you can find that language in Sound Move, post it here and I'll tell you why those words don't mean what you think they mean. And I'll be correct, and you'll be wrong. Stefan, Eric - all of them will agree with me.
Whatever your source for that italicized quotation was, don't pay any attention to it. What you've quoted is not an accurate description of what the voter-approved measure says, and no appellate case has said anything like what that italicized text says.
Posted by: evergreen_rails on June 25, 2007 03:41 PMSo, from one idiot to the horse's ass, go back to work for the second time.
Posted by: swatter on June 25, 2007 03:54 PMThe first phase of Sound Transit was approved in 1996 and imposed a ten-year .4% sales and use tax and a .3% Motor Vehicle Excise Tax (MVET). In 1996, Sound Transit estimated the total phase would cost about $5 billion in year-of-expenditure (YOE) dollars and be completed by 2006.[1] Today, Sound Transit says the total cost of Phase 1 is about $15 billion and will not be finished until around 2020.[2] In other words, Phase 1 is about $10 billion over budget and 14 years late. In addition, Sound Transit will persist in collecting both the .4% sales tax and .3% MVET in perpetuity, even after the first phase is complete in 2020.
Posted by: Palouse on June 25, 2007 04:11 PMThe next response will be that only Sound Transit and the State Auditor's comments are the truth.
evergreen is getting paid to promote the ST myth.
Posted by: swatter on June 25, 2007 04:24 PMPut your calculator away cement head, Yes it is. You're paying double.
But don't be sad. You'll be making party goers laugh for a long time because I'll be telling this story of stupidity for years to come.
So they are mounting a blogging campaign to lie, lie and lie again.
They always say: "The agency is not "over budget." ST is one of the most frequently-audited agencies in Washington. If it were over-budget, either KPMG or Auditor Sonntag would have caught it. Stop spreading falsehoods. You CAN'T prove ST is overbudget. If you think ST is overbudget you have an obligation to sue it in a court of law and prove you are right and KPMG is wrong. Point to ONE document showing ST is overbudget (and not one that some asphalt fetishist invented - I'm talking about a document with credibility, like one from ST)."
We know they are lying.
Here's how the uninitiated know they are lying: they never say "Prior to the vote ST said the 21 miles would cost $X."
"Now the 21 miles costs $X just like what we said.
Instead, they pretend they don't know that what we mean is ST is going over what ST told voters. Of COURSE ST increases its formal budgets periodically to account for going over what they told voters. Duh.............
Same with the timetables.
Not only do they lie, lie and lie -- they think readers are total fools.
@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@__We know they are lying__@@@@
Then prove it. Smart guy, eh. Get a lawyer. Sue. The judge will give you WHATEVER you want. Godspeed.
Posted by: Punctil on June 25, 2007 08:22 PMInterestingly, she said pretty much everyone that she polled did not like the fact that mass transit and roads had been jammed together on the same measure. The respondents overwhelmingly did not like that they were forced to vote for both to get the one they wanted.
I predict this measure going down in flames. Big time.
On HA the prediction is approval, big.
Posted by: Cliff on June 25, 2007 08:49 PMCome to think of it, there aren't *any* Park & Ride lots on this route except for the one in Tukwila. So don't lament the minimal capacity of the stations. No one is gonna ride it anyway.
yup--like the Boston Big Dig, The Great Train Robbery, eons of tomb robbers at the Pyramids and that old classic, Ocean's 11. same "marvel," same theme...there's one born every minute...
Posted by: jimmie-howya-doin on June 25, 2007 10:45 PM"Hizzoner would have none of it."
Hizzoner sez we need development/Gentrification
In the Rainer valley.
So we get it.
Now load up the poor in box cars and let them pay for relocation.
Put an x on them and ship them out to burien or Kent says hizzoner.
We want higher square footage rates,sales taxes and property taxes,without having to pay for it ourselves.
We will just use carrot,stick and flubber to get our gentrification.
"Hizzoner would have none of it."
Hizzoner sez we need development/Gentrification
In the Rainer valley.
So we get it.
Now load up the poor in box cars and let them pay for relocation.
Put an x on them and ship them out to burien or Kent says hizzoner.
We want higher square footage rates,sales taxes and property taxes,without having to pay for it ourselves.
We will just use carrot,stick and flubber to get our gentrification.
"Hizzoner would have none of it."
Hizzoner sez we need development/Gentrification
In the Rainer valley.
So we get it.
Now load up the poor in box cars and let them pay for relocation.
Put an x on them and ship them out to burien or Kent says hizzoner.
We want higher square footage rates,sales taxes and property taxes,without having to pay for it ourselves.
We will just use carrot,stick and flubber to get our gentrification.
And Acid Brain, the proponents of ST way back when were asked if inflation and normal cost overruns were factored into their estimates. They said, yes, most definitely. I hold them to their word and will hold them to their budgets, even though they are way over budget. My vote is easy- NO!
Posted by: swatter on June 26, 2007 07:10 AMWhen it comes to money, government is just like when AT&T was a monopoly: They don't care because they don't have to. They are a monopoly and don't have to care, you have nowhere else to go.
What you have to do is stop listening to their excuses and start looking at the facts.
Underpromise and overdeliver.
Huge government projects do the EXACT opposite, almost every time. It's all about expectations. You'd think they would have figured that out by now.
Posted by: Palouse on June 26, 2007 01:54 PMThat's why is is great Sound Move has spending limits in it. Under Sound Move and Res. 75, ST may not spend more than the voter-approved amount of local taxes putting (what it can of) the system plan into place. That is why ST had to scale back the light rail line from 21 to 15 miles: it lacked enough spending authority.
@39 wrote: "Underpromise and overdeliver." My guess is that not enough voters in 1996 understood they were voting to put into place the Sound Move and Resolution 75 documents. Those don't promise projects, all they promise is that ST will tax and spend money. ST KEPT the actual promises it made.
Posted by: evergreen_rails on June 26, 2007 02:44 PMYes, I'm sure that's exactly how it was sold to the voters in 1996. If you believe that, I've got some bridges I'd like to sell you.
Posted by: Palouse on June 26, 2007 03:06 PMand what of the nearly 20+ years of failed/poor DOT audit findings? any changes? any improvments? why would this be any different?
Posted by: jimmie-howya-doin on June 28, 2007 12:55 AMThey did a piss poor job of managing expectations of this project, so the people believed they were voting for 21 miles of rails. If ST thought their budget could at best only build 14 miles, then that is what they should have put on the ballot. Supposedly they had contingencies and cost overruns built into the budget - so much for that. They are either the world's worst budget writers, or they are defrauding the public in order to get their projects passed.
Posted by: Palouse on June 28, 2007 08:03 AM