Sierra Club Playing Nicer With ST

We've got a ton of work to get done this morning so we can knock off early and go enjoy the more than 45 inches of new snow in the past five days and this weekend's coming snow at Baker. However because we try to be fair, we thought it important to note a letter sent by the Sierra Club to Sound Transit regarding ST 2.1 and parking garages since we've come down pretty hard on The Sierra Club recently.

According to Carless in Seattle, The Sierra Club's Mike O'Brien told ST that there are three issues on which the transit agency should focus (emphasis ours):

• Green house gas emissions should be a key driver in the projects that Sound Transit selects
• In place of allocating funds exclusively for parking garages, Sound Transit should add "station access funds" that allow spending on a variety of transportation modes, including cyclists, pedestrians and, yes, cars;
• WSDOT and Sound Transit should cooperate closely on plans for replacing the 520 Bridge so that adding light rail to the 520 Bridge in the future will be as cheap and as non-disruptive as possible.

So there you have it, The Sierra Club may be willing to play ball with ST on a package that includes park and ride garages at suburban stations, as long as ST also finds ways to discourage driving to the stations or encourage the use of alternate modes of transport to get to the stations. That is a policy we can solidly get behind and we hope ST takes it to heart.

If you're interested, Carless in Seattle has some select quotes from the letter that are worth reading, as well as the whole letter.

Picture is courtesy of Seattlest Flickr Pool user AndrewMartin. Thanks!