City to Queen Anne: Drop Dead

if they put salt on those hills, the buses could run.

this no salt thing is beyond moronic. we're talking about a few times per year. major cities in snow country near water have a negative environmental impact because they apply salt regularly over the span of several months.

last time i checked, puget sound is salty. so what is the environmental impact of a few days worth of salt? especially if they only applied salt to key choke points?

this whole salt business stinks. it sounds to me like someone thought it sounded like an easy political win. nothing in this has to do with reality. this is the equivalent of banning bonfires on city beaches to combat "global warming". yes global warming is an issue. and yes, runoff from road treatments can cause environmental issues. but you have to ask yourself if you're really making a difference or just posturing.

the real world affect of this idiocy is a dangerous and paralyzed city. i read in an article in the seattle times that police officers were avoiding hills and were responding to some calls in foot. that puts people in danger, and it is irresponsible. it's one thing for people from the midwest like myself to poke fun at our friends and coworkers who freak out about a little snow. but what is happening in this city is gross negligence, and goes beyond a little inconvenience.

What [brad] said. But take all of the buses that would have served the canceled routes and drive them on the open routes too. I'd be happy to walk down QA hill if they had a bus come by every 10 minutes, rather than the 30+ minute wait for a bus.

Oh, and here's my public service announcement: If you live on top of QA hill, don't use the stairs. The rounded snow that existed on each step yesterday are now ice designed specifically to kill you. The Counterbalance is your best bet, since there are divots from ski boots. We now return you to your regular blogging.

What is Metro to do?

Simple.

1) Have a snow emergency route plan, with at least one route from downtown to every Seattle neighborhood.

2) Plow/sand/de-ice those routes. (Not talking 40 plows here. Just one truck per route, full-time, if necessary.)

3) Announce that the system is now running on 'snow emergency routes' only.

It would take about one-half day to implement and get the city back on its feet.

Metro and SDOT need to coordinate. There are two perfectly passable routes that connect downtown with the top of Queen Anne: Taylor and 10th W. First SDOT plows or sands, then Metro runs the buses. It's not rocket science.

And for what it's worth (listen up, commenters in subsequent posts), I live in Belltown, where the snow doesn't have much of an impact. It just bothers me that Metro simply abandoned Queen Anne.

What a douchey blog entry. What exactly is Metro supposed to do?

[Simonian] Actually, the streetcars that went up and down the counterbalance were counterbalanced both ways (going down is how they got the weight back to the top).

I walked to work downtown today after standing like a moron at my bus stop on West Olympic Place waiting for something that would never come.

It took me maybe forty minutes and nothing bad happened except I got yelled at by a Space Needle employee who warned me to stay away from the Needle because of hazardous ice falling from 500 feet up.

Bring back the actual counterbalance! Cable cars going up and down Queen Anne Ave again! Stopping on the way down might still be a bit of a problem, but getting up the hill shouldn't be a problem.

I used snowshoes to get to work today, after nearly falling on ice on the way down the hill friday. It worked well. I walked right past all of the bus stops once down the hill, since I've found buses to be slower than walking.

I say at the first sign of snow we change all QA buses to buses that loop around the hill and go back downtown - we'll make up in reliability and frequency what we lose in convenience (of having to climb up and down the hill).

Or let's just implement my Galer Street Ski Lift idea (meant for regular travel to the streetcar, but it'll work great in the winter).

ANYTHING ! Dobbin, even.

I blame Metro for ignoring the obvious cable-drawn sleigh solution.

Seems to me that if you live on a hill in a city that has a history of leaving massive snowfalls to clear themselves, you'll have to put up with the occasional extended stranding. I'd rather Metro not send buses up or down streets that are likely to strand them.

It also seems to me that Seattle should invest in more snow-clearing equipment. Where are today's Charlie Chongs?

So here's the question: SDOT says Taylor and 10th W are not snow-closure streets (like the Counterbalance). But Metro balks, cancels the routes. How the hell are people supposed to get up or down the hill if no one runs a plow or sander (let alone a bus) along the two arterials that still serve the neighborhood?

*Shakes head* Don't blame Metro. It's not their fault it snowed, not their fault that the City of Seattle, King County, SDOT do not have the funds to maintain more snowplows and deicers. Misdirected emotions there, I think.

FO?