The Pros and Cons of CSAs
Washington Leads the Country in Troubled Banks
Seattlest Pix 09Nov08
Seattlest Pix 09Nov09
CHS reminds us there's another person we met at the Google meetup the other day: Tri from the Group for the Loop and theColumbia City blog. The City Council has been looking at either 12th Avenue or Broadway as a streetcar route, but the Group for the Loop refuses their false dichotomies, man!
We should really get Tri to hold forth in one of our Seattlest editorials, but in a nutshell, here's what we remember him telling us at the meetup. First of all, as you can see from the graphic (click to make it big), the streetcar would run in a loop north up 12th Avenue and then south down Broadway, before heading back to 12th and then down South Jackson.
One thing the loop does is remove the need for decision about 12th or Broadway, which, it being Seattle, could keep us at the consensus table for the next quarter of a century. Also, as we understand it, it takes up less space to run the streetcar one way down a street, and it pencils out (construction-wise) as cheaper to do.
The Group for the Loop has been lobbying the City Council with their plan--they met with Richard Conlin earlier this week, and are sitting down with bus-pushing Tom Rasmussen today. We're asking the Mayor what he thinks--we'll add that if he gets back to us. Tri thinks they're getting some traction, and we have to say, if he's right about the costs, a loop seems like something we could get behind. Anyone got a better idea?
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Lets do it. These useless politicians are so busy trying to please everyone and their mother that they dont get anything done for this city. Isn't that a lesson in elementary school: You just cant please everyone.
I think you know I am a huge proponent of mass transit, so it may surprise you that I can't figure out why it makes sense to have a streetcar on the hill?
Capitol Hill is one of the most connected neighborhoods in the city already. One can easily walk, ride or take the bus (and someday soon even take light rail) just about anywhere they want to go from the hill. So why build another discrete streetcar system to nowhere there?
How about this, build a streetcar along Denny that connects to the existing one and goes out to 15th and up to Ballard. I know it's hard for people who live up on the Hill to believe, but there are many people living in other neighborhoods in this city that would LOVE to have mass transit other than buses near them.
Plus, those of us who live on the West side of the city that could have already been riding a monorail had it not been killed, are getting the shaft from Sound Transit. There's nothing over there for us. Light rail is grand and all, and the extension to Overlake makes total sense, as does U-Link, but I still have to take the bus downtown to get on a train to the airport. Where's the West-side love people?
Finally, gotta say, don't see much use in another surface-level transit option that will simply go only as fast as the traffic around it. It may cost more upfront people, but dig dig dig and move fast fast fast.
I agree with Charles; dig and/or elevate. And, yes, Ballard and West Seattle could use some love.
You mean a streetcar going somewhere people want to go, live, work, play, etc? Novel fucking idea! Too bad Paul Allen is a better reason to build transit than, say, people who actually fucking live or work in Seattle.