The airliner slowly banked, circling into the landing path to SeaTac. I looked down, and immediately realized why metropolitan Seattle has such abysmal traffic problems.
I saw the Puget Sound area dissected by two giant lakes, the broad watery fingers of Puget Sound and mountains to the west and east, leaving 2.6 million souls crammed onto three relatively skinny water-bound strips of land. Little wonder why they can’t get from here to there without encountering gridlock somewhere along the way.
So, it came as little surprise to learn that the Census Department determined that the average commute time for Snohomish County residents rose over five minutes to nearly a half hour (29.6 minutes) since 1990. While the national commute time fell 36 percent, the combined drive time for Snohomish, King, Kitsap and Piece county residents rose 8 percent.
This isn’t just about the slow drive to work and home. Gridlock and the high cost of transportation has become a critical economic development issue. Boeing’s Commercial Airplane Group President Alan Mulally insists he’s serious when he warns that real transportation reforms are necessary now if the Puget Sound area has a chance to build the proposed Sonic Cruiser, or even retain current aircraft assembly operations.
Government leaders have responded with Gov. Gary Locke’s Legislature-induced $8 billion statewide plan financed by higher gas taxes, and with the $12.6 billion regional plan proposed by the executives of Snohomish, King and Pierce counties, using .04 and .05 sales tax increases. The plans, if approved by voters, would take up to 10 years to complete.
If this sounds like Yogi Berra’s “deja vu all over again,” that’s understandable. Back in 1996, voters approved $3.9 billion in new taxes to create Sound Transit, which promised a 21-mile light rail system from Northgate to SeaTac Airport, commuter rail service between Everett, Seattle and Tacoma and regional bus rapid transit.
Seven years later, I don’t have to tell you what’s been delivered. Not much. Everett, bless its heart and civic spirit, has a beautiful and functional new transportation center, but no commuter train stops there.
Today, Sound Transit Chairman Ron Sims and Executive Director Joni Earl deliver the “State of Sound Transit” address before an Everett Area Chamber of Commerce luncheon. In addition to listing the agency’s many internal organizational improvements under Earl’s leadership, we can only hope for a definitive projection when the “North Sounder” will begin running from Everett to Seattle.
Even if commuter rail finally becomes a reality here, the Puget Sound area is very (I hesitate to use the word, hopelessly) behind in building a 21st century transportation infrastructure.
In the last few years, I have traveled to St. Louis, Los Angeles, San Francisco-Oakland, Atlanta, Portland and Washington D.C. In each city, I have enjoyed riding on an efficient, speedy and affordable rapid-transit rail system.
Some of these cities also have up to five Interstate-quality highways that bisect and surround their metropolitan areas. Puget Sound has no rapid transit and, just three “I” highways (with I-405 being so limited and grid locked as to be functionally unusable).
Road expansion has severe limitations as a long-term transportation solution. The Puget Sound area has precious little land available – nor the political will to endure the disruption of building an additional Interstate-quality highway. We can expand those that we have only so far.
Additional light rail construction will be equally disruptive to businesses and neighborhoods in its path. Tunnels are costly but necessary to extend light rail north.
Is there an alternative? Perhaps we should take a clue from our geography. We have little land, but we have air and lots of water. What about looking there?
In November, Seattle city residents will vote whether to spend $1 billion to build a 14-mile monorail between Ballard, downtown and West Seattle. A monorail, supporters insist, can move as many passengers as fast as any rail system at a fraction of the cost and far less disruption to business and residences. Similar systems are being built in Las Vegas and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
Call me a dreamer, but wouldn’t a natural expansion of the Seattle monorail lead to Northgate and eventually Lynnwood and Everett? Combined with commuter rail and a fleet of high-speed passenger ferries on the sound and Lake Washington, it might be a workable prescription for our transportation ills that is compatible with our unique geographical limits.
Write Eric Zoeckler at The Herald, P.O. Box 930, Everett, WA 98206 or e-mail mrscribe@aol.com.
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