Comments on Ron Sims on Roads/Transit

sims would have been a better governor than gregoire.

we wouldn't be having this retarded viaduct debate, at least.

Josh-
What political capital was Sims talking about spending? Didn't he piss off everyone he has to work with?

Also, Sims says he supports light rail, but a smaller package. Does this mean he only wants light rail in Seattle?

so josh, did you ask Sims where he wanted to build light rail?

Doesn't want it across I-90 because that will make it more difficult for the North Bend resident to get to Seattle.

Doesn't want it south to Tacoma.

Doesn't want it north.

Doesn't want to connect the region's four major urban cetners (well he used to, but not now).

So, uh, Josh - what light rail package would Ron bring back next year?

And why should I believe him today, when yesterday he told me he supports light rail and "digging until we get to Bellevue, and Everett and Tacoma!!"

So now Ron Sims is saying that he will be back next year with a "better" package. I am more than a little skeptical. This is the same man who until two weeks ago voted repeatedly for the light rail portion of the package and then stated that he would remain neutral on it. Further, need I remind people that most of his Seattle Times editorial attacked Sound Transit. How are we to believe that he will now back a light rail proposal next year. Will this "better" light rail proposal include rail to the eastside, south King County and north of Northgate. If buses are his big solution for the rest of us non-Seattlelites then thanks but no thanks Ron Sims. And oh if he thinks that voters are going to be embracing congestion pricing in the near term over sales tax increases then all I can say that he needs to listen to his constituents (other than the Sierra Club).

Just like surface/transit, Sims is leading us to real solutions. Glad that at least someone isn't a hypocrite on global warming (yes Mayor Nickels, I'm looking at you).

Ron is having a transportation identity crisis.

I wouldn't trust him to drive me to the video store, let alone put together a region light rail plan and get it back on the ballot.

seems to me that if you want to reduce traffic the easiest way would first be to get the people living within seattle out of their cars. Build a comprehensive light rail system within the city that is accessible to most the larger neighborhoods ie capitol hill, queen anne, ballard, u-dist, west seattle, etc and that will greatly reduce the number of people driving on the streets. Then expand the light rail to the other large cities. it might be just me, but that seems to make sense.

Sims just got finished blasting pretty much the entire light rail route except for completing the initial line to Northgate. He blasted the very concept of light rail and how it takes too long to build. And now he says he wants to revive light rail? If it takes too long to build now, how is waiting another x number of years going to do anything but make matters worse?

And when we do finally get around to fighting for another light rail package, which political "leader" is going to suddenly and at the last moment "pull a Ron Sims" then?

Well, all this is academic. Sims isn't going to be doing any political heavy lifting in this region anymore. The fact he wants use this local debate to take a shot at George W. Bush suggests he has got his eye on that other Washington. If Sims is going to serve in a future Clinton administration, I guess that's one reason to root for Hillary. So she can rid us of him.

Did anyone really think the Executive would just sit back and do nothing on this? The man has shown leadership on climate change again and again, and this time he's risking sticking his neck out because he actually believes in what he's doing. And really, it's not hard to come up with a better plan than what we have before us now.

I'm really sick of folks on the slog lashing out at anyone who dares question the orthodoxy of the ST package- because it includes trains it's good - end of debate. It's unfortunate that we don't seem to be able to grasp a position in which one can be pro-train and pro-transit but not believe that ST2 is god's gift to man.

Real leadership @9: The man has shown leadership on climate change again and again...

Uh, how so? Ron Sims -- and Greg Nickels for that matter -- have shown quite a bit of leadership when it comes to getting national media coverage for signing meaningless, feel-good pledges. Where else?
* Does helping to kill monorail count for leadership on climate change?
* Does possibly now helping to kill regional light rail count for leadership on climate change?
* Does trying to expand commercial airline traffic to Boeing Field count for leadership on climate change? (Check out some time how much airplane travel contributes to global warming.)

Tiring @10:

I'm really sick of folks on the slog lashing out at anyone who dares question the orthodoxy of the ST package- because it includes trains it's good - end of debate. It's unfortunate that we don't seem to be able to grasp a position in which one can be pro-train and pro-transit but not believe that ST2 is god's gift to man.

It would be one thing if Ron Sims were someone who had a deep and abiding animosity towards mass transit, like Seattle P-I columnist Bill Virgin, but Ron Sims deserves all the abuse he gets for the timing of his about-face and the depth to which it contradicts years of past positions. It's one thing to take a political position. It's one thing to switch political positions in a flip-flopping manner. But it's a whole 'nuther thing to switch positions in a shameless, selfish, grandstanding fashion that betrays all your past commitments as a public servant who's supposed to serve millions.

I'm with Tiring @10 - all this lashing out is boring. Especially from somebody that hasn't demonstrated himself to care about climate, clean water or clean air.

Hey Cressona! The cross base highway will cause a species to go extinct. RTID will kill a species but you couldn't care less.

Icycle @13, actually the environmentalist community managed, through some tough negotiating, to get the Cross-Base Highway funding reduced sharply. It had been fully funded in RTID. Now they only have enough money to build the ends, and they can't build any more until the process goes through mediation. And the mediation only happens once John Ladenburg, the elected who was really pushing Cross-Base, leaves office. Apparently, this whole arrangement was intended as something of a face-saver for Ladenburg.

If it hadn't been for this effort, I bet more of the environmentalist community would have come down on the Sierra Club side.

There you have it people- Ron Sims said it first:

“I’m into that. I’m back. I’m fully engaged. No question, I don’t believe in letting waters stagnate. I want to come back with a package that reduces our impact on global warming that is less expensive. Yes. Light rail is a big part of that package. I will spend a lot of time and political capital on that.”

Translation-

If you vote down light rail, it will come back... how will it get cheaper? IT'S ONLY GOING TO NORTHGATE.

Welcome to beautiful urban Bellevue, hope you like your new rapid... busses ... fun right? Sorry all you suckers in Tacoma. Lynnwood, you knew it was just a pipe dream. You like busses stuck in HOV-less traffic.. right Renton?

If this isn't proof of the ridiculousness to follow I don't know what is.

Comon people, these are freeways in already developed and horribly congested areas. These are freeways STILL IN THE PLANNING PROCESS.
We can still make them as environmentally friendly as possible.

It is looking more and more foolish to vote this one down.

If this gets voted down at least in two years, when we are voting on a light rail package 1/4 the size for twice the cost, I'll get to point and laugh at you as we sit there, stuck on a crowded Metro bus on an overcrowded freeway.

If Sims wants to be the mayor of Seattle, he should run for mayor. He's the KING COUNTY executive, which means he has an obligation to represent the whole county. With his decision to oppose this package, he's shown all that he gives a shit about is Seattle.

Pathetic.

I keep seeing this fact that the crossbase highway was fully funded, it was never anywhere near full-funding, it has always been short by $200 million or so. Ladenberg was smart, while chair of the Puget Sound Regional Council, he made crossbase a "highway of statewide significance." Which means it now can get federal funding, so doesn't need RTID as much as some other projects.

You really think (species elimination aside and the probable closure of McChord Air Force Base, Pierce County's 2nd largest employer from highway encroachment on ALL 4 sides) Ladenberg, who threatened to resign as Chair of Sound Transit if he didn't get his pet project, the crossbase put back on the RTID list, (and he questions Ron Sims's loyalty?) will give up on this highway to home? How come I don't get my own personal highway to home in Duvall, or Clearview? He just wants to keep all those bedroom commuters who pay taxes to unincorporated Pierce County happy, and not let them move to Thurston or other counties.

$600 million for crossbase when if Sierra Club is correct, RTID will fix only one of the 34 deficient bridges around here? Sierra Club is always getting beaten up over their opposition to this, but their analysis shows the Sounder much more cost effective than light rail for Seattle to Tacoma. Whenever you get that kind of distance, you use trains, I used to commute daily from to NYC on its great commuter trains. Took the subway to work from Grand Central.

Re: Sierra's analysis, at least they personally visited the crossbase highway site on Ft. Lewis as well as the Frederickson employment center, the purported reason for this road. Who else does that, everyone else just took the word of the politicans......

#17,

Actually, most people are saying that the crossbase has a pretty slim chance of getting built...

As for the argument that Tacoma doesn't need light rail because it has Sounder is pretty much without merit--

The goal is not only to connect Seattle to Tacoma via train, but to connect Tacoma to Federal Way, Redondo, Des Moines/Kent, SeaTac and so on.
People work in Tacoma too ya know.

Josh get over your "I talked to an elected official today hard on" and come back to earth. You had it right in your post last weekend. Ron Sims doesn't want to build light rail. Ron is more concerned with the North Bend resident's SUV commute into Seattle than connecting two major urban centers like Seattle and Bellevue with light rail. Don't believe me? Read his own Op Ed.

And Josh, Ron Sims says "peace" all the fucking time. Why you reported on it is beyond me.

#2 -

Sims mostly just wants light rail from SeaTac to South Lake Union and back. Any other stops that get served are merely in the right place on Vulcan's taxpayer-built direct transit between the airport and Allentown.

My two cents on Sims are that I wouldn't be so quick to leap to conclusions about what Ron Sims is thinking, his allegedly self-serving motives, or what his next plan is.

Sims has been a real transit (rail, bus,and otherwise) advocate for quite some time now, but as County Executive he does have to look at a larger picture than how Capitol Hill hipster X gets to job Y that's less than 5 miles away from his domicile, and has decided (publicly, mind you) that the last few years of his work on an issue that is genuinely important to him have come up wanting.

News flash, y'all - the reverse commute from Seattle to jobs in the 'burbs is about the same now as the inbound Eastside commute, and folks with careers and families have a pretty hard time pulling up stakes, selling the house, and yanking the kids out of their school to move closer to work (thus reducing their commute time - if you're a selfish Rethug - or their carbon footprint - if you're a virtuous urbanite) when their employment situation changes.

You all might want to reconsider your anger and animus toward Sims - I think he is looking at the larger picture (for better or worse), and that his position comes from a more honest place than you're giving him credit for.

By way of contrast - can you begin to imagine George Bush publicly eating crow about realizing that a policy he'd pushed for years was less than perfect?

In any event, Dino Rossi's spies must be thrilling at the spectacle of blue state types like those of us who take the time to post at SLOG bleeding ourselves white in this intramural squabble.

@21: I appreciate your well-thought-out post, especially in contrast to Josh Feit's yes-man cheerleading for Ron Sims. But Sims fans of all stripes need to consider this: Ron has participated in every step of putting this light rail plan together, worked with elected officials from many jurisdictions, and then stabbed them in the back come campaign time. The idea that Ron can guarantee a light rail revote next year is ridiculous. Even the concept that Ron would lead the revote process is arrogant and another example of Ron's ego canceling out his many political talents. If R&T fails, Ron's going to need a couple years to rebuild trust on anything involving light rail and rail backers will need to find a new leader on the ST Board. If R&T passes, Ron's going to have very little power to make changes after the fact, given the animosity he has generated among members of the Sound Transit board--including the many he appointed.

@21, agreed. Sims is brave enough to own up to his mistakes, and better, is trying to correct them.

I also think that his errors are understandable. Knowledge of the certainty and gravity of global warming has increased dramatically over the last few years. At the same time, recently completed studies have debunked the theory that building new highway lanes can reduce pollution. When new evidence comes in, an honorable person changes his mind.

In this regard, Sims stands apart from our other progressive leaders, who continue to pretend that Prop 1 is actually good for the planet.

Mr. X, the best way to serve the misnamed "reverse commute" is with light rail across I-90, serving the largest Eastside retail and business center (downtown Bellevue), the largest Eastside employer (Microsoft), and connections of those areas to Seattle.

I don't know how anyone can claim that Sims has leadership when it's not even clear what he's in favor of. Principled opposition is one thing, particularly if you provide an alternative, but Sims has neither led from principle nor developed any coherent plan to do anything else.

Executive Sims is the best champion for transit on our political scene.

In 1997, he and Mayor Schell, antipating that ST phase one LRT could not be afforded, suggested the LRT be concentrated between South McClellan Street and NE 45th Street. Nickels and the South King and Peirce boardmembers said no, they had to spend the South King LRT funds on LRT and would not redeploy them. For decades, the high capacity transit studies have shown that the north corridor attracted much more ridership (total and new) than the others.

In 2001, he was the Board Chair during the crisis time.

In 2000, after I-695, he tried to use one-tenth of the Metro taxing authority to extend Link LRT to Northgate, but Councilmember Fimia would not go along. That third tenth became Transit Now in 2006.

Executive Sims is a brave leader in advocating for tolls. They will be needed to move freight, transit, and general purpose traffic.

It is good he is escaping the ST2 group think led by Executive Landenburg, who would have opposed the joint ballot measure if it had not included enough of his cherished Cross base highway.

What Ron Sims says now is meaningless because he has proven that his word dont mean shit.

He also has been significantly marginalized politically by breaking his word and flip flopping on this.

Finally, he was in a position to shape this plan and couldn't apparently get what he wanted...So what makes you think that he suddenly has some kind of new power? The opposite is true. He is a confused and dishonest man. Other electeds are not going to trust him, and neither should we.

I'm still surprised that Mayor Green hasn't come out on the side of No on RTID given his Vanity Fair front cover "green" rep.

What's up with that?

The bribes too big ... ohh, my bad, "campaign contributions from big business, road interests, and labor" ...

So?

We are (ok, well, I, at least, am) eagerly awaiting your promised post...

Did anyone else see the scariest part of that post?

JOEL HORN? Josh, I've been waiting all day for you to post what that charlatan has to say.

Still eagerly awaiting...