Comments on When All Else Fails, Vote Against Your Enemy

New McMansion subdivisions in the exurbs = realtors' wet dreams.

Sprawl is the ONE reason the realtors pumped about $300K into this measure.

Saying you have yet to whine about 'it' is a fancy way of finally whining about 'it'. Only instead of whining about it, you're whining about it while placing yourself above all the whiners.

Smooth.

When you don't know the answer, it's best to leave that section blank. LIke the SATs.

I'm with you Annie - I was wrestling with this one myself. The combo of sales tax as a funding mechanism and sprawl-inducing "road improvements" finally tipped me to no also.

But I sure do like that map that show all them pretty Sound Transit trains all over the place.... *sigh*

Less roads = more congestion = more cars stalled on the road = MORE PULLUTION than cars that are not in traffic.

I've tried really hard to not count the ways that the No on Prop 1 positions posited here are completely retarded, but you guys don't want to hear it, and there's no fucking hope.

POLLUTION. excuse me.

When All Else Fails, Vote Against Your Enemy

less roads = ....MORE PULLUTION

?????

fact:
more roads = more congestion, more traffic, more sprawl, more CO2, and more global climate change.

idiotic doublespeak:
"Let's build more roads -- to fight pollution"

Yes, Matthew, and more roads equals more cars on the road, more traffic congestion, and more pollution. Anyone who thinks that "more roads" will help traffic fly right along is on the wrong side of history. The question is how much extra road capacity is an absolute necessity given the financial and environmental costs.

"Smells like sprawl to me." == WHINE.

Shutup, fool. Please don't vote.

who the fuck cares what realtors think? they are the biggest scam artists and hype artists around. realtors are worse than lawyers.

The element that I think might be missing is this one: Next November Dino Rossi is going to be running for Governor. He has already said that one of the main planks that he is going to be running on is "congestion relief" for the Puget Sound Region (i.e. building more roads). If Prop 1 goes down he is going to be off to the races because he is going to win in Eastern Washington and if he can split King, Pierce, and Snohomish Counties by having people in the suburbs (people who have to commute) vote against the people in the cites (people who don't) he will be Governor. How environmentally friendly do you think that State is going to be then?

Stop making the Good the enemy of the Perfect!

So encouraging an inaccessible urban core and promoting the migration of residents and businesses by stonewalling transportation improvements is a GOOD choice?

I'm often struck by the idiocy of Seattle voters. Look, unless you find a way to get a transit system financed by fucking rainbows and sunshine, the idea that voters in areas which will *never* be serviced by transit will cast their ballot against their self-interest is stupid. The only way to get anything done is to combine everything in a single package, so that there is something for everyone, and everyone gains something from the passage of the measure. Realpolitik will get things done more often than foolish idealism nine times out of ten.

But the same "shorter commutes" argument works if you consider a vote for Prop 1 pro-light-rail.

I imagine realtors would benefit from light rail too -- mid rise condos and townhouses springing up next to stations all the way from Federal Way. Making it possible for people living in Roosevelt or Lynnwood to live without a car, etc...

I'm the most public transit-y person in the city, yet still WE NEED ROADS. Roads does not JUST equal "more sprawl". It means it's easier for us to get our goods from the rest of the country in case our crumbling infrastructure fails us at a certain point.

I'm in complete support of tearing down the Viaduct for a surface option. We don't need our "mistake by the sound" anymore. But to ignore funding of roads because "omg global warming and spawl" is just childish and lame.

If you don't want to build roads because you want to teach a lesson to people to force them to use public transit, voting no on Prop 1 is going to shoot yourself in the fucking foot, since it shoots down the major solution we need to provide that actual REAL public transit. There's at least one person at the Stranger who has stated "he doesn't do buses". He's not alone.

If Prop 1 fails, the successor is going to be even more watered down and more of a disappointing compromise.

Here's my open question to the Stranger:

If one of the raisones d'aitres is that the failure of Prop 1 will hopefully promote a more public transit friendly initiative or proposition the following year or two, how come you're not applying that same strategy to promote a vote AGAINST Burgess so that someone better will come along to replace Della next time?

Or do the people who actually come to your offices win you over just because they're cool like that i.e. Hugh Foskett luv?

I've seen a ton of real estate ads hyping the new light rail line. Buy this condo, it's right next to where Link's going to be! Why is it not possible for realtors to be psyched about access to real transit?

Annie's post captures one important reason we came out against prop 1; a reason we caught hell for stating in our 'NO' endorsement.

"The line itself (through a low-density area) may feed sprawl in South King County, instead of promoting dense urban development that will grow alongside light rail stations in North Seattle."

It sounds counterintuitive, but you have to be strategic about using mass transit to promote density.

Light rail is not just a pour and stir fix.

Running the line where there's already some earnest development will suck in development and fight sprawl. Spending billions to run it out into Yenemsvelt will simply create park and rides and more sprawl.

Annie was canny to match up the realtors quote with this tricky phenomenon.

Realtors/developers = sprawl? So what are those 500 foot condo/apartment buildings downtown?

Who are those built buy?

Or did you drink the same kool aid Skip Berger did and now believe in Vertical sprawl..

How does transit cause sprawl?

Annie Wagner: Smells like sprawl to me.

Believe it or not, Annie, realtors make money off density too. They don't charge fees only for single-family homes and then sell condos for free.

When I came across that Washington Association of Realtors contribution in that P-I story, I simply took it as a sign that passing Prop. 1 will promote economic growth. With economic growth comes higher real estate prices.

Will the new highway lanes promote sprawl? Not necessarily if they're tolled and not necessarily if the Growth Management Act is already constraining where you can sprawl to. Frankly, though, I don't understand the interplay of the GMA and these highway lanes.

Still, even in the worst-case scenario, the windfall to realtors of the density created by the light rail in this package will dwarf any windfall to realtors from any sprawl created by the highways in this package. How do I know this? Just look at other cities.

how is the election of burgess anything like a roads package in regards to cost, scope, and impact?

@ 13 BMA:
"I'm often struck by the idiocy of Seattle voters. Look, unless you find a way to get a transit system financed by fucking rainbows and sunshine, the idea that voters in areas which will *never* be serviced by transit will cast their ballot against their self-interest is stupid"

Well said and fucking hilarious. I almost wet myself. And yeah, seriously this is the one of the only issues that I have STRONGLY disagreed with the Stranger on. And oh yeah, not everyone wants or can afford to live in the city. Density = good for sure, but MANY people don't like the city, but like to visit it and spend money here.

@21: decisions where council members have say can certainly have costly and seemingly permanent effects just like propositions. I stress the word "can". But I was questioning the overall "shooting down the imperfect compromise solution" strategy in voting, since it was applied to Prop 1. but not Della vs. Burgess.

bma @13:

So encouraging an inaccessible urban core and promoting the migration of residents and businesses by stonewalling transportation improvements is a GOOD choice?
I'm often struck by the idiocy of Seattle voters. Look, unless you find a way to get a transit system financed by fucking rainbows and sunshine, the idea that voters in areas which will *never* be serviced by transit will cast their ballot against their self-interest is stupid.

Bma, I bow before you and your evocative choice of language. "Rainbows and sunshine." !!!

jackofgreen @12:

The element that I think might be missing is this one: Next November Dino Rossi is going to be running for Governor. He has already said that one of the main planks that he is going to be running on is "congestion relief" for the Puget Sound Region (i.e. building more roads).

Great point.

Less sprawl does mean more density.

In fact, that's part of what Ron Sims and the Sierra Club have been arguing.

I mean, come on, we all love trains. But building a line in a mostly underpopulated area (SeaTac to Tacoma) is one of the most ridiculous concepts ever. Sure, the line east across I-90 will extend the utility a lot, and the line north of Northgate will do the same, but that third segment is just plain dumb.

Look at Vancouver BC for a successful example - you build where it makes sense and expands when the population density reaches a certain level.

Not that being in a train on wooded sections isn't fun - man, it is!

But it's not a good reason to raise the regressive sales tax.

That's OK, there's still some apartments out here in the burbs. You know, where all the "sprawl" is.

Why does Seattle even give a crap about sprawl? Usually Seattle doesn't even lift its gaze beyond the Sound, the lake, the airport, or the King-Snohomish line. But sprawl? OMG crisis!

Running the line where there's already some earnest development will suck in development and fight sprawl. Spending billions to run it out into Yenemsvelt will simply create park and rides and more sprawl.

Again, I need to slap my head and seriously question the competency of The Stranger staff. Are you people consistently in favor of cutting off your noses to spite your faces?

Yes, I agree with the fact that adding light rail and stirring is not a panacea for the problems in the region. However, the answer is to work with the jurisdictions in south King County to change their zoning codes to encourage denser development in neighborhoods surrounding transit. Suburban communities across the region (such as Federal Way!) have been actively interested in encouraging mixed-use development projects. However, without any kind of transit this is really a sham exercise. Mixed-use developments provide little benefit unless tied to transit, and these projects have very little chance of working as intended without those connections to rail in the long term.

And hey, if you look at other cities with extensive transit systems, their outlying suburban stations are packed with park and rides as well. Assuming that all transit riders need (or want) to live in downtown condos and completely forswear the use of cars is a pretty big conceit.

So... why don't we focus on establishing a working, integrated transportation system, instead of believing that everyone shares the opinions of liberal urban Seattle condo/apartment dwellers?

I wouldn't call the SeaTac to Tacoma corridor "unpopulated" at all.

I really don't get how Park and Ride Lots create sprawl. The people are already there now and they are not magically going to all move into Seattle because the measure fails. The people who are using the park and ride lots already ride buses and trains actually do attract new riders who wouldnt use the bus, mostly due to the fact that the trains come every 8-10 min and are on time and have a guaranteed travel time. Wouldnt you rather have those people who live there not drive to work or wherever else they are going instead of denying them that option and forcing them to use crappy bus transit just because you have some sort of ideological vendetta against suburbia?

I dont really like suburbia either, but unless leaders there magicaly all start requiring their developers to build in grids (i.e, as in all development before WW2 for the most part), denying a speedy transit system just because people happen to live there now seems counterproductive. Also, this further antagonizes and alienates people to your point of view of pro density because you're not willing to help them out a bit. Hence one of the bigger reasons why suburbanites usually vote against big transit projects in this area. Seattlelites thumb their noses and look down at all the people outside of the city. Having lived in both the outlying areas and the city, I can attest that enough of a problem to cause gridlock on issues. Start treating some people with respect instead of attacking their lifestyle all the time and they may actually start thinking about your propositions.

A response like this is only possible from someone who hasn't really experienced a real regional transit system. Mass transit connects the whole REGION, so YES Tacoma will grow-- but it won't sprawl, it will grow with the urban growth boundary, and it will grow more densely along the rail lines. It is not a bad thing that places that are affordable to live will also be connected with rail to the rest of the region.

Right now, we are not a metropolitan region. We're a bunch of little disconnected fiefdoms. If you live in the Bay Area, you are connected to San Francisco even if you don't live in that city. In the Seattle region, you either live in Seattle or you live in Another City that is not the same thing.

The provincialism of this region is outrageous, and until we can start thinking of Tacoma not as the sticks, but as an extension of our urban core, only then will we move towards being a world-class metro region. That will never, ever happen without connecting our cities with mass transit.

Josh @18: I kind of just want to stand and scream at you guys URBAN GROWTH BOUNDARY. URBAN GROWTH BOUNDARY.

Seattle is the only livable city in this region because our cities are totally disconnected. However, we have a plan to focus growth in the... wait for it... URBAN GROWTH BOUNDARY. So if growth happens inside of that boundary, IT'S OKAY. We are managing our growth; Seattle cannot, should not, and will not absorb the growth that is coming to this region in the next 20 year.

Fortunately, we have an URBAN GROWTH BOUNDARY where we will focus that increase in population, and we should connect with with mass transit.

Smart, insightful, and honest. Please stop posting news-like slogs unless you can get with the program of petty, juvenile diatribes from Josh and Eric.

Hah! So, Monique, you admit it! You stand AGAINST rainbows and sunshine!

What gets my goat about Realtors (tm) is that they think Realtors (tm) is a trademark of their association, and if you use the word Realtor (tm) without a capital R and a trademark mark, you'll get a letter from an attorney (not an Attorney (tm) at the association threatening to sue you if you do it again. Fucking knob-ends.

Exelizabeth, please drive out to Orting via South Hill in Puyallup, or from Marysville to Arlington via, say, 67th Ave NE, and tell me how well that urban growth boundary is working out.

There isn't anything you can do about it. It's going to happen with or without Prop. 1. The Key Peninsula is going to turn into a Taco Bell Fiestaland because of the new bridge, and you can't fix that. But you can do something about encouraging liveability in your own city here. A little bit of train line would help, really it would.

Anyone who thinks (much less writes about in a publication read by this many lazy voters) that the area between Seattle and Tacoma is underpopulated hasn't done their goddamned homework.

Put Erica and Josh in straitjackets and drive their asses to Federal Way, pronto. Point out the thriving commercial strip on mile-wide Hwy 99, the many small immigrant businesses, and the no-other-choice rampant car culture. How is it that these people don't deserve a train while paying for your ass to walk to the Sound Transit station on Capitol Hill and ride only as far as the airport?

Oh right, I forgot: it's much easier to "flex some urban muscle" if you keep your gaze steadily on your navel while gazing in the mirror, waiting for Prince Perfect to come replace Mr. Good Enough. Try reading Matthew Stadler's latest, reviewed right here, I believe - you're refusing to recognize that the newcomers, the people who clean your offices and drive the taxis are actually creating a hell of a lot more vitality out there in terra incognita.

And you're also forgetting that the walkable parts of this city (every Seattle nabe below 85th) look the way they are and have sidewalks because someone built a streetcar first. If you don't build the damn train down there, it'll be car culture, forever. ST2 won't fix everything, but it's a start.

Just to add one more thing to that rant - the streetcars that were built to create your beloved Capitol Hill? Built to support REAL ESTATE SPECULATORS.

So again, why is it that only the neighborhoods that have existed for 100 years deserve to have a train? Because the rapacious capitalists that made it look the way it does are dead?

@34: You didn't just use the word "nabe." Did you? While I don't necessarily share Josh's position on the South King County portion of the proposed route--I'd definitely vote for a light rail-only package even with the same funding structure--I have to say: Streetcars are intracity transit. That's not ST's purpose and it won't create the same results.

I don't see why it's a problem connecting the #3 city in the state with the #1 city in the state by light rail and targeting smart growth along that rail line. Seems to me that would create options for people to get to major destinations (ie, Seattle, Tacoma, the airport) that don't require driving.

Yeah. Nabe. Nabe. Nabe....Nabe.

I wasn't talking about ST streetcars. I'm talking about streetcars that existed before 1940. Look anywhere in this city where you see a trolley bus. A streetcar used to run there. Historylink.org will tell the rest of the story.

And will it create the same results? No. Will having no alternatives to driving a car create more Federal Ways? Yes.

"Anyone who thinks (much less writes about in a publication read by this many lazy voters) that the area between Seattle and Tacoma is underpopulated hasn't done their goddamned homework."

Hmmm. Looked that way to me on my return flight from DC a couple of weeks ago.

So, I'm going to say it has insufficient density and should be done ... LATER.

Not that this impacts the ST2.1 vote in Feb 2008 that we'll approve after we kill the bad RTID/ST2 version.

@38: Um, that's what I was saying, and yes, I adore historylink. The private streetcars that made it feasible to move workers the whopping 2 miles between downtown and Capitol Hill or other city neighborhoods were intracity transit and promoted relatively dense development in the city center. ST's light rail is primarily for moving people between cities, suburbs, and the airport. The pattern of the development that results won't be remotely comparable.

Meaning that the development is only acceptable if it looks like something in a 2-mile radius of downtown Seattle?

The future of Puget Sound is density, but it's not going to look like a city mainly built 100 years ago. There will the development around stations out in the 'burbs (there already is near bus transit centers), but it will never look like Capitol Hill.

Again, though...does that mean those (taxpaying) voters don't deserve a train? Is the (utterly pragmatic) park and ride unacceptable because it doesn't fit into your personal vision of how everyone should live?

I ask these questions because there's so much smug anti-suburban feeling running through the Prop 1 opposition - at least the Seattle variety. As a Seattleite who often works in the 'burbs, I have a lot more respect for what's going on out there than I did before. And it's for a lot of the reasons that are in Stadler's book - it's where the action is, it's cheaper, immigrants move there, etc.

I also think transit isn't going to happen without the support of those people out in the 'burbs. We tried doing it without them (monorail) and it ultimately didn't pencil out.

Will @40 - looking down on Federal Way from the air - ha. It's something like the 6th or 7th largest city in the state, right next to Kent, about the 7th or 8th.

Largest. Not with sufficient density for light rail, as you very well know.

Try again.

@15 "Roads does not JUST equal "more sprawl". It means it's easier for us to get our goods from the rest of the country in case our crumbling infrastructure fails us at a certain point.."-

When things get THAT sticky, we'll finally be forced to do the truly sensible thing- and move stuff & people by water... because that's the true beauty of a Port City with natural inland waterways connecting an entire region. Where are those Boeing hydrofoils (that they quit making because there was more $$$ in Defense contracts)? Singapore? They're working... Somewhere. Why not here?
Really- I have no problem with rail. We HAD an interurban... once... & I have a news article on my wall of the fine imposed on GM for buying up & scrapping the LA rail system (in 1948)- $500. What I DO have a problem with is how environmentalists & developers (does that need caps, yet?) are planning to buy Weyerhaeuser's (& Hancock- the insurance co that took forests for collateral, so that big W could buy BC's biggest timber co) development rights- in other words, pay them to keep logging the lands they got for free- so that we can have more Density without ruining the Foothills. I'd as soon see Microsoft build 3-story (piles of oriented strandboard mulch) rentals out there "on campus"- and bring in all the "immigrants" they need... and leave us to our decadent "white Russian" sufferance in the urban ghettoes, as our organic vegies come in containers from China... ^..^

It should be noted that the Realtors aren't just a big contributor...they are the BIGGEST contributor to the Yes campaign.

That's no small feat considering the massive contributions made by huge gravel companies like Glacier Northwest, Cadman, Washington Asphalt Pavement Association, etc.

I guess the next comment will be about how those contributions are done in the name of protecting our environment, or more roads = less pollution or some other bullshit like that.

You can see the entire list here:

http://www.pdc.wa.gov/servlet/CurrentLocalContribInitServlet

(select KEEP WA ROLLING)