Comments on This Just In

How about run for County Exec Erica?

They already raised the student, staff, and faculty rates for U-Pass, so this is probably a done deal, FWIW.

@0 FTW. Yeah, PopTart, go find a lightning rod ...

Make basketball players ride the bus, then maybe the city would spend some money on it.

wtf is wrong with wrapped advertising? they're the most entertaining part of Sound Transit busses and lets be honest, its not possible to make the metro busses more ugly.

I'm pretty sure the UPass increase was due to the Metro increase from a few months ago. Maybe it'll go up even more now . . .

How do bus wraps make the act of riding the bus less pleasant? Sure, they're ugly, but Metro buses aren't exactly attractive to begin with, and it's far from the worst option in terms of raising revenue.

Thanks, Erica. Keep up the pressure on 'em.

So suburban riders who have their routes reduced or canceled should be forced to use their cars to commute to work? Oh wait, I forgot, they're supposed to drop everything and move to the "city", i.e. Ballard or Capitol Hill.

Clearly the people who don't know what the problem is with wrapping have never ridden a wrapped bus. It's very hard to see outside. It' gloomy. It's depressing. I like to stare out the window and people watch and in a wrapped bus I can't. I can barely read the street signs to know when to pull the string.

Bob @6: Harder to see out of them, and near-impossible to read street signs through the wrap -- if you don't have your stop memorized, you're in trouble.

The loss of light is also an annoyance if you're trying to read.

@8: but not to condos that displace the old bars and record stores.

Agreed with 9 and 10 on the problems with wrapping. How about a stricter set of rules on wrapping whereby a much smaller percentage of the surface of the windows may be blocked?

If bus riders paid the cost of their transportation, bus rates would go up by a lot more, probably a factor of 2-3. If everybody pays their own way, and busses really are more efficient, then it will still be cheaper to ride a bus than to drive a car.

Just because someone is too poor to afford X does not mean the rest of us should buy him X.

Revisiting 40/40/20 would do nothing to address Metro's budget problems because it only impacts new service. Plus, it exists to correct the massive imbalance in service levels between Seattle and the suburbs. Newsflash: the reason Seattle has the most transit riders is because it has, by far, the most service. Frequent service on suburban lines (120, 358) means high ridership on those lines.

Other than raising fares, Metro's options are limited to cutting service and raising taxes. Let's not pretend that Metro has the money needed to "invest in new hybrid or electric buses." If we don't want service to be cut (and we don't) and we don't want fares to rise (and we don't), then we need to raise taxes. But even on the pages of the Stranger do we rarely if ever see calls for King County to increase taxes to maintain existing Metro service levels, when that's what it's going to require in the long run.

The big question is: Why are diesel prices rising as quickly as gasoline's?

ECB says:
"Raising fares repeatedly, as the county seems poised to do, takes its biggest toll on the working poor—the very group that’s most likely to depend on transit service."

She is right.

An extra quarter per ride may not seem like much, but it is considerable to many.

Oh, and those bus wraps, particularly at night and in the rain, made finding one's stop near impossible.

@2 Will, I'm done. For the win all you want. Slog is yours to rule. I don't have the heart to continue to beat my head against a brick wall. I'll avoid you, please avoid me.

Has Sims, or any Democrat on the Council the last 10 years, ever created a long term plan for preserving rather than privatizing/ devolving public transit, parks, and human services? Have they ever done anything serious to transform the county's tax base in the long term to prevent its government from simply becoming the regional administrator of police, courts, and jails? If so, I missed it.

All I see are little fix-it rate hikes, park privatization, public private partnerships, occasional special levies, and the progressive cutting of social services down to almost nothing.

Christ, get rid of the free-ride zone, and hey bus drivers, get some balls and start charging the worthless street kids when they get on the bus. And all busses you should have to pay for right when you get on. Of course Seattle fucked up the new transit centers by not getting turnstiles you have to go through so you're prepaid before getting on the bus.

Add more routes, some should run 24/7 and you'll get more riders and that equals more $$$. And wrapped ad's work if the drivers did their jobs and announced all the main intersections with stops, if you're lost that's your own damn problem.

Not that I disagree, ECB, but weren't you at last years rate increase?

if busses (and public transportation) are thought of as part of our nation's infrastructure, then we all benefit from it and should all pay for it.

Just because someone is too poor to afford X does not mean the rest of us should buy him X.

your closing statement is just affirming that you don't believe in progressive policy. according that theory, the poor wouldn't get police, libraries, schooling, parks, or roads.

Ack -- make that: weren't you arguing the opposite at last years rate increase?

@17, that is why I stopped leaving comments on Slog ages ago. If you are not "in" with the Stranger staff you are disrespected by Sloggers.

@14: The other reason Seattle has the most riders is it has the most dense neighborhoods, least parking and slowest arterials, and more suburban service isn't going to change that. Also, your frequent suburban examples aren't that suburban -- 120 and 358 both stop a bunch in Seattle, and the 358 even counts as a Seattle route for the 40/40/20 policy.

I say wrap the bus, get rid of the fucking ride free zone and charge when you enter the bus. Three simple things to increase funding. The wrapped busses look better than the current ones, the ride free is a joke and only allow the homeless and crack whores a free ride to their dealer on the corner of 3rd and Pike. If they charged when you board like most major city transit then they would not loose assholes who ride the bus every day and when they go to pay all they have is a five. Oh yeah and one more thing charge the lazy fat fucks who think it is necessary to have the ramp lowered because they cannot make it up two steps without breaking into a sweat.

@11: Exactly, then they become "invaders" horning in on the precious urban lifestyle.

Thinking of ditching the bus for your bike to escape the fare increase? Have fun. Bicycle tube & tire manufacturers are raising prices 15-20% in the next few months. NO ONE is immune to high fuel costs, no matter if you live in Belltown, Bellevue, or Basin City.

@21-22: I love it!

Of course, what you're seeing here isn't inconsistency. Nor is it a tendency to find fault with everything. How could anyone possibly suspect Erica of either of those faults?

No, the resolution to this apparant contradiction is that Metro is perfect. Any change is a step in the wrong direction. Erica just wants to safeguard this perfection, to make sure they don't change a thing.

Except, of course, that they should ban handicapped people.

#14 addresses what Erica conveniently ignores. All forms of transportation are subsidized by tax payers

You think your gas + car tab taxes pays for 100% of roads? Not even close. What do you think the largesse that is the Federal Highway bill is all about.

Calls for rail or buses to be 100% rider supported are simply ignorant of reality.

As with everything suffering in this country, we need to get our heads out of our asses and support raising taxes (hopefully in a progressive manner). We need better/more transit, we need to improve/shore up our infrastructure (roads, bridges, water, sewer, electrical grid), we need to take care of our national parks.

This shit costs money, and until we stop selling/buying the whole Republican line that you can get something for nothing (lower taxes and keep services the same) we're doomed to situations like this.

I've been in the hospital now for 11 months so I didn't know that the bus wraps had been prohibited. I didn't think anything was wrong with them. If it means cheaper bus fare I am pro bus wrap. I WOULD pay an extra quarter or even dollar if they could get rid of that Metro bus smell and make sticky-proof seats.

Well, David Wright, when I was defending your freedom, I wasn't paid the full market value of my service -- by a long shot. The list of reasons why your Ayn Randian version of The Way Things Ought to Be is nonsense starts with that, and goes to police and fire protection, on to my law and order society giving legal protection to your intellectual property, and on and on and on and on and on.

We subsidize things because the market isn't capable of placing the correct dollar value on them. How much does the free market charge you for pollution, and sprawl, and traffic congestion when you gas up your car, for example.

This is really basic shit dude. Really basic.

@8
You sound so cynical. Move to the city for practicality, not because its "hip." That is why a bunch of douchebag-drunk-beer spilling-homophobic-moron apes frequent places like the hill.

"Hey, uh bro, lets go to capitol hill and, uh drink. Afterward we can buy an ugly view obscuring condo too! I hear there are helllllla hot chicks and stuff there. Do not forget the GHB man, or I won't score! I hope we don't run into any fags, man. I hate fags. They are gay. Thats gay."

I hear that conversation WAY too often.

Take commuter rail. Sounder commuter rail had the highest ridership increase in the nation during the first quarter of 2008. If you live outside of Seattle in more densely populated areas, you already have Express routes with high ridership as well. Same to the creepos on the Eastside.

Here is the issue. The way the city and metro interact does not compute.

It is this simple:
Better transit in the city = more people ditching suburbs to live in the city (in neighborhoods such as Wedgewood or Maple Leaf. They do not have to free themselves from perfectly groomed lawns and symetrically built houses.)

More people in the city + better, more frequent transit = more money for Metro.

More people also means more money for the city.

If only we hadn't abandoned rail in the 30's.

Smart move Seattle Metropolitan Area.

Bring back the wrapped buses! They're a great way to make money for Metro and it's not like people are going to NOT ride the bus because of them. "Well, I WAS going to get on the 44 and sit next to that urine-covered bum in the back who keeps leering at me, but now that I see the bus is WRAPPED, forget it!"

p.s. to the person who wanted to know why diesel prices were rising like gasoline's, both are made from the same stuff -- petroleum! When the oil prices go up, both gas and diesel prices will go up. Diesel also has different regulations that can make it cost more, plus different supply/demand issues.

Way to sound elitist about the bus wraps. A lot of people don't have a choice in riding the bus, so for them, if it's between an increase in fares, or a bus wraps, I think they'd prefer the latter. I personally have no problem with the bus wraps. It's ugly, but so what?

@ 20: It's true that, as I said in both this post and the one you linked, a quarter here and a quarter there doesn't impact much on either the revenue side or the expense side. However, gas and diesel prices are not going to stop going up, and eventually, if we pay for price increases exclusively with fare increases, we'll reach a breaking point where it's prohibitively expensive for some people to ride the bus. That's why I think that, in the long term, we need a systemic solution. My earlier post was about why we shouldn't lower fares, which doesn't contradict the argument that we shouldn't raise them infinitely at all.

@21:

your closing statement is just affirming that you don't believe in progressive policy. according that theory, the poor wouldn't get police, libraries, schooling, parks, or roads.

What he wrote was, "Just because someone is too poor to afford X does not mean the rest of us should buy him X." You quoted him on this, so I assume the problem is comprehension, not omission.

What he said could be rephrased as, "being too poor to afford X does not imply we should buy it for him." If "being too poor" is "condition A" and "we should buy it for him" is "conclusion B," then what the original poster wrote was, "A does not imply B."

What you then assumed was that he was claiming "A implies not B," which is a logical fallacy.

Christ, you people are morons.

Trevor @ 18 says: "All I see [is] ... the progressive cutting of social services down to almost nothing."

Go look at the King County Budget history. In 2007, county spending on health and human services was $270/resident. In 2000 (which is as far back as the online records go), it was $245/resident (in CPI-adjusted, 2006 dollars). In real terms, we spend 10% more than we did seven years ago.

Take a hint: almost anytime someone complains about the government spending less and less, the government is in fact spending more and more. That's true for education, social services, infrastructure, ...

The problem with pay as you board buses in downtown is that with the number of people boarding downtown the overall boarding time skyrockets, throwing buses (more) off-schedule. It would be better to go to a pass-only system, possibly with spot-checking for passes rather than checking every rider.

@37, the only reason this is an issue is that Seattle has no alternative to bus transit in the city, ala Subways or light rail in other cities. If we had had those things here for, let's say 10 or more years, you could easily do pay when boarding downtown because your buses wouldn't be articulated ones due to less bus rider volume from people using rapid transit instead. I've not read whether they will or not, bus the BRT idea seems to be somewhere that pass only would be a good idea, and perhaps downtown originating buses should also be pass only. However, this would only server to make bus riding in Seattle more confusing. The solution is to deploy a real rapid transit infrastructure, and in our case I suppose that's going to be Link light rail.

@28 is correct, our taxes SUBSIDIZE large trucks and other users of roads in terrorist-supporting SUVs.

Who do you think pays for the streets, streetlights, and paving - RENTERS who pay the tax in the form of RENT and who, for the most part, DON'T DRIVE all the time.

Want to cut something?

Cut the prison budget and let them put a Levy on the ballot to pay for it.

@30:

I can't speak for that other guy (David), but one needn't be a Randian to support charging drivers (and bus riders?) the full cost of their consumption.

By full cost I don't mean the cost the market assesses it at (that would neglect, as you point out, the cost of externalities like pollution). But one of the best ways to adjust the behavior of individuals and groups while preserving freedom, in particular the freedom to innovate, is by charging for the cost of that behavior (as opposed to regulations).

In short, this is one of the best ways to bring about social engineering in a progressive (fuck that, "liberal") manner. That, not some Ayn Rand worship, is why I support it.

Are you opposed to a carbon tax or carbon credits? That's the sort of policy I'm talking about. Charge people the true cost of their consumption; if they want to pay it, it must be worth it to them (and to us).

I would end with some potshot at what you wrote, but I think the true problem here is you are simply drawing a false dichotomy between your position and the Randian one. There is a third (actually, many more) way.

@31: Adding more routes in-city is not going to make someone sell their house in Mill Creek to buy in Wedgewood. Assuming they own, of course. Not all the "creepos" in the scawy, scawy suburbs own their homes or are even necessarily wealthy or otherwise economically flexible enough to move closer in. And really, how realistic is it to expect everyone in, let's say, King County alone, to move into Seattle? For one, unless you completely razed every residential property in the city limits and rebuilt from the ground up with high-rise condos, it would be physically impossible to accommodate. Second, not all jobs are in the city; discounting service-industry jobs that exist to serve the local infrastructure, major employers like Boeing, AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon, Microsoft, Google, and Yahoo all have the bulk of their presence far outside Seattle city limits.

@35. i'd rather not reply to you, dan, but i was dealing with the practical implications of the conditional theory david proposed. his theory is, of course, correct at times:

ex1: just because someone cannot afford a yacht, that doesn't imply the rest of us should buy him a yacht.

but we are not talking about luxury items here, rather necessities. using his logic appeals to those who view riding the bus as a luxury.

which is why i wrote against it.

ex2: just because someone cannot afford police protection, that doesn't imply that the rest of us should pay for such protection.

i believe it does imply that the rest of should pay for it. since not paying for police does in fact equal no police in practical terms. what i wrote was, in this context, accurate.

ECB, how much did wraps bring in?

All these full buses must be bringing a lot more per mile. How much has revenue increased? How much per mile? Perhaps the increase should be for monthly passes since that's probably why revenues aren't going up enough - people are riding more but paying less.

Is the answer to use the sales tax potential for building a system that will help in 15-20 years?

to reiterate, wrapping something up in a convoluted string of logic confuses the issues. i was addressing what he was advocating using real-world examples.

and @40 there will not be true cost for automobiles in the near-future... so it'd be nice if we we remained consistent if not progressive in regards to public transportation. surely the libertarian ethic has room for progressive ideas? for schools, police, fire, infrastructure and public transportation?

@44:

I'm not a libertarian, but I think you're still misunderstanding.

"i believe it does imply that the rest of should pay for it. since not paying for police does in fact equal no police in practical terms. what i wrote was, in this context, accurate."

No, it wasn't accurate. Someone's inability to pay might be a necessary condition to us paying for them, but it is not sufficient (as your yacht example shows). Thus, logically, someone's inability to pay does not imply that we should pay for them.

The issue here isn't ideology, but logic. You got your terminology all screwed up and lost on a technicality. David was right all along.

@41.

You bring up a very valid point. No one here is saying suburbs are scary. Many city dwellers have moved from the suburbs and are still, as well as, always have been decent human beings.

As for your transit views:

I explained that many people commute via the Sounder if they live north of, or south of, Seattle. To those who work on the Eastide (i.e. ATT, T-Mobile, Microsoft, Nintendo, etc) Express busses service most, if not all of, that companies.

As for more frequency, I am asking for the busses to run on time. Maybe better planning on where they run? I hate seeing two 10's and an 11 heading up the hill in a caravan. A lot of times these busses are at full capacity. Good news is a lot of the city is part of a trolleybus network, and we have a lot of electric two-coach trolleybusses. We should put them in places, in certain times of high ridership, where they are needed.

We also really do need to have another form of mass transit. This would alleviate some of the stress on busses. Another good idea would be to possible have more busses running later hours as well. More convenience definitely brings people in.

Not everyone in King County needs to live in Seattle. I am not saying that, but I, like many others, do live in the city. I would like the busses to be more reliable where it is really needed, and that just isn;t happening.

Why do I care about Express busses with fancy stops on Pac Highway?

The city of seattle desperately needs its own transit authority.

Jcricket @ 28 says (and Will @ 39 piles on): "You think your gas + car tab taxes pays for 100% of roads? Not even close."

No matter how often I slay this dragon, it keeps comimg back! This belief is just too damn convenient for its adherents.

The fact is that federal and state road revenues (gas taxes, licensing fees, use fees) entirely cover federal and state road expenditures. (I don't know about the local level, but in dollar terms that's comparatively tiny.) Mass transit revenues, by way of contrast, cover about 1/4 of mass transit expenditures, on average nationally.

I have posted links to the relevant statistics before, but since that didn't work, let me try a different argument this time: You will notice that ECB and other proponents of increased mass transit subsidies oppose the provision of I-985 that requires road revenues to be spent on roads. If road revenues didn't cover road expenditures, there would be no reason to oppose this: road spending could continue as is, or even decrease, and the state could shift the supplementary general funds it supposedly spends on roads to mass transit without violating the provision. Why do ECB and other proponents of mass transit subsidies oppose the provisions? Because road revenues do in fact cover road expenditures, so the provision would really bite into their mass transit subsidy, which currently flows in large part from that surplus.

For the record, let me say that I support making drivers as well as bus-riders pay the cost of their transportation. If you find a real way that they don't (e.g. effluence, congestion), I would support increasing use fees (e.g. a Pigou tax, congestion pricing) to cover it. Mass transit proponents just need to be honest about the end result of such a consistent policy: the cost of taking the bus will go up a lot more than the cost of driving.

*whimper*

Count me as one of those who really can't afford to pay more to ride the bus. I know the extra ten bucks per month or so doesn't sound like a lot, but. . . for some of us, it is. I barely scrape together the money to get coffee with friends or go listen to some music a couple of times per month. That ten bucks. . .that's my social life.

Here's a link to a letter I received from Titan Worldwide, the company responsible for the bus wraps. I had written to Sound Transit to complain about the wraps, this letter is their response http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3274/2635199924_5130560395_b.jpg

Here's a sample of the PR BS:

"We are sorry you felt discomfort while riding in a full wrap bus. We can appreciate how each rider’s experience is very personal. The effect of the window tint is certainly subject to personal interpretation and does vary by rider. Much like personal tastes regarding color and food, window tint can affect individuals differently."

Ha!

If I recall correctly, the compromise with the bus wrapping was that they'd cut back on the area covered by the wrap, but double the number of buses allowed to have wraps. I don't believe Metro ended up losing a dime on the change.

@34

Erica, you did mention they are going to try to hedge against price fluctuations, by buying futures or contracts something? What is their hedge plan?

So aside from the short-term bump in fares, doesn't that address your concern that there will be increases in diesel fuel beyond the recent jumps in price?

Infrequent & Dan: I am so impressed at your respectful dialogue. And of SLOG! Keep it up, please!

Since I am pretty-close-to-a-liberatrian, I wanted to chime in to answer Infrequent's query "surely the libertarian ethic has room for progressive ideas?"

Classical libertarians (e.g. Hayek) have usually advocated restribution by simple and transparent cash transfers instead of subsidies, e.g. everyone gets $10K from the government each year and there are no further subsidies or welfare schemes.

A second-best scheme might be that typical people pay the full costs of their activities, but we provide targeted, means-tested subsidies to the poor for specific services: e.g. collage tution and bus fares aren't subsidized, but the poor can apply for a reduced price.

If fuel consumption really imposes such incredibly high externalities as Al Gore's rhetoric implies, though, I submit we should not be subsidizing any kind of fuel consumption by anyone, including bus service. Instead, transportation should simply be a luxury affordable only to the rich, and the poor and middle classes will simply have to radically change their lifestyles.

Finally, I think your example of police protection is an entirely different class than things like bus fares and food. We don't provide police protection to everyone as a benefit to the poor. We provide police protection to everyone because it's not possible to efficiently charge only those who use the service: when a ciminal is apprehended, it doesn't benefit the victim nearly as much as it benefits the rest of us, so who would pay? Economists call such situations uncapturable positive externalities, and they are the traditional justification for the provision of a public good. It is extremely hard to find uncapturable positive externalities in a bus ride that come anywhere close to the benefit to the rider.

@45 no.

if you are correct, the statement is worthless.

for instance: just because someone is drowning, that doesn't imply s/he should be rescued.

either we stick completely with logic, and such statements are void of meaning, or we read it in a practical manner. everyone knows (from the context) what david meant, but he through this odd bit of bad logic out there to make his point seem stronger. his logic was inaccurate.

no one is saying not being able to afford a something implies that that something should be free. we are saying this particular service should be available, and that it should be subsidized if necessary. the yacht/police examples are on two ends of that spectrum. we are discussing on which side of the bright line public transportation falls on.

if that is not what we are discussing, then his logics holds, but then yachts and police are not one opposite ends, and there is no line. in all cases, not affording something ALONE does not IMPLY that others ought to pay for it.

that was very nice of you to say, david, right before i said you have bad logic! maybe your logic wasn't bad, i don't know. i just feel (and still feel) that i know what you were trying to say. even your last paragraph about the police somewhat agrees. anyways, perhaps the logic was fine, either way, that doesn't change the point i was trying to make when dan began symatizing with me.

All this could be solved if we on the West side of Lake Washington seceded and let the Eastsiders continue to be King County while we became Lincoln County comprising Kent, Seattle, and Woodinville.

Then, suddenly, we'd have a PROFITABLE transit system - get our DUE SHARE of the existing bus lines, and build and operate our own transit systems at a PROFIT.

Just think of how much we'd save not having all those inefficient Eastsiders to support ...

And the first thing we'd do is impose a tax on people who file more than two unconstitutional initiatives for the air that they breathe ...

Kill the ride free zone. It's just a bum shuttle. I'm sure Metro had visions of giddy tourists in mind when they started it, but most who get on in the ride free zone are gakked to the gills and have a load of shit in their pants.

@53:

in all cases, not affording something ALONE does not IMPLY that others ought to pay for it.

OK. Then why do you keep harping on how people can't afford public transit rather than laying out what conditions are sufficient to imply we should subsidize a service and proving that these conditions are met by public transit?

As for what David really meant, I have no idea what he meant. All I can go by was what he said.

@24 Without the 40/40/20, suburban taxpayers (and councilmembers! Remember that 5 of the 9 councilmembers have none of Seattle in their districts and only 1, Phillips, is entirely within Seattle) have no reason to continue the heavy subsidies they their tax dollars provide to Seattle bus riders. It's unjustifiably elitist to say that Seattle should get the lion's share of new bus service when it already has the large majority of existing bus service, which is funded by taxpayers COUNTYWIDE.

@55 There are a lot of possible responses to your comment but I will limit myself to 3.

1. Look at a map. Seattle, Kent, and Woodinville are all pretty far apart, and Woodinville is most definitely east of Lake Washington.

2. A Seattle-only (or west King County-only) bus system would still not be profitable, by a long shot. Maybe farebox would cover 30-35% instead of the current 20-25%.

3. Seattle's "DUE SHARE" of existing bus lines, were they allocated by tax dollars or population, would be far less than Seattle currently has. You seem to be under the unfortunate illusion that 40/40/20 governs existing bus service, not new bus service. Seattle is currently heavily subsidized by the suburbs' sales tax dollars for its existing Metro service. 40/40/20 says that, to correct that imbalance in the long run, Seattle will moderately subsidize new bus service in East and South King County.

@ 52 if it is too expensive to drive already and there is no other public transit option, since light rail is not finished, the SLUT is a joke, and buses are now too expensive...then what radical changes do they need to make to their lifestyles? lose their jobs? stop going to a school that is far away from where they live that they are attending to make a better life for themselves? only walk to places when the times they are going to and from work or school it is often dark and unsafe? really, i want to know...

I have been saying get rid of the ride free zone for years (or have buses that only stay in the ride free zone and are not part of Metro).

I also agree that many bus routes should run 24 hours long. If a bus runs from 6:00am to 3:00am, it might as well run the other three hours.

I'm for bus wraps that do not impede vision. I agree with the poster who said that rainy dark nights are hard enough to see without the gauzy sheen of the wrap on the windows.

While I'm on a bus rant, nights when there are events like MNF should not effect bus routes in the U-District or other routes outside downtown.

I want more weekend routes, or light rail to get across lake Washington (pipe dream). Warning, this is a rant:

How about us poor schlubs that work on the weekends? I live in Greenlake and commute to Redmond, and I can take the bus all week no problem, but on the weekend the bus straight-up doesn't run at all. This means I can take the bus 4 times a week but I still have to drive on Sundays, which is ass-retarded since if I didn't have to drive on Sundays, I might not even own a car, and I could totally do without the car insurance and petroleum sucking, thanks.

Our entire dept. is open on weekends and I know at least some of those cats ride the bus all week, but why is the only way to get across the lake at reasonable times on weekends to make two easily missed transfers and get on a Sound Transit bus downtown, whereas 1 well-timed metro bus does the trick all week?

You might say, "hey man, just move to Redmond!", to which I respond "Have you BEEN to Redmond?". I'd rather not contribute to urban sprawl and live in the land of strip malls and Hummers. Unfortunately, my skills to pay the bills are located on the other side of that lake.

@47 - we're not talking federal and state highways, we're talking CITY ROADS AND LIGHTS AND POLICE/FIRE for traffic off the highways.

Fed dollars don't pay that.

Now, stop expecting us to pay for your SUV addiction.

First, get rid of the Ride Free Zone. Create a shuttle (99?) that can loop all throughout Downtown, that is free. Second:
Pay/enter through the front door and exit through the back door. Last: Enforce the damn fares.

@36 point taken.

But I was referring to the fact that speculation about the effect of the next few year's budget cuts has included cutting human services by 30 percent with some suggesting much more.

Also, If health care, cost of living, and gas prices go up, though, combined with the effects of inflation, we pay more for the same or even fewer services. Even if spending remains constant on some programs, there's a big difference between funding them through the general fund and funding them through all sorts of proliferating fees that make public services more and more private.

So gross increases in spending over time-- the likes of which you cite to suggest that County government is simply growing-- are misleading, even if they do suggest the need for a more cautious approach than I originally offered. If government spending is just an upward spiral, then explain the county's $137 million in budget cuts from 2002-05, its budget deficits, the seasonal closing of parks, etc...

a poor person is going to care a lot more about the $0.25 every time they ride the bus than they do the horrors of advertising. and they *really* don't care about how much you care about them.

Firstly -- bus/train wraps in most other cities are about 75% transparent over the windows. The ad is legible from the outside, and the effect on visibility is negligible from the inside. I moved to Seattle too recently to know how Metro did it, but if their versions were opaque, then it's yet another thing the rest of the transit world has mastered that Metro can't fucking do right.

For ANYONE who defends the 20/40/40 idiocy: Metro press releases often remind us that Tim Eyman's Inintiative 695, enacted overwhelmingly by the car-loving suburbs, eviscerated bus service levels in Seattle. Until the effects of I-695 on Seattle service are reversed, the 20/40/40 split is adding insult to injury.

Now, of every 25 additional cents you pay, only a NICKEL can be dedicated to improving your ride in North King County -- which is Seattle+Shoreline+Lake City (Seattle itself gets less than a nickel of your fare increase).

Fact: you will never convince suburban voters or King County Councilmembers to support repealing the 40/40/20, as long as North King County already receives far more bus service than East or South King County.

@69: Which is why the operations of a transit agency MUST be removed from political influence and run by actual professionals, on the basis of demand (and with an eye towards creating a truly efficient, effective system).

Unlike the last fare hike, which was chalked up to inflation, they are specifically blaming the new one on diesel fuel. Guess what? A bus with 5 people on it going all the way to fucking North Bend requires infinitely higher per-rider fuel subsidies than a jam-packed bus to Ballard. So how about no new fare hike in the city, and a still-proportionally-reasonable 75-cent fare hike for intercity fares?