City Yesterday’s Mismatched Transit Debate
posted by on October 23 at 11:53 AM
A scene from the rally outside.
I rode my bike out to the University of Washington yesterday to catch the debate on Proposition 1, the mass-transit expansion measure, between Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels and Bellevue land magnate Kemper Freeman. Freeman was so outmatched by Nickels on charisma, statistics, and general coherence, however, that it seems almost unfair to call it a “debate.”
Traffic jam.
Almost. This is the man, after all, who has poured more than $100,000 into the effort to kill Proposition 1; who put twice that amount into the campaign against last year’s roads and transit ballot measure; and who once, according to legend, refused to set foot on a bus that had been chartered to give him a tour of East King County—just, you know, on principle.
So—however doddering he seemed yesterday, however out of touch, rambling, and just plain inaccurate his arguments—it’s hard to feel too sorry for the guy.
Yes, that’s a weird bandage on his nose. No, I don’t know what it was doing there.
Freeman’s main argument seemed to be that light rail doesn’t serve enough people, and that buses and lots of new freeways would. (Never mind that he also supports Initiative 985, which would clog all those wonderful bus lanes Freeman envisions with single-occupancy drivers—or that freeways aren’t exactly cheap.) “This proposition is about one in 200 of us who are not using transit today using transit in the future,” Freeman said, a phony statistic he also pulled out at last week’s CityClub debate with King County Council Member Dow Constantine. “They are pretending that we can somehow solve our transportation problem with public transit, and in fact it is impossible.” Freeman even charged that the only way light rail will serve as many people as Sound Transit says it can—up to a million trips per day—is if “you hire people to shove people in like they do in Japan.”
Freeman also argued that because Seattle isn’t as dense as New York—an example he brought up half a dozen times—light rail won’t work here. “I’ve studied Portland… I spent three days in Portland … I saw buildings [along the light rail line] that were totally empty, that had gone bankrupt. I saw retail spaces that were totally empty.” It wasn’t the first, or the last, time Freeman would refer to his extensive (and expensive) work “studying” transit systems in other cities, only to find every single one of them lacking. Finally, he argued that light rail was a dirty technology because it runs on electricity, and “over 40 percent of the electricity in the US is made from burning coal.” Nickels quickly eviscerated that fish-in-a-barrel argument, pointing out that the Puget Sound region’s electricity is almost exclusively (clean) hydropower—something Freeman presumably knows.
On his game.
In contrast to the jumpy Freeman, Nickels appeared relaxed, comfortable, even funny. Maybe it’s that he really feels strongly about light rail, or maybe he just shouldn’t read his speeches, but Nickels was more on game than I’ve ever seen him. He noted, first, that light rail boosters aren’t trying to solve all the region’s transportation problems—they’re just trying to make it easier for people to get around during the busiest times of the day. “The trips that we’re particularly concerned about are the trips into and out of our major urban centers, like UW and downtown Bellevue and Northgate,” Nickels said. “This will not eliminate congestion. … What it will do is create the capacity for up to a million people a day to take light rail rather than get on the freeway in their individual automobiles.” Freeman, bizarrely, made the same point in arguing against light rail, noting that trips to and from work “are less than one fifth of our trips in this region. Our public leaders have been leading us down a wild goose chase and we can’t do that,” Freeman said.
But that, Nickels noted, was exactly the point: Transit is supposed to serve people at the most congested times. “The problem is that we all try to get to and from work and to and from the university at the same time every day,” Nickels said. “We wouldn’t have to put down another cubic foot of concrete if all those trips were spread out throughout the day and night.”
As for the ultimate number of people the system could serve, Nickels acknowledged that a million is on the high end. (Officially, Sound Transit predicts there will be about 300,000 light-rail boardings daily by 2030.) But, he noted, Nickels’s and Freeman’s car-dependent generations are being overtaken by younger people who want new ways of getting around. “As we shape our cities and our region around transit, and as young people replace those of us who grew up totally dependent on the automobile, I think that those models vastly underestimate what we’re likely to see happen,” Nickels said. “I expect that the actual use will far outpace what the models show today.”
I thought I saw you. Freaky.
ECB ... was this debate recorded? Can I watch it online?
@2: I don't think it was officially taped, but the "yes" campaign was taping and should have an edited version soon. If I can get hold of it, I'll post later today.
Thanks.
Hydropower is not clean. Hydropower kills endangered species.
ahh, thought that was you erica. you asked me how to get to the ave. just as a clarification, there was a faster way to get to the ave from that place, but i assumed you wanted to get to "the ave" where the majority of businesses and what not were, which is why i pointed where i did.
i didn't really think about it until i started walking the same path a bit later and realized i should have clarified.
that is my great story for today.
fuck nickels. he's responsible for destroying housing that people are building to survive yet another cold winter--if people die, their blood is on his hands.
"so I rode my bike out to the University of Washington yesterday to catch the transit debate..."
"outmatched by Nickels on charisma"
"up to a million trips per day"
hilarious
I assume Greg Nickels arrived in his taxpayer-funded towncar, which later drove him to his West Seattle home. Yeah, I'm sure he's a real authority on transit.
OK, set aside for a moment the obvious point that we get our electricity up here in the NW through relatively, if not perfectly, clean hydropower (see Fnarf @5). Isn't one of the phony arguments of the perpetual anti-mass-transit campaign that magical electric-powered cars are right around the corner, as if the only compelling reason for building mass transit is reducing our oil consumption? So these guys want to damn light rail for being electric-powered at the same time they hype the hypothetical alternatives for, yeah, being electric-powered. Huh?
In fairness, Kemper & Co.'s arguments do hold up if you don't think too hard about them, kinda like they themselves didn't think too hard about them. (Kinda like Kemper didn't think too hard about how distracting a Band-Aid on the side of one's nose can be.)
joykiller @9: I assume Greg Nickels arrived in his taxpayer-funded towncar, which later drove him to his West Seattle home. Yeah, I'm sure he's a real authority on transit.
joykiller's right. The fact that the high-speed subway to the UW does not yet exist is no excuse for Greg Nickels. Transit advocates' inability to ride nonexistent transit systems is all the reason I need for those transit systems to continue to be nonexistent.
Non-existent transit systems like King County Metro or the Water Taxi. Or a carpool, or maybe his lardass could get on a bike -- you know he wants to make Seattle a "bike friendly city." Barring any of these, perhaps the mayor could drive his own car to and from work, thus saving an extra downtown-West Seattle round trip, as the car is parked overnight at City Hall.
The fact that the mayor doesn't do any of these things make me seriously doubt whether or not he would actually ride anything proposed in Prop. 1 (outside of a press stunt, of course). And if he has no intention of riding it, why is he trying so hard to push it down my throat?
Just sayin'.
"Freeman’s main argument seemed to be that light rail doesn’t serve enough people, and that buses and lots of new freeways would."
And?
What's the point of the debate?
Kemper's right!
joykiller @12: Non-existent transit systems like King County Metro or the Water Taxi.... The fact that the mayor doesn't do any of these things make me seriously doubt whether or not he would actually ride anything proposed in Prop. 1
Ah, another great example of the sort of self-contradictory, scattershot, damn-them-if-they-do, damn-them-if-they-don't arguments of the perpetual naysayers.
If Greg Nickels did take the bus to the UW, the naysayers would be falling all over themselves about why we have to spend billions of dollars building a subway to the UW if the bus service is already adequate.
Believe it or not, joykiller, a transit line that is not only competitive with but superior to driving along a corridor will attract people who would never have bothered to take the bus. And when that UW line is up, it's not guilt that's going to be motivating the likes of Greg Nickels to ride it; it's the fact that they value their time.
(I guess this means I am daring Greg Nickels to ride University Link whenever it's up and running, even though he won't still be mayor when it finally is.)
@5 - actually, Fnarf, all (and I do mean ALL) forms of energy production kill endangered species.
But non-porous roadways and oil plus refineries kill a lot more than hydro power.
Hydro is not perfect, but it's a damn site better than nuclear or coal. It's damage is mostly limited to fish. Take a look at the dead forests of Canada and the NE if you want to see what Coal does, and look at Chernobyl for Nuclear's legacy.
But back to transit: It's really not fair to Kemper to put him up against anyone with even a normal intellect. Like Frank Blethen and George Bush, he is the son of privilege, and never had to accomplish anything in his life.
It's really quite sad how people with inherited wealth are so ineffectual. Thank God for financial managers, or they'd probably just squander all that money.
Hydro is not perfect, but it's a damn site better than nuclear or coal. It's damage is mostly limited to fish. Take a look at the dead forests of Canada and the NE if you want to see what Coal does, and look at Chernobyl for Nuclear's legacy.
But back to transit: It's really not fair to Kemper to put him up against anyone with even a normal intellect. Like Frank Blethen and George Bush, he is the son of privilege, and never had to accomplish anything in his life.
It's really quite sad how people with inherited wealth are so ineffectual. Thank God for financial managers, or they'd probably just squander all that money.
Oh, Poo! Sorry for the double-post
Here's a good one. This is Kemper Freeman equating transit with communism. Seriously. They thought they got rid of this video.
http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/39870/EGN%20Hi%20Res.wmv
@12: So, your argument is that we shouldn't build light rail because Mayor Nickels won't ride it?
I've always wondered why conservatives hate public transit so passionately, despite it being used almost exclusively and to amazing success in almost every major city in the developed world.
I think its because riding public transit forces one to interact with and accommodate others, some of whom may have different beliefs, incomes, skin color, politics, or dress than you. When you sit on a bus or train next to these people you are implying that they are equal to you. You are all fellow travelers. On the other hand, in the fortress of your car you are king, and everyone else is a competitor to be cut off and honked at. Driving is a fundamentally conservative act and riding transit is a fundamentally liberal act, and that is why, I think, conservatives despise it.
@14, the problem with Prop. 1 is that the proposed transit line would serve a corridor that serves people who choose to live far from their places of employment. I have no sympathy for them -- if they don't want to drive, and the bus is beneath them, I really couldn't give a crap.
@20, I'm saying we shouldn't build the proposed line because most of the people who pay for it won't benefit from it. And I'm saying it's disingenuous for the mayor to claim it will serve X number of people when most taxpayers -- himself included -- will never even have the opportunity to use it.
@21 is right. I've seen the same thing: anti-transit folks are afraid, even phobic, of the idea of masses of people--some of them poor and brown-skinned!--all interacting in close proximity. It's an anti-social pathology.
Erica, that bicycle parking isn't a traffic jam -- this bicycle parking is a traffic jam:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/litlnemo/2873034971/
And that's only probably half the lot or less that you can see in that pic. The amount of bikes in that city is truly amazing, but then again, it's also completely flat and jammed full of students.
"I think its because riding public transit forces one to interact with and accommodate others, some of whom may have different beliefs, incomes, skin color, politics, or dress than you. When you sit on a bus or train next to these people you are implying that they are equal to you. You are all fellow travelers."
Which is why Kemper Freeman, Emory Bundy, Jim Horn, John Niles and half of the anti-rail goons in this town are advocates of Personal Rapid Transit. You get your 'transit,' and you don't have to interact with "those people."
Too bad PRT is just a bad joke played on us by Richard Nixon, and carried out by the freeway dinosaur Republican class (plus some whacked-out tech clowns...who also don't like being around people)
That bit from Kemper Freeman about shoving people into trains? He must have seen that video on U-Tube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0rJ0h4Flbw
This article is a pretty bold misrepresentation of how the debate seemed to me. I walked in the room without a strong opinion either way, and I walked out on the side of Freeman. To put this in perspective, I'm an advocate of efficient transport, and as the author included (giving away a bias right at the start of the article), I too rode my bike to the debate.
Kemper wasn't jumpy, and the quotes in this article are taken way out of context and manipulated to make him seem all over the place. He answered the questions, and made a sound argument. Anyone who is interested in Prop 1, please seek out some real info from both sides, and don't listen to anything from this article. In my opinion, Kemper really cares about how this region spends its time and effort in the way of transportation, and he has spent a lot of time and money trying to figure out and advocate for the ways that make the most sense.
Comments Closed
Comments are closed on this post.