Reflections on 2018: Traffic Lab No Gift

The Seattle Times December 23^rd full-page “Reflections on 2018” claimed to be a "holiday gift for you" for their success in 2018 as "part of a local free press system that ensures popular governance and opportunity for all”.   That success was “made possible by support for our public service journalism projects, Education Lab, Traffic Lab, and Project Homeless”.  

However their education lab apparently didn’t believe a teachers competency rather than their color should determine their ability to teach area students.  That Project Homeless didn’t recognize even compassion has its limits as demonstrated by the fact Seattle homelessness now ranks behind only New York and Los Angeles despite the hundreds of millions spent attempting to reduce it.     

However the most blatant example of the dubious value of the Times “Gift for you” was their “Traffic Lab.” A project “that digs into the region’s thorny transportation issues and spotlights promising approaches to easing gridlock”.   Instead it continued the Times decade-long failure to recognize “the region’s thorniest transportation issue” is Sound Transit’s 2008 decision to route their Prop 1 light rail extensions through the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel (DSTT). 

An August 2004 Puget Sound Regional Council Technical Workbook, “Central Puget Sound Region High Capacity Transit Corridor Assessment” concluded the DSTT limited its capacity, to 8880 riders per hour in each direction. (Unfortunately the PSRC has also decided to abet Sound Transit since the 2004 report is no longer available on Internet.) Previous posts have detailed how Sound Transit Board CEO Peter Rogoff’s 2019 Budget demonstrate he plans to spend $96 billion between 2017 and 2041 continuing Sound Transit's decade-long failure to recognize that “issue”.   

Rogoff's claims light rail ridership will increase to 162 million in 2041 demonstrate either blatant mendacity or monumentally incompetence regarding transit capacity.  His 2019 budget increases ST3 cost from the $54 billion voters approved in 2016 to $96 billion in 2018 raising questions about his ability to control light rail construction costs.  Yet the Sound Transit board recently granted him a new three-year contract that included a 11% raise and a $16,000 bonus, raising his 2019 salary $364,000.   It doesn’t take much “digging” to recognize the Sound Transit Board and CEO Rogoff are a “thorny transportation issue”.

The other dubious Traffic Lab “gift” is their approach to “spotlighting promising approaches to easing gridlock” consists of imposing tolls on the area’s roadways.   They apparently don’t recognize, unless commuters have a viable alternative, tolls only increase their cost of commuting.  That the only viable alternative is to allow more commuters to use public transit.

Instead the Traffic Lab ignores Sound Transit’s decade long failure to increase transit ridership.  All the parking with access to transit has been full for years and Sound Transits total bus revenue miles haven’t significantly increased since 2008.  Yet Rogoff’s 2019 Budget ST3 plans for added parking consist of waiting until 2024 to begin adding 8560 parking stalls over the next 17 years.  He demonstrates contempt for increased bus ridership by failing to increase anticipated ridership between 2017 and 2041.    

The Traffic Lab’s dubious “Gift” extends beyond apparent concurrence with Sound Transit plans for I-5 and I-90 to failure to recognize the “thorny transportation issue” with WSDOT plans for 2 HOT lanes on I-405.   The WSDOT apparently based their decision to implement 2 HOT lanes on the I-405 project director’s “dubious” claim, “toll lanes often carry 35 percent more cars per hour than general lanes. That’s because rising prices prevent toll lanes from being clogged.” 

The WSDOT ignores the failure of the 2 HOT lanes between Bothell and Bellevue to meet the 45 mph for 90% of the peak commute, despite the fact they assume peak commute begins at 5:00 am.  Only about 50% of current HOT commuters likely average the 45 mph.  They problem being maintaining 45 mph requires limiting traffic to 2000 vehicles per hour. 

Limiting GP to only 3 lanes between Bothell and Bellevue increases congestion to the point where more than 2000 drivers per hour are willing to pay the current HOT tolls.  WSDOT plans to limit GP traffic to only 2 lanes on the rest of the route will surely exacerbate the problem there.  The increased congestion on HOT lanes also increases bus commute times reducing the incentive to use public transit if Sound Transit ever decides to increase capacity.

The Traffic Lab “gift” of “spotlighting promising approaches to easing gridlock” didn’t include limiting I-405 HOT to one lane.  Tolls could be set to whatever was required to reduce traffic to 2000 vph.  The additional GP lane would reduce congestion for those vehicles, potentially reducing the need for raise HOT fees.  The assured 45 mph HOT velocities would make BRT attractive to thousands more commuters than Sound Transit currently envisions.

The bottom line is if the Seattle Times wants to call their Traffic Lab a “gift” to the area they need to recognize Sound Transit and WSDOT failure to deal with the area’s congestion.   Sooner or later everyone will recognize that reality.  Unfortunately every year the Times doesn’t is another year of billions wasted and increased congestion.