Traffic Lab Needs Danny Westneat

The Danny Westneat column in the January 9^th Seattle Times concerning keeping the viaduct is the first example in years of someone at the Times recognizing what’s needed to reduce area’s congestion. Something the Traffic Lab January 7, 2019 front-page article, “A lot has changed in a decade: tunnel debate, not so much” failed to do.

Spending $3.2 billion on a tunnel for two lanes under Seattle in each direction could have added much needed capacity through the city.  Yet the Traffic Lab still doesn’t acknowledge the stupidity of using it to replace the three lanes on the viaduct, one of which provided downtown access. Or that much of the money that could have been spent reinforcing the bridge for safety was instead spent reinforcing it to allow tunnel boring. 

The “debate” should never have been about replacing the viaduct with “improvements to I-5 and to surface streets and public transit”.  The debate should have been how best to add capacity both into and through the Seattle.  While the tunnel added capacity through Seattle with the “best possible facility with the available technology", it didn’t add capacity into and out of downtown. Tearing down the viaduct not only eliminated the tunnel capacity benefits through the city, it ended the viaducts access to downtown.

Former Mayor Mcginn admitted the tunnel “is not for people trying to get to and from work in downtown”;  “Average travel times from Federal Way to Seattle were 24 minutes longer in 2017 than in 2009”.  The current 8:00 am, 37-minute travel times along I-5 (per WSDOT) will surely increase along I-5 without the viaduct.  

The Traffic Lab article continues to make dubious claims “our rapid shift to public transit--- faster over the last few years than anywhere else in the country”.   A PSRC “Stuck in Traffic-2015 Report” concluded that, at least between 2010 and 2013, transit ridership had increased from 8.6% to 9.8%.  That in 2013, 73.6% of commuters “drove alone” rather than the “just one in four” Traffic Lab claim. It's "unlikely" they've changed that much "in the last few years". 

Sound Transit’s decision to continue its decade-long failure to increase bus transit capacity make it “unlikely” those results will ever improve. Especially since the billions spent extending light rail beyond Angel Lake will do nothing to increase transit capacity into Seattle.  That any riders added will simply limit access for those currently using Central Link.

The Traffic Lab needs someone (Danny Westneat?) who recognizes that reality.