Kate Riley Still Doesn’t Get It

The 10/12/23 Seattle Times Opinion Page Editorial calling me “a perennial candidate whose fixation with Sound Transit makes him unfit to serve a community whose needs go far beyond public transit” exemplifies more than a decade of an editor, Kate Riley, who simply “doesn’t get it”.  

My candidacies have been “perennial” because for more than a decade they’ve been an attempt to make up for the Seattle Times obsequious support for Sound Transit. They’ve never been attempts to win but to use the Voters’ Pamphlet to reach the widest area possible that year, from Bellevue City Council to U.S Senate.

 

That my “fixation” with Sound Transit is due to Kate Riley’s refusal to recognize Sound Transit’s failed approach to public transit. It began in 2012 when I filed for 48^th District after three years of presentations to Bellevue City Council failed to convince them to disallow 10 permits Sound Transit needed to route light rail through Bellevue. 

 

My “candidate interview” with Kate Riley did not go well as she cut it short when I persisted with claims 48^th district residents were more concerned with the area's congestion  than the McCleary school funding issue.  She’s declined to interview me during my 10 subsequent candidacies.

 

She doesn’t "get it" that my “fixation” with Sound Transit is due to it having a Board of elected officials who have no idea of what constitutes effective public transit.  That public transit’s goal should be to provide the transit needed for those who don’t want to drive and to reduce the congestion for those who do drive. Yet the Sound Transit Board plan is to implement “Voter Approved”  extensions that won't do either.  They don’t increase the capacity of the trains or add to the parking needed for access; they only increase the operating cost.  

 

She doesn’t get it that lack of capacity and access belies any claim the extensions will reduce multilane freeway peak hour congestion.  That off-peak operating costs will dwarf any fare-box revenue. Using light rail to replace bus routes into Seattle reduces transit capacity into the city and nothing to reduce freeway GP lane congestion.   That former bus riders added by the extensions will reduce access for current light rail riders.

 

She has ignored years of attempts to persuade Seattle Times to include an outside audit of Sound Transit policies that would have verified or refuted the concerns. Instead, Sound Transit has been allowed to confiscate the I-90 Bridge center roadway precluding two-way BRT with 10 times the capacity, ten years sooner at 1/10^th the cost. They've compounded that failure by using the $3.6B East Link to replace I-90 bridge bus routes. Forcing bus riders to transfer on Mercer Island to and from light rail for the commute into and out of Seattle will likely dissuade many current transit commuters 

 

She has abided Sound Transit’s decision to no longer release quarterly Service Provided Performance Reports.  They would have detailed the results of the October 2021 Northgate Link debut.   That the lack of access limited ridership to a fraction of Seattle Times claims for it being “transit transformed” with 42,000 to 49,000 riders added by Link’s three stations.  The need to replace track attachments has delayed East Link demonstrating similar results and what can be expected with future “voter approved” extensions.  Thus, next year's East Link Starter Line and Lynnwood debuts will be the next to demonstrate the result.

 

Her “Opinion Page” has abided Sound Transit  continuing with plans to spend $13B boring a second tunnel under Seattle with 5 new stations for access.  Sound Transit's plan to locate 2 of those stations north and south of existing CID station ignores more than a year of public requests to locate a station near CID. 

 

An Opinion Page editorial initially supported the “near” CID station.  Yet they haven't asked Sound Transit to consider modifying the existing CID for use as a terminus for East Link and West Seattle extensions and existing Westlake station for Ballard Link terminus.  Use the existing DSTT for those who need to go beyond CID and Westlake. Saving billions and years of disruption in Seattle as a result.  

 

Kate Riley’s opinion page has also abided Sound Transit using the ST3 approval to spend $54B from 2017 to 2041 to justify spending $150B from 2017 to 2046.  That their 2023 Financial Plan & Adopted Budget ends 2046, $24B in debt, $1B in debt service payments, $3.8B in “expenditures”; and ST3 taxes that voters approved ending in 2041.  Yet obligating them to pay for far into the future without any vote.

 

The bottom line is she still doesn't recognize the results of a decade of Sound Transit approach to public transit with an incompetent board of directors.  A competent transit board would have routed light rail to West Seattle rather than across I-90 Bridge, terminated Central Link light rail at SeaTac and UW stadium, and expedited light rail to Ballard.   Instead, the board insists on spending billions and years on a second tunnel to allow eastside and West Seattle commuters to transit directly to Everett and Ballard commuters to SeaTac. 

 

A competent transit board would have opted for implementing BRT routes along limited access I-90 and I-5 lanes to dedicated stops on an elongated bus-only 4^thAve T/C.  SR520 commuters would benefit from using a UW Stadium T/C as interface for BRT routes in both directions.  

 

Sound Transit has already been allowed to spend billions and years on voter approved extensions that will do nothing to reduce area congestion and leave the area with huge operating costs.  Those billions and years are only a down payment on future Sound Transit plans to spend $150B on the “largest transit system expansion in the country”. 

 

Again, all my candidacies' “fixation on Sound Transit” have been to use the Voters’ Pamphlet to inform the area about that future.  Kate Riley’s failure to “get it” seems to be a major reason the Seattle Times continues abetting it.  It's time she considers Sound Transit worthy of scrutiny.  The Starter Line and Lynnwood extension debuts next year will be the next demonstration of that need.