My Candidacy for Governor

It’s that time of the year when I again file as a candidate for office, not to win but to use the Voters’ Pamphlet to attract voters to this blog.  It’s my attempt to make a difference by providing the state’s voters information they won’t read in the Seattle Times or hear on local TV news.  

It started more than a decade ago with concerns Sound Transit’s had failed to comply with RCW 81.104.00 (2)(b) by never considering “a low capital option that maximizes the current system”.  My attempts to raise the issue with letters to Attorney General Ferguson’s office culminated in the following response:  

Regarding Sound Transit, our office does not advise or represent regional transit authorities, nor does our office have the role of supervising or correcting the activities of such authorities.

The Attorney’s General lack of “authority” has resulted in Sound Transit confiscating the I-90 Bridge center roadway for light rail trains, precluding 2-way bus-only routes with 10 times light rail train capacity, 10 years sooner, at 1/10 the cost.  They’ve never recognized 4-car light rail trains don’t have the capacity needed to reduce peak hour multilane freeway congestion and cost too much to operate off peak. 

Not only have they spent billions extending light rail across I-90 Bridge, they’re also extending light rail along I-5 beyond UW and SeaTac.  None of the extensions increase the capacity, they only increase the cost.  Riders added reduce access for those along Line 1 route into Seattle.  

Even more absurd many of the extension riders are those who previously rode buses in the city.  The reason being that rather than increase access with added parking near stations or local bus routes to stations Sound Transit is terminating King County Metro and Snohomish Community Transit routes at light rail stations.   The result, the more the extensions the more the lost transit capacity into Seattle as well as less access for Line 1 riders, and no reduction in freeway congestion.

The bottom line is my candidacy has gone from attempting to use RCW to prevent the extensions to warning what’s coming.  That Sound Transit has used voter Prop 1 approval in 2016 to spend $54 billion between 2017 and 2041 to spend $148.2 billion from 2017 to 2046 and a $28.5 billion debt when ST3 taxes end.  Sound Transit called it, “building the most ambition transit system expansion in the nation”.  

The problem is they are using it to replace bus routes into and nothing to reduce congestion.  Again, my candidacy is an attempt to tell voters what they won’t read or hear elsewhere about the folly of the light rail spine and other projects of dubious value.  More to follow.