The City Council is delaying the vote for Seattle's new proposed streetcars. Councilwoman Sally Clark calls streetcars "a useful part of the whole transportation system." But after she scheduled a vote on her resolution in the council's Transportation Committee Tuesday City Councilwoman Jan Drago called off a vote, delaying it until later this year as a new round of questions was raised. This may put off voting for the 4 streetcar lines that would cost an estimated $685 million until after the November election.
While some neighborhoods seem keen on the idea, The Belltown Business Association is happy with just Metro service, much of it in the free zone anyway, so why would we want a streetcar that would charge fares?
I agree that things seem to be working just fine with the Metro service. What do you think?
I think they wanted to run the streetcar down 1st Ave., didn't they? There's not enough room. I think the SLUT has been disasterous for parking along that route. I really don't see the need or the use of a transit system that isn't grade-separated. Sharing the road with cars means that the streetcars share the same problems with cars and buses, of delays due to accidents, getting in accidents themselves, and other dangers. Why bother? Buses get us around Belltown OK.
The buses suck.
What is wrong with you people? Seattle needed rail transportation 40 years ago! Cities all across Europe, San Francisco, and even Portland, all have streetcars. Waiting on ghetto, crappy buses with erratic schedules sucks. I'd gladly ride a streetcar around town. Imagine hopping on a nice, clean, steetcar and riding it to Fremont or the U District, rather than waiting on a bus and having to transfer and wait some more. Read the plan... they want to network all of the major neighborhoods.
Oh, and do some reading on how more effective public transit tends to change the social nature of cities. Cities that are still ruled by the automobile tend to leave people feeling and acting more closed off. Whereas more integrated cities like New York and London are much more open and have a sense of community. Seattle is closed off and living in the dark ages in that regard.
The free ride zone won't be free much longer. The downtown business association sponsored the free zone since it's inception. They stopped paying Metro for the fare recovery when the tunnel closed, and haven't resumed payments.
Metro has been footing the bill for the last four years, but can't afford to continue giving the business association a free ride, nor do they want to.