Transportation Benefit District for Roads, Mobility, and Transit Passes in Bellingham

In case you didn't hear, there was a big election last night. 

There is still a lot in flux with last night's election in Washington State and I'll let the political blogs cover yesterday's wild night.

There was one important transportation focused measure in Bellingham that passed last night which may be of interest to you and is lost in the fray of everything else going on.

As you'll recall earlier this year Whatcom County narrowly rejected a .02% sales tax measure, which we endorsed and worked on, that would have saved bus service in Whatcom County.  In that election voters in Bellingham overwhelmingly approved the measure and everyone else in the rural areas of the county overwhelmingly rejected it.

After the WTA measure narrowly failed, The City of Bellingham under the leadership of their mayor decided to go back to the ballot to ask only Bellingham voters to approve a .02% sales tax increase to buy back transit service in the city and to back fill their underfunded road maintenance and bicycle-pedestrian infrastructure accounts. 

Jared at the Bellingham Herald reports that the sales tax increase for transportation and transit funding in Bellingham is passing at a comfortable 55%.  This is not surprising considering the transit measure passed with 60% in May. 

By passing this measure transit service should be able to stay much more intact within Bellingham, which is definitely a good thing, but the counter question is by using sales tax at the city level will that politically prevent WTA from going out to their entire taxing district for the rest of their sales tax authority in the future?  Regardless of that answer to that question, I think that public transportation districts at the city level are going to become an increasingly relevant short term solution to save transit service as we approach a very complex State Legislative climate in 2011.

A Creative Approach to Transportation Impact Fees

Jared Paben on the Belllingham Herald traffic/transportation blog has a recent post on a very interesting idea regarding transportation impact fees.

Transportation impact fees are collected by the majority of local governments, cities and counties, in Washington when new developments are permitted.  Traditionally this money goes towards the local governments roads funds and in the case of large exurban developments they often pay for new expanded road capacity.

According to Herald Blog post Bellingham is proposing a set of criteria that developers can use to reduce their overall impact fee costs.  Upon first glace I think this is a brilliant idea coming out from my hometown in the Northwestern corner of the State.

Here is the list of criteria proposed the reduce impact fees in Bellingham:

• 15%, for building in one of the follow urban village areas: Downtown, Fairhaven, Old Town, Waterfront District, Fountain District, Samish Way, Barkley Village.
• Up to 10%, for being close to bus lines. Developments that front a once-every-15-minutes Go Line get a 10% discount, those within one-quarter mile of a GO Line get a 7% discount, those fronting a standard WTA route of at least once an hour get a 5% discount, and those that are one-quarter of a mile from a standard route get a 2% discount.
• 10%, for participating in a mandatory commute-trip reduction program. Under state law, only businesses with 100 or more employees are required to participate in these programs.
• 1%, for each employee or resident of the project who is provided two years worth of WTA bus passes.
• 2%, for each car share program membership fee that’s provided for an employee or resident. They also get a discount of 2% for providing a space for a car share vehicle to park. We don’t have car share programs here anymore, after Community Car Share, a nonprofit that was based in Bellingham, folded earlier this year.

 This approach will incentivize developers to build in urban walkable pedestrian oriented areas.  It will encourage them to put their developments through a robust transportation demand management program and in the end it will save them money, encouraging development in the right places and with sustainable approaches.

It will be interesting to watch how this program works out in Bellingham (once it is adopted) and may serve as a good model for the Legislature as they grapple with how to incentivize sustainable development in our urban areas of Washington State.


The full blog post is here http://blogs.bellinghamherald.com/traffic/?p=5360
More info on the City of Bellingham's website here http://www.cob.org/services/neighborhoods/community-planning/transportation/development-impact-fees.aspx

A lot of fuss over parking

I don't know if it's going to get published or not, but I thought I might share with our members a letter I wrote to the Seattle Times in response to their parking rate editorial this week. As always, let us know what you think. - Rob

Regarding the Seattle Times recent editorial about requiring a more thorough analysis of parking rates, I wanted to let you know that parking rate increases like the ones planned for downtown Seattle have already been studied at length.

SDOT has analyzed proposed rate increases and found that the rate increase to $4/hour downtown would reduce parking space occupancy by 9%. This would be a dramatic change from the current situation,where street parking downtown is at 100% occupancy for most of the day.

This would bring along a host of sorely needed benefits: greatly reduced congestion from circling cars, reduced pollution, and yes, greater vehicle turnover. But you don't have to blindly take any one's word for it, because the proposed changes for Seattle have already been implemented in similar pilot programs in other major cities. The results have been uniformly encouraging.

In New York City, the PARK Smart program has already completed two successful pilots in Greenwich Village and Park Slope, Brooklyn. In Greenwich, weekday occupancy was reduced by 6% and the percentage of people parking for more than one hour decreased by 12%. And Park Slop has experienced an astounding 18% increase in the number of unique vehicle parked daily. That's 18% more people who were able to find parking in the area for their business, shopping, and recreational needs.

I understand that tax hikes are hard to stomach. Although $4/hour isn't close to the private market rate of $7.hour for parking, it's still a significant change. But if we can get similar results here as they got in New York - and the city's research suggests that we can - that could only help our businesses or our 'retail ecosystem'. Increased parking vacancies and turnover would make it easier for people to find parking near locations of interest. They would spend less time burning gas in search of a parking spot, and more time doing whatever they came to do. This is a scenario that's beneficial for everyone. Rob Johnson - Executive Director - Transportation Choices Coalition.

More Federal Funding for WA Rail on the Way

WSDOT just announced via press release and their twitter feed (@WSDOT) that in the latest round federal rail investments for passenger rail WA State received $31 Million.

It looks like most of the money will go towards:

• Retrofitting King Street Station in Seattle
• Building a permanent station in Tukwilla
• Building bypass passing lanes near Mt. Vernon which will help with congestion issues.

Here is more directly from the WSDOT press release:

More than $18.2 million will be spent to seismically retrofit King Street Station in Seattle and its clock tower, as well as restore the station’s main hall and upgrade electrical, mechanical and plumbing systems. This work will transform the busy and historic station and adjacent tracks and platforms to meet current and future needs of expanding intercity and commuter rail service. The effort is a partnership by the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT), Amtrak, the city of Seattle, Sound Transit and BNSF Railway.

The grant also contributes $9 million to Sound Transit’s Tukwila Station project, a new train station for use by Sounder commuter trains and Amtrak Cascades intercity trains. The project converts the existing temporary platform to a modern full-service station.

“Making these improvements will help give passengers the reliable intercity train services that allow them to choose transit over driving, and help us meet our state goals for reducing how much we drive,” Washington Transportation Secretary Paula Hammond said.

In Mount Vernon, $3.3 million will be spent to build sidings – passing lanes for trains – to improve speed and reliability for freight and passenger trains. The remaining $400,000 will be spent developing a State Rail Plan integrating freight and passenger service – a move that makes Washington more competitive in winning future rail funding.

This latest round of grants comes from two Federal Railroad Administration programs. A total of $2.4 billion from the 2010 DOT Appropriations Act was made available in August to continue the development of high-speed intercity passenger rail corridors across the country.

This is great news for passenger rail service on the Cascade's Corridor.  It is rewarding to see the Feds investing in State's like Washington where we've made a significant investment in passenger rail on the State and Local levels already.

Here is Senator Murray's Quote from the release:
"This funding will help create and save good paying jobs as we work to modernize out state's rail infrastructure," said Senator Patty Murray. "In addition to helping commuters get where they're going this investment will also benefit the movement of freight rail in our state that is so critical to our economy." 

Full release can be found here: http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/News/2010/10/102810_MorerailgrantstoWashington.htm

NOV. 5th FRIDAY FORUM: Your Future Bus Service - Get the Scoop from the Transit Task Force

FRIDAY FORUM: Your Future Bus Service - Get the Scoop from the Transit Task Force

Worried that bus service cuts are coming your way?  Curious about what's been going on with the King County Regional Transit Task Force?  Get the answers to your all questions at our Friday Forum, the first public forum on the recommendations for potential Metro bus service cuts and investments.

The King County Regional Transit Task Force was convened in March this year to help shape a policy framework around future transit service investments and potential service cuts.  This 31-member group with representatives from local government, business, labor, social services, riders, environmental groups and other transportation experts has been grappling with some tough policy questions in the face of Metro's significant budget shortfall. 

Join our all star panel of task force members to find out how the process went, the recommendations the panel has come up with, and some of the potential challenges moving forward.  Victor Obeso, Manager of Service Development at King County Metro and John Howell, facilitator of the Regional Transit Task Force will be on hand to answer questions related to bus service and the task force process.
 
WHAT: King County Metro - Updates from the Regional Transit Taskforce. 

• Dow Constantine, King County Executive opening remarks
• Seattle Councilmember Tom Rasmussen
• Suzette Cook, Mayor of Kent
• Kate Joncas, President of the Downtown Seattle Association
• Josh Kavanaugh, Director of Transportation Services at the University of Washington
  

WHEN: Friday, November 5, 12:00pm - 1:30pm
WHERE:  Seattle-King County Public Health - Chinook Building, Room 121, 401 Fifth Ave., Seattle (at Jefferson St.) (Please note room change).

As always, feel free to bring your lunch. 

This Friday Forum is co-sponsored by the Downtown Seattle Association

Book Review: Carjacked: The Culture of the Automobile and Its Effects on Our Lives

In Carjacked: The Culture of the Automobile and its Effects on Our Lives, Catherine Lutz and Anne Lutz Fernandez take on the daunting task of cataloguing the hidden costs of car ownership in America. The book is divided into roughly three sections: the first describes the ways the automobile industry cultivates America’s love affair with cars, the second unmasks predatory selling and financing schemes, and the third explains the non-financial costs of car ownership on the environment and society.

The Good: The book is a fairly compelling, fluid read. I was able to finish it without ever once falling asleep! I am a very sleep deprived person, so I can’t actually say this about every book.

For those who don’t have the time to read more than a small chunk of the book at once, the authors have obligingly provided section headers every few pages with descriptive names like “Hell on Wheels: Road Rage, Other Drivers, and the Pope” “Paying $34000 for a $17000 car” and “Driving while black, walking while Latino,” making it very easy to flip to the interesting parts first.

Most claims are well supported with references and statistics, and the authors finish the book with a useful summary of concrete things readers can do to help. We aren’t just left wallowing in the disillusionment.

The Not-as-Good: Unless cars and the car industry are really your thing, the book isn’t terribly exciting. There are some surprising facts and interesting anecdotes, but if you’re looking for a very colorful, attention-grabbing book, this isn’t it.

This book is appropriate for: people who are interested in cars, people who are interested in American culture, who like to delve into the details of these things, and who aren’t yet so wise and knowledgeable that they’d know everything in the book already.

Pierce Transit planned fare revision effective November 1st, 2010.

Effective November 1st, 2010 Pierce Transit will be raising fare rates.

This move will bring Pierce Transit into aligment with Metro and CT's off peak fares. The board decided not to raise fares for seniors and disabled persons. Here is their new fare chart; follow the link for complete details.

	New Fares, Effective Nov. 1, 2010	Current Fares Through Oct. 31, 2010
Local Cash Fare	$2.00	$1.75
Local Monthly Pass	$72.00	$63.00
Local Adult Tickets*	20 tickets for $40.00	20 tickets for $35.00
Adult Weekend All Day Pass	$4.00	$3.50
Class Pass	$48.00	$36.00
Thanksgiving Day	Regular Fares	Free
Christmas Day	Regular Fares	Free

http://www.piercetransit.org/alerts/fare_change.htm