Will Light Rail Be Enough
Will Light Rail be Enough?
August 25, 2009
Will Light Rail Be Enough? With traffic congestion what it is today, many cities are looking for solutions to remove single-occupancy vehicles from the roadways and still get people where they need to go. Seattle, Washington is no different. According to Sound Transit’s website, Light Rail was approved via voters and meant to provide transportation to a minimum of 75,000 passengers daily in King County, run 24 hours a day, and remove traffic congestion from the Puget Sound region. What once was a 21-mile Light Rail idea approved for $1 Million in 1996, is now a 14-mile Light Rail system for $2.4 Billion, and for just the first of many phases on this project running by summer 2009. By 2020, …show more content…
Although this is a major community project, PSTC should be approximately 60% through the design phase and have a better understanding of where the rails will be placed and how much it will cost. Sound Transit has abused the planning process to promote this Light Rail system. They biased key studies by masking key information issued to the public and promoting a robust rail alternative against a deliberately hobbling transit bus system. Harkness indicates if Sound Transit utilized the Light Rail funds to improve arterials, HOV programs (car and van pool) and bus enhancements, then our transportation problems would have been progressing by now. Or if the number of people car or van pooling to work could be increased by five percent using employer incentives, it would take the same number of cars off the road as would the 21 mile Light Rail system (Harkness, 2005). Analyzing available options are crucial to any project, but very ineffective if never applied or applied differently than originally …show more content…
(2009, July 21). Light-rail trains run smoothly, if not to capacity, on first day. Seattle Times, The (WA). Retrieved July 21, 2009 from http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2009503977_websoundtransit20m.html.
Lindblom, M. (2009, July 30). Light rail averaging 12,000 riders per weekday so far. Seattle Times, The (WA). Retrieved August 18, 2009 from http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2009570527_webstridership31m.html.
Middleton, W. D. (2006, April). Sound Transit builds for LRT. Railway Age, 207(4), 43-45. Retrieved August 5, 2009, from Business Source Premier database.
San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District (2009). A History of BART: The Concept is Born. Retrieved August 18, 2009 from http://www.bart.gov/about/history/index.aspx.
Sound Transit (2009). Sound Transit - Projects and Plans site. Retrieved July 16, 2009, from http://www.soundtransit.org/x14.xml.
University of California (2007). King County Central Link Light Rail startup, best practices Light Rail grade crossings. Retrieved July 16, 2009 from http://www.techtransfer.berkeley.edu/railroad06downloads/jenkins.pdf.
TrainWeb, LLC (1998, August). How does commuter rail differ from light rail and heavy rail? www.TrainWeb.org. Retrieved August 5, 2009
August 25, 2009
Will Light Rail Be Enough? With traffic congestion what it is today, many cities are looking for solutions to remove single-occupancy vehicles from the roadways and still get people where they need to go. Seattle, Washington is no different. According to Sound Transit’s website, Light Rail was approved via voters and meant to provide transportation to a minimum of 75,000 passengers daily in King County, run 24 hours a day, and remove traffic congestion from the Puget Sound region. What once was a 21-mile Light Rail idea approved for $1 Million in 1996, is now a 14-mile Light Rail system for $2.4 Billion, and for just the first of many phases on this project running by summer 2009. By 2020, …show more content…
Although this is a major community project, PSTC should be approximately 60% through the design phase and have a better understanding of where the rails will be placed and how much it will cost. Sound Transit has abused the planning process to promote this Light Rail system. They biased key studies by masking key information issued to the public and promoting a robust rail alternative against a deliberately hobbling transit bus system. Harkness indicates if Sound Transit utilized the Light Rail funds to improve arterials, HOV programs (car and van pool) and bus enhancements, then our transportation problems would have been progressing by now. Or if the number of people car or van pooling to work could be increased by five percent using employer incentives, it would take the same number of cars off the road as would the 21 mile Light Rail system (Harkness, 2005). Analyzing available options are crucial to any project, but very ineffective if never applied or applied differently than originally …show more content…
(2009, July 21). Light-rail trains run smoothly, if not to capacity, on first day. Seattle Times, The (WA). Retrieved July 21, 2009 from http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2009503977_websoundtransit20m.html.
Lindblom, M. (2009, July 30). Light rail averaging 12,000 riders per weekday so far. Seattle Times, The (WA). Retrieved August 18, 2009 from http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2009570527_webstridership31m.html.
Middleton, W. D. (2006, April). Sound Transit builds for LRT. Railway Age, 207(4), 43-45. Retrieved August 5, 2009, from Business Source Premier database.
San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District (2009). A History of BART: The Concept is Born. Retrieved August 18, 2009 from http://www.bart.gov/about/history/index.aspx.
Sound Transit (2009). Sound Transit - Projects and Plans site. Retrieved July 16, 2009, from http://www.soundtransit.org/x14.xml.
University of California (2007). King County Central Link Light Rail startup, best practices Light Rail grade crossings. Retrieved July 16, 2009 from http://www.techtransfer.berkeley.edu/railroad06downloads/jenkins.pdf.
TrainWeb, LLC (1998, August). How does commuter rail differ from light rail and heavy rail? www.TrainWeb.org. Retrieved August 5, 2009