Hebert Research

Bellevue , March 28, 2016 (Newswire.com) - Seattle in 2016 is the 6th Worst Congested U.S. City

Jim Hebert, Hebert Research

INRIX just released their national comparative traffic congestion findings.  This year, Seattle now exceeds the rank order with Boston.  This comes at a time in which the Seattle area plans to ask voters to approve in November the proposed $40 billion transportation funding.  This follows the Sound Transit ST2, which is yet to be finished.  Voters approved Phase 2 for $9.5 billion.  Both Phase One and Two will cost an estimated $13.7 billion for 50 miles.  By comparison, Phase Three will cost 2.9 times more.  There are many explanations for the added cost from an average of $274 million per mile to $800 million, but the fact remains that it continues to be a major cost over the next 20 years and may restrict other infrastructure projects.

Now with the serious U.S. federal fiscal budget conditions, most of the ST3 funding will come from local government.  The Sound Transit Board of Appointees members, who are not elected, will require voters to approve an increase in the sales tax of 00.5%.  Motor vehicle tax will increase by 00.8% and property tax by 00.25%, a $1,000 of valuation.  At this time, there is no end date of the tax increases.  This is similar to a home mortgage with no term in the interest rates.   

Seattle and Boston have more in common than differences, which needs to be understood.  Both cities have a similar population of more than 600,000. Seattle is the largest city in the Northwest and Boston the largest in the Northeast.  Demographics are very similar with large, high technology employment centers.  Both Seattle and Boston have an average commute time of 65.5 minutes of wasted time commuting.   But the striking difference is that the completion of Sound Transit’s first 50 miles by 2023 compares to Boston’s Tremont’s Street Subway of 65.4 miles  The statistical inference is that the traffic congestion rates remain very similar, in spite of the fact that Boston has a much larger public rail system.

There are several questions that must be answered and not assumed.  A rail-based transportation system is fixed and requires decades to complete. By the time all three phases of Sound Transit are completed it may have become outdated.  Passenger ships and trains have been replaced by the advantages of air travel.  So, there will still be other transportation alternatives emerging, such as driverless cars, which will become increasingly available. 

Will the employees work from a centralized location or will there be more divergence, such as what is being proposed by Google, Amazon, and Microsoft?  Suburban crest cities where employees live and work may become major solutions to increasing population density in major urban centers.  Industries and large employers may relocate all or a large segment of employment.  Boeing is one painful example of this relocation, but this is also the case with many of the Fortune 1000 companies.

Three principles must be met to encourage and not socially engineer ridership.  A light rail alternative must be cheaper, faster, and a better experience than driving or buses.  Floating bridges with rigid steel rails still have no final solution after more than 25 years. The solution may become the need to transfer riders of the light rail onto buses when crossing Lake Washington.

Remember: “Having set your hand to the plow, you cannot turn backward."

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