Cascadia Report

Category: Cascadia not cities

  • Insist on a better Korea-trade deal

    U.S. and Korean negotiators are arriving in Seattle for talks this week on a free-trade agreement between the countries. Trade-dependent Cascadia should support increasing trade — but not at all costs.

    This week’s meetings are the third in a year-long series of meetings over the U.S.-Korea pact. They’re notable in Seattle as the first major trade talks since the collapse of the WTO round in 1999.

    But the venue is far less important for Cascadia than the potential long-term impact of a flawed deal. Indeed, many labor groups oppose any trade deal because of the threat to existing workers.

    These negotiations shouldn’t be a choice between free trade or no trade. That’s the false premise set up by supporters of the Bush administration’s pursuit of free-trade agreements to create a patchwork of lopsided deals that favor U.S. corporate interests. Such bilateral deals don’t require the sacrifices necessary to make international trade truly work better.

    In the current negotiations, Korea wants more market access and the U.S. wants intellectual property rules and financial deregulation. We shouldn’t settle for that kind of bilateral horse trading. As host, Cascadia officials should instead insist that the U.S. put its will behind a comprehensive trade pact — through the WTO — that would benefit all parties.

  • Move on viaduct, floating bridge replacements

    A state panel this week found again that Seattle’s viaduct and the 520 floating bridge are in danger of collapse in an earthquake. The report adds urgency to removing the viaduct, which blights the waterfront, and to building a transit-friendly replacement for 520.

    The panel concluded that the state has enough money to rebuild the viaduct and a portion of what’s needed to replace 520. The problem is that Seattle wants a more-expensive tunnel along the waterfront and there’s no agreement on how big the new 520 should be.

    Replacing the viaduct with street improvements and building a transit-friendly six-lane 520 makes the most sense. But the key takeaway from the report is the need for action:

    “The biggest risk these projects face … is that of indecision and vacillation by political and civil leaders,” the panel’s report said. “If these projects are to succeed, the people in positions of elected and appointed authority must make decisions that stick so the projects can be completed.”

  • More dissent on US-Canada trade deal

    The impression that Canada caved to the U.S. in order to settle the dispute over the trade of lumber is fueling widespread opposition to the agreement and to the Canadian government.

    Canada would forfeit some of the $5+ billion in duties paid to the U.S. government, under the deal to end the long-running dispute. Opposition to the terms is so strong that analysts say it could threaten the Conservative Party government this fall.

  • Seattle’s clubs, musicians may be on way out

    Seattle is close to snuffing out its club scene and is losing the people who produce the city’s music, according to a pair of articles in The Stranger. Whether you’re a club-goer or not, Seattle needs all the diversity it can get.

    Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels is drafting a series of rules that reportedly would make it easy to close down all of the city’s clubs on drug-related technicalities. The proposal is unworkable in the extreme, as shown in this hilarious story.

    Meanwhile Portland is becoming “Seattle’s hot new neighborhood” as musicians move south. The attraction is a lower cost of living, an influx of talent into the city and new music venues. Not that this is a new trend — the Doug Fir lounge, cited as one of the new draws, opened two years ago.

    The proposed rules are part of a trend that threatens Seattle’s character by discouraging vibrant nightlife. No doubt The Stranger would argue that outspoken coverage of these issues is important for the city. It’s convenient that it also makes a brilliant defense of the paper’s advertising base.

  • Canada bails out Olympics budget

    The 2010 Olympics are getting another $100 million from the national and B.C. governments to cover soaring construction costs.

    The capital budget for the games has swollen 23 percent since 2002 to $520 million, despite trimming or cancellation of some projects. The spending plan came under scrutiny earlier this year in comparison to the$1.2 billion budget for the games in Turin, Italy. Vancouver organizers say they have less to build and that the venues can be completed with the current budget.

    Critics maintain that the projects still lack transparency and accountability. They charge that the true cost is hundreds of millions more because project costs have been shifted to other agencies for accounting purposes.

  • Check how candidates near you rate

    To help voters navigate through the thicket of competing political campaigns during the election season, the Municipal League of King County just published its series of candidate ratings for legislature, supreme court and Seattle city council.

    The nonpartisan community group has been rating candidates for office since 1911 based on four critieria: Involvement, Effectiveness, Character and Knowledge. The ratings are the only independent non-partisan, non-agenda driven evaluation of candidates in the area. On the group’s web site voters can see the ratings and read questionnaires filled out by the individual candidates.

    I served as a volunteer on one of the evaluation committees that met evenings throughout August to rate some candidates for legislature. I can attest to the nonpartisan nature of the process and the fairness of everyone involved (the natural result: candidates from both parties earned high and low ratings). A printed voters guide with the ratings will be available at Safeway stores and other locations in King County next week.

  • Seattle should mimic Stockholm’s traffic plan

    During the last six months Stockholm tested a sophisticated traffic-management system designed to ease congestion, cut pollution and improve the quality of life in the city, according to a story in Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal (subscription required). It’s a model that could easily be implemented in Seattle, which has a central area that’s roughly the same size and has similar geographic chokepoints for traffic.

    tolls in StockholmThe Swedish city used a congestion-pricing system that charges drivers different amounts depending on the time of day. A windshield-mounted transponder automatically deducts the tolls from the driver’s bank account every time the car passes through a checkpoint. Since the tolls rise or fall depending on congestion, drivers adjust their habits. The result is more space for bicycles, pedestrians and buses, and less time for thousands of cars to spew exhaust while stuck in traffic.

    A similar system would fit well with the Seattle’s stated goal of making the city friendlier for travel by bicycle. Stockholm ran the test and plans a referendum to decide whether to keep it. A yes vote would sustain public support better than any plan imposed by a bureaucracy would.

    Similar congestion-pricing programs have been discussed in Cascadia, where gridlock is likely to spread even if residents heavily tax themselves to pay for mass transit and road projects. The Puget Sound Regional Council years ago won a federal grant for a pilot project that would use car GPS to assess tolls on some roads. But it’s unclear how that project paid off or might be more widely implemented.

  • Region grapples with water shortage

    It’s hard to imagine in this soggy region, but water resources are under pressure.

    British Columbia is starting to run out of groundwater thanks to soaring population, more wells and climate changes including less snow, according to the latest in a series of water-related stories in The Tyee.

    Researchers don’t know exactly how much groundwater is withdrawn now, the story says. But there’s evidence of dropping acquifers, especially in the Okanogan and on Vancouver Island. With the area’s population forecast to grow by a third to one-half by 2020, alternate water sources need to be found.

    Meanwhile, in the Portland area the EPA recently designated a major aquifer under Clark County for closer consideration during construction projects. The decision doesn’t automatically stop any projects but is a sign that the health of the area’s water resources should at least be a factor.

  • Alaska Airlines may fly to Hawaii

    Alaska Airlines is working to pass federal safety hurdles that would allow it to fly long flights over water, potentially to Hawaii and Central America, according to the Puget Sound Business Journal.

    The Seattle airline remains tied up in safety and scheduling problems but is expanding to places where people from Cascadia want to go. The new certification would allow it to fly its 737-800 jets up to three hours away from land.

  • Growth-management laws still aren’t safe

    Washington’s so-called property-rights initiative, I-933, is receiving only lukewarm support from business groups that generally want to roll back land-use laws, according to a report today. Supporters of a similar measures a decade ago reportedly are taking a pass this year because they see it as a lost cause.

    Farmland threatened by initiativeDon’t be so sure. While there may be differences over this specific initiative, momentum is behind the “government causes our problems” mindset, especially in exurbs and rural parts of the state.

    Over breakfast in Concrete, Skagit County, today I noticed that the latest Sedro-Woolley Times-Courier carried an opinion piece by the Building Industry Association of Washington, laying blame for the state’s affordable housing cruch on restrictive growth-management laws. Technically the group isn’t working to pass I-933 but its efforts to undermine land-use laws will help the measure. Similar screeds are appearing around that state and could easily put I-933 over the top.

    Unfortunately the campaign against I-933 hasn’t caught fire. They talks about abstractions, like how much traffic the repealing land-use laws would supposedly cause. But it’s far from clear that those those abstractions will persuade enough voters to support the status quo in November.