Cascadia Report

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  • Seattle backsliding on bicycle plans

    Take a quick spin around north Seattle by bicycle on a Sunday afternoon and you’ll find missing links in bike routes, bike paths that abruptly end and almost 100 percent preference for cars along roads and at intersections.

    biker in fremont; seattle p-i via bikehugger.comFor the clearest example of bicyles taking a lower priority look at Fremont, where the Burke-Gilman bike trail was supposed to reopen this month after a year-long closure.

    Instead the city suddenly agreed to extend the closure for another year. The reason? The neighborhood’s top landowner apparently just started construction on an office building and doesn’t want bicyclists nearby.

    The change is one sign of backsliding on plans to make bicycling more practical. Evidence is piling up to suggest that Seattle is gutting its new bicycling master plan. For a study in contrasts, consider what Paris is planning.

    All commuters should demand Seattle do better. A sudden route closure wouldn’t be allowed if it blocked car lanes. Delaying better bicycle infrastructure simply makes it harder for the city to accommodate more people without adding to congestion.

  • Private investors right about rail corridor

    A government plan that would close the door on transit in a rail corridor through Seattle’s eastern suburbs is such a bad idea that private investors are reportedly considering a bid for the property.

    The corridor — from Renton to Snohomish — could serve as a key link in the region’s future transportation network as the city grows around it. It should be upgraded and connected to projects like the Sounder commuter rail in Tukwila and the proposed light rail line from Seattle to Redmond. A bike path also could be constructed along much of the route.

    This rail-to-trail deal stokes frustration about the Seattle area’s too little, too late approach to transportation, for example in this op-ed. What’s missing is a plan to make it pay (hint: put tolls on 405 and beef up transit to compensate). What’s upsetting is that the public sector isn’t taking a lead on this vision.

  • Spending money to make money

    The latest BusinessWeek has a summary of how Google convinced a poor North Carolina county to pay $212 million in exchange for siting a server farm there — without even getting a guarantee of how long they would be there or how many locals they would employ. Poor suckers.

    But wait. A few pages into the article there’s a table of recent corporate welfare handouts, topped by Washington’s $3.2 billion gift to Boeing in 2003 to site final assembly of the 787 in Everett. That deal surely played a part in improving perceptions of the state’s friendliness to business.

    Of course you have to spend money to make money, especially in a globalized economy. But how do you walk the fine line between losing to competition and selling out taxpayers? Unfortunately the magazine suggests just a few tentative ways to safeguard the investment.

  • Tacoma needs a sales job

    Tacoma has had it with pr. Now it needs to close a sale.

    After years of promotion as a tech-savvy livable city, it’s now looking for a team that can actually lure investment and jobs.

  • Eliminating fares wouldn’t help transit

    Collecting transit fares costs a lot of money, funds that could be better spent adding service. That’s the conclusion of this interesting report at TheTyee.ca.

    The report considers Vancouver and several transit systems in the Northwest and around the country. For King County Metro, the costs of fare collection in 2006 were about 10 percent of revenue — equal to about $8 million or 18 new buses per year, it says.

    Yet fares are hardly the biggest problem facing bus service. There must be more efficient ways to collect money (issuing annual passes, rounding the cost to the nearest dollar, etc.). But charging something probably gives people at least some sense of ownership, or a feeling that they should be getting a service in return.

  • Report: Washington’s a better place for business

    Forbes magazine ranked Washington the fifth best state in the country to do business and says the situation here is improving:

    The biggest mover (tied with Tennessee), rising from 12th to fifth place, Washington is also the only state to finish in the top five in three main categories (labor, regulatory environment and growth). And Washington’s numbers are up across the board when you look both backward and at projections into the future.

    Ratings like this are problematic by defintion. But this one, coming from a conservative business publication, is likely to come up during campaigns for governor and legislature over the next 18 months.

    The rating gives Washington kudos in multiple categories, especially growth prospects, reduced red tape and low energy costs. The magazine says this results in innovation: “Washington has had more businesses open per capita the past three years than any other state in the U.S.”

    The lowest mark was for quality of life, which includes schools. The state did well despite transportation woes (which would seem to drive up costs but don’t seem to have been a factor in the low quality of life score). The state’s tax structure wasn’t an issue.

    The magazine rated Olympia as the 10th best metropolitan area for business. Spokane, Bremerton, Portland and Eugene all finished in the top 50 (out of 200 rated). Oregon moved up three places to 28th.

  • New container port gets funding

    While infrastructure bottlenecks constrain shipping at Cascadia ports, plans are moving ahead for a brand-new container facility — one big enough to eventually handle as much freight as Tacoma’s.

    Oregon’s legislature recently approved a $60 million package to dredge the harbor at Coos Bay over the next five years. The funding hinges on a major shipping company commiting to operate there. The Oregonian called the prospect “an economic dream come true.”

    Though hurdles remain, the deal is the latest sign of more competion for ports in Vancouver, Seattle and Tacoma. It should underscore the need for more efficiency at existing ports and for transportation improvements to keep freight moving.

    The Coos Bay project reportedly includes a new jetty and $250-$750 million in terminals, rail infrastructure, a container yard, docks and wharves. Eventually it could handle 2 million 20-foot-long containers, roughly the volume at the Port of Tacoma.

  • Tapping tidal power from Puget Sound

    Tide-driven power turbines may be coming to Puget Sound. The Snohomish County energy utility is beginning research into installing generators that could power 60,000 or more homes.

    The studies would inform debate over harming the already troubled ecosystem:

    The modeling could also show whether the turbines could affect tidal currents in Puget Sound, slowing them. Some observers worry that losing such “kinetic energy” could harm places such as Hood Canal, where water circulation already is poor.

    Others believe turbines won’t mix well with endangered salmon and the marine animals and fishermen that depend on them.

    The proposal was reported a couple months ago, along with introduction of a bill by U.S. Rep. Jay Inslee to promote development of tidal energy through tax credits. That bill is now sitting in committee.

  • Losing out on the China travel market

    Sea-Tac hosted the signing of the latest U.S.-China air treaty yesterday, but it’s unlikely to host flights between the countries anytime soon.

    Shanghai Airlines; boeing.comSo the question for Seattle is whether courting a Chinese carrier makes more sense than waiting to lure a top-flight international airline. Both Hainan Airlines and Shanghai Airlines reportedly have had talks with Seattle about starting flights, and Hainan has considered linking with Alaska Airlines for connections in the U.S.

    Of course Seattle should pursue all comers to expand international service, in order to remain competitive and capitalize on visiblity around the 2010 Olympics. It should seek a Chinese carrier and continue courting major international carriers that would offer this region a premium network, for example a Cathay Pacific flight to Hong Kong. Note that Vancouver offers daily nonstops to three Chinese cities on a range of airlines.

    Any nonstop would help trade and tourism. Consider the impact on some businesses in Oregon when Delta Airlines ended its Asia flights from Portland (eventually Northwest was recruited to start Tokyo flights). But a second-tier airline won’t lure major corporate or frequent fliers who expect mileage plans and extensive networks. Smaller airlines using Seattle as a U.S. toehold would likely shift to bigger city as soon as possible (both Thai and China Eastern left Seattle for California in the 1990s).

  • Wanted: Someone to make windmills

    Driving across the wind-swept expanses of Eastern Washington is enough to make a person wonder: isn’t there potential for more wind power in Cascadia. If only legal ambiguity and NIMBYism weren’t in the way.

    Add this to the list of hurdles: a shortage of windmill makers.

    This Wall Street Journal article shows how surging global demand for turbines outstrips supply. Manufacturers are reluctant to make long-term bets since the market in the U.S. isn’t stable. Wind power requires major capital investment up front and who knows if tax incentives will continue or if siting the projects will get easier or more difficult.

    Oregon is mentioned as encouraging turbine-makers to set up in the state. That’s one way Washington could encourage development (instead of simply mandating alternative energy). Consider the possibility:

    In the U.S., more wind power was installed last year than in any country in the world — 2,454 megawatts, or more than the equivalent of two nuclear reactors. Despite the recent action, the U.S. still lags behind other countries that have spent decades nurturing wind power with subsidies and price supports. Germany has fewer wind resources — breezy, wide-open spaces — than the state of North Dakota, for instance, but has twice as much wind power as the entire U.S. Spain, with one-seventh the population of the U.S., has the same amount of wind power. Overall, only about 1% of power in the U.S. comes from wind.