Shallora- Does this make sense to you?

As a self ordained expert in traffic efficiency and urban planning, can you explain the logic, if any, to this proposal.

There is a city somewhat south of Seattle that is about to spend $65 million to build a light rail system. The light rail system will stretch (if thats the term) a full 1.6 miles from an existing Athletic/Event facility that doubles as a park n ride, allll the way to the city hall, almost 8000 feet away. It will run in out and back fashion, taking 15 minutes for the round trip, along streets that are not very busy, in an area of town without a whole lot of people. There will be a total of five stops, counting the Park n ride and the one near the city hall. Please see the following site for a reference.

http://www.soundtransit.org/link/Tacoma/tlinkfacts.htm

Currently, this area is served by one (1) bus. Its called the downtown connector. It goes a full 1.6 miles from an existing Athletic/Event facility that doubles as a park n ride, allll the way to the city hall, almost 8000 feet away. It runs in circular fashion, taking 15 minutes for the round trip, along streets that are not very busy, in an area of town without a whole lot of people. There are a total of five stops, counting the Park n ride and the one near the city hall. Please see the following site for a reference.

http://www.ptbus.pierce.wa.us/dtcon.htm

Can you, with your traffic efficiency and urban planning expertise, please explain this to us mere mortals? It doesnt seem to make a whole lot of sense to us common folk.

-- Craig Carson (craigcar@crosswinds.net), December 17, 1999

Answers

I know this answer won't please your thirst for blood, craig, but. . .

Since I don't know enough specifics about the Tacoma Link proposal you mention, I dare not try to answer your question. Could it be a frivilous project? Maybe. Maybe not. I don't really know for sure. But perhaps if we learn more, pay attention to information distributed through the group, and ASK BURNING QUESTIONS, we can find out.

In the meantime, why are you so quick to dismiss new information, especially that information that goes against everything you've known before? And why is it that you automatically want to reject a project before it's even had a chance to show you how it works?

Finally, if you're really interested in this subject (as I am), why not contact Sound Transit for yourself, and ask them (politely) to send you some more literature on the justification for a project such as this?

Perhaps that's the root of my frustration. Those in the "pro-Eyman" camp seem content to automatically - - and without thinking - - reject everything they don't understand, negating the work of THOUSANDS of people who are - - even as we speak - - trying to solve the problems for which they seem to profess.

To me, Eyman (and others like him) are the kind of people who would rather bulldoze their house down rather than fix a leaky faucet. They'd prefer to chop off their feet rather than cut their toenails, and write love letters with spray paint instead of a pen.

No, I cannot answer all your specific questions, craig, nor can you answer all mine. But as long as we're talking, progress is hopeful. That is, unless you try to get 100,000 signatures to get me to stop talking, which is exaclty what Eyman and his gang are doing with the public discussion on transit.

Prepare to be dominated by Eyman's one-sided ideas on transit. There's no discussing things with this guy: he loves to talk and hoot and holler, but when it comes to sitting down and grinding out the details, his "plan" is quickly discovered to be incomplete, one-sided, and poorly thought out. Just like the text of his I-695 initiative.

-- shallora (shallora@hotmail.com), December 17, 1999.

"Finally, if you're really interested in this subject (as I am), why not contact Sound Transit for yourself, and ask them (politely) to send you some more literature on the justification for a project such as this? "

Actually, if you will read the threads that I've already posted for you, you will see that this subject has been extensively discussed, I HAVE contacted Sound Transit, read pretty much everything they've posted, read their proposals on the USDOT web site, etc. I HAVE been following this issue since the Forward Thrust proposals in the 60s. You are the one who is ASSUMING your bias to be correct, as is pretty readily shown by YOUR lack of objectivity < I know this answer won't please your thirst for blood, craig, but. . .>

Now since you freely admit that you don't understand this issue it would seem fairly obvious that you're the one who is (self- admittedly) ignorant and is asking someone who has spent considerable time and effort studying this issue to change their fact based opinion to agree with your biased one, based on an ad hominem attack on Eyman.

Understand me, Eyman ain't der Fuherer or a cult leader. I am not sure that I could pick him out of a crowd of one. I may have seen him on television twice, and heard him on radio no more than that. My concern with Sound Transit is that it just doesn't make logistical sense to spend $5 billion or better to switch bus riders to light rail and to initiate commuter rail on economic terms greatly favorable to BNSF at great cost, but providing paltry benefits relative to congestion.

And the constant mantra by transit advocates that "we need choices" is more cultish than anything I've seen from the pro-695 people here on this website. I've got no problem with choices, but everything has a niche, and when you push it outside of it's niche it becomes very inefficient. The Space Shuttle is mass transit too, but I don't think we want to get commuters from Paine field to BFI with it.

SHOW ME FACTS AND FIGURES that Sound Transit makes sense and I'll change my mind. My research, some of which was on the threads I cited which you have apparently not taken the time to read, indicates it's a boondoggle.

If I had ever entered a debating competition where I'd initial started out with an appeal to authority (my six years in traffic efficiency and urban planning....), than done an ad hominem attack, then demonstrated my lack of objectivity by name-calling, then admitted I didn't understand the issue that I was claiming expertise with, but justified that with another ad hominem attack, ............. Gee, I wouldn't have had to wait for the judges to score the debate, my debating partner would have already dumped me and found a new partner.

-- Craig Carson (craigcar@crosswinds.net), December 17, 1999.

>If I had ever entered a debating competition where I'd >initial started out with an appeal to authority (my six years >in traffic efficiency and urban planning....)

I noted this only to point out the fact that if Eyman is so concerned about traffic issues, and professes to have all the answers, why has he never even attempted to participate in traffic and planning groups before? Yes, I've been involved for just 6 short years, but I don't think Eyman's ever been involved at all. Don't you find that curious? I do, especially considering that he professes to have all the traffic answers. If he DOES have all the answers, where did they come from? Were they given to him by God on two stone tablets? They certainly didn't originate in traffic engineering schools or planning circles, because up until this year no traffic or planning professional ever heard of him before.

It seems to me that if his answers are as credible as he claims, he shouldn't fear having his ideas scrutinized in public.

>than done an ad hominem attack, then demonstrated my lack of >objectivity by name-calling, then admitted I didn't understand the >issue that I was claiming expertise with

Whoa, whoa. I didn't say I didn't understand the issue. I only said that when it comes to the particular example of the Tacoma Link proposal - and that proposal only - it is true that I haven't studied the blueprints, and know only what I know from the Sound Transit Website. Have you seen the blueprints? I doubt it. I doubt more than 50 people in the whole state have.

This is the root flaw of Eyman's arguments: he (and his followers) continue to reject anything they can't understand, and/or have shown no interest in even learning.

If we were about to exterminate a species of bird, would we not want to at least study the bird first?

Eyman doesn't even want the bird to be born in the first place. He wants to nuke it from orbit before the egg is even hatched.

-- shallora (shallora@hotmail.com), December 17, 1999.

shallora-

"Have you seen the blueprints? I doubt it" You AGAIN show your ignorance. There ain't no blueprints. The environmental impact statement isn't done yet. Blueprints are for engineering and construction purposes. Where the rails go, whether the station is an A-frame or an open air terminal, and how you connect the electricity to it has no real bearing on the logistics of what you are doing. Your answers betray an abysmal ignorance of systems engineering, so much ignorance, in fact, that I must start to doubt your assertions that you have studied in urban planning or anything involving major construction projects for that matter.

So add to the list above a feigned expertise, an attempt to obfuscate with irrelevancies (Have you seen the blueprints? I doubt it. I doubt more than 50 people in the whole state have. ), and an additional ad hominem attack (He wants to nuke it from orbit before the egg is even hatched.) that seems plagiarized from an old Sigourney Weaver movie.

I am about to give up on you shallora, you are not showing me much in the way of being someone that one can rationally debate with.

Why don't you sit down and study this one issue as given in the original question. It's worthy of study, $65 million of YOUR TAX DOLLARS that could otherwise be used to fund Public Health clinics is riding on us getting this right. So study it and come back with FACTS. Don't tell me about Tim Eyman, the man is irrelevant to the discussion. I don't care if you'd like to tow him out to sea and sink him with naval gunfire, it isn't applicable to the issue in question. So read up on the Tacoma Link light rail and try to come back with a succinct coherent argument backed up by FACTS as to why it's a good or bad idea.

Shouldn't be too hard for someone that's put all those years into urban planning.

-- (craigcar@crosswinds.net), December 17, 1999.

"It seems to me that if his answers are as credible as he claims, he shouldn't fear having his ideas scrutinized in public. "

Dang! He's asking a couple hundred thousand people to judge whether or not it ought to be on the ballot and then EVERY voter in the state to judge the merits of his ideas, after the Secretary of State invites opponents to publish their article in the voters guide and after the pros and cons of this initiative are discussed on the editorial pages of every paper in the state of Washington.

Imagine him trying to slip one by us like that. The VERY IDEA!

-- (zowie@hotmail.com), December 17, 1999.

Shallora--"I know this answer won't please your thirst for blood, craig, but. . ."

If thirst for blood includes a distaste for dogma, feel free to call me Dracula.

"In the meantime, why are you so quick to dismiss new information, especially that information that goes against everything you've known before? And why is it that you automatically want to reject a project before it's even had a chance to show you how it works?"

Umm, I might have missed something, but I've not seen you provide anything remotely resembling new information. Transit has been discussed to death on this forum. If you were at all courteous, you would spend a wee bit of time reading past threads on this topic.

"Finally, if you're really interested in this subject (as I am), why not contact Sound Transit for yourself, and ask them (politely) to send you some more literature on the justification for a project such as this?"

If you were addressing me, this advice might be well noted. Unfortunately, you're addressing this advice to someone with extremely strong opinions on transit. The basis for these opinions appear quite well researched. Again, I ask that you pardon the snort.

"Perhaps that's the root of my frustration. Those in the "pro-Eyman" camp seem content to automatically - - and without thinking -- reject everything they don't understand, negating the work of THOUSANDS of people who are - - even as we speak - - trying to solve the problems for which they seem to profess."

As if this is any different from the anti-Eyman (I find it your wording remarkable. . .Washington now has pro and anti Eymanism) people, it's called human nature.

In any event, isn't the word THOUSANDS a large slice of hyperbole?

"To me, Eyman (and others like him) are the kind of people who would rather bulldoze their house down rather than fix a leaky faucet. They'd prefer to chop off their feet rather than cut their toenails, and write love letters with spray paint instead of a pen."

Grin.

"No, I cannot answer all your specific questions, craig, nor can you answer all mine. But as long as we're talking, progress is hopeful. That is, unless you try to get 100,000 signatures to get me to stop talking, which is exaclty what Eyman and his gang are doing with the public discussion on transit.

Hyperbole ala mode. . .YUM.

They're not stopping the public discussion on transit. If anything, they're renewing the public discussion on transit.

Oops I forgot, it's only a discussion as long as everyone agrees with your perspective. It's called groupthink.

"Prepare to be dominated by Eyman's one-sided ideas on transit. There's no discussing things with this guy: he loves to talk and hoot and holler, but when it comes to sitting down and grinding out the details, his "plan" is quickly discovered to be incomplete, one-sided, and poorly thought out. Just like the text of his I-695 initiative."

Out of curiousity, have you ever watched a political discussion? Politics has nothing to do with rationality. It has to do designing a reasonable message and promoting it widely. In my experience, the person who stays on message *wins.*

Anyone else wish chez would come back?

-- Brad (knotwell@my-deja.com), December 17, 1999.

"Anyone else wish chez would come back? " I miss chez. Not badly enough to bail him out from sitting in jail since the WTO, but I DO miss him.

-- (zowie@hotmail.com), December 17, 1999.

No, I don't miss chez, I'm missing a witty response from shallora to craig's last post. You don't think chez is cross dressi.. um posting do you?

-- Marsha (acorn_nut@hotmail.com), December 17, 1999.

"No, I don't miss chez, I'm missing a witty response from shallora to craig's last post. You don't think chez is cross dressi.. um posting do you?"

I don't think it's chez. chez was certainly dogmatic, but he was also clever and rational.

-- Brad (knotwell@my-deja.com), December 17, 1999.

"I'm missing a witty response from shallora to craig's last post. " I don't think he's capable of more than 50% of a witty response, at least not from anything he(she? What gender is a shallora)'s shown so far.

-- (zowie@hotmail.com), December 17, 1999.

Shallora:

Who's Tim Eyman? I keep reading all of your posts, and you seem to be very interested in this Eyman fellow, but not too interested in defending RIDICULOUS spending habits by our neo-fascist government. Start your own initiative to create an MVET tax. Go out, get signatures, defend the position. But, I'll give you one bit of advice: don't get a lot of rich, fat-cats who own large corporations, or live in million dollar houses to back you. That's how the ANTI 695 crowd lost.

-- Paul Oss (jnaut@earthlink.net), December 17, 1999.

shallora-

Still waiting for a response.

-- (zowie@hotmail.com), December 19, 1999.

shallora is too busy planning new signs to build to answer any questions.

I guess traffic planning in shallora's eyes is the attempt to cause traffic to look at the signs that are built by the company he/she works at

-- maddjak (maddjak@hotmail.com), December 20, 1999.

shallora-

STILL waiting for a response (now that you're back).

-- (zowie@hotmail.com), December 28, 1999.

shallora-

THIS IS THE PLACE!

-- (zowie@hotmail.com), December 29, 1999.

Zow: What was the question? The direct question seems to be lost amid all this hootin' and hollerin' about somebody named 'chez' or 'cheese' or whatever.

-- shallora (shallora@hotmail.com), December 29, 1999.

Shallora,

Just helping to move this thread up, and help you find it!

-- Marsha (acorn_nut@hotmail.com), December 29, 1999.

Shallora-

I think THIS is the pertinent paragraph:

Why don't you sit down and study this one issue as given in the original question. It's worthy of study, $65 million of YOUR TAX DOLLARS that could otherwise be used to fund Public Health clinics is riding on us getting this right. So study it and come back with FACTS. Don't tell me about Tim Eyman, the man is irrelevant to the discussion. I don't care if you'd like to tow him out to sea and sink him with naval gunfire, it isn't applicable to the issue in question. So read up on the Tacoma Link light rail and try to come back with a succinct coherent argument backed up by FACTS as to why it's a good or bad idea.

Shouldn't be too hard for someone that's put all those years into urban planning.

-- Mark Stilson (mark842@hotmail.com), December 29, 1999.

"Zow: What was the question? The direct question seems to be lost amid all this hootin' and hollerin' about somebody named 'chez' or 'cheese' or whatever. "

As Craig would no doubt say, chaff and flares!

Can you please quit the obfuscating, making up sob stories, feigning ignorance (although that's your most inherently believable tactic), and just try to put together a rational assessment of this one small transportation project....... based of course on your six years of training in urban planning and traffic efficiency?

.

-- (zowie@hotmail.com), December 29, 1999.

Now Shallora can't find the original question at the TOP OF THE THREAD SHE JUST POSTED TO THIS MORNING?

-- Marsha (acorn_nut@hotmail.com), December 29, 1999.

"Answer the question, shallora!"

Oh, I see. You want me to answer a question. . . THAT I ALREADY ANSWERED!!!!!!

Did you all not read my first posting at the top of this page? Is that not answering the question? Why should I post it AGAIN and waste valuable time and space? Is that not redundant, anyway? And why are you all so obsessed about getting an answer out of me (that I already answered), rather than doing your own research?

"Answer the question, shallora! Answer the question, shallora!" I did. It's there for you to read.

"Answer the question, shallora!" I did. (As if any answer I give isn't immediately rejected by you Eyman minions, anyway.)

"Answer the question, shallora! Just answer it!" I already have. Scroll up to the top of this very page. Waayyyyyyyy up. I'll wait here for you to do so.

Have you scrolled up yet to the top? Then you see my answer. If you don't see my answer, than you haven't scrolled up to my first posting at the top.

"Answer the question, shallora! Do it NOW!" The answer is there. It's signed, sealed, dated, and delivered a long time ago.

"Why don't you answer the question, shallora?" (Sigh) I answered the question a long time ago. I answered the question. Why do you ignore it?

Read the answer. It's in English (I think).

Now I've REALLY got to get out into the field today. Won't be back until tomorrow. . . .

. . .and please, I answered the damn question. So enough already, okay? It's not my fault you can't scroll up and read it for yourself.

-- shallora (shallora@hotmail.com), December 29, 1999.

>SHOW ME FACTS AND FIGURES that Sound Transit makes sense >and I'll change my mind.

BTW, if this is the "follow up" question that you wish for me to answer, it's all available on the Sound Transit's Website, or by mail, or through the King County government offices (although I think the city has it, too).

Those papers present it much better than I can on a text-only forum such as this.

I didn't put the Sound Transit plan together any more than you guys put the Federal Highway plan together back in the '50s, so anything either of us present is mostly heresay, anyway.

I'll tell you what: If YOU can show ME facts and figures (statistics, that is) that makes sense of our highway and road system that's clogging the Puget Sound area, I'll retort with some statistics of my own. And then we can do this back and forth for many weeks until all your statistics are gone as are mine.

OR, we can simply look back at the public record, which shows that residents in a three-county area OVERWHELMINGLY supported the Sound Transit initiative, which is a direct result of our archaic, overclogged, and ridiculous highway system.

Now, if you want to OVERTURN the Sound Transit vote, which was favorably voted on by the people of the three-county area, than that's fine. Let's hold an election in the SAME counties that voted for it, which is also the ONLY counties affected by it!

Would you ask the residents of Chicago to vote on Seattle issues? No. Would you ask the residents of California to vote on a Washington initiative? No. So why are you asking the ENTIRE state of Washington to re-visit an issue that ONLY affects the residents of the King County area? Duh!

I say, if we're going to allow residents from other counties to vote on King County issues, than we should allow King County residents to vote on issues not affecting them in other parts of the state. Let's have Seattle residents vote for the mayor of Tacoma! Let's have Jefferson County residents pass levies upon the people of Kitsap! Let's have Kitsap residents overturn every law in Renton! Sound silly? Well that's essentially how ridiculous Eyman's new initiative is!

Don't you see? If the residents of King County voted to tax themselves for the purpose of a new light rail line (which they did overwhelmingly), why should residents in Spokane have any say in the matter? Do Spokane residents know more about King County issues than King County residents? I doubt it. But that's what Eyman wants.

-- shallora (shallora@hotmail.com), December 29, 1999.

I take that as a NO, she won't answer the question.

I guess it did answer the gender/identity question I had earlier....

-- Marsha (acorn_nut@hotmail.com), December 29, 1999.

Chaff and flares! One would have thought that someone who had studied urban planning and traffic efficiency for SIX LONG YEARS would have done a little better.

-- (craigcar@crosswinds.net), December 29, 1999.

shallora- If you'd like to see the facts behind this issue, go to the thread "We know LINK is a loser, but what about Sounder?" Craig pretty well destroyed Patrick on that thread. It might be a cheap lesson for you to learn, before you venture anything OTHER than "chaff and flares."

zowie

-- (zowie@hotmail.com), December 29, 1999.