King County Executive Ron Sims today released his recommendations for guiding future Metro Transit
services and capital investments if voters in November adopt a measure to preserve and enhance public transportation.
"King County residents rate traffic as our number one problem. It is a critical factor in our growth management planning,
our economy and our overall quality of life. The last several months I have been out in the community
discussing transportation, and everywhere I go I hear that our neighbors want us to address our traffic
congestion, and they want us to do it now," said Sims. "My vision is to keep the buses moving, enhance
Metro Transit service, and focus on projects that provide congestion relief."
In a letter to the King County Council this morning, Executive Sims identified transit improvements and traffic relief
projects that could be implemented by Metro Transit if the two-tenths of one-percent sales tax proposal
is approved in November. As proposed, the two-tenths would raise $80 million to restore bus service set to be eliminated as a result of Initiative 695. Funds run out early next year and the Legislature gave counties this local option tax to save local transit.
Sims was joined by King County Councilmembers Louise Miller, Greg Nickels,
Dwight Pelz and Maggi Fimia
for the release of the two-tenths of one-percent proposal. Sims recommends:
- Using revenues approved by the voters to enhance the overall transit system by strategically adding another 575,000 annual service hours over the next six years to the 3.3 million annual service hours currently being provided.
- New services recommended throughout the County include added commuter services from park-and-ride lots;
- New connections between Eastside employment centers;
- New service from Sea-Tac airport to Kent and Auburn; and
- More frequent service will be offered on key corridors
- Future transit-related improvements that make bus movement easier and quicker, such as:
- Expanding park-and-ride lots at Eastgate and Northgate;
- Construction of new park-and-ride lots at Pacific Highway and Issaquah Highlands;
- Continuing the County's highly successful transit oriented development program;
- Providing transit passengers in a four-county region with new "Smart Card" technology that will make it even easier to transfer between bus, rail and ferries;
- Devoting $5 million to improve bus shelters and bus zones throughout the County;
- Relocating and improving the Burien Transit Hub as part of that city's downtown revitalization effort;
- Expanding Metro Transit's bus fleet to meet the needs of the enhanced service; and
- Traffic signal synchronization to jump-start a six-year regional initiative to upgrade traffic signals to get buses moving on major transportation corridors. Successful pilot project partnerships are already underway in Seattle with others under consideration. This will help move buses faster, and it will also benefit general-purpose traffic. The two-tenths measure will be able to fund about half of the countywide synchronization program as planned.
Councilmember Nickels said, "This region has thousands and thousands of people who depend on transit to run the business of their lives. This package provides for the preservation and enhancement of our transit system -- the best system in North America."
Councilmember Miller said, "The suburban communities around Seattle will benefit greatly from the expanded transit service, new and improved park-and-ride lots and the traffic signal synchronization."
Sims agreed with Miller, and, in a separate action, he also today unveiled a portion of his 2001 transportation budget that will reduce traffic back-ups and get vital road projects constructed more quickly to reduce traffic congestion on key transportation corridors. It will also fund the remainder of the synchronization program.
"It is my intent to use every possible tool to tackle traffic congestion. Therefore, my 2001 budget proposal calls for issuing general obligation bonds backed by dollars in our Road Fund to generate up to $117 million over the next six years to synchronize traffic signals and pay for road construction in unincorporated King County communities," Sims said. "This funding approach not only provides money for smoother traffic flow and road construction, but gets critical projects on the ground years ahead of schedule."
"By taking this next important step toward transportation reform, I am proposing we leverage our buying power to upgrade traffic signals, increase road capacity and put the brakes on congestion," Sims said.
The sale of bonds to reduce congested intersections and accelerate road construction builds on flexible funding approaches put in place by Sims in 1998. The bonds would be sold over the course of four years with revenues earmarked for signal upgrades and interconnects right-of-way acquisition and project construction.
Some key aspects proposed in Sims' 2001 budget include:
- Reducing administration and overhead, and implementing efficiencies that will save $14.6 million and those savings will be put back into direct service;
- A fare increase;
- Earmarking $5.2 million over the next six years to update traffic signal controls and interconnects to improve signal timing on Regional Arterial Network corridors;
- Widening nearly four miles of Novelty Hill Road between Redmond's city limits to 244th Avenue Northeast to provide added capacity;
- Improving the intersection of Benson Road Southeast and Carr Road to provide additional turn lanes to enhance traffic flow;
- Widening Carr Road between SR-167 to Benson Road Southeast to provide additional east-west travel capacity;
- Adding a continuous left turn lane on 124th Avenue Northeast between Northeast 132nd Street and Northeast 145th Street to improve traffic flow;
- Widening Northeast 124th Street from four to five lanes between Willows Road and SR-202, and
- Adding more travel lanes on Issaquah-Fall City Road from about Southeast 48th Street to Klahanie Drive.
Sims' 2001 proposed transportation budget measures will be included in his 2001 budget that will be forwarded to the King County Council in mid-October. The two-tenths of one-percent sales tax for transit improvements will be on the November general ballot. Taken as a whole, Sims said, "we can keep people, goods, services and our economy moving."
