You best leave your car at home as the powers that be turn downtown Seattle into an auto-free, rich-folks worker’s paradise.
We would hate to be the lane camper in the fast lane of transportation planning around here. So we’re going with the flow.
Clearly, the powers that be in Seattle, the Creeping Slowdown City, are well on their way to making the downtown area an auto-free, rich-folks worker’s paradise. Mr. Wrap, being a good American, is behind this 100 percent.
Alas, not everyone is wise enough to share the foresight of the newly arrived transpo-hipsters. In fact, hundreds of thousands of Legacy Citizens — those older / lazier / less-fortunates who live in Arlington or Carnation or Monroe because they A) clearly have poor taste and B) can’t afford Green Lake or Madrona — keep yammering away about the need to penetrate the Moated Compound that is Seattle to do superfluous things such as work, attend school, spend money, or conduct business.
The careful observer will note a consistent thread in the plaintive wailing of these nabobs: They inexplicably fail to grasp how a mostly car-free city can serve as the central hub of a growing region still stuck, by choice or necessity, in cars. Like monkeys flinging poo at the glass of their cages, they keep asking vexing questions, such as:
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• Since people commuting into town from the burbs now (rightfully) are being encouraged to cycle into town from Puyallup, Snohomish or Sumas, how many days in advance of their class or work shift should they depart?
• What’s the best bike, fender, headlight, feeding tube, living will, goggles and Lycra-tights setup for the above purpose?
• Those who find the above untenable, or who perhaps don’t have legs, will need to resort to existing rail services to reach the outskirts of The Moated City. What’s the best option here? Getting on the Sounder train that shuts down every time it rains, or getting in line now for that light-rail line to Lynnwood set to open in 2079?
Do tell.
More middle-class truancy:
Seriously, Folks: While we kid the corporate minions turning the place into Sea Francisco (sans BART), the above questions would be good ones to ask key regional leaders who have the political clout to institute a truly regional solution to this white-hot quality-of-life issue. Except there aren’t any.
Speaking of Non-Livability: For what should be obvious reasons, people attempting to park near their jobs or business appointments downtown henceforth will have their paychecks direct-deposited into the city’s parking fund. At 6 p.m. Friday, those curbside pay stations will dispense the remaining balance of earnings, if any.
This Just In: After the recent big reveal that commuting in the 1-Percenter Collector / Non-Distributor Lanes on 405 might cost as much as $10 one way, the new electronic-tolling gizmo “Flex Pass” has been renamed the “Sux Pass.”
Suggested Names for Microsoft Internet Explorer Replacement Browser: Internet Impaler. MonoChrome. Netflax. Windows Identity Thiever. Spit Take. ClipWit. Bobo.
And Finally: The overturning of that load of fish that shut down the entire city last week occurred during a weeklong celebration of the birthday of Ivar Haglund. Somewhere below the viaduct, a visage of a crusty old salt with a captain’s hat was strumming his ukulele and smirking.