Pierce County Executive John Ladenburg responded to my blog post yesterday about the attorney general's race.

Based on an earlier item from the TNT's Political Buzz blog, I had noted that House Majority Leader Rep. Lynn Kessler, D-Hoquiam, had said she wouldn't endorse Ladenburg for AG – because Ladenburg had opposed her bill requiring local governments to record their executive sessions.

Ladenburg says that it it was all a misunderstanding.

Dave, I did not oppose the Kessler bill. In fact, I never took a position on the bill. The article in the Vancouver paper was wrong.

I ...

The City Council is scheduled to vote Tuesday on a resolution that would put the question to voters in November.

Currently, the City Charter says no one can serve more than 10 consecutive years as mayor or council member, or any combination thereof. That usually limits council members to two four-year terms, but it's possible for someone to serve longer if they are appointed to an unfinished term.

The resolution proposed by Councilwoman Connie Ladenburg would ask voters if they want to repeal that section of the charter and remove term limits ...

Read former Washington State Secretary of Transportation Doug McDonald’s articles (3) on transit & transportation in the Puget Sound region at the Crosscut site.

Here’s an excerpt:

“Successful organizations build their strategies around meeting customer-driven needs.

The customer-driven mission here is to help move ordinary people where they need to go.

It’s not to lay a few ribbons of expensive rail lines where it seems suitable and convenient to engineering firms, public relations consultants, contractors, and rail buffs.

Sound Transit has to back off the merchandising of this expensive and one-dimensional plan that most people don’t need and won’t use and enter a collaboration to see how all transit can best work for all the people of the region.

The ridership numbers for all the systems are the best place to start the planning.”

We couldn’t have said it better. Read all three articles by McDonald at Crosscut:

Transit Train Wreck: The case against more light rail

Transit Train Wreck: Revealing Bus Route Ridership

Transit Train Wreck: Here’s how to do buses right

It’s drawn the most support at West Seattle public meetings about what will replace the “central waterfront” section of The Viaduct, which the state vows to take down 2012 no matter what — but the possible option shown above, a retrofit, is one of three options now totally out of the running, according to a state/city/county briefing this afternoon, presented by these three government representatives (left to right, Bob Powers from the city, Ron Paananen from the state, and Ron Posthuma from the county/Metro). We liveblogged the briefing in detail here; ...

Eight Viaduct replacement ideas on the table KING5.com, WA - 7 hours ago ... but another calls for using deep tunnel boring technology under downtown, like that used by Sound Transit building the new light rail line.

Driving no longer fun and getting increasingly expensive Seattle Post Intelligencer - 9 hours ago He'll get a vociferous argument from mass transit advocates, and Sound Transit will offer the kind of tenacious resistance of a bureaucracy defending itself ...

We’re still working on our summary of the briefing we liveblogged earlier - where state/city/county reps presented the 8 “scenarios” now under consideration to replace the “central waterfront” section of the Alaskan Way Viaduct - but in the meantime, we wanted to let you know the meeting materials including artist renderings have just been posted online; find them here (look for Scenario A through Scenario H). Share This

(3:13 pm note, the briefing is now over - all notes below - we will write into a summary later.) We’re downtown, 24th floor of the Wells Fargo Building (view above is from the briefing room), headquarters of the Alaskan Way Viaduct and Seawall Replacement Program, for the briefing on the Alaskan Way Viaduct progress so far - will post notes here as it goes. NOTES: 8 possible scenarios identified so far … A-C surface, D-E above ground solutions, F-H are below ground “SR 99 components.” No longer any 6 lane replacements in the solutions ...

The new light rail line under construction in Jerusalem has a unique bridge at the entrance to Jerusalem. It is also known as the Bridge of Strings. Like with all light rail lines, the project has been controversial and charged with being over budget, late and making traffic congestion worse. Heat over troubled bridge:

Nevertheless, the full picture is much less rosy than the PR. While it is true that Jaffa Road will turn into a pedestrian mall once the ...

WOW. According to a Washington Policy Center study: “Attracting a new rider to light rail costs 16 to 47 times as much as attracting a new rider to a traditional bus system“.

Read the Washington Policy Center’s research on light rail and download the study at:

http://www.washingtonpolicy.org/Centers/transportation/policybrief/08_Ennis_LightRail.pdf

The Facts on Light Rail: A Comparative Analysis of Light Rail Systems in Six West Coast Cities

by Michael Ennis
Director, Center for Transportation

As Washington cities consider whether light rail is right for them, this study on the performance of the six existing systems on the West Coast provides factual, real life examples of what taxpayers could expect here. Policymakers and the public should consider whether diverting transportation taxes away from other programs and services is worth the opportunity costs. Based on the data, this analysis concludes that it is not.