One casualty of the election that hasn’t attracted much attention is the failure of the Maltby/Clearview area Public Transportation Benefit Area annexation. Voters soundly rejected the measure 8503 NO votes to 6781 YES votes. Why would voters reject this measure?
On the surface, this failure is of little consequence to most of us.
For regional transit service planners, this failure presents an obstacle to developing a comprehensive East Snohomish County plan and a north/south service strategy.
This ballot measure asked property owners in the Maltby/Clearview area along SR9 to annex into the Public Transportation Benefit Area. The PTBA is the area served by Community Transit. It would have added an important neighborhood to the service area.
Under the current plan, the areas already in the “Benefit Area” authorize the collection of .9% Sales and Use Tax (ninety cents per one hundred dollars) on transactions within the benefit area to fund Community Transit activities.
This funding enables CT to offer bus service and a number of other transit related services to our citizens. Most of the urban parts of Snohomish County are already in the “Benefit Area” and are currently served by CT.
Annexing into the system would benefit residents of the designated areas by allowing transit planners to develop routes that link south central county residents to points north and south. Considering all the discussion about congestion along the SR9 corridor, having transit service available makes good sense.
In the context of the larger system, adding this piece to the system would allow CT to develop routes that could start in Arlington and end at the county line at Woodinville. From a usefulness standpoint, not having North – South service is a real impediment to many potential bus users who don’t want to have to go to Everett to get to Snohomish from Lake Stevens.
In the long term, it will be absolutely necessary for this area to be a part of the Community Transit system. Any expectation that people will park their cars and take the bus will only materialize if the bus goes where people want to go.
I have to believe that voters were confused when they rejected this proposal. I would recommend that the CT Board spend some time educating voters in this area about the benefits compared to the cost and after a suitable time period put it back on the ballot for another try. This is an important issue in East Snohomish County.
Imagine transit service eastbound from I-5 to a transit center at SR-9 then links to King County to the south and Snohomish, Lake Stevens and Arlington to the north.
Maybe a loop route following US-2 from Snohomish to Monroe, SR-522 from Monroe to Woodinville and SR-9 from Woodinville back to Snohomish.
Workable transit will only happen if we work to make it happen.
What do we need to do to get this ball rolling?
Posted on November 17, 2008 at 11:51 am in Political commentary, Snohomish County Political Commentary | RSS feed
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No Loss for Words
I’m sorry lady, this bus goes to Gold Bar, but not Woodinville!
by Steve DanaOne casualty of the election that hasn’t attracted much attention is the failure of the Maltby/Clearview area Public Transportation Benefit Area annexation. Voters soundly rejected the measure 8503 NO votes to 6781 YES votes. Why would voters reject this measure?
On the surface, this failure is of little consequence to most of us.
For regional transit service planners, this failure presents an obstacle to developing a comprehensive East Snohomish County plan and a north/south service strategy.
This ballot measure asked property owners in the Maltby/Clearview area along SR9 to annex into the Public Transportation Benefit Area. The PTBA is the area served by Community Transit. It would have added an important neighborhood to the service area.
Under the current plan, the areas already in the “Benefit Area” authorize the collection of .9% Sales and Use Tax (ninety cents per one hundred dollars) on transactions within the benefit area to fund Community Transit activities.
This funding enables CT to offer bus service and a number of other transit related services to our citizens. Most of the urban parts of Snohomish County are already in the “Benefit Area” and are currently served by CT.
Annexing into the system would benefit residents of the designated areas by allowing transit planners to develop routes that link south central county residents to points north and south. Considering all the discussion about congestion along the SR9 corridor, having transit service available makes good sense.
In the context of the larger system, adding this piece to the system would allow CT to develop routes that could start in Arlington and end at the county line at Woodinville. From a usefulness standpoint, not having North – South service is a real impediment to many potential bus users who don’t want to have to go to Everett to get to Snohomish from Lake Stevens.
In the long term, it will be absolutely necessary for this area to be a part of the Community Transit system. Any expectation that people will park their cars and take the bus will only materialize if the bus goes where people want to go.
I have to believe that voters were confused when they rejected this proposal. I would recommend that the CT Board spend some time educating voters in this area about the benefits compared to the cost and after a suitable time period put it back on the ballot for another try. This is an important issue in East Snohomish County.
Imagine transit service eastbound from I-5 to a transit center at SR-9 then links to King County to the south and Snohomish, Lake Stevens and Arlington to the north.
Maybe a loop route following US-2 from Snohomish to Monroe, SR-522 from Monroe to Woodinville and SR-9 from Woodinville back to Snohomish.
Workable transit will only happen if we work to make it happen.
What do we need to do to get this ball rolling?
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Posted on November 17, 2008 at 11:51 am in Political commentary, Snohomish County Political Commentary | RSS feed | Reply | Trackback URL
One Comment to “I’m sorry lady, this bus goes to Gold Bar, but not Woodinville!”
November 17, 2008 at 1:13 pm
“Imagine transit service eastbound from I-5 to a transit center at SR-9 then links to King County to the south and Snohomish, Lake Stevens and Arlington to the north.”
I imagine this, I *dream* of this. It would be so nice for people who work in the Bellevue/Kirkland/Redmond area to be able to park their cars and get from here (Lake Stevens/Snohomish/Marysville/Arlington area) to their jobs (high tech, whatever) in King County. The last time I checked, this was only feasible by either driving to Everett and changing busses umpteen times (and I’m still not sure if it goes to “the East Side”) or driving all the way to Swamp Creek (at which point they might just as well continue on down I-405).
CT definitely needs to educate the necessary voters and get this on the ballot again.