Seattle Monorail: Little train that can?

Sunday, June 5, 2005

SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER EDITORIAL BOARD

It looks as if Seattle's little train that could really can.

The Seattle Monorail Project is still a long way from being built and operating, but the agency's management and staff have come to a major milestone by reaching an agreement in principle with Cascade Monorail Co. to design, build, operate and maintain a 14-mile monorail system.

Asked to describe what it is that Seattle taxpayers will be buying in the tentative deal, SMP Executive Director Joel Horn summed it up as "a 14-mile automated, elevated, monorail system with an operating system and guideway to accommodate 20 stations (although 16 are currently in the contract), with a train configuration that is the most modern Hitachi makes, with the latest technology and the capacity to meet and exceed ridership forecasts through 2030."

Horn emphasizes, though, that it is more, that the negotiated project incorporates "a lot of the social goals and values that are important to Seattle." Those include a responsible labor agreement, a diversity management program and environmental sustainability.

It all sounds remarkably like what was promised Seattle voters when they approved the project's funding in 2002. The devil is, of course, in the details, and there are reportedly eight volumes of details that have been negotiated on this project. It will take a couple of weeks of lawyers' vetting, followed by public hearings and approval of both the SMP Board of Directors and the Seattle City Council before the project is officially on its way.

But for now, monorail supporters and everyone involved with the agency have earned a moment of celebration and congratulation. It has at times been against all odds that the project has gotten this far, beginning with its humble roots as a taxi driver's daydream pitted against the powers that be.


Will the Seattle Monorail Project be built?
66.8% Yes, the voters in Seattle have backed it multiple times and will insist that it be built.	29.2% No, it's too big, too expensive and too complex a project for Seattle to pull off.
4.1% Don't know or don't care
Total Votes: 391