We need light rail.

1. Buses get stuck in traffic.

2. Mr. Freeman, don't we need light rail at some point? If not now, when?

Let's get going.

I will not support the light rail initiative. I do not want my sales taxes increased for an initiative that has no end date, no dollar figure, and leaves the sales tax open to be voted on again in the future. I drive for Metro transit and I do believe that adding more bus service is the way to go. There are so many people taking the bus now than ever before. More buses,and more roads is the answer. Not one line that the people have to get to and it only goes one place. I do not trust this light rail system at all and the people in charge of it. If they have nothing to hide, then put a money figure on it, and an end date.

Prop 1 is another boondoggleby selected leaders want to spend our hard earned dollars on their pet project to make the region "Look Progressive". No financial case can be made to support this as is evidenced by the huge expenditures on the existing light rail system far in excess of original forcasts. This Prop 1 is just another black hole to pour money into. This pasengers for this system will substantially be people from existing busses without taking many cars off the streets. It is not nearly as flexible as is required in our varied region.

A far better sollution is to add better bus service and add some road lanes to solve the real traffic problems.

Prop 1 is another boondoggleby selected by leaders to spend our hard earned dollars on their pet project to make the region "Look Progressive". No financial case can be made to support this. Just look at the huge expenditures on the existing light rail system far in excess of the original forecasts. This Prop 1 is just another black hole to pour money into. This system will primarily move people from existing busses to light rail without taking many cars off the streets. It is not nearly as flexible as is required in our varied region.

A far better sollution is to add better bus service and add some road lanes to solve the real traffic congestion problems.

What are we waiting for! We are 20 years behind the times already. Adding more busses to the already jammed highways will do little to relieve traffic congestion. It may take years to see the results of light rail... another reason to start NOW! Adding more roads does not help the long term solution of removing cars from the highways. It also just promotes urban sprawl, which is the last thing we need.

I'm sorry, but Sound Transit light rail is a total waste of tax payer dollars! The solution is clear ... increase our already fine bus system. Add more express buses to high traffic destinations: Sea Tac, UW, All Boeing locations, Ft. Lewis, Downtown, Everett, Bellevue, Federal Way, Tacoma, Olympia and others as needed.

I travel from Puyallup to SeaTac twice a month. I used to pay parking at SeaTac ($10.00+ per day) plus gasoline to drive to the airport. Two years ago I discovered the SeaTac Express bus from the 512 Park & Ride to SeaTac's front door. What a relief! The bus has NEVER been late, they are comfortable and no stress driving I-5 or 167 to get to the airport on time! Not to mention the $2.50 each way fare!

I had never even been on a local bus before - now I'm sold on bus transit! The # of riders has increased substantially on this bus over the past year. More and more people are discovering what I did ... bus travel is dependable, comfortable, more economical and less stressful than driving!

Sound Transit has hidden agendas; property owners looking to make a fortune off the sale of property for train depots, huge $$$ to contractors for building the system, big management $$ for the company ... and it NEVER gets finished on time! Let the railroad - BNSF and AmTrack - provide commuter trains to destinations like Everett and Olympia, their tracks are already there!

Let's use our tax $$$ for projects we can use NOW, not for something our grandchildren will consider obsolete once it's built! We need solutions NOW, not in 15 years!

Vote NO against Proposition One - It's a waste of your tax $$$ - Support increased bus transportation and then USE IT! You won't be disappointed!

I'm sorry, but Sound Transit light rail is a total waste of tax payer dollars! The solution is clear ... increase our already fine bus system. Add more express buses to high traffic destinations: Sea Tac, UW, All Boeing locations, Ft. Lewis, Downtown, Everett, Bellevue, Federal Way, Tacoma, Olympia and others as needed.

I travel from Puyallup to SeaTac twice a month. I used to pay parking at SeaTac ($10.00+ per day) plus gasoline to drive to the airport. Two years ago I discovered the SeaTac Express bus from the 512 Park & Ride to SeaTac's front door. What a relief! The bus has NEVER been late, they are comfortable and no stress driving I-5 or 167 to get to the airport on time! Not to mention the $2.50 each way fare!

I had never even been on a local bus before - now I'm sold on bus transit! The # of riders has increased substantially on this bus over the past year. More and more people are discovering what I did ... bus travel is dependable, comfortable, more economical and less stressful than driving!

Sound Transit has hidden agendas; property owners looking to make a fortune off the sale of property for train depots, huge $$$ to contractors for building the system, big management $$ for the company ... and it NEVER gets finished on time! Let the railroad - BNSF and AmTrack - provide commuter trains to destinations like Everett and Olympia, their tracks are already there!

Let's use our tax $$$ for projects we can use NOW, not for something our grandchildren will consider obsolete once it's built! We need solutions NOW, not in 15 years!

Vote NO against Proposition One - It's a waste of your tax $$$ - Support increased bus transportation and then USE IT! You won't be disappointed!

I'm sorry, but Sound Transit light rail is a total waste of tax payer dollars! The solution is clear ... increase our already fine bus system. Add more express buses to high traffic destinations: Sea Tac, UW, All Boeing locations, Ft. Lewis, Downtown, Everett, Bellevue, Federal Way, Tacoma, Olympia and others as needed.

I travel from Puyallup to SeaTac twice a month. I used to pay parking at SeaTac ($10.00+ per day) plus gasoline to drive to the airport. Two years ago I discovered the SeaTac Express bus from the 512 Park & Ride to SeaTac's front door. What a relief! The bus has NEVER been late, they are comfortable and no stress driving I-5 or 167 to get to the airport on time! Not to mention the $2.50 each way fare!

I had never even been on a local bus before - now I'm sold on bus transit! The # of riders has increased substantially on this bus over the past year. More and more people are discovering what I did ... bus travel is dependable, comfortable, more economical and less stressful than driving!

Sound Transit has hidden agendas; property owners looking to make a fortune off the sale of property for train depots, huge $$$ to contractors for building the system, big management $$ for the company ... and it NEVER gets finished on time! Let the railroad - BNSF and AmTrack - provide commuter trains to destinations like Everett and Olympia, their tracks are already there!

Let's use our tax $$$ for projects we can use NOW, not for something our grandchildren will consider obsolete once it's built! We need solutions NOW, not in 15 years!

Vote NO against Proposition One - It's a waste of your tax $$$ - Support increased bus transportation and then USE IT! You won't be disappointed!

We need light rail now.
The bus system is subject to the same problems that automobiles are – road conditions and traffic congestion. Expanding the bus system cannot work without expanding roads; it has been proven over and over again the citizens of the Puget Sound area are adamantly opposed to expanding roads.
Light rail is our only chance to solve our transportation problems.
We need light rail; we need it now.

Light rail works well in Portland, San Jose, San Diego and countless other cities. Bus transit and rail transit are both necessary components of a complete transportation system. Bus transit is needed where service frequency can't support rail and to feed riders to stations. Rail can provide a more rapid trip through heavily developed areas than a bus trying to move through traffic. We need options to roads.

The problem is that people get sucked into the hype and don't pay any attention to the proposal.

As a huge advocate for transportation solutions tailored to fit the situation, and who has pushed Sound Transit to put together a reasonable package, I can tell you that is proposal is a complete joke.

The disaster in the making is the I-90 proposal. This takes 25 percent of the lane capacity away, pushing busses into mainline traffic with cars, replaces is with less capacity even at the best case projections, and is a solution looking for a problem.

Only one train can be on the bridge deck at a time, will be forced to slow to a snails pace, and would be completely shut down in moderate winds. Bellevue doesn't want this cutting a swath through wetlands and residential areas so it will be put underground from I-90 to downtown, and would only emerge when it hit the Bell Red Corridor.

Vote no. Doing something for the wrong reasons is unacceptable.

We need Prop 1 and Light Rail about as much as those people on the Eastside need to own a Hummer.

Prop 1 is a terrible waste of money. It is the largest tax increase in our area's history. It would increase the sales tax in Seattle to 9.5%! This tax increase could last forever. The worst thing you can do in a recession is to raise taxes. How can Sound Transit hit everyone with the largest tax increase ever, when many people are having trouble paying their bills?

Increasing the bus system is much more cost-effective. And ADDING BUSES REDUCES TRAFFIC CONGESTION. The people who talk about "adding buses to crowded highways" just don't have a clue. Buses TAKE CARS OFF OF ROADS! Just as Pat Block wrote above -- he used to drive his car to the airport, but now he takes the bus. The bus took his car off of the road! One bus can take up to 90 cars off the road at a time. Buses don't ADD TO traffic. Buses take cars OFF OF crowded highways.

If you add 50 buses per hour to I-90, for example, that could remove up to 4,500 cars per hour from I-90. Fifty buses take up a lot less room on the highway than 4,500 cars.

People are driving cars now because buses are so crowded they can't take any more passengers. Add buses, and many people who now are driving cars will take the bus instead.

Just what counties are paying or are you going to say screw you all and stick it to all taxpayers in Washington state

I really am upset that this is being pushed by the enviro. groups. They haven't even bothered to do a carbon analysis of this project. Building a completely new infrastructure and all that tunneling dumps so much new carbon into the atmosphere that it will take 60 years for there to be a net environmental gain from Prop. 1. This is good to combat global warming? We can use the existing infrastructure and put buses on the road NOW for a fraction of the cost and without such a dramatic environmental cost up front. I have never been late because of taking the bus system and I am in favor of MORE bus-only lanes on the highways. NO NEW highways, just start changing the way we use the ones that exist now. I have seen no data making a positive case for more light rail.

Portland has light rail too... and it's not used much. Why do we think we'll be any different? I will vote this prop down every single time it comes back up. I'm down right angry they keep up the lies and attempt to push it through. I will vote NO NO NO.

I refuse to support this boondoggle which has been a moneypit for far too long. We were sold a bill of goods on this project which has made a lot of consultants rich with very few results.

Tell you what, I'll vote yes to this proposition when I stop paying for the last one which said I wouldn't be billed past 2006.

I don't ride the bus because of the amount of crime that goes on at bus stops and in the back of busses. I used to ride the bus, but after witnessing several arguments and shoving, profanities, and no action on the part of the driver (I don't really blame them though. People get mad if the driver slows them down, but don't want to do anything about the few people making the ride uncomfortable for many.), I no longer ride our busses. I would prefer to ride public transit, but not at risk of personal harm or injury. I've seen/ridden on rail at Portland, Vancouver BC, and San Fran, and they seem to be so much cleaner and safer and efficient than our busses. As an added bonus, you can actually walk around a rail car without people looking at you like you're crazy. On an hour & forty five minute ride into Seattle, you sometimes just want to walk around...

I live in Puyallup and work in Tacoma, and my commute would never be accomodated by any type of light rail, why should I pay for this?

Pay for it yourself.

Man what a lot of short-sighted people. Let's see - I don't have kids in public school, so eliminate the schools. I don't drive on I-405 so don't do any projects on it. I haven't ever called the fire department, so let's do away with it.

For the good of the region and our regional economy, the Puget Sound, as a whole, needs better public transit that take people out of being stuck in traffic, which frees up the rest of traffic to move better. We need Prop 1 now.

And can't all these double posts be prevented, makes reading a pain.

Prop 1 is the wrong package at the wrong time - vote NO. We need more busses, far more than the under 2% total increase in bus service provided by Prop 1. The current economic situation makes this a bad time to ask for a forever tax increase for this big package.
Further, the line to the eastside is the worst part of the proposal. It serves only one current route (#550 downtown Bellevue to Seattle), and disrupts service from Eastgate, Issaquah, North Bend, Renton, etc. by taking the entire I-90 center roadway for the rail line and displacing the existing bus routes into a single HOV lane in the main eastbound and westbound roadways. See the comments above; there are very significant problems with putting a rail line on the floating bridge that would make service unreliable at times as well as limiting its usefulness.
The whole hub (downtown Seattle) and spokes (rail lines in three directions to suburbs) model is faulty. It completelyt misses the needs of people to take any trip that doesn't have one end in downtown Seattle. Further, it gets proven again and again that people really don't like to transfer from one route to another, and increased reliance on set rail lines means that more bus routes are turned into local collector routes to feed the rail. So overall the rail doesn't serve major segments of the trips at all, and makes people transfer against their desires if they are going to take the rail. This is not a good fit for the Seattle area, where busses already have a large market share and are flexible in going where people want to go.
We need some more bus and carpool lanes to go with more busses, and we need some other balanced road improvements too. This proposal doesn't have any of that, some needed improvements that last year's plan did have. We need a better plan, one that moves more people for less cost.

Naysayers who are promoting just buses are forgetting about the 1.2 million more people who will be overcrowding our already crowded roadways by 2030. They also don't realize that light rail works in concert with buses--buses can make shorter, more frequent trips to drop people off at light rail stations, with trains traveling on the most congested corridors, arriving every few minutes to make transferring easy. A typical articulated bus can carry 90 people (64 sitting) while a 4-car light rail train can carry up to 400 people every two minutes, free from traffic. And a commuter train can carry over a thousand people at a time! Sound Transit's proposal includes all three--buses, light rail and commuter rail. The expansion will cost the average person a little more than a tank of gas per year (there's no tax on food or prescriptions). It will create construction and other jobs, which in turn help support local businesses. I choose to invest in our region NOW, not sit around complaining while companies like Boeing relocate because we're unwilling to pony up.

To Larry & Bob - Where exactly do you plan to build more road lanes? Are you offering to have a 4 or 6 lane road in front of your house? Call your neighbors and legislators and let them know! Or tell the businesses around the corner that you propose to remove their street parking in favor of adding more lanes. See what happens.

To Pat Block & Smith - The great bus from the SR 512 Park & Ride to SeaTac you refer to is Sound Transit route 574.

To "Truth Detector" - An HOV lane will be added to each side of I-90 so your assertion that buses will be forced into general purpose lanes and that there will be a 25% loss of lane capacity is wrong. Also light rail trains will be able to easily run every 2-5 minutes across the bridge. It was the monorail trains that couldn't cross I-90. Does this make me "Lie Detector"?

To Transportation Guy - People don't like transferring in the Puget Sound Region because buses are unreliable (transfers are common with rail systems). Carpool lanes are already included on most of our major corridors. Where would you add them? What's your "better plan that moves more people for less"? Why didn't you submit your great plan at one of the hundreds of public meetings on transportation? Our region needs great minds that can develop and propose solutions to issues, not people who just complain.

Half a percent in sales tax increase? Heck I'd pay half a million just to get some light rail! I can't believe a city the size of Seattle has somehow survived with a mass transit consisting almost entirely of buses and the token rail!

Who were the idiots that thought Seattle couldn't do without any railed transit anyway? I ain't knocking buses that's for sure but there's only so much they can do before you're just making the traffic situation worse with more of them. If Seattle is ever to become a truly global city, some kind of railed transit is not only good, it is VITAL! There needs to be a transit system that isn't held up by downtown traffic.

Build an el-train or a subway or something! I'll be more than happy to pay whatever taxes required! I'm sick and tired of being stuck in the Everett suburbs with the only two options of visiting Seattle is either an extortionate parking fee or a bus trip that takes three times as long as driving!

Light rail works only for the few who can afford to live nearby the rail lines. It is extraordinarily inconvenient for everyone else, and not time efficient or cost effective. Rail mass transport is an idea from the 19th century that worked when the competition was horse and buggy. Most people will use their car, gas, diesel, electric, hydrogen powered or whatever... this is a CAR CULTURE, and I believe it will remain that way. I vote NO on all rail taxes.

We DO NOT need another sales tax increse as we have one of the HIGHEST sales tax in the country already.

Why can't the funding for such prodjects come from somewhere else?? I for one am sick and tired of the politicians taking money out of our pockets just because they want to expand certain prodjects.

Vote NO!! for an increse in the sales tax.

I do not agree with raising the sales tax again.
there are other ways or avenues to create revenues to raise funding for projects. Raising
taxes is not the only solution.

the Dude, short sided one minded.
boy you have your facts wrong.. Lets see...

Average bills.

Car payment $500.00
Insurance $100.00
Maintenace $100.00
Gas $450.00
Parking $150.00
Misc $ 50.00

Why dont you take everyone who wants to ride
and make them pay $1350.00 a month and I am
sure your problem will be solved.

I passed an 80+ passenger bus this morning
(bus was in my way holding up traffice)
Funny thing, only the driver and 2 children were
on it.

When you cast your vote on Prop 1, consider that Sound Transit is millions of dollars over budget on the Sound Move project approved by voters in 1996. Recall that the excise tax assessed on vehicle licensing to pay for this was supposed to be for 10 years yet somehow the tax is still being collected and will be until 2030. We never voted to extend the collection of the tax but somehow through the court system, Sound Transit was able to squeeze taxpayers for more without our approval. Now they want more $ when they have failed to keep on budget and on schedule. We need to hold Sound Transit accountable. They should uphold their end of the deal before we commit to millions more out of our pocket for nothing in return. Don't be fooled.

It is unfair that those living or working outside the corridor of this new $17.9 billion plus boondoggle can't vote on it but will pay the increase in the sales tax if it is approved if they shop outside of their no-vote residence.

It is unfair for all Washington state residents to be forced to pay for something they will never use while having to fund the "I can feel good about myself" loony leftist Seattleits and the rich in Bellevue for leaving their Mercedes in the garage until returning home from work to travel over to have a $100 fancy dinner.

Sound Transit is a failure and made up of corrupt, inept, overpaid government bureaucrats who want to suck the people of this state dry.

The truth is the radical leftists and environmentalists that run this state real intent is to get individuals out of cars and remake the state into huge mega-cities, forcing people out of urban and rural areas in order to survive.

People are more easily controlled when they are bunched up like sardines in crime-infested mega cities and that is another of their purposes.