Harrell Plans to Cut Transit Investment, Prioritize Cars

More Lesser Seattle

A few weeks ago, Mayor Harrell rolled out a flaccid plan for a transportation levy that, among other things, proposed huge cuts to public transit funding.

It was panned, even by some ardent centrist mayoral allies, both because of its characteristic lack of ambition, but also because it gave short shrift to people who get around the city outside of a car, ever.

With prodding from those crazy people who think that buses, bikes, sidewalks and safe streets for kids are the city’s responsibility, Harrell popped in another $12.5 million a year. 

The War On Transit

But even with the extra money, Harrell is taking a hatchet to transit projects. 

The Urbanist estimates the levy will produce $144M in transit spending. To merely keep up with inflation, we’d have to invest $196M, and with construction inflation, $235M! 

So  we’re cutting transit investments by between 24% to 36%, depending on which way you look at it. 

Watch this video to see what gets you the best ROI from road space

A Modest Bump for Bikes

The bike budget is a bit better. 

Harrell aimed to do less than last time here, cutting total spending after adjusting for construction cost inflation. But after advocates dragged additional dollars out of the administration, we will see some modest increases. 

In the 2015 levy, we spent about $10.9M a year in (inflation adjusted), or $13.1M if you adjust for construction inflation. The plan is to spend $14.25M. 

This is a formal budgetary increase of about 31%, although in terms of purchasing power, it’s more like an increase of 9%. 

That is, well, fine. 

But with an economy that is 33% larger, and a planet that is a good bit hotter, it’s not going to move us ahead a whole lot to allocate less of our economy to making options other than cars safe and convenient for families.

Pedestrians Aren’t The Priority

Pedestrians were also set to get the shaft in the initial proposal. Harrell wanted to cut their inflation adjusted spending by 15%, and the purchasing power of pedestrian investments by 30%, respectively. After advocates got another $3.25M a year, the math modestly improved. 

Pedestrians now get a 5% budget increase after inflation, but because construction costs go up faster, it’s really a 12% cut in purchasing power on behalf of peds.

And remember, all of this is against the backdrop of an economy that is one third larger than it was nine years ago!

Not the Port

Freight mobility saw a huge cut, 47% after inflation, and a whopping 61% after construction cost inflation. Presumably this is because the Lander overpass project is done, but still, I’m sure the Port and its tens-of-thousands-strong blue collar workforce isn’t exactly giggling with delight.

So what gives? The Harrell Administration Does. To Cars.

Friendly reminder that researchers also say that we have to cut our car travel by 20%, even if we electrify everything, to hold warming under 1.5 degrees. 

Instead, the Harrell administration decided to put cars first. We have a 35% increase in spending, after inflation for cars and bridges, and 13% in additional purchasing power allocated to it, after construction inflation.

Now look, the state of our roads isn’t great. I even get the need to ramp up spending to get on top of the mess. But we didn’t have to go hog-wild only in favor of reinforcing the status quo in literally the area we have to change the most if we are going to avoid catastrophic climate change.

Seattle’s Climate Plan? Or an Ostrich?
Hard to tell the difference.

As I mentioned above, Seattle got a lot richer in the last decade. With population growth and increases in per capita income, we have an economy that is 33% larger, after inflation, than it was nine years ago. 

But this levy is only a 29% increase in spending after inflation and about a 7.5% increase in purchasing power for investments, because construction inflation always runs hotter.

This means we are (modestly) cutting spending as a percentage of our economy.

Treading water is better than moving backwards (see, Harrell’s housing plan), I suppose! But it hardly seems like an inspiring reelect slogan.

Transportation, Especially the Clean Kind, Is Less Important to Harrell

When you modestly deprioritize transportation overall, plus pedestrians in particular, and you deeply de-prioritize transit and put cars first, this is the levy you get. 

Voters Disagree

But voters beg to differ with these priorities. A recent poll by change research found a near supermajority of Seattle voters want a much bigger levy. A full 57% are in favor of a $1.9B levy that puts much more into sidewalks, bus lanes, and safety improvements.

Will the council do the will of the people?

Correction: An earlier version of this piece had the transit figures as annualized, rather than for the course of the whole levy. Sorry.