Just remember Sloggers: 1.5% VAT sounds innocuous, but :

For a $5,000 car that's $75.

For a $10,000 car that's $150.

For a $15,000 car that's $225.

1. Raise the fares. The average bus commuter makes $70K a year and needs no subsidy.

2. Make KC Metro more efficient. Reduce costs, eliminate inefficient routes.

3. Tax bicycles the way we tax motorcycles, and put the money into transit.

#1, it won't matter to this crowd. The Seattle fuckwits hate cars. Fortunately, the Seattle voters feel a bit differently.

Two words: income tax.

#4, been there, voted on that, and every single county in Washington State defeated it. We are not going to have an income tax, fuckwit. All the king's horses and all the brave fuckwit posts on the Stranger aren't going to put the income tax together again. Get it through your stupid brain, such as it is.

#5, some of those douchebags are freeloading bicyclists such as yourself.

@1 - That charge goes toward reducing congestion to make your driving experience more pleasant, fuckwit. When bus routes are cancelled those people go back to driving again. But at least their cars are 1.5% cheaper.

@2: What's the source of the $70k figure? I'd love to look over that data.

@1 - what @8 said.

The cost to build and maintain the First Hill and Broadway streetcars would cover all of these bus routes and more.

The average bus commuter makes $70K a year

Bullshit.

"The average bus commuter makes $70K a year and needs no subsidy."

Who's cooking your fucking burgers? That's what I want to know.

And yeah, the voters voted down an income tax that would overwhelmingly have a negligible effect on them (as opposed to the leviathan sales taxes which clobber us every time we fork over for common, everyday purchases). Surprise surprise, voters have knee-jerk responses against long-term investment in the future. What a shock. The initiative system is broken but this sure as hell is nothing new. I suppose we "Seattle fuckwits" just hate cars because we don't want to deal with broken, congested streets choked with cars because we chose to live in a city and actually have city-ish things unlike a certain shitkicker lumberjack segment of the population. But that's fine, really. Let's just keep doing what we've been doing for decades because it works so well.

@8 Fuckwit? Just for stating facts? Please.

Also, I take the bus regularly and own a car. I also don't make $70k.

Why are people allowed to use city streets to store their cars for free? Pay for transit by expanding residential zone parking restrictions and sell more permits.

This is for #9 and #13 and #14, each of whom is a typical Seattle fuckwit. The facts won't matter, of course, because you assholes never met a fact you wouldn't deny or bury if it conflicted with your selfish interest. Anyway, see page 5 at the link. Yeah, it's in there. Put your bong down and focus.

http://your.kingcounty.gov/mkcc/clerk/Ol…

It comes from p. 44 of the following study.

http://metro.kingcounty.gov/am/reports/2…

So much for the fuckwits of Seattle, who pretend to be for the working man but who in actuality are always willing to fuck over the little people to save whatever amenity they have convinced themselves they "deserve" because they are so special. What a bunch of transparent, shit-filled hypocrites you are.

p.s.: #14, it's too bad that you're another 20-something hipster who never made enough money to be able to buy a car. You are the odd fuckwit out. See, as of 2010, 84% of Seattle residents lived in a household with a car. Same as 10 years earlier. More people live in households with three cars than with no cars.

So, fuckwit, yes I will have fries with that Coke, and make it quick before I tell the manager what a fuckwit you are and you lose your third job this year because you were out back smoking dope.

The claim was that "the average bus commuter makes $70K/year." The figure in the report is household income, which is quite a bit of a different thing. Whether that makes anybody in the conversation a "fuckwit" I could not judge, perhaps because I are one myself?

All transportation modes are subsidized to some degree or another. Look at where your property taxes are going, for example.

Congestion doesn't care whether it's an eighteen-year-old Toyota Corolla or a brand-new Lexus that's displaced by a transit user.

"More people live in households with three cars than with no cars".

And therein lies the problem - fuckwit.

Now, get back to work signing up new cable subscribers...

Unbrainwashed,

Nah. I'm an engineer. I just don't like driving and don't like sitting in traffic with my thumb up my ass for hours on end.

I mean, if I was a sociopath I'd tell you to just turn the gun on your whole fucking worthless family and stuff the last bullet in your fucking mouth to make sure your filthy bloodline was wiped from the face of the earth, but that's not very nice. So I'm just going to suggest you sit down and have a cookie instead.

Or follow the instructions above. I'm just a dumb stoner, so either would make me happy.

But back to the facts - sure, people own cars, let's take a survey on who drives them all the time and under what conditions?

@2 I'm trying to figure out the argument. Aren't the bus riders paying taxes? If they make more money, aren't they probably paying more taxes? Have you looked at the average income of automobile owners to see whether they deserve the subsidy we give them on road construction?

It is indeed a myth that only impoverished people ride the bus, but I'm not sure what the actual problem with that is. Looking through that survey one thing that pops out at me is that many daily riders do have access to cars so if ridership drops these people are not going to lose their jobs, but are going to join traffic.

Jesus Christ. What was I thinking? Feeding a troll like that. I'm slipping in my old age.

@22 have fun with this grade C troll. He used to go by Mister G, and ranted about bikes, 'liberals' and thought the city was going to ban non-native plants. He also thought Romney was going to win and that pot, once legalized would bottom out to a dollar an ounce because it's easy to grow.
Basically, he's a dipshit who basically hurls whatever insult of the week (fuckwit had been it for a bit) and when confronted by people who actually know what they're talking, he'll basically have a tantrum.
Unbrainwashed, your inability to hide the fact that you're Mister G only showcases your lack of creativity or worse intelligence.

Just remember, Sloggers: The ultra-liberal, hyper-taxation State of Wyoming has a 1.8% MVET charged on the original MSRP (that is, sticker price, not actual paid price) of your vehicle with a depreciation schedule of six years.

http://conversecounty.org/gov-admin/trea…

Just remember this is an INCREASE of 1.5% MVET, with no depreciation for service years, in addition to the already existing $60 tab fee.

@28 P.S. that means that if your car is new and under $20,000 you'll actually be paying more than Wyoming.

@14: I abstained from the income tax vote because it would have been incredibly naive to think that after the two years applying to those earning $250k or more, as voters had approved, they wouldn't lower the cap to apply to those outside the scope of what was on the ballot. I didn't vote against it, but I'm also not going to support something when I have no doubt I'm being bullshitted.

I have a car and take the bus everywhere. I'm happy to pay more in car taxes for the privilege of living in a city with vibrant public transit.

It should be noted that, if I lived in fee loving San Francisco, I'd be paying about 40% less in registration than if this 1.5% MVET increase passed.

@17, haha, good one. As #19 has already pointed out, you apparently are equating a single person with a household.

You: "The average bus commuter makes $70K a year."

What you linked to: "The average (median) household income of King County Riders is $72,857. ... Average household size for Riders is 2.38 persons 16 years of age and older."

Try again.

So, fuckwits, you want the bus riders of King County, with an average household income of $73K a year, to be subsidized? Hey, you 20-something making $12 an hour and living with three others who make the same, and combining ramen noodles to survive, how does it feel to be called on to finance the fuckwits who make three times as much as you do?

@2: You're on bad drugs if you think that the average person in Seattle makes $70k a year. People who make $70k a year don't ride the bus they ride their Porsche SUV to shop and park their vehicle downtown. Also, most of those $70k people don't live in Seattle. They live on Mercer Island or in Medina.

#35, the average bus commuter has a household income of $73K a year. They don't need a subsidy.