All aboard the supertrain!

Another regional transit authority- just what we need.

I will vote for the Tea Baggy-ist looney out there before I vote for this man.

John Roderick is bullshit.

How does John Roderick keep getting headlines?

@4, Alex "my mom's not dead, she's just sleeping, so I'll go cash her social security check" Tsimerman welcomes your vote.

Wow, just about everything he says make sense. Let's see:

"Sound Transit and King County Metro aren’t creating sufficient public transportation within the city’s densest areas.".

Absolutely correct. The densest areas not being served include First Hill, the Central Area and South Lake Union. None of those have much proposed for them. Meanwhile, folks push for light rail to Federal Way or Everett. Even West Seattle is a lot less densely populated than all the areas that are being ignored. OK, next issue:

He’s skeptical of rent control, but says he supports micro-housing and thinks the city should make it easier for people to rent out mother-in-law-style apartments.

Again, that makes a lot of sense. Rent control is illegal by state law. Even if it was allowed, it would backfire (as it has everywhere). Meanwhile, micro-housing or inexpensive housing (mother-in-law apartments, backyard cottages, converting houses to apartments) is very cheap, which make it the cheapest way to add housing, and thus the best bet for getting rent down (http://daily.sightline.org/blog_series/l…). It should be politically possible (unlike building more apartment buildings) because it still preserves the houses that home owners so desperately want to preserve.

But he also warns against Seattleites viewing wealthy people as "the enemy."

No kidding.

We’re all progressives, we’re all urbanists.

Again, this should be obvious. The labels these folks attach to themselves are meaningless in the city council. You have self described progressives and environmentalists who have no interest in changing the zoning laws. But more importantly, the difference between the candidates on most issues are ones of approach, not fundamental politics. Compared to the U. S. House, for example, every single city council member would sit to the far left of Congress (right next to our congressman).

This guy sounds pretty smart and it sounds like he means it when he says

“super nerd for the actual nuts-and-bolts operation of the city,”

@8

NO WAY. I would vote the fuck outta that guy.

More of the Same.

"A nascent urbanist supercity is right behind the gauze, and we just need to pull the curtain back."

Maybe back in 1995, but not now. Now the DSA and the like have so much power they can turn the direction of this very "paper". Anyone who can pull that kind of curtain back should be running for president, not a City Council.

"Roderick says regional transit agencies like Sound Transit and King County Metro aren’t creating sufficient public transportation within the city’s densest areas, so the city should consider creating its own transit agency to work with those other authorities but focus on the urban core."

That's kind of the point in many ways. Mass transit is designed to reduce automobile usage. Auto usage isn't high in the densest areas of Seattle. It is high in the suburbs. Creating lines only in the densest regions of the city ensures the route makes its money back, but doesn't exactly provide a significant amount of public transportation.

Calling Metro a problem and at the same time saying the city needs to create its own transit agency is such short sighted, ill informed thinking, it makes Santayana roll in his grave.

Typical trendy, short sighted, hipster thinking for the region. For such a non-traditional candidate he sure knows all the tired, overused lines that all the establishment candidates use.

He sounds incredibly boring. It's difficult to think of him as an artist since nothing he's said is in the least original or interesting.

@14 You just described his whole career.

John is the man! I believe in his vision for the City with respect to transportation. We are about to drown under our own traffic. None of the same old candidates are going to solve a problem they haven't fixed over the past 10 years. Why would I send them back to office? Makes no sense.

Let's knock Burgess out of there.