August 31, 2000

Sound Transit mailing responds to 'WPPSS on wheels' charge

In the "other Washington," as it's now routinely called in TV campaign ads, a policy attack in an obscure journal of opinion might garner a formal response from the public entity in the crosshairs.

But in "our Washington" such a prospect seems unlikely.

Which is why Sound Transit's mass mailing last week was unusual, if not unprecedented.

Responding to an article in Portland-based Open Spaces ("Views from the Northwest") magazine, Sound Transit mass mailed copies of a memo, with board chairman Dave Earling's signature, rebutting the highly critical piece. The memo was sent to elected officials at the municipal, county, state and federal levels, the media and to an additional roster of "opinion leaders" in the community.

The article in question, entitled "Why Rail?" and authored by longtime Sound Transit critic Emory Bundy of Citizens for Mobility, calls Sound Transit, and especially its Link light rail component, a combination of rail buff nostalgia and "cynical, old fashioned pork barrel politics." Moreover, he derides Sound Transit as "WPPSS on wheels," referring to the mammoth $2.25 billion utility bond default by the Washington Public Power Supply System in 1983.

The direct mail response, said Sound Transit spokesman Clarence Moriwaki, was "what the board and directors wanted to do." In addition to publication in Open Spaces, which circulates around 6,000 copies, friends of Bundy who share his views sent out an additional 1,000 copies of the article to people around the Puget Sound region. According to Moriwaki, "There was concern from people, officials, supporters...."

The next issue of Open Spaces appears on newsstands the first week of October and will have a full article entitled, "Why Rail Works" with Earling's byline. According to his memo, the long lead time for publication of the piece was one of the catalysts for the direct response.

Open Spaces editor Penny Harrison said the magazine's role is to "provide information so people can make decisions." She also said that Bundy's position on the magazine's board had no real impact on the vetting of the piece. "We have people on both sides of the issue on our board," she said.

Bundy contends the region could better utilize the infrastructure already in place. He says there is "no restriction on having a ready throughway if we prioritize" existing High Occupancy Vehicle lanes, bus and ridesharing resources. This would include potentially upping the passenger requirement for HOV as well as targeted road investments.

In an interview, Bundy was adamant that Link light rail is a "terrible investment." But he feels that "sentiment is turning rapidly." A long planned lawsuit by the Citizens for Mobility, of which Bundy is the co-chair, remains in the works. The suit alleges that the environmental impact statement for Sound Transit was deficient and that the Link plan would cause violations of the federal Clean Air Act.

Bundy says that the group plans to file the action the week of Sept. 11.

"This time I think we're going to do it," he said. "I'm pretty confident... What they're doing cannot stand scrutiny."

Sound Transit's rebuttal to the article begs to disagree, of course.

"It's the same discredited information he's been saying for 10 years," said Moriwaki. And regarding Bundy's analysis of the region's density (too sparse for light rail says Bundy) and the passenger carrying capacity of the downtown transit tunnel (Bundy asserts buses can carry more people), Moriwaki says it's flawed.

"You have to compare apples to apples and oranges to oranges, and Mr. Bundy keeps coming up with fruit salad," he said.

Earling's memo notes that light rail will not solve all of the region's transportation problems. Rather, he says,"It is an essential component in addressing our transportation problems. The key word is 'component.'"

For opponents of that light rail component, time is running out. Sound Transit is currently negotiating the contract for the tunnel portion of the project (see sidebar) and construction is slated to begin this spring.