Month: January 2013

Exciting news! Yesterday the King County Council formally approved the formation of a Low Income Fare Advisory Committee, which will meet for the first time on January 30, 4:00 to 6:30 pm at the King Street Center (201 S. Jackson St.), 8^th Floor Conference Center.

The committee will meet every 3 to 4 weeks and is scheduled to give its recommendations to the Council by July 1, 2013. Transit Riders Union organizer Katie Wilson will represent the TRU as a member of this committee.

These meetings are open to the public and include a public comment period. Please attend and testify to the need for a low income fare! [Correction: public comments can be submitted in writing and a summary of comments will be read at the next meeting.]

Check back for updates, including the dates of future meetings.

According to a May 2011 report from the The Institute for Transportation & Development Policy, Seattle’s Rapid Ride doesn’t qualify as real Bus Rapid Transit, let alone measure up to the “gold standard” of systems in cities like Bogota, Colombia.

Here’s from the Stranger Blog:

https://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2013/01/17/report-proves-that-seattles-rapid-ride-is-not-bus-rapid-transit

And here’s the report:

https://www.itdp.org/documents/20110526ITDP_USBRT_Report-HR.pdf

Transit riders in the Magnolia neighborhood are organizing to restore their evening service. In the fall round of service changes, all bus service to Central Magnolia after 9:30 pm was eliminated. This has disrupted the lives of many residents of Magnolia who depend on public transit.

On Tuesday, January 15 at 7 pm, there will be a meeting at the Magnolia United Methodist Church, 2836 34th Ave. W.  Magnolia transit riders and supporters will be meeting with Metro transit officials to ask for the restoration of their evening bus service. Please come out to support Magnolia transit riders!

There may well be future opportunities to take action in support of Magnolia transit riders, so stay tuned.

Happy New  Year!

Check out this article in last week’s Real Change about our push for a low income fare:

https://realchangenews.org/index.php/site/archives/7293

Also, Seattle and King County are petitioning the State Legislature for a 1.5% Motor Vehicle Excise Tax that would, among other things, provide $85 million per year for King County Metro. Here’s the article, and their letter to Governor Gregoire:

https://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2019957303_transpotax22m.html

https://www.seattlemet.com//data/files/2012/12/attachment/56/2012_1214_Exec_SCA_McGinn_ltr_to_Governor_Gregoire.pdf