Mayoral candidate Michael McGinn was interviewed by SeattlePI.com's Chris Grygiel.
Here is the short of it.
Tunnel bad, surface/I-5 expansion good (I agree).
High cost is bad (I agree).
Cars and oil are bad (a mass transit that does not completely run on oil and is sized appropriately for every use I call busses and electric cars, we have one and the other is coming in 2010, so fix the roads already).
Fence sitting on KeyArena and Seattle Center. He gave no solution to an anchor tenant if that is not the NBA. He did not say anything about the $540 million dollar master plan for Seattle Center that does not account for KeyArena or how to pay for it, or how to justify paying for it without an anchor tenant in . . . KeyArena.
He's green (I think he has a fixed idea of what that is, and his funding sources like him that way). He needs to tie tunnel spending to the sidewalks not being built anytime soon if I am ever going to think about voting for him.
He's a people person (I'm people).
Read the interviewright here!
Have a great day,
Mike Baker
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Visit me here:
http://ManyWordsForRain.blogspot.com
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6 comments:
Great comments! And, I am glad to be able to say that McGinn DOES get the connection between building the tunnel and the sidewalks (and other pedestrian safety infrastructure) that is not being built.
McGinn is part of the Pedestrian Master Plan Advisory Group (the group that developed the Pedestrian Master Plan that was just released in draft form last week: www.seattle.gov/Transportation/ped_masterplan.htm). He has been a strong advocate for finding funding for the implementing the many elements of the plan - especially sidewalks.
I think that in every conversation that I have had with Michael about the tunnel, he has focused on the investments (always including sidewalks) that could be made with the billions of dollars that could be saved with doing a surface and not tunnel viaduct project.
What worries me most is that Mayor Nickels just does not understand that the tunnel option runs the risk of breaking the barrier between Seattle and the mole-men.
Maybe he is reaching out to a potential voting block.
Anyway, the simple point is that tunnel, or no, I will not have a view of Puget Sound, and the sidewalk in front of my house was put down 50 years ago, stretches for 4 blocks, and ends.
More people need sidewalks than they "need" that tunnel.
RE McGinn on Key Arena: He just wants to see if it polls well. Yeeesh. Just what we need another politico with feet of clay regarding this issue. Just pure speculation here, bearing in mind I want Seattle Center to work with a multipurpose indoor venue. But if Bellevue decides to jump into the fray after the dust has settled, it wont be a concern for any of the city of Seattle mayoral candidates.
On the topic of sidewalks in Seattle you might be interested in this entry from the Seattle Transit blog.
http://tinyurl.com/oshf48
i think what mcginn meant about keyarena is that he would prefer to have a new NBA team, but renovating keyarena had to be the right deal, keeping the public contribution down.
i think what mcginn meant about keyarena is that he would prefer an nba team there, but renovating it would have to be the right deal, a fair deal.
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