66 Replies to "City Council visits Delridge to explain $60 car-tab-fee proposal"

• Tim T August 16, 2011 (3:32 pm)

  What are they smoking? We’re going to almost double our registration fee? They asked for $20 to fix the stuff they now need 60 more ON TOP of the 20 more the County is adding. How about cutting the road diet budget and the $9,000 per green bike lane box we are adding? Just say NO.

• en August 16, 2011 (3:54 pm)

  Great timing.. after they forced a new $20 fee, they’d like us to cough up another $60. VOTE NO.

• Amanda August 16, 2011 (4:05 pm)

  I demand an audit of Seattle and of King County. This is crazy!

• Rob August 16, 2011 (4:10 pm)

  Id like to know why they insist on calling this a fee. Seems to me it’s a tax. I’m guessing they dont want to call it a tax so they don’t have to admit to creating/raising taxes.

• Mike in the Junction August 16, 2011 (4:11 pm)

  I wrote in the other day and tried to explain this was on top of the levy and the Seattle $20.00 fee and was brow beating by my fellow West Seattle-ites. I am in sales and need my vehicle to get around to make calls- I already pay 62 cents per gallon gas tax (federal) We have voted and passed numerous times for the $30.00 tab. As I was driving I see these double articulated buses all over Seattle with a handful of people of them. Maybe they can be more efficient. When will these people stop coming to us for more money? We are getting tapped out.

• GoGo August 16, 2011 (4:16 pm)

  I agree with everyone above. VOTE NO! Although even when we vote no they go ahead and do whatever they want anyway. I’m not going to be able to keep my car at this rate.

• dsa August 16, 2011 (4:17 pm)

  There are no new general purpose lanes planned for construction.
  It has 4 million per year for bus corridors. Those would come from existing traffic lanes. Vote no.

• monroe1200 August 16, 2011 (4:28 pm)

  VOTE NO!!! VOTE NO!!! VOTE NO!!!
  (Sorry about the shouting, I am just trying to make my quiet insignificant voice heard)

• gene August 16, 2011 (4:35 pm)

  Question for those complaining about the potential car tab fee increase:
  .
  Do you think that car tabs and the gasoline tax actually pay the full cost of the roads that we use?
  .

• Rob August 16, 2011 (4:56 pm)

  Gene:
  They don’t. The actual car tab fee (the 30 bucks, not the stuff added on above that) doesn’t pay for roads at all, it pays for the DOL.

  I don’t know about king county, but in Seattle gas tax only pays for about 9% of SDOT’s budget. The rest of it comes from sales tax, property tax, and state and federal grants (which are funded by state and federal taxes).

  Very little of the cost of owning and operating a car goes toward providing the roads we drive on.

• lucky chick August 16, 2011 (4:59 pm)

  Thanks to the Council for making progress. It’s time that the heavily subsidized single-occupancy vehicle driver started to pay more for infrastruture, and that includes alternative transportation that KEEPS OTHER CARS OFF THE ROAD. Funny how so many people fail to grasp that.
  .
  Go back a few years and learn what Eyman’s first car tabs initiative did – thanks to those of you unwilling to pay for what you get, transportation projects got canceled, people lost jobs, and people’s (drivers’) sense of entitlement got even more bloated.
  .
  Take responsibility for yourself, VOTE YES and move Seattle out of the dark ages.

• visitor August 16, 2011 (5:05 pm)

  The same way you voted NO on 1098? You people won’t be happy until government is bankrupt; then we can count on corporate goodwill to maintain our transportation infrastructure and maintain our parks. good luck.

• wsguy August 16, 2011 (5:07 pm)

  So If I read the Seattle Times Article correctly then this $60 fee is for 10 years.

  -“No specific list of projects yet exists…” – Seattle Times.

  Really – So the City Council says we need to tax you for 10 years because – um, we got things we got to do!

  What Things?

  “…within the next few months the city is to complete a Transit Master Plan” – Seattle Times.

  You mean to tell me you don’t have one of those Already? What the heck do they do? Seems like they’ve already divided it up though…

  “Approximately $18 million is to go into streetcar design and planning, with the highest priority to create a connecting line between the South Lake Union streetcar and the upcoming First Hill streetcar.

  In all, 49 percent would go to transit, 29 percent to road maintenance and safety, and 22 percent for pedestrian, bicycle and freight projects.”

  There’s a surprise – we need $18 million for planning. We sure spend a lot of money on that in Seattle don’t we.

  The City council is saying give us a blank check for $204 million and then we’ll tell you what we will spend it on.

  We would be a bunch of fools to pass this.

  22% go to Bicycle, Pedestrian and freight. Sure pays to have a Bicycle Aid on staff for the Mayor. What a surprise – the Cascade Bicycle Club has promised to support it.

  • WSB August 16, 2011 (5:10 pm)

    Yes, it’s 10 years. I just verified that a little while ago with a City Council rep – there was an amendment proposed during the City Hall meeting today for 8 years, and for some reason I had thought that passed – but no. – TR

• J August 16, 2011 (5:08 pm)

  Good for the city council for looking reality square in the eye and doing what’s needed.

• wsguy August 16, 2011 (5:10 pm)

  And the best part is the City Council left themselves room to come back and hit us for another $20 / year next year.

• GRG August 16, 2011 (5:10 pm)

  HELL TO THE NO!!! “The largest single category” is road repair at $4Million… so the other $16 million is going to what? Fuzzy headed feel good crap that hurts drivers. Anyone who votes in favor of this at the ballot box is like paying for the bullets for their own execution. This city’s “leadership”, and I use the term lightly, is hell bent on making this a “car free” city. As someone who has three motorcycles, and a car I’ll end up paying $240 more per year. I ain’t gonna get nice roads to drive on – I mean come on, anyone drive down Beach Drive lately?? NO NO NO!!! At least if the idiots in Seattle who vote for every tax hike they can approve this I can register my vehicles at my secondary residence in another county and will do so gladly!

• michael August 16, 2011 (5:12 pm)

  Once again, an overwhelming response against this tax. ‘Fee’? Don’t insult our intelligence. Vote them out of here!!

• w.s. maverick August 16, 2011 (5:13 pm)

  mayor mc schwinn needs to make bikes get license plates and make them pay a small amount of tabs each year. this would help out a lot for the city. making cars pay for metro and bikes, f that. I was a good payer but now I am just going to register cars at someone else’s address

• Nick August 16, 2011 (5:14 pm)

  NO!

• rw August 16, 2011 (5:31 pm)

  I’m not automatically opposed to additional transportation funding, and I think it’s good that they scaled this back from the $80 that our @#$%^ Mayor proposed. But if I had been at this meeting I would have asked how this tax would fit in with the County’s $20 tax and additional taxes that were added in recent years to address the same (supposed) needs. Also, the breakdown is 30% for paving, 50% for transit, and 20% for bikes/freight/pedestrians. I’d love to have a line item vote to bring down the overall cost, because I would bet my portion of the tax that there are projects in this proposal that are more a gleam in a politician’s eye than “gotta have” improvements. Or worse, the projects are not specified and they are saying “trust us, this is how we will divvy up the money.”

• GC August 16, 2011 (5:40 pm)

  Not just no, but hell no.

  If we need bicycle trails, let us impose a fee on bicyclists. If we need special pedestrian improvements – that’s what we have the core city tax base for…

  And if folks want more transit? That’s what bus and trolley fares are for – to pay for those luxuries.

  And with no specific list of projects on the ballot measure, we’ll be *lucky* if roads get 29% of what’s billed as a roads measure, should it pass.

  Seattle roads are badly maintained embarassments, but the right pass is not to rape car-owners yet again. It’s to get back to the basics of city government – and use the money saved to pave the roads.

• bebecat August 16, 2011 (5:41 pm)

  What about businesses with multiple vehicles to run that business to supply jobs that, has to say take a business breaking hit, in car tabs…shame on the councils city and county..I know your names and will not vote for you. I have just one car and do not really mind..but you have not thought this through for the good of the economy. Raise the bus fees…I worked downtown for some years and found the bus way cheaper than paid parking.

• John August 16, 2011 (5:52 pm)

  Vote No – plus, this type of pandering in Delridge is insulting.

• back2thedrawingboard August 16, 2011 (5:59 pm)

  NICKEL and DIME us. Because there are so many bike commuters on Delridge and their needs trump everyone elses – seriously give me a break. What a HUGE waste of money. Not a fan of the ‘Bike Master Plan’ either. The ‘transportation infrastructure’ for our future is to lose the buses and do what other large major cities do to move people via subway or light rail. Get with the millenium people not from Seattle running Seattle. Riding a bike in the dark and the rain is not an option and neither is walking downtown via Delridge. Voting absolutely NO.

• Amanda August 16, 2011 (6:13 pm)

  @lucky chick – I voted for the monorail – every time. How’s that for progression? Oh right, the council decided they know best. Tunnel? Oh sure, that’s progress. I agree with wsguy. How can they possibly know what the cost will be without a plan? And $18m to just create a plan? Are you kidding me? This has to stop.

• Recall McGinn August 16, 2011 (6:18 pm)

  Vote no. Until they can manage the revenue we give them, they do not deserve our money.

  I am all in favor of helping to subsidize mass transit, but I draw the line at subsidizing special interest groups (bicyclists). Raise revenue for bike lanes by instituting registration fees for cyclists.

• austin August 16, 2011 (6:29 pm)

  Seattle drivers deserve the roads they get.

• Just sayin August 16, 2011 (6:36 pm)

  Why not use some of the vast amounts of revenue they get from the liqour board? Oh that right it’s for the schools I think.

• Rob August 16, 2011 (6:45 pm)

  Didn’t we just approve a huge levy “bridging the gap” a few years ago for transportation and road funding?? What happened to all that money. And, since bike lanes now make up a portion of our infrastructure, why don’t they to get registration fees from bicycles as well? It’s only fair.

• JayDee August 16, 2011 (6:51 pm)

  I hate to say I agree with those against the tab–the City is very fond of passing special purpose taxes (fees) to pay for things that used to come from the general fund. Of course, once the parks, transportation, special levies expire we must support them or everything will fail. But the monies in the general fund end up…where?
  –
  I’d vote for the car tab if the council wasn’t so tone deaf as to the timing. This is not the time to pass this tax without specificity as to what it is for. And like they are now claiming Bridging the Gap didn’t mean filling it. Apparently, despite what we were told before.

• silverback August 16, 2011 (7:22 pm)

  Don’t tax me on what I own, I paid sales tax when I bought the vehicles. Tax me on what I use or what a make. Raise the gas tax, raise the sales tax. Seattle is becoming a very expensive area to live in, it is a race between the King County Executive and the Mayor to see which one can get their hands in my pocket.

• D.D August 16, 2011 (7:31 pm)

  I have lived in Seattle my whole life (West Seattle specifically) and I have been hitting the same potholes since I started driving in 1979!! BUT, it seems to me when the state started the lottery; that was suppose to help pay for roads, then the car tabs; that was suppose to pay for roads, then the gas tax; that was suppose to pay for roads and now this!!! I don’t mind paying higher taxes or fees to pay for road repair; for crimeny(? spelling) sake we have the worst roads in the country, but what is the guarantee that this new fee will actually be allocated to road repair…because they say so!!! Sorry government you lost my trust a long time ago.

• Near Alki August 16, 2011 (7:40 pm)

  Even Seattle voters are suffering in this economy and just can’t afford a tax hike on anything. Is the City Counsel so blind and out of touch with reality that they think people can afford to pay higher motor vehicle tax when so many of the basic necessity’s of life are on the rise. Seattle voters will put this down…and then our “leaders” will have an “excuse” to defend their poor performance. Nobody (INCLUDING the City Counsel) actually believes this will garner a majority of votes.

• G August 16, 2011 (7:42 pm)

  “Bike Master Plan?” Huh?

  Has Mayor McSchwin and the council forgotten that Seattle is full of hills, windy and wet for most of the year? Realistically now, how many MORE people are going to be riding up and down Admiral Way on a dark, cold, windy, wet day in February? Even in the summer, you can count them on one hand.

  I grew up here and can’t believe how utterly wacko this city and a lot of it’s citizenry has become.

• Tuesday August 16, 2011 (7:53 pm)

  And what do they spend the almost 10% sales tax on? Roads are one of the three basic services the government ought to provide… I resent that such a thing is treated as an afterthought that “must” have an ADDITIONAL fee (tax) to be provided. How is that right? Seattle, stop spending money or random programs that serve very few and start prioritizing for things EVERYONE uses FIRST. This is ridiculous.

• tiredofyou August 16, 2011 (8:55 pm)

  Take the dumb press conferences regarding this and anything the Mayor is pushing OUT OF WEST SEATTLE and go back to your City Council office. Your demographic isn’t as strong as you think it is here. Not welcome.

• Aman August 16, 2011 (10:38 pm)

  Oh my, based on the majority of comments against the proposed $60 car tab fee it appears that there may be a difference of opinions…

• Kathy August 16, 2011 (11:32 pm)

  I’m voting for it, I am willing to pay the fee on my two cars for the privilege of using the roads. I would not vote for a bike tab fee as I don’t encourage my child to ride on the city streets. I would not vote for a pedestrian tab fee, either.

• JN August 17, 2011 (12:11 am)

  To all of you drivers of single occupancy vehicles out there: you get what you pay for. And btw, you basically pay jack squat compared to the actual damage you inflict upon our roads and our environment. EVERY SINGLE liveable, pleasant city in the world has significant provisions for public transportation and cycling, often to the (DESERVED) detriment of the selfish, pig-headed SOV driver. And to everyone who complains about hills, wind, and rain, I have two things to say to you: Gears and Jackets. ‘Nuff said.

• Paul August 17, 2011 (12:22 am)

  End of days!!

• Sean August 17, 2011 (1:09 am)

  This is not a bike problem. I’m not sure why it keeps coming up. The percentage of people who bike for transport is small (5% on a good day) and if everyone biked the roads would be in good condition and there would be no need for public transit or expensive road infastructure. If all of the bikers chose to drive the traffic would be even worse… so drivers should really be thanking the bikers.

• w.s. maverick August 17, 2011 (6:18 am)

  the mayor wasted a lot of money on bike lanes, green lanes and all the new poles and street lights for the bike lanes, look that one up and see how much that costed. If I become mayor can I spend money on what I like to do

• redblack August 17, 2011 (6:19 am)

  make it $120 (in addition to the $20-per-tab metro funding.)
  .
  and yes, i’m serious.
  .
  i’m betting the same people yelling “noes!” are the same ones who complain about the condition of the roads, which has been caused by budget cuts, which were caused by lack of tax revenue.
  .
  get a grip, people, and start acting like adults instead of spoiled, entitled children. this isn’t cle elum; it’s a city of 600,000 people with an aging infrastructure. it’s time to fix what’s broken.

• Danny August 17, 2011 (8:04 am)

  They can’t manage the money they already have, ergo they don’t deserve another dime of my hard-earned money.

  There’s no clear plan for this money, so how can anyone argue for it? If it’s for a shortfall in public transportation, then let’s talk about the mayor’s bike buddy and bus drivers making 6-figures. Manage your existing revenue stream first. This is ridiculous.

  You don’t solve a crack addict’s habit by giving him more crack.

• RickM August 17, 2011 (8:09 am)

  I support the $20 increase but f*ck this! This stinks of the monorail extortion all over again. A blank check for $204 million with 18 of that for planning? All this city does is plan things and argue over the outcome for years. I am voting hell no. I believe that we need to pay the price for transit (all transit: bikes, cars, buses) but this is a messy, unorganized cash grab. GTFO.

• Amanda August 17, 2011 (8:14 am)

  You know, the argument that bikers are somehow superior to car drivers is really arrogant. It’s not the first time it’s been brought up, nor the last. However, the fact that some of the comments on here seem to be so self righteous is really counter productive. If bikers want to share the road, they should have to pay for the road. Agreed? The same asphalt they use for bike lanes is the same as the road, correct? I won’t thank you bike riders – and to suggest it is maddening. I ride my bike and ride the bus. It’s not something I want someone to reward me for. I would just like to not have to worry about being thrown from my bike because of the conditions of the road. The government’s irresponsibly in asking for MORE money to fix the infrastructure of this very taxed city is crazy. I really would like to see it audited.

• Ben August 17, 2011 (8:23 am)

  I’m going to reserve judgement on whether to support this until it’s actually time to vote (i.e. almost three months from now, in November), and I urge others to do the same. That gives us plenty of time to mull it over, not to mention time for specific proposals for how to use the money to be developed, suggested, and argued over (and against).

• McGruff August 17, 2011 (8:40 am)

  I frequently see 2-3 guys standing around while 1 or 2 actually work. I witnessed this in from of my house for over a week. There is your savings SDOT. Run a tighter ship so that you won’t have to continue to bleed us dry.

  VOTE NOOOOOOOOOOOO!

• Jiggers August 17, 2011 (8:40 am)

  Leaders of Seattle had visioned the city to be lived in only by very rich people. It’s turning out tha tway. You need to make over $100,000 a year to be safe here.

• george August 17, 2011 (11:54 am)

  Couple of suggestions:
  – suspend the 1% “Art Beautification” on Sound Transit Projects
  – find a better contractor for building roads. Most of the roads I’ve seen repaved break down in just a few years. Why? These potholes just keep growing and growing after they’re repaired, and the new roads don’t last.
  – make the tax 100% roads and I might pay for it. Let the bikers generate their own revenue.

• rob August 17, 2011 (1:46 pm)

  – make the tax 100% roads and I might pay for it. Let the bikers generate their own revenue.
  .
  i would be totally for this, if we made the tax also pay for 100% of the roads.
  .
  if they figure this 60 bucks per car will raise around $20M, simple math, they figure around 333,333 cars will be registered.
  .
  iirc SDOT’s budget is about $100M/yr. take out the 9% paid by gas taxes, and we just need $91M more. cover that with car tabs and we only need to pay $273 per car to cover the budget.
  .
  do that and we can lower sales and property taxes, because we wouldn’t need to pay so much of those to cover the vast majority of the cost of the roads.
  .
  the demand for accountability of an individual type of use of the resource is interesting, but if we are going to do that it needs to be fair. we know what the resource (the roads) costs overall, but it is much more difficult to figure out how much of that resource is consumed by a given type of use, and thus really difficult to figure out what a “fair share” is for that type of use.

• JTK August 17, 2011 (1:48 pm)

  “Condition of the roads”… I lived in Michigan for 33 years… and let me tell you about THOSE roads… the roads here are like Perfect pavement comapred to other areas… so when they need money to Repair the roads.. I don’t understand what they are “repairing”… also.. STILL is anyone missing the point here.. it’s not the Drivers of the CAR’s responsibility that the busses are running out of money…. There are more CAR drivers than Bus riders in this City and for that.. i can see a HUGE “NO” coming to the grand stand… let the busses revamp their routes and the ones that use less riders at times, run them with more time inbetween… Or if they want to keep that same route… have those riders pay MORE for that late or irregular service… .. why is this so hard… there are a lot more solutions than just … TAX the DRIVERS…. drivers pay ENOUGH TAX…Hell, everyone pays enough tax around here… make the bus riders PAY more….. period… they are the ones riding the bus… I thought I heard that the 99 was going to be a TOLL road eventually… …. so … when the tolls come in should we ask the bus riders to pay a percentage for the tolls that the drivers will have to pay?…

• Sean August 17, 2011 (2:37 pm)

  @Amanda – I drive more than I bike, but my point was that the fact that the city council asked for a $60 car tab fee has very little to do with bicyclists. People get upset because they feel like the bikers aren’t paying their fair share and it’s simply not true.

  As far as bikers paying for the roads, here are some stats pulled from http://publicola.com/2010/08/31/we-all-pay-for-the-roads/

  The Seattle Department of Transportation’s 2009 annual report breaks down the agency’s $340.8 million budget by funding source. The gas tax accounts for $13.4 million, or 4 percent of that total. The full budget breakdown (in millions):

  Grants & Other: $96.9 (29 percent)
  Debt: $77.4 (23 percent)
  Bridging the Gap (a property-tax levy passed by voters in 2007): $60.9 (18 percent)
  General Fund: $42.3 (12 percent)
  Reimbursables: $42 (12 percent)
  Gas Tax: $13.4 (4 percent)
  Cumulative Reserve Fund: $7.6 (2 percent)

  Other than gas taxes, Seattleites contribute most directly to the voter-approved Bridging the Gap levy and the general fund. The voter-approved portion of Bridging the Gap is funded by property taxes (the rest comes from the commercial parking tax), and more than 75 percent of the general fund comes from property, business and occupation, and sales tax—revenue sources that all city residents pay for in one way or another. The remaining general fund revenue comes from government and private grants, traffic fines, and other fees.

  Obviously, SDOT’s budget includes salaries and other spending in addition to road projects. But the budget breakdown nonetheless shows that bicyclists, transit riders, and drivers alike pay nearly equal shares of the city transportation budget (and bicyclists have a smaller impact on road maintenance costs), granting everyone their “right” to space on the road.

  UPDATE

  The SDOT budget office sent me their 2009 arterial and non-arterial paving expenditures. They spent $29,377,725 for arterial and $261,000 for non-arterial for a total of $29,638,725. The arterial revenue sources breakdown as follows:

  Bonds: $14,748,947 (50.20 percent)
  Bridging the Gap Property Tax: $9,693,410 (33 percent)
  Bridging the Gap Commercial Parking Tax: $4,801,062 (16.34 percent)
  Gas Tax: $129,981 (.44 percent)
  Grants: $4,325 (.01 percent)

  All of SDOT’s non-arterial paving work was 100 percent funded by the gas tax, but non-arterial work only accounts for .9 percent of total paving expenditures for 2009.

  The paving numbers reinforce what the budget numbers already showed: everyone is paying for Seattle’s roads.

• dcac August 17, 2011 (2:46 pm)

  I’ll vote for this, if only for the fact that it’s another step toward making Seattle a car-free city. The more people who can’t afford to drive, the better public transit will get and the cleaner our environment will be. Imagine walking a few blocks from your house and getting on a quiet, cheap, clean, and safe light rail train that will zip you anywhere in the city. Getting to that point will be extremely painful, including for me. I love my car and commute alone every day, but I still think it needs to happen eventually. Seattle can’t keep getting denser and expect its citizens to rely on cars as their primary mode of transportation. Yes, $18 million for planning is ridiculous; yes, I want to see a solid plan for where the money will go; yes, some people must drive for work and whatnot; and yes, I’d rather spend that $60 on something else, but I also know we Seattleites won’t change our car-centric ways unless we’re forced to. So I’m going to grit my teeth and vote yes.

• lucky chick August 17, 2011 (3:43 pm)

  The $18m is DESIGN and planning – big difference. Engineering design is a huge expense. And necessary if you don’t want the infrastructure literally collapsing under you.

• george August 17, 2011 (4:15 pm)

  How many light rail trains do you think it will take to “imagine walking a few blocks from your house”? Be careful what you wish for, cutting your nose off despite your face will eliminate the city’s cash cow. Then what?

• pjmanley August 17, 2011 (9:24 pm)

  Before we pay more for our roads, how about we stop prematurely ruining our roads with overweight
  trucks?
  Excerpts from Proposed Comprehensive Plan Amendment, May, 2010:
  According to SDOT’s own studies, some of the worst damage to Seattle’s roads and bridges is caused by Metro buses. This finding is echoed in other cities; Austin, Texas, for example, found that 70 to 90 percent of the damages to its arterial is caused by transit buses. The weight of these buses would cause them to be prohibited from our streets if the state legislature and then Congress had not completely exempted them from any weight regulations. (Yay, Politicians!)

  Although some of Metro’s buses are within reasonable weight limits, most are not, including virtually all that it has purchased in recent years.

  The other heaviest vehicles that are legally on the road are Seattle’s own fire trucks, which enjoy a state exemption from any weight limits. Most of the operation of Seattle’s fire trucks at weights that require use of this legislative exemption is other than during emergency runs.

  Another very extensive instance of City-sponsored use of extra-heavy trucks are its contractors’ garbage and recycling waste trucks, which under state law enjoy a special exemption allowing them to weight considerably more than any other truck (other than fire trucks).

  Studies by the Washington State Department of Transportation find that solid waste trucks do more road and bridge damage than any other kind of truck, and for this reason, WSDOT does not allow these trucks on state highways when they are using the special exemption for more weight. Seattle has no such prohibition, nor even any incentive for its own solid waste contractors not to use the special exemption for more weight.

• dcac August 18, 2011 (8:50 am)

  The expression is “cutting your nose off to spite your face”. And what cash cow are we talking about? I’m lost in a sea of idioms. All I’m saying is that after traveling to cities all over the world, both rich and poor, with better public transit than Seattle, I hate coming home to this beautiful, prosperous city and getting stuck in traffic on the freeway. Heck, even Cleveland has a subway system. If they can do it, why can’t we?

• george August 18, 2011 (10:13 am)

  Where does the car tax tabs fees come from if no one has a car anymore b/c they commute? hth.

• dcac August 18, 2011 (10:50 am)

  What? I think your argument is that if car owners switched over to taking public transit, then we wouldn’t be able to impose a fee on car tabs, and the city and/or county would be missing out on a lot of money. You’re right. Doesn’t change any of my previous comments.

• MP August 18, 2011 (3:40 pm)

  Yep, it’s a big NO!!! I’ve said it a million times, bikes need to pay tab fees too! You want the same rights as cars, well there you go! Seems so damn easy!
  Oh wait, can’t piss off Mcswinns biking buddies… Oh wait, what was that guys name that makes a sh*t load of money that he hired to fix transportation??? Oh yeah, his name is mayors lackey!

• JN August 18, 2011 (7:47 pm)

  @MP, I still can’t believe someone is still out there who believes the kind of junk you do. Go crawl back into your garage and sit in your gas-guzzling dinosaur while the modern world cycles by you.

• MP August 18, 2011 (9:07 pm)

  Let’s not forget the SDOT also gets all the money from Seattle businesses that have signs and outdoor seating for customers. Yes, I make out 2 checks to SDOT for this. And yes, huge increase in this from last year too! Running a small business in Seattle is sooooo expensive! Learn how to manage your money!! And I agree, run a tighter ship. How about all crew members work! Geeez what a concept!

• Aman August 18, 2011 (9:53 pm)

  I am not a pedal-biker. Although I think it could be fun. I know that my doctor would endorse me!

  This said, are bicycles legally required to be licensed in Seattle? Are bicycle-riders required to have insurance?

  I would appreciate insight on these questions as to ANY “other” issues which I am sure I have overlooked. Thank you.

• sam-c August 19, 2011 (8:42 am)

  Aman- don’t think lciense or insurance is required, never had it when I’ve been on my bike, and I’ve never thought that those were necessary. Until last night, when I was walking home from work. A guy on a bicycle flew past me less than a foot away, riding on the 4′ wide sidewalk, never heard him coming since a loud car was also coming up behind me at the same time. no bell, no ‘on your left.’ I thought wow, good thing I was walking straight down the right side of sidewalk otherwise I would have been mowed over. it lead me to wonder, well in a hit and run by bike, how are you supposed to identify the perp ? what if I didn’t have health insurance, cyclists don’t have liability insurance….not only that, but if he had hit me, he might have gone into the street, right when the car was driving by.. bad news for driver, cyclist, and pedestrian.

Sorry, comment time is over.