It’s being called by some, Seattle’s war on cars. A series of recent moves by city leaders has critics saying Seattle wants to balance its massive budget deficit on the backs of motorists. Mayor Mike McGinn calls the idea that Seattle is at war with cars silly, but he does admit he’s trying to get many people out of their cars and onto bicycles and their own two feet.
The list of recent actions is long. Last year Seattle jacked up taxes on parking lot owners who are now passing those costs along to customers. McGinn beefed up parking enforcement in an effort to write more tickets and it’s working. Last year, officers wrote 508,675 parking tickets which works out to one ticket per minute. And they’re on pace to write even more this year. Parking ticket fines are projected to bring in $23 million next year up from $18.4 last year.
The city has also put itself on what it calls a “road diet”. The transportation department is taking car lanes and giving them to bicyclists. At a cost of more than $300 million over 10 years, Seattle is creating hundreds of miles of bike and pedestrian lanes.
And most recently, Mayor Mike McGinn has proposed raising the metered parking rates up to $4 an hour. Currently people pay $2.50 per hour. It’s all got motorists and downtown business owners fuming. Some drivers we spoke with say only the wealthy can even afford to drive downtown these days. And the parking crunch has shop owners blasting the mayor for creating road blocks at a time when many of them are suffering and struggling to stay afloat. One antique shop owner told me his sales are down 40% since 2008 and this will deter even more would be customers from shopping downtown.
Read more: http://liveshots.blogs.foxnews.com/2010/10/12/seattles-war-on-cars/#ixzz12CCgPhKQ
No comments:
Post a Comment