Jon Orcutt, a liberal New York activist, wants Seattleites to waste more money on transit. Orcutt is the Advocacy and Communications Director for TransitCenter — according to him, an organization that “fosters research and advocacy to improve and expand public transportation across the United States.”
He recently wrote in an opinion piece for liberal blog Publicola to announce the “inaugural class of an exciting new training program from TransitCenter” in Seattle. Orcutt:
TransitCenter is delighted to bring its first class of transit board members to witness and learn from Seattle’s great example. Ironically, however, we arrive in Seattle just as some in the region are hesitating to celebrate or even acknowledge your success. The Seattle Times, for example, recently called for the region to “pause” in planning and seeking funding for future transit expansion.”
Orcutt goes on to lament that Seattle’s “Pronto bike share system is stuck in limbo—at once too small to provide useful transportation for appreciable numbers, but also seen as too troubled to warrant expansion.”
Perhaps Orcutt should stick to giving his opinion on transit “successes” in New York City, because his observations on, and advice for, our region are ridiculous.
The Seattle Times called for a “pause” on Sound Transit 3 (ST3) because an unelected board is asking taxpayers for a whopping $54 billion without properly considering better options. As for Pronto, the bike share company failed for a reason – and in a prime example of liberal spending run amok, the city of Seattle bailed out Pronto for a whopping $1.4 million. The city plans to spend another $5 million of taxpayer money in 2017, expanding the failed experiment.
The truth is that Sound Transit and the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) have proved — time and time again — that they do not deserve voters’ trust.
Of course, if Orcutt was actually from here, instead of being paid by a liberal group to drop in and provide bad advice, he would know that.
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