Yesterday will go down in history with the opening of the Seattle South Lake Union Trolley, the first streetcar line in 25 years. Buy your tee shirt here or visit Kapow Coffee in South Lake Union when you ride. Solving all the cities transportation woes, the S.L.U.T. connects Paul Allentown with Westlake Mall, cutting what would be a half-hour walk into a 10 minute ride in this a high commute area. During December the streetcar is free: making the Seattle S.L.U.T. a Cheap Trick. It was a smooth ride with full carriages as Seattlites flocked to try the new toy. Your intrepid reporter and sometime city planner Ciaralira was there in the trenches to take the maiden voyage and report back to her eager fans.

Great things about the S.L.U.T.:

It was free. It was clean. It didn’t smell like a bus, but like a new car. A barbershop quartet serenaded me at the South Lake Union Park stop. Starbucks gave me a free sample peppermint hot chocolate at the end of my ride. Some salon gave me a goodie bag at the end of my ride in the other direction. I got free stickers.

Not-So-Great things about the S.L.U.T.:

There will never be a time when I will need to travel between Allentown and Westlake. It gets stuck in traffic too. The real traffic tangles- I-5, the 520 floating bridge, Ballard- will be completely unaffected by the S.L.U.T.

IF the city were to put in trolley lines all over, connecting the major commuter routes and especially the high density areas that it has created with commercial hubs, then…well then Seattle could really be considered a first class city, not a frontier town of highly-caffeinated computer nerds. There used to be streetcar lines all over the city and many of the streets are still extra-wide to accommodate them. Currently the city has no funding plans for further development. Separately, the city of Shoreline is putting in Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) along Aurora Blvd (aka highway 99) and King County Executive Ron Sims has promised to put in BRT lines through the county connecting poor neglected Ballard, which voters approved in the last election. Sound Transit is still building it’s single light rail line from Northgate to the airport, with plans to connect the University of Washington eventually.

Let’s not even mention the Monorail. (Shown passing the S.L.U.T. overhead at left.)

What makes mass transit effective? It needs to be Reliable – to get commuters where they want to go when they want to get there. It needs to be Affordable – cheaper than taking a car. It needs to be Efficient – to get commuters there faster than taking a car. Why would a person take mass transit if driving a car can get you there in half the time? Studies have shown that commuters are unwilling to make multiple transfers on multiple different forms of transportation. This is the problem. The state, the county, the city of Seattle and the surrounding cities need to work TOGETHER for ONE, EFFICIENT, RELIABLE, and AFFORDABLE system.

But, hey, I gave up saving the world through smart planning. I’m left to make snarky comments, sing jesting songs, and enjoy my time riding the Seattle S.L.U.T.