Liberal Talk Radio

Definitely check out the Seattle Weekly article on the re-emergence of Bombarier-backed Team Monorail. Money quote:

We believe that the voters and residents of Seattle will welcome a competitive process, and that SMP, as a responsible, transparent public entity with the best interests of the entire Seattle community, will as well.” Adds consultant Blair Butterworth, a spokesperson for TM: “This is the monorail Seattle wanted. If we’re allowed to bid, we’ll win.”

Looks good to me, except the part where they say that Bombarier’s Vegas Monorail still has chunks of metal falling off it. But hey, this is new technology we’re talking about here!

Also noteworthy for Seattle is Team Monorail’s ambition for the whole project to be LEED Silver certified. In case you’re wondering, LEED is a standard for environmentally-sustainable construction. LEED Gold, which is exceedingly rare, more or less means the whole building can be converted back to mulch at the touch of a button, as far as I understand.

Kudos to TM for realizing that the Monorail is a populist movement, and gearing their proposal to appeal to the populist in us. Savvy.

You know, re-inserting competition to the design project makes me think about the coming showdown with Monorail and Sound Transit’s Link Light Rail, which began construction downtown recently. Competition can be a healthy thing. It’s going to cost us a sh*tload of money (probably around $6000 from me personally over the next 30 years), but we’re going to get to see two competing designs in action, and then we can choose to expand on whichever one we like better.

As much as I dislike most popular initiatives, this one may prove to have unexpectedly worthwhile results.

Oh yeah, and TM’s station designs look DOPE!