Yes. Approval of an insane number of construction sites in downtown core has lead to absolute gridlock, the removal of lanes on arterial roads for wider bike lanes, and the 405 toll lane are the first which come to mind.
Ugh, that 405 change is almost enough to have me start an armed rebellion. Not only did it make traffic worse, as a motorcyclist it made my commute far more dangerous because they couldn’t be bothered to spend money for even the most trivial of barriers. Even the car drivers are scared, because they all huddle in the left HOT lane. It is one of the few public projects that blatantly appears to involve some degree of graft.
I think what he's saying is that the city has enabled unchecked population growth, and this has hurt quality of life for those already living here, who have put down roots, and been paying their taxes. This is plainly true - the ever increasing height limits in South Lake Union, rezoning of various neighborhoods, etc. has made it much harder to get around as density increases and shared resources (e.g. roads, parks, etc.) become vastly over-subscribed.
Are you suggesting the city of Seattle has any control over 405? I agree that the 405 toll lane(s) are awful, just not on the part about Seattle's culpability.
I think it's more a question of what they haven't done as the city has grown. If you increase the populace, but don't increase the amount of roads and parking, driving gets worse. (I'm not arguing that that's a bad thing.)
Interstate 405 toll lanes, turning two way roads into one way roads to add a bicycle lanes in many places, lowering arterial speeds from 30 to 25mph and in downtown streets from 25 to 20mph.
The 405 toll lanes originally removed capacity on off peek hours by removal of the HOV lanes, until pushback had them undo it. 2 person HOV was removed.
The way the WADOT has been measuring success of the toll lanes is by polling people at the Bellevue Transit Center to find out if they are now taking the bus because of the toll lanes.
Yes, lots of actions. I'll name just a few but this is FAR from exhaustive:
- They have eliminated car lanes in favor of bike lanes that are typically not highly utilized - even in neighborhoods far from the downtown core, street parking is being eliminated for bike lanes, and is making even simple tasks hard and hurting quality of life (e.g. taking the kids to the dentist but not being able to park anywhere nearby).
- They have reduced speed limits in many places and therefore added travel time everywhere. This includes thoroughfares obviously designed for high throughput (e.g. WA-522, Lake City Way).
- Next month, the main on-ramp at Mercer Avenue onto I-5 will begin to be metered, which is going to be incredibly painful given that traffic is already super bad on Mercer (as always they are claiming it will "improve safety").
Many lanes on important highways and connecting streets downtown are being made bus-only all the time, when they really should be Bus+Carpool or allow regular car usage outside peak hours.