If you think of a light rail expansion like baking a cake, we are late in the process of figuring out what recipe to use. The characteristics of what flavors and textures we’d like to see in the cake have already been determined and were prioritized by public processes over the last three years. In order of priority, Tacoma wants the cake (that is, the light rail expansion) to:

1. Improve mobility and transportation access for Tacoma residents and visitors,
2. Increase transit ridership,
3. Serve underserved neighborhoods and communities,
4. Spur economic development,
5. Be environmentally sensitive and sustainable, and
6. Be a project that’s competitive for federal funding.

Up until two weeks ago, Tacoma was getting ready to select one or two (of three) highly-refined and well-supported recipes to tell Sound Transit to start baking.  Sound Transit staff had already narrowed a list of 24 alternative routes along nine different corridors to three options based on community input. The three remaining routes were: Hilltop and Sixth Avenue via Tacoma General Hospital and Salishan via the Emerald Queen Casino. The analysis had been completed, public comment gathered and the date to move forward was set for late this month. Then, as the decision approached, Tacoma City Councilmember David Boe and the Streetcar Stakeholders Group felt that we hadn’t exhausted all of the options since we started studying expansion of Tacoma Link (... more than six years ago). Both Boe and the Stakeholder group proposed "hybrids" of alternatives previously examined.

Both 11th-hour "hybrid" alternatives, one drawn on the back of an envelope, the other with no map at all, now try to link Hilltop with Lower Portland Avenue and the Emerald Queen Casino. In terms of the process, what this does is it elevates "underserved communities" to the top of the priority list and demotes mobility and ridership as less important - in effect, overriding much of the public comment received thus far.  Another danger in taking this course is that it opens up the process to what transit consultant Jarrett Walker calls "symbolic transit," where "services that add little or no mobility to the network, but appeal to 'special' demographics or non-transport purposes" displace those that would provide mobility and access.  Both hybrid options are tragically over budget, and neither of the options can extend light rail to any Tacoma neighborhood center more than walking distance out of Downtown - a project objective that has remained a focus since the streetcar feasibility study was authorized back in 2006.

While these alternatives jump to the front of the line, a decision awaits on which ones will move forward into environmental review and conceptual engineering. The question now isn’t, "Which route are we going to build?" — It's more like, "Which routes are promising enough, based on our project criteria and limitations, to warrant an in-depth analysis of benefits and impacts?"  So, IF we build it, 1) what issues are we likely to encounter? and 2) what do Sound Transit and the city of Tacoma need to address to help make it successful?

Residents will get to have their say from 4-7 p.m. April 11, when Sound Transit will be holding yet another open house just off the Tacoma Dome Station Link stop. At this meeting you’ll be able to learn about the two new hybrid corridors, provide input about which corridor you prefer and learn about next steps. This will be an opportunity to sound off on the process, too. Make sure to attend, if you can. Sound Transit is scheduled to move Tacoma Link to the next phase of environmental review in late May.