Susan Hutchison says she supports light rail… but not the one we’re building out to the Eastside, and certainly not the light rail approved by 62 percent of King County voters last November.
In supporting Kemper Freeman’s lawsuit to block Sound Transit’s access to I-90, and in arguing against crossing I-90 but for choosing a 520 route instead, Hutchison is clearly stating her intent to obstruct ST’s efforts to build the line approved by voters. And with the county Executive appointing 10 of the 17 seats on ST’s board, don’t think she can’t do it.
Now I know there are many folks who would prefer a 520 alignment (for example, Darryl commutes from Redmond to the UW, so it would work out great for him), but if wishes were horses beggars would ride and all that… and they certainly wouldn’t be riding the train. I myself would have preferred a South Seattle alignment that went down Rainier AVE, and included a stop at S. Graham ST, but, well, you know, screw me.
The point is, as the transit wonks at Seattle Transit Blog explain in their usual wonky detail, the cross-lake issue has already been studied, debated and deliberated ad infinitum, and no amount of wanting or wishing would make the 520 alignment any more feasible. It would be more expensive, would take longer to build, and would generate less ridership and revenue than the I-90 route. And, the University Link tunnel simply wouldn’t have the capacity to handle all the extra north-south traffic.
But most importantly, moving light rail to a new 520 bridge span would put off construction by years, dramatically raising costs, and potentially killing the project altogether. A project, by the way, that voters overwhelmingly approved, knowing it would cross I-90.
After Sound Transit’s initial birth pains, its early mismanagement and poor projections, the Central Link line nearly died on the drawing board too. And it would have, if not for the willingness of elected officials like Ron Sims, Greg Nickels, Larry Phillips and yes, Dow Constantine to stick their necks out and spend political capital in defense of what many others at the time had already written off as a doomed vision.
Leadership matters, and in speaking out against the I-90 alignment while endorsing the Washington Policy Center’s anti-transit prescriptions and embracing the patronage of racist, anti-light-rail xenophobe Kemper Freeman, Hutchison has clearly signaled her intent to lead the effort in undermining ST’s voter-approved Eastside expansion.
So if you supported last year’s transit measure, and support building rail to the Eastside, vote for Constantine. Otherwise, a vote for Hutchison is clearly a vote to kill East Link, whether she’s willing to come out and say it or not.
Not that I doubt it, retrograde that he is, but where does the reference to Kemper Freeman as racist come from?
jmh @1,
Freeman doesn’t want light rail to Bellevue Square because he doesn’t want the kinda clientele it would bring. You know, colored people.
Furthermore, a good portion of the real estate holdings he inherited were bought up at blowout prices from interned Japanese. You do know that his grandfather, Miller Freeman, was the founder and leader of the Washington State Anti-Japanese League, and played a huge role in riling up the anti-Japanese sentiment that led to internment?
So let’s just say the racism runs in the family.
People, do your own research. Hutchinson, in all her statements, has come out for East Link.
Ask Goldy to provide you with a quote where she says she wants to kill East Link light rail.
He won’t be able to provide one.
Goldy @2,
I always thought his anti-transit crap was all about the Repub belief in the bogus liberty of the car and the right to all the transportation subsidies for their own selfish souls. You know, the Jim Horn argument.
But the bit about the family history is enlightening. (Thanks.) I trust Kemper has said all the appropriate thank-yous.
Claiming someone is racist because they dont support a rail line – or because their dad was(and lets be real, plenty of people hated the Japs after pearl harbor), is just plain assinine Goldy. That is low even by your east coast standards.
using that logic, I think goldy is racist against all christians, because his ancestors were responsible for selling out Christ to the Romans.
nice logic, eh fucktard?
@2
Goldy is demonizing Freeman, but Freeman isn’t the boogeyman. He’s a friendly, rational human being. But because he doesn’t think or vote exactly like Goldy, he’s going to demonize him.
Freeman believes sinking so much money into public transit, which provides only a fraction of commuting trips, won’t solve our region’s traffic problems. He believes the math is out of whack. To him, sinking 10’s of billions of dollars into something that will serve only a fraction of the commuters is a waste of money.
Yes, Hutchison has come out for East Link, but on HER terms, Troll — throw out 4 years of planning and preliminary design and start over on a different corridor, to be built on a bridge that hasn’t been designed or funded yet, and which would deposit riders in Seattle in a spot where they can’t be accommodated on the Central Link trains.
And oh yes, defy the will of the voters who approved the current East Link alignment last November.
Yup, she’s for light rail all right, light rail that even Kemper Freeman could love.
deleted at my request
With all due respect to Darryl, I don’t feel like shelling out several billion dollars of taxes for a light rail alignment to serve his convenience, and his alone.
@5 “plenty of people hated the Japs after pearl harbor”
But old Miller Freeman hated the wrong Japs. The ones he hated weren’t the Japs who bombed Pearl Harbor. He hated the Japs who became America’s bravest soldiers and most highly decorated military unit in World War 2. (Two of three of their Medal of Honor recipients are buried in the Evergreen-Washelli military cemetery.) And who, incidentally, owned land he wanted to acquire for next-to-nothing.
It’s almost as though Nathanial Hawthorne was thinking about old Miller Freeman when he wrote The House of the Seven Gables, except Miller wasn’t born yet when the novel was written. Eerie.
erratum @10 Two or three, not two of three
@6 “Freeman isn’t the boogeyman”
Yeah he is.
“He’s a friendly, rational human being”
They always come across that way until they start to exert their money and power behind closed doors.
Goldstein…have you even been at Bell Square ever ?
If not, go there and open your eyes…
but it shows a lot about you…calling the race card cuz you don’t have better arguments ?
Pathetic
@13
The Freeman family has a rather odious and well documented history of stiring up racist sentenents to serve their interests.
@9…you dont support light rail – well then you must be racist…according to Goldy.
@10….roger, I think the majority of americans hated the japanese after pearl harbor – even ones that were patriotic US citizens. It doesnt make it right, but its how it was.
@14…are you sure you arent refering to jesse jackson or al sharpton? sure sounds like you are describing either one of those two pieces of shit.
“Freeman likes rail, but says rail-based transit systems only work in areas with extremely high densities – places like New York City, Singapore, and Hong Kong.
He notes that metropolitan Seattle is far from ever reaching that level, with 2,200 people per square mile compared with New York’s roughly 60,000 people per square mile.”
If you’d like to be educated on Freeman’s views on rail, here’s an article that doesn’t demonize him. It simply explains his, and Sound Transit’s views on this issue:
http://navigatekingcounty.com/.....-track/76/
goldy is a racist.
Troll@6: “Freeman believes sinking so much money into public transit, which provides only a fraction of commuting trips, won’t solve our region’s traffic problems.”
Using fraction of overall trips is misleading. Something like 10 million trips are taken each day in the region. I-5 through Seattle is 130,000 daily and I-90 at its highest capacity serves 190,000. That’s 1.3% and 1.9% of all trips on those corridors. They take a larger share of commuting trips, but so does transit. By Freeman’s rationale, we shouldn’t build freeways because they don’t solve our traffic problems.
By comparison, Metro serves 300,000 trips daily, and it’s just one transit agency.
Who was it that signed this executive order?
http://bss.sfsu.edu/internment.....r9066.html
The entire United States of WW2 bears the shame of the internment of the Japanese Americans (some of which I know)…not just Grandpa Freeman.
Troll@18: Seattle has a density over 7000/square mile. New York is just over 27k/sq. mile, or 3.8 times as dense. Freeman cited a ratio of 27:1, so he was off by a factor of more than 7.
Seattle is the 10th densest metro city in the United States.
Does she eat babies too? I read it here on this blog so it must be true.
Goldy,
So Sound Transit has spent $20million in plans and design for I-90…It is already over a billion dollars over budget from when voters passed it in 1996, so what’s another 20 million in exchange for the right plan?
@1
Racism in the Freeman Klan goes all the way back to great great-grampa Legh Freeman who published a little race baiting ditty called the Frontier Index. Kemper’s grand father played a fairly major roll in getting Japanese Americans interned.
For more info pick up Dave Neiwert’s book Strawberry Days.
Oops. Scratch on of those greats.
You’d think that Kemper Freeman would try to atone for the atrocious racism of his forebears. He doesn’t, though. Doesn’t seem to bother him at all. That’s a Republican for you.
@27…since when are we responsible for what our forefathers did?
sounds like suffer from a bunch of white guilt..why dont you go lynch yourself and end your shame.
Sheesh – where to begin clearing all the smoke billowing up here?
The agency isn’t “a billion dollars over budget” – the projects all are coming in on time and under budget. Yes, there are technical details remaining on the bridge crossing, but it’ll all fall into place.
@29..which budget is that? the original budget? the revised budget? the revised revised budget? the revised revised revised budget? Same goes for the schedule
Hell, anybody can say they are on bugdet and on schedule when they constantly update the budget the and schedule.
keep moving them goalposts……..
#27,
Do I have to make good for what my forefathers did in 1066? How shall I atone for this?
@16 Well, don’t you think it’s better if people do what’s right? I mean, shouldn’t we strive toward that? At least give it a try?
@17 Jackson and Sharpton have nothing to do with the Freeman family’s odious racism. Are you blow off the Freeman family’s odious racism? Is that your intent? Sounds like it.
@18 “He notes that metropolitan Seattle is far from ever reaching that level, with 2,200 people per square mile compared with New York’s roughly 60,000 people per square mile.”
But Seattle’s population isn’t evenly distributed. What’s the density along the light rail route? That’s what’s relevant.
@28 I don’t care what your forbears did, but I hold you responsible for your Republican idiocy.
@30 Pretty weak comeback there after getting your ass kicked, ace.
@31 seppuku*
* Heh! Just kidding! Wingnut joke.
@5,10
His Daddy and Grand Daddy hated the “Japs” long before Pearl Harbor. The Freeman’s hatred of the Japanese and Chinese went on way past WWII. I grew up reading their racist screeds in Pacific Fisherman as a kid in the late 70’s.
@31
Nope, you’re free and clear. The problem with the Freeman’s is that there’s a direct line where Freeman after Freeman issued racist screeds and profited from racism for 100 years or so.
Maybe Kemper isn’t apposing the light rail line for racist reasons, but his numbers don’t support his claims and with the family background it’s a fair question to ask.
Race, racism and anti semitism in the history of the Puget Sound region tend to get glossed over. There are a lot of us that want to point it out so that we have a more accurate view of what our history really is. You can not talk about racism in our region and not talk about the Freeman’s.
How many of you had or have relatives that are racist?
That’s right, 100% of you.
And you benefited from their and our country’s racism, didn’t you?
Damn right you did.
So shut your fucking mouths about Freeman’s ancestors.
You are even more fucked up than I thought you were…and that was pretty fucked up.
Damn…
#39 Michael,
Thanks. Whew. I thought England was going to have to be given back to the fucking Krauts and the beer would go to hell.
@40
Um… If you consider leaving the south to fight for the north in the civil war, taking a musket ball in the back and being run out of town when you came back home after the war racist and beneficial, then yeah I’ve got ancestors like that.
If you consider having a grandfather who canceled a customers account at his store and told him to never come back when the customer disapproved of my grandfather having “jap” work at his store a benefit. Then yeah, thats me. Actually, I think of this, my grand fathers opposition to racism, having a back bone and moral compass, a big benefit to me.
If you think growing up reading racist garbage published by the Freeman’s and thinking it was cool to call Brazil Nuts Nigger Toes benefited me in some way, than yeah that’s me.
Yes, I’m a white boy that has benefited from racism and probably still does considering the conditions and practices we let American companies get away with when operating in foreign countries.
But, that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t have an accurate telling of our history or that we shouldn’t try to called people out on racist behavior and policies when we see them. Again, you can’t have an accurate telling of our history here in the Puget Sound region without with the Freeman’s and their racism. Given Kemper and the rest of his families history with racism, it’s a fair question to ask if his opposition to light rail is based, not on good public policy, but on racism.
….and Vikings…..I hate lutefisk.
@42
Great comment!
Kemper’s grand daddy sorta, kinda, had several members of my extended family (by marriage, duh) shipped off to Manzanar for the duration. It’s a bit of sore spot.
Why don’t we just open the transit market to anyone who wants to run a bus or whatever? No costs to the taxpayer and improved services. Was that difficult or what!
@36…dumb rabbit – once again talking about things you have no clue about.
@33…..so let me get this straight. Freeman’s dad(along with A MAJORITY OF THE COUNTRY) were pretty pissed at the japs after pearl harbor..in fact, the DEMOCRAT president at the time signed the orders to intern the japanese.
based on that, freeman is someone how a racist because he is against the rail line.
how ya figure that dunderhead? You know what, nevermind, you wont answer the question because you cant. Instead, you will play the same old liberal game – when someone disagree’s with you, just call them racist.
your shit is old…just die already.
@35…my republican party? ahhaahhha, nice try, but your assumption fails again.
now, go be a good liberal and suck a dick.
@38……..you dont get it, do you? what his father or grandfather thought or did is irrelavant….perhaps we should you responsible for what your ancestors did?
you have white guilt, thats your problem. go shoot yourself and put yourself out of your own misery.
That’s just not very good.
You’re going to have to ramp up your game mr. humunganunga or you’re gonna get your ass kicked here.
@51…what kind of GEEK talks about “kicking ass” on a message board? LMFAO….nerd much?
Seattle grew up with light rail. Look around you: the long straight level avenues? Most of them once had streetcar tracks. But now, somehow, with more people than the city had when its trolley suburbs were built, there isn’t “enough density.”
Hominids. Can’t count.
@48
You don’t read very well do you. The Freeman family had a long history of anti-Japanese racism prior to 12/07/1941 and a long history afterward.
Of course it wasn’t just the Japanese, the Freemans tried to keep blacks and Jews out of the Eastside as well, they were big supporters of restrictive property covenants.
Whether Kemper himself ascribes to the blatant racism of his forbears may be a subject for debate–most likely he doesn’t.
If he really is scared to death of light rail polluting his mall with too many of “the wrong people” i. e. those who don’t have a lot of money or credit to buy stuff, or who might…er, put off others who do, then he’s at least being classist, and furthermore has lost touch with the way development has gone over the last several decades. Bellevue is no longer the center of the Eastside universe, and the epicenter of high-tech industry that’s long been its economic engine has migrated from the Northrup corridor to Redmond. Suppose light rail does get shoved off to 520…and goes straight from Seattle to Redmond. Then all those folks from the Republic of Microsoft will be considerably less likely to take their business to Bellevue Square.
Goldy, did you watch last night’s mayoral debate? How do you feel about McGinn now that he’s publicly advocating for light rail on 520? Should we expect a similar post lambasting him & noting that a vote for him is a vote against light rail?
what’s this bullshit about being responsible for shit you didn’t do, because some ancestor did it?
Fuck man, the Vikings took slaves and even took 30,000 Irish girls to Iceland and forcibly made them their wives, that is raped them repeatedly.
Should a Norwegian in Seattle today feel bad?
If you look at history, pretty much every group that had the power abused it whether thru slave taking (balcks, whites, arabs, chiese, everyone did it) opressing women enforcing serfdom colonising (believe me, the Mayas and Aztecs did it just as much as they could) or most of all, systematically acting holier than thou about it to all other groups.
So if your grandparent for for the union, that’s nothing you did, and shut the fuck up about it.
Just work for justice today, everyone.
Or else my viking blood may come back and I’ll do to you what we did to the residents on london and bristol circa 950!