Transportation For America Can-do places: How Seattle is accommodating population growth and sustaining economic growth while maintaining quality of life

Can-do places: How Seattle is accommodating population growth and sustaining economic growth while maintaining quality of life

4 Nov 2016 | Posted by Christiaan Mader | 0 Comments | affordable housing, buses, Can Do Places, local successes, public transportation, Seattle, transit, washington

This story from Seattle, Washington is the seventh in our series of stories illustrating how local communities across the country are casting a vision and often putting their own skin in the game first with local funding while hoping for a strong federal partner to make those plans a reality.

In cities, towns and suburbs like Seattle all across the country, local leaders are responding to new economic challenges with innovative plans for their transportation networks, including taxing themselves to make their visions a reality. But they can’t do it alone and need strong federal and state partners to make it work.

Set aside some time to read this long profile of what’s been happening in Seattle — which includes their enormous measure on November’s ballot, where voters will decide whether or not to bring the next phase of their regional transit expansion to life.

Seattle, Washington

The economy in Seattle and the greater Puget Sound region is soaring, and area population growth is supersonic. Unmanaged, that prosperity could drive the cost of living out of reach for many low- and middle-income Seattleites and choke the regional transportation network to deadlock congestion, pumping the brakes on the region’s historic prosperity. But forward-thinking transportation investments and smart city planning have the region poised to stay in control of the boom.

Read the full story here.

Mt. Rainier peaks over the Seattle skyline. Natural beauty, a bustling job market, and high quality life have this Pacific metro booming. Flickr photo by Daniel Schwen.