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Comment by intopieces | Hacker News Reader

Seattle is improving the normal transport service, too. They are tearing up streets and putting in trains, they are eliminating parking(!) in favor of places to hang out. Seattle is becoming fantastically more car-hostile by the day. Seriously, the last time I visited one street had eliminated street parking in favor of a protected bike lane, potted plants and some chairs.

There are 27 distinct, voter-approved transit projects in progress:

https://www.soundtransit.org/system-expansion

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Is that a bad thing, though? I mean, it is for people who like to drive, but I think the benefits to everyone else outweigh the preferences of car owners.

I read "fantastically car-hostile" as a pro car-hostility statement.

I had the opposite take. Usually when I read opinions colored by "car-hostile," it's from authors who advocate for car-maximized infrastructure.

I used to term car-hostile as a step beyond "pro-transit," because cities can be pro-transit while still not doing enough to actively reduce the number of people getting into cars.

Seattle is not just making riding transit more convenient. They are making driving more inconvenient.

As someone living in the suburbs near Seattle... You're half right. Mostly about the making driving (and parking) more inconvenient.

In programming terms they're ripping out a deprecated interface without having first provided a replacement to transition to. Yes there are park and ride facilities outside of the core city, but they're specced for local capacity. The gateway interface would be much more like replacing several warehouses near the tram line and freeway with GIANT, actively police monitored, parking garages. On the north end something similar probably needs to happen near the northgate mall, and if the extension up through the U doesn't go there it needs to.

THEN after the pre-requisite work is done, they should just ban all cars from the city outright.

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