'Eastside cities feel left out': Group again pushes countywide monorail

By Natalie Singer
Seattle Times Eastside bureau

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Citizens for King County Monorail gathered less than a quarter of the signatures needed to get their proposal on the ballot this month.

But instead of giving up, supporters are holding public forums, organizing regional divisions and looking for more volunteers to try again. A forum is scheduled in Bellevue tomorrow.

"By hook or by crook, we want to put this before the voters," said Karin Blakley, a steering-committee member and Newcastle resident.

The grass-roots campaign for a monorail linking the Eastside to Seattle and South King County needed at least 45,000 valid signatures from King County voters to get the initiative on this month's ballot. The initiative would authorize a $6.4(million, two-year feasibility and design study to determine where an elevated transit line could go and how much it would cost.

But the group was thwarted by vandalism of petitions and what it called overly strict county regulations that led to delays in the initiative filing. The 10,000 signatures the group collected cannot be resubmitted.

But Blakley said interest in a countywide monorail is growing as high-profile mass-transit projects in other areas, including light rail and the monorail in Seattle and commuter rail in Everett, get under way.

"A lot of the Eastside cities feel left out. They want something, too," she said. Though the Eastside has seen significant investment in buses and transit centers through Sound Transit, there are no firm plans for a rail system there.

Citizens for King County Monorail estimates that a trip from Bellevue to Seattle would take 19 minutes on a monorail, and that such a system would cost $5(billion.

While the group is aiming for next November's ballot, that could change, depending on the fate of a regional tax package for transportation that's in the works, and other factors, members said. In the meantime, they're seeking new volunteers and supporters.

At recent public forums in Seattle, Kenmore and Kent, steering-committee members fielded questions from residents about the project's cost, routes and whether a countywide monorail would compete with light rail, which has been discussed for the Interstate 90 bridge.

More detailed answers would come from the two-year study the group wants voters to approve.

But Cleve Stockmeyer, who was elected this month to the Seattle Popular Monorail Authority board and also has been working on the countywide effort, said a monorail would not preclude light rail, because the former is elevated.

"If you have monorail, you could have light rail underneath. You could have cars underneath," he said. "It's basically like two free lanes."

Natalie Singer: 206-464-2704 or nsinger@seattletimes.com

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