As Seattle voters ponder whether to boost car-tab fees another $60, they can't peruse a simple list of projects and decide if they want to pay to have them done.

Instead, if they agree to pay an estimated $204 million over 10 years, the City Council would later make decisions about how to spend it.

The measure on the Nov. 8 ballot is different from a typical school or parks construction levy.

There's only a general plan for the money, but most of it would support transit, cycling and pedestrian projects. About one-fifth is earmarked for pavement repair or replacement.

Supporters promise something for every neighborhood, which is both a strength and a weakness. Money would be spread thinly enough that the city's more ambitious ideas — an Interstate 5 bicycle overpass to the University District, or a streetcar line to Ballard — become unaffordable. However, the city could repave more streets, add hundreds of bicycle-parking spaces and better maintain traffic lights, virtually everywhere.

Despite lacking a dramatic project, the measure pleases environmental and transportation-advocacy groups supporting the Streets for All Seattle campaign, which seeks to help residents conquer congestion and shift away from carbon dependence.

"The taxpayers should be glad. No one particular group got everything they wanted. We took a balanced approach," said Ref Lindmark, co-chair of the city's advisory committee.

But the proliferating wish lists bother opponent John Fox, head of the Seattle Displacement Coalition. In particular, he worries that politicians will later point to an $18 million share for streetcar planning to commit Seattle to future taxes for rail.

"God help us, and how much longer do we have to wait for the Magnolia Bridge to get repaired? Do we wait for it to be closed down, like the South Park Bridge?" said Fox. "Spending tens of millions of dollars to invest in new infrastructure when we can't fix what we have, it's absurd. It's ludicrous. It makes no sense."

Streets for All spokesman Viet Shelton answers that a significant share of the car-tab money — for trolley wires, signals and paving — would improve the transit and roads that already exist. The plan would include money to repave the equivalent of a two-mile lane and to complete 30 small-area repairs each year.

Opponents already have formed two campaigns. Citizens Against Raising Car Tabs says the fee hurts lower-income drivers, while Sidewalks and Streets for Seattle argues that the city should focus on those two areas.

David Miller, leader of Sidewalks and Streets, says the city needs more transit hours and a firm plan for upgrading and repairing main transit corridors.

"Seattle taxpayers deserve more specifics for their $20 million a year," he said.

A new transit master plan with a more definitive list of projects will be finished at the end of the year. But City Councilmember Tom Rasmussen, chairman of the transportation committee, says it is important to reach voters now, before a rash of new funding requests in 2012.

Besides a possible state tax for roads and maybe transit, the city might ask voters for $300 million or more in property tax to rebuild part of the Elliott Bay sea wall. And Mayor Mike McGinn, who wanted a longer-term, $80 fee to fund actual construction of streetcars, likely will propose a future package for high-capacity transit, spokesman Aaron Pickus said.

Transit

Seattle's measure comes just after the Metropolitan King County Council raised car-tab fees $20 for two years, to sustain existing bus service while converting six busy corridors to "RapidRide" routes with roomier buses running more frequently. This past May, another $20 car-tab fee took effect in Seattle, the majority to repair and build streets and sidewalks.

Still, Lindmark said, residents at neighborhood meetings showed overwhelming support for transit spending in the new measure.

"We're going to be mostly talking about the transit portion of the package," said Streets for All spokesman Shelton.

The city has identified 15 major corridors, and supporters say the money could improve one or two per year, reducing bus trip times up to 20 percent.

"Twenty percent would be great. That would be a pretty aggressive plan," said Jim Jacobson, deputy manager of Metro Transit.

But wish lists from Metro and the city differ, so it's unclear whose priorities would prevail.

"It's all very preliminary at this point," said Metro spokeswoman Linda Thielke.

To take one example, the Delridge corridor in West Seattle ranks next-to-last in a draft of Seattle's forthcoming transit plan, yet City Council members used it as a photo backdrop to announce the ballot measure.

Metro ranks Delridge in the top half of its list of corridors needing improvement. Riders from nearby White Center and Burien fill Route 120 through Delridge, so the importance doesn't stop at the city limits.

Jacobson said he hopes top priority would go to support RapidRide lines — exactly where Metro is adding buses in tough economic times, he points out. These would include Aurora Avenue, the Ballard-Interbay area and West Seattle Junction.

The November package also includes $20 million to close gaps in Metro's grid of electric trolley buses. Peter Hahn, director of the Seattle Department of Transportation, has been a steady advocate for the quiet, nonpolluting network, one of six in North America.

For instance, Route 48 from Ballard to Mount Baker could become electric, if power is extended through 23rd Avenue in the Central Area. That serves another high-ranked goal, a direct line from the Mount Baker light-rail station to the University of Washington.

Bicycling

Seattle enjoys a "gold" rating from the League of American Bicyclists, yet only about 4 percent of commuters go by bike. A yes vote on the car-tab fee would launch new debate: Should $1.4 million a year be marshaled to deliver a few game-changing trail links, or be spread around as the city has done the past few years?

The Seattle Bicycle Advisory Board named 19 high-profile projects, including a fix to the treacherous Ballard Bridge and raised or separated "cycle tracks" for downtown and the waterfront. The list includes overpasses at Northgate and the U District, and improving the Jose Rizal Bridge at north Beacon Hill.

But a city spreadsheet talks about how the cycling money could cover five miles of bike lanes or painted icons along with 124 parking spaces, and signs — the small stuff.

Another, intermediate-priced strategy is to build two miles per year of "greenways," where certain non-arterial streets feel more like trails, so casual bicyclists and children also can safely use them.

In similar projects, Portland is providing landscaped traffic barriers, speed bumps, a 20 mph speed limit, passageways through parks, or stop signs pointed to favor bicycles.

Greenways are now being designed or discussed, with city backing, in the Wallingford, Beacon Hill, Ballard, University and Laurelhurst neighborhoods in Seattle.

Cathy Tuttle, leader of Spokespeople, a group that encourages new riders, said she fears the city will be tied to carrying out its 2007 bike master plan, which tends to integrate cycling in or alongside other traffic. She suggests changing the plan.

"We want to be able to get people from 8 years old to 80 years old comfortable with bicycling and walking on city streets, and that means taking them off of arterials," she said.

Pedestrians

An estimated $2.3 million a year for walking could provide nine blocks of new sidewalks and dozens of crosswalk and signal improvements per year, the city estimates.

"What would really help is if we concentrate on the arterials, and we don't splatter them around to the neighborhoods because of demands for a block here and a block there," said Richard Dyksterhuis, a pro-walking advocate in the Bitter Lake area.

A morning stroll with Dyksterhuis entails walking around parked cars, in road lanes or around rusty signpoles along Aurora Avenue North, where people walk to reach bus Route 358, soon to be a RapidRide line.

Lindmark notes that many of the projects would help more than one mode of transportation.

When a countdown is added to crossing signals, pedestrians won't dart into the street with a few seconds left, he said. That means cars have more time to make a right turn, and buses are less likely to be interrupted by someone walking across on red, he said.

Mike Lindblom: 206-515-5631 or mlindblom@seattletimes.com