Puget Sound region planting seeds for European-caliber public transit

Sounders FC coach Sigi Schmid might know where I watched the quarterfinals and semifinals of the FIFA World Cup. The village of Pfäffingen is a quick train ride away from his hometown, Tübingen, in southern Germany.

Thirsty soccer fans packed into Club Boom on the grounds of the local community sports association to follow the matches on a wall-sized television screen. Germany advanced, then lost to Spain, the eventual champions.

My appreciation of European football is growing, but my envy of the continent's transportation system is well established. The train, tram and bus options in the land of $6.80-a-gallon gasoline is a peek at our future.

So congratulations to Sound Transit on the first anniversary of its 16-mile Central Link line from downtown Seattle to Sea-Tac International Airport. By the way, I owe you five bucks.

A recent trip chasing after far-flung daughters began with me dropping my wife and our luggage off at a bus stop at the top of Lake Washington and taking the car back home. Armed with our Orca cards we rode a bus 13 miles into Seattle, walked a couple of blocks and rode an elevator down into the bus tunnel.

My confused assumptions about tapping our cards on board a light-rail car, and a lack of signage, put me in ST's debt.

The opportunity for transit options to blossom around Puget Sound is extraordinary, and at the same time marvelously ordinary. Watching the basic, unassuming role of transit in the daily lives of others raises expectations.

Debates over light rail, street cars and buses in the United States take on a curious, almost heretical, overtone. Instead of focusing on how to move people, promote transit-related development, support tourism and create jobs, investment and paychecks, the talk can quickly turn to those people who want to do away with cars.

Still, progress is being made. Sound Transit is working to connect Capitol Hill and Husky Stadium by 2016. The City of Bellevue is wrangling with Sound Transit over prospective routes. The guiding principle ought to be which path will carry the most people, support bus links and allow for expansion. Make it easy and accessible for the greatest number of potential riders.

The truly exciting possibility is the 42-mile Eastside rail corridor between the cities of Snohomish and Renton, with a spur from Woodinville to Redmond. The simultaneous offering of rail and bicycle trails is a logical, appealing way to connect Eastside cities.

A promising rail option for the corridor is DMU, diesel multiple unit. These self-propelled, typically two-car trains sound a bit mysterious, but could not be more practical.

German towns, and communities elsewhere in Europe, are linked throughout the day for local and regional service. Commuters, parents and baby carriages, kids on field trips and wide-eyed tourists buzz along with ease. DMUs are also hauling passengers in suburban Portland and other U.S. cities.

The same DMU system that takes Eastside commuters to work in Redmond can get residents and tourists to wineries in Woodinville and Snohomish's farmers' markets.

Another basic transit goal should be extension of Seattle's South Lake Union streetcar line to the University of Washington. Easily moving people to jobs, cultural and sporting events, restaurants and shopping truly adds economic velocity to transit dollars.

Germany works hard to keep public transit busy seven days a week, marketing to residents and tourists with all-day, multipassenger passes that cover an entire region. How about a Seattle Card that combines hassle-free use of all transit, and offers discounted admission to museums and tourist attractions?

Transit is green in part because there is money to be made via creative ways to get around easier. Those are hardly foreign concepts.

Lance Dickie's column appears regularly on editorial pages of The Times. His e-mail address is ldickie@seattletimes.com