In "Selling a Transit Technology," I attempt to answer objectively  a number of questions regarding the Green Line Phase 1 Monorail and the larger citywide system proposed to follow, including:

	What is the probable true cost of construction?
	What is the full cost of the project including borrowing costs?
	How should costs be expressed in risk (probability) terms?
	What is the current level of traffic congestion in the corridor including downtown, and what will be the project's impact on future congestion?
	Was ridership evaluated accurately?
	What were the assumptions concerning bus route restructuring, and is there a cost that needs  to be estimated and assigned?
	What are feasible alternatives, and how do they compare in terms of cost-effectiveness?
	Where will the money come from to complete a citywide system?

Now these are straightforward, albeit somewhat technical, questions, and their answers would seem to be of value to citizens who are being asked to make a multi-billion dollar investment decision. And they would be useful to reporters and editorial writers who help inform citizens, and need to break out of the normal "he said, she said" reporting.

It's also clear that we should not expect to obtain straight answers from proponents, or opponents for that matter. Experience teaches that biases will tend to control and color every nuance of the transit debate. That's the way it was (and still is) for light rail. And passions seem to run even stronger for monorail. Probably only psychologists can explain why.

So, just as we found for Sound Transit, answers to the basic questions had to be dug out of the ETC's plans, environmental statements, and consultant reports, or estimated independently when the documents were found to be incomplete, which was often the case.

Is there a better way? This observer thinks so. What's missing is a neutral and believable analytical entity. Everyone, including the consultants who crunch numbers for proponents, is susceptible to sins of omission if not commission. Thus even the EIS process is woefully inadequate. Tough and challenging comments are simply blown away.

The only entity that can bring some measure of professional neutrality and credibility to the technical and financial issues is the regional planning agency, the Puget Sound Regional Council (PSRC). Unfortunately, the PSRC has been allowed to sit on its hands and computers throughout the past 10 years when passions and politics have dominated discussions of our transportation future. Fathoming the possible reasons for this would take more space than this format allows. Let's just assume that the regional planners can be freed from the constraints that currently mute their voices. As a discussion starter, here's what they might do:

	Commit to an effective public information/involvement process for each major transportation project. It would also apply to major modifications, such as the Link Initial Segment to Tukwila.
	Hold timely public "scoping" meetings that allow the public to submit questions, including those that might require analysis and modeling, before a public vote or before construction can begin. This process should be on-going to allow new questions to be addressed as they arise.
	Hold timely public "scoping" meetings that allow the public to submit questions, including those that might require analysis and modeling, before a public vote or before construction can begin. This process should be on-going to allow new questions to be addressed as they arise.
	As needed, establish a technical review panel that is commissioned to investigate and report directly to the public on the key questions such as cost-effectiveness, feasible alternatives, and modeling input assumptions and accuracy. Panel members should be recruited from "disinterested" transportation experts, meaning they should come from outside our region and should not have a history of choosing sides in the bus-rail or transit-highway debates.

An agency with 60 employees and a $15 million annual budget should be able to handle the assignment.

We must expect history to repeat. Whatever the fate of the proposed Green Line monorail or Sound Transit Link Light Rail, there will be future transportation proposals that generate more heat than light on both sides. If we wait for the inevitable it will be too late. Passions and invested political capital will again control the information flow. The time to change the process is now.