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Ardennes posted:It has all happened recently, in the space of a month, but that said I have slowly been noticing more spaces staying vacant. There's a big space in a nice building that is literally across the street from the Space Needle in Seattle that has been vacant for I think over a year. Used to be a sports bar ran by a sorta famous local chef. They left because the rent was just too much. Unless you charge 45 bucks for a hamburger you just ain't going to make it. Another big restaurant in downtown Seattle closed the other month because of rent. It's been there for decades and is in a major shopping mall. But rent. I'm baffled why the landlords would rather get zero money for over a year than just lower the rent, but I guess that's why I'm not a Job Creator.
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Nov 1, 2019 18:12
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1glitch0 posted:There's a big space in a nice building that is literally across the street from the Space Needle in Seattle that has been vacant for I think over a year. Used to be a sports bar ran by a sorta famous local chef. They left because the rent was just too much. Unless you charge 45 bucks for a hamburger you just ain't going to make it. Another big restaurant in downtown Seattle closed the other month because of rent. It's been there for decades and is in a major shopping mall. But rent. We desperately need a vacancy tax (on both commercial and residential properties). It's not a panacea, but it's a start.
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Nov 1, 2019 18:22
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halokiller posted:How are the chances of I-976 passing? Everywhere I go it's a hard resounding NO, but then there's always that threat of the silent majority with their "muh taxes!" that always worry me. This isn't the first time Tim Eyman has attempted $30 car tabs, he did it in 1999 which passed at 56% but got overturned by the WA Supreme Court (as do most Eyman initiatives that pass). The no on 976 is outspending yes on 976 by a resounding 8 to 1, so who knows. I cant find any polls on it.
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Nov 1, 2019 19:08
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seiferguy posted:This isn't the first time Tim Eyman has attempted $30 car tabs, he did it in 1999 which passed at 56% but got overturned by the WA Supreme Court (as do most Eyman initiatives that pass). I would also point out the fact that he’s absolutely toxic at this point. Don’t be complacent, but know that lots of folks just plain hate his guts.
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Nov 1, 2019 19:12
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Solkanar512 posted:I would also point out the fact that he’s absolutely toxic at this point. Don’t be complacent, but know that lots of folks just plain hate his guts. Yeah I think most people know his poo poo sucks. Even the no on 976 are calling it "Tim Eyman's initiative" in every ad I see. I'm actually interested in ref 88 (worst number for this type of referendum). Every major newspaper endorses approving it, but I feel like a bunch of people will fall back on the lie that it creates a quota system.
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Nov 1, 2019 20:07
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I've heard his goal is to dismantle government and he's like stuck on the first step. He's very odd. I want to know what was going through his mind when he stole that chair from Office Depot.
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Nov 2, 2019 01:59
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inkblottime posted:I've heard his goal is to dismantle government and he's like stuck on the first step. He's very odd. I want to know what was going through his mind when he stole that chair from Office Depot. "Chair today, gone tomorrow"
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Nov 2, 2019 02:34
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seiferguy posted:This isn't the first time Tim Eyman has attempted $30 car tabs, he did it in 1999 which passed at 56% but got overturned by the WA Supreme Court (as do most Eyman initiatives that pass). Polling on 976 from the "no" campaign: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6536786-I-976-poll-by-opposition-October-2019.html It was ahead in previous July polling but the ads so far have worked and driven down support. Yes is still ahead but both sides are under 50% now so it could go either way. Rule of thumb is that undecided voters tend to lean "no" on initiatives but that's not really driven by data, more just an anecdotal thing. Given that the No camp has increased their ads since this poll was in the field, probably leaning our way but far from a sure thing for either side.
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Nov 2, 2019 22:57
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It looks like it would also get rid of the $150 tax on electric vehicles. Why the hell is there a $150 tax on electric vehicles?
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Nov 3, 2019 00:52
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CongoJack posted:It looks like it would also get rid of the $150 tax on electric vehicles. edit: This is not to suggest that gasoline taxes are a good way to fund public infrastructure, but it's the system we've got. twodot fucked around with this message at 01:05 on Nov 3, 2019 |
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Nov 3, 2019 01:00
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twodot posted:Electric cars still degrade and congest roads by driving on them, but don't pay gasoline taxes. Ok, that makes sense for why they would do that, thanks.
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Nov 3, 2019 01:10
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So that's how double posts happen.
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Nov 3, 2019 01:16
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Punishing people for not buying gas is the stupidest loving thing.
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Nov 3, 2019 01:18
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You're right, we should require all electric vehicles to include tamper-proof GPS recorders that keep track of how many miles the car is driven on public roads in Washington state.
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Nov 3, 2019 01:26
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Javid posted:Punishing people for not buying gas is the stupidest loving thing. Taxes aren't punishment. Electric cars use the roads but don't pay the gas tax that is one of the primary funding sources for road maintenance and construction. It's not "punishment" to say that drivers of on-road diesel cars and trucks can't legally use the specially dyed, non-taxed diesel that's supposed to be for farm equipment only, either. You can make a reasonable argument that the emissions benefits of electric cars are substantial enough that we should deliberately subsidize them by letting their drivers get around the gas tax. But, that's not failing to "punish" them. That's offering a specific subsidy.
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Nov 3, 2019 01:26
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Like I fully agree that funding public infrastructure via gas taxes is dumb and bad, and we should be working on ending the use of gas, and not relying people purchasing it to build roads. However, it's way harder to do that than say "Wow these cars need roads and don't need gas, I guess we need to tax them in order to keep building roads".
twodot fucked around with this message at 01:32 on Nov 3, 2019 |
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Nov 3, 2019 01:30
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Buying and burning fuel is specifically an activity there needs to be less of, so people who are willing to deal with the hassle of owning a fully electric vehicles should not be financially disincentivized from doing so any more than they already are. Taxing them in the manner they are is objectively stupid and driving people away from EVs in exchange for probably a piddly amount of tax money. "Electric vehicles are taking over the market so hard that gas tax income is hurting" is a good problem to have, and we're lol not even close to it happening
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Nov 3, 2019 02:01
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edit: This post confused two different taxes
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Nov 3, 2019 02:05
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If people actually want to change vehicular taxes based on road damage they should clearly do it based on axle weight and mileage, which is the only thing that actually matters in terms of damaging roads. But people don't actually do that because then those big trucks and SUVs would end up having to pay their fair share. Gasoline taxes are fine, and the fact that all of these "alternative tax programs" conveniently carve out savings for big pickups are entirely the point for the people that are promoting them. The only issue with them is that the taxes generally haven't been increased to match inflation since the 1970s.
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Nov 3, 2019 03:31
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Kaal posted:If people actually want to change vehicular taxes based on road damage they should clearly do it based on axle weight and mileage, which is the only thing that actually matters in terms of damaging roads. But people don't actually do that because then those big trucks and SUVs would end up having to pay their fair share. Yeah, it's rather bullshit that some Escalade isn't taxed more than my BRZ when the BRZ does way, way less damage.
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Nov 3, 2019 05:56
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Javid posted:Buying and burning fuel is specifically an activity there needs to be less of, so people who are willing to deal with the hassle of owning a fully electric vehicles should not be financially disincentivized from doing so any more than they already are. Taxing them in the manner they are is objectively stupid and driving people away from EVs in exchange for probably a piddly amount of tax money. Electric cars are also disproportionately owned by more wealthy people, they can afford the minor tax to contribute to road repairs.
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Nov 3, 2019 06:07
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You’ll find that commercial trucking is much worse for roads than an Escalade. The gap from BRZ to three ton SUV and three ton SUV to 21 ton loaded reefer isn’t really comparable.
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Nov 3, 2019 07:24
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JUST MAKING CHILI posted:You’ll find that commercial trucking is much worse for roads than an Escalade. The gap from BRZ to three ton SUV and three ton SUV to 21 ton loaded reefer isn’t really comparable. Diesel needs to die, but at least the shipping trucks are accomplishing something.
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Nov 3, 2019 08:30
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Being only generally familiar with the relative orders of magnitude involved, i would really love to see numbers for what vehicles both cause and end up paying for what proportions of the annual road repair budget, but lol, the only way a Volt comes even close to a semi is if the driver DUIs into a particularly expensive freeway sign
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Nov 3, 2019 09:13
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The damage to the roadbed is proportional to the 4th power of the axle load. Doubling the weight of a vehicle increases its relative damage to roads by 16x.
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Nov 3, 2019 09:43
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Javid posted:Being only generally familiar with the relative orders of magnitude involved, i would really love to see numbers for what vehicles both cause and end up paying for what proportions of the annual road repair budget, but lol, the only way a Volt comes even close to a semi is if the driver DUIs into a particularly expensive freeway sign This blog ran the numbers and found that semis cause 99 percent of road wear but only pay about 35 percent of the maintenance. This means that taxpayers subsidize trucking to the tune of $60 billion a year in tax avoidance. https://truecostblog.com/2009/06/02/the-hidden-trucking-industry-subsidy/ Additionally, trucking gets subsidized pretty thoroughly at every level, from discounts on fuel and pollution waivers, to breaks on taxes and insurance. It amounts to about 50 cents a mile, or another $130 billion per year, which means that American effectively taxpayers pay for all the fuel that semi-trucks use. https://usa.streetsblog.org/2015/06/02/trucking-industry-imposes-up-to-128-billion-in-costs-on-society-each-year/ Kaal fucked around with this message at 14:16 on Nov 3, 2019 |
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Nov 3, 2019 13:58
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Kaal posted:This blog ran the numbers and found that semis cause 99 percent of road wear but only pay about 35 percent of the maintenance. I agree that vehicles should pay based on damage caused to the road, but not solely that, because that's not the only reason roads degrade.
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Nov 3, 2019 17:35
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Not paying a gas tax is something I have heard older folks use as a "drat stupid bicycle riders taking up the road" complaint.
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Nov 3, 2019 17:59
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Cicero posted:Surely that's road wear from vehicle damage, not all road wear. As in, even with zero vehicles on a road, it will gradually degrade anyway simply from existing+weather. It really can't be overstated how much road deterioration is effectively synonymous with heavy vehicle usage. A modern highway, meaning one constructed with decent quality materials, appropriate to the local environment and designed to have good drainage, is effectively immune to weather issues. But what happens is that load stress breaks up the surface protection and introduces cracking, deformation, and water infiltration. This is why disused roads can last for decades with virtually no maintenance, whereas the truck corridors need constant repaving. Indeed road engineers have largely switched to using cheaper 10-20 year materials in part because investing in 50 year materials is pointless when you have to resurface so often anyway. If we were to design a system that factored in both direct roadbed damage and "shared" environmental damage, it would be about 99% axle weight / mileage and 1% "engineers didn't sufficiently account for climate change".
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Nov 3, 2019 18:33
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^^^ Edit: That's some interesting info. Thanks. Where do you suggest I go to read more? Shifty Nipples posted:Not paying a gas tax is something I have heard older folks use as a "drat stupid bicycle riders taking up the road" complaint. Yeah, I'll pay a road tax on my bike if it's proportional to the amount of damage it is causing. In addition to looking at damage, you could look at who is profiting off of the existence of the roads. Through that lense trucking companies and large businesses should be paying basically all of the road maintenance costs. But I also think a carbon tax that taxes all vehicles based on output is really necessary if we want to get our hands around climate change. And honestly I feel like that could have played with old school fiscal conservatives (Bush 1 era), because you literally get to choose how much tax you are paying. Cap and trade was their idea in the first place. But LOL those conservatives are gone now. Drummed out of the Republican party or else have made a deal with the devil to stay in. An individual carbon use tax really needs to accompany a dramatic reimagining of our economy and massive public transportation projects to be feasible and fair though. therobit fucked around with this message at 18:35 on Nov 3, 2019 |
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Nov 3, 2019 18:33
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therobit posted:^^^ While there's a lot of studies and such that talk about the mechanisms of road wear, they're mostly 100 page engineering white papers because the only people interested in this sort of thing are being paid to learn about it. But there's a couple different articles that I've found that break things down more succinctly: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/understading-pavement-deterioration-muhammad-bukhsh-bhatti http://asphaltmagazine.com/understanding-asphalt-pavement-distresses-five-distresses-explained/ Basically what you'll find a lot of at the lay level is explanations that private roads and driveways typically have issues because they get built in the wrong places or with poor foundations. When proper engineers remedy these issues (like when building a modern freeway) there's every expectation that the road should stand up to light cars and trucks without any particular strain, allowing them to last for years before needing maintenance. But as vehicular weights have increased over time, they've induced unavoidable stresses. As an example: A sedan is never going to affect warm summer asphalt, even if 10,000 of them drive over the same spot. But a single heavy truck is going to compress that asphalt down and to the side, creating rutting when done enough. This allows for water to get in during the fall, which makes for freezing damage during the winter, and cracks and potholes in the spring. This damaged surface then compounds problems until the road is repaired or has foundation issues and has to be replaced entirely. Without that initial load stress, the road is never deformed, water never gets in, and cracks and potholes never develop. Kaal fucked around with this message at 19:08 on Nov 3, 2019 |
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Nov 3, 2019 18:53
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Thanatosian posted:1. Herbold, godwilling; the pigs and Safe Seattle are mobilizing hard against her, though, so it'll probably be tight, either way. seems like herbold is pretty safe, she got over 50% in the primary, as did morales for D3, i wonder where dewolf's and nguyen's voters will go—adding them to kshama's primary vote totals 57.5%. i think the big Amazon/chamber $$$ may just put kshama above 50%. that is being optimistic though shaun seems like he has the longest shot of any of the progressives/socialists in the race. his and emily myers' primary vote total is only 36%, though that was while most students were away, but i'd guess very few students probably vote in the general anyway. his ground game has been pretty big though. very curious to see how this turns out. agree juarez is a lock dan only got 34% in the primary, and i'm guessing sergio voters will go with heidi, but i'm not sure how fathi's 13% will split. i think this one will be as close as D1, but dan will hopefully edge out. re: D7, the hotel unions have been putting major $$$ behind lewis, even flying in people to canvas. seems like with magnolia and queen anne it'll be hard for him though, as pugel seems more aligned with that crowd. but then i see this and i just don't know, all this money is loving crazy https://twitter.com/hlweiner/status/1190721222264250368 Wraith of J.O.I. fucked around with this message at 22:23 on Nov 3, 2019 |
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Nov 3, 2019 22:17
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Is Sawant really getting a majority of her contributions from outside the city? Or is this some weird numbers thing that's getting misinterpreted?
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Nov 4, 2019 04:42
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I know racism is bad, but that doesn't help me vote on that one initiative.
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Nov 4, 2019 06:01
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Spergin Morlock posted:walmart produce is gross though. i'm not sure how they manage to ALWAYS have half rotten fruits and vegetables on display They ship them in from really far away. They're rotten before they get off the truck.
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Nov 4, 2019 07:40
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EDIT: Why you making me respond to super old post.  That was seriously like almost a month ago.
inkblottime fucked around with this message at 08:38 on Nov 4, 2019 |
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Nov 4, 2019 08:35
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inkblottime posted:Is Sawant really getting a majority of her contributions from outside the city? Or is this some weird numbers thing that's getting misinterpreted? Probably. That doesn't necessarily mean anything bad. A fair amount of it will be Socialist Alternative members outside of the city donating their own money. Some will also be those same members hitting up their community for donations. The race has gotten a bit of coverage outside of Seattle and people see this as a fight against Amazon. A bunch of people are willing to throw in donations to take on Amazon.
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Nov 4, 2019 16:28
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DevNull posted:A bunch of people are willing to throw in donations to take on Amazon. Target, Walmart, the list goes on.
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Nov 4, 2019 18:05
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inkblottime posted:Is Sawant really getting a majority of her contributions from outside the city? Or is this some weird numbers thing that's getting misinterpreted? Given that most of Amazon's revenue comes from outside Seattle, most of Orion's contributions are from outside the city, too. Ham Equity fucked around with this message at 18:59 on Nov 4, 2019 |
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Nov 4, 2019 18:33
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inkblottime posted:EDIT: Why you making me respond to super old post. I didn't realize how long ago it was either and necro'd it.
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Nov 6, 2019 03:34
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