The Reporter’s recent editorial about affordable housing only covered the good features of having a TOD (Transit Oriented Development) at the South Kirkland Park & Ride. In this case, the good does not override the bad. If you live in Kirkland or north of Kirkland, you put up with the traffic jams. If the TOD is approved, it will get worse.

The council has not taken actions to relieve congestion. Instead of adding capacity on its arterials, instead of adding capacity on their collector streets, they have endorsed congestion that forces traffic to use residential streets. Now they want to exacerbate the problem, not solve the problem.

If the TOD is allowed, traffic conditions in Kirkland will get worse. The council has created congestion in hopes of forcing commuters to use busses instead of allowing them the freedom to use their vehicles. The last time I checked, Kirkland was still a suburban city. Yet the council wants us to be more like Seattle.

The ridership has shown that most of the people getting on or off the busses need to go through Kirkland to catch a bus or to get home.

The TOD will result in more and longer periods of traffic jams on 108th Ave. N.E., Lake Washington Blvd., all of which lead to downtown where the real jam up is the most notable. The first time downtown jams can be avoided is an exit at N.E. 70th Street to I-405, which also is jammed: so much for good planning. The argument can be made that the council has not complied with the concurrency requirement of the Growth Management Act. They’ve bastardized the definition to foster traffic jams instead of promoting and protecting what was once Kirkland. They’re created more congestion in order to get you out of your car.

While having more affordable housing may be good for some, it also comes with its bad features, issues the editorial failed to identify as reasons to disapprove the TOD. For Kirkland, if the TOD is approved, it will decrease our quality of life. That’s reason enough for me to oppose the council’s inconsiderate response to neighborhood’s concerns.

Bob Style