What's on Pierce Transit's drawing board?

I have just read the descriptions of the PT Tomorrow concept designs. From what I can see at the moment (which isn't a whole lot I'll admit) I'm not all that impressed. Even at first glance, I think that the concepts have an "unsatisfactory level of concurrence" with the land use, transportation, and environmental policy of the City of Tacoma, especially policies that have come into play since Mayor Baarsma started the Green Ribbon Task Force on Climate Change in 2007.

I am hoping that someone at Pierce Transit is reading this, because I am going to reiterate the common sense vision that I have heard articulated in many ways by so many people on blogs like Exit133, in public meetings throughout the City, and in the newspapers concerning the future of Tacoma.

A Vision of a Sustainable Tacoma in the 21st Century

Tacoma is a sustainable mid-sized city that is poised to grow by 127,000 residents by 2040 (Puget Sound Regional Council). It is a community that has committed itself to a 50% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by the year 2050. To accomplish this end and to improve the livability and economic vibrancy of the city, the City Council has implemented policies to require compact mixed use development and complete streets that cater to pedestrians, cyclists, and transit operations.

We envision the creation of a frequent, rapid, and reliable transit network that transitions away from the timed transfer model of the 1970's to more of a grid system. We wish to create priority transit corridors where combined routing and priority treatments work together to provide service at much higher levels than provided today at lower costs. We desire to have high quality, appropriately-scaled, on-street transit stations in our mixed use centers with proper protection from the elements and easy access to amenities (like food and WiFi).

We believe that a modern streetcar system can help bridge the gap between North and South Tacoma by linking neighborhoods together like pearls on a string - encouraging transit-oriented development. We believe that new technologies like the ORCA smart card, GoogleTransit, and GPS technologies can make transit more accessible and efficient. We aspire to the highest levels of inclusion and openness with the public, including the creation of an ongoing Citizen Advisory Board and potentially a transition to a directly elected transit board.

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What a vision like this says is that the scope of the current redesign proposals is too narrow and falls far short of what the community was hoping for. It's really not a redesign at this point, it's a little tweaking, a little trimming around the edges and an expansion of service to the outskirts to try to attract the votes to get to 0.9%. It's too defensive a strategy. It tries to protect the status quo, while not properly aligning with Tacoma's policies or our aspirations for the future. These proposals need to fall by the wayside and be replaced by new ideas that have a real level of concurrence with the vision of each municipality.