Seattle Green Spaces Coalition
Call for the No Build Option
instead of West Seattle-Ballard Light Rail (WSBLE)
WSBLE will cause significant, negative environmental impacts.
• Its construction will generate three million tons of carbon, plus non-point and carbon pollution from years of traffic congestion. Sound Transit’s mitigation plan will take more than 300 years to complete — and prevent Seattle from achieving its carbon neutrality goal by 2050
• It will eliminate up to six acres of Seattle forest from Ballard to West Seattle — after Seattle has lost 255 acres of forest since 2016. Sound Transit has already cut nearly 15,000 trees for the Everett-Tacoma light rail line. So it is helping make Seattle’s heat island worse, and prevent Seattle from achieving its 2037 the tree canopy coverage goal.
• It will negatively impact waterways and habitats in Ballard, Interbay, the Duwamish River, Longfellow Creek, and salmon runs.
With the NO BUILD ALTERNATIVE, Sound Transit must create less damaging transit options for the Ballard-West Seattle corridor.
If environmental damage has already been done, is it OK for Sound Transit to do more? SGSC says “No.”
The No Build option only applies to WSBLE. All other Sound Transit and City of Seattle projects will continue: Everett-Tacoma, Seattle-Redmond and Kirkland-Issaquah light rail build-out, greenway improvements, and Seattle’s Bicycle & Pedestrian Master Plan.
SGSC response to Sound Transit DEIS (Draft Environmental Impact Statement)