Sightline in the News

Higher density will help the Sound

11/17/2008
Seattle Post-Intelligencer

The Sightline Institute's 2007 Cascadia Scorecard puts our region 57 years away from achieving the important goal of 62 percent of the region's people living in compact, transit friendly neighborhoods.

Wash. voters defeat Eyman's traffic-focused I-985

11/05/2008
Seattle Times

In rural and suburban areas, the opposition said voters would hear a "giant sucking sound" as their sales taxes and red-light camera revenues got diverted to a new traffic-jam account, presumably spent more heavily in urban areas.

Opponents say I-985 would benefit only metro Seattle

10/24/2008
Spokesman-Review

A study from the Sightline Institute, which has contributed to the campaign opposed to the initiative, says of the $623 million expected to be raised statewide for programs aimed at reducing traffic congestion, almost $400 million would be spent in King County. The only other county that would get more money than it raised is Snohomish, according to the study

Bringing back the wolves of Olympic National Park

10/20/2008
Crosscut

What happened to the Olympic Peninsula after its wolves were hunted to extinction in the 1920s? There's a fascinating new study (pdf) from Oregon State University out on this question — the first of its kind, as far as I know. As it turns out, eliminating this one keystone species sent shockwaves through the whole ecosystem. Some of the effects were felt almost immediately after wolves were extirpated, and some are only just now becoming clear.

Seattle and I-985: A new subsidy

10/19/2008
Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Clark Williams-Derry pointed this out at the think tank Sightline Institute: "First off, 100 percent of the HOV lanes and ramps that I-985 would affect are in King, Snohomish and Pierce counties. That's about $224 million spent on carpool management changes right there. Second, 90 percent of the severe traffic congestion in the state is in the central Puget Sound, and over 60 percent is in King County alone."

Initiative 985: No

10/15/2008
Tri-City Herald

According to the Sightline Institute, "I-985 would siphon about $180 million from the rest of the state into Greater Seattle -- or $229 for the average four-person family living outside of the three Puget Sound counties -- through 2013."

Don't permit Measure 63

10/14/2008
The Oregonian

The glitch, pointed out recently by the perspicacious Seattle-based environmental nonprofit the Sightline Institute, is this: We Americans hop around a bit. In any given year, roughly 15 percent of us move.

The WaMu tragedy as a lesson in sustainability

10/14/2008
Crosscut

If we are honest with ourselves, many of us will have to admit that it's not just the mortgage-home-buying bubble of the last five years. In Cascadia, as throughout North America, living beyond our means is commonplace.

Critics fear traffic backup with I-985

10/10/2008
Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Meanwhile, the city of Kirkland on Thursday joined the swelling ranks of local and statewide organizations lining up against the initiative, many citing new studies by the Puget Sound Regional Council, Institute of Transportation Engineers and the nonprofit Sightline Institute which show negative affects on traffic, transit, air quality, highway safety, federal funding and HOV merge lanes.

Eyman's I-985 drives slowly in fast lane

10/05/2008
Seattle Post-Intelligencer

The Sightline Institute, which produces an annual (and highly regarded) Cascadia Scorecard on livability trends in the Northwest, took a detailed look at I-985 and came to a startling conclusion. "All told, Sightline estimates that Initiative 985 would siphon about $180 million from the rest of the state into Greater Seattle -- or $229 for the average four-person family living outside of Greater Seattle -- through 2013," it concluded.

How Powerful Is Your Workout?

09/26/2008
New York Times

Of course, riding a real bike rather than driving a car saves much more energy than riding a stationary bike attached to a generator, said Clark Williams-Derry, research director for the Sightline Institute, an environmental research center in Seattle.

Western States Agree on Plan to Tackle Global Warming Pollution

09/24/2008
KUOW

DE PLACE: "Any price that was attached to this cap–and–trade program would be little more than noise when compared to the volatility that we've seen in the fossil fuel markets lately. So this is really a way to take control of energy prices, not to just ratchet up the prices."

Environmentalists See Flaws in Pollution Credit Program

09/23/2008
The Oregonian

Sightline on the Western Climate Initiative

Cap and Trade 101

09/21/2008
Worldchanging.org

Carbon pricing, and specifically the leading strategy of cap and trade, is something we discuss regularly here at Worldchanging. One of our favorite, informed voices on this solution is carbon pricing guru Eric de Place, a senior researcher at the The Sightline Institute, whose writing on the subject we've featured prominently here. From carbon budgets to carbon taxes, Eric's articles and research have been helping us wrap our heads around this issue.

Want to calculate a carbon footprint?

07/25/2008
Seattle Post-Intelligencer

“One reason for the wide range is that emissions from air travel, the couple's largest carbon producer, are often calculated very differently, said Clark Williams-Derry, research director at Sightline Institute, a nonprofit research center that studies carbon calculators.”