The Volcano recently posted an interesting story in discussing the effects of Fort Lewis’ huge growth. While more soldiers at the Fort is good for the local economy, it is bad news for our already strapped transportation system and other services.

I have railed on the traffic around Fort Lewis many times, especially when I made the bus commute to Olympia daily. See my posts here and here. This is one of the worst choke points in the County and is only going to get worse.

The Volcano reports:

As reported in The Ranger earlier this year, traffic mitigation will be minimal due to funding constraints to ease the strain of more cars on the road.
Gov. Christine Gregiore, the keynote speaker for last week’s meeting, said the state would add a traffic signal at Highway 507 and the East Gate to ease traffic congestion there.
Gregoire said the state also will work to fund the Cross Base Highway plus add traffic cameras and real-time traffic updates on the freeway at the DuPont interchanges. Finally, the state will add roving tow trucks to clear accidents during peak hours daily on Interstate 5 around Fort Lewis.

Its very unfortunate that there is not more federal traffic mitigation money coming in. Traffic monitoring and tow trucks are good band-aids but are not long term solutions to a very big problem (I won’t even get started on Cross-Base).

We need sustainable transportation alternatives in this congested area. Here are my three suggestions, ranked from cheapest to most expensive.

1) Extend carpool lanes from Tacoma to the Fort. This will give people more incentive to carpool, van share, and take transit. Right now when traveling through this mess it does not save time to take transit due to the lack of carpool lanes.

2) Use federal traffic mitigation funds to implement Pierce Transit run express bus service to the Fort. Originate the runs early in the morning when the soldiers need to be at work from the areas where the majority of them live. This would be an direct and easy way to take cars off the road and provide reliable transportation for our soldiers coming back from overseas.

3) Extend the Sounder to Olympia. Pierce County taxpayers can pay to get it to the County line and then Thurston County taxpayers could take it South from there. This would take thousands of people commuting between King, Pierce, and Thurston Counties off I-5 daily. Also we could put a station near Fort Lewis and provide seamless shuttle service into the Fort.