By Hank Myers, David Carson and Toby Nixon

You’ve heard about exorbitant costs and 50 years of payments with ST-3. There is realistic concern that ST-3 will exhaust taxpayer willingness to underwrite other important priorities like education. All true, but we do need a plan to reduce congestion. How does ST-3 rate as a transportation plan?

On the whole, it’s a bad plan that goes all the way to awful when considering the cross-lake rail service.

The folly is putting light rail across floating bridges to the Eastside. Installing rails on a roadway greatly increases the cost while dramatically reducing the utility of the right of way for all users. Light rail trains are not light, and the roadway has to be built much stronger to carry the heavy trains. Proven technology does not yet exist allowing light rail to cross from pontoon to pontoon at full operating speed. Light rail is 19th century technology with little room for innovation and improvement. Once tracks are laid, we’ll have that line for the next 50 years or more.

Is there a better solution? Two words: Elon Musk. Tesla has proven that battery powered electric cars are powerful, high performing, reliable vehicles that are cheap to operate. For months, Metro Transit has been using Proterra battery powered electric buses over lengthy and topographically challenging routes with great success.

These buses are quieter inside and out, less fatiguing to drive and more pleasant for riders. They have 70-mile range and are fully rechargeable at layover points in just 10 minutes. New Flyer, another Metro bus provider, also makes all-electrics so there can be competitive bids. One-hundred-and—thirty-mile-range buses are available today, and articulated versions are on the way. This is the future of mass transportation; it’s flexible because it can be reconfigured.

What happens when buses get stuck in traffic across the bridge? They won’t; buses would use the same fully or partially dedicated rights of way that light rail would have. They cross the floating bridges now at full speed, even when they share the space with cars. Before light rail was installed, the tunnel under Third Avenue accommodated buses only.

Elections are negotiations between governments and voters. If a levy or bond issue fails, it is almost a certainty that soon voters will see an improved and less-expensive version. We should hold out for a better plan.

Here are the three great reasons to vote “no” on ST-3:

1. You don’t like the high cost and burden you are passing on to future generations.

2. You aren’t getting your money’s worth for the service being offered to your area.

3. You would like to see a state of the art, agile and reliable service, not 100-plus-year-old technology.

Hank Myers and David Carson are Redmond City Council members and Toby Nixon is a Kirkland City Council member.