> Maintaining our mass transit is (stupidly) a state responsibility, to be fair.

I guess that this is circumstantial. That is USA's political system that is not working.

Because the headline is about a local government taking responsible actions to improve peoples lives while empowering public transportation as an efficient way of transport.

How different is "Metropolitan Transportation Authority" to "Consorcio Regional de Transportes de Madrid" [0]?

[0] https://www.crtm.es/conocenos.aspx?lang=en

Oh I'm not making excuses for it. The commenter I responded to noted that NYC's political dysfunction makes things difficult. I'm just noting that New York State's political dysfunction is also to blame.

I feel like Western and Eastern WA should just split, they are pretty different culturally, geographically, and economically, plus Western WA sends the rest of the state tons of money while the state largely ignores important problems affecting Western WA. The wealthier part of the state subsidizing the rest of the state is fine but not if the wealthier part gets screwed like this. Plus, if Western WA were to become its own state, they could start off with a new constitution that doesn't prohibit income taxes.

There is a pretty big need for a stronger, faster transit system spanning the region from Olympia to Everett. Housing price madness could be mitigated by fixing the ridiculous commute times over reasonably short distances that occur during rush hour.

Light rail is being built in King County, and the bus system in King County is actually pretty good in my opinion, but those don't cover a wide enough area to truly be effective. Given the geography of the region, I think the greater Seattle region needs a mass transit system most similar to NYC (though smaller)

Wow, that is a bad idea, why is it that way?

I'm not sure there's a better answer than "it seemed like a good idea at the time." The problem (as we saw in the recent primary here) is that the person who is actually in charge of the system - the governor - is able to deny responsibility for it.

https://nyti.ms/2rx3V9D