The Seattle segment of Sound Transit's light rail had it's first accident, on Martin Luther King Way in South Seattle.
These risks were well known, and discussed. Light Rail, though appearing 'modern' and upscale is in fact a 19th Century technology with a big drawback - very slow braking thanks to steel on steel operation. FWIW, I think this is a risk worth taking, but I'm not an underwriter either, hindsight, as always, will be 20/20.
On thing this accident does do though is make a point in favor of integrating buses into our upscale and modern light rail corridors, as is done in the Seattle tunnel. Bus drivers can handle that risk, and the specific engineering would also provide a test bed for Intelligent Vehicle 'Platooning' technologies maximizing safety and capacity.
