The local mainstream media’s monorail bashers remain vigilant, ever on the lookout for any potential for negative spin. One recent case in point: SeaTimes columnist Danny Westneat, who ponders whether the most recently-released designs for the elevated rail lines look too much like “another Kingdome.”

If they do, that wouldn’t be such a bad thing.

The Kingdome was a marvel of engineering, and was built in budget and almost on time. It was designed before the era of nonstop cable sports coverage, luxury boxes, and retractable-roof technology; so it was designed to maximize what was baseball’s principle revenue stream at the time, regular ticket sales, by preventing rainouts in the most cost-effective way–a permanent roof. Aside from the ceiling-tile fiasco and early field-lighting issues, it served its purpose well, until the time came to progress beyond it.

So will the monorail.