Today the City of Seattle and SDOT released a Draft Pedestrian Master Plan (webpage, pdf). The plan, which has been in the works for 20 months, is designed to guide city investments in pedestrian facilities in a purposeful and efficient manner. The plan has four major goals.
Safety – Reduce the number and severity of crashes involving pedestrians
Equity – Make Seattle a more walkable city for all through equity in public engagement, service delivery, accessibility, and capital investments
Vibrancy - Develop a pedestrian environment that sustains healthy communities and supports a vibrant economy
Health – Raise awareness of the important role of walking in promoting health and preventing disease
The plan first looks at current conditions around Seattle identifying both the opportunities and challenges pedestrians face. It also identifies the places where there is the most potential for pedestrian improvements. This combined with crosswalk and sidewalking facility information is then used to prioritize investments. This is hot off the servers so I haven’t had much time to sift through everything. It looks like the plan is very narrowly focused on sidewalks and crosswalks and targets investments from Bridging the Gap into these. I am a little surprised because I was expecting to see a greater emphasis on place-making and pedestrian spaces, not just sidewalks and crosswalks. What are your thoughts? Reactions?
UPDATE: Here is Portland’s Pedestrian Master Plan. I like their emphasis on pedestrian districts and corridors.
Sound Transit is getting some of its U-Link money as part of the Federal Stimulus bill’s New Starts grants. $44 million of the $813 mn total will show up now instead of about this time next year. Good stuff! Full list of stimulus funded New Starts here.
I chatted with Goldy from HA about the Viaduct, Light Rail and Metro bus hours (among other topics) on Tuesday. You can listen here.
The fine for fare violation on Link could be $124. Make sure tap your Orca in!
In 1971, Amtrak began operations as the US’s intercity passenger rail service provider. President Nixon created Amtrak out of the remains of the few local and national providers left, and secretly Nixon had planned on shutting Amtrak down within a few years. Its future looks fairly bright today. 1971 was a dark time for Seattle as well.
Terminate Route 66 and 67 at the Northgate Transit Center instead of the Northgate P&R lot. This is because the Park & Ride is slated to become an actual park. The change would take effect in June 2009.
Make permanent the “temporary” shortening of Route 240 to terminate at the Renton Transit Center instead of the South Renton P&R
On April 28, two King County Council committees combined to receive a report from Metro on proposed Southeast Seattle and Southwest King County service changes, followed by public comment from both the official citizen sounding boards as well as fully private citizens. The two-hour-plus video is archived here. A boatload of supporting documents is accessible from this page and this one.
Krist Novoselic of Nirvana fame had a post on his Seattle Weekly blog some time back where he discussed driving and mass transit, I find this section particularly interesting:
Before Nirvana became popular, my individual transportation was what you would expect of a nearly broke bass player: Volkswagens from the 1960s. These well-built cars get great gas mileage and are easy to fix. I once bought a 1965 VW bus that didn’t run for $100. I put another cheap used engine in it and drove it all over! Eventually I drove it from Tacoma to Los Angeles for the session at which Nirvana recorded Nevermind. Instead of driving it back, I sold it for $400. (Check out the prices an old VW bus is getting today.) Back in those days, I didn’t even have a credit card, the state didn’t mandate car insurance, and gas was around a dollar a gallon. My personal transportation costs were very small.
The costs of driving have risen really dramatically in the past few decades, and if you’re a regular reader here, you’ll know that mass transit has become increasingly popular the same time frame. In the last couple of years, vehicle miles traveled by car has decreased. In 1990, you could buy a car for $100, fix it yourself and pay $1 a gallon to drive it. Today, you need insurance, registration fees have increased, parking costs have gone way up, and gas is much more expensive. New cars are so complicated and computerized, that the majority of people can’t change their own oil anymore, much less replace the engine in their car. Obviously cars are a lot safer and have better features, but they have also become much more costly to maintain.
I think this highlights something a lot of highway proponents are missing. They often argue that you increase highway capacity and reduce congestion and everything will be dandy. Beyond the fact we know that building new highways doesn’t reduce congestion, congestion isn’t the only thing that has made driving less attractive: it’s also become much less affordable. So a lot of people are naturally switching to transit. Over the coming decades, these trends are going to continue: cars going to get ever more complicated, gas is going to become more expensive again, and as governments scramble to raise funds to pay for road construction, tolls are going to become more common and other fees are likely to appear. Even if we could somehow build our way out of congestion, not likely, we’re still going to need more and better transit options, along with better bike lanes and carpool services, just to keep commutes affordable.
STB is happy to congratulate Brentt Mackie of Pierce Transit for placing first at the American Public Transportation Association Bus Roadeo competition. From Pierce Transit’s press release: (more…)
The City is holding an open house next Tuesday on the King Street Station Renovation. From the press release:
In 2008, the city purchased King Street Station and started a major restoration of the landmark building to transform it into a modern transportation hub equipped to serve Seattle for the next hundred years.
In less than a year, the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) and its contractor have substantially completed exterior building improvements. Very shortly, SDOT will begin Phase II and the much-anticipated interior restoration. The lobby’s original ornate ceiling will be restored, Amtrak operations reconfigured, the grand staircase to Jackson Plaza reopened, and seismic upgrades will be made.
You are invited to a public meeting to meet members of the project team, learn more about completed and upcoming work, and ask questions.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
4:00 PM to 6:00 PM
International District/Chinatown Community Center
719 8th Avenue South (cross street Dearborn Street)
Please RSVP to Josh Stepherson, (206) 684-3136, or kingstreet@seattle.gov
Looks like a good event. H/T to Tim.
Update: Ben plans to attend, so say hi if you see him there.
1973 is the year King County Metro was formed from the combining of Seattle Transit and the Metropolitan Transit Corporation.
Here’s a news round-up:
Metro is facing a giant budget hole, but King County Council-member Larry Phillips wants to make sure that Rapid Ride, Metro’s BRT system that will open next year, will be prioritized over other service when cuts are made. The Federal Transit Administration has awarded Rapid Ride a $13.8 million grant for buses and stops, and it would be a shame if the service was cut down to make the BRT service infrequent. I think we need a chance to see BRT really work in our region, so I agree with Phillips.
The tunneling for the station on Beacon Hill apparently created a ton of sink holes in the area around the station. It’s going to cost about $1 million to fill them all up.
May 9th is National Train Day. Unfortunately, I’m not going to be able to take a train that day, but I will be able to in just 73 days.
This is an open thread.
Update: This is a big week for BRT in the Puget Sound region. Today, Community Transit had an unveiling ceremony for its version of BRT called Swift. It will run along SR-99 in Snohomish county starting Nov. 30th of this year. It will have higher service frequencies than Rapidride (10 minutes all day) and use Transit Signal Priority to speed buses along SR-99. This corridor is perfect for BRT and will be very interesting to watch.
Michael Ennis, longtime transit opponent, has been given space on the Seattle Times opinion page this morning (with a bio calling him ‘independent’, no less!) to show us not only how out of touch he is with voters, but also with reality.
He starts his piece by calling light rail a ‘controversial battle’. Maybe in 1995 – that should have been my first clue about the theme of his piece…
As you heard earlier this morning, Greg Nickels (the Mayor of Seattle) came to our blog’s meet-up last night. After delivering a speech detailing is 21+ year history of trying to bring rail transit to the region, the Mayor asked the audience for some questions. Here are the more interesting facts we found out:
Nickels said he wasn’t “convinced” about a 12th avenue streetcar rather than one that runs along Broadway. He implied that it wouldn’t serve the same area that the original First Hill stop promised in Sound Move would have. But he said there is time to look at 12th, and that the city should.
The First Hill Streetcar may not pursue federal funds because it can delay a project for years and the city is attempting to open the line ahead of the planned 2016 date.
But the 1st Ave (ID, Belltown, Lower Queen Anne) Streetcar will pursue federal funds and will be started during his next term if re-elected. This line will link the First Hill Streetcar and the South Lake Union Streetcar.
Thanks for everyone who came to the meet-up. Our guest this time was Mayor of Seattle and Sound Transit board chair Greg Nickels. Nickels was awesome, he gave a history of Link and Sound Transit that only someone who has sent years leading the fight for light rail can, and spent a long time answering questions about light rail, streetcars, transit oriented development and buses. It was a great meet-up, and I’m always impressed by the transit acumen our readers have. We’re really lucky to have such smart readers.
Also present was Shefali from TCC, who I want to encourage people to contact for Link opening event volunteer opportunities.
Seattle is playing host to the American Public Transit Association’s Bus and Paratransit Conference, and Metro unveiled its Rapid Ride BRT buses, as well as bus stops, more photos below the fold. (more…)
Via Streetsblog, here’s a CNN news clip on transit cuts being faced in St. Louis.
Okay, that’s admittedly a bit melodramatic, but it does illustrate some of the real-world effects of cutting transit service. St. Louis’s METRO is looking at about a 15% service cut. King Country Metro was looking at some larger, somewhere around 20%. Thankfully, the property tax authority that Olympia gave the county for transit should plug about a third of the hole, but still 13% cuts in service are not going to be pretty. At least Olympia helped, Missouri’s state government refused to move at all on transit funds.
Each Link car has 74 seats, with room for another hundred and twenty or more standing. The trains can run up to four cars, so that’s as many as 296 seats, and 800 total riders.
In 1974, BART began operation in the Trans-bay tube under the San Francisco Bay. Also, the Seoul Subway first opened that year, and that system now already has ten lines. 1974 was the last year electric trains ran on the Milwaukee Railroad that connected Chicago to Seattle
by GREG NICKELS, Mayor of Seattle and Chair of the Sound Transit Board
CPSRTA Election Pamphlet (also note the old agency logo on the train)
With just over ten weeks until Sound Transit Light Rail opens, this is my fourth installment on how we got here.
After the three County Councils agreed to place the RTA plan on the ballot, the RTA’s first actual service began on January 28, 1995. Called TRY Rail, this demonstration of commuter rail service carried passengers between Tacoma and Seattle for a few weeks and then between Everett and Seattle. In total, 35,000 passengers rode TRY Rail. Commuter rail was one of the elements of the ballot measure.
The first vote to decide Mass Transit for King County in 25 years (and the first ever for Pierce and Snohomish Counties) was scheduled for a March 14, 1995 Special Election. In addition to commuter rail, the plan contained a mostly surface light rail system connecting Tacoma to Seattle, north to Lynnwood (actually 164th St SW) and east across Lake Washington to Bellevue and Redmond.
The campaign in favor was called “Citizens for Sound Transit,” and the opponents, “Families Against Congestion and Taxes.” Early polls looked favorable with some 60% of respondents likely to vote yes. According to the Pro campaign FAQ:
There are basically two opponents: Ed Hansen, the Mayor of Everett and Kemper Freeman, Jr., a Bellevue developer. Mayor Hansen opposes this project because it doesn’t include light rail to Everett – in other words, it’s not enough. Freeman opposes this plan because he thinks it’s too much.
The campaign was nasty and the proponents often found themselves on the defensive, responding to FACT’s charges that the ($6,700,000,000) cost was too high (compared with buses and freeways), the ridership numbers inflated and it would not put a dent in congestion.
Despite carrying King County 50.3% to 49.7%, getting 61.7% in Seattle and winning in Lake Forest Park and Mercer Island, the measure got only 42.8% in Bellevue, lost Pierce County and did so poorly in Snohomish County (especially Everett) that Prohibition looked popular in comparison. It went down RTA district-wide 46.5% yes to 53.3% no. The region rejected mass transit. History repeated itself – mass transit was once again treated by many politicians in Olympia and the region as political roadkill. It looked like another dead end for rail transit.
The DJC is reporting that the Port of Tacoma and Port of Seattle are going after stimulus cash for rail projects along the I-5 corridor that should help ease freight congestion along the BNSF line. These would also ease congestion and increase on-time performance for Amtrak Cascades. The four projects they want money for are:
Building a third mainline and storage track bretween Kelso and Martin’s Bluff. There’s only $53 million of state money currently set aside for this project but it is estimated at more than five times that.
Completing the Point Defiance bypass, which would shave a lot of time off of Amtrak Cascades and have a big impact on its on-time performance.
Building the Vancouver bypass, which would let Cascades bypass the heavily congested rail yard in Vancouver.
Improving the Blakeslee Junction, which is where the BNSF line meets the Puget Sound and Pacific Railroad in Centralia. This has a bigger effect on freight and cars than on Amtrak, but congestion there is a problem for Amtrak as well.
These do seem like good projects for stimulus money if they can reduce congestion for both freight trains and Amtrak service.
75% is the share of construction costs for Forward Thrust the Federal Government would have paid. King County taxpayers would have had to come up with just 25%.
In late 1975, construction started on Atlanta’s first MARTA line, the East-West line. The Urban Mass Transportation Administration – the Federal Agency that become the FTA – gave MARTA the $600 million it had set aside for our area’s failed Forward Thrust that year. Operations on the West line began in June of 1979, and began on the West Line in December of 1979.
Update from Ben:
Amusingly enough, while looking for light rail related ’75s’, I found another countdown from a year ago – here’s a post made when Phoenix’s light rail had 75 days left as well. I think everyone gets excited about having a new transit system!
Also, New Jersey Transit’s SEPTA’s (thanks) light rail system has 75 stations.
The Memorandum of Agreement on Interstate 90 was also signed in 1976.
Here’s a tangent: I’ve been reading over more of the I-90 documents, and I’m no lawyer, but it looks to me like the state committed to building the facility to be converted to rail. The state was the lead agency on the project, and that memorandum says:
The I-90 facility shall be designed and constructed so that conversion of all or part of the transit roadway to fixed guideway is possible.
So, let’s say we find some significant barrier to conversion. Doesn’t that mean the state will be obligated to make it right, as their responsibility was to make it possible? We’ll see what happens between now and November 1st.
On Friday Metro unveiled a new website design, which as far as I’m concerned is a major improvement on previous versions, in particular the extremely wordy one that immediately preceeded it.
The “Reports” tab is a godsend to transit wonks like us. In this respect I believe they’re leapfrogging ST’s site, which has long been the gold standard for planning documents.
Frank at Orphan Road pretty much says everything else that needs to be said.
