Comments on: Route 7 Stop Consolidation

By: Route 16 Stop Consolidation - Seattle Transit Blog

Route 16 Stop Consolidation - Seattle Transit Blog — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 16:14:45 +0000

[...] and save about $50,000 a year in operating costs. Metro has done similar projects on Routes 7 (as we covered), 48, and [...]

By: mike

mike — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 03:03:04 +0000

the 5 between bitter lake and aurora stops entirely too often.

the 26/28 between fremont and downtown could 60% of its stops – there is absolutely no reason people that live on dexter can’t walk more than a block to a bus stop – it would improve transit times 3-4 fold through this section.

also, having LESS seats on busses, especially during rush hour, would allow more people on. seats are for the pregnant, elderly and infirm. it would be great to have euro-style seating so that during peak loads, more users can board (improving capacity/efficiency) and during off-peak hours, buggies and luggage could easily be accomodated.

as bus systems go, ours is pretty pathetic.

By: Bernie

Bernie — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 23:22:57 +0000

The County grid is 16 blocks to the mile. Downtown I don’t know because it was plotted by three different landowners. That’s why we have the triangle blocks.

By: Pete Lorimer

Pete Lorimer — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 22:31:20 +0000

I always heard that Seattle blocks were 12 per mile. But I’m wondering how consistant Seattle blocks are? Most of the city was platted by individuals or land trust corporations way before those blocks were incorporated into the city, so there wouldn’t have been a mandated size that they would have to follow. I know that in my neighborhood on Beacon Hill there are some blocks that are about 200′ long (curb to curb) and some that are as long at 350′.

By: Mike Orr

Mike Orr — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 21:49:47 +0000

So how many Seattle blocks are in a mile? I always thought it was 20. But that means Fremont to Denny Way (34 blocks) should be less than two miles and take 40 minutes to walk, but it takes me over an hour and the sign says 3 point something miles.

By: Jill

Jill — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 19:27:07 +0000

I just visited up from Portland… we have bus stops every 2-4 blocks and our blocks are short. So the walk is always short- I felt I was hiking miles for a stop in Seattle in comparison. It may be I didn’t always know where the closest was, but surely they were further apart than here. And our busses don’t really stop all that much… at least not to me.

By: Chris Stefan

Chris Stefan — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 18:33:15 +0000

I guess I haven’t been paying attention. I’ll have to look for those next time I’m in Wallingford.

By: Chris Stefan

Chris Stefan — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 18:30:26 +0000

Maybe not Rainier, but there are many places where the solution is to ban left turns except for intersections with a left turn signal and lane. Even with the two way left turn lane people making left turns in and out of driveways can cause quite a bit of traffic congestion.

By: Oran

Oran — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 18:19:49 +0000

I saw a couple of bus bulbs on N 45th St in Wallingford complete with mini islands that prevent cars from passing in the turn lane.

By: Chris Stefan

Chris Stefan — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 16:34:38 +0000

The 44 needs bus bulbs, at least between Aurora and the U District.

By: Oran

Oran — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 16:31:26 +0000

And that’s already after Metro did speed & reliability improvements along the entire route in 2002. Not only just stop consolidation but also transit signal priority, signal retiming, and changes to the roadway configuration.

By: Martin H. Duke

Martin H. Duke — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 14:41:22 +0000

I’m surprised no one has yet mentioned the 48 along 23rd Ave. That’s a stop-an-go nightmare during peak periods.

By: Mia

Mia — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 14:26:05 +0000

The 44 stop at Stone Way N is a connection for the 16. The 44 went through a (much needed) consolidation a few years ago,

By: Michael

Michael — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 13:11:44 +0000

The 44 stop at N 45th St and Stone Way N WB far side is way close to the stop at N 46th St and Green Lake Way N near side. The latter is a connection for the 358, and the former should be eliminated.

By: Andreas

Andreas — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 11:32:54 +0000

“Every two blocks” varies in Seattle from 600′ to 1300′ feet, because most of our blocks are rectangular, not square. 1300′ is in the range of European stop spacing, and probably what we should be aiming for, though most American cities space their stops closer to 600′. However, other things need to be considered.

On NW Market St, for example, a few years ago Metro tried to remove a stop at 14th Ave NW. This would have created stops for the 44 and 46 every two blocks (at 15th, 11th, and 8th [there's no 13th, 12th or 9th]) with a spacing of 1300′ feet. But 11th Ave, unlike 14th, doesn’t have a marked & signaled crosswalk, and removing the 14th stop would make the distance between marked crosswalks around 2400′ (half a mile). Since Market is four lanes and rather heavily trafficked, this probably meant that for many users there was no accessible stop in that half-mile. Unfortunately bus stops are usually added after arterials and signals are already established out, and these things will often dictate stop placement, rather than maximum efficiency.

All that said, Metro’s stop-removal policy is more or less as you suggest. They put up signs at stops that are to be removed, with information on how to comment on the proposal. In the case of the 14th Ave stop above, they put up the signs but never removed the stop. Presumably, they got an earful. No study necessary.

By: Oran Viriyincy

Oran Viriyincy — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 06:15:17 +0000

A legal crosswalk exists at every street intersection with or without a marked crosswalk, unless explicitly prohibited. This misconception that the only way to cross the street is to cross at a marked crosswalk leads to drivers not paying attention, not yielding and hurting/killing people. Not everyone can walk long distances to a marked crosswalk if it even exists.

I won’t disagree with you that there’s a lot of underused impervious surface out there but you have to consider the traffic and safety impacts of having a lane blocked while people make a left turn into a driveway or side street. That section of Rainier has a lot of businesses with off-street parking lots (also lots of underused impervious surface). If it were downtown Columbia City then it would be a different story. There isn’t a TWLTL and there is on-street parking. There are still 4 lanes of traffic, though. The city had plans to road diet it to 3 lanes (NB+TWLTL+SB) with 2 bike lanes and parking but it seemed to fell through.

By: gmer

gmer — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 06:15:06 +0000

Or the stop at taco time, then a couple hundred feet to the locks, and a third one around the corner. Three stops on one block seems kind of excessive for the northbound 17.

By: Andreas

Andreas — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 05:00:49 +0000

You can get a rough feel for stop frequency in Google Maps by turning on the Transit labels, for example this shows the ridiculous number of stops for Routes 10 & 12 on Capitol Hill. Don’t know of any route-specific maps, however, though I’m sure Metro has them internally.

By: Bernie

Bernie — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 05:00:08 +0000

And I think it would go faster if they spent the money on that rather than the Rapid Ride reader boards.

By: Tim

Tim — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 04:36:16 +0000

GPS is coming. It has been planned for long long ago. It’ll be installed in the system wide radio upgrade, but the project is waaaaay behind schedule and they won’t start touching coaches until 2010 at the very earliest.