In any case I don’t see it as too likely unless there is a big push for HSR to Spokane, I-90 might make more sense as a ROW anyway in that case.

Stampede Pass is far from maxed out and throughput could be improved by installing modern signaling. Throughput on Stevens pass could be improved by also upgrading the signaling and by electrifying at least the tunnel. Supposedly fumes in the tunnel are the big limit on traffic over Stevens at the moment.

I’m pretty sure the Cedar River Trail is also a rail banked rails to trails project.

Who tracks that anyway, and how does one differentiate leisure (summer) bicycle use vs. the serious bicycle commuter?

Jim

I used to ride from home up Simonds Road to class at Inglemoor High everyday for a while. Sure beats having to get up early for the school bus or taking Metro which takes forever. I didn’t drive because I didn’t get a drivers license until two years ago.

That said I’m not a big ESR supporter. I’m only interested if some sort of demonstration can be done relatively cheap. At this point I’m mostly interested in ensuring sections of the corridor can be re-used for either Link or BRT.

The three sections most interesting to me for BRT or Link ROW use are Bellevue to Totem Lake, Coal Creek Parkway to Renton, and Redmond to Woodinville.

A Link spur to Kirkland and Totem Lake will at least be looked at before the next round of Link expansion. There just aren’t that many ways to get between Bellevue and Kirkland that have reasonable costs and travel times. I-405 is even further from any desired station locations (S. Kirkland P&R, Houghton, Downtown Kirkland) than the BNSF ROW and WSDOT will want to keep the tracks out of the way of any future highway expansion. Therefore use of at least part of the BNSF ROW will be looked at and very likely will end up one of the better alternatives in terms of cost, ridership, and community objections.

For BRT use, buses could enter/leave the ROW at the grade crossings at NE 8th in Bellevue, 108th NE near S. Kirkland P&R, 6th S and NE 87th near downtown Kirkland and at NE 124th and 124th NE in Totem Lake. Such a line would be able to use existing transfer and P&R facilities at Bellevue Transit Center, S. Kirkland P&R, Kirkland Transit Center, Totem Lake Transit Center, and Kingsgate P&R. There is also an opportunity for a station on the ROW at Houghton. To control grade crossings, particularly where buses are entering or leaving the corridor I would envision installing traffic signals similar to what LACMTA uses on the Orange Line.

I’m not sure what the costs of turning that section of ROW into a BRT line would be but I’m guessing it would be less than putting in Link. It would provide a transit bypass of a rather congested section of I-405, preserve the corridor for future rail conversion, and provide access to 520 BRT and East Link for people traveling to and from Kirkland and Totem Lake.

Note that I don’t think using the ROW for Link or BRT would preclude putting in some sort of trail, especially as the ROW is relatively wide between Woodinville and Bellevue.

With the section from Wilburton to Renton, there hasn’t been much talk of Link in this corridor (at least as compared to a Kirkland spur). However if such a line is ever built there aren’t too many routing choices between Factoria and Renton. While I-405 and the BNSF ROW are very close in this section, using the BNSF ROW might prove more practical.

For BRT you are mostly concerned about moving buses between Renton and Bellevue there isn’t much in the way of population or employment along 405 either until you get to Factoria/Eastgate. I think there are some small P&R lots and freeway stations, but due to the proximity of the BNSF ROW these could be easily served from there as well. One huge advantage of using this section for BRT would be bypassing one of the most congested sections of 405.

Another thing about this section is there is already a perfectly good bike route/path between I-90 and Renton, using this route for a bike trail would duplicate what is already there. I suppose the existing trail could mostly be removed, especially the on-street sections, but it is hard to argue this section is needed all that badly.

As for the Redmond Spur, the City of Redmond seems to have a pretty good plan for the corridor. A bike trail on both sides of the Sammamish Slough would be fairly useful. Due to the topography it is fairly easy to utilize the full ROW on this section which combined with the lack of residential uses nearby should make putting rail or BRT in at a later date relatively easy.

Rail may someday make sense on this corridor, but that time is not now. What we can do now is buy this corridor and build a trail soon that will serve thousands of commuters every day. The Burke-Gilman serves over 3,000 commuters a weekday and an Eastside trail could carry as many or more due to the lack of good bike connections on the Eastside and the tremendous movement north-south on the Eastside. As a bike corridor this trail would serve as a bike freeway in a sense that would drain a huge bikeshed of three miles or so on each side taking in much of the density on the Eastside to carry people to their jobs at Microsoft, Downtown Bellevue, or south to Renton where is would link to the Green River Trail and the Interurban. Bike trails don’t need to be located right next to density. But rail should.

The BNSF corridor avoids most density on the Eastside. This is by design, people didn’t want to live near a track. One must walk 3/4 of a mile to downtown Bellevue, or over a mile to Microsoft from the tracks. Cities could rezone existing single family neighborhoods to provide some density, but frankly Bellevue has better opportunities they are pursuing in Bel-Red, Downtown, and Meydenbauer Bay. It doesn’t fit with the plans for density in the cities along the rest of the corridor either.

This is a poor investment. The recent PSRC study estimated costs at $1.2-1.6 billion at least. The track is in horrible shape and only has symbolic value. Keeping it is the equivalent of laying poor track in the Seattle bus tunnel at the last minute. It will be torn up for any serious rail. There are 107 (!) at-grade crossings–almost all unimproved since trains infrequently ran on the line. Commuter rail would need frequency, and this would cause mobility problems for east-west travel on the Eastside. This corridor is also very curvy and average speeds would be estimated at 24 miles per hour after spending that billion dollars. You would likely have to build expensive grade separated crossings at a bare minimum at 8th NE in Bellevue and 124th in Kirkland.

If this was the right corridor for the Eastside, Sound Transit would have used it. But it is not. We need rail that serves and encourages density. Building an expensive line that is estimated to carry less riders by rail daily than bicyclists is not where we should spend our money. We should focus on extending light rail before any investment in this corridor.

And what entity is going to pony up the billion-and-a-half dollars to build this trail? Likely not ST, even in ST3. We can build a world-class trail now that will serve thousands of commuters and recreational users. Or we can waste years and money on an expensive rail corridor that is likely to be highly litigious and difficult to design and construct. BRT and park and rides are also a poor and expensive option here. The BRT wouldn’t be that rapid and park and rides at $30,000-60,000 a stall aren’t in the cards for a train that would carry few. The spur will be sold to Redmond no matter what happens to the rest of the trail.

I’ll bet most of you debating this have actually never been on much of the corridor unless you rode a dinner train. Correct me if I am wrong. Larry Phillips is pandering by supporting dual use on the corridor right now. He wants to try to make the rail advocates on the left and the Discovery Institute nuts on the right both happy, while giving lip service to bikes.

You can be pro-rail and not support building rail here or at least now. Lets do what we can do that will serve us now, rather than pursue an expensive pipe dream.

Other than being cheaper and slightly faster there is really nothing to reccomend the D5 alignment.

Well, faster and cheaper sounds like two high priority items :-) Add to that safer since it eliminates at grade segments and crossings in what might someday be office/residential. Honestly for me the concerns are congestion, cut through traffic and visual blight. I live on the hill north of Bel-Red. Early mornings we get woken sometimes by truck back-up alarms. The damn bells and other noise from Oh-dark-thirty until well after the witching hour would be awful. The Link alignments all bypass Auto Row which is closer to downtown and rapidly becoming a ghost town. Using the BNSF ROW there would be in a retained cut (no grade crossing with the existing line). That would be better than at grade through downtown and the cost savings would indeed allow the line to make it to Redmond in the first phase.

As far as money to tunnel and/or complete the line I think you’re right that it will be there by the time construction starts. But then I’m figuring on the 50% schedule slide we’ve seen so far with Link which puts completion out around 2028.

Pictures and Videos

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No, I’m saying zero support for the south extension to Renton, not Redmond. Lots of support for the extension to Redmond… just not enough to economize and actual get there without another round of funding.

Oh, it sounded like you were talking about Redmond above. I haven’t seen much discussion of an extension to Renton other than maybe a Burien to Renton line. I think the ST board decided for the near future that BRT/Express buses are the solution for the 405 corridor for the moment.

The cost saving with D5 won’t pay for a tunnel for sure but it might be the difference between what can be found (grants, LID, etc.) and what’s needed.

Other than being cheaper and slightly faster there is really nothing to reccomend the D5 alignment. Bypassing the biggest opportunity for TOD along East Link seems like a dumb idea. True there is a fair bit of opportunity in Redmond, but not enough to justify bypassing Bel-Red.

Since ST has said paying for the tunnel is mostly Bellevue’s problem I don’t think they are going to cut corners on the rest of the line to give Bellevue a tunnel.

I will say I think enough money will be found by the time construction starts to both give Bellevue it’s tunnel and complete the extension to downtown Redmond. This is without cutting corners on the other segments.

(Just in the last couple of decades we’ve seen some old wide streets that were wide because of their streetcar ROW, be filled with medians full of trees and plants — lovely, but it means we will probably never get streetcars back on those routes now. The neighbors would scream bloody murder.)

Zero Support for an East Link extension to Redmond? What?

No, I’m saying zero support for the south extension to Renton, not Redmond. Lots of support for the extension to Redmond… just not enough to economize and actual get there without another round of funding.

The cost saving with D5 won’t pay for a tunnel for sure but it might be the difference between what can be found (grants, LID, etc.) and what’s needed.

The cost difference between D5 and D2A isn’t really enough to pay for the tunnel. Given the support for the D2 alignments I believe the tunnel will be given up before the alignment is switched to D5.

Any potential Link alignment between Bellevue and Totem Lake would have issues. At grade or elevated along Lake Washington Boulevard isn’t going to go over well. I-405 misses the S. Kirkland P&R and is even further from Downtown Kirkland than the BNSF ROW, it’s also well away from the intersection of 108th NE & NE 68th in Houghton. Any possible routings of a downtown Kirkland loop off of I-405 would be even more disruptive than a similar loop off of the BNSF ROW.

I’m not sure of the issues with the steep bank, but there would be similar ones with building along I-405. Remember link doesn’t need the full 100′ ROW and in fact doesn’t need all that much more than the current rail line.

For the grade crossings (esp. Totem Lake) Link can either duck down into a retained cut or go over with a bridge.

Using any of the BNSF ROW for rail (or BRT) doesn’t preclude having a bike trail as well. It might not be as nice as it would be without trains running alongside, but it still could be done and would beat riding in traffic. I do agree a trail along the BNSF ROW from Woodinville to I-90 would be a nice addition to the regional trail system.

As for the section South of NE 12th in Bellevue I don’t think it really becomes important for any potential Link alignment until South of I-90 since you have the East Link ROW between those points and probably want to interline. This solves the problem of what to do about the trestle and I-405 crossing. Presumably at the Renton end Link would connect to the Burien to Renton line via Southcenter and (hopefully) the Tukwilla Sounder station.

I don’t think the BNSF ROW South of the Wineries is ever likely to see heavy rail service again. If there is to be a DMU demonstration it needs to happen soon or it never will. Therefore the only thing we’re likely to see other than a trail is some sections used for Link or BRT. The latter two are quite likely a long ways off, at least ST3 if not ST4.

On the other hand if someone wanted to use either the Interurban or Burke-Gillman trail right of ways for light rail, commuter rail, or a streetcar I’m sure it would be tied up in court until the sun grew cold. Not to mention that the local cyclist community would make a big stink even if there was to be a bike trail alongside the new tracks.

Hard to say how things would go if the Eastside Rail Corridor is converted to a trail and Sound Transit decides to re-use part of the ROW for BRT or a Link extension at some point in the future. ST has been remarkably effective in not allowing the EIS process drag on forever.