Comments on: Editorial: Site ‘Future Downtown’ Bellevue’s Station Right

By: Bellevue’s Proposed 405 Station: Less Accessible - Seattle Transit Blog

Bellevue’s Proposed 405 Station: Less Accessible - Seattle Transit Blog — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 21:49:27 +0000

[...] for good reason. We shouldn’t build a station right next to a freeway and we should instead put the line downtown. According to the report, the other alignments serve nearly all of the 79,000 jobs downtown [...]

By: Bernie

Bernie — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 08:57:11 +0000

Bellevue clearly wants to keep Auto Row as the premier destination for the city’s auto sales

What world do you live in? Bentley, Jaguar, Porsche, Lotus, all up on 20th; the new “Luxury Auto Row”. The dealerships on 116th are dead or dieing. The area that was the “big three” is a waste land. Nissan (aka Datsun) has a building up on NE 8th. Subaru/VW, Honda and Toyota are out in Eastgate.

By: Bernie

Bernie — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 08:44:14 +0000

I don’t see a moving sidewalk ever being a reality. They don’t even work that well inside airports. If, and it seems like a good probability, the crossing of 405 is at se 6th then a Hospital Station serves the east side of 405 just fine. As optimal as it could be. There are too many stops on the East Link plans. The issue really is getting people to/from the Link stations to their destination in Bellevue and Seattle. Remember, unlike Central Link where there was a no P&R policy in force (now being attacked) East Link is predicated on new P&R or greatly expanded P&R facilities in South Bellevue and in Bell-Red at 130th. Yes Virginia, light rail means more traffic congestion coming to a neighborhood near you!

By: Bernie

Bernie — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 08:27:10 +0000

no one lives in Seattle’s downtown office core

There are ~5,000 people living in downtown Bellevue (less than 5% of the City population), there are ~55,000 living in the Seattle City Center area (half the population of Bellevue, ~10% of Seattle). Comparing Seattle to Bellevue is like comparing Seattle to Manhattan; there is no comparison.

By: Bernie

Bernie — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 08:13:50 +0000

Thank you. Why is this so hard for people to understand? Perhaps they are completely disconnected from the reality of the situation.

By: Bernie

Bernie — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 08:10:25 +0000

Try driving N/S during rush hour. Bellevue will continue to control signal priority and trains running N/S at grade will end up sitting up to 6 minutes through downtown. The LOS for the roads will be preserved but the light rail will suffer. At best 20% of the people commuting will be using transit. Of that maybe half on Link. Where do you think the signal priority is going to be?

By: Martin H. Duke

Martin H. Duke — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 19:12:59 +0000

I think it’s right to be skeptical of claims about the “will of the people” from any side. Electorates vary from election to election; both candidates and ballot measures are voted on for a variety of reasons, some good and some bad.

Moreover, even people’s revealed preferences are partially a product of existing government subsidies and incentives.

By: joshuadf

joshuadf — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 18:47:27 +0000

Microsoft did decide not to lease any more space in SLU. The building in question, 2201 Westlake, is already occupied by non-profit PATH and Amazon wants the rest:
http://www.techflash.com/seattle/2010/01/report_amazoncom_to_lease_more_seattle_office_space_from_vulcan.html

By: joshuadf

joshuadf — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 18:33:43 +0000

“2. Therefore, instead of choosing technology appropriate to will of the people, force people into lifestyles they would not choose.”

You realize that the Will of the People was passing ST2 in 2008, right? The logical conclusion here is that the Vision Line would “force people into lifestyles they would not choose.” Of course, many different people chose all kinds of different lifestyles.

By: Mike Orr

Mike Orr — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 18:02:52 +0000

Microsoft is moving into downtown Bellevue. One Microsoft sign is prominent next to the transit center, and another on the Bravern. They just went up within the last year or two (obviously the Bravern sign didn’t go up until the building was completed). Crazy Swan seemed to suggest they’d made a sudden about-face and were moving back to the office park world, which I haven’t seen collaborated elsewhere.

By: phil

phil — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 17:52:37 +0000

Didn’t you know? No one drives in London, they were all forced onto the trains.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/travel/jam_cams/index.shtml

By: Paul

Paul — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 12:57:09 +0000

“Following Fauntleroy would be more rational, for multiple reasons, they say, including the fact that a long stretch between Morgan Junction and The Triangle has just been rebuilt. But even without that factor, they say route planning — which includes RapidRide station locations — needs to be part of the Triangle process that’s about to rev up.”

A route on Fauntleroy between Morgan Junction (the proposed Green Line terminus) and the Triangle would skip the Junction.

By: Adam B. Parast

Adam B. Parast — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 10:21:32 +0000

How so? If I read it right they want the segment from Alaska to 35th to change right?

By: Paul

Paul — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 04:50:39 +0000

This ‘skip the center’ nonsense is freakin’ contagious now!!!

http://westseattleblog.com/2010/02/rethink-the-west-seattle-rapidride-route-sw-district-council-says

By: Caps are . . . Good?

Caps are . . . Good? — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 19:47:24 +0000

I haven’t seen anyone else mention this, and I know the point of light rail is to help get people out of their cars and where they want to go, but … have you seen I-5 at the Seattle Convention Center?

I-405 is further along in its development than I-5 was at that decision point (I assume) but if you’ve driven there during rush hour you can see what I’m getting at.

I’m just sayin’

By: Chris Stefan

Chris Stefan — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 18:50:27 +0000

Yea, I thought Microsoft was moving into downtown Bellevue. At the very least they’ve been steadily increasing the amount of office space they lease in downtown Bellevue from none to a fair bit (Bellevue Place and The Bravern).

In that time they’ve also given up some space in North Bellevue out on 108th near 520. Their old HQ on Northrup was sold to BCC and they gave up the leased space they had in the office park on the other side of 520.

By: Mike Orr

Mike Orr — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 18:34:15 +0000

Microsoft is moving out of downtown Bellevue?

By: JL

JL — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 18:01:18 +0000

There are three clear winners if Bellevue picks the Vision Line route.

First will be the Downtown Seattle. Office developers and Hotel developers will point to Seattle’s excellent connections to the SeaTac airport and after Northlink is completed downtown’s connection to a regional shopping center.

Second will be Northgate. Unlike Bellevue Square, Northgate will have both excellent freeway access and a light rail station. Bellevue square will have increasing traffic and no light rail.

Third will be Wright Runstad. They bought the old Safeway distribution site in Bellevue and the City has zoned it for commercial use. Unlike Keeperman, Wright Runstad will have a light rail station and they want the station. They know what it can bring in benefits.

As for downtown Bellevue, the only future is increasing traffic. The highest density will be between Bellevue Way and 108th Ave NE. This area is zoned CBD-01. The height limit is 450 feet with a FAR of 8. That means 45 story buildings that can have a size 8 times the total lot area. (100,000 square foot lot equals 800,000 square foot building) This brings up two big problems, the parking ratio in new buildings is very low to encourage transit and the super block street grid does not have the capacity to handle all of the traffic that the density will bring. Moving the station to 405 will be great for Seattle and bad for Keeper in the long run.

By: Ryan

Ryan — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 10:49:50 +0000

That’s exactly correct. There is no efficient way to serve both Southcenter and the Airport on the same line. There are steep grades in the area and it’s much more complex than just jogging a mile east, and then climbing the hill to the airport.

By: justin

justin — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 06:39:39 +0000

Going from Redmond to Seattle will MUCH slower on Link then ST bus routes over the new 520.