As Andrew mentioned in an earlier post, Mayor Greg Nickels made an official announcement on Friday that 3rd Avenue will in fact remain a transit only corridor according to the Seattle PI.
Eighteen Metro bus routes, now above ground, will reroute to the tunnel
when it reopens, but 22 others will move to Third Avenue from First, Second and
Fourth avenues, theoretically freeing up space on those streets. That means
overall bus traffic will increase on Third once the tunnel reopens.“By shifting … buses onto Third, the buses will move more quickly and
there’ll be less disruption to traffic,”
This is good that the city is making transit priority. Especially since the people have become accustomed to having that restriction on 3rd Ave, the September shakeup should be really noticeable for downtown traffic.
This is really good news to hear, especially since I went to the Torchlight parade, and the buses all ran on third it was a smooth operation for the most part. This will be nice I think they need to extend the transit priority beyond peak times though.
Givin the events of yesterday, looks like they should definitely invest in security and police to protect riders.