On Saturday, January 5th, 2008, I went out with my good friend, Jason Hill to check out just how popular the Seahawks trains are. They say seeing is believing and the crowds were at first, very little but we did arrive a little after 10:00am. When security came through and announced there was 380 passengers that loaded in Tacoma alone, that was surprising, but when we arrived Puyallup, the only other stop for the train before it is non-stop to Seattle, our jaws slacked open… this was going to be a packed train.

People were lined up well into the parking lot, some were even tailgating in the parking lot! This is a much different, much more upbeat passengers than your normal early morning commuting crowd…well, duh, Football Fans are gonna be more alive! To give you an idea of each station patronage…

Passing Sumner Station at 79mph

Passing Auburn Station at 79mph

Passing Kent Station at 75mph

Passing Tukwila Station at 70mph

And the crowd getting off the train and mind you, this only the first train, the second was behind us by 15 minutes followed by the arrival of the Everett Sounder Train a few minutes after our train left to back into a different track.

Both Everett trains had 5 cars each had a full STANDING only train along with the other 2 Sumner and Tacoma trains which had 6 cars.

The thing most people want now – more cars or more trains or both, this service is incredible and makes it more of a steal since the fare on this run was normal commuter fares. In 47 minutes with a 5 minute delay waiting for a freight train and Southbound Amtrak to clear in Georgetown, we arrived in Seattle.

For more information on these trains, check out Sound Transit’s website
http://www.soundtransit.org/x6652.xml

Now back in the day, Amtrak ran a train from Portland to Seattle and back and a lot would love to see this train return. Would you be somebody that would ride the train and pay the normal Amtrak fare for it if it resumed for the 2008/2009 Season? Have you been on the Sounder Seahawks service? If so, what was your thoughts and opinion about it.

The rest of the photos can be viewed at http://www.flickr.com/photos/brian_macster/

Thanks for viewing!