A few points that I think were missed in this weekend’s Battle Royale about the Rainier Valley segment:
- Federal funding rules don’t allow transit agencies to take TOD into account when doing ridership projections. So a line through Sodo’s warehouses would have had lousy ridership projections, and probably not have earned any federal dollars. So a Sodo alignment means no alignment at all. People actually live near the Rainier Valley line.
- Seattle’s neighborhoods are famously risk-averse, and likely to fight a rail line that will ultimately benefit them. Poorer neighborhoods are generally less litigious and less politically active, meaning that both political and engineering risk were lower for this segment.
- The Rainier’s valley development pattern was unique. MLK is/was a fairly underdeveloped strip of auto repair shops and small, run-down apartment buildings, but also is two or three blocks from major arterials on either side: Rainier Avenue and Beacon Avenue. This made it uniquely suited to draw ridership from two vibrant and transit-intensive populations while still being capable of inspiring large TOD projects with minimal political opposition.
- I would have liked to have seen our Ballard/West Seattle contingent — leading advocates of in-city before regional rail — come out a little more strongly for the Rainier Valley segment. I think the Seattle-first argument would have substantial merit if transit were being funded by a dictatorship, but fortunately we actually require democratic assent in this country. Unfortunately, the electorate is shackled with extremely narrow parochialism. At any rate, Central Link was an opportunity to provide substantial in-city service while also meeting regional goals: the best of both worlds.
Furthermore, as several commenters pointed out, what’s done is done. If you’re concerned about operating delays incurred by the Rainier Valley segment, the proper response is to pressure the city and Sound Transit for additional safety improvements to improve operating speeds. For instance:
- Pedestrian overpasses, instead of signalized, at-grade crossings.
- Crossing gates at all auto intersections.
- Fencing along the route to discourage pedestrian crossing at unauthorized points. It doesn’t have to be triple-strand concertina wire; even a tasteful, 4 foot black iron fence would be a sufficient deterrent in 90% of cases.
- Construction of underpasses for major arterials.
Most of this stuff is relatively inexpensive, and can be added incrementally as funding and political will allow.
It’s a slow, meandering, political route that won’t get people out of their cars. It’s nothing more than a local bus route on rails. What a waste of a great opportunity.
A local bus route with dedicated right-of-way, headways as low as 6 minutes, capacity of 800 pax per train, and the ability to encourage dense, walkable development all along the route.
If that was the standard for “local bus routes”, I daresay we wouldn’t be spending all this time advocating for rail.
And by the way,
Link (Westlake-Seatac): 35 minutes
Communities served south of SoDo: 6
Rte 194 (2d/Pike – Seatac): 29 minutes (assuming no traffic delays)
Served communities beyond SoDo: 0.
So is that a “meandering” routing problem, or simply that the line actually attempts to serve people, instead of being an airport express?
The 194 is just an airport express from downtown, no one is counting the time it takes to get TO downtown. Even if you live in Belltown or Pionier Square, you still have to get to the 194.
Same with Link – they’re both in the same bus tunnel.
I wasn’t online this weekend due to sun. But here’s my West Seattle opinion…
I fully support the route and the building of this rail. Sure, my tax dollars are paying for it and it looks like I will rarely use it, but I don’t care. Funny how everyone complained bitterly about the monorail and how they were paying for it but wouldn’t use it.
My husband and I visited the area before, during and will continue to do so after the rail line is complete and we are JEALOUS. We tell our friends to go visit and check it out.
We WANT true mass transit. We know what is coming with the Spokane Viaduct construction starting and the Alaska Viaduct due to for construction. But no solid transit alternatives have been presented. RapidRide is viewed as a joke by most residents.
We want trains, trolleys, more/improved bus service – read: dedictated lanes. We want monorail, ferries, better bike infrastructure. West Seattle has many major construction sites ready to start which will impact auto/transit use in the very near future, not to mention those built within the last year or two.
We get nothing but a pat on the head from the City and Metro, “Don’t worry, we’ll think of something by 2010 or 2011.”
This is a great post. Six dense neighborhoods will have 35-minute trips to the airport, compared to 29 minutes plus the time it takes to take a bus downtown, plus transfer time.
On top of that, those neighborhoods are connected to each other and to downtown, and get transit-oriented development.
All of this includes capacity greater than a freeway lane, an order of magnitude more people than you can pack onto a bus.
I agree with Al: I see this service and I’m envious. I think a lot of people just don’t like that they’re not the ones getting the benefit (with an undercurrent in some cases that these neighborhoods are made up of the wrong kind of people–poor, ethnically diverse, etc.) As far as I’m concerned, more power to them. Let’s just build the rest of the system as quickly as possible so more of us can get the benefits.
Most of your suggestions at the end of your post seem to make sense (especially since they could be constructed over time when money becomes available). One point not have the intended result though.
Despite the perceived safety improvements resulting from fencing along the right of way, the opposite result may be true.
First emergency vechicles might from time to time need to cross the tracks at points in between intersections. Fencing would obviously prevent this.
Secondly, if someone (rather stupidly) was on the tracks and a train was coming, having a fence would create a barrier for that person to escape the right of way quickly. This would result in either the person be hit by the train or the train stopping which would create service delays.
These points have been cited in numerous Sound Transit documents about the MLK segment.
I think good community education, obvious markings and signs and regular security patrols would have the same effect that fencing would, but without the associated problems.
Chris M,
Interesting points.
I think there’s a tradeoff on the fencing. What saves more lives: an extra 30 seconds for U-turning emergency vehicles, or not having people hit by the train in the first place? (That’s not rhetorical, I genuinely don’t know).
As for escaping the tracks:
– A 4-foot fence won’t keep anyone who really wants to from crossing, but will prevent stupid stuff like running across the tracks to catch the bus.
– I believe there’s typically enough room between the tracks to stand if need be.
– Without a fence, you have rare occasions where trains have to slow down or stop due to pedestrians. With a fence, such cases will be very rare. I prefer the latter.
martin, fencing wouldn’t be a great idea. Nobody else in the world uses it for their trams. People learn, someone might get hit, but they’re the same people who would get hit by a car otherwise. You aren’t going to see more people die than already did on the roadway.
Loads of people use fencing near the stations for trams. You see it a lot in the netherlands.
I have yet to see an example of center roadway light rail or tram actually being fenced off. You want this to be an urban revitalization project, not a disaster!
I too think the argument about times from Westlake a little specious. Not only does Link win because it serves so many people directly, but it’s still going to win out over the bus for people who do need to catch it from downtown to the airport, because it will be so much more frequent and reliable. I live near Westlake station, and trips to the airport are one of the things I’m most reluctant to take the bus for because if I miss it I’m 15-30 minutes late, and the bus itself is often 15-20 minutes late. For me, the short headways on Link will make all the difference so it feels reliable enough to count on for catching a flight, and efficient enough to be a whole lot more pleasant for getting home from a flight than the wait for the 194. And those advantages will matter 10 times as much to people who have a bus connecting with it.
Sure, it could have been 10-15 minutes faster if it skipped all those neighbourhoods (and by-the-by it would give me a gloriously easy commute to my Georgetown workplace, and I hope that one day we do have a proper airport express), but the tradeoff in terms of all the people who get to use it without a transfer seems far more important as a first light rail line for a city that still needs to be convinced such things are worth the money.
Re fencing on MLK — in Portland, they have a simple black chain link fence down the middle of their Interstate Ave. traclway. What it does is send a visual message to all: don’t cross the tracks, stay off the tracks. For the idiots that venture out there anyway, they can step over the chain and not get trapped where they shouldn’t be when a train comes.
I haven’t asked my Tri-Met friends, but I’m sure the fence contains break-away links, so fire trucks and aid cars can still cross the track in emergencies.
Re comparing the Link light rail trip to the Airport, v. the Route 194. I added up the trips on both modes, and the train will come and go 2.4 times as often as the bus — truly no-wait service. When you add waiting time to the bus travel time, and superior reliability, the trains advantages become even more obvious.
Getting to the airport is not the be-all and end-all of existence.
Why does the LINK go to the airport? Because it would be insane not to! But what is really happening here is that at some future time the LINK will extend south of the airport towards Tacoma, and possibly north towards West Seattle. And, of course, at an airport you have large numbers of people arriving and departing without their cars, many of them coming to stay or do business in downtown Seattle.
LINK is not just a way to get to the airport, it’s a new transportation corridor intended to support several hundred thousand new residents of the region in the future. Getting to the airport is one reason to build the LINK, but not the only reason.
TOD?!? Can someone please provide a definition?
I’m merely a casual follower of this blog and obviously not as steeped in the issues as many, but I like to think that I’m of at least average intelligence. Unfortunately, I find myself unable to decipher this acronym either from the text or the context.
Perhaps I’m not amongst the target audience of this blog, but I would suggest that it would behoove you to avoid using such jargon (or alternately define it in the post).