Central Streetcar Alignment

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

The CD News has a post up about an effort to move the central/First Hill streetcar over to 12th Avenue (south of Pine) instead of Broadway.

This makes a ton of sense to me. 12th Avenue down around Seattle U is catching fire, and there’s plenty of pedestrian-friendly retail opportunity all the way south to Jackson. Broadway south of Pine, on the other hand, is mostly parking garages and hospital entrances.

Of course, those hospital entrances are exactly the problem. The whole point of the First Hill streetcar was to serve First Hill, which is being bypassed by Light Rail (in what will likely be looked upon decades-hence as a decision as misguided as having the DC Metro bypass Georgetown).

Still, it’s worth exploring. I bet the ridership numbers are greater than they would be for the Broadway alignment, which is estimated at about 3,000 riders per day (PDF). One alternative would be to proceed with the Madison St. bus corridor improvements that were studied by Sound Transit(PDF) during the FH streetcar design process. Or, better, yet, just build a Madison streetcar line all the way out to Madison Park.

You can read more about the 12th Avenue alignment in this PDF. And all of these options are interesting to think about in light of the planned Yesler Terrace redevelopment.