King County Ridership – Spring 2009

Posted on by Adam Bejan Parast
Highest Weekday Ridership Routes, Spring 2009 (click for more routes)

This data (click the image to see more routes) is a tad dated but I think everyone will enjoy taking a look and seeing how their favorite routes stack up.

Back when I wrote at Orphanroad.com I did a series with some similar ridership data (Part 1, Part 2). I didn’t directly compare the ridership figures because they aren’t directly comparable, so cross your eyes a bit if you want to compare them. I have only included routes with more than 1,000 daily riders. Also note that these figures are not direct measures and created using sampling and some fancy statistics.

The next shakeup should complete the most significant change Seattle’s transit system has seen in many years and it will be interesting to see how it impacts ridership on specific routes. At first blush I would expect the 8 to gain a good amount of ridership. It is becoming a center city version of the 44 and 48. And can’t the the 48 get any love… or Rapidride branding, TSP, off-board fare payment and maybe some real-time information?

I-90 Term Sheet is a Good Step Forward

Posted on by Ben Schiendelman

We held off on writing about yesterday’s East Link news to get some more information and more fully understand the process – and I’m glad we did, because there’s more to it.

The term sheet (.doc) referred to in pieces published yesterday is positive, but it’s not the final agreement – it’s more of a mutually agreed upon starting place for building an agreement. WSDOT and Sound Transit are agreeing that these terms are good enough to use when crafting a more lengthy, complex “umbrella agreement” later in the year. This umbrella agreement will be much more detailed, potentially covering exact dates for project delivery, particular responsibilities assigned to each agency, and more.

The term sheet, though, lets us in the public know that WSDOT has pretty much accepted that they’re not going to get actual cash from Sound Transit for the reversible express lanes, despite Speaker Chopp’s earlier demands. This is in line with what we predicted before – the R8A work Sound Transit is doing to add HOV lanes to I-90 constitutes a benefit to the state, a benefit, it turns out, that outweighs the reversible lanes’ value!

Aside from that, there are two things I find really interesting about this term sheet.

First, it’s temporary. It will last 40 years after the start of East Link revenue service, but the umbrella agreement will provide for a renewal contract extending that for an additional 35 years. This ensures the agreement won’t have to be renegotiated until 2095. Hopefully light rail will have its own bridge by then, otherwise I’m going to have to live to 114 so I can write about it.

Second, this removes all responsibility from WSDOT for additional R8A funding past their already spent or programmed money. That bodes well for East Link’s schedule, as Sound Transit is pretty good about funding things when they say they will. Sound Transit just moved forward with the next step of R8A, as well.

This should be representative of the final agreement, but don’t throw a party yet. There are a lot of costs here, from the airspace lease to bridge maintenance, and they could go up before the umbrella agreement is complete and signed – that said, this is good news.

News Roundup: Sounder’s Back

Posted on by Sherwin Lee
'Which direction?' by Oran

Editorial: The Olympia tax fight matters for transit

Posted on by Martin H. Duke
wikimedia

[UPDATE 2:28pm: If you’d like to put together your own package of  sales tax exemptions, this Dept. of Revenue pdf lists them all.  The list of special-interest giveaways is mind-boggling (livestock semen?  gun safes?).  Of particular interest, gasoline (p.291) would yield about $28m for Metro.  Taxing all personal and professional services (p.285) would net over $100m a year.]

One could be forgiven that the coming legislative struggles over plugging the State’s general fund deficit are orthogonal to the transit funding crisis.  And indeed, the profound decisions to be made are likely to drown out calls to rescue struggling local transit agencies with more tax revenue.

However, of all the new revenue options being covered, one stands out as being useful for transit, and that is the option of reducing exemptions in the Sales Tax.  Unlike other options, such an expansion would also increase the revenue of all other state entities that use the sales tax — including all county transit agencies and Sound Transit.

I’ve spoken to a number of veteran Olympia watchers and no one has definitively verified or challenged my layman’s interpretation.  Perhaps that’ll happen in the comments.

Here are some back-of-the-envelope calculations, using the 2011 revenue estimates reported in the Schmudget blog and the estimate that Metro sales tax collections in FY 2011 will be 5.5% the size of the State take*:

  • Extending the tax to candy and gum would raise $1.5m;
  • bakery products, $0.9m;
  • a variety of consumer services, $6.5m;
  • financial services, $10.5m (mentioned in the Seattle Times) ; and
  • removing the non-resident exemption, $2m.

More after the jump.

Continue reading “Editorial: The Olympia tax fight matters for transit”

Comments on Comments

Posted on by Martin H. Duke
Sony Pictures

Over the last couple of months we’ve made some additions to the comments policy.  Check it out.

While we’re on the subject, there have been some guerrilla efforts to moderate threads through chastising of trolls and/or complaining about the comment policy.  There are currently three people (John, Ben, and me) who have moderating authority and I’d appreciate it if you left it to us.  If you think someone is trolling the best response is to not feed them. This is well-established internet practice and makes it easier for us to clean up the thread if it’s needed.  More below the jump.

Continue reading “Comments on Comments”

Bellevue

Posted on by Frank Chiachiere

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Vintage Seattle has a great postcard of 1970s Bellevue. Bellevue’s growth over the last few years is a good reminder of how much the region’s changed, and how much the center of gravity has shifted away from Seattle over the years.* In the 1960s, you could build a Seattle-centric transportation system. No more.

Ironically, despite greatly increasing its stature and urbanity vis-a-vis Seattle, Bellevue still seems interested in pushing transit out to the hinterlands, rather than have it run where people live.

—
* Obviously Seattle’s still the big dog, but in relative terms its unipolarity has declined as the rest of King County has grown in population.

Bellevue City Council Considers Study of B7 Modified

Posted on by Sherwin Lee

[UPDATE 7:30pm: We were just contacted by John Chelminiak, a city councilmember who let us know that no formal votes were cast regarding a preferred B segment.  Instead, the council was merely unanimous in agreeing to further study of a B7 modified segment.  A vote, however, will be taken on January 25th to authorize Mayor Davidson to draft a letter to Sound Transit requesting the study and for the segment to be included in the Supplemental EIS.

So no, the council did not choose or favor a particular segment.  I’ve changed the title and the story in accordance with that.  Publicola has more reporting.]

Last night, the Bellevue City Council had a regular study session discussing the B segment of East Link.  As we’ve hinted before, the council was apt to change their preferred alternative from B3 modified, and as was expected, it looks like that’s exactly what’s going to happen.  Commenter Mike Skehan posted a short update following the session last night in our notification thread:

Update: Bellevue council 7-0in favor of B7 modified (S. Bellevue P/R, then cross Mercer Slough to BNSF ROW). Letter being drafted to ST to that effect.

A B7 modified route appears to be a compromise alignment between the original B3 and B7 routes.  As Mike said, the route would serve South Bellevue, but would have to cross Mercer Slough to meet up with the BNSF tracks, leaving a big question about the potential environmental impacts.

While none of the blog staff were able to show up at last night’s meeting, we’re asking any commenters who attended to report on the session.  For my part, I was able to catch a few public comments off the live stream near the end. Most B7 supporters largely constituted a Surrey Downs neighborhood committee, which has been attempting to push light rail far away, even more so than the compromise alternative the council picked last year (which would curve around the neighborhood).  However, there were also a few comments speaking out against B7 from residents living near the BNSF right-of-way and from Enatai commuters.

These next few months will bring a barrage of East Link relevant meetings, some more important than others.  We will be reporting on the dates soon and a potential meet-up in Bellevue.

Chuck Wolfe Weighs In On ‘Nodes’ And ‘Places’

Posted on by Sherwin Lee
'Inbound to Othello' by Mike Bjork

For those who have never read contributions by Chuck Wolfe at the Seattle P-I’s City Brights blog, you’re missing out.  Chuck co-authored the Barriers Report (PDF) on TOD (transit-oriented development) and is a land-use attorney who knows his stuff about transit’s role in planning the urban environment.  Last week, we had a few big stories about the City of Seattle’s initial cease-and-desist order of a private parking lot in the Rainier Valley and then McGinn’s subsequent moratorium on that policy.  Chuck has a piece out weighing in on the issue’s relevance to distinguishing between ‘nodes‘ and ‘places‘ in planning a transit-oriented community.

More below the jump.

Continue reading “Chuck Wolfe Weighs In On ‘Nodes’ And ‘Places’”

New ST Schedule is out

Posted on by Martin H. Duke

The new Sound Transit schedule, effective February 6th, is out.  Highlights:

  • Routes 564 and 565 replaced by the 566, Auburn-Overlake.
  • Route 582 replaced by more service on the 578, which will now provide extensive “Sounder shadow” service and replace trips to Federal Way by the 194.
  • More trips on 554, 574, 577, 592.
  • Route changes on the 560.

Replacing the Seawall

Posted on by Frank Chiachiere

This post originally appeared on Orphan Road.

Last Thursday, the Mayor proposed a property tax levy, to be approved by referendum, to fund the replacement of the seawall. His reason:

“The current plan leaves the existing seawall in place for far too long,” said McGinn. “Replacing our deteriorating seawall, before it fails, is one of the basic needs for our city. One of the first briefings I had during the transition was on the seawall. It was alarming. The current plan will not see the completion of a new seawall for at least another six years. Based on what I know now, that’s not good enough.“

The city council has concerns. At the very least, they want to be consulted:

“We want to make certain that the City’s Central Waterfront Partnership Committee has full opportunity to participate on this issue,” councilmembers said. “Legitimate questions have been raised about how to best restore some ecological function to the central waterfront shoreline as part of the seawall replacement…the Committee members’ input is vital to the success of the project.”

Why wouldn’t McGinn get the council’s support before announcing this? What is he thinking? If the seawall is in as bad shape as McGinn claims, surely it would be easy to win the council’s support, no?

Finally, there’s a sense that this is disconnected from the overall viaduct debate. Is that intentional? To be sure, the replacement of the seawall has always been a separate, city-funded project, but it’s still referred to by WSDOT as the “Alaskan Way Viaduct and Seawall Replacement” project. The two have been considered, heretofore, as interdependent projects. McGinn would seem to be attempting to disentangle them.

But again, why blindside the council here?