[UPDATE: ST planner Jim Moore explains about the 522:

When originally written, the routing change was the fact that we returned to the express lanes.  Later on, we revised the routing in the SODO area to eliminate right turns from westbound Holgate Street to northbound SODO Busway.]

The new ST schedule book, effective June 12, is out.  Aside from “minor schedule adjustments”, there are new trips on the 535 and 577, ne2 Saturday service for the 578, and fewer on the 586, 590, 592, and 593.

The booklet claims new routing for the 522 but looking at old and new maps I can’t figure out what the change is.

21 Replies to “Sound Transit June 2010 Service Change”

  1. If nothing else, the map shows a small change to the 522 routing around 6th/the busway/Airport Way.

    (The service change summary does state that the change has to do with “revised routing to/from downtown”…)

    1. They are changing the routing of the 522/545 due to safety concerns when they turn from West Holgate to North Busway. There have been some issues with the crossing gate arm (if the coach was waiting for pedestrians and the gate started to come down on top of the bus) and also Holgate can be congested at certain times and with Link, so they are going to aviod that intersection. This way they will just cross Link going straight across at Royal Brougham. They are thinking of ways to turn the buses around from the southbound 6th Ave S layovers, and I believe it will be via S Mass. St, 8th Ave S. and S. Holgate back to NB 6th Ave S.

      This will affect 522/545, but also the 510,511,513 will have a new stop at 6th/Atlantic, rather than on the Busway.

  2. I would imagine the new routing for the 522 is just putting it back on the express lanes when available.

    1. Yes, it is refering to the re-opening of the Pike ST Express lanes on/off ramp.

  3. I see they adjusted the early morning schedule for Link. Trains now depart the terminals 15 minutes earlier on weekdays and Saturdays. Westlake to the airport at 5:05 am instead of 5:20 am. SeaTac/Airport to downtown at 5:04 am instead of 5:19 am.

    Interesting that Tacoma Link has been around longer than Central Link and they never had a timepoint schedule.

    New trips on the 535? I can’t seem to find them. The schedule adjustments are welcome. Hopefully the 535 schedule will reflect reality this time.

    1. Tacoma Link must have a schedule published, because onebusaway uses it. Don’t know where to find it though.

      1. The Tacoma Link schedule is here. There aren’t exact times listed, but trains leave the ends every 10 minutes most of the time so it isn’t that hard to figure out when the next one will show up.

  4. They also eliminated some evening trips on ST 540 Kirkland – U District, due to low ridership. Demonstrating why a Montlake station is valuable so that a Kirkland – downtown Seattle route (MT 255) can still provide some access for the U-District and 23rd Ave corridor.

  5. What is the status of the roll out of the new ST Express hours that is part of ST2? How many hours have been added? How many still to come?

    1. i think most, if not all of the PC hours have been added with the new 578 and expansion of service on the 574 (i have to wonder how some of these routes that cross county lines are being funded (i.e S. King paying for added 574 and part of the service on the 578 or is PC paying for it all). Most of PCs hours were easy to add as the equipment was already there, since they took coaches that would have otherwise been laying up in seattle all day and put them to work. I think King Co. is now recieving some new DE60LFs for their ST 2 expansions.

  6. When are they coming out with the new regional transit map book? I heard that was happening sometime this year. That would be awesome, that’s my favorite local transit resource.

  7. The Saturday schedules for Central Link show 15 minute headways ~6 am to ~8pm. I’m hoping that’s an error.

    1. It looks like someone made a mistake a put in PM (and bold) when it should have been AM. That’s the same service frequency went from 15 minutes to 10 minutes in the old schedule, and it wouldn’t make sense to have 15 minute service all day and then shift to 10 minutes for 2 hours at night. It must be 10 minutes all day.

  9. I was thinking…can’t they spread out the Sounder schedule, so instead of running every half hour they run every hour? Then it could run

    5:30am
    6:30am
    7:30am
    8:30am
    9:30am
    10:30am

    in the morning and then

    3:30pm
    4:30pm
    5:30pm
    6:30pm
    7:30pm
    8:30pm

    in the evening?

    This would give twice as much coverage and be far more flexible for workers coming and going to the city.

    2. Sounder South is pretty full during peak commute. Eliminating trains at that time would force many people to alternate transportation (bus or drive). Relatively few commuters can afford to take a train that arrives DT after 8:30. You might find more people wanting to take a later return but if they’ve been forced to drive in the AM they won’t be able to take the train in the evening. Expanding the evening schedule only might have merit. It would depend on the current ridership numbers in the PM. Anybody know which trains are running most full?

      1. The 6:15PM southbound is almost empty many nights, but there’s a bit of a vicious cycle there: Nobody wants to plan their commute for the last train home, because if they’re late, they’ve missed the last train.

        The first southbound train is usually pretty sparse. By 4:45, there are occasionally people standing on some cars. With service into downtown concentrated around 7-8AM and ending at 9AM, there are lots of commuters who are ready to leave before 5PM.

  10. They tried a 6:45 departure last year, but moved it up to 6:15, presumably due to lack of ridership. The last NB in the morning that hits Kent Station at 8:32 was pretty empty, too.

    Having four SB trains that leave before five is pretty useless IMHO, but I’m sure the BNSF schedule is dictating it. There’s only two tracks south of Seattle, making the scheduling really tight. The commuter rail in Philadelphia, for comparison, has four tracks on most of the lines.

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