Sound Transit wasn’t able to perform scheduled track work last week because they had to run trains all night to keep the tracks thawed. So this Wednesday and Thursday take the hit instead. Best to be done with your rail travel by 8pm those nights.
Central Link Light Rail – Central Link light rail — delays
Central Link light rail will operate about every 30-45 minutes due to maintenance work at the following times:
* Wednesday, Dec. 1 from 8 p.m. – 1 a.m.
* Thursday, Dec. 2 from 8 p.m. – 1 a.m.
Maintenance will also temporarily close the southbound platform at the following stations:
* Beacon Hill Station
* Mt. Baker Station
Community Transit reports that October 2010’s Swift ridership is up to about 3,500 boardings per weekday, out of a total corridor ridership of about 8,200 (Swift, CT 101, and Everett Transit 9). The corridor boarding figure counts each transfer as a new boarding, so a trip involving a transfer 101 to Swift is counted twice.
A 2004 CT study predicted 2,500 Swift boardings at this time and 4,000 in four years, so they’re ahead of their expectations. CT routes average about 20 riders per revenue hour, while Swift is at 25, compared to Metro‘s 48.2 in 2009. That’s in the ballpark of Metro’s East Subarea 2009 productivity of 29/hour.
Stations:
Where do people board Swift? While every station has seen good activity, solidly a quarter of all boardings in either direction originate at the terminals of Everett Station and Aurora Village in Shoreline. Northbound, 216th Street by Stevens Hospital, 200th Street near Edmonds Community College and 148th Street are the next most popular boarding stations. Southbound, Casino Road, Pacific Avenue near the county campus and Airport Road are the next highest boarding stations.
According to CT data analyst Davis Hyslop, CT does not use automated passenger counter sampling like Metro or Sound Transit. For Swift, CT takes data from ORCA readers and ticket vending machines, and adds an estimate of flash pass boardings based off of manual surveys on random days. For other CT routes not based on fare inspectors, they use ORCA/farebox data plus manual operator record of flash passes.
From the other side of the world Jarrett Walker shares his thoughts on his home region immobilized by snow. Briefly, Seattle is doomed by rare snowfall, high temperatures, lack of rail, and lots of people living and working on hills:
So I would suggest folks go easy on the Seattle Department of Transportation, which is responsible for snow clearing, salting, etc. (Full disclosure: SDOT is a former client of mine, and I do have friends there, but I haven’t spoken with them since the storm.) First of all, not even Minneapolis can deliver an incident-free evening rush hour when a winter storm hits at 4:00 PM, as it did in Seattle this year. But more important, Seattle needs to relax into the futility of even attempting normal daily life in such a situation.
It’s the typical accessible, comprehensive Human Transit treatment. I don’t wholly buy into the “sit back and enjoy the snow” attitude of some commenters — some people really must be able to get around — but it’s true that there must be acceptance that the city will not work as if it were a clear day.
[UPDATE 2: Numbers corrected on DBT transit funding.]
[UPDATE: It may very well be that nothing can stop the tunnel at this point. However, tunnel opponents are told that trying to stop it could lead to a worse outcome. The point of this post is that it isn’t the case.]
We’ve made it abundantly clear that the Surface/Transit/I-5 option is the best one, on the policy merits, to replace the viaduct. Spending billions to maintain highway capacity, including $2.4 billion in unrestricted non-gas-tax funds, when so many other transportation priorities go unfunded is fundamentally unsound. Both portals will create huge, dozen-lane-width concrete plazas hostile into any human-scale activity near some of our most delicate neighborhoods. Many tunnel proponents tacitly admit this when they explain that this is the best deal we can get out of Olympia, rather than defend the tunnel on the underlying merits.
Although it is far less important than the overall policy critique, the debate has paid a lot of attention to the troublesome details. No one has committed to fund the overruns; there are large technical and financial risks; and the required tolling rate will divert most of the traffic the tunnel is intended to absorb.
But is it the best deal we can get? I haven’t done a whip count in the legislature, but let’s assume that Governor, House, and Senate can’t be brought around to the best solution. My perception is that, left to their own devices, the State would have rebuilt the viaduct long ago, and that the DBT is viewed as a concession to Seattle. Is fighting for that concession worthwhile? In other words, given the choice between tunnel and new viaduct, which is a better option for advocates of alternative transportation? Consider:
Tomorrow evening, Sound Transit will host an open house and public hearing on the East Link Supplemental Draft Environmental Impact Statement (SDEIS) at Bellevue City Hall. The SDEIS was released earlier this month with the inclusion of a few new alternative alignments along with some revisions of old alignments. Overall, there wasn’t a great deal of new or shocking information yielded from the study.
As usual, there will likely be a good deal of comments lambasting Sound Transit and if nothing else, more questioning of the credibility of information in the SDEIS. Information for the open house/public hearing and general SDEIS comments are available below:
Invitation to Comment Comments must be received or postmarked by Jan. 10, 2011. Please provide your name and include a return mailing address with all comments. Comments may be submitted by e-mail, mail or in person at the public hearing.
Public Hearing and Open House Tuesday, Nov. 30, 2010
4 to 7 p.m., hearing begins at 5 p.m.
Bellevue City Hall : 450 110th Ave. N.E., Bellevue, WA 98009
For those of you ordering passes for January 2011, please recall that all [adult and Access] Metro fares are going up a quarter beginning the first of the year, which escalates the price of your PugetPass by $9. The senior fare is not going up, but the pass price is increasing from $18 to $27.
Sound Transit’s 542 was one of the most substantial changes to service in the last service revision. It’s essentially the same as the 545 — Downtown Seattle to Microsoft in Redmond — but serves the U-District rather than Downtown. The problem is that it seems some 545 riders who transfer from local routes at the Montlake flyer stop still don’t know that the route exists. An anonymous Microsoft employee took it upon his- or herself to help out fellow riders. This via the City of Redmond’s R-Trip Blog.
Here for the 545 from Montlake to Overlake Transit Center/Microsoft?
Tired of a standing-room only 545?
Did you know that the new 542 express bus goes directly from here to Overlake every 15 minutes during weekday commute hours — and the majority of seats are empty?
The new 542 bus follows the exact same route from Montlake to Overlake as the 545 — except it stops right above you (Montlake Blvd E & E Lk Washington Blvd). It’s the same place that the 271/540 stop before turning onto 520.
Metro is giving Route 75 the stop consolidation treatment. The targeted stops are along 24th Ave NW (therefore also affecting the 18) and between Lake City and UW. The number of stops will drop from 168 to 132, increasing the average spacing to 1,250 feet. About 7% of riders will have to use a different stop.
Consolidation is done with a minimum of fuss, with a short comment period and in between service changes. Metro has recently sped up the 3 & 4, 7, 8, 14, 16, 28, 49, and 70 in this fashion.
Metro will enact the cut on December 18th, so if you have comments get them in soon. Remember that positive comments are as useful as negative ones.
