The Federal Omnibus spending bill had a number of transit-related earmarks for Washington, including a $110m installment for University Link and $21m for RapidRide C.
Unfortunately, that omnibus bill died in the Senate. However, ST spokesman Bruce Gray assures me that the “continuing resolution” that passed instead authorizes FTA to follow the previous Full Funding Grant Agreement with Sound Transit, which is an identical amount. This means that payments will be made on schedule.
Similarly, KCDOT Assistant Director Ron Posthuma says that the RapidRide money came through a competitive grant process, and so while there is always uncertainty when budgets are late, there shouldn’t be any significant issues.
Didn’t I read somewhere about an earmark for the ETB network in Seattle? I can’t find it in the embed on that page.
Perhaps a little OT, and I know the map actually says “Downtown Seattle routing and stops to be determined”, but why wouldn’t they route it on the SODO busway and into the tunnel? Can the tunnel absorb anymore routes at this point, or is it at capacity during rush hour? Would the payment system totally break what with needing to have rapid ride-specific ORCA readers on the platforms?
You hit upon a couple of the problems, but the biggest is that Metro doesn’t like changing routes more than they have to.
RapidRide will eventually get kicked upstairs, so why not start it there? I’m sure the planners were thinking about that.
At the meetup Jack Lattemann said it would be go on 3rd Avenue from Yesler to Denny. I’m not sure if he meant just the C or all three routes, but it would make sense to put all three routes on the same street to make a frequent-transit corridor. (Not that 3rd isn’t already a frequent-transit corridor, but it would put a trunk line from Intl Dist to Seattle Center, and some other routes could therefore be reduced.) Although I don’t think the E would be able to go all the way because it would be hard to get to Aurora.
Battery Street Busway, anyone?
Oh great, so funding for low-capacity buses which stop far too often and drive far too slow will continue!
But none for light rail, I’m guessing.
Huh? Did you read the post?
“ST spokesman Bruce Gray assures me that the “continuing resolution” that passed instead authorizes FTA to follow the previous Full Funding Grant Agreement with Sound Transit, which is an identical amount. This means that payments will be made on schedule [for University Link].”