It shouldn’t be that severe, but you never know:
Current weather forecasts indicate if snow falls Tuesday night into Wednesday morning in the lower elevations of King County, it should be mostly in the form of snow showers with no significant accumulations. But, the snow could be heavier at higher areas in east King County or if a convergence zone sets up inside the county. Bus operations could change rapidly.
Metro will start updating their snow page at 4am Wednesday.
Consider this the snow day thread. If it were me, if at all possible I’d arrange my trip to involve as much light rail as I could, even if it were quite a bit out of my way. On second thought, I’d arrange to not make a trip at all.
Atomic Taco adds:
Metro’s radio system can be pretty interesting to listen to during the snow, and there’s a live feed up:
Windows/ASX:Â http://www.interceptradio.com/live/at.asx
iPhone/MP3:Â http://live.interceptradio.com:8000/at.mp3It’s my scanner that’s streaming, but if you put this in a post, please thank Rich from InterceptRadio for providing the hosting and bandwidth.
Don’t forget about Sounder. It can do pretty awesome in the snow as well!
“Only two people were at [my] work before noon that day [that it snowed]: me who took the train, and my coworker who walked to work.” —Mike Bjork on Sounder
Well heck, I was going to come here and preach about the goodness that is the Sounder Commuter Rail, but Tim beat me to it!
To add another shameless promotion to SDRX service: during the Thanksgiving snow storms, my advice to a friend ‘get off the CT bus and get on the Sounder for the ride north’. The CT ended up taking 6 hours to go from downtown to Mount Lake Terrace TC. The Sounder? It’s usual, boring, predictable, bathroom-equipped 33 minutes.
Only a fool would take a bus in this city during a snow storm. Especially a commuter bus.
I would say then that the most socially and environmentally responsible employee was the one who chose to live within walking distance of work, because not only did he get to work on that snow day, like the rail commuter, but a multi-billion dollar transportation system didn’t have to accommodate his lifestyle.
Congrats to the walker. He is to be applauded.
I’d LOVE to live that close to my job, but not everyone has a neighborhood civil engineering office and/or a million dollars for a downtown lifestyle.
Is a 2.5 mile walk really socially responsible? Especially if said walk relies on billions of dollars worth of roadways and sidewalks and bike lanes? Or the person relies on a billion-dollar water system? Or billion-dollar carbon-spewing freight systems to move our goods that make a CITY LIFE possible? Or our farming system that allows cities to EXIST? Remember the big picture!
So I guess the only answer is to live in the country with no lights, an outhouse, and a well.
I hope you’re referring to the times when the Sounder is an option. When the bus is your only option, I think you’d be a fool to not take the bus.
For what it’s worth, the “downtown lifestyle” doesn’t cost $1m. I took that picture above while on a coffee break after walking to work in South Lake Union, where I live near Cascade Playground with my wife and 2 kids. We have neighbors (some also with kids) who work for Real Networks, Microsoft, etc. There are apartments available that are affordable for every income level, and as everyone knows condos if you’ve got the money. Personally I think it’s a more relaxing life than a long commute, but I recognize it’s not for everyone.
What snow? bare and cold in Seattle ;-)
There’s plenty where I am in east King County.
There is plenty in Woodinville.