Month: May 2013

It just got four times easier to buy a new adult ORCA Card:

More than 120 retail stores, including local QFC, Safeway and Saar’s locations, just joined the 40 transit agency venues that sell ORCA cards…

There are currently 126 retail locations throughout King, Kitsap, Pierce and Snohomish counties that participate in the ORCA program. Most QFC and Safeway stores in the region participate, as well as Saar’s Market Place, the downtown Seattle Bartell’s, Kingston IGA, Vashon Thriftway and Roger’s MarketPlace in Mountlake Terrace.

Until now, riders could only load new fare value on an existing card at these locations. Now, they can also buy “adult” ORCA cards. Transit riders who pay reduced “senior/disabled” or “youth” fares must still go to customer service centers to get their ORCA cards since proof of eligibility is required.

Currently, all participating retail outlets are selling cards except the downtown Seattle Bartell’s at Third and Union, which is in the process of finalizing a purchase agreement. A complete list of stores that revalue cards or sell cards is available at orcacard.com.

The excuse that ORCA is hard to get is getting thinner. It’s time for Metro to remove incentives to pay cash (e.g. unequal transfer policies) and start creating incentives to use the sales infrastructure they’ve helped to create.

Transit Patterns: San Francisco from Schema Design on Vimeo.

Zurich and Geneva here.

Bruce Gray at Sound Transit was kind enough to send us the newest station level data report for Link.  These reports are a treasure trove of information, too much in fact for one post.  Some things I found interesting:

• During the week the Rainier Valley (Beacon Hill Station to Rainier Beach Station) accounts for 28% of all boardings and alightings.  During the weekend it is only 22%.  This suggests a strong commuter focus and room for continued growth.
• Growth rates at Rainier Valley stations are higher than system average, except for Rainier Beach Station which is half of system average.
• International District/Chinatown Station has the least weekday to weekend fluctuation, Stadium Station the most.
• SeaTac Airport Station, Tukwila International Blvd Station, and Westlake dominate weekend ridership (52% of all boardings and alightings).

Combined with earlier reports we now have data from February 6th 2010 to February 15th 2013:

• Feb 6th, 2010 to Jun 11th, 2010
• Jun 12th, 2010 to Oct 1st, 2010
• Oct 2nd, 2010 to Feb 4th, 2011
• Feb 5th, 2011 to Jun 10th, 2011
• Jun 11th, 2011 to Sep 30th, 2011
• Oct 1st, 2011 to Feb 17th, 2012
• Feb 18th, 2012 to June 8th, 2012
• Jun 9th, 2012 to Sep 28th, 2012
• Sep 29th, 2012 to Feb 15th, 2013

Also, see Station Level Data posts from 2010 and last year, and other related charts and a data posts from Bruce and Andrew.  I’ve also uploaded my spreadsheet (where I have a half dozen charts) if anyone wants to play around with the data.

Enjoy!

[UPDATE – 13JUN13]  As noted in this post, there was an error in Service Change 19.  Both the link and my spreedsheet have been upadated.

Lots of interesting things have been announced at Google I/O this week, including a major update to Google Maps, a Google product that’s familiar to almost everyone, and used by many on a daily basis. Most of the news coverage has revolved around visual, social or privacy aspects of the Maps experience, but I want to talk about a major upgrade to the transit functionality of Maps.*

With the new version of Google Maps, when you ask for directions between two points, rather than getting an itinerary that minimizes travel time for a handful of particular departure or arrival times (as you do today), you’ll be offered an itinerary that gets you between those points, as frequently as possible, for as much of the day as possible.

To put it in transit nerd terms, Maps will evaluate all the possible ways to get between two points to figure out the effective all-day frequency and span of service (accounting for connections between services of different frequency), and show you itineraries which prioritize those qualities over a naive minimization of scheduled travel time. It will still be possible to look at departures or arrivals at specific times, but the general guidebook itineraries will be the first thing users see.

The screenshot at the top, taken from the public preview, shows an example of this. To travel on transit from the PacMed building to downtown Fremont, take bus 36 and then transfer to 26, 28 or 40 in Pioneer Square. This itinerary works at least every 15 minutes from 6AM to 11PM, every day; within those time periods, it’s a general solution to the problem of getting between those two points. An alternative route, using the 5, 16 or 26X to get off at 38th & Bridge Way and walk down the hill is also available.

In both cases, note that even though a single route determines the baseline daytime frequency for the connection, Maps notices that other routes also serve an identical pair of stops origin destination stops, so if one of them comes first, you should take it.

After the jump, another example. Continue reading “Google Maps Introduces New, Smarter Transit Routing”

In the years since OneBusAway took over the realtime arrival market, Busview, the old UW website that provides recent bus locations rather than expected arrival times, has been quietly doing its job, largely forgotten.

That may change thanks to Andrew Filer,* a local programmer who (among other things) runs a site that indexes trademarks . Filer has updated the Busview concept with a new website named busdrone. “The biggest problem [with busview] is that it’s a Java applet, and I think a large percentage of people just don’t have the ability to run applets anymore,” Filer explained. “Mapping has also just gotten a lot nicer and more flexible since Busview’s mapping code was written, and so I think Google Maps sets the bar fairly high for anything that uses custom maps.”

After what Filer estimated to be about 30 hours of work, busdrone launched last Sunday. “Eric [Butler] just suggested it one day, and it’s actually kind of a fun problem to begin with, because it was like, ‘how do I figure out this busview software,’ which was written in the late 90s, I think. I  basically ended up decompiling Java and figuring fdall that stuff out and it was a good challenge, but then it was like, ‘ah, it’s kind of useful,’ so I’m still working on it!”

The color code is not yet clearly explained on the site. Most buses are blue; when there hasn’t been a position report for 10 minutes, it turns gray. The SLU streetcar is Black, Red, and Purple, corresponding to the actual colors of those streetcars. Link, of course, has no public real-time data.

At the moment, it’s hard to tell at a glance which direction the bus icon is moving. Filer has the heading information and should have the indicator running within a week or so. Another problem is that the icons don’t show up on some mobile browsers, including my Android phone. In the next “week or two,” Filer expects to tweak the site to work on more browsers. A beta version currently incorporates the OneBusAway feed, which includes Pierce and Intercity Transit, and that should also be stable in the next week or so.

Currently, when you click on an icon it shows all possible paths that bus route could take. Filer can use the OneBusAway data to instead display the path relevant to that trip. He is also toying with the idea of connecting it to webcam feeds so that you can physically see the bus on its way.

Filer says that Butler (an STB alum)  is interested in making a mobile app, though he’s not sure when that might be ready.

Busdrone is to onebusaway as a system map is to Trip Planner. One gives you a single answer, digested to what you exactly need to know. Map-based displays let you see all the options at one time. The two approaches complement each other, so it’s good that busview is getting a modern update.

*Andrew also helped out a bit with the STB back end a few years ago.

• Update on the Capitol Hill Station upzone.
• Lofts in West Seattle go through design review. Aside from the usual parking fear the comments seem constructive.
• WSB had a 48-minute interview with Metro GM Kevin Desmond.
• Seattle Weekly reviews bus apps.
• Brier Dudley reviews Car2Go ($).
• More evidence that supply and demand works.
• Doug Macdonald explains how the House transportation revenue package is a huge sprawl enabler. He wails on the package some more here.
• On a completely unrelated note, worldwide CO2 levels at 400ppm, highest in 4 million years ($).
• McGinn proposes to spend $3.25m project savings on various safety improvements.
• TriMet now running a weekend-0nly bus route to Washington park.
• C-Tran officials met with the CRC team to figure out a plan for light rail. Also: the cost has dropped to $2.8 billion through “deferred” interchanges, which is indisputably good news.
• USPIRG study says the driving boom is over, younger generation will not drive as much.
• Amtrak unveils new locomotives.

This is an open thread.

This week Franklin High School, across the street from Mount Baker Station, is holding its annual Arts Festival and Talent Show.

Festivities begin with an art opening at 5:30 pm, Thursday, May 16, at Mioposto, 3601 S. McClellan St, a one half mile walk from the station.  Walk north on Rainier until McClellan, then east.  Mioposto is located in my all time favorite building in Seattle.  A beautiful art deco building that serves as the anchor of that part of the neighborhood (but unfortunately could not be built today).  The main attraction is the talent show Friday, May 17, starting at 7 p.m. in the school’s auditorium, 3013 S. Mount Baker Blvd. The arts festival will be from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, May 18, on the plaza in front of FHS.

The events, which are open to the public, bring together students, their families, teachers and staff and Mount Baker neighbors. The festival raises money to benefit Franklin’s art, drama and music programs and student clubs, while the talent show raises money for the senior class of 2015. Tickets to the talent show are $3 for FHS students and $5 for others. The art opening and the arts festival are free.

The festival will feature student performances, including the steel drum band, fashion club, jazz band, Quaker band and lion dancers, along with displays of visual art, ceramics and wood arts. Student clubs will sell heirloom tomato and vegetable plants, treats and handmade crafts. Also for sale are woodcrafts, such as cutting boards, created by students and notecards featuring student art. Vietnamese sandwiches, chips and soft drinks also will be for sale.

For more information, see the full press release, check out the event’s Facebook page, or email elizabethlowry@comcast.net.   While my 10 week old son is the ultimate ‘decider’ when it comes to my schedule, we hope to check out the art opening Thursday.

See past Link excuses here.

As the video indicates, a broad coalition of interest groups, many of which broadly share STB’s ideals, are expressing support for the latest version of the Clibborn package, HB 1954. The conventional wisdom is that these bills will pass the House but run into trouble in the Senate.

For transit advocates, this bill is about saving transit agencies around the State. There are tax provisions tailored to each of the big Puget Sound county agencies. King County (Sec. 405) could levy a 1.5% Motor Vehicle Excise Tax (MVET), of which 60% would go to Metro and 40% for roads; this would answer Metro’s desire for a “stable” revenue source and basically make the agency’s budget whole. Pierce Transit (Sec. 406, 408), which can’t get voters to approve authorized taxes, could create an “enhanced public transportation zone” to serve precincts interested in supporting transit. Community Transit (Sec. 406), currently maxed out, could add another 0.3% to its sales tax rate. Finally, transportation benefit districts could approve a $40 vehicle license fee without a public vote, up from $20 (Sec. 404).

The summary suggests that over a 12-year period, out 0f $7.8 billion in state spending $100m will go to complete streets and $100m to passenger rail, in addition to $120m in direct state funding for transit. Transportation Choices Coalition Executive Director Rob Johnson tells me that has since increased to $400m, and that its formula suggests Metro would get just under half, which by itself would patch about a fifth of the budget hole.

On the other hand, the bulk of the bill is about raising the gas tax (from 37.5 cents now to 50.5 in 2015, Sec. 101). While gas tax is an excellent source of revenue for roads, the package is heavy on new highways rather than maintenance. 10% of the funding goes to cities and counties, 5% to ferry operations, 7.5% to the “Puget Sound capital construction account,” and the remaining 77.5% to the new “Connecting Washington” account (Sec. 103). That account draws from this list of environmentally destructive highway widening and new freeways, but can also be used for maintenance and upkeep. Some of the proceeds are set aside to complete SR 520. There are also new vehicle weight fees (Sec. 301).

In one of the basic asymmetries in Washington between the way the legislature treats its drivers and its transit riders, the bulk of  transit funding is subject to a public vote, while the new highways are deemed too critical to risk at the ballot box. Personally, I’m no fan of direct democracy, but it would be nice if the sustainable transportation options had the same number of veto points as the anti-urban ones.

I imagine transit advocates will have different takes on this issue.  For those that primarily care about making sure the transit-dependent have a way to get around, this deal meets their needs, but only if they’re optimistic that the transit measures would pass. For those whose advocacy is more about stopping the spiral of environmental destruction and avoiding land use patterns that are hard to serve with transit, the overall merits are far less clear.

Of the six RapidRide routes Metro has rolled out, or soon will roll out, only one will have more than one adult fare: RapidRide E, an improved version of today’s Route 358, which connects downtown Seattle and Shoreline via Aurora Avenue. Metro’s fare system has two zones, with Zone 1 the city of Seattle, and Zone 2 the rest of the county; adult riders pay a 50c surcharge on rush-hour trips that cross a fare boundary, while off-peak riders, seniors and youth each pay a flat rate. All E Line trips will cross the boundary at 145th St. I don’t know exactly how long the zone system has been around, but it’s at least 30 years, and like so many things of that era at Metro, seems to have been designed with a focus on the downtown Seattle 9-5 commute trip.

One of the few rapid transit-like features all RapidRide lines will ultimately have is partial off-board payment at the busiest stops: riders with ORCA will be able to tap on at the platform, while cash payers delay the bus, fumbling with change and dollar bills at the farebox just like they’ve always done. Zone fares present a problem in this system, as riders have no way* to declare to the ORCA platform reader how many zones they wish to pay for; of necessity, platform ORCA payers risk under- or over-payment. We at STB, along with many of our readers, have wondered how Metro is going to deal with this, and after more than two months of pleading and nagging, we finally have an official answer:

The E Line will have the same 1 and 2 zone boundaries as the 358. The off-board readers can only handle one fare set so we are setting them to the number of zones that the majority of the riders pay (which is also consistent to the default settings for the farebox and ORCA reader on the bus).

This means in the inbound/southbound direction, the off-board readers from Aurora Village Transit Center to North 160th Street (the last station before the zone boundary) will be set to two zones.

Riders who are only going one zone will have to pay on the bus and ask the driver to override the two-zone setting on the bus. All other off-board readers, inbound and outbound, will be set to one zone. Again, if the rider is going two zones from those locations, they will have to ask the driver to override the default setting.

More after the jump. Continue reading “RapidRide E and Two-Zone Fares”

A Martin mentioned last week, at 3:30 PM today King County Metro will host an open house on the extensive service cuts that could come if the legislature fails to provide a sustainable local revenue source for the agency; this will be followed by a public testimony to King County’s Transportation, Economy and Environment Committee from 4-8 PM. This may be your best chance in this legislative session to say your piece on how the cuts would affect you.

From the Metro Future Blog:

If sustainable transit funding does not become available through efforts by the Legislature, an estimated $75 million annual revenue shortfall could force Metro to reduce bus service beginning in fall 2014. Metro has identified 65 routes at risk for elimination and 86 routes at risk for service reductions.

The potential cuts would create a transit system with fewer travel options and longer travel times, with buses that are more crowded and less reliable. These effects could cascade through the system as bus routes are eliminated and riders compete for space on other already-crowded routes.

So far, Metro has been able to avoid these cuts through $798 million in reforms, reductions and additional revenue – such as the implementation of the congestion reduction charge, a temporary $20 charge on vehicle licenses for two years. The fee ends in 2014, and without new sources of revenue, Metro must reduce service.

Open house and public hearing Tuesday, May 14
Union Station, 401 S. Jackson St., Seattle

3:30 p.m. open house
4-8 p.m. public testimony
Can’t attend? Submit your testimony online.