North Line
Sept. 14: 326
Sept. 21: 200
Total North Line: 526
South Line
Sept. 14: 1,356
Sept. 21: 1,354
Total South Line: 2,710
Total boardings, all trains both days: 3,236
For comparison, an average August full weekday of Sounder draws over 11,000 boardings. You can find the schedule for the special service here. It consisted of six round trips to Lakewood and three to Seattle, one of which extended to Everett. Some of this service was not particularly useful for the fair, instead maintaining Sounder’s quite rider-friendly practice of making almost all runs revenue runs just in case someone needs to make a trip. I won’t claim to really understand attendance patterns at the fair, but I’d estimate that five Lakewood round trips and 1.5 Seattle round trips were actually useful to people attending the fair.
ST spokesperson Kimberly Reason says no ST funds were used to provide this service. It instead came from the Washington State Fair and Events Center, so it’s ultimately up to them if this is value for the money and whether they increase, maintain, or reduce service next year. The Center didn’t respond to my inquiry about their plans.
Are the Sounder trips faster/slower/comparable to an equivalent bus/shuttle? If the sounder is comparable/slower, I have a hard time thinking about why they would continue to invest in a service like this.
But Sounder IS slower from Lakewood/Tacoma to King Street than the ST Express buses. But South Sounder is still very popular.
But the Sounder isn’t really meant for Seattle->Tacoma and in fact, a lot of trains are pretty empty between Puyallup and Tacoma. But for the other stops to/from Seattle or amongst themselves, it’s hands down quicker than any other mode.
So, we’re talking about Puyallup. Seattle-Puyallup is 40 minutes on Sounder vs 77 minutes on the 578. (Likewise, Seattle-Kent is 20 minutes on Sounder vs 43 minutes on the 159.) It’s only Seattle-Tacoma where the advantage disappears because of the large detour the train makes.
For Lakewood-Puyallup, I don’t know because there is no direct bus. I assume a bus’s travel time would be faster becausehighway 512 goes from one to the other. Sounder takes 33 minutes weekdays, but it may be less on Saturdays when there’s not the hundreds of people disembarking at Tacoma Dome.
Kent->Puyallup is 20 minutes on Sounder, compared to at least an hour via the 180->578 transfer.
That does assume no backups or accidents on I-5. Some might prefer the reliability and predictability of a train to a bus.
As a parent and a daily commuter on Sounder, (Tukwila to Seattle and back), I did have the opportunity to use the Sounder to the Fair, which I believe is the topic, how did we get on opinions on regular routes?
I LOVED IT !! If one fair goers opinion matters, let me say that being able to board the train not having to worry about traffic to and from the fair, or the unreasonable parking, is the only way to go. In fact, it’s the only reason I went to the fair. I wouldn’t have taken my daughter if not for the Sounder, I definitely wasn’t planning to drive.
Thank you WA State Fair, and the Events Center
We’re comparing Sounder’s travel time to buses, and indirectly their costs, to determine how much value Sounder adds.
I was thinking about taking Sounder to the fair, but I had too many other priorities to take a whole day for it.
What I see for Sounder is what I saw happen to the LIRR in New York.
When I was growing up, the suburbs were houses. Just houses. You had to drive 3/4th of mile just to get to a bakery or grocery store! Everyone took the Long Island Expressway or LIRR to The City and returned home at night, so the stations were full of cars in the morning. Then desolate. Then full for rush hour. Then vacant.
Fast forward a few decades. Long Island is now a place to be in and of itself. People stay there all day. Roads are full. There are commercial properties and businesses integrated with homes. Now the LIRR stations have people on the platform all day long. Some arrive by bus, some by cab, some are dropped off. People get off all all stations. You might get on at Deer Park in the further reaches of Suffolk and get off near Jamaica for job at one of the office buildings.
So, Sounder will seem a little bit absurd because it’s in the in between period where people only use it mostly to go in and out of Seattle for work, however, I do notice that there seem to be more and more reverse commuters or people getting on in Auburn to travel to Tukwila.
Long Island Alki as the Chinook might say.
Does the Long Island Railroad have to share its tracks with freight trains and have to pay the railroad company a marginal cost of $50 million for each daily trip, on top of what it costs to actually operate the trains?
Given the short amount of time North Sounder riders had at the fair, I’m surprised there were as many riders as there were.
I wouldn’t be so sure they were going to the fair, instead of just spending the day in Seattle.
I didn’t even go to the fair, I just took the sounder from Tacoma to Auburn.
How long has this service been in operation? If the State Fair wants to fund this service, we should support their willingness to do so and encourage more people to get there by rail rather than by car.
this was the first time they tried it
Strikes me then that it’s far too early to judge this service’s viability. Give it a few more years. Plus, where’s the harm in a state fair paying for rail service to its doors? Helps get more people used to rail and understanding its benefits. I see no downside here at all.
I agree with that Will: A) it was the first time they tried it, and it’s going to take a few times to change people’s habits & practices, B) the Fair was paying for it.
I think that’s great…what other institutions can we get to do this? Maybe Sounder/Amtrack can pipe up to Mt. Vernon for the Skagit Tulip Festival…that’s always a nightmare.
What did ST use to promote the Sounder service in advance of the event? For service like this, advertising is key – no matter how useful it is, people won’t use it if they don’t know about it.
Great for a joy-ride, but until there is regular mid-day, evening and weekend service…
Hello? Is it 2033 yet??
Does anyone know what the fair spent for this service and what it amounted to per rider vs. fare recovery? I do want to see regular Sounder rail service seven days a week. A good point was made above about transit between Kent Valley cities and points south. There would be demand for this service.
I know one thing, if the service is offered next year, I am so taking it. Doesn’t matter if its faster or not. I will take peace of mind over trying to deal with horrible traiffic, then paying expensive parking, and finally driving home tired, after a fun but long day.
I wonder how much Pierce Transit service the fair association could have purchased for the same amount.
Don’t know, but it would have only attracted local people around Tacoma and done nothing for the hoards of people coming from Seattle.
Also, I’m not sure local service to Tacoma would have even worked for that market. There’s a general rule that the longer the trip, the easier it is to entice people out of their cars (if you are willing to offer a large enough operating subsidy). For short trips, even if the fare is free, it’s just not worth the bother for too many people.
They could not have purchased Pierce Transit service anyway. Pierce Transit is not allowed to compete on the Charter market for this kind of service, they would have had to go to Bellair, Starline, Horizon Coach Lines, Raz Transportation, First Student, or any other charter operators that escape my mind.
This is because PT receives Federal money for operation, and it would give them an unfair advantage over the other private sector operators. Same reason why the Mariners cannot buy Metro service anymore. I don’t see anybody else running passenger train service, so there is no competition for Sounder, even though it receives Federal funding at some level.
I wonder if this rule has not been changed or altered recently. The UW certainly still purchases Metro special service for home football games, just as it has for many years (although this is the first year there is a charge for it).
So how do the University and Seahawks manage to buy Metro shuttle service?
http://kingcounty.gov/transportation/kcdot/NewsCenter/NewsReleases/2013/October/nr101013_FootballShuttles.aspx
I suspect the Mariners didn’t have the loads needed to make it worth it after light rail opened and considering routes like 41 drop off quite close.
IMO, the transit service to the fair was mediocre. I can understand the expensive train service being very limited, which it was, both in number of trips and in the number of passengers. However, the number of bus options was surprisingly limited as well.
It’s been a very long time since I went to the fair before this year, but I vaguely remember that Metro had a downtown Seattle to the fair “Special Service” bus. I would have gladly paid a premium for this service. However, this time, nada. The only choice was to take the ST bus from downtown, but the last returning bus left at 9:04 p.m., so anybody attending a grandstand show – as I was – could forget about that option. Plus, as it was, I couldn’t determine the frequency of the travel from the fair to the Puyallup station. I would’ve liked to have had a transit option.