In keeping with the spirit of the occasional series offered on Seattle Transit Blog entitled “Link Excuse of the Week”, Cascades Excuse of the Month is offered for those wishing to explore various events further afield.
Today’s suggestion is in honor of recent discussions that some day the South Lake Union Streetcar may one day get a piece of dedicated transit lane.
From April 10th through 26th, the Evergreen Playhouse in Centralia will be performing Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire. The theatre is located at 226 West Center Street in Centralia, which is well within the walkshed of the Centralia Amtrak station. It’s essentially two blocks north and two blocks west. The performances are Friday and Saturday at 8 pm and Sundays at 2 pm. The performance tickets are $10.
The Sunday performances at 2 pm do allow for someone to arrive and depart by Amtrak on the same day. The last southbound train goes through a little after 7 pm, and the last northbound train goes through around 8:20 pm. NOTE: The station waiting room closes at 4:30 pm. After that time you just go out on the platform and wait there.
As the performances on Friday and Saturday are at 8 pm, it is not possible to use Amtrak to get back home from those performances, unless you spend the night.
If you do decide to spend the night, McMenamins Olympic Club and the Centralia Square Grand are both within several blocks of the theatre and the Amtrak station. Also, keep in mind that Twin Transit ceases service pretty early in the evening and has nearly nothing on Saturdays, and completely nothing on Sundays. Thus, your options of getting from the central downtown area to a more remote hotel (such as those along I-5) is limited to a 3/4 mile to 1 mile or so walk.
The Greyhound stop is close to I-5 and a bit over 3/4 of a mile from the central downtown area. There are sidewalks the entire way along several routes. Twin Transit does have a bus stop close to the Greyhound stop, but the lack of Twin Transit service in the evenings and weekends makes using Twin Transit of very limited utility for getting from the Greyhound stop into downtown Centralia for this event.
Another option for returning to the Seattle area from Centralia is the Capitol Airporter shared van to SeaTac. It is expensive but it is cheaper that some of the hotel options.
Anyone with suggestions for future Cascades Excuse of the Month are welcome to send them to glennl at the internet provider named easystreet.net.
Glenn Laubaugh (“Glenn in Portland”) is employed by a small company in Portland that manufactures electrical equipment for railroad passenger cars. Typical commute: TriMet #10, but may also be seen on #14, #17 or MAX Green Line.
As best as I can tell anyway, Capitol Airporter has nothing on their web site about requiring an actual airline ticket in order to use their services.