SDOT to Add Transit Priority for the First Hill Streetcar

64 Replies to “SDOT to Add Transit Priority for the First Hill Streetcar”

1. Can we place bets on SDOT coming back to this in about 3-4 years and removing the street parking to add dedicated lanes that they didn’t want to today? Feels more political if we can’t take advantage of that. I’m trying to think of the last time I found a parking spot on Broadway that wasn’t south of James. Probably back in the early 2000s IIRC.

   1. Not without rebuilding all of broadway… which IMO is such a screwed up design that it needs it. Remove the parking, remove the cycle track, put true electric trolley coaches on the curb and the streetcars in the median. While you are at it you can put up more overhead and use conventional streetcars instead of expensive hybrid units. Better yet put poles on the cars instead of pans and be able to negotiate crossings at speed.

      1. Hey what does this mean: “put poles on the cars instead of pans and be able to negotiate crossings at speed.” ?
         I was in Europe a few months ago and was shocked how nimble and quick the streetcars were maneuvering through the tight old street grids. I actually had to hold on!
         I didn’t really know streetcars could do that. Does that have to do with poles/pans?

      2. Trolley poles. A straight bar rather than a trapezoid-shaped thing. All the trolleybuses have trolley poles, and if the streetcar did too it would be able to cross the wired intersections more easily (Broadway & Pine, Seneca, Madison, James). Pantographs have difficulty crossing wire intersections. That’s one reason why the FH streecars have batteries, so that they can run off-wire through those blocks. But that takes more energy and shortens the battery life.

      3. Better yet, get rid of the streetcar and just send a bus on a better route. But that would be admitting that our streetcars offer no fundamental advantage to our buses (both are roughly the same size) and thus a terrible choice.

      4. https://www.google.com/search?q=streetcar+pantograph+crossing+trolleybus+wire&rlz=1C1AVNG_enUS671US671&espv=2&biw=1249&bih=689&tbm=isch&imgil=C3JurnEJ3JjJTM%253A%253BV_6w9PDTJ-YxPM%253Bhttp%25253A%25252F%25252Fsdotblog.seattle.gov%25252F2014%25252F02%25252F27%25252Fdont-get-your-wires-crossed%25252F&source=iu&pf=m&fir=C3JurnEJ3JjJTM%253A%252CV_6w9PDTJ-YxPM%252C_&usg=__l4EI5P6QQ_BGPpdcbP59i2p4kMg%3D&ved=0ahUKEwiw8Z_ns7bSAhUollQKHQQTB8oQyjcIOg&ei=3VG3WPCOFqis0gKEppzQDA#imgrc=dcntsTcJbYTD9M:

         Where there’s a will there’s a way, guys. Trade-off, though, is sort of a Brooklyn Bridge-full of metal in the air. Every additional wire and steel, more cost and effort to buy and repairl

         Only choice before hybrids were invented. So might look at the hybrids as an hardware saving experiment. But I think there’s one way to make Broadway work very well for streetcars:

         Switch priority street use, so at every point of conflict- automobiles are the ones that hold and wait. As a corridor of any kind, Roy Street at the north end of the Business District dead-ends it.

         As if anything besides the Routes 49, 9, and LINK use Broadway for anything like through travel. SDOT knew all this when they laid out the car-line. So if the Mayor tells them to adjust Broadway so it’ll work, they have to.

         Though I think time’s also past when anybody wants to risk getting their car stuck,bike- scratched, or worn out up there anyhow.

         Mark

         Mark

2. Are they still planning to divert money from the 23rd RR+ to fund this?

   Other than that, it sounds like a good idea. But as it is, a better (or faster!) RR+ would be far more useful.

   1. Agreed.

3. I have mixed feelings about this. This sounds like one of those classic signal projects where you have long light cycles and streets that take forever to cross. This could end up hurting pedestrian mobility at least as much as it improves streetcar mobility, and there are probably far more people who walk through First Hill every day than people who ride the streetcar.

   At least from a pedestrian standpoint, short signal cycles and no turning phases is best – and a four-way stop, of course, even better.

   1. This. SDOT doesn’t seem to understand that we need to be prioritizing pedestrian movement over transit, which leads to situations like this (read the entire thread):
      https://twitter.com/BHSafeStreets/status/834978811263406082
      https://twitter.com/BHSafeStreets/status/828812545746034688

      I’ve seen plenty of other examples as well, where SDOT goes backwards by making pedestrians wait longer or add beg buttons where they weren’t before in order to optimize transit time for buses stuck in mixed traffic. Since the buses are stuck in traffic and late, the signal optimization doesn’t work. They push the beg button and wonder why it now takes 40s instead of 5s to get a walk signal; meanwhile, not a single bus goes by.

      1. I’m all for pedestrian access, but not over transit. Speeding up a streetcar carrying 100+ people is definitely worth delaying a handful of pedestrians. Anyway, with the current 15 minute headways pedestrians will only occasionally be delayed.

      2. A streetcar carrying 100+ people??? In your ever-luvvin dreams.

      3. @QARider: If they add a bunch of turn-arrow signal phases pedestrians are delayed every cycle.

4. > SDOT will ban PM peak left turns and retime the signal at 12th/Yesler.

   I walk this in the AM every day. Banning does shit without enforcement.

   1. There is evidently a special field of invisibility that hides “No Turn” or “No Turn on Red” signs from vehicle drivers.

      1. And don’t forget the “No Turn From Second Lane” signs.

      2. Could be our signage is sooooooo 1956 Oldsmobile, David. Let’s try: OMG! LTOR!!! LOL!

         But also have to have one reading: TXTNUGTJ! (Text and You Go To Jail!)

         MRK

5. My vote would be to convert the cycle track to a NB travel lane with no through traffic (like Bell St). Then paint cycle tracks on parallel streets (10th Ave, Harvard etc…). If you do that you then can convert the NB travel lane to BAT, preserve parking, you get more bike options (2 NB corridors), seems like a win-win. 100% NB transit ROW , just requires some paint on 10th and Harvard.

   1. Harvard is not a good biking alternative because it’s riddled with potholes and patches, and doesn’t go nearly as far as Broadway does. I don’t think 10th is as rough, but it also does not go very far, compared to Broadway. Also, Harvard and 10th are not good alternatives for bikes because most destinations are on Broadway, not 10th or Harvard. I used to use 12th regularly, but switched to the protected bike lane on Broadway once it opened because it’s significantly safer than an easily ignored painted line, as long as you know to watch for vehicles making legal and illegal turns across the bike lanes at intersections.

   2. At this point, removing the cycle track would be a mistake. If SDOT had that kind of political capital, then they could probably just remove some GP lanes.

      Plus, although the cycle track isn’t currently well used, it will get more traffic as more of the bike master plan is implemented.

   3. The cycle track was the only good thing that came out of the streetcar construction, so it would be foolish to remove it. The reason why it’s not as well used as it could be is that it doesn’t go far enough to the north. It needs to continue at least to Roy, ideally further.

6. These sound like good improvements. We’ve been dealt a bit of a turd with the Streetcar, but perhaps we can polish it to be a bit better.

   1. Look at it like a farmer, Brad. Only way you can grow cash crops without your customers being poisoned like weevils by Monsanto.

      Mark

7. Tangential question for 60 riders: would you prefer a direct connection to SLU? Rather than then turn from 9th to Madison, the 60 could continue on 9th, jog over to 8th, pass under the convention center, and serve SLU via Virginia and Fairview, laying over near the RapidRide C terminals. To access Broadway, you’d transfer to the streetcar at Broadway/Yesler; there would be a time penalty for that, but then there’s a time penalty today for the Pill Hill deviation.

   This would require more service hours, but it would fix a significant gap in the downtown/First Hill transit grid, which no agencies are really talking about today.

   1. I used to use the 60 to get from Beacon Hill to Capitol Hill, but that was before the days of the Link connection. The 60 would still be useful for North Beacon Hill to Capitol Hill, but in that case I’d probably bus south to BHS and then take Link.

      I would support the idea of the 60 going to SLU, or to Capitol Hill via 12th. Basically anything but its current milk run through First Hill.

8. “Converting the center lane to a through lane will remove left turns from Broadway to Pike and/or Union.”
   Currently those are the only left turns permitted off of southbound Broadway between John and Columbia Streets, which is effectively James St, as Columbia and Cherry turn into the SU campus. I can’t see SDOT creating a mile long virtual wall.

   1. a mile long virtual wall.

      Turn right.
      Turn right again.
      Turn right again.

      Virtual wall breached.

      1. It does seem like people will get overly tired of that and make the illegal left though. Sometimes they already do going SB Broadway –> EB Pine.

9. I felt from the beginning that the Broadway ROW was a failed attempt at design by committee. I don’t feel so lonely now.

   1. +1
      Committees don’t make decisions, they reach compromises.

10. I don’t think these minor fixes will help FHSC that much. Meanwhile it will force more drivers onto narrow local streets so that they can make the movements that SDOT wants to prohibit.

    A better solution would be to reopen a public dialogue with interests in the corridor and actually listen to them before trying anything. That dialogue needs to be led by a fresh face who had nothing to do with the original design.

    1. Yes. Why was this stupid thing built? These are obvious problems.

    2. Why was the streetcar built? Because ST deleted the First Hill Link station that was going to be between Westlake and Capitol Hill (at Broadway & Boren, causing a little backtrack). ST deleted the station because its engineering studies said the soils there presented a significant risk of cost overruns or failure, and ST didn’t want any risks after its 2000 budget fiasco. (The initial Link estimates in 1996 were too optimistic in construction costs and risks, so ST went through a restructuring in 2000 under a new CEO and is now risk-adverse.) ST has a precedent of when it says it promises to serve a (middle-class) neighborhood but then doesn’t, it gives them a substantial mitigation instead. When the First Hill station was deleted, First Hill notables made a stink that they’d accept nothing less than a streetcar as mitigation. They weren’t interested in a trolleybus or regular bus, because streetcar. So the First Hill streetcar was (hastily?) drawn up as a sop to them, and a way to get Sounder riders to First Hill hospitals.

       As to why Broadway is in the un-optimal state it is, it’s because SDOT insisted on preserving most of the parking spaces and adding a two-way cycletrack on Broadway. Again, First Hill notables didn’t want to give up parking; they said their businesses would lose customers, etc.

       1. The rush to build the FHSC is precisely the kind of situation which Seattle should never want to do again.

          When the First Hill station went away, agencies could have studied a number of alternatives. Instead, agencies supported quickly throwing the streetcar into the mix without studying if other strategies could work better. They could have forced a LRT station relocation to Pine and Summit. They could have studied gondolas from Downtown, an aerial funicular or underground diagonal elevator from Downtown above Jefferson or Seneca, a low-cost one track aerial cable system from CHS above Broadway with a middle stop at Pike Street and an end point at Jefferson (like what exists at the Minneapolis airport), or even an early version of a Madison BRT. Original studied alignments for the streetcar included 12th and Boren in addition to Broadway — neither of which would have included a cycle track addition as part of the project. Then Broadway was chosen at the corridor.

          At that point, the cycle track was added to the project once the streetcar corridor was finalized, and that took additional valuable street ROW that could have been used for parking or a traffic lane The track could have been built on 12th (more level anyway) but the bicycle advocacy pushed for more hilly Broadway because bike lanes are already on 12th..

          Let’s not blame the problem as primarily created by First Hill notables trying to save a few blocks of parking. The problem was primarily created by elected officials and staff in the City o Seattle eager to rush to a decision, and then changing the project incrementally rather than to envision it systemically in the first place. The primary cause of the problem is incremental, quick-action-without-adequate-study, interest-group-driven politics at its core rather than a systemic approach to the situation. It’s transportation planning done at its worst.

       2. The ST Board made a poor mode choice. The same funds could have provided much more transit mobility and connectivity if used to improve the electric trolley bus network. The name First Hill implies the topography. Service frequency is much more important to mobility than monuments are.

       3. +1. Eddiew nails this one.

11. Does the through-lane necessarily have to ban left turns? Can’t they simply have a single lane that is both through and left turn, and have a prolonged “through and left” signal followed by a shorter “through and left turn yield” signal to ensure traffic flow?

    It seems like the most thought that the city puts into some problems is simply “let’s ban left turns!” I’m confused, for example, about prohibited left turns from WB E John onto SB 23rd Ave E. I can’t imagine why left turns are prohibited there other than they just don’t want to adjust signal time ratios (which silly because adding a left there would bring directional parity to E John street at 23rd).

    1. If there is no turn lane, a car trying to turn left blocks the traffic behind it. If left turns are prohibited, that blocking will not occur (the drive will need to make 3 rights or find an allowed left turn somewhere else).

       Take a look at the proposed channelization diagram that shows no turn lane.

       1. Right, and to that, I’ll requote the other half of that sentence:

          “and have a prolonged “through and left” signal followed by a shorter “through and left turn yield” signal to ensure traffic flow”

          A “through and left” signal always guarantees traffic flow in a combined through/left lane.

       2. Even with that, you will only get a few cars through each cycle. Left turns are incredibly inefficient, and they are right to ban them.

       3. I think a more likely occurrence is that drivers will simply divert to the narrow streets parallel to Broadway earlier or later to make the same left turn movement. For example, those wanting to turn left onto Union from the north will turn right at Pine or Pike, turn left at Harvard, turn left again at Union, and go east on Union. Those wanting to turn left onto union from the south will turn right at Madison, turn left at Broadway Court or 10th, turn left on Union and head west on Union (at least until Madison BRT possibly blocks those left turns in the future).

          In other words, it will be the policy of the City of Seattle to encourage more traffic on parallel narrow streets (with people jaywalking between cars), as well as adding turning movements — both things that are proven to decrease pedestrian safety. That becomes a profound contradiction to the “Vision Zero” effort.

12. On this week’s Overhead Wire podcast, they predicted that after St Louis and another city open mixed-traffic streetcars this year, the USA will never again see new mixed-traffic streetcars because they will have failed so consistently across a dozen different cities.

    I guess that makes mixed-traffic streets the early-2000s equivalent of urban freeways? An idea that everyone thought was super great at the time, but in hindsight was a waste of resources that tended to make cities worse, not better.

    1. That may stop the streetcars but it may not lead to a better solution. Why are cities building mixed-traffic streetcars? Because they don’t understand what non-drivers want in a transit system: namely, something that goes from here to there quickly, and is at least somewhat competitive with driving. Furthermore, they don’t prioritize non-drives’ experience that highly because otherwise they would make more effort to find out what they want and implement it. So the result is mixed-traffic streetcars, because somebody said streetcars were cool. So if the politicos realize mixed-traffic streetcars aren’t very effective, they may stop ordering streetcar lines, but that doesn’t mean they’ll understand the underlying issue any better than before. So they may never get around to grade-separated streetcars, or BRT with transit lanes, or anything else effective.

       The freeway revolt has some parallels, but freeways are still popular with a lot of people, they’re still being built in outer areas (our own 509 is being extended). and there’s still widespread misunderstanding of what their impacts and costs are. For instance, people may not want freeways in their backyard but they want them in somebody else’s back yard. For instance, people outside Seattle wanting to keep I-5 through Seattle, and people in north Seattle and Rainier Valley wanting the Deep-Bore Tunnel.

       1. A “grade-separated” streetcar would be a folly of the first order. That’s what LRT is for. Did you mean “reserved right-of-way streetcar”? Because that is a wonderful thing. Just as they do along the new South Lake Union park strip, streetcars can mix well with pedestrians, because they don’t go wandering our of their envelope. And they’re quiet which of course can be done with ETB’s, but not the rigorous wayfinding.

       2. @Richard: There’s a whole spectrum of things meant by “light rail” and “streetcars”. Probably anything with a grade-separated section is pretty far down the “light rail” side of things, but… there’s really not an inherent technology difference.

          I’m not sure I’d say the south end of Lake Union Park is “wonderful”, having lived near it. The streetcar doesn’t “mix” with pedestrians, it just forces extra track crossings on people walking between the park and Fairview (you can cut through the parking lot there, but it can be pretty busy, and you can take the other way around if you can find it). With the tracks so close to people walking in and through the park the streetcar has to go pretty darn slow… so maybe it’s faster than using the road if traffic is really bad, but if traffic is really bad what are the odds someone’s blocking the tracks for the weird turn across Fairview (the size of the “box” drivers have to avoid blocking is unusually large)?

       3. A grade-separated streetcar is light rail. It’s just a question of the vehicle size options and coupling. And yes, an exclusive-lane streetcar is better than a mixed-traffic one, but it will also need signal priority like MLK. If it has to stop every block at a stoplight between stops, then we’ll be back where we started, like the SLU streetcar was. (And may still be; I haven’t ridden it since the Westlake transit lanes were installed.)

    2. That certainly matches our experience here, doesn’t it.

13. Pingback: City planning 2017 changes to speed up First Hill Streetcar | CHS Capitol Hill Seattle

14. Ban cars from Broadway? I ride the street car daily and use the cycle track frequently so I’m motivated by self interest.

15. Signal priority shouldn’t just be longer lights. It should be: When the streetcar comes by, it always sees green. No need to delay pedestrians who are trying to cross.

    1. The thing is, Madison BRT should also see green. And the Pike-Pine buses. And if the streetcar sees green, by definition pedestrians trying to cross it see red. You can’t avoid delaying pedestrians without underpasses; i.e., grade separation.

       1. … and Madison BRT, if not also Pike/Pine buses, are actually more important than the streetcar.

       2. Yes, pedestrians would be delayed once every 10-18 minutes (ok, every 5-9 mins considering two-way traffic) instead of every single light cycle, which would be the case if you take the easiest way and just lengthen the light cycle. And the streetcar/car portion of Broadway is narrow enough that if the walk signal wait is too long people just start crossing against the light.

          I didn’t consider Madison and Pike/Pine, though! But, just throwing it out there, you could give priority to the buses in that 4 block stretch and have streetcar signal priority at the other intersections.

    2. When push comes to shove, pedestrian mobility in First Hill is more important than streetcar mobility, as far more people walk through the area than ride the streetcar. Even within the transit realm, east/west corridors, such as Madison BRT, or even regular old bus route, like the 2 and the 11, carry more people than the streetcar. It is impossible to give signal priority to everything in different directions, so something has to make do without. And, of all the routes and travel modes, the streetcar is the one that is least essential to mobility, and carries the fewest number of people.

       1. https://www.flickr.com/photos/43315334@N07/30961455351/

          https://www.flickr.com/photos/43315334@N07/26979981312/in/photostream/

          https://www.flickr.com/photos/43315334@N07/26979981252/in/photostream/

          https://www.flickr.com/photos/43315334@N07/25851523926/

          asdf2, I think experience shows that after pedestrians get used to them, streetcars turn out to be the most comfortable match for pedestrians. Owing largely to the fact that everyone can sense how close to the track they dare to get.

          Though it’s true that Europeans literally grow up seeing grooved rail and catenary, and listening for bells and sensing vibrations. In Gothenburg, streetcar drivers are taught to sound the bell when pedestrians approach, but always to maintain a steady speed.

          Very often, pedestrians don’t even look up. They just step aside exactly the right distance, or quicken or slow down their walking pace.

          We’ll need some marking, signage, and signaling for awhile. But I think pedestrians will feel that streetcars are much less of an obstacle than a bus. And certainly private automobiles, which are probably worst fit for any pedestrian area.

          Mark

    3. It’s more complex than that. The biggest issue is that there are pedestrians at almost every Broadway intersection and enough time to get pedestrians to cross the street has to be allocated before a streetcar could go through. The only other option to that is to make pedestrians push those awful crossing buttons even at major pedestrian intersections on Broadway so that a streetcar doesn’t run pedestrians over.

       Along with that, the streetcar stops are located every few blocks and that keeps the number of nearby signals that can be preempted low. You can really only estimate when a streetcar is coming through an intersection for only 0-3 blocks upstream — where the previous streetcar stop is located. With a southbound stop at Pike, it may first take a full cycle for the streetcar to even reach the stop because cars are in front of the streetcar. Then when it does, the signal can’t possibly know in advance when the streetcar doors are shut. When the signal finally is told that a streetcar is ready, the streetcar signal may still have to wait until all of the pedestrians along Pike get enough time to cross the street.

       Ironically, Union is probably one of the few places were the signal would have a block or two information about a coming streetcar in each direction to adjust the timing in a signal priority concept! If left turns are to be allowed in the Pike-Pine corridor, that’s the place to allow them! An example: If a streetcar is coming, the signal can postpone the left turns to go after through traffic rather than before. The other great irony about eliminating left turns at Union is that the streetcars are moving with traffic on the blocks between Madison and Pine without stopping, so that creating a separate lane for traffic is fairly useless because the streetcar doesn’t stop within a block of Union anyway so cars don’t need to go around it (or vice versa)! If the streetcar is trying to get around a right-turning vehicle, it can’t be done because right turn vehicles would use that special streetcar BAT lane anyway. Frankly, the proposal to eliminate left turns at Union appears to have not really have been thought through well — and appears to accomplish almost nothing.

16. The biggest simple fix for trip times on FHSC is that they stop at each platform, open and close the doors. Even if there is no one on the streetcar, no one has requested the stop and there is no one on the platform. At SLU if no one requests a stop and no one is on the platform they slow to platform speed, but keep rolling like the bus does.

    1. That is so right. LRT stops at every station as usually does BRT. They’re “fixed schedule” systems. Proper streetcars like the SFMuni lines stop only on demand when they’re on the surface. The Seattle streetcars should do the same, except possibly along First Avenue where they will be in a reservation with formal stations.

       And besides, there will almost always be someone at that stop.

17. cycle track>parking. people on bicycles are more important than car storage, if anything should give it’s the parking.

18. See: sunk cost fallacy.

19. Will drivers not be allowed to turn left anymore? Or will they be allowed to make dangerous left turns with no signal? I wouldn’t want to see Broadway and Union turn into something similar to 12th and Madison. I watch people getting into accidents there all the time.

    It would be better to axe the street parking than a left turn lane that makes the intersection a bit safer. Drivers can park in the Harvard Market if they want.

    1. Agreed, Beth. As pointed out above, left turns are already few and far between from John all the way south past Seattle U/Swedish main campus. I have no issue with limiting them IF there is an obvious benefit; again, as pointed out above, pedestrian access and busier east-west transit routes seem far more important than the streetcar.

       I’d also share concerns about streetcar dwell time; in my limited experience, even aside from the “make every stop even if no one wants it” issue, this is a non-zero waste of time on the FHSC. It seems to make sense that operational changes should be made so that travel times are optimized as much as possible, before messing with an already fragile signal/street grid that serves many more people in other modes already.

20. Zach, looks like SDOT took down the blog post in your link. Goes to an empty page, and I couldn’t find it anywhere else.

    Maybe I’m lucky, but the streetcar has never “barely bested” walking for me, even at 6 p.m. It’s always been significantly faster, and of course it’s productive time, dry and comfy, instead of sweating my way up a hill in the drizzle or snow.

    But it should be faster. Shaving three or four minutes off the trip will help, but only begs the question: Why are we yet again improving new service after the fact, instead of doing it right the first time? The SLUS and FHSC have clearly poisoned the well for streetcars, which was about as predictable as the failing of a bikeshare network that lacked an actual network of stations. Maybe at some point someone in this town will get it through their heads that going halfway in pursuit of perpetual compromise invariably yields (at best) middling results, fuels skeptics, and turns neutrals and even advocates into opponents.

    1. Capitol Hill Seattle reported that the announcement was retracted/modified and now SDOT plans to begin the outreach this summer, not begin the work as said previously. This is probably why the page is now a 404 error.

       In other FHSC news, it suddenly went out of service yesterday (replaced by shuttle buses) and is also not operating today because of an unexplained mechanical problem requiring all the cars to be inspected. Also Capitol Hill Times reported a month ago that the Roy Street extension now looks doubtful because the Capitol Hill Chamber of Commerce no longer supports it. More recently the CH Chamber of Commerce has been promoting a plan to expand the Broadway BIA to be a Capitol Hill BIA, raising fewer $ over a wider area than the FHSC extension proposal.

       http://www.capitolhillseattle.com/2017/03/mechanical-issues-knocks-first-hill-streetcar-out-of-service/
       http://www.capitolhilltimes.com/Content/News/News/Article/Business-opposition-could-stop-Broadway-Streetcar/26/337/4685

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