The Next Big Step for a Seattle Subway
Part 3 of a three-part series
[UPDATE: The hearing has been moved to February 9th. There is no updated link at this time.]
We’re very excited to announce HB 1304, a bill to enable local rapid transit funding, is now live with its first hearing scheduled on Wednesday, February 3rd 9th at 10 am. This bill will give Seattle the tools we need to build a citywide, high quality transit system the right way. The system the city has dreamed of ever since the Bogue plan was presented in 1911.
HB 1304 will help us solve a lot of problems:
Continue reading “The Next Big Step for a Seattle Subway”News roundup: good luck
- Seattle and King County have a new bus service contract
- South OMF EIS coming March 5th, will be pivotal in getting ST to avoid/take responsibility for a landfill site
- A report from “brainstorming” ST realignment
- West Seattle Bridge is stable
- An interview with Metro GM Terry White
- and CT’s new CEO, Ric Ilgenfritz ($)
- Many apartments ($) coming to Lynnwood TC
- Thanks to the transit fairy ($)
- A smaller water taxi for two weeks
- Pacific Transit has a new Director
- Pausing highways, fixing culverts ($)
- Good luck to Kevin Desmond
- No one else thinks Covid-19 is a long term problem for transit
This is an open thread.
How to deliver ST3 in Seattle
Part 2 of a series
Sound Transit recently delivered some disappointing news about their estimates for ST3 project costs. When paired with decreased revenue due to Covid-19, the projected 50% increase to Ballard and West Seattle cost estimates present a gloomy outlook for the projects. There is a lot of hard work ahead, but it’s still possible for Sound Transit to deliver the high quality system voters approved. Transit improvements are still essential to our city and these projects must be delivered. We need to look hard at a combination of new funding sources and value engineering to get this plan back on the right track. However, making major decisions about the quality, scope, and schedule of ST3 this year is a mistake with long reaching consequences.
The underlying reasons to build transit in Seattle haven’t changed. Seattleites still want fast, reliable, convenient, low-carbon ways to get around the city. Voters have repeatedly reaffirmed their desire to make progress on transit — including November’s vote that passed by over 60 points in the middle of a pandemic. Seattleites believe in a post- pandemic future, and we need to make sure Sound Transit delivers the progress they demand.
The case for transit: 2021 edition
Part 1 of a series
As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, questions about whether transit will thrive post-pandemic have been floating around. In our long term view, the human tendency to gather and the need for urban mobility has not gone away. While the pandemic has paused life for a while, and Zoom has made working from afar possible, none of that has changed human nature, or radically affected the tools we need to combat climate change.
Our species still requires connection. If history is any indicator, post-pandemic we will still have social events, shop in urban villages, and cluster where other people are. We will do these things because we are hardwired to value them. Not only does human nature point to this need for cities, climate science demands we double down on them. Don’t just take my word for it—let’s dive into a city doing it right.
The (thankfully) ex-First Lady likes to say “Be Best.” On transportation, we just say “Be Paris.”
Continue reading “The case for transit: 2021 edition”Weekend open thread: Earthwork
Earthwork is the foundation which roads, whether highways or railways, are built on.
News roundup: President Amtrak
- Better access to NE 130th and NE 148th Stations
- SBB on bike access to lots of stations
- Northgate train testing has started
- Complete streets in Bellevue
- ST donating land for affordable housing; you can comment
- Olympia floats a big transpo package
- Bellevue’s ADU rules are not good
- Peter Rogoff talks about ST3 woes
- West Seattle, Ballard tunnels don’t seem so expensive now
- Another bill would let monorail authority fund light rail
- Uber, Lyft drivers now earning more
- PT Chief Sue Dreier retiring
- Comment on the curb space around Climate Pledge Arena.
- More research about high infrastructure costs
- Biden USDOT starts staffing up
- ST gets $1.4m from feds for commuter rail
- Sounds like infrastructure week again
- New stimulus proposal has $20 billion for transit
This is an open thread.
South Bellevue garage to open in September
As the Sound Transit 3 news gets worse and worse, Sound Transit 2 continues a stream of good news as the bulk of the projects converge on opening. Today, we found out the South Bellevue parking garage will open in September, which restores the spaces for route 550 and 241 riders, and then some. This may be as much as two years before the Link line itself.
The garage has 1,500 spaces.
This publication is not a big fan of parking garages. But if there’s anywhere in the Link system there ought to be a garage, it’s here: hemmed in by a wetland and a neighborhood that won’t countenance upzoning (also up a steep hill), this station exists because it is on the way to downtown Bellevue, sits at an elbow in the line that allows it to draw from a wide swath of the Eastside, and proximity to two interstates.
Sound Transit committee gets a closer look at West Seattle & Ballard cost increases
Sound Transit’s System Expansion Committee heard a deeper dive on the recent increase in costs for Seattle Link projects at their meeting Thursday. A long list of revisions to property costs and construction plans contributed to a more than $4 billion increase in the overall cost of the project just since last year.
The incremental cost of tunnel alternatives, however, are now much closer to elevated alternatives, though only because the representative elevated alternatives are so much more expensive. Board members gave no hint of how they would respond to the affordability gap on the project, though there was enthusiasm for adding tunnels as they would not make the needed delays so much greater.
In 2019 dollar terms, the West Seattle-Ballard Link Extension (WSBLE) had an estimated capital cost of $7.1 billion in the ST3 plan. By 2019, that had been revised upwards to $7.9 billion, reflecting some mix of the preferred alternative choices made by the Board and underlying inflation in costs. The most recent estimates, with the benefit of more detailed investigation since the Board selected preferred alternatives for the EIS, raises this to a range of $12.1 billion to $12.6 billion. The lower number is for an elevated Fauntleroy terminus in West Seattle, the higher for an elevated station on 41st/42nd in West Seattle.
Continue reading “Sound Transit committee gets a closer look at West Seattle & Ballard cost increases”Help guide Metro’s return to service
As the County returns to full economic life, Metro is ramping up service. In keeping with their normal service reorganization procedure, there will be a citizen advisory board:
We are looking for participants for a workshop to provide input on how we prioritize what service to restore.
Participants will:
· Attend a virtual workshop in the first two weeks of February 2021 to review Metro’s response to the COVID outbreak,
· Help Metro planning staff evaluate what types of service are most important to communities,
· Be compensated for their time and participation, and
· Be accommodated through interpretation and ADA access, as needed.
If you are interested in this opportunity to participate in Metro’s planning, please respond to mjahshan@kingcounty.gov by January 21, 2021.
Longtime readers know I did one of these boards back in 2008 (unfortunately for me, well before one got paid to do so). It was an interesting window into the many considerations planners actually balance, as well as an education into what ordinary people in your community really think.
As always, I think people with a solid grasp of planning principles and a system view can be a useful corrective to narrower interests, as long they are willing to listen, open-minded, and empathetic.