Last week Martin Pagel and I walked the Longfellow Creek Trail. We took RapidRide H to 26th & Roxbury and walked to the Roxhill Park entrance at 28th. Then we went north through the park and Westwood Village and streets and the football stadium and woods. I discovered a beaver dam, which created a pond for ducks and has its own Facebook fan club. A woman on the trail who has lived in the neighborhood for decades said the beaver dam is wonderful.
We left the trail at Genessee Street and stopped to eat near the H’s Andover Street station on the way home. So I missed the northern part of the woods, which has the Dragonfly sculpture, but I’d been there once before. The West Seattle Blog has an article on the creek and its preservation. The trail goes partly along the avenue west of Delridge, which is surprisingly full of recent middle housing.
Next time I’ll start from the northern end near the Andover Street station and go south to the Dragonfly sculpture and beaver dam. Those are the most woodsy and interesting parts of the trail.
Other news below the fold.
Initiative 2117 ($) wants to repeal the carbon-emissions law that indirectly raised gas prices.
Pedestrian deaths on Aurora ($) and neighbors’ vows to fix it. Hopefully the project to make a complete street between 90th and 105th comes to fruition. The state funding has been “delayed because the city doesn’t have a completed design yet.”
Businesses are bullish on downtown Seattle’s recovery. ($) The second paragraph mentions a vintage store on Jackson Street I saw on my way back from Longfellow Creek. There are now three vintage shops within two blocks of each other.
SLU Link station alternatives. ($) Aurora or Taylor?
A well-designed train station 50 km from Amsterdam. (Not Just Bikes video)
The worst places in American cities were intentional. (Rob Robinson video) A rant against pedestrian-hostile stroads.
Freiburg, Germany, is serious about the war on cars. (Type Ashton video)
This is an open thread.
So Edmonton is having all sorts of issues with its transformation to battery busses. What is metros plan to avoid the same fate?
The primary issue I know of in Edmonton is Proterra went bankrupt and therefore they can’t get support.
Shouldn’t be too difficult to avoid this problem by buying buses from a company that still exists.
They’ll either go with a different manufacturer as there are a few other options (tho not NA iirc) or just quietly abandon the project altogether.
Would the Buy America laws let them?
I’ve heard “not available in the US” is sufficient grounds for a waiver, but it still seems to scare away transit agencies. Most of the state-of-the-art trains and buses and recent technologies aren’t available in the US because the market is too small and it’s one-city-at-a-time-maybe-if-it’s-approved.
Volvo (which also makes buses) bought the drive train assets of Proterra.
BAE systems is building over 1,000 battery electric buses for several operators in Quebec.
Alexander Dennis has at least some buses in the USA, but I’m not sure about manufacturing.
BYD is still active in battery electric buses in the USA.
Las Vegas found it cheaper to just buy what they wanted from Europe and not go through the federal Buy America grant process.
So, there are options.
Oh, also: TriMet’s battery bus experiments (5 so far) are New Flyer.
I wonder if it’s possible to have a hybrid system where a bus runs most of the route on batteries, but switches to overhead wire for the slog through downtown and while on layover downtown. Would the wire be able charge the battery enough to reduce the required battery size enough to cover the cost of the pantograph?
“Las Vegas found it cheaper to just buy what they wanted from Europe and not go through the federal Buy America grant process.”
The only exception I remember is like AC transit in the bay area back im the late 00s getting an exemption for Beligan Van Hool buses which I know some liked but they ended up going with New Flyer for the next order of articulated busses.
asdf2. over the life of the bus? Of course it would. But it wouldn’t be “[a] pantograph”. Buses use trolley poles because a pantograph shorts the overhead and the buses have to move laterally to the curb from the travel lanes.
I understand that there is a system in use in Sweden for trucks in which they have somewhat wider-spaced wires and the trucks carry two pretty short contactors which can swivel with the truck’s relatively erratic path. They aren’t nearly as long as bus trolley poles, and the trucks only use them on a “truckway”, not on city streets.
Really wish the buy america rules didn’t exist or were a lot laxer.
Not really quite sure why transit dollars must always end up serving a bunch of other interests to the point that it waters down the efficiency for actual transit users.
I wonder if it’s possible to have a hybrid system where a bus runs most of the route on batteries, but switches to overhead wire for the slog through downtown and while on layover downtown.
It should be, yes. This really should be the goal of most transit agencies. I think part of the problem is that people assume a leap, similar to how much of the world just switched from land lines to cell phones. In the long run, that is inevitable. But in the short run, that could be very expensive.
The other problem is that not that many cities have an extensive trackless trolley system. We are lucky, but also unusual. As a result, it is trickier to just follow the masses. Instead, we are doing what might make sense if we didn’t have wire in the first place.
Most buses don’t have trolley poles. It would seem like an excessive cost to add them when they wouldn’t be used much.
Seattle already sort of has that, as the existing trolley buses are able to operate off wire for some distance.
The problem is, the charging system plus the static converter electronics to operate off the overhead take up space too, so once all that gets added you get less battery capacity in a given space.
That said, a study in San Francisco indicates trolley buses with extended battery packs is the cheapest and fastest way to reduce emissions:
https://sf.streetsblog.org/2023/07/13/study-trolley-buses-with-batteries-are-the-best-path-to-zero-emissions
I agree, U.S. trade policy is a mess, and a big reason why buses are so expensive here. It also leads to very limited options. Like the fact that you can either get a bus with left-hand side doors or a bus that connects to trolley wire, but not both, therefore the entire G-line has to run off of diesel.
Of course, from the standpoint of national politicians, bolstering U.S. manufacturing and avoiding giving money to China is considered a high priority, while making public transportation cost-effective is way down at the bottom. This applies to politicians on both sides of the aisle, and they are getting what they ask for.
The “Initiative 2117” link goes to the SLU station location article. Looks like this is the Seattle Times article on it: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/opponents-of-wa-climate-law-file-signatures-to-repeal-it/
Also, here’s the Ballotopedia page on it: https://ballotpedia.org/Washington_I-2117,_Prohibit_Carbon_Tax_Credit_Trading_Initiative_(2024)
Fixed the link.
Given I-976 results, I could definitely see this passing. It’s something to watch out for.
I look forward to the day when vehicle electrification hits a critical mass where gas prices no longer matter electorally. Unfortunately, that day is a long, long way away.
We’re eighth in per capita income nationally, and we don’t have an income tax. We can — and should — afford to pay more for gasoline and diesel. We’ll drive less, which is the point of the Carbon pricing.
I’m not moved by the crocodile tears of the R’s sucking the teat of the fossil fuel companies.
I agree – gas is expensive but it needs to be to send the signals to shift to transit and walking / biking.
I don’t like the misleading arguments that supporters have been using though. Big Oil is passing on the tax because it is Econ 101 – demand for oil is relatively inelastic in the short term and just because the producers buy the credits doesn’t mean they are paying the vast majority of it economically speaking. Similarly it is absurd that the supporters believed it would only slightly raise gas prices.
I would like to see the excess funds used for ferry construction (electric ferries), basic road maintenance (no expansion), and transit system improvements. Every part of the state would have a need covered (rural red counties have lots of roads to pave) and it doesn’t contribute to expanding highways.
The basic problem is, people are stupid. Everyone with any sense knew this would raise gas taxes. But they also know that most of the smart people are OK with it. So you only had to convince the stupid people that this would magically lower emissions while not raising the price of gas. That seemed to work fairly well, but then Russian invaded Ukraine, and of course, the idiots started complaining.
I would like to see excess funds used for whatever is most politically popular. Schools is a good bet (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chMCU5VSuqw). Maybe local fire departments. Puppies somehow? Whatever is likely to be popular is the key.
Of course Republicans would argue that we could shift money from other placed to pay for those things, but that argument is way too complicated for much of the electorate. Those that understand it either hated the tax from the get go, or are OK with it.
Seriously though, I would actually put the money into school funding. Not new construction, but actually paying the salaries of school teachers. Let’s see what places like Auburn, Federal Way and Spokane think about the tax if it helps pay for teachers.
What makes me particularly nervous about I-1117 is that I (someone who does follow the news, believe climate change is real, and supports transit) have trouble naming off the top of my head specific projects that the carbon fees are funding, other than a vague since that, whatever it is, it’s something good.
This is a problem because if voters perceive the carbon fees as merely a slush fund for unspecified interest groups, passage of the initiative is almost certain. The only way to defeat it is the election becomes about preserving funding for specific things that voters care about, not simply the price of gas and generic “government spending”.
The Climate Commitment Act will need some solid PR next year highlighting projects in completed or in progress from the funding.
From https://ecology.wa.gov/Air-Climate/Climate-Commitment-Act#revenueanchor
There is no list of funded projects that I can see. So far, it does seem to have all been dumped into a slush fund for the State, and so supporters of the CCA need to prove that it’s being put to good use.
This may be worthy of its own comment thread (or even it’s own discussion post because there’s a lot here for inspiration) so here’s the actual article from 2012 where Las Vegas is shown to be buying vehicles from Europe (if you use local instead of federal funds, you don’t necessarily need to follow Buy America policies):
https://www.masstransitmag.com/home/article/10627897/las-vegas-rtc-where-image-is-important
Halfway down the article:
The other “Madison BRT” is going along well in Madison, Wisconsin. They’re building their first east-west BRT of around 9.5 miles of dedicated lanes (total length 15 miles). The federal government also just released 110 million in funds for the project. Estimated total cost ~200 million.
https://www.cityofmadison.com/metro/routes-schedules/bus-rapid-transit/east-west-brt-line
While construction costs are definitely more affordable in Madison, it’s definitely still quite impressive how much they are building for the cost.
I don’t think Madison WI uses BRT money to fully rebuild a street like Seattle does — and that rebuilding probably adds more to the cost and schedule of RapidRide G than the BRT part does. . Plus Madison doesn’t design for left side boardings that require buying special vehicles to serve a couple of stops.
Definitely agree that those items increased the cost, to be fair to SDOT what Madison, Wi’s east-west BRT is building is more comparable to RapidRide C/D.
> Plus Madison doesn’t design for left side boardings that require buying special vehicles to serve a couple of stops.
They do have left side doors actually. The downtown section will have center boarding islands.
https://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/madison.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/f/70/f70291fc-7172-56ea-930c-98cc26e68c7a/64113089e231e.image.png?resize=1200%2C637
I agree, Al, and that is why it is tough to measure BRT projects. Agencies love to redo all the city plumbing, and then get a federal grant to help cover the costs. I’m not saying I would do anything different. At some point the sewer and water system needs to be rebuilt (and the road might be in bad shape as well) but saying it is all for “BRT” is often a little game played between the locals and the feds.
200 hundred million for BRT doesn’t exactly seem like a bargain. What is the cost per rider? Any idea how much time each rider will save (to get a rough idea of the cost per rider-time-savings)?
I’m not saying it is a bad project, but it doesn’t look like it is an especially cheap one.
> 200 hundred million for BRT doesn’t exactly seem like a bargain. What is the cost per rider? Any idea how much time each rider will save (to get a rough idea of the cost per rider-time-savings)?
I mean given they are building 15 miles (* 9 miles with bus lanes) that is not bad and a lot of those bus lanes are center bus lanes. For comparison Seattle’s Madison costs 130 million and is 2 miles.
A large factor that made it much more affordable was their willingness to give up the 2/3 car lanes on large sections so didn’t involve as much road widening. Aka, unlike Tacoma for their brt project.
I guess perhaps the more recent comparable project would be RapidRide H, though it mainly implemented bat lanes. It’s technically 154 million for 13 miles.
But actually talking about the percentage of transit dollars actually spent on transit that’s an interesting thing to check and compare against others. I’ve kind of wondered how much exactly is spent on the bus lanes versus everything else.
It’s a down payment on getting better support for transit citywide. If a city really has to say, “Operates approximately every 15 minutes for most of the day, with service on weekends” — as if it has no weekend service and little 15-minute service — then it needs one good line to show what other lines could be.
> SLU Link station alternatives. ($) Aurora or Taylor?
Honestly after pondering it a bit more, I don’t think it matters as much if the slu station is next to aurora. If one is heading south can just stay on the E bus to westlake. And for heading north can just get on at westlake as well. Or worst case if they really do drop the slu station sigh the denny way one isn’t that far.
Anyways more importantly I’d spend energy on the ballard alignment and cid station alignment, but I’ll talk about it on some other open thread as we’ve discussed a lot about them already.
Agreed. But the thing to do is move it east, not west. It is basically the same mistake they made with the Ballard Station, just in reverse. The Ballard Station should ideally be at 20th. Every block you move east is a degradation. The SLU station is a bit more complicated, because you have to consider the Denny station. You really want the best pairing, to go with the new Westlake Station (which has to be next to the existing station, just to allow for a decent transfer). Thus you want to go east, not west with the two stations north of Westlake. East is the land of skyscrapers (mostly residential). West is the land of parking lots, office parks, city parks and highways. Density to the west is tiny compared to density to the east.
Sound Transit is more into symbols than substance. They really, really want to say they ran the metro to Tacoma, even if it is only to what is basically a giant parking lot. Same with Ballard and South Lake Union. They are ignoring what is really important. Maybe it is because they don’t care. Maybe it is because they just don’t understand. Either way, the end result is not nearly as good as it should be.
“They really, really want to say they ran the metro to Tacoma”
What’s really amazing is, Pierce County really wants this. Even though it’s Pierce Countyans who will have to drive to the far corner of the county to use it.
How do you know we really want it? Is there some poll of residents I missed, or are you going by the bygone vote from years ago? Or worse, what a local politician says?
I think you are right, btw. I’m just curious is there is some new data I haven’t heard about.
But if you asked the million residents of pierce some contextless question like “Do you want light rail to come to Pierce County” I think the vast majority say yes. Why wouldn’t they, without presentation of cost and different options to spend that money.
But if you asked the million residents of pierce some contextless question like “Do you want light rail to come to Pierce County” I think the vast majority say yes. Why wouldn’t they, without presentation of cost and different options to spend that money.
Yes, and that is the problem. I really doubt people would support Tacoma Link if they knew how long a trip to Seattle on the train is going to take, and what else you could use the money for.
It is also worth noting that Pierce County voted against ST3, so I don’t think there is that much support as prices escalate and projects are delayed. But again, like the other areas, there were no transit alternatives on the ballot. This left transit advocates (like me) in the position to oppose a transit project even though I generally like spending money on transit.
Put it this way. Hold a vote in Pierce County, with the three alternatives:
1) Spend money as planned.
2) Shift the money to bus service and bus infrastructure.
3) Save money on taxes.
My guess is the first option has the least amount of support.
Maybe.
I do think a stand-alone transit bonding initiative has a decent chance to pass. I don’t know how to a vote Ross outlined above would work, or whether it would even pass muster as a citizen’s initiative. Perhaps non-binding.
The transit advocacy groups that might have the manpower and legal support to run a campaign are still pretty pro-TDLE. Whether that’s due to ignorance or something else, I don’t know. I guess I could focus my efforts on figuring that out.
Tangentially, I did learn why the Pac Ave BRT didn’t seriously consider simply taking a lane. WSDOT wouldn’t allow them to.
The Pierce County public chose their county and city leaders. Those same leaders are the ones who insisted on being in ST, insisted on the single tax district so that Seattle/King “Yes” votes would overcome Pierce’s “No” votes, and insisted on subarea equity. Then those politicians insisted on having a spine to Tacoma and Everett as top priority. That was the reason they wanted Pierce in the ST district. The tax district Pierce was a part of approved TLDE in 2016. Other voter decisions are permanent, so who wouldn’t this be? You can’t plan or build anything large if approval is on-again, off-again every couple years.
There are city-level initiatives and state-level initatives, but no initiative capability on the ST district. So you’d have to convince the board to change its mind or hold another vote. Or get the legislature to modify ST.
A state-level initiative might be able to modify ST3, but that’s uncertain. Initiatives have only limited powers, and a state initiative may not be able to override local voter approval of a tax. And you don’t want people in Clark County or Eastern Washington micromanaging ST, because they’d just dissolve it and redirect its resources to exurban freeways.
Gotcha. I was confused by your use of the present tense. I have no idea if Pierce County residents really want it. We do know a solid number, but still a minority of PC residents 7 years ago kinda wantED it. A majority didn’t. And some politicians wantED it, and probably still do, though I’ve decided not to trust what ST board member DM Walker actually wants. Her words have been pretty different from her actions, in my small sample experience.
And yes, I agree that votes like this should be binding
“a minority of PC residents 7 years ago kinda wantED it. A majority didn’t.”
Our system is based on what a majority votes for, not on what a poll says. If they didn’t want it, they could have chosen different leaders, or argued against including Pierce in the ST district.
Oh, and the connection to the Aurora buses would be handy, if the train went somewhere else, like First Hill. Riders from Aurora have to transfer anyway, so a train that went from 7th & Harrison (or thereabouts) to First Hill would save those riders a considerable amount of time. But that isn’t the plan, and never was. They made a series of bad mistakes, and now things are getting worse.
Oh, and the connection to the Aurora buses would be handy, if the train went somewhere else, like First Hill.
Even if the new line went to first hill, One could still transfer at west-lake? Or am I interpreting your scenario wrong
Even if the new line went to first hill, One could still transfer at Westlake?
Yes, definitely. I’m just saying by sending the new line to First Hill, you add more value to that transfer station. Imagine a few scenarios:
1) You are trying to get from Phinney Ridge to downtown:
With the current plans for Ballard Link, you just ride the 5 until it gets very close to your destination. You could transfer to Link, but it just isn’t worth it, even if you are headed to the south end of downtown.
2) You are trying to get from Phinney Ridge to First Hill:
In a couple years, you just ride the 5 until it gets close to Spring, and then transfer to the G as it heads up the hill. Same is true with the current plans for Ballard Link. However, if the Ballard spur serves First Hill, you transfer in SLU to it. The spur — being automated — runs as often as the bus (maybe more often). Since you have to transfer anyway, you might as well transfer to the train as soon as possible.
3) You are headed from Phinney Ridge to Beacon Hill, Rainier Valley or the airport. With the current plans, you transfer at SLU. With the Ballard spur, you transfer at Westlake.
In the first scenario, Link is irrelevant. In the second scenario, Ballard Link means transferring to the train, instead of a bus. In the third scenario, you transfer at a different place. The savings in the second scenario are bigger than the third.
I think it is also quite possible that First Hill is a bigger destination than all the stops combined in the third scenario. That seems like a stretch with just one stop (simply because there are a lot of stops on the main line south of downtown) but First Hill is huge. It is extremely dense. It has very high employment, residential and visitation density. The more stops you add, the more the balance shifts towards the new line. If you eventually connect to East Link (at Judkins Park) and the main line (at Mount Baker) then it becomes a short-cut of sorts. Not only is it faster for trips to Mount Baker (e. g. Franklin High School) but three-seat rides sound plausible. The 7 is frequent (more frequent than Link) so going 5/Ballard-Spur/7 to get to various parts of Rainier Avenue would be better than going 5/Link (like today) especially if the Ballard-Spur is really frequent.
“I’ll talk about it on some other open thread”
There’s only 31 comments here in two days, so there’s plenty of room
I was partially talking about myself that didn’t want to talk about the same topic if there’s nothing new. 🙃
Though I guess I am kind of noticing a pattern now.
The denny station was moved since Vulcan offered their land plot. And the chinatown one was moved to south of cid when Urban Visions proposed using their land to build the station there.
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/developer-could-be-key-at-seattle-transit-station-south-of-chinatown-international-district/
The ST board chair/King County executive offered the Administration building for CID/N, so that’s like ST offering it to itself or King County using ST to unload an obsolete property. I think the Urban Visions offer for CID/S was secondary to that, and wouldn’t have happened without CID/N.
Vulcan is offering a promotional property, where it markets its other SLU properties. I think that’s more driven by trying to minimize traffic disruption on Westlake and sacrificing the promotional property for it, than an attempt to unload an obsolete property. Vulcan could always turn it into another lucrative use if the promotional use is no longer worthwhile.
All of these cases are deprioritization of transit, because none of them was initiated to improve passenger access to stations and increase ridership.
We need to think of the question in 3D! It’s not where the platform sits on a map but how easy or difficult it is to get to the actual platform.
Consider that escalators run diagonally. Unless the are laid out as a switchback created at the mezzanine, they are rarely on top of a platform. ( Note that there are diagonal elevators.)
A good example is Capitol Hill Station. The big entrance is at Broadway and John. The actual platform is a few hundred feet southeast. However, the platform is also 65 feet deep. Could a different position reduce the depth? Would it have been better to be closer to Broadway but deeper?
Even normally insightful reporting by the Urbanist is missing what I think is an important point. The discussion needs to take into account depth as well as entries in assessing how to best place the station. Further, rather than just fight about platform position, the subway walkways under streets need to be defined by entrance locations rather than merely by platform locations..
In the case of a South Lake Union Station, there should be entrances on both sides of Aurora with an underground mezzanine. In the case of Denny, there should be entrances on either side of the busy street. These should ideally be design requirements and not merely nice ideas when comparing subway station alternatives. I’ll point to WMATA’s DuPont Citcle Station as it has entrances three blocks apart on opposite sides of the circle.
> In the case of a South Lake Union Station, there should be entrances on both sides of Aurora with an underground mezzanine.
That’s the most complicated part where the 99 tunnel is. There’s zero possibility sound transit are going to tunnel there.
> Even normally insightful reporting by the Urbanist is missing what I think is an important point. The discussion needs to take into account depth as well as entries in assessing how to best place the station.
I’m more concerned by the cost escalations of the stations and alignments than the exact placement.
“Would it have been better to be closer to Broadway but deeper?”
We wanted it under Broadway but ST chose Nagle Place to avoid construction disruption on Broadway. The same issue as CID and Denny Stations. Politicians prioritize temporary construction impacts over long-term station access, even though we’re building an expensive metro to solve a basic mobility need and move people the most efficiently — or would be if we put the stations in the optimal places.
“These should ideally be design requirements”
Yes, ST has difficulty recognizing minimal requirements. In station location, frequency, capacity, … Ideally the state or federal government would make sure it does, or local politicians would insist on it. But they’re all missing in action.
However, I was one of the people who pushed for a third Capitol Hill entrance on the west side of the street. I was thinking of stations in St Petersburg and Moscow, Leicester Square in London, and Essen in Germany, where you don’t have to cross the street to get to an entrance. But now that it’s built and I use it all the time because it’s my entrance, I wonder if it’s really that worthwhile. Going on the diagonal passage and up two escalators and backtracking isn’t really much better than just crossing the street. Broadway isn’t that wide or the wait long.
Ideally the state would have included station stubs in the Aurora rebuild, and underground bus stops in the 99 tunnel. But no, the only thing it cared about was an automobile bypass.
“ I’m more concerned by the cost escalations of the stations and alignments than the exact placement.”
I am concerned about the inaccurate cost estimations, too. However the two issues are interrelated.
The relationship is that ST can shrink the cost by designing their preferred station arrangement more cheaply at the time of the decision to pick the location so that it appears best. It’s an easy, back-end way to legitimatize selecting an alternative to please backroom stakeholders. Just reduce the amount of pedestrian tunnels and escalators!
It’s why design criteria is so important. It keeps the costs between alternatives comparable. If the criteria are lax, ST can simply pick the station that shows the least amount of disruption and refine it to be done cheaply while making it less rider friendly. Then opening day arrives and everyone is observing that the station is horrible for pedestrian connectivity yet is too late to fix.
For SLU, I read the tea leaves as creating just one SLU station and one Seattle Center station. I’m expecting that by moving the SLU Station to be west of Aurora and the Denny Station fully north of Denny, they have achieved this first unspoken goal. The second goal can be met by using other factors like construction to put one station near the international fountain and rather than have two stations between Aurora and Elliott. If this does happen, the pedestrian connectivity should become an even more important consideration.
“ That’s the most complicated part where the 99 tunnel is. There’s zero possibility sound transit are going to tunnel there.”
I could see an entrance being on the east side of Aurora going fully down to the track level with elevators, and a walkway being part of the bore — ultimately reaching the station west of Aurora. (Another main station trance would still be west of Aurora.) The bore or bores for the tracks would all be below the 99 tunnel portal like they are already planning.
Note that light rail single track tunnels are taller so there is room at the side to add a walkway. If it’s a double track tunnel the walkway would easily go between the two tracks.
I’m more concerned by the cost escalations of the stations and alignments than the exact placement.
Do we have to choose? Seriously though, I’ve very concerned about the station placement and alignment. I feel like Ballard Link is fragile, and always has been. If I had to summarize general alignments, I would have three different categories:
1) So fundamentally sound that you really can’t screw it up. U-Link for example. So many problems, and yet still the best investment we ever made.
2) So fundamentally weak that it will never be worth the money. West Seattle Link is a good example. I rarely look at the details in West Seattle Link for this very reason. ST can nail this in an unprecedented fashion, and it still isn’t worth the money.
3) Projects that could go either way, depending on the details. This is Ballard Link. Done right, and it is an excellent line. Ballard, Uptown, South Lake Union and downtown are all good destinations. Interbay is a bonus, with good connections to Magnolia and the north side of Queen Anne. Done wrong, and it all falls apart. You skip the main part of Ballard, so folks just ride the 40. Except the 40 now has to make a detour to serve the station, which means you’ve created a coverage hole (or buses with very awkward detours). Likewise, the transfer for Magnolia and north-Queen Anne riders has to be good, otherwise you lose a bunch of riders from Magnolia. You can’t go too wrong with Uptown, but you can with “SLU”. Same with Denny. Too close to Westlake, and folks just don’t transfer there. Too deep a station, and it doesn’t work for short trips. Screw up the transfers, and you are in deep trouble (no pun intended). Next thing you know, it is basically just used by folks on the main line, and yet ridership for Link south of downtown goes down. Sure, it is nice to get from Rainier Valley to SLU, Uptown or Ballard, but the existing destinations north of downtown (Capitol Hill, UW, Roosevelt etc.) are more popular. Done right, and it is a big improvement in transit that benefits the whole region. Done wrong and it barely moves the needle, making us more dependent than ever on the buses.
@AL
> I could see an entrance being on the east side of Aurora going fully down to the track level with elevators, and a walkway being part of the bore — ultimately reaching the station west of Aurora. (Another main station trance would still be west of Aurora.) The bore or bores for the tracks would all be below the 99 tunnel portal like they are already planning.
That’s fair, I didn’t quite consider they could dig the pedestrian pathway as part of the bored tunnel. Though Sound Transit hasn’t suggested that approach so far.
> Do we have to choose? Seriously though, I’ve very concerned about the station placement and alignment. I feel like Ballard Link is fragile, and always has been. If I had to summarize general alignments, I would have three different categories: … 3) Projects that could go either way, depending on the details. This is Ballard Link. Done right, and it is an excellent line. Ballard, Uptown, South Lake Union and downtown are all good destinations.
Let me correct a bit. By alignment I mean the excessively tunneling. And even worse Sound Transit is considering even more tunneling at both ballard and west seattle end segments. The ballard/west seattle link has already almost doubled it’s budget going from 7 billion to 12 billion and somehow we are still talking about more tunneled segments? Even the interbay station consolidation was predicated on trenching/undergrounding that section. They should have dropped all underground alternatives for both ballard and west seattle back in 2021. It was patently absurd that the further studies was all about even more tunneling.
Sound Transit should be studying elevated approaches and alignments that are more affordable and accept more construction/community impacts not less. If not we’re going to end up with severe truncation of the line.
Minor budget changes https://www.seattlegreenways.org/get-involved/blog/whats-happening-in-the-2024-seattle-city-budget/
They are planning on making Thomas street have a much wider sidewalk/pedestrian street format on the north side.
North side of mt baker blvd short section want to close to cars.
Road channelization of Henderson st.
Cut the school safety budget but seems to be made up in the ada/sidewalk budget?
It seems Sound Transit is facing a lot of challenges to locate the SLU stations without causing too much disruption to developers such as Vulcan. What if Sound Transit would use shorter automated trains? The station size could get much smaller and therefore it might get easier to locate them and fewer buildings may need to be torn down. Disruption would also be shorter as less earth needs to be moved.
Has anybody thought how this might affect the plans? Could automated trains simplify the SLU line?
Of course, I agree with you. Martin, the challenge is more getting ST to give up on their commitment to having four car light rail trains with drivers.
Certainly none of the usual transit rider advocates can force them. But if developers could convince them then I think ST would look into it. Maybe we should figure how to sell developers of the idea of shorter automated trains. Certainly, the vaults will be much smaller and I believe there are slight station depth advantages too.
In Toronto’s case, it took the province to force the technology change — with accompanying financial incentives..
Automated trains have been extensively discussed here as a speculative alternative which would operate as a stub between Ballard and Westlake, with the prospective OMF in Interbay (the soon-to-be-vacated National Guard base is a great candidate).
Unfortunately the only way automated trains get considered is if they’re piloted on a long-term stub that is 100% grade separated and never interacts with human-operated trains, and it’s determined that building a new OMF is affordable. The only way we get there from here is if the BLE DEIS offers no affordable solutions, and we replace the entire Board (except maybe Balducci) with electeds who: a) care about transit, and b) have some imagination.
Yes, none of these limitations are inherently necessary, but there’s no way ST pilots operator-less trains in-line with operator-operated trains.
Nathan, I don’t agree that automated trains need never interact with operator driven trains. There are always small fold down cabs in automated cars so that they can be hostled around the layover yard and at the MF. So the MF for the stub really needs only be for storage, cleaning and state of good repair monitoring.
When it comes time for a car to have a hundred thousand mile workover (or whatever the schedule is), it toodles southbound to a switch just north of New Westlake, a driver takes charge and scuttles it down a single-track tunnel under Stewart to Third and Pine where it merges with the southbound trackway and hustles down to Forest Street or east to Lake Bellevue.
To come back put an “extended” facing-point cross-over in the middle at USSS with the two turnouts spaced a bit more than an automated train length apart. A train can then duck into the middle track and wait until a train can be held at Westlake long enough for it to go up the three blocks to the connector tunnel. There would be a pair of cross-overs just north of the merge under Westlake to deliver returning trains to the proper northbound track. This does have to be planned now because it means that the tunnel box for New Westlake has to extend farther north to accommodate the cross-over.
Notice that the turns between Third and Stewart and Stewart and Westlake are both “obtuse” [e.g. “between 90 and 180 degrees”], so the curvature can be less than a simple right turn.
If the thing does not have “scheduled service” a very minimal connection like the above is eminently operable.
Tom, I agree that with a little imagination, ST could integrate convertible driver/driverless trains with the traditional trainset, and thus reduce the need for a completely new OMF for an automated stub.
The problem is the Board. I simply have no faith that the Board would be willing to push ST staff to investigate the possibility any time soon. Maybe after ST3 starts getting delivered in 2040’s, and operational costs become a constraint.
It does seem unlikely that the board would support automated trains unless they are completely grade-separated lines. There are a bunch of different options in terms of automation, but many just wouldn’t work very well. If Ballard is tied to Rainier Valley (which is the plan) then you wouldn’t automate that. Likewise, I don’t think trains coming from the East Side could be automated because of the surface section in Bellevue. That leaves West Seattle to the north end, but that doesn’t give you that much. You are interlining with the trains from Bellevue, so running more often is limited and complicated*. You wouldn’t run smaller train sets, which means the stations in West Seattle would have to be big. You save some money (to be sure) but you don’t get the main advantages of automation, which are better frequency, smaller trains and smaller stations.
I think the only potential use of automation is on an independent new line, like a Ballard stub. Just to piggy-back on what Tom wrote: There are other options when it comes to maintaining the trains. Interbay is a good idea, but another option is to connect to the main line. This would only be for train service (no riders would be on the train when it switches lines). It seems possible to connect between Westlake and University (although it could theoretically connect anywhere). Because the trains would not be in service, this reduces the cost considerably. If I’m not mistaken, this sort of thing — a non-service connection built after the fact — was done in Toronto when they added the Sheppard Line. That line runs independently, but when the trains need servicing, they head to Davisville Yard using the wye tracks connecting the Yonge line with the Sheppard line at Sheppard-Yonge station (according to https://transittoronto.ca/subway/5110.shtml). That station is a lot more complicated than the type of thing I have in mind, but it is the same basic idea. The Sheppard Line does not head downtown when it is carrying riders (much to the chagrin of many passengers I’m sure) but the trains head that way when they need servicing.
*If West Seattle Link was automated, you could squeeze in another train north of downtown. For example, assume trains are running every ten minutes from Bellevue. Under current plans, West Seattle trains would run every ten minutes (for five minute combined headways in the north end). You could have two West Seattle trains during that period. That would mean a train running by Capitol Hill every 3.3 minutes. Two of those would go to West Seattle, one would go to the East Side. That is better, but not that much better. You go from 5 to 3.3 for the north end. To West Seattle, you go from 10 to a 3.3/6.6 pattern. I like it, but I’m not sure the board would.
I think the only way to get the board to embrace automation is with a brand new line (e. g. a Ballard stub) or as part of a major maintenance/upgrade project (bury the lines in Rainier Valley and Bellevue). The former seems more likely, although it is still a stretch at this point.
“It does seem unlikely that the board would support automated trains unless they are completely grade-separated lines.”
The board did muse in the mid 2010s about looking into maybe automated trains for Ballard and future grade-separated lines beyond that, but it never went anywhere, and now the board seems to have forgotten that they were once thinking about that.
Incidentally, I think it’s time that ST be called out again for the hypocrisy of saying that moving the Midtown Station to First Hill just four blocks away was deemed “inconsistent with ST3” by the Board, yet now they are proposing to move a station four blocks and on the other side of SR99 (a freeway like I-5) and the constancy question never gets mentioned.
Of course, calling Pioneer Square the transfer point is wildly more inconsistent than First Hill would have been and the Board chose that as preferred with no study of ridership impacts.
Martin, your posts are great, but don’t be disingenuous. EVERYONE on STB agrees that shorter, automated trains would be far better for BLE and you know it.
Well, true, not Lazarus, but to him ST can do no wrong. There’s a sucker born every minute.
I’m not sure you can speak for everyone on STB. I think it’s a bit short-sighted to assume that we’ll never need 3+ car trains between Ballard and SLU. If the trade-off is between infrequent “long” trains or frequent “short” trains, then yes, short and frequent is better. But you can recognize that building short platforms now will hamstring the system from scaling as NW Seattle grows.
Instead, ST should be looking to do shallow cut-and-cover along major arterials as much as possible and modest stations. Obviously that’s off the table right now, too, but if we’re fantasizing about automated rail, might as well wish for more wishes.
Where is Ballard Link Extension going to be serving a large increase in population? Certainly not between the tunnel portal at Harrison and the Ship Canal Bridge. BNSF is not going to give up Interbay, and the remaining strip of developable land is pretty narrow.
Seattle Center takes a big bite out of the path between South Lake Union and Expedia, and it’s already largely built out with apartments to the west of the Center. Sure, what’s there might be replaced with larger structures, but that’s just one station’s worth of development.
Nobody wants to touch “Old Ballard”, so where other than east of 15th NW is there going to be radical growth in population at the terminal station in Ballard? I don’t think so; Fifty-Sixth is already lines with mid-rises.
Sure, if you “allow” the assumption that the line will be continued north you can make a defensible case that the population in the walk-shed might double for the stations west of “SLU”.
Automated trains can easily and reliably run at ninety-second headways. That means that 40 trains per hour can run on the line. Assuming one hundred and fifty passengers per car at crush loads, like the smallish cars on Skytrain, that’s 12,000 passengers per hour in whatever peak pertains at that time.
I will stipulate that transferring and distributing that many people per hour at Westlake would be a chore, but I don’t think the system would reach that volume, ever. And if northwest Seattle is ever built out to the degree that would overwhelm the system, then another line sort of parallel via Westlake and Leary is an obvious candidate. You can do elevated along both streets and nobody will emit a peep of dissent. Grant, the Ship Canal crossing would have to be tunneled, so it wouldn’t be a walk in the park, but if northwest Seattle outgrows a Skytrain clone, the City will have plenty of meoney to build it.
It isn’t crazy to think that we might someday wish there was more capacity on Ballard Link. But consider what the plan is. The trains will be running from Ballard to Tacoma (through Rainier Valley). This means you can’t possibly get better than six minutes headways. Run trains half the size and twice as often, and you’ve matched the planned capacity. Actually, you’ve increased it, as much of the room with these trains is taken up by the driving compartment. Three minute headways are actually quite easy to achieve. It is quite likely they could run them every two minutes, or better (the new Victoria line in London runs every 100 seconds). At two minutes, you’ve dramatically increased capacity over current plans.
Thus if you are really concerned about future capacity, focus on headways. Even then, at two minute headways, you’ve probably already reached YAGNI territory (you aren’t going to need it). Transit use is becoming flatter. There is still a peak, but it is smaller. Then you have the fact that this is not a suburban line. This gets to what Tom wrote. There is a fairly limited amount of land that can draw riders to that station. You go north of Ballard, and eventually you run into Carkeek Park. You have to go east, which means you connect to Greenwood and Aurora, both fast corridors, with express buses to downtown. It just doesn’t make sense for lots of feeder buses to serve it, or for the line to be extended really far.
They dynamic is the opposite of commuter rail. Commuter rail covers a huge area. It is quite reasonable to travel a mile (or more) and then take Sounder to get to work. That just doesn’t make sense for Ballard Link, other than Magnolia and a small stretch of Ballard. Commuter trips tend to be much longer, with a lot less spontaneity. Thus frequency is less important. This is why it is OK to have relatively infrequent (but really big) trains for South Sounder.
I just don’t see the Ballard Line needing a lot of capacity. Meeting — or exceeding — the current maximum (equivalent to four-car trains running every six minutes) would be plenty, and easy for an automated (independent) line to achieve.
And if northwest Seattle is ever built out to the degree that would overwhelm the system, then another line sort of parallel via Westlake and Leary is an obvious candidate.
Agreed. Another (much cheaper) option is to run express buses. The trip from Ballard is not fundamentally slow. It is not like the route that various buses take (e. g. the 3/4 has to deal with traffic light after traffic light, along with congestion). There is some congestion as you go over the Ballard Bridge, then there is basically an express lane for buses (with very few lights) until you get to Western, at the edge of downtown. The 15 stopped at Dravus, but if we ever lived in a world where Ballard riders overwhelmed the system, then it wouldn’t. It would run express from Ballard to downtown, without any stops in between. Likewise, the 19, 24 and 33 (from Magnolia) would run pretty much as they run now, connecting riders to downtown. This seems like a very bad set of routes (how does it connect to Link or the other buses?) but remember, this is if there are so many riders trying to get from Ballard or Magnolia to downtown that it overwhelms a two-car train running every two minutes. The buses would be popular. They eliminate a transfer, are fairly fast, and serve Belltown (something Link doesn’t).
In the very unlikely event that we would every have crowding with automated buses, the obvious answer is just to run buses. But again, crowding is more likely with the current plans than with an automated system.
Right, Ross, express buses can certainly handle peak overcrowding, and do it cost-effectively. I only mentioned Westlake – Fremont – Leary as a “hole card” in case Northwest Seattle radically grows to meet WL’s objection of limited growth potential.
“Martin, your posts are great, but don’t be disingenuous. EVERYONE on STB agrees that shorter, automated trains would be far better for BLE and you know it.”
agreed, Tom… what I meant to say: With a smaller station box, would there be other more interesting alignments/station locations which ST has not even considered as they only look for long straight locations?
Along with what I wrote above, I would add that a big part of the problem is that the board gave up on pairing West Seattle and Ballard. If they were, then automation would make a lot of sense. They are even building a brand new line through downtown. This seems like yet another way to save this mess:
1) Have smaller, automated trains running from West Seattle to Ballard.
2) Serve First Hill, but otherwise it would look similar.
3) Create a high-quality transfer at Westlake.
4) Run trains from Tacoma to Lynnwood, and Redmond to Everett.
It is worth noting that the worst thing about West Seattle Link is the fact that most riders will have to transfer (either that, or very few will ride it). Since trains from West Seattle will be interlined with trains from the East Side, frequency will never be very high. My guess is eight minutes peak, and ten minutes most of the day. That means that the vast majority of riders will have to transfer to a train running every ten minutes. The transfer won’t be trivial, either. It is quite possible that most of the trips actually take longer.
Running the train a lot more often helps mitigate this problem. It still doesn’t strike me as a good value, but it helps ease the pain for all those West Seattle riders.
Likewise, one of the more frequent transfers will be at Westlake, as people change directions (e. g. UW to Uptown). If the Ballard train is running every ten minutes (which is likely) then the transfer is poor. For some of the combinations, it is no longer worth it. For example, Capitol Hill to Uptown. The trains are faster, but you lose time with the transfers. You might as well take the 8. UW to South Lake Union: take the 70 and walk. With poor frequencies to Ballard, you make riding the buses more attractive, and riding the trains less popular. This is bad. The fundamental advantage of rail is that it can carry more riders. You haven’t fully taken advantage of the new massive investment in the rail line if you continue to run the trains infrequently. Mostly empty trains and full buses is just not a good approach.
Oh, and another thing. Remember the original plans for the station at the Junction? It actually looked pretty good. The platform would be east-west, fairly close to the actual junction. But then they realized that it wouldn’t quite fit there. So they went back to the drawing board, prices went up, and it is quite likely they will end up with a station that is worse. Having a shorter station would allow them to go back to the original plan (it would fit easily).
I see that there is a tacit deal between the Board and senior staff. The Board chooses staff that are in over their heads like Timm. That way, the staff never put more strategic solutions in front of them and the Board can stay in charge. That way, the Board does not have to publicly consider more strategic solutions presented by staff. Instead, they can wheel and deal with developers behind the scenes — and when these backroom deals are finalized, the Board can change course without questioning by staff. The often presented Board line is that “we can’t delay the project any more” after years being indecisive as these deals get worked out.
We will have an increasingly suboptimal light rail buildout until this cycle is changed. Developers trump riders. Every future design step has been getting progressively worse for riders for a reason and that reason is the power structure around ST is tainted against riders.
Sadly, the elected officials we have present themselves as liberals who care about people, when their actions are more like corporate toadies . Even the most “liberal” elected officials we have seem to be inadvertent puppets for the developer game. They have no hesitation to spend big money while making things worse for riders. Then in 20 years when we are left with this suboptimal system ST won’t have the riders to justify the operations and the downward decline of public transit here will be happening.
Rather than take each project decision individually, I think we need to push for a structural systemic changes like these:
1. All major capital decisions must be cleared by a Riders Committee. The Riders Committee members must be screened by more than just a handful of Board members.
2. Station design criteria for each proposed station needs to be defined before choosing alternatives. That needs to include the locations of station entrances, numbers of escalators and elevators, and vertical as well as horizontal distances to reach the platform.
3. A bi-partisan state legislative oversight effort needs to be put into place. It needs to focus on the enabling legislation for ST and how it needs to be adjusted to better represent the taxpayers and the riding public and not be so attached to developer interests.
The most disturbing thing about our local elections is that I have yet to see a major candidate willing to advocate for riders. Riders will continue to be second class citizens until we are given equal consideration to neighborhood group whiners and wealthy corporate developers.
This is an excellent plan that puts West Seattle last instead of first, which is of course appropriate given the potential ridership.
However, how do you get from First Hill to West Seattle? The stations on First Hill, like all well-designed stations everywhere, preferably would be as relatively shallow as possible given the need to pass under the DSTT at Westlake and I-5 at University (or so). You really don’t want Martin’s two-hundred and fifty footer at Ninth and Marion in order still to be underground at Washington Street.
So, ideally the line would continue south under Sixth to around University and then turn uphill. University is about forty feet higher than Pine, which helps ease the difference between First Hill and Westlake Center. The trackway could rise south of New Westlake as the street does, but because the freeway is in a cut and multi-level, the first station south of Westlake, near Virginia Mason, would have to be pretty deep in order to under-run the freeway. But as the line continued southward, stations near Swedish and Harborview could be shallower. That would give superlative coverage of First Hill and probably not break the bank with two short automated train stations in the sixty foot range and one in the hundred-plus.
But if that happens, the line can’t then turn west to pass through the IDS complex underground. It could come out of the hillside below Yesler Terrace, but where does it go then? Ideally it would swing west to First South and a station really AT the stadiums and then have one at the north edge of Starbucks that would also serve the condos along there, but wow, would that raise some howls, because it would have to be elevated all the way, and would be pretty high when it started at Eighth and Jackson. It has to clear the freeway.
Three-D geometry, it’s a bitch.
Oh, and add an overlay during peak hours between Northgate and Stadium or SoDo on The Spine so that Seattle riders have some chance of getting on the trains. Even if it means spending the big bucks to re-engineer a two-track layover stub north of the Skycastle at Northgate.
The answer to my rhetorical question is “You don’t”. Basically, build BLE as an automated small metro and extend it three stations through First Hill. Maybe it goes a little way east from there (23rd and Jackson anyone?) Or it goes down Rainier in the air to Judkins Park and Mt. Baker, linking First Hill to both regional lines without a fish-hook double back at Westlake Center. Or both? Basically Seattle Subway’s SLU-23rd Avenue half-a-square but with First Hill served instead of Capitol Hill?
Whatever comes of it, going to First Hill in a meaningful way pretty much eliminates extending to West Seattle except via a second Beacon Hill tunnel.
Another addendum. Going to First Hill instead of “CID-North” makes a shallower “New Westlake” station possible — even desirable — eliminating the ridiculous number of level changes planned for the DSTT2 version of New Westlake.
Tom, First Hill is an easy connection that doesn’t require a huge expense. The slope basically requires use of a cable rather than a typical electric motor. Of the various cable technologies, I prefer a closed loop system. It’s essentially a diagonal elevator. It can be fully automated. It may be best as a counter balance system with two vehicles that cross paths at the halfway point. A shuttle vehicle could leave First Hill as frequently as every two or three minutes.
Where would this shuttle operate? The default I see is Jefferson St. The street is minor and dead ends at I-5. It’s owned by government most of the way if not all of it already. Whether it’s built aerial over I-5, under the street in a shallow subway vault or some other profile I can’t say; it needs study. The lower terminus could be Pioneer Square.
That simple connection would offer the opportunity for level vehicle boardings for Harborview patients who are mobility restricted. It also would close a gap between the Second Ave bicycle tracks and the Broadway bicycle tracks.
ST doesn’t even have to build and operate it. King County Metro could! It could even be a City of Seattle project — and maybe the CCC funds can be moved to help pay for it.
And if Dow gets his way about the new mega station for Pioneer Square/ CID-N, this connection can actually be built at the same time and it would directly connect the three major m Link lines.
If three Link lines were in the DSTT (like many of us suggest) and there was a Ballard-Westlake stub, it would still connect all three lines. Only Ballard and Issaquah would be double transfers. If Ballard stub was built as a high frequency automated line, the transfer hassle becomes merely the walk effort to go between different platforms.
build BLE as an automated small metro and extend it three stations through First Hill.
Yes, that would be my choice as well. I’m just saying that it seems quite possible to serve First Hill and then eventually connect to SoDo or Stadium, especially if you aren’t interested in making the connection to CID (which seems to be the case).
Also worth noting. A smaller station is more likely to be close to the surface. But if we do end up with a deep station, it is still cheaper, and quite likely better. Large stations have to have enough infrastructure to handle the load of people that leave a train. The bigger the train, the harder it is for elevators to handle the load. Thus with smaller (but more frequent) trains, we could get by with just elevators (like Beacon Hill) which greatly reduces the cost, while being faster for riders.
The key station would be Westlake. You need to provide a connection to the other line, as well as the surface. A stair/escalator system makes the most sense (with elevators for mobility impaired riders). Stations after that (on First Hill) or before it (SLU, Uptown) could be deep and just have elevators (along with stairs for emergencies).
Al, that’s great for Harborview and Yesler Village, but First Hill is much more than Harborview, and “Madison BRT” is not really that great an option. It’s better than POBS, for sure, but boarding and alighting on Seneca and Madison around Third are not for the feeble or infirm.
Ross, yes, you could probably connect to Line 1 at Stadium, but that would leave East Link without a direct connection except at Westlake. It would require some demo on one side of the freeway or the other through the International District because there’s not enough room for two tracks between the freeway structure and the existing buildings.
The structure would have to be pretty high, though, because it would need to clear the freeway either at the north or south end of the parallel running zone.
that would leave East Link without a direct connection except at Westlake
Which would be adequate for most trips. West Seattle to Bellevue suffers a bit, but I doubt there are that many riders taking that trip. It is yet another case where an express bus (with proper infrastructure) is the solution for West Seattle. Even with existing infrastructure you could probably beat the train most of the time (there are HOV lanes much of the way). It would be as simple as taking one of the buses (e. g. the C) and going to Downtown Bellevue instead of Downtown Seattle.
**at grade 1st avenue**
Honestly I still like the at-grade approach through downtown copying Los Angeles’ blue/gold line, Portland’s light rail, and Dallas light rail. Have the west seattle to ballard line be separate and just run at grade on 1st avenue, the rest of the alignment north of belltown and south of cid staying the same as before. The transfer walking distance is basically the same being two blocks from 1st ave to 3rd compared to going from 5th to 3rd avenue. If walking uphill is a problem just dig a short pedestrian tunnel from 1st to 3rd. If there is ever the need for more capacity then build the tunnel later and in the mean time just use 2 car trains.
Anyways since I can’t really resist talking about the Chinatown/Ballard alignment the most recent open house had a powerpoint that outlines Sound Transit’s idea for the South of CID station. (I didn’t attend the meeting just saw the document).
**Dearborn Station**
Some minor ideas about adding a north exit next to Seattle Blvd S for the South of CID station renamed to “Dearborn Station”. Also outlines it’s a two/three minute walk from South of CID station to the existing Stadium station. Though not exactly sure who is going to use this transfer pattern when one could transfer at sodo or westlake. They are also still studying the shallow 4th alternative. Notably the 5th ave one wasn’t listed so I guess really dropped.
They also call the North of CID station now “Pioneer Square/Midtown” station. And now showcases the passenger exits (I don’t think the earlier document showed it?)
https://www.soundtransit.org/sites/default/files/documents/BLE-SDH-open-house-briefing-english-traditionalchinese.pdf
**BLE EIS delay**
Also fyi they’ve delayed the selection of the Ballard Link extension yet another 3 years. (page 6)
> While we will not have the analysis of the new BLE Draft EIS complete until late-2024…
All of 2024 for workshops
2025 draft publication and comments
2026 final actual selection of BLE route
**South Downtown Hub**
Lastly, there’s a pedestrianization plan called “South Downtown Hub” (page 33) encompassing from Pioneer Square to the Dearborn station. It seems they are attempting to apply lipstick to the pig of the plan by just adding more pedestrian connections between the three separated stations.
Kind of reminds me of Bellevue’s plan to make a pedestrian pathway “grand connection” since they eliminated the station on bellevue way and their downtown station is now much further from bellevue mall.
https://www.bellevuegrandconnection.com/
“Honestly I still like the at-grade approach through downtown copying Los “Angeles’ blue/gold line, Portland’s light rail, and Dallas light rail.”
That’s what’s wrong with most American light rail! It’s the opposite of what Europe does, where they build a downtown tunnel like the DSTT. Portland takes twenty minutes from one end of downtown to the other. People have been complaining about it ever since it opened, and now there’s a plan to tunnel the center.
“Also fyi they’ve delayed the selection of the Ballard Link extension yet another 3 years. (page 6)”
I don’t see it on page 6. But if they are delaying it, that gives more time to get a sensible solution that doesn’t create really bad transfers for passengers. And possibly other people will be on the board by then.
“Kind of reminds me of Bellevue’s plan to make a pedestrian pathway “grand connection” since they eliminated the station on bellevue way”
It’s expanding an existing pathway on 6th between the transit center and Bellevue Square. Bellevue needs it anyway for general east-west ped/bike access to everything downtown, from Meydenbauer Bay to 116th. (And really to 120th. Or 124th if you want to include the Bellevue Botanical Gardens.)
What does “Future Park” mean?
> Portland takes twenty minutes from one end of downtown to the other.
I mean with the stub idea wouldn’t one have to exit at westlake and transfer as well? Plus if you’re going through downtown you can stay on the existing line 1. Or transfer onto Line 1 if heading to Northgate/Seatac. For Northgate to West Seattle one could transfer at Pioneer Square/Sodo (depending on exact configuration) instead. Or for say Seatac to Ballard one can stay on the Line 1 tunnel till westlake and transfer there. Only West Seattle to Ballard would riders really use the at grade portion.
> People have been complaining about it ever since it opened, and now there’s a plan to tunnel the center.
I find the idea fine, Seattle’s a medium sized city, I was always astonished where it got the funds to dig a second tunnel — which it has now shown never really could afford. And we can do the same just delay the tunnel till it’s necessary.
> It’s expanding an existing pathway on 6th between the transit center and Bellevue Square. Bellevue needs it anyway for general east-west ped/bike access to everything downtown, from Meydenbauer Bay to 116th. (And really to 120th. Or 124th if you want to include the Bellevue Botanical Gardens.) What does “Future Park” mean?
I’m not saying the grand connection is a bad idea by itself nor is improving the pedestrian connections around pioneer square/chinatown but they are both covering up for the fact the stations were moved away from where they should have been.
The future park is a suggestion for a park freeway lid on 405. There’s been no real funding for it since the original plans, instead what has moved forward was rebuilding main street with the widened pedestrian/bike section on the south side.
I mean with the stub idea wouldn’t one have to exit at Westlake and transfer as well?
For some trips, yes. To get to the south end of downtown you would have to transfer. It is worth noting that this is not that different than how riders often use Link now. Link serves part of downtown, but to get to First Hill, Belltown or SLU, they transfer (or walk).
In this case though, you could make train-to-train transfers, which is typically pretty good (this is why it is essential to get the Westlake transfer right). Frequency is the key. The Ballard Line would be frequent, as would the other line (through downtown at least). You could run the stub every six minutes all day long (while the section through downtown runs every five). No, not as frequent as the buses on top, but still pretty frequent.
The stub would be cheaper, and would be designed to be extended to First Hill. Both of those items are critical. The fundamental problem with the second tunnel is the same problem with your proposal — you haven’t added coverage. First Avenue is too close to Third.
I admit I’m not sure exactly sure what you are proposing. The train goes through Belltown and then runs on First (to cut costs)? Or are you suggesting it follows the same path to Westlake, then cuts over to First? The latter seems fairly expensive, while not getting you that much. You throw away automation (and with it, good frequency and probably smaller stations).
I was always astonished where it got the funds to dig a second tunnel — which it has now shown never really could afford.
We could have afforded a second tunnel, it was everything else with it that was the problem. It all goes back to West Seattle Link. They actually looked at BRT, but the plan was to run the buses on the surface. They would be slow. ST never looked at a bus tunnel. Then they thought they could build ST3 in all of its glory. Now we are basically back to where we were not that long ago, realizing that a bus tunnel would likely be the best value, and maybe even the only thing we can afford.
@Ross
> I admit I’m not sure exactly sure what you are proposing. The train goes through Belltown and then runs on First (to cut costs)? Or are you suggesting it follows the same path to Westlake, then cuts over to First? The latter seems fairly expensive, while not getting you that much. You throw away automation (and with it, good frequency and probably smaller stations).
I’m referring to the original candidate projects. Option 1, 15th Ave then 1st Avenue (rapidride D) and West Seattle C-03b (rapidride C). Before the split the spine idea and expensive tunnel.
If you wanted to reach SLU one can build both Option 1 and Option 4 up westlake ave (route 40) and you’d still be well within budget with the added bonus you also reached fremont.
https://www.soundtransit.org/sites/default/files/ST3_Ballard_DtwnSeattle_11252015_11x17.pdf
https://www.soundtransit.org/sites/default/files/ST3_WSeattle_DtwnSeattle_12032015_11x17.pdf
> The stub would be cheaper, and would be designed to be extended to First Hill. Both of those items are critical. The fundamental problem with the second tunnel is the same problem with your proposal — you haven’t added coverage. First Avenue is too close to Third.
As meta commentary, part of the problem with the stub idea is that one ‘kinda?’ can’t use the funds from the other subareas to build that partial tunnel. The at-grade approach suggested here is completely affordable by north king even with the covid increases.
Also the other problem with the stub is that it doesn’t reach an OMF.
As meta commentary, part of the problem with the stub idea is that one ‘kinda?’ can’t use the funds from the other subareas to build that partial tunnel.
So what? Backing up here, there are two possibilities when it comes to the main line:
1) No West Seattle Link.
2) West Seattle Link, with the trains all heading north. Some would turn back (eventually) but they would all go as far as the UW.
The latter would require spending money making sure the trains can all go in the existing tunnel. To do that is definitely something that benefits the region.
Then there is the stub itself. It would be designed to go to First Hill (a regional destination). Again, it benefits the region. You would have to renegotiate, to be sure, but it is quite reasonable to have everyone chip in. This would be a major change, but it wouldn’t be that different. You still have all of the stations outside of downtown. If they built the Ballard Stub with the First Hill Station all you’ve done is basically move the Midtown Station a few blocks east (which is nowhere near as a big change as what they did when they got rid of the First Hill station in the first place). You also lose the station next to CID, but that was redundant. From a station standpoint, it is remarkably similar. Biggest change is that the lines interact in different ways (but better, in my opinion). Ultimately it would be cheaper and better.
Also the other problem with the stub is that it doesn’t reach an OMF.
As folks mentioned, there are two possibilities. One is to connect to the train lines at Interbay. The other is to build a non-service track to the main line (probably between Westlake and University Station). This would be similar to what Toronto did with the Sheppard Line.
I’m referring to the original candidate projects. Option 1, 15th Ave then 1st Avenue (rapidride D)
OK, yeah. The problem with that is the travel time is slow. You really aren’t much faster than a bus. Might as well just go with BRT.
It reminds me of what Bruce Nourish wrote almost a decade ago: https://seattletransitblog.com/2013/12/06/some-thoughts-on-ballard-option-c/.
@Ross
You might want to elaborate a bit more how this stub would work because you’re claiming multiple items and I don’t see how they could simultaneously exist.
*Same-elevation/level with existing Westlake station*
Sure I can see one having a non-revenue connection if it’s the same level, this fixed the OMF issue. But if it’s the same level I don’t see how one is going to extend further to first hill now
*Underground, lower than westlake station*
Sure this allow for a future tunnel boring machine from the south side to connect up with the stub. But if the elevation is lower than the existing line 1 tunnel then how is this going to have a non-revenue level connection?
Lastly for “Then there is the stub itself. It would be designed to go to First Hill (a regional destination). Again, it benefits the region. ”
A first hill station isn’t that simple to reach.
First how to get there, you can’t just easily turn east if the tunnel is facing south (say on 2nd/3rd/4th) as there are skyscraper foundations in the way if one tries to exit the street grid around downtown.
Secondly, the station itself. You’re severely underestimating the elevation change. There’s a reason why the midtown station was so deep. A first hill station would be even deeper to accommodate the rapid elevation change and the close distance from westlake to first hill. I can only see it being reasonably being built if it’s on say broadway and jefferson so the tunnel can increase it’s elevation enough.
WL, “reaching an OMF” is relatively easy though not “free”, assuming that a relatively shallow tunnel alignment under Westlake is chosen in order to take full advantage of the value of an automated light metro stub. There would have to be a “junction box” built a couple of blocks north of the New Westlake platforms.
Look at the intersections of Stewart and Westlake and Stewart and Third in Google Earth. Both intersections are “obtuse angles”. Stewart and Westlake seems almost “made for an LR tunnel curve”; it must be within ten of 135°. So, it’s fairly easy to put a single-track tunnel running between a facing-point turnout in the southbound track a bit north of Stewart to a trailing point turnout in the southbound “Spine” track at Third and Pine, especially if the trackway under Westlake — a wide street — is against the east curb.
I grant that the curve between Stewart and Third is tighter, just 105 – 110°, so that would be a squealer. Howevwer, the trackway could be along the north side of Stewart east of the curve and it’s entirely natural for it to be along the west side of Third south of the curve on Pine, because that’s where the existing Spine track is. That allows the radius of the curve to be essentially the same as that of the southbound curve between Pine and Third. The southbound curve suffers much less wear than the tighter northbound one does. To get the best curvature at Westlake and Stewart, the trackway would switch to the south curb between Fourth and Fifth. It would make a tall, skinny (and backwards) “S” between Westlake and Third.
A facing-point “extended” cross-over within the body of University-Seneca Street Station including a straight-stretch long enough to store a two- or even three-car train of light metro vehicles [e.g. “a Skytrain”] would unblock the Spine tunnel. It would allow a train headed toward the stub to pause in the middle of the station for a gap in the southbounds leaving Westlake Center. This is NOT a simple cross-over, but essentially a “siding” in the middle of the station that instead of connecting to the same track at each end would connect to the opposite track at the north and south ends. Call it a “pocket cross-over”.
So, the only really big impact on DSTT1 would be demising a hole in the north wall at Third and Pine and cutting in three turnouts. The pocket cross-over could be built at night over several weeks before the demising operation to be ready for delivering trains to the stub. That of course would require that the tunnel be taken out of service in order to clean up the mess.
A trailing-point cross-over between the south and north tracks just north of the merge point under Westlake would also be necessary.
In the worst case, the merge could be with the northbound track under Westlake, rather than the southbound, and a facing-point crossover applied immediately north of it. That means a car going to Forest Street or Lake Bellevue would have to cross-over from the southbound track to the northbound track and then re-cross the southbound track in a diamond. That’s admittedly kind of funky, but I think the angle between Stewart and Westlake is broad enough and Westlake wide enough that it wouldn’t be necessary.
Yes, some sort of MF would be needed for the stub in Interbay, but it would not need to do heavy repairs, just cleaning, storage and state-of-good-repair monitoring. The heavy stuff would happen at Forest Street or Lake Bellevue.
And remember, automated trains can run around the clock. Sure, between 10 PM and 5 AM most of the fleet would be parked and cleaned, but you don’t have to provide parking for 100% of the stub trains, more like 70%.
That’s not a huge difference, but it’s not nothing, either. Between 10 PM and 5 AM there is plenty of activity on First Hill at the hospitals, so this is a natural for automation.
> OK, yeah. The problem with that is the travel time is slow. You really aren’t much faster than a bus. Might as well just go with BRT.
The stub isn’t that much faster either? The alignment is basically the same until denny way. 15th ave and elliot ave can be elevated, there’s only 1 mile of at grade to westlake. The main cost factor is the tunnel not the elevated sections. The travel time from ballard to westlake is only 1 or 2 minutes longer.
WL, also I’m assuming that the “New Westlake” platforms would be as nearly directly below the Westlake Center platforms as possible. Obviously, there would need to be some headroom for construction of the new station box, so the tracks might be forty vertical feet apart. The actual platforms would probably be south of Pine to make the entire station closer to the high rises along Fifth and Sixth south of Union.
There would be stairs and escalators from the ends of the existing platforms directly down to the new center platform. I know that demising a pedestrian entrance at the east ends of the platforms in Westlake Center is a difficult thing because of the enormous weight of the Westlake Center station box, but that is the optimum plan if it can be done. The northside approach would pass over the southbound stub track and then have a pair of escalators and a staircase that slants north to a reversing mezzanine where folks would pivot to another bank of escalators and another staircase down to the north end of the center platform of the stub trackway. A transfer would require a two-level change rather than a seven-level maze.
From the south platform extension the escalators and stairways could just go diagonally down directly to the new platform. This would separate movements between the two existing platforms and the new center platform for better circulation.
I wish there was a way to attach a photo or diagram to these posts.
Given that Sixth rises to University, I believe that the major depth constraint for the northernmost First Hill station would be the undercrossing of I-5. It rises toward Madison also, but not as much as Sixth, so the undercrossing might be maybe thirty feet higher than the platforms? Something like that.
So the northernmost station near Virginia Mason might be in the hundred foot range, but any others farther south could be shallower.
But you end up on First. While, yes, that’s really nice for folks headed to the Market — which would be massively impacted by having a regional metro right outside its front door instead of just a tiny streetcar — it sucks for folks headed to the office core. It’s easily two-hundred and fifty vertical feet between First and Marion and Columbia Center. It is a SLOG.
Folks in Ballard and West Seattle celebrated when their buses shifted to Third Avenue. Maybe not so much now with all the tweakers, but originally it was very popular.
> But you end up on First. While, yes, that’s really nice for folks headed to the Market — which would be massively impacted by having a regional metro right outside its front door instead of just a tiny streetcar — it sucks for folks headed to the office core. It’s easily two-hundred and fifty vertical feet between First and Marion and Columbia Center. It is a SLOG.
Yes but the current plan is also to build the light rail on 5th so it’s the same two blocks away from the 3rd avenue.
For the exact avenue of 1st, 2nd, 4th or 5th this is a bit more of personal preference. I didnt want to overcomplicate the at grade idea but 4th/5th were alternative alignments for the streetcar the awkward part is how to go through cid to reach sodo but beyond that it’s just following the west Seattle current link proposal rather than on 1st.
The main point is a second tunnel should just be deferred. Even the stub idea really is just deferring the tunnel to be dug from the opposite direction as well and opting for transfers at westlake. My suggestion is might as well just through run it to west Seattle.
The elevation challenge is real for First Hill.
The grades that a steel wheel vehicle can handle is less than a rubber tired vehicle. This is why having electric trolley buses are the best solution from a technology standpoint.
In the abstract, there are really only a few ways to address this using steel wheels:
1. Circuitous routing to moderate the grade change. This was the idea behind the FHSC. It should have been successful except the project was not ultimately designed to achieve a reasonable transit speed. (And let’s be clear that the blame goes partly to McGinn plus bicycle advocates with the insistence of Broadway bicycle tracks after the Broadway alignment was decided.)
2. Cable pulled technology. That was the first solution created by the initial cable cars. This is the notion behind inclines aka funiculars.
3. Deep stations. This is the current ST approach. As we know, the time to access a deep platform makes short distance trips impractical from a journey travel time effort. The failure of the SF Chinatown Station to attract riders is a case study in why deep stations are a problem.
4. A hybrid of aerial and subway alignments. This option has not be studied. In the past, I’ve noted that if the transfer point is moved from Westlake to Capitol Hill this option appears somewhat feasible:
– shallow cut and cover between Elliott and Seattle Center
– aerial between Seattle Center and the I-5 hillside (like above Mercer St)
– subway between an I-5 portal north of Denny to a station shallower than the current Link tunnel and a mezzanine station connection to Capitol Hill station (Note this could cross above the current tunnel below Capitol Hill either north or south of the station)
– subway someday extending to a shallow First Hill Station
– a terminal station someday added at the proposed HSR station near I-90 and I-5 ( accompanied by an infill 2 Line station also near the I-5 crossing and 12th Ave bridge where the tracks run north of I-90 lanes)
There is another aerial and subway combo option and that is to move the monorail and use that alignment. The monorail could be moved to offer a tourist experience elsewhere and the current monorail structures (built in 1962 and will be 80 years old in 2042 as a likely Ballard link opening year) could be replaced with a light rail structure — with some rethinking of how to connect at Westlake and maybe First Hill.
WL, the towers are mostly on Fourth, Fifth and Sixth, not Third. Fifth is a LOT better for office workers up near the freeway. There is a lot of Class A office footage up there. Some of it is unoccupied at this time, but you can be double-damn betcha certain that when the existing leases end and the prices fall for new lessees, there will be a lot of folks moving into those posh offices. It’s the “B’s” and “C’s” on Second and Third that will suffer the most.
So yes, Fifth is a MUCH better alignment for a regional metro. I do agree that a line on First Avenue would much better serve the big cluster of apartments north of Battery between First and Alaskan Way. There should be a rail line along there to serve them. But a branch of the CCC is much more appropriate for the demand and the neighborhood. At grade Link would be better on Third which is a wider street.
Al, the First Hill ETB’s all used to turn on Sixth and run up to Seneca where they turned left. Then the James/Cherry lines turned right at Ninth to head down to Harborview. It’s NOT STEEP that way.
From Sixth and Pine the easiest grade to First Hill is straight southeast under Sixth to just north of University, curve under the courtyard for One Union Square and diagonal up the hill passing under the freeway about Seneca. You’d be going somewhat across the street grid to Boren, but deep enough to pull it off. Have a station at Ninth and Boren for Virginia Mason and Swedish then go South to Harborview and Yesler Village. You could serve most of First Hill with two stations.
I do like the funicular idea for Harborview, but buses stopping on the steep east-west hills are not adequate transit.
“(And let’s be clear that the blame goes partly to McGinn plus bicycle advocates with the insistence of Broadway bicycle tracks after the Broadway alignment was decided.)”
The same thing that happened to RapidRide J (Eastlake). And 35th Ave NE, NE 65th Street, and 23rd were also watered down after the decision to improve transit there — non-transit factors whittled away at the improvements substantially. And now CID2 station is facing the same thing.
Al, I like your “hybrid of aerial and subway alignments” thinking! Yes, 3d planning is challenging. (Tom, I like your Virgina Mason approach, too, but I’m concerned about curves and elevation changes.)
Going over Hwy99 seems to make more sense than going under and having a deep station next to the highway. A station could even straddle the highway and therefore allow pedestrian access and bus transfers on both sides of the highway. Entering CapHill east of I-5 should be easier than diving under I-5. The line could then turn south and could go up to connect with the CapHill station right above the 1 line. From there it could continue on the east side of Broadway with another station by Swedish or Harborview and then follow Boren, may be even come to the surface again and ultimately serve Judkins and Mt Baker station. It may even provide a single-track connection to the 1 line to connect to the OMF.
Martin, it sounds like you’re proposing elevated across SLU and then a dive into Capitol Hill after crossing just above the freeway. Am I understanding correctly? This might be a good solution with the following caveats:
1) I believe you would be proposing having the new tunnel through Capitol Hill pass above the Spine bores. Would that be deep enough to clear the parking sub-basements of adjacent apartments?
2) You say “along the east side of Broadway”. How far east? Virginia Mason is three blocks west of Broadway, so that puts a station at Madison a bit far for it.
3) You mention coming back up to elevated somewhere south of Harborview for a run down Rainier to Judkins Park and Mt. Baker. I agree strongly on that, and have proposed it in passing several times in the past.
So the primary differences between this and a Westlake-connected stub following the BLE proposed path is that it is elevated through SLU and connects at CHS instead.
This would serve SLU differently. You couldn’t go elevated over Denny; there isn’t enough room for four lanes of traffic and the supports. So the Westlake station would be somewhere at John or north, a bit far from the primary cluster of buildings south of Denny straddling Westlake. If one did use John, though it would put a potential Fairview station right next to the very large cluster of buildings adjacent to the freeway just south of Denny. That would be a big plus.
The problem with passing through SLU in the air, though, is that the retaining wall on the east side of I-5 is not tall enough for the elevated to clear the freeway and dive below Melrose. There isn’t anywhere north of Denny that the retaining wall is tall enough for the train to pass under Melrose. The street would have to be closed and the tunnel portal placed in the block of the east-west street that the elevated is following between Melrose and Bellevue no matter where you cross SLU.
So that’s probably a full stop; Melrose to the north of the closure would be “orphaned”.
The alternative, of course, would be to step down from the elevated west of I-5 and underrun the freeway. That adds an unknown extra cost depending how far west of I-5 the transition is made, but there is a bit of a hill up to Eastlake that would ease the transition. However, every street north of John is already pretty well built out. If ST jumped right now to buy the two half-blocks on either side of Yale between John and Denny east of the substation, it might conceivably be done there by closing Yale. But I’m sure the opportunity to purchase that land will be gone within a few years.
So I think that you’ll have to end up with a tunnel across SLU and the “Metro Eight” half-box only farther west than 23rd. It’s a solid idea, but I don’t see how it is viable with an aerial SLU crossing. Also, I don’t know if CHS has the platform capacity to be the primary transfer point. Westlake Center’s platforms are the biggest in the system.
Read below for a radical proposal for West Seattle.
Tom… While I can’t speak for Martin, he was commenting on an idea that I presented. So here are some answers:
“1) I believe you would be proposing having the new tunnel through Capitol Hill pass above the Spine bores. Would that be deep enough to clear the parking sub-basements of adjacent apartments?”
The bore alignment would have to be studied. However, it needs to be mentioned that a big reason for the current Capitol Hill Station depth is because tracks east of Westlake are so deep and run under I-5 as opposed to solely avoiding foundations. We just don’t know whether or not it could be engineered. The separate level for subway line track overcrossing could be anywhere from Mercer and 11th Ave to Boylston and Pike so that’s a wide distance to hone in where to put a crossing.
“2) You say “along the east side of Broadway”. How far east? Virginia Mason is three blocks west of Broadway, so that puts a station at Madison a bit far for it.”
Again, it’s just a general concept. The exact stations would need study. Where a First Hill station vault goes depends on where a bore is feasible (your first point). I will add here that an automated train has a smaller station vault as the more frequent trains do not need 400 feet long platforms. I will also mention that both the Harborview and Swedish/ Providence facilities appear much larger than Virginia Mason. Finally, the back side of Virginia Mason is just one block (less than 300 feet) from Madison St so any station entrance between I-5 and Broadway around Madison puts Virginia Mason easily within walking distance.
“3) You mention coming back up to elevated somewhere south of Harborview for a run down Rainier to Judkins Park and Mt. Baker. I agree strongly on that, and have proposed it in passing several times in the past.”
The extension of an automated line southward could have a portal in several places. First Hill is steep when coming from the south and there are a number of north-south streets that already do not connect because of the steepness. I will opine that it’s good to think this through even if the extension stops further north initially because of cost.
It actually seems possible in one scenario to ultimately connect back to West Seattle Link and convert that branch line to being fully automated once a connection finally gets open. But again that’s just one of many ways to lay out a rail network.
A much different scenario could extend an automated stub from Ballard and SLU to Capitol Hill into an imagined Metro 8 corridor.
Or both branch paths could be built later.
The one big concept change is simply moving transfers from Westlake to Capitol Hill, enabling the SLU segment to be built above ground with good transfers from a station straddling Aurora. That has tradeoffs for sure. It also has system implications for how the SLU streetcar line and RapidRide work. But it could open up many new ways to connect an automated Ballard line to First Hill without wrestling with the elevation challenges of going under the current DSTT then serving a deep station up on the hill then going back below the current light rail tracks a second time near the CID.
Al, the crossing on the new line can’t be at 11th and Mercer or Boylston and Pike, because a station by those place would be a HUGE hike to CHS. The platforms for a new station would have to be directly adjacent to the existing ones and very preferably across them at one end or the other so that only one vertical movement needs to be made between the two platforms.
That practically means the platforms for a new line have to run between Broadway and 10th either along John or between Denny and Howell. Of the two choices, the southern placement is much better because it gets the turn to the south started earlier. Also, a part of Cal Anderson could (again) become a staging site.
Also, the easternmost point that I know of in Virginia Mason is at Spring and Boren, a long way from Madison and Broadway. So I’d think that swinging west to Madison and Minor would be better. Then go straight south to Harborview. And, “Yes, Virginia Mason is less important than Swedish.”
I grant that going “across the grid” like this means that stations have to be deeper. But just going down Broadway would be missing the heart of First Hill.
I agree about planning for an exit to the south of First Hill and preserving it.
See my big post at the bottom for how to get to West Seattle from Harborview on First Hill without freaking out the Pioneer Square and International District preservationists or proposing impossible gradients.
I can’t comment on heights and engineering angles, but from a passenger perspective, a Ballard line serving Capitol Hill instead of Westlake would raise several interesting opportunities from an urbanist-pedestrian perspective, but also have some drawbacks that would generate strong opposition.
Capitol Hill Station is a proven success, with ridership in the top three existing stations. There’s a wide variety of commercial, residential, and other destinations within walking distance, and a north-south bus route could extend that reach further. First Hill is at the periphery of the walkshed, and any destination is either almost flat or at worst a much smaller climb than from 3rd Avenue to First Hill.
However, Westlake Station is widely considered to be the center of the city, and its walkshed is the major retail district, highrises, tourist attractions, Pike Place Market, and the most bus routes to the most places. So it would be hard to convince the board to route the Ballard line to Capitol Hill instead of Westlake, and many people would say that’s a crazy and counterproductive idea.
It would also be hard to square with the ST3 ballot measure. The mandate is to serve specific urban centers, even if the routing or stations between them are more flexible. The most must-serve walksheds are Westlake, SLU, Ballard, and CID. CID/N and CID/S are entertained because the supposedly “serve” the CID; i.e., are in walking distance of most of it (so they say). A future vote could change things, but those are the strongest mandates at this point.
However, a Ballard-Westlake stub doesn’t contradict ST3, it just implements part of it. So it’s similar to when ST2 south was truncated from 272nd to 200th due to South King’s revenue loss in the 2008 crash. And it includes all the walksheds stated above except CID, and it include the all-important Westlake. So this is what would be easiest to get the board to approve and ST’s lawyers to say it’s legal.
But, a stub could end up pointing toward First Hill for future expansion in ST4+. Or it could possibly point toward both First Hill and 5th Avenue, so that ST could argue it’s consistent with ST3’s downtown assumption.
The next issue might be that ST would say it can’t spend resources on stubs for non-voter-approved projects (First Hill) when it hasn’t finished all the voter-approved projects (5th Avenue). That’s the roadblock we ran into with U-District Station. We wanted an interface stub to a future east-west line (the Ballard-UW(-Redmond?) line). When I brought that up in an open house, the ST representative said ST couldn’t spend money on a stub because the east-west line hadn’t been voter-approved yet, and it may not even go to that station. (At the time there was an alternative along Northlake Way to UW Station and 520.)
So I would most support a Ballard-Westlake stub, and try to get an option for a future First Hill extension into it, because that has the most chance of getting board approval of all these alternatives.
“Al, the crossing on the new line can’t be at 11th and Mercer or Boylston and Pike, because a station by those place would be a HUGE hike to CHS. ”
I believe you misunderstood me. Where the tracks cross doesn’t require a station. In fact it makes it easier to have the lines cross if there is not a station at that exact point!
Instead, a new platform connected to and within walking distance to the CHS mezzanine would be added. For example, if it crosses north of CHS the platform can be placed under where the tennis courts are on the east side of Nagel Place with a mezzanine connection into Capitol Hill Station.
When folks like me were making the case for a second bus tunnel (West Side Bus Tunnel) I believe it was Frank who came up with a very nice graphic. He basically had circles around the areas that were slow, while everything else was fast. The bus tunnel, of course, would be where the buses are slow.
This idea is the opposite. Downtown is where the buses are slow. The train would be just as slow. So now you are basically asking everyone to transfer to a train that would travel no faster than their old bus.
Why? Capacity? Is the C is overloaded right now? No. In fact it peaks out at 7.5 minute frequency. Same with the H. Capacity isn’t the issue, and this would be a degradation for just about all the trips (not just most of them).
If it is on the surface, you can forget about automation. This means it isn’t especially frequent. So now you are transferring from a bus that runs every ten minutes to a train that runs every ten minutes most of the day. Even at peak you are probably running 7.5 minutes on each. There won’t be integrated stations, where the bus platform is right by the train platform. This not only makes the transfer worse, but it makes timing the connection more difficult. The West Seattle buses are long. It takes a while to get from the end to the station. This adds variance. Thus you have to account for the range in walking times between the bus stop and train platform while also adding in plenty of float. The end result is a lot of waiting for a train that remember, is not particularly fast.
I’ve explained most of it above in my response to Mike but I’ll repeat it.
> This idea is the opposite. Downtown is where the buses are slow. The train would be just as slow. So now you are basically asking everyone to transfer to a train that would travel no faster than their old bus.
> If it is on the surface, you can forget about automation. This means it isn’t especially frequent. So now you are transferring from a bus that runs every ten minutes to a train that runs every ten minutes most of the day.
If you are talking about a stub how is that any different than transferring at westlake from ballard to seatac? I didn’t want to complicate too much, but one can also add back in the fremont (westlake) if you’re talking about slu and it’s still well affordable. The only real travel time that is longer is for going from ballard to west seattle.
> Why? Capacity? Is the C is overloaded right now? No. In fact it peaks out at 7.5 minute frequency. Same with the H. Capacity isn’t the issue, and this would be a degradation for just about all the trips (not just most of them).
Regarding frequency, part of the problem why Sound Transit is so hesitant to have higher frequency is because of such long train routes to everett/lynnwood or tacoma into the suburbs. If the line is only from ballard to west seattle much higher frequency really isn’t as much of a problem. From lynnwood to seatac is like 67ish minutes while ballard to west seattle at grade (1st) would be 34 minutes.
Lastly, it is actually affordable and buildable. With the current approach what is going to be built is the west seattle tunnel and a tunnel to westlake not even interbay and then run out of money.
I disagreed with a certain someone else on many issues, but they did rightly point out this project is severely overbudget and cuts are going to happen. I’m not sure why we keep pretending sound transit actually has the money to build the current preferred alignment.
“Is the C is overloaded right now? No. In fact it peaks out at 7.5 minute frequency. Same with the H.”
Again, frequency is not capacity! The reason the C and H have their frequency is largely arbitrary and based on other factors than load. Link and other bus routes are in the same situation. It’s a combination of agencies not understanding what excellent transit networks in other industrialized countries are like, or thinking that it’s “convenient enough” for what riders should expect, or there’s a revenue shortage or driver shortage that prevents the agency from delivering the full service it thinks the corridor needs… so it has to divide up a fixed pie and choose which corridors to underserve.
Increasing frequency also generates more ridership. At some point there’s diminishing returns, but that point is more like 6 minutes, not 8 or 10 or 15 or 30.
“part of the problem why Sound Transit is so hesitant to have higher frequency is because of such long train routes to everett/lynnwood or tacoma into the suburbs.”
That’s speculation; ST has never said that. It has keptdaytime/evening frequency at a minimum of 10 minutes for Link’s entire time except during the lockdown and short-term maintenance, even though most American light rails have 15 minutes or sometimes even 30 minutes. And its plans assume it will continue 10 minutes to Everett and Tacoma, and two-line 5 minutes to 128th (Mariner). Maybe it will eventually turn back more trains at Lynnwood, Northgate, or Federal Way, but there’s no indication it might reduce service in the core. As to why it won’t increase the current service to 6 minutes all day or peak, it won’t say. At most it seems to be it won’t do it until trains reach some threshold of fullness. And because of the temporary train/base shortage in Lynnwood Link’s upcoming first phase.
“they did rightly point out this project is severely overbudget and cuts are going to happen. I’m not sure why we keep pretending sound transit actually has the money to build the current preferred alignment.”
We don’t know when or how much the cuts might happen, so it’s useless to plan for you don’t know what. ST seems determined to continue as-is with delays until it hits a brick wall, which may not happen for several years. Then it might be willing to consider things it won’t consider now, and we have several suggestions ready for that. (Cancel DSTT2, automate Ballard or Ballard-West Seattle, West Seattle BRT, etc.)
There’s no point in not following ST’s official opening dates, even when we suspect they’ll probably slide further. Because we don’t know for sure, and we have no other dates that are more definite. It’s useful to assume the full East Link will open in 2025, the West Seattle Stub in 2032, and Ballard in 20239, even though we expect they’ll probably slip again, because it helps in planning and which decade or generation it will occur in — if it happens at all.
I really wanted a Ballard line to fix the 30-45 minute overhead of getting to Ballard from the regional transfer points (downtown and U-District). But seeing how badly the recent changes might serve Ballard riders (long downtown transfers, 14th station), I’ve started thinking that maybe it’s OK to cancel it and fall back to bus improvements. And I’ve always thought West Seattle Link was unnecessary and multi-line BRT will be fine. So at worst, that’s what I assume the fallbacks would be, if ST someday decides Ballard or West Seattle can’t be delivered or its timeline has gotten too far. Whether that happens in 2039 or 2042 or 2050 doesn’t really matter. Even 2039 is 14 years away, so I’ll have to make other live/work arrangements for 1 1/2 decades, and I’ll be over 70 then so over retirement age. My entire working live will have been without Ballard Link — but at least I finally got Northgate and Rainier/SeaTac for the last quarter of it, and Redmond and Lynnwood for the last fifth. Other people face similar things and are having to make similar decisions.
@Mike
> That’s speculation; ST has never said that. It has kept daytime/evening frequency at a minimum of 10 minutes for Link’s entire time except during the lockdown and short-term maintenance, even though most American light rails have 15 minutes or sometimes even 30 minutes.
It’s not speculation. The operational cost would be quite high to run 6 minute frequency trains all day from everett to tacoma.
For the higher frequency I’m talking in reference to the automation stub, not saying that Sound Transit has done badly so far. In general low frequency caused by long suburban extensions, this is also a very common problem for many other US regional light rails/subways that have far flung extensions. Both BART and dc wmata talk about trying to put in some turnback or loop so they can run more urban frequency in the core. Because every time they run an additional train it needs to travel really really far before heading back. Alternatively just have ballard to west seattle line so its all contained and frequency can be increased independently.
> And its plans assume it will continue 10 minutes to Everett and Tacoma, and two-line 5 minutes to 128th (Mariner).
That’s not actually what Sound Transit promises. It just offers a range of 10 to 15 minutes. And rightly so, I don’t see why we should sacrifice the urban core frequency to run so many trains so far. Though feel free to correct me if there’s some other documents stating otherwise. But all the promises I’ve seen are regarding peak commuting hours not midday.
“Every 4-6 minutes during peak commuting hours, 10-15 minutes midday, weekends, and evenings.” And this is not outlined in
https://www.soundtransit.org/system-expansion/everett-link-extension
> As to why it won’t increase the current service to 6 minutes all day or peak, it won’t say.
I’m not sure why we are speculating why? It is quite obvious why similar to all other transit agencies. It is trying to minimize number of train drivers and it is also running out of train cars (4-car) due to the length of the travel time for the route since it’s been lengthened.
The Everett to Tacoma line is basically an RER line length at that point, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it ran at RER 15 minute frequencies as well.
Again, frequency is not capacity!
Sometimes it is! Look, if the buses were full, and they were leaving people on the sidewalk, they would run the bus more often. This is why they used to run buses every three minutes on Lake City Way (towards downtown). That had nothing to do with giving riders a better experience, and everything to do with capacity.
My point is, that clearly isn’t the case in West Seattle. There is no reason to believe we need extra capacity. It is quite possible that we have excess capacity on every bus from West Seattle, all day long. Running every 7.5 minutes means they aren’t that crowded. Not even close.
I have mentioned it before, but the fundamental advantage of rail is bigger capacity. That’s it. It would be quite reasonable for Vancouver to run a streetcar (or light rail) along Broadway, simply because the buses are so crowded. They skipped a step, and are going to run a subway.
Likewise, the reason so many cities run subways (not bus tunnels) is similar. Once you build the new infrastructure, you attract riders, because the trip is so fast. With the addition of new riders, you begin to overload buses in a busway.
That simply isn’t the case with West Seattle. There just isn’t enough demand to justify a streetcar-type system, which is what this would be. I call it that, because like a lot of streetcars, it would be no faster than a bus.
>> Again, frequency is not capacity!
> Sometimes it is! Look, if the buses were full, and they were leaving people on the sidewalk, they would run the bus more often. This is why they used to run buses every three minutes on Lake City Way (towards downtown). That had nothing to do with giving riders a better experience, and everything to do with capacity.
Agreed, I mean that’s how the 2/3 car link trains originally got higher frequency before the 4 car trains came. That’s also why the at-grade with 2-car link trains/streetcars I find is fine, one can just run more link trains rather than 4-car trains every 10/15 minutes especially if its just ballard to west seattle.
> That simply isn’t the case with West Seattle. There just isn’t enough demand to justify a streetcar-type system, which is what this would be.
I mean I agree West Seattle transit wise would be better off with a BRT system. But that’d be politically too far to drop it entirely so I have to come up with something more amenable.
> I call it that, because like a lot of streetcars, it would be no faster than a bus.
One can still build the elevated segments on 15th ave and sodo/west seattle. It’d be just as fast besides a short section from lower queen anne to downtown.
There’s baseline frequency and higher frequency. Those are two different policies.
Baseline frequency is to ensure a minimum level of service so that people don’t have to wait longer than that. Because the wait time determines whether some trips are viable for some people, whether the implied transfers are acceptable, how competitive transit is with driving, how attractive transit is, and how satisfied passengers are.
Additional frequency is to cope with crowding when baseline frequency isn’t enough.
Metro and ST do this. Many routes have a daytime/Saturday baseline frequency of 15 minutes. Metro’s metrics say that some of these are underservice. It said the 36 needed more frequency for a decade until it got it. It also said that some corridors should have 10 minute service. This was fulfilled when Seattle’s TBD gave it funding to raise the 45, 48, 65, and 67 to 10 minutes from 2016 to 2019, and the 49 from 15 to 12 minutes, and the 8 evenings from 30 to 20 minutes. I believe that 20 minutes means, “We think it should be 15 minutes but we can only afford 20 at this time”, and 12 minutes means, “We think it should be 10 minutes but we can only afford 12 minutes at this time.”
Additional frequency is added peak hours on the D and others to cope with crowding. The 15, 218, and 322 exist partly for the same reason: to relieve peak crowding on the D, 554, and 522. Without those routes, there would have to be more frequency on the D, and ST might just leave busloads of people behind on the 554 and 522 because ST Express is not designed for that.
So when Ross says the current frequency is the optimal frequency, that’s just wrong, and it throws all the passengers and potential passengers in that corridor under the bus. He’s applying “additional frequency” standards to “baseline frequency”. Baseline frequency is what it is because of revenue constraints, the driver shortage, maintenance worker shortage, supply-chain delays for bus parts, Metro’s arbitrary decisions, and Metro’s not-fully-enlightened policies.
“It’s not speculation. The operational cost would be quite high to run 6 minute frequency trains all day from everett to tacoma… It is quite obvious why similar to all other transit agencies.”
But you’re guessing what the implications are for Link. You’re guessing what the cost would be, how that relates to the budget, and how big the negative impact would be of doing it. And I’m not even talking about 6-minute frequency to Everett or Tacoma because nobody has proposed that. I’m talking about some people asserting that ST won’t keep 10-minute service to Everett or Tacoma. There’s no evidence of that. People are just saying ST will reduce it to 20 or 30 minutes, without evidence, and claiming the costs are too high, as if ST’s accountants have said that, when they haven’t.
So now you are transferring from a bus that runs every ten minutes to a train that runs every ten minutes most of the day.
If you are talking about a stub how is that any different than transferring at westlake from ballard to seatac?
Because trips to the airport aren’t that common, and the Ballard Stub would run more often. That is really the basic selling point of the stub: Smaller trains, smaller stations, trains running more often. But my example was West Seattle. Riders have to take a 10-minute bus, then a 10-minute train, just to get anywhere outside of West Seattle! Never mind the airport. Downtown, Uptown, Ballard — they all require a 10-minute bus and a 10-minute transfer. Meanwhile, to get to places like the UW, Capitol Hill or Northgate? They have all that and another transfer on top of it. Same with anywhere else in the city (First Hill, Central Area, Fremont). Places like Lake City have three transfers (although at least one of them is to a train running frequently).
Regarding frequency, part of the problem why Sound Transit is so hesitant to have higher frequency is because of such long train routes to everett/lynnwood or tacoma into the suburbs. If the line is only from ballard to west seattle much higher frequency really isn’t as much of a problem. From lynnwood to seatac is like 67ish minutes while ballard to west seattle at grade (1st) would be 34 minutes.
Right, but the trains don’t go to Lynnwood right now. Yet they have been running every ten minutes midday for as long as I can remember. Sure, they might run them every six minutes if they ended in Rainier Valley, but I’m skeptical.
In contrast, look at Vancouver. The travel times vary from 26 to 41 minutes. Midday, they are remarkably similar. Even on places where there are branches, they run the trains every six minutes (on each branch). That means they are running every three minutes most of the way. For the Expo Line (where trains take 40 minutes on each branch) that means running a lot of trains, all to give riders at the handful of stations outside of the branch good midday headways. How do they get away with running the trains so often? Automation.
Obviously there are other factors. Ridership per service hour, for example. If this is low during midday the agency may shortchange riders (creating a negative service-ridership cycle). You could make the case that this is the problem with Link, and always has been. But I don’t see the Ballard-West Seattle line having more riders per service hour than the main line, now that it serves Northgate. Even if it did, it wouldn’t be a lot higher. It is worth noting that peak is different than midday. Peak determines how many train cars you need to buy — midday does not. With midday, it is about wear and tear (on the trains and track) as well as operator costs. You are absolutely right — the shorter the better. But if you eliminate the operator, things do become a lot cheaper. I just don’t see each branch of the Expo line running every six minutes in the middle of the day without automation.
If you build an automated stub, then it is highly likely it runs frequently. It would be designed with that in mind from the very beginning. In contrast, if we run without an automated system, we are just hoping that ST will run the trains more often. Maybe they do, or maybe they feel like running every ten minutes is good enough (like they do now).
Lastly, it is actually affordable and buildable.
As is a stub. Run the trains from Ballard to Westlake, aiming right towards First Hill. For that matter, plan on having First Hill open with the rest of it, which means at worst you open that station a while later. The tracks would again be aiming towards more of First Hill — areas of the city that make sense to serve with rail (e. g. Yesler Terrace). Just keep going until you make additional connections (at Judkins Park and Mount Baker Station).
Meanwhile, West Seattle at worst has what they have been begging for: a connection to the main line (through downtown to the UW and beyond). Will they come to their senses (like Kirkland) and realize it makes way more sense to invest in bus infrastructure? Or will they be like Tacoma, Everett and Issaquah, and think the only way to a better transit future is via light rail? Who knows. What is clear is that this approach is simply better than what they have planned.
> “It’s not speculation. The operational cost would be quite high to run 6 minute frequency trains all day from everett to tacoma… It is quite obvious why similar to all other transit agencies.”
> But you’re guessing what the implications are for Link. You’re guessing what the cost would be, how that relates to the budget, and how big the negative impact would be of doing it.
It is not a guess but a fact. If Sound Transit cannot afford to run 6 minute mid day frequency right now from Seatac to Northgate (26 miles) there is zero chance it can do so with the expanded 116 mile network.
> And I’m not even talking about 6-minute frequency to Everett or Tacoma because nobody has proposed that. I’m talking about some people asserting that ST won’t keep 10-minute service to Everett or Tacoma. There’s no evidence of that.
Either way the insistence on running all the way to Tacoma will limit the frequency of the ballard segment. That is the main point I am making clear. Even if the ballard segment could support say 6 minute frequency mid day, it’d most likely be capped at say 10 minute frequency mid day since the train would need to run an extra hour down to tacoma.
> People are just saying ST will reduce it to 20 or 30 minutes, without evidence, and claiming the costs are too high, as if ST’s accountants have said that, when they haven’t.
Link is no longer just an urban light rail but transforming into a regional rail, of course lower frequency is part of the sacrifice. I’m not sure why 15 minutes would be surprising for midday/evenings. Sound Transit’s own documentation says 15 minute intervals are what is suggested.
One can’t just say “we’re building a light rail” and suddenly that magically enforces higher frequency out to the suburbs. There’s a reason why lots of other cities have an urban subway (MTA, paris metro) that only travels 5~10 miles away from downtown and a separate regional rail system (lirr, RER) that travels further.
> Metro and ST do this. Many routes have a daytime/Saturday baseline frequency
Sure that’s fine with the system is only 14 miles from seatac to downtown or 26 miles from seatac to northgate. That baseline idea isn’t going to work when it’s 116 miles long. Especially since ridership will be a lot worse outside the core.
So when Ross says the current frequency is the optimal frequency
I never said that! Come on Mike — when have I ever said that running buses every 7.5 is optimal. I have said six minutes is ideal, across the board.
Additional frequency is to cope with crowding when baseline frequency isn’t enough.
Yes! And my point is, the buses aren’t running frequently, even when they might be dealing with crowding. I really think you entirely missed my point. Here it is, as simple as possible:
* We don’t need extra capacity for travel between West Seattle and Seattle.
How do I know this? Because we don’t run the buses frequently, even during peak. They aren’t running every two minutes. They aren’t running every four minutes. They aren’t even running every six minutes — a point at at which there would be some ambiguity — are they doing that to be nice to riders, or because the bus is crowded? No, they are running every 7.5 minutes! Clearly the buses aren’t crowded. If they were, they would run them more often.
If the West Seattle train is no faster than a bus and we don’t need the extra capacity, what is the point of running rail? At least the current plan gets riders to various parts of downtown a little bit faster. Not enough to make up for the transfer (and certainly not enough to justify the really high cost) but still a bit faster. A train that would basically mimic the existing bus (really fast from West Seattle to the outskirts of downtown, then slow through downtown) seems pointless.
Either way the insistence on running all the way to Tacoma will limit the frequency of the ballard segment. That is the main point I am making clear.
Probably. Theoretically they could have turnbacks, allowing the Ballard section to run twice as often. But there is also the real possibility they wouldn’t.
Of course all of this is speculation. Absolutely. But I think we all agree that if Ballard Link is tied with Tacoma Link, the best we can hope for is 10 minutes (midday). My guess is they turn back trains at SeaTac, so that Tacoma gets 20 minute headways, while the rest of the line gets 10. Or maybe they just swallow the extra cost, and run trains every 10 minutes to Tacoma. But I think it is highly unlikely they run trains more often than that, simply because they don’t do that now! Think about it. Right now, the line to Angle Lake (just a stone’s throw from SeaTac) runs every 10 minutes in the middle of the day. There have been no plans to change this. This is not a pandemic thing — this would be happening without it. Right now, the line is as efficient as it will ever be. The addition of Northgate Link has dramatically improved the ridership per mile. Huge numbers of riders now board north of Seattle, and it costs relatively little to service them. And yet, ST has no plans to run trains every 6 minutes midday. They have made it very clear that the best they will do is 7.5 minutes, and that is only during peak.
Things will get worse in the future. Lynnwood Link will add riders, but ridership per mile will go down. More to the point, swapping with Ballard Link won’t help. It will take roughly the same amount of time to go up to Ballard as it does to go Northgate, but it will get substantially fewer riders. I just don’t see them running trains every 6 minutes as long as the two lines are connected.
I also think it is far more likely that an automated Ballard stub has higher frequency. This is just the nature of automated transit. This would also be way more likely if it was the design from the very beginning, instead of just crossing our fingers, and thinking “maybe ST will run the trains more often, since this line isn’t so ridiculously long”.
> If you build an automated stub, then it is highly likely it runs frequently. It would be designed with that in mind from the very beginning.
I am not that against the stub, but one really needs to resolve the OMF issue and cannot handwave it away. It’s the same reason why the Ballard to U District idea was not moved forward with. Even in the original conceptual studies for westlake avenue or 15th avenue stub’s beyond the tunnels/elevated alignments the largest problem was finding an OMF site
“It is not a guess but a fact. If Sound Transit cannot afford to run 6 minute mid day frequency right now from Seatac to Northgate (26 miles)”
You don’t know that. It may just be intertia, or ST doesn’t think it needs the frequency. Even if the current operations budget couldn’t handle it, ST could reallocate a microscopic part of the capital budget and it would have plenty of money lots of frequency. Since most of the openings are years away and continue slipping further, and BLE is getting a horrible design, that would actually serve passengers better.
“Either way the insistence on running all the way to Tacoma will limit the frequency of the ballard segment.”
No it doesn’t. There will surely be a turnback at Federal Way and probably more closer.
There may also be a turnback at Stadium or SODO like the existing track has.
“Link is no longer just an urban light rail but transforming into a regional rail, of course lower frequency is part of the sacrifice. I’m not sure why 15 minutes would be surprising for midday/evenings.”
It’s not surprising but the two aren’t necessarily related. BART runs every 15 minutes on each branch and it’s regional rail.
“when have I ever said that running buses every 7.5 is optimal.”
You said: “There is no reason to believe we need extra capacity. It is quite possible that we have excess capacity on every bus from West Seattle, all day long. Running every 7.5 minutes means they aren’t that crowded.” You keep saying that the current Metro frequency is the right amount, and the reason Metro doesn’t run more frequency one one route or another is because it’s not needed. Metro’s off-peak frequency on the C and H and former 120 has fluctuated several times between 7.5 and 15 minutes, and the 120 even 30 minute weekends and 60-minute evenings. It wasn’t because demand kept going up and down by a proportional amount that triggered every change, it was because of other reasons.
“If the West Seattle train is no faster than a bus and we don’t need the extra capacity, what is the point of running rail?”
For Ballard, it’s because it’s a large urban village with a wide variety of destinations that many kinds of people go to. For West Seattle, it’s because Dow Constantine wants it and put his thumb on the scale.
“But I think it is highly unlikely they run trains more often than that, simply because they don’t do that now!”
It’s unlikely ST will change its current policies. But in ten or twenty or thirty years a lot of things can happen. Boardmembers can change their mind. Public sentiment can change, and there can be lots of calls and petitions from non-foamers asking it to do something. A city or county politician may start championing it and ST will listen to them. The board potentially changes every election and different people may be on the board in the future. All that is likely in a timeframe of a couple decades. We just don’t know what they’ll change or when, or whether it will be something we agree or disagree with. But there will doubtless be something, and probably several things.
“I also think it is far more likely that an automated Ballard stub has higher frequency. This is just the nature of automated transit.”
That’s the tendency, but they’re not necessarily related either. Automation gave Vancouver the ability to run Skytrain every 5 minutes until midnight, but it was TransLink’s decision that made it happen. It could have chosen not to. And with an agency with Sound Transit’s mentality, it’s not clear that it would choose to. I give ST credit for running Link every 10 minutes when other American light rails and BART run every 15 minutes. But the fact that it refuses to restore 6-minute peak frequency, or to consider 6-minute all-day frequency, or to upgrade DSTT for 3-minute trains and the capability of 1.5 minute trains, makes me wonder if it would run a Ballard line every 5 minutes even if it could.
“It’s the same reason why the Ballard to U District idea was not moved forward with.”
The reason it wasn’t moved forward was that Mayor Mike McGinn wanted Ballard-downtown first and squashed Ballard-UW’s chances in ST3.
>> It is not a guess but a fact. If Sound Transit cannot afford to run 6 minute mid day frequency right now from Seatac to Northgate (26 miles)”
> You don’t know that. It may just be intertia, or ST doesn’t think it needs the frequency. Even if the current operations budget couldn’t handle it, ST could reallocate a microscopic part of the capital budget and it would have plenty of money lots of frequency. Since most of the openings are years away and continue slipping further, and BLE is getting a horrible design, that would actually serve passengers better
You’re severely underestimating how much operations will cost in the coming years. Perhaps I don’t know it in the vein of maybe summer might be colder than winter next year. But it’s pretty guaranteed that they aren’t going to run midday/evenings any faster than 10min for the Tacoma/everett segments.
“But it’s pretty guaranteed that they aren’t going to run midday/evenings any faster than 10min for the Tacoma/everett segments”
What I object to is putting words in other people’s mouth. If someone say “I think this” or “I predict this”, that’s fine because it’s their opinion or estimate. But when they say “the ST board thinks X” or “ST is doing something because of Y” and I see no indication of that, then I’m bothered because it’s asserting something about somebody else’s thoughts or motivations that may not be true.
> What I object to is putting words in other people’s mouth. If someone say “I think this” or “I predict this”, that’s fine because it’s their opinion or estimate. But when they say “the ST board thinks X” or “ST is doing something because of Y” and I see no indication of that, then I’m bothered because it’s asserting something about somebody else’s thoughts or motivations that may not be true.
I’m not talking about Sound Transit board members personal motivations that prevent them from running 6 minute frequency midday from Tacoma to Everett. I am talking about the economic infeasibility. That is why I specifically referenced the route length.
I understand there’s the baseline idea for bus frequency, but this isn’t a bus route that King County metro can just run more frequency. The link light rail costs from “Light rail in 2021, according to Sound Transit’s annual report, cost $163 million dollars to operate” Going from 26 miles to 116 is x4.4 times the cost at $717 million. Sure that is a bit napkin math, and perhaps its a bit higher or lower but it’s not going to be cheap. To then run double the midday frequency or evening trains requires a lot more train drivers which isn’t cheap either.
To do so on such a long route is pretty much unheard of for a low density area route (everett/tacoma sections). Not even japan on their (medium sized cities) jr lines or france’s rer lines do so.
RMTransit has a different take on rail frequency. Run the trains as frequently as possible to leverage the investment in the infrastructure. $163 million is a small fraction of what we spent to build it. More frequency generates more ridership, and thus more support for future rail expansions.
It’s not like Link is in the middle of nowhere. It connects Seattle’s three largest urban centers, and a high-equity area, and the airport, and South King County’s highest-ridership corridor. So if it did have 6-minute frequency, that availability would be used.
Clearly that becomes less so in ultra-far extremes where no light rail has ever has gone before (i.e., Everett and Tacoma). But that’s what turnbacks are for. As to whether the capital cost of those ultra-far extremes are worth it then, I’ve long said that Link beyond Lynnwood and Federal Way is not necessary, so ST has the possibility of canceling them someday if it should ever decide to.
“I’m not talking about Sound Transit board members personal motivations that prevent them from running 6 minute frequency midday from Tacoma to Everett. I am talking about the economic infeasibility. That is why I specifically referenced the route length.”
It comes down to terminology then. I’m just saying that your wording sounded to me like putting words in ST’s mouth. Maybe adding some more “I think”, “I predict”, “I estimate”, “other cities show”, etc, can help avoid that impression.
@Mike
> RMTransit has a different take on rail frequency. Run the trains as frequently as possible to leverage the investment in the infrastructure. $163 million is a small fraction of what we spent to build it. More frequency generates more ridership, and thus more support for future rail expansions.
$163 million is from 2021 during the pandemic, I kinda just searched the first number in that comment. The normal operational cost would be probably around 300 million in today’s dollars, 2019’s operational cost was $250 million, 2023 forecast is 300 million.
https://www.soundtransit.org/sites/default/files/documents/2019-sound-transit-annual-report.pdf
https://www.soundtransit.org/sites/default/files/documents/2023-financial-plan-proposed-budget-book.pdf
> It comes down to terminology then. I’m just saying that your wording sounded to me like putting words in ST’s mouth. Maybe adding some more “I think”, “I predict”, “I estimate”, “other cities show”, etc, can help avoid that impression.
I keep trying to talk about the ballard to tacoma segment limiting frequency on the ballard side due to the length, but you are trying to talk about the existing segment’s frequency.
> It is not a guess but a fact. If Sound Transit cannot afford to run 6 minute mid day frequency right now from Seatac to Northgate (26 miles) there is zero chance it can do so with the expanded 116 mile network.
“I think” if Sound Transit ran 6 minute mid day frequency right now from Seatac to Northgate the operational budget would then eat into the capital budget. Though is this really a hypothetical? A 150~200 million dollar increase in annual operational costs would kill the budget. Over the next 15 years that’s like 2 billion dollars.
>> “It’s not speculation. The operational cost would be quite high to run 6 minute frequency trains all day from everett to tacoma… It is quite obvious why similar to all other transit agencies.”
> But you’re guessing what the implications are for Link. You’re guessing what the cost would be, how that relates to the budget, and how big the negative impact would be of doing it.
Mike this applies to all transit agencies. Like I can really add it if you want but would you say “‘I think’ Sound Transit runs double decker busses to save on operational costs”. WMATA and DC Metro doesn’t run 12/15 minute frequency off peak for fun. Neither do the other regional rails in other countries. 10 minute frequency mid day/evenings on the everett sections and tacoma sections would already be stretching the financials of sound transit to it’s breaking point.
> And I’m not even talking about 6-minute frequency to Everett or Tacoma because nobody has proposed that. I’m talking about some people asserting that ST won’t keep 10-minute service to Everett or Tacoma.
Well, I am talking about the Ballard to Tacoma line limiting the frequency on the ballard segment. My paragraph on that was:
> Regarding frequency, part of the problem why Sound Transit is so hesitant to have higher frequency is because of such long train routes to everett/lynnwood or tacoma into the suburbs. If the line is only from ballard to west seattle much higher frequency really isn’t as much of a problem.
“I also think it is far more likely that an automated Ballard stub has higher frequency. This is just the nature of automated transit.”
That’s the tendency, but they’re not necessarily related either.
To quote this article:
“Automation isn’t the only factor in greater frequency, but the two certainly appear to be closely related.”
My guess is other major factors are length, ridership, branching and grade separation. The longer the route (or more specifically, the total time of the route) the less often it runs. Overall ridership is important, but so too is the ridership during that period. Branches can work both ways. An agency may feel like each branch should have good frequency (which results in great frequency in the combined sections) or they can decide that the combined section is the core, and thus each branch runs half as often. SkyTrain is more like the former, while the Munich S-Bahn is more like the latter (with branches running every 20 minutes).
Here is the thing: An automated Ballard Spur would have everything going for it in terms of frequency. It would be:
1) Automated.
2) Short distance.
3) Good ridership per hour.
4) Fairly consistent ridership per hour.
5) No branching.
6) Grade separated.
It is quite possible that running trains more often would actually pay for itself (in terms of increased ridership). Of course is it possible that ST would decide that running trains every ten minutes midday is adequate, but that seems unlikely, especially if frequency was a key selling point (and it should be).
In contrast, running the trains more frequently on the existing lines would require a change in approach. What ST is doing right now is what many (if not most) American agencies would do. The frustrating part is that they are spending so much on expansion, and so little on running the trains frequently. But a cash-strapped agency would definitely run the trains every ten minutes midday, if not less often. The problem is the one that WL mentioned: the line is really long. Not only does this effect operational costs, but ridership as well. Midday trips from Angle Lake to Seattle are bound to be smaller than midday trips from Northgate to the UW, or Roosevelt to Capitol Hill. Then you have the branching, which will happen fairly soon. When you throw in the fact that it isn’t automated and is not grade separated in Rainier Valley, the current line has everything going against it in terms of frequency. It is disappointing, but not exactly shocking that the plan is to run trains every ten minutes, especially since they will combine for five minute frequency through the core of our system (in a couple years). I would love to see us take the SkyTrain approach, and run each branch every six minutes, but that would require a major change in mindset by the agency.
If Ballard Link is connected to SeaTac (and beyond) I think we’ll see what we see now: Ten minute midday headways. I don’t see any reason why they would change. If anything, it is worse. You’ve got a system with lower ridership-per-service-hour north of downtown, and much lower ridership-per-service-hour to the south. To the south it will be even more suburban, as the main all-day destination (SeaTac) is already served. Even if you turn back trains at SeaTac or Federal Way, you aren’t going to do better than ten minute midday headways, unless there is a major change in the way ST operates (and they become one of the few U. S. agencies willing to spend a lot extra on operations so they can improve rider experience).
The Ballard spur would have everything going for it in terms of frequency, whereas the current line has everything going against it. If you build the spur with a focus on frequency, it would have even more. I think it is quite likely you would see trains running every six minutes midday with the Ballard spur.
I should add that for political reasons, a spur would need to emphasize frequency. There is a degradation in terms of one-seat rides (at least until you connect to First Hill) but that can be made up for with better stations and better frequency. The former still requires a lot of nitty-gritty work, while the latter could be an implicit promise from the beginning.
““‘I think’ Sound Transit runs double decker busses to save on operational costs”.”
I think they’re doing it because the Pierce subarea wanted double-decker buses because some people think they’re cool or prefer them. Otherwise why don’t the King County and Pierce County routes have double-deckers too instead of articulated buses?
When I tried ST’s double-decker bus, I found I couldn’t stand or walk upright on the upper level, and I’m just average height (5’9″). It’s hard for me to walk while bent over, so I vowed never to go up there again. Then when I went to Everett a month ago and stayed on the lower level, I found that the raised seats over the wheels also have limited headroom, so it was hard to get in and out of them. So I hope the double-deckers don’t expand to other routes, and that I never have to get in one where the lower level is full and where the only lower seat is over a wheel.
“> Regarding frequency, part of the problem why Sound Transit is so hesitant to have higher frequency is because of such long train routes to everett/lynnwood or tacoma into the suburbs.”
“Sound Transit is hesitant” is a statement about ST’s thoughts and motivations. ST has never said that publicly that I’ve heard, so how do you know unless somebody on the board or staff told you?
I don’t see how high frequency in Ballard is related to the length of the line, because it’s possible to have a turnback at Stadium or elsewhere so that Ballard’s frequent trains don’t have to go all the way to Tacoma.
If I could try a more objective wording, I’d say “Sound Transit is apparently hesitant because…”. Or, I’m not sure how to word it well, but: “Long lines have high operating costs, and Tacoma can’t generate a lot of passengers, so the cost per passenger would be high. Too high for N-minute service in Ballard I think. ST may be hesitating to commit to more frequency because of this.” This expresses ST’s visible behavior, your thoughts, and third-party information/opinions, without making assertions about ST’s unspoken thoughts and motivations, which we don’t know.
> I don’t see how high frequency in Ballard is related to the length of the line, because it’s possible to have a turnback at Stadium or elsewhere so that Ballard’s frequent trains don’t have to go all the way to Tacoma.
The frequency of the Ballard-Tacoma line is directly correlated with the length of the line. If Sound Transit runs some overlay/second line on that route then sure the frequency can be decoupled but it has given zero indication that it is going to do so.
‘I think’ it’s lesser of an assumption that Sound Transit isn’t going to do something they’ve ever studied than that they’d continue the course of just maintaining the low frequency on the ballard segment.
It’s also more complicated on this segment compared to original tunnel. The original tunnel can quite easily have an (for example not a suggestion) overlay of say northgate to federal way and lynnwood to seatac with the middle northgate the seatac having double frequency. Or the east link split lynnwood to redmond and lynnwood to seatac. Even after the split the original tunnel can do say everett to west seattle and lynnwood/mariner to redmond.
The ballard to tacoma you’d either have to do 2 lines of ballard to seatac and ballard to tacoma? doing something like ballard to seatac and sodo to tacoma just places the doubled frequency from sodo to seatac. And the ballard segment cannot head to west seattle (as currently designed) as the southbound from ballard line would need to cross the northbound west seattle line to reach the southbound west seattle line.
For the record, there has been no additional schedule delay since Realignment in 2021, which determined a “target” delivery year of 2037 and an “affordable” delivery year of 2039. Based on the May 2023 Annual Program Review (part of the Realignment tracking process; https://www.soundtransit.org/st_sharepoint/download/sites/PRDA/FinalRecords/2023/Report%20-%202023%20Board%20Annual%20Program%20Review%2005-19-23.pdf), the 2037 delivery date is no longer feasible, and so the “affordable” 2039 delivery is now the active schedule. This assumes that formal design and permitting begins in 2026 (4 years of work), with pre-construction (demolition, etc.) starting in 2027. Design is planned to be complete in 2030, which will kick off 8 years of heavy civil.
Of course, again, that assumes the draft EIS results in an alignment and cost estimates that the Board and their constituents find palatable.
ope, that was meant as a reply to @WL.
> For the record, there has been no additional schedule delay since Realignment in 2021,
That’s fine, I agree I don’t think the delay matters too much. The ballard link is more waiting on funds, even if they had completed designs 3~5 years earlier they’d still be waiting.
More worryingly is if they wait too long and some building get’s built on whatever xyz site they choose. I’m still kind of astonished they don’t talk with the seattle zoning board to not approve apartments on the future sites.
The zoning board is more then ready to protect single family homes from shadow/traffic concerns but when it comes to the light rail somehow there’s no coordination?
We knew the recent decisions to study more options for CID and SLU would add a year or two to the planning, so if it’s now set at three years, that’s not much more. And it has a silver lining, because that gives more time to convince ST to do something more sensible, or for the board to turn over and get more members who are willing to consider it.
Agreed. At this point, the more delay the better. The plans are so poor that the last thing we need is someone saying “We can build it really fast. It will be terrible, but we can get it done right away.”
I definitely don’t feel that way about ST2 projects. The delays to East Link, Lynnwood Link and Federal Way Link (which was promised what, a decade ago?) are irritating. Same goes with the infill stations. 130th should have been built as part of Lynnwood Link, and Graham Street Station should be built as soon as possible.
“I’m still kind of astonished they don’t talk with the seattle zoning board to not approve apartments on the future sites.”
It’s not certain until ST makes a final alignment decision. All these preferred alignments are provisional and subject to change.
It did make a big strategic blunder in not pre-acquiring lots on Fauntleroy Way and 15th Ave NE before multistory buildings went up and land prices ballooned.
Thank you for sharing your experience on the trail. The city trail that I have walked the most is the north Seattle portion of the Interurban trail. Most people guess it is the Burke Gilman. But I have been on the Interurban more times. I used to work a block away from part of it in the early 2000’s. I have walked from the south entrance at about 109th and Fremont to a little north of 145th and back. I have also walked from the Sears parking lot near 155th St to 205th and Meridian. We walked back to Costco and took the Rapid Ride back to Sears sometimes. I also used to walk the Greenlake loop. I don’t know if they list that as an urban trail. But I count it. As a kid we used to walk down all those stairs from NW 85th St and 32nd NW to the beach. Across the street from the Gob Shop. That was the toughest walk for me. There is also a set of stairs at the end of NW 64th ST that used to be an access the BNSF tracks. It looks like it is part of the Burke Gilman Trail now. The stairs are now paved better with handrails and don’t dead end on a hill full of blackberry bushes. That is most of my urban trail experience.
There’s a streetcar exhibit somewhere along it; I forget exactly wear.
I usually take the Interurban North trail by taking the E to 160th. On the east side is a path going up to the ped bridge on 155th across Aurora. The trail continues south to 105th. Parts of it are off-road; other parts are on quiet Linden Ave N. It goes right behind the TOD behind Aurora between 140th and 135th, some of which is senior housing.
Going north the trail continues to 200th, and then there seems to be a gap and freeway blockage to Snohomish 242nd St SW, where it starts again to Lynnwood Transit Center and beyond. I’ve never been on those parts.
In the south end there’s another part of the Interurban Trail in Kent and Auburn. I walked that once but it’s straight and boring. More interesting trails there are the Green River trail, and the Soos Creek Trail from Lake Meridian Park (just north of bus 168) to SE 192nd Street (a mile east of bus 160 and future RapidRide I).
I used to ride the interurban north quite a bit. Once you get into SnohoCo it disappears and puts you on residential roads, and then reappears. Rince and repeat. Mostly low traffic roads, and it’s pretty pleasant, though you often feel like you are lost. Their is a stretch below high-tension (buzzing) power lines which is less great. It gets a little confusing getting into Lynnwood. You have to weave through some parking lots of strip malls and such. They claimed they were going to do some work to make it more continuous, in advance of the mighty trains arrival. No idea if they did.
How’s the Seattle Transit Hikers doing, asdf2? I went on some walks but stopped because I was logging in via Facebook and that wasn’t reliable and I stopped using Facebook and I never changed the login method, and then it got harder to walk long distances or up/down hills. But I still think it’s a great resource for walks like mine.
Feet First also has walks. They usually have a tour guide who talks about the corridor, and the walks are shorter (1 hour instead of 2-4 or more). I participated in several during Jane’s Walk, an annual international event honoring Jane Jacobs’s birthday in early May. One was in West Seattle (Admiral, Junction), one on Beacon Hill (Jefferson Park to Link), one at Kubota Garden, and one at Northgate Transit Center.
ST just shared: https://www.seattletimes.com/life/outdoors/visit-dozens-of-seattles-best-parks-on-this-olmsted-walking-route/
I had that article collected for the next open thread. All that route between the zoo and Seward Park is part of the Olmstead boulevard system. I didn’t know about the part west of the zoo or south of Seward Park.
And I wonder if they picked arbitrary streets between the zoo and the switchback road above Golden Gardens because I don’t know what’s special about them. When I rode my bike there, I went around the north end of Greenlake to Winona, and then took the little streets between 73rd and 85th to Ballard. Then I went west to 32st where the switchback road starts, and there’s also a stairway straight down if you’re walking.
The stairs on the west side of 32nd are the ones I mentioned before in the above comnent. It is a good excercise on the legs. I have not done a round trip on them for over 15 years. I could not do it now. I could maybe walk down and hire an Uber or Lyft driver to bring me back up. I might just lay down in the dog park near by. Just kidding.
And I wonder if they picked arbitrary streets between the zoo and the switchback road above Golden Gardens because I don’t know what’s special about them.
My guess is it was arbitrary, or even worse — chosen by Google Maps. For walking directions, Google is often flawed. They think some streets don’t go through (for pedestrians) when they do. Or they think you can’t cross at a particular spot, when it is really easy to. They also ignore aesthetics. It looks like they go on 65th and 80th much of the way. I wouldn’t. The side streets are much more pleasant. There is also the issue of hills (most people try to avoid them, although some people don’t care, or even welcome it).
From the corner of the zoo on 59th, I would probably cross Phinney (by the old doll shop, now a bakery) to Greenwood Avenue, then head north. That is a nice plateau, with views of the Olympics on a nice day. Greenwood eventually becomes the main drag, so you can dogleg again (and again) as you head north-northwest. That avoids the busy streets (although the commercial section of Phinney Ridge is relatively interesting and pleasant making it a nice and straightforward alternative). By going north, you avoid the steep hills. Just about anything works for going west. The big issue is crossing the busy streets. 75th is probably the safest option, and arguably just the best overall. That connects right into Sunset Hill Park — a nice little view spot. If you want a more direct path, then dogleg to 77th (via Loyal Heights Playfield) after crossing 15th. 77th is actually a better way to cross 24th. After that, just go straight west until 28th and head north to 80th. Cross 80th and pick up the diagonal Loyal Way NW, until it ends, close to the old Gob Shop. Cross 32nd and go down, down, down until you reach sea level. (By the way, I think it is funny how Jimmy mentioned the Gob Shop, and old-timers knew exactly what he was talking about.)
If I can reconstruct it, I probably biked west on 77th or 78th. They both go all the way from Greenlake past Greenwood Avenue to 8th Ave NW. Those streets are nicely quiet and small.
Here is what I think a First Hill stub that temporarily ends at Harborview/Yesler Village could become: the line to West Seattle as some have suggested.
But here’s the difference, it would come out of the hill next to the hillclimb run elevated east of the freeway to Dearborn, turn east to Rainier with a station somewhere near Rainier and Dearborn, run south in the center of Rainier to Judkins Park, another station at 23rd and then Mount Baker.
But it wouldn’t end there. Instead, a third tube would be bored north of the existing northbound Beacon Hill tunnel, with a platform placed between the existing northbound track and the new tunnel at BHS. Trains to West Seattle would interline with northbound Line 1 trains between a switch just east of the platforms at Mt. Baker, while trains from West Seattle would use the new tube. This means that the West Seattle line would be running “left-handed” through the tube, but that can be accommodated by raising the new tunnel’s portals at both ends in order to “weave” the tracks back to “normal” handedness, if it actually matters.
This would make Beacon Hill Station the main transfer point between this line and Line 1 for three of the four primary transfers between the lines and ease the placement of the new platforms at Mt Baker, since transfers there would be discouraged. Two of the four possible transfers at BHS — First Hill to RV south and the airport and RV south and the airport to First Hill — would be “cross-platform”. One, RV south and the airport to West Seattle would be “same-platform”. The fourth, West Seattle to RV south and the airport would be made at SoDo along with “express” transfers to the Spine for downtown-bound riders. Some riders headed to Westlake or points north on The Spine would probably opt to transfer here, but some folks headed to Westlake itself would probably just stay on the train.
The new tunnel would portal to the west just north of the existing two and the westbound line to West Seattle would junction right at the portal. The line would swing north to Lander where it would run as an elevated in the middle of the roadway as far as Sixth South. It would then curve north to a station diagonally crossing the Busway and Line 1 station then curve into the Stacy Street ROW to run west across BNSF to First South. It would curve into a station above the Starbuck’s parking lot and then head south to its crossing of the Duwamish next to the West Seattle Freeway.
Yes, this is “circuitous” for riders who want to go to uptown from West Seattle, but it gives direct connection to RV buses at Mt Baker and to eastside trains at Judkins Park and the First Hill and SLU. Since it would be automated and (probably) pretty frequent, it might serve as a quicker three-seat ride for riders between RV South and Bellevue, like the proposed gondola between MBS and JPS that I mentioned a couple of weeks ago.
This is essentially Frank’s proposal gussied up to be “all things to all people” by restoring the “in-city” Ballard to West Seattle line of the original proposal, serving First Hill directly, and “bridging the gap” between MBS and JPS.
It would require a radical re-thinking by The Board, and a willingness to add stations a few at a time on the way to West Seattle, but it would work, and, incidentally, serve First South around Starbuck’s.
Yes, this would eliminate the need for a Judkins to Baker gondola.
If I can already transfer at Judkins, why do I need to build the circuitous route through SODO and not just go straight west from the Beacon Hill tunnel?
Moving away from link slightly for a second to go back to busses.
**Rapidride A/E**
King County is currently looking into improving the rapidride A and the rapidride E. RapidRide E improvements are mainly around the city of Seattle’s rethinking of aurora. Still waiting on the designs after the community feedback
RapidRide A I can’t find any document online yet beyond “Metro is taking another look at the RapidRide A Line’s service area. To make sure the A Line can continue to provide the most high-quality service for riders, this improvement project will measure the area’s current needs. This work is starting in 2023—more information and a full project schedule will be provided to the public at a later time.”
But it’ll be interesting to see if they’ll attempt adding more BAT lanes or convert the hov lanes to bus lanes. Or maybe more ambitiously center bus lanes?
https://kingcounty.gov/en/dept/metro/travel-options/bus/rapidride (scroll near bottom)
**Route 36 / Beacon Ave.**
Route 36 King County also wants to improve. 2023 july blog post claims there’d be a study by now but nothing’s been released. Main trouble is on dearborn and around the beacon hill station, the rest of the route on Beacon ave is pretty traffic free.
Main thing originally suggested (2022) was removing the center median in front of the train station and adding a south bound bus lane. Also adding bus queue lanes at main intersections.
https://kingcountymetro.blog/2023/07/19/route-36-improvement-study-estudio-de-mejoras-en-la-route-36/
https://www.theurbanist.org/2022/07/05/metro-plans-to-speed-up-beacon-hills-workhorse-route-36/
(I searched stb site briefly doesn’t seem like we talked about this article yet)
However, semi-separately Seattle DOT is also looking into adding a protected bike lane on 15th/beacon ave. Note the bus runs on 14th Ave S, so there’s no /fewer conflict on the north segment of the bike lanes but the middle/south sections might need more coordination.
https://www.seattle.gov/transportation/projects-and-programs/programs/bike-program/protected-bike-lanes/beacon-hill-bike-route
Unfortunately it does look like with the bus stop islands for the bikes running behind the bus that does mean no bus lanes in front of the beacon hill station.
There’s more than enough space south of that on beacon ave for a bike lane, bus lane and travel lane on most sections… but also the sections south of the beacon hill train station have very minor bus passenger delays so it doesn’t matter as much.
The secondary area that would be useful for delays is around Beacon Ave and Columbian Way. The bus idea is add a BAT lane on the right lanes (there only exists 2 travel lanes near the intersection that quickly merge into one lane)
There’s no detailed bike idea for the middle segment but I’d imagine it’s either right side bike lanes or building it in the middle path (converting from the middle parking?)
I definitely remember the planning and work for bike lanes on Beacon Hill. The Seattle Bike Blog covered a lot of the issues and trade-offs. It did have bus ramifications as well, but I forget the details.
I don’t remember much about the 36 plans. We might have mentioned it on an open thread (we often scour the various blogs for links of interests) but it was (or still is) at the very early stage. It is usually when they release that first draft (and ask for comments) that we write about it more. It is as that point that I either get excited (like the 40) or go “meh” (like the 5). (To be fair, the improvements to the 5 are fine — every little bit helps — but the changes for the 40 seem like they are a lot more significant and daring.)
Bu the way, in the run-up to ST3 there was an alternative that would have gone from West Seattle to Jackson Street, east to 23rd, north to John, west to Smith Cove, and north to Ballard. At a board meeting the board didn’t know what to make of it, and asked the staff rep, “Who’s asking for it? Who would ride it?” The rep said one person had suggested it at an open house. Nobody spoke up to defend it, and it was deleted. In retrospect, I think a few activists realized its potential, but nobody else did. It would have fulfilled the “Metro 8” concept that came up on STB later, would have gotten at least near First Hill, and would have created interesting new trip pairs from Garfield High School to John/Ballard and Jackson/West Seattle. And maybe it could have served Harborview if it had been a little north of Jackson east of the hospital.
Amtrak adds two more round trips between Seattle and Portland. From 4 round trips to 6 round trips. (Only some of these trains continue south of Portland or north of Seattle to Vancouver)
> Beginning Monday, Dec. 11, more trains will run in both directions – for a total of 12 trains every day between the two most popular cities on the route.
https://wsdot.wa.gov/about/news/2023/amtrak-cascades-adds-two-more-daily-roundtrips-starting-dec-11
The schedule also has them leaving earlier and later than before
> The new schedule will see trains departing Seattle at 5:52 a.m. and Portland at 6:45 a.m. The latest trains between the two cities will leave at 7:25 p.m. from Portland and 7:50 p.m. from Seattle.
A midday Seattle-Vancouver BC train would be nice, especially for hockey fans.
But NOBODY LISTENS TO ME!
WADOT is investigating it https://www.theurbanist.org/2023/10/16/concepts-for-amtrak-cascades-service-growth-have-arrived/
This was discussed briefly in an earlier open threads
> As part of a renewed service development plan process responding to public feedback, the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) has developed five options to illustrate different frequency levels, stop patterns, and top speeds.
I’m not sure how much funding they can actually attain though and whether bnsf will be that open to running so many more trains.
A number of years ago, at an All Aboard Washington meeting, where the guest speaker was DJ Mitchell, (the BNSF Passenger Rail Liason) mentioned that the Seattle-Vancouver BC segment could easily accommodate a midday train.
It’s the layover in Vancouver that’s apparently the issue.
At that meeting he also commented that there’s a lot more value to making more incremental improvements to the infrastructure, that would cut the running time between Seattle and Portland, rather than chasing high speed rail or electrification. Better bang for the buck.
Just the extra round trips to Portland already adds a lot of value. It makes it a lot easier to go to Portland for a day trip without the expense of an overnight hotel stay. Cars have offered the day trip option since forever, so it’s time the train did too.
Now, we just need the local transit that connects with the Amtrak at each end to run good service with these odd hours…
It would be great if they improved the border crossing experience to and from Vancouver. There are really two things to worry about: people and stuff. They should check the stuff in the departing city. It shouldn’t take that long to inspect it. It should be similar to how luggage is inspected when you go from Hawaii to the mainland. The more stuff you have, the longer it takes (but it still doesn’t take that long).
For people, the inspection should happen on the train. Showing your passport should be adequate for boarding. Once on the train, they ask you the usual questions (where are you staying, how long are you staying, etc.). If there is a problem, you get held up in Vancouver and sent back.
With the border crossing being quicker than it is with a car, it becomes a lot more attractive.
Jim, what do you mean “it’s the layover in Vancouver that’s apparently the issue”? Why not just turn around after a quick cleaning? Why is a layover required?
Thanks.
Mind you, my thought experiments are on a purely speculative nature, since I don’t have any idea what WSDOT is cooking up. (i.e. what times are they using for scheduling for each option?)
Along with the fact that it’s been years since I’ve been up there to verify the ‘lay of the land’.
As far as I know, there is only 1 “US Territory” track/platform available , so what happens if there’s a delay for an outbound train, that conflicts with an inbound train?
Where is Amtrak allowed to park the trains?
Again, purely speculative on my part.
Thank you.
Somewhat related, a group calling itself The High Speed Rail Alliance is recommending something similar to what WSDOT proposed in 2006 instead of what they are studying now (bullet trains). The group had an editorial in The Urbanist. A similar editorial (with different writers) appeared in the Seattle Times.
I agree. We should be pursuing improvements based on the existing tracks, instead of dreaming about building what California is building. We just don’t have the population that California has. Nor has their project worked out great so far either. An iterative approach, based on improving the existing line is bound to have a lot fewer problems. If an area can’t be easily fixed, you move to a different spot. In contrast, with a brand new line, every little bit has to be built or the thing just won’t work.
We don’t need to improve the existing line that much to get faster speeds. Amtrak showed this with the turbiliner demonstration in 1973. They ran Portland to Seattle over the existing line, curves along Puget Sound and Point Defiance and all, in somewhere around 2.5 hours.
It’s just a matter of proving there’s a demand for light weight trains that can operate at higher speed on existing lines.
Apparently, the difficulty there is getting the FRA to approve light-weight trains, as their safety standards require significant structural reinforcement (assuming the eventuality of a crash) rather than focusing on implementing systems to prevent crashes in the first place.
The Talgos are light weight trains, and the current type are FRA approved.
The limiting factor is getting light weight locomotives, but that’s possible if given sufficient will to spend the money.