Community Transit ridership increased 23% in 2023. A third of total riders were on the Swift Blue and Green lines.
Apply to the one of Seattle’s transportation advisory boards by April 15 if interested.
What’s happening with the 520 reconstruction project in Portage Bay.
Efforts to lid I-5 in more of downtown Seattle continue. Activists have been working on this since 2010. One concept would lid from Madison Street to Thomas Street, aka the library to Seattle Center.
How WSDOT designs maps to show event and road-closure congestion bottlenecks throughout the state on busy summer weekends.
National transit expertise could help cities in Canada and the US with common problems like expanding capacity, electrifying trains, upgrading signaling, and rebuilding stations.
Trains on the Moon. The US government is studying whether passenger and freight trains would be feasible on the moon. Why, when we don’t have cities on the moon yet? For astronauts on long-term missions. Alon Levy says low gravity will require wide turning angles.
This is an open thread.
Of course “passenger and freight trains would be feasible on the Moon”. Alon is right about the need for gentle curvature, and equially important would be very gentle “reflex” gradient transitions. That is, from rising to flat; you don’t want the cars lifting off the track from momentum.
He mentioned this in passing in his explanation of cant deficiency, but it would be a real thing for massive freight shipments. That’s because mass is the same regardless of gravity, whereas “weight” is dependent on the specific gravity well in which the mass is moving.
What that means is that the “I want to continue in a straight line” tendency of a moving mass would be relatively greater than the “I want to stick tight to the surface of this particular ball I’m moving on” of a moving weight.
The great news is that the Moon is flooded in unattenuated sunlight, so solar collectors at the polar regions could supply thousands of Grand Coulee’s worth of electricity to a civilization there. Mag-Lev would be an easy thing, especially since just shading the magnets and their supports well gets them down to a hundred and fifty degrees C below 0°, making superconductivity relatively easier to achieve there than on Earth. So electrically powered railroads would operate almost free once the infrastructure is paid for.
LA Metro is hosting virtual meetings on the Vermont Corridor transit alternatives this week.
https://www.metro.net/projects/vermont-corridor/
In addition to the web site, LA Metro posted a YouTube video on the study too:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=WWIzcxqgFMQ
I commend LA Metro for both adding an educational video as opposed to a mere print of a PowerPoint presentation that we get here, as well as assessing modes in a more objective way rather than force an outcome.
I’d much rather have a PowerPoint that I can flip through in 4 minutes. Who has time to sit through a community meeting?
Kudos for the YouTube summary, but negative points for not having a simillar executive summary on the website. All they had was a DropBox folder where it appears there is nothing new since 2021. Where is the content that was shared on March 23rd? All they provide is a Zoom link.
The brt technical study is here. (2017)
https://libraryarchives.metro.net/DPGTL/studies/2017-vermont-brt-corridor-technical-study-final.pdf
Those images are from the story map (2022)
https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/d3cecab189b445b9a8ad0a1ce6d359c1
> LA Metro is hosting virtual meetings on the Vermont Corridor transit alternatives this week.
It’s practically speaking moving forward with the BRT. Either Side-Running (convert right most lane not parking) or Curbside-Running BRT (convert parking spots). There’s around 400 million dollars allocated.
Thanks!
Pie-In-The-Sky type of thinking: I’d put an automated, grade separated line along Western instead of Vermont. The line would extend from Hollywood to “the” 405. Just by Google maps, Western Ave appears to be busier and more populated. The down-side is it wouldn’t serve USC.
Running along Western would not just skip USC, but skip Exposition park (a much more important destination in central LA). Sure, putting high-capacity transit on Western would split the distance between the Crenshaw Line and the Silver Line more evenly, but the Silver Line is not a useable transit corridor; it’s a commuter bus that stops every 2 miles or so along the 110.
IIRC LA Metro’s Long Range Plan includes driving heavy-rail subway down Vermont to the 105.
The Community Transit numbers are interesting and put things in perspective. They get 23,000 weekday boardings a day for the whole system (including van pools and DART). That is not a lot. To put things in perspective, the Metro 7 got about 20,000 riders last month. The single digit Metro buses got a combined 46,000 (or double the entire Community Transit ridership). That is without a 6 and 9 bus.
Obviously the agency got hammered by the pandemic, and has been slow to recover. Same goes with Metro (and other agencies around the country). But ridership was never that high. The clue is when they list yearly numbers (it always sounds bigger).
I expect ridership to improve as they restructure in response to Lynnwood Link. There are a lot of very important improvements there.
The two Swift lines account for 35% of the ridership. That percentage will likely increase dramatically when:
(1) The Orange Swift Line gets its ribbon-cutting this Saturday at Edmonds College, accompanied by a few other route restructures.
(2) All but one of the 18 commuter routes go away with this fall’s service change. That might only slightly increase the numerator, but the denominator will decrease with rides shifting to the 1 Line and ST Express 515.
(3) The Swift Blue Line extends to Shoreline / 148th St Station this fall, making the whole line even more useful.
Frequency changes the game.
As an aside, ST staff’s chart showed Westlake to Capitol Hill being the bottleneck. If they are correct, the 515 might actually have riders. Those wanting to stay off gridlocked freeways or going to somewhere south of Lynnwood Station will hopefully have hyperfrequency available on Metro’s 49, and whichever other route ends up going from Westlake to Capitol Hill after the RapidRide G mini-restructure. Or, just get used to sometimes having to wait for the next train coming in another 8 minutes.
I still bet most will choose the train patience option, and a lot of them will begin partaking of the Blue and Orange Swift Lines to continue their commutes.
Indeed, Swift may come to dominate CT ridership the way light rail has come to serve the overwhelming majority of ST ridership.
The Green Swift line will extend to UW Bothell in a few years.
The Gold Swift Line will some day take over the portion of CTs semi-frequent 201/202 from Everett Station north, with more frequency, hopefully matched by a frequent 512 that skips the Ash Way loop-de-loop-de-loop stop, that hardly anyone uses.
Brent, Swift Blue is going to North Shoreline / 185th.
I’m quite skeptical that Route 515 will have many riders.
Southbound in the mornings, those boarding in Lynnwood will find ample room getting on a train. The train may get crowded but most or all of the riders getting on at Lynnwood City Center will be seated and not notice much.
Northbound is more likely, but that’s predicted to be lessened with the new storage plan. Plus, it doesn’t approach crush loads until it reaches Westlake heading northbound. Those boarding at Symphony or Pioneer Square will find plenty of room.
https://www.soundtransit.org/st_sharepoint/download/sites/PRDA/FinalRecords/2024/Presentation%20-%202024%20Service%20Plan%20Phase%202%20-%20ST%20Express%20and%201%20Line%20Capacity%20Improvements%2003-07-24.pdf
I think most riders will automatically return to the same mode they used in the morning. That’s especially true given that there is still plenty of room on the trains until they reach Westlake.
I’m sure some riders won’t want to stand on a train — but they would have to decide that they would rather get a seat on Route 515 before they enter the station and negotiate those 45-50 steps down to the platform. Plus, ST plans something called “gap trains” but it’s not clear whether they will turn around halfway or not.
And the chart seems to suggest that ST should be turning around half of the trains (more than just gap trains) south of Downtown to go back to Lynnwood until they can cross Lake Washington. I say that noting that ST staff doesn’t tell the Board what the southbound load will be in the afternoons here so that’s only is a speculative conclusion . The chart doesn’t make it clear what time period they are referring to and whether this is the peak train, a peak load hour or some other time period; they only say “high estimate” and “low estimate”. So only speculation can be made with the lack of presenting more comprehensive info.
A final issue is that a crowded train will have to sit with doors open longer at each station to let people get off and on. So that the following train will get closer and closer and take in fewer and fewer riders at each station. So if a train is crowded, a rider can likely wait only a few more minutes for the next train and easily get on that less crowded one. It takes more time and effort to go back out of a station than to just wait for the next train.
Which begs a question: How long after someone “taps on” with an Orca card can they “tap off” and not get charged? I’m expecting that anyone who “taps on” on the mezzanine won’t leave the station unless the Link trains have an extended disruption of service because they paid their fare. It’s hard to walk away from anything once you’ve paid for it.
I’m quite skeptical that Route 515 will have many riders.
I agree. It wouldn’t surprise me if we have crowding *and* not that many people ride the 515. The problem is the route. It offers nothing that Link doesn’t offer. I suppose a regular commuter may prefer the 515 but maybe not. I think it is likely to be most popular when it isn’t needed (e. g. during the week of Christmas, when traffic and transit ridership is low).
In contrast they could just replace the 413/415 with a Sound Transit bus. The 413 and 415 both serve Swamp Creek and Ash Way but skip Lynnwood Transit Center. The 410 also serves Ash Way. As a result there are a lot of buses serving Ash Way (and almost as many serving Swamp Creek). While both of these are park and ride lots, there is some density around them. I would imagine a fair number of riders just walk to the stop. This is where the bus should go, as it would (continue) to provide those riders with a one-seat ride to downtown.
In contrast the 515 will not. Those riders will have to transfer (or drive to) the Lynnwood Transit Center either way. It is not very good, but maybe that is the idea. They don’t want people to get used to something that is a better alternative (for some).
Sorry for confusing the two Shoreline stations.
Al S,
I have seen no evidence of a “Cancel” feature existing for ngORCA.
I have gotten the “You already tapped” message a few times.
The issue will become moot for Link in a few months, with ST happily treating each tap as its own ride.
I expect the busiest portion of the Orange Line will be the station to Edmonds College. Students and teaching assistants provide a more stable source of daily riders than shopping centers do.
Brent —
I just perused the Aorca and Sound Transit web sites. I can’t find a clear answer about either canceling a trip or tapping onto Link then turning around and using a bus by Metro or another provider because it’s too crowded.
Am I not looking on the correct web page, or it is a secret?
If you tap on for Link, and then a bus, you get charged for the Link trip, and then transfer credit for the bus ride. The ORCA upgrades simply removed the Cancel feature, which was only applicable at off-board ORCA readers, and now is gone.
What will change next is the fare charged for the Link ride, so you get charged $3 instead of an amount based on how far the station is from the center of the line. And then switching to an ST Express bus will be a 25-cent upcharge.
You are using the correct webpage to find non-apologetic answers to tough questions: SeattleTransitBlog.com
Brent —
The more important thing is not the actual policy but the lack of clear explanations in the various websites. That’s because a rider will assume that as soon as they tap a card inside a Link station, they’ve paid to ride Link. If they think that, they will only ride Link and not exit the station to ride Route 515 unless there is a notable service stoppage.
” a rider will assume that as soon as they tap a card inside a Link station, they’ve paid to ride Link”
We don’t know what they’ll think because everybody is different. They’ll assume they’ve paid for Link because that’s what the reader is for, but whether they’ll think they have to pay again to ride the 515 is unclear. The people who can choose this are disproportionally regular commuters; they aren’t making a one-off trip. They know enough that Link and the 515 exist, so they may know more than that. And they may have employer-paid passes, which their employer told them means they don’t have to care about fares or double-charging because they won’t be paying it.
The people who can choose this are disproportionally regular commuters; they aren’t making a one-off trip.
Agreed. I also think it is unlikely they get to a Link station, tap, and then turn around. It takes a while to actually get to a train platform (and figure out how crowded it is) and by then most people will just endure the wait. My guess is people will have a bad experience with crowding and then try taking the bus the next time. It is possible there will be info on the wait time for a train, but if that is the case it will also be on the phone, and riders can make the decision before they tap for Link.
Al S,
I’m still not clear what you are asking ORCA to do.
Brent —
I’m not expecting ORCA or ST to do anything more than to clearly explain to riders that a tap-on inside a Link station means that they won’t be charged if they then run back upstairs and catch a bus instead — if that is indeed the way the card gets charged. I do know from experience that if a rider taps twice within a few seconds that the trip cancels — but I don’t know how much time has to pass to have the cancellation be disallowed.
Why is that so hard for you guys to understand? It seems to be a very basic rider situation that would occur with this anticipated overcrowding on Link.
@Al S,
“a tap-on inside a Link station means that they won’t be charged if they then run back upstairs and catch a bus instead ”
Ya, that is pretty much how the ORCA card works and hopefully everyone understands this. But it hardly matters. Nobody is going to “run back upstairs” to catch a bus instead of Link..
Peak crowding is predicted to occur NB PM peak at CHS, and no rider who can’t board at CHS is going to run upstairs to catch the 515. And the reason is simple — the 515 doesn’t serve CHS. Or UWS, or UDS. The 515 won’t go there so it isn’t an option.
I suppose someone could switch to the 49 and then try to reboard Link at UDS, but if I was in that situation I’d just wait for the next train.
The 515 is just CYA for the board. I predict it will be cancelled in 6 months.
Peak crowding is predicted to occur NB PM peak at CHS, and no rider who can’t board at CHS is going to run upstairs to catch the 515. And the reason is simple — the 515 doesn’t serve CHS.
If it is crowded at Capitol Hill it will probably be crowded at Westlake. The main reason people won’t go upstairs is because they’ve already spent the time to get to the station. Getting to the platform (or even the mezzanine) at Westlake Station is not trivial, and once you’ve done it you don’t want to go up to the surface and walk to your bus stop. It is far more likely that an experienced rider will decide that they “don’t want to do that again”. After waiting in a big crowd for the train on Monday they decide to take the bus on Tuesday (and keep taking the bus). That is the hope, anyway. The likelihood of that being successful is diminished because of the poor routing on the 515.
Even if a rider can return to the street and ride Route 515, it’s not exactly at the station entrance. They plan on stopping at the Mountlake Terrace freeway stop, which is away from the station. Even in Downtown Seattle, the stops near Westlake or University Street aren’t right at the station entrance.
Perhaps more deterring will be the frequency though. Link is planned every 8 minutes, right? Route 515 is only running at peak and initially at 10 minutes, but the CEO has been given the okay to reduce that if ridership doesn’t meet standards. If the CEO reduces that to 15 or 20 or 30 minutes, the users will almost certainly give up in using it. It’s a classic transit death spiral set up.
I still opine that the most effective strategy would be to encourage making local Seattle trips by Metro bus instead of Link during overcrowded periods. Two to three bus round trips between Downtown and the U District would be possible rather than one between Downtown and Everett.
And I do feel that those of us waiting for East Link deserve this additional bus service more than those who speculatively may be crowded on Lynnwood Link. ST is going to be over two years late on the connection across Lake Washington, and the real sufferers of the speculative overcrowding are those wanting to get to the Eastside on the 2 Line as well as those preferring to ride Link inside Seattle — and not riders from Everett.
@Al S,
“ 515 is only running at peak and initially at 10 minutes, but the CEO has been given the okay to reduce that if ridership doesn’t meet standards. If the CEO reduces that to 15 or 20 or 30 minutes,…..”
Ha! Give the 515 the Metro treatment! That is sort of what happened with the 20. “Oh look. Ridership is low, we have to reduce frequency!” Followed by, “Oh look. Ridership is falling. We better just cancel the route!”
And ridership won’t materialize. Nobody is going to give up on Link and go back upstairs to take a slower, less convenient bus. And peak crowding is at CHS anyhow, and the 515 doesn’t even go there.
The 515 is a short lived exercise in CYA. It won’t be around very long.
“I still opine that the most effective strategy would be to encourage making local Seattle trips by Metro bus instead of Link during overcrowded periods”
Well, Metro could offer extra service on the 49 like it did for the multi-week Link reductions. Pike-Pine and Broadway are frequent but not as frequent as they were in 2019 or that their urban-density status deserve. They’re not consistent either: the 10, 11, and 49 could alternate for even 5-minute service, but they don’t; instead they come at seemingly-random intervals. Evenings and Sundays are the worst: all three routes come simultaneously or within a couple minutes of each other, and then it’s a full 15 minutes until the next pulse.
I think Metro also had extra service on the 48, 67, and 70 during the Link reductions, but I don’t remember the exact list of routes.
I should qualify that saying the RapidRide G restructure will apparently happen at the same time. That will bring the 12 and 3 (47) to Pike-Pine, increasing frequency. Maybe Sound Transit is counting on that for crowding mitigation.
Even if a rider can return to the street and ride Route 515, it’s not exactly at the station entrance.
Exactly. That is not how this is going to work. This is not like an outage, where people come streaming out of the station and you have to give them an alternative. It isn’t even like when the escalators broke down at the UW Station and everyone had to take the elevator (leading to really big backups outside the station). In that case I could see people using a bus (if it was there for them).
Assuming the 515 runs like the 510 (on fourth and fifth) it is actually better. Again, it isn’t as good as if served a different part of Lynnwood (that Link won’t serve) but many riders may find it more convenient (especially in the evening). The stop at 5th Avenue may be easier to get to than the station (even before you account for the depth of the platform).
Two to three bus round trips between Downtown and the U District would be possible rather than one between Downtown and Everett.
Good point. We could basically resurrect the 71/72/73 that ran express from downtown to the U-District. Of course it wouldn’t go any further than the U-District, but that might be far enough. Way more people take Link between downtown and the U-District than will take Link between downtown and Lynnwood. For that matter they could resurrect the 41. By doing so it would not only be faster between downtown and Northgate, but reduce one of the transfers (between Link and where the bulk of people live). Adding back the 41 (541?) would be very easy for riders to grasp. People going to 5th (in Northgate), Pinehurst or even Lake City might just prefer it over taking the train and transferring.
As you noted a lot of these options are cheaper to operate. The route of the 515 appears flawed for many reasons.
Nobody is going to give up on Link and go back upstairs to take a slower, less convenient bus. And peak crowding is at CHS anyhow, and the 515 doesn’t even go there.
You are confused. First of all, I’m not sure you understand what “peak crowding” means. It is basically when the train is most crowded (not the station that is most crowded). It is like the ship canal on I-5. It isn’t the destination, but the area where the most congestion occurs. Someone driving a truck from Everett to Tacoma (over the ship canal) contributes to the congestion just as much as someone driving from Shoreline to downtown.
Second, I agree, no one is going to go back upstairs and take the bus. That doesn’t matter. Maybe they take the train the first day and decide the bus is more convenient, so they take that instead. Or maybe they never bother with the train because the bus is simply more convenient and faster (for them).
That being said, the 515 is poorly designed (as I explained earlier) which means that it may fail despite having potential. But that may be the point. Maybe ST didn’t want to offer something that could actually work better for some of the riders, lest they ask for it in the future.
Or maybe this was just a lazy attempt to deal with an issue that board members complained about. Don’t forget why this is happening. Sound Transit screwed up. They can’t run as many train cars as promised. As a fallback position they told Snohomish County leaders they would run extra buses. By providing the bare minimum — a set of very poorly designed routes — they meet their legal responsibility (without spending much money).
Then again, maybe this is just another example of ST not understanding how this transit things works. Maybe someone at ST honestly thinks this is the best approach. It should be obvious to anyone who reads the schedules that running the 415 would be much better (holy cow, it even ends with the same digits!) but the folks in charge don’t have a clue.
“We could basically resurrect the 71/72/73 that ran express from downtown to the U-District.”
Metro has always positioned the 70 as the successor to the 71/72/73X, and riders have voted with their feet to it. That surprises me because the 70 is non-express, and I find its travel time frustrating. But ridership has remained high and growing even with Link, and Metro repeatedly added service because of this, and it’s probably why it was elevated to RapidRide. So Metro could add extra service to the 70 now, which would be the same as what it did during the Link reductions.
Mike, the success of the 70 doesn’t surprise me at all, since its corridor not only is dense and connects two of the biggest transit nodes in the state, but also basically cut off from any other transit options, especially Link. Its ridership patterns are like the 44 and the E, where there’s somebody getting on or off at every stop.
“It is basically when the train is most crowded”
It’s when the doors open and a lot of people are already standing, and it may be hard to get on, or you don’t want to be so close to people.
For northbound trains, if they’re not already like that in Rainier Valley (as they currently are peak hours), they’ll gradually build up at Pioneer Square and University Street, so there’s a 50/50 chance they’ll be pretty crowded at Westlake, and there may or may not be a lot of people getting off (that doesn’t always happen either). Some people may prefer an express bus to that.
My friend in north Lynnwood keeps telling me that even now she gets off the 512 at Northgate and it’s often packed. Once when there was a ballgame it was so full that she didn’t even try to get on; she looked for a bus. I would have taken the 67, but she ended up choosing the 20. She’d never been in that corridor, but she raved at how beautiful and leafy it was. She found a reason to stopover in the U-District, and then took the 49 to Capitol Hill.
“running the 415 would be much better”
That’s the exact route my friend in north Lynnwood prefers when it’s running. It goes straight to Ash Way, which is her stop. (Actually she lives two miles northwest of there, but that’s the closest express bus stop. And the 119, which goes halfway toward her house, is hourly, so she often walks to Ash Way under protest.)
“ For northbound trains, if they’re not already like that in Rainier Valley (as they currently are peak hours), they’ll gradually build up at Pioneer Square and University Street, so there’s a 50/50 chance they’ll be pretty crowded at Westlake, and there may or may not be a lot of people getting off (that doesn’t always happen either). Some people may prefer an express bus to that.”
Having commuted on crowded subways for many years of my life, I can confidently say that crowded trains don’t have even loads. A rider usually just has to wait one train or maybe two to get on a less crowded train.
The reason is simple. Crowded trains take more time with doors open at a station to get people off and on. As that train gets more riders and needs more time at each station, the train behind it gets closer. So by the time it reaches Capitol Hill it won’t arrive every 7.5 minutes evenly. It will arrive every 10 then every 5 minutes. The first train may be packed but not the second.
Plus, the arrival signs will show that a follow up train is approaching. Someone on the platform will quickly learn that the second train will be less crowded.
That is sort of what happened with the 20. “Oh look. Ridership is low, we have to reduce frequency!”
Actually the 20 got an increase in frequency from what they originally planned. More of Seattle money was put into the route, so it ran every fifteen minutes initially. Then the driver shortage worsened, and lots of buses had worse frequency (including the 20). It wasn’t just Metro either. All the agencies have suffered because of the shortage. I believe Sound Transit is planning on making additional cutbacks fairly soon.
It is worth noting that much of the 20 performs OK. The section along Northgate Way (between Northgate and Lake City) did well. At one point they were thinking of getting rid of this (and only running buses during peak) but clearly this has done well, which is why they are keeping it. They are removing the section that has performed poorly and has always performed poorly (even when they ran the bus more often).
@Al S,
“ I can confidently say that crowded trains don’t have even loads. A rider usually just has to wait one train or maybe two to get on a less crowded train.”
You are correct. People who are used to these kinds of commutes know to wait for the next train. They will not “run upstairs” and attempt to switch to a bus.
But the situation with Link is even better than that. ST has a gap train plan and will deploy gap trains when Link gets crowded. So any savvy or experienced Link rider will quickly learn simply to wait for a gap train with added capacity.
The 515 won’t last long.
Lazarus —
I agree that gap trains are the next most useful remedy if the 1 Line gets too crowded.
I don’t get the logic about the Route 515 at all. I’m thinking it’s likely some Luddite with influence that doesn’t want to be forced onto a potentially crowded Link, and would rather ride a mostly empty bus to Downtown as if they are sharing a spacious limousine.
I do find it interesting that Sounder North isn’t mentioned as a remedy by ST. I’m expecting that the Lynnwood Link opening to reduce Sounder North ridership anyway. I’m kind of surprised that ST acts like Sounder North isn’t part of the potential overcrowding. It’s not enough to run a mostly empty commuter train; we need a mostly empty express bus too!
How many services need to operate between Edmonds/ Lynnwood and Downtown Seattle? There’s Link, Sounder North, RapidRide E combined with Swift Blue and now Route 515. Will a ferry be next?
@Al S,
“ I agree that gap trains are the next most useful remedy if the 1 Line gets too crowded.”
I would have preferred a scheduled overlay at peak times, but my idea got rejected. However, apparently they *might* do quick turns with their gap trains. So that gets it pretty darn close to an overlay.
“I don’t get the logic about the Route 515 at all. I’m thinking it’s likely some Luddite with influence that doesn’t want to be forced onto a potentially crowded Link”
I agree, it’s a pretty nonsensical (non)solution. But this region doesn’t have a lot of experience with rail, and I think the policy makers just wanted something that made it “look” like they were “doing” something about crowding.
After 60 years of bus only solutions, it is easy to sell “more buses” as a solution to a traveling public that doesn’t have a very deep understanding of rail transit, or even transit in general.
And it sounds like ST has given themselves the out of canceling the 515 on short notice, so I think that is what we will see.
… part of the potential overcrowding SOLUTION.
@Al S,
“ How many services need to operate between Edmonds/ Lynnwood and Downtown Seattle?…… Will a ferry be next?”
I certainly hope so!
With all the construction that will be going on near, on, over, and under I-5 in the next few years, a ferry on the Sound might actually be faster than a bus on I-5.
And even if the ferry wasn’t faster, it would be an infinitely more pleasant trip!
Going back to Mike Orr’s comment about the 70…the purpose of the 70 is not to go all the way from the U district to downtown (although it used to have that role before Link). It’s to connect South Lake Union and Eastlake to downtown, each other, and the U district. In other words, all those stops between the U district and downtown is precisely the point of the route.
There is even a part of me that would like to see the 70 turn west on Mercer and go to Seattle Center and Lower Queen Anne rather than downtown. From the perspective of someone living in the U-district, it would be quite bus. But I can’t actually endorse such a shift, considering how it would really screw over Eastlake-downtown commuters. There is also the existing Link->Monorail option which is not that bad.
@Al S,
“ I do find it interesting that Sounder North isn’t mentioned as a remedy by ST.”
I just reread the ST fluff piece on how they are going to handle crowding on LLE and they say that they are:
“ Doubling trips on the Sounder N Line, bringing that service back to its pre-COVID levels and providing additional capacity between Snohomish County and Seattle.”
So apparently ST is using Sounder to help alleviate crowding. I had missed that before.
The power of rail to the rescue….
I don’t get the logic about the Route 515 at all.
Maybe because the implementation is all wrong. It is like a rain umbrella made out of fishnet. If it is the only umbrella you’ve seen then umbrellas seem pointless.
Express buses can reduce crowding. This is solid logic. There are a ton of trips where people would prefer the bus (even if the train isn’t crowded). The problem is the 515 isn’t one of them.
A good example is the old 312. From Lake City Way (and Bothell Way) the old bus was faster to downtown. Riders also avoided having to transfer. Thus if they resurrected the old 312 it would give those riders a faster trip to downtown and allow them to avoid a transfer. As a result, a lot of people would take that bus (instead of Link).
The 515 approach would be like running a bus from Roosevelt Station to downtown. The problem is that by the time you’ve taken a bus to Roosevelt Station you might as well transfer to Link. It is really a poorly thought out implementation of what is a fairly common approach throughout the world (run express buses to complement the trains).
As I wrote up above, there are three possibilities for why Sound Transit chose this terrible route:
1) They don’t want it to be popular.
2) They knew this was a poor implementation, but they are doing what they were told to do (like following the letter of the law but not the spirit).
3) They actually believe this is a good implementation.
I’m not sure which is worse.
the purpose of the 70 is not to go all the way from the U district to downtown (although it used to have that role before Link).
Even then the 71/72/73 provided express service between the U-District and downtown. Those buses (71/72/73) make more sense if your goal is to reduce crowding on the trains (since the express lanes are in their favor when the trains will be crowded).
I expect Lynnwood Link to be a much greater ridership boost than the new Swift line on its own. In fact, Swift might not do much at all, besides get people onto more comfortable, larger branded busses with better bus stops (actual shelters!). Here’s why.
First, the new line replaces three routes that had already combined for frequent service: 115, 116, and 196 (every 15 minutes or better for most trips). Compared to 115/116, the Swift will spend more time on 164th and make more turns in the Alderwood Mall area. New local routes are being added to fill in the coverage gaps, including the busy bus stops on the east side of the mall, but these routes will not be as frequent (e.g., the 166, the only route traversing the full stretch of 196th, will be just half hourly).
Second: lack of bus/BAT lanes. 164th does not have any form of bus lanes, and the new route will not take advantage of the brand new BAT lanes on 196th ST east of 48TH Ave. (e.g., Fred Meyer to the Convention Center). In fact, NO route will use the new BAT lanes in front of Freddy’s, they all divert to the TC instead! So very little of the route will benefit from bus lanes.
Signal priority? I have not heard much about signal preemption for this new Swift line, so I assume it is not being implemented. It would definitely help on 164th, the 200th and 44th Ave. intersection, and 196th at Highway 99 if it is being done.
Finally (and most critically!) pedestrian and bicycle access to the stops has not been improved much. Very little traffic calming, save for the single family home stretch on 36th Ave. The new Alderwood Mall stop on 33rd Ave. will make you walk across *even more* of the mall parking lot than the current local bus stops on 33rd, and more than the busy Alderwood Mall Blvd. stops. Oh, and you now get to cross in front of a slip lane that they didn’t remove. This lack of multi-modal improvements, indeed, making it *worse* in some respects, is very different than what is typical for Rapid Ride in Seattle (think more along the lines of Rapid Ride B or F than the G or the H). This is all VERY frustrating considering the apartment building boom going on in Lynnwood right now. (Rant: One new apartment complex on Alderwood Mall Blvd. is literally a stone’s throw from the mall, but requires a 10 minute detour on narrow sidewalks because the direct route is fenced off. And no, they didn’t add a crosswalk to easily get to the Interurban Trail either).
Now when Link opens up, catching Swift or even a local bus to go into Seattle becomes a two seat ride instead of a three seat ride. That helps a lot. Especially if the garage fills up. Is is then that the frequency increase from every 15 minutes currently to every 10 should make a difference. And hopefully in the future they will get serious about more “Rapid Ride”-like improvements to the corridor as a whole.
> Second: lack of bus/BAT lanes. 164th does not have any form of bus lanes, and the new route will not take advantage of the brand new BAT lanes on 196th ST east of 48TH Ave
there was a plan for BAT lanes on 164th but unfortunately it is only in form of roadway expansions not converting existing lanes.
” Widen 164th St SE/SW to increase vehicle capacity along the corridor and across I-5 through the addition of a BAT lane and a dedicated transit, bike and pedestrian crossing of I-5. The project will provide needed speed and reliability improvements on the corridor for future Community Transit Swift BRT. Project is an important link to a future Sound Transit light rail station at Ash Way Park and Ride. ” From 35th Avenue to SR 527. Would cost 230 million dollars.
I don’t think this projected was moved forward and 164th is just road repaving.
I somewhat agree with Brandon regarding the new Orange Line, especially around the mall. The former routing (115/116/196) provided fantastic coverage on the busiest side of Alderwood, serving Target, Costco and other businesses on the east side of the mall.
Now it’s switching to the dull side of the mall with less businesses. Plus, the route will take longer as it has to deviate to 33rd Ave W where mostly single family homes are located.
If Everett Link places its station on the east side of the mall, there will be a major disconnect between the Orange Line and Link at one of the busiest retail centers in the region.
A couple questions:
(1) Can both the Blue and Orange Lines have signal priority where they cross paths? (And does the Green Line have any signal priority?)
(2) I know the working title is “West Alderwood Station”. Will ST see it as cheaper to build the Link extension as close as possible to I-5, and end up turning the station into a P&R station, a long walk from any of the planned TOD, much less what is already built? Ya know, kinda like Lynnwood Station.
(3) Are there plans to turn the walkshed of Lynnwood Station into more than just vacant lots and an anti-transit center that ruins all through-routes (including after Lynnwood is no longer the terminus)?
@ Brent…
1) The Green Line has a queue-jump at Eastbound 128th & I-5. This area is notorious for PM traffic back-ups and all buses get a head-start on traffic at the intersection where freeway traffic enters/exits.
2) Placing a station on the eastside of the mall will definitely be more effective as there’s less development to acquire/move/tear down. And that’s precisely what I fear ST will chose and cause a BRT-Rail disconnect.
3) The current walkshed of Lynnwood Station isn’t too terrible. There’s businesses and apartment complexes to the north and west. To the east,, there’s a strip mall that could probably use redevelopment. You can’t do anything to the south as it’s hemmed in by I-5 and wetlands.
There is an urban village planned for the immediate north along 200th St & 46th Ave.
Brent: The only signal priority I am aware of is what Jordan mentioned at 128th ST. This really is low hanging fruit which doesn’t “take” any lanes from cars. But it would also have to go through WSDOT.
I suppose in the long term, Stride could be diverted to meet a potential Link station on the east side of the mall. The only thing they really did to 33rd Ave. is reinforce the surface *at* the bus stop and install the new bus shelters. Didn’t even bother to install better crosswalks or re-paint the existing ones!
However, by the time that Link extension would open, the trend of redeveloping the surface parking lots may well have continued enough that it would be worth having premium transit stops on both 33rd and Alderwood Mall Parkway. Presumably most BRT – rail transfers would happen at Lynnwood TC or the 164th ST station anyway.
there’s a map by psrc that lists the signal priority https://experience.arcgis.com/experience/a587d27d1c444a6e891fe1b58508622d/page/Existing-Conditions/
toggle ITS -> Transit Signal Priority.
It isn’t completely accurate and is missing some but pretty good overview of where they are.
For snohonomish county most of it is just for swift blue along aurora avenue. There’s others implemented on sw 164th avenue though I don’t exactly which ones have it. (Switch to “adaptive timing strategy” some of them have transit signal priority as well, but can’t disambiguate on the map)
As a bonus if you want to see king county’s tsp existing and future plan: https://www.psrc.org/media/7492.
> (1) Can both the Blue and Orange Lines have signal priority where they cross paths? (And does the Green Line have any signal priority?)
Signal priority isn’t preemption btw. And partially yes one can. Aka extend green light for say a north bound bus, and then once it passes through switch over to red quicker for the next west bound bus in the other direction.
Though given these buses are every 15 minutes, it’s not that big a deal.
Signal priority isn’t preemption btw.
Yeah, I was going to mention that. It isn’t like emergency vehicles. A typical implementation is that a bus arrives right before the light is about to turn yellow. Since the bus is there it doesn’t, and stays green long enough for the bus to pass. However, if the bus arrives early in the cycle (right after the light turned green) it has to wait. It may have to wait a little less than it if it was a normal car, but it wouldn’t be like an emergency vehicle (where all the other lights almost immediately turn red and it can go).
There is a also a fair amount of wiggle room when it comes to implementation. https://nacto.org/publication/transit-street-design-guide/intersections/signals-operations/active-transit-signal-priority/
Blue Swift Line is already running every 10 minutes during the day on weekdays.
Brent, “signal priority” is not “signal pre-emption” like what ambulances and fire trucks get. Priority means that if a bus is approaching an already green cycle lengthens to wait for it to pass through the intersection. Or if it’s green for the cross-street at some times of the day it may shortens that cycle so that the bus has to wait a shorter time, or even if triggered early enough, gets a brand new green.
Guess I should have read the replies before sounding off.
Pre-covid, I took a long trip through Snohomish County once. As I recall, I started in Redmond, taking the 545 to Downtown Seattle, the E to Aurora Village, Swift Blue and then Swift Green to Canyon Park, the 535 to Bellevue, and finally the 249 back to Redmond. Once I got off the E in Aurora Village, I was the only passenger on the bus for the entire rest of the trip. Which is not surprising, because essentially every bus stop on the Snohomish County portion of this trip was surrounded by parking lots. I don’t know about you, but every time I take a bus trip, and both the beginning and the end of the trip require walking past large parking lots, I feel like the world is telling me, “get a car, loser!”
The amazing thing is that the bus service is so good up there. Not as good as King County of course, but it could be a lot worse.
Of course CT’s numbers pale in comparison to KCM. That owes to its service territory’s population being less than one-third of King County’s, as well as it’s network being far less dense and stretched across a 1300 square mile map. Also doesn’t help that Everett is a separate island CT doesn’t fully serve.
The more interesting takeaway here is yet more validation of the fact that frequency is KING. CT’s performance is best where its services are most frequent and easy to access. And yes that trend will continue as they re-invest hours from serving downtown Seattle into a more frequent local network. Another good case study of how the regional investment in rail can be leveraged to deliver more local benefit.
Anyone know when the Montlake HOV ramp and station opens, other than “2024”?
WSDOT social media team is still being cagey on exact dates beyond “this summer”: https://x.com/wsdot_520/status/1772294683814670697?s=20
What’s the current status of Metro’s driver shortage? Have they been able to grow their driver pool to the point where they can start expanding service levels back? Or is this still a significant blocker?
Last I heard it was gradually improving, and is projected to continue gradually improving. The final proposals for the Lynnwood Link and RapidRide G restructures had a bit more service than the previous proposals did — on the order of one more route, or evening frequency that wasn’t as gutted as the previous proposal six months before. It will probably continue like that, with a few small restorations each service change for the next few years.
There’s a Metro dashboard if you can get anything out of the statistics.
https://kingcounty.gov/en/legacy/depts/transportation/metro/about/accountability-center/rider-dashboard
Thanks for that link! I couldn’t find much on there that relates to service hours or anything similar that I could use to estimate how they’re recovering from the driver shortage. But maybe I missed it. I don’t spend a lot of time in Metro’s statistics.
Link ridership for December and January are posted:
https://www.soundtransit.org/ride-with-us/system-performance-tracker/ridership
Link average weekday ridership is lower than in the prior year for both months.
Surprised the January drop wasn’t worse, given the major disruptions to Link operations due to the tunnel track work.
For January, yes they are lower, but not for December.
December 2022 weekday boardings: 1,453,056 (66,058 Avg.)
December 2023 weekday boardings:
1,522,569 (73,932 Avg.)
There’s January 2024 data on the Link tab, RTB. It’s 1,380,555 weekday for the month or 69,028 average weekday. That’s lower than January 2023.
To get to the data, you not only have to look at the Link tab but you also have to add 2024 to the pull down menu at the top.
I see what you mean about December. I made a mistake about that.
When will East Link open across Lake Washington?
This presentation says October 2025.
https://www.soundtransit.org/st_sharepoint/download/sites/PRDA/FinalRecords/2024/Presentation%20-%20Project%20Performance%20Tracker%20Update%2003-14-24.pdf
The same presentation says October of this year is when the Downtown Redmond Extension opens. Federal Way Extension is listed as April 2026.
Note that an early opening of KDM is not listed. Of course, the East OMF likely can’t be accessed until the spring of 2025.
The Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore was taken out by a cargo ship around 1:30 am EDT last night. Although there were thankfully only a few cars on the bridge when it collapsed, some reports mentioned construction crews. The horrific scene is being described as a “mass casualty event”.
Watching the video, it looks like maybe the ship lost power, and regained it too late. There did appear to be maintenance vehicles on the bridge, but thankfully little other traffic.
Kinda surprised they don’t have tugs to get them past the bridge.
The boat lost power and sent out a “mayday” call. Authorities were able to prevent additional cars from going on the bridge (otherwise a lot more people would have died). https://www.baltimoresun.com/2024/03/26/key-bridge-collapses-into-patapsco/
Yeah, saw my power-loss guess was correct.
There was also an article in the NYT that addressed my second concern:
“The crashes have also raised questions about whether more ships should be required to be ready to drop anchors quickly during port emergencies, and whether tugboats should accompany more vessels as they enter and leave harbors.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/26/world/asia/bridge-collapse-baltimore-guangzhou-shipping.html
Incidents like these are stark reminders that America must invest in expansive, grade-separated rail lines. The Minneapolis bridge that collapsed 10-ish years ago and the fires that have closed major freeways in Atlanta and Philly in the last few years come to mind.
I’m not sure how you got that implication from this incident?
And how did you come to that conclusion? Do you think a railroad bridge could have withstood a smack by that enormous containership?
There have been two categories of bridge failures: — structural and accidental. Collapses in Minneapolis and Pittsburgh were structural. Collapses in Philadelphia, Atlanta and now Baltimore have been because of incidents caused by other things. .
I guess someone could argue that the bridge pier in Baltimore wasn’t protected — but the would not be a cause but merely a preventative addition.
Redundancy in transportation corridors with various modes is a reasonable goal. Especially in a country that spends so little on infrastructure, and gets even less for it. If you skimp on planning, engineering and maintenance, things are more likely to go wrong.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/566787/average-yearly-expenditure-on-economic-infrastructure-as-percent-of-gdp-worldwide-by-country/
shrug demand incredibly expensive rights of ways for transit and don’t be surprised if one’s city/region can barely build more than a mile or two per decade.
> Redundancy in transportation corridors with various modes is a reasonable goal. Especially in a country that spends so little on infrastructure, and gets even less for it. If you skimp on planning, engineering and maintenance, things are more likely to go wrong.
> https://www.statista.com/statistics/566787/average-yearly-expenditure-on-economic-infrastructure-as-percent-of-gdp-worldwide-by-country/
I’m not really sure what you trying to imply here with redundancy and referencing these stats?
I’m not trying to imply anything. I’m simply stating that if you skimp on investment, things will go wrong. If things go wrong, it’s good to have an alternative. Not rocket science.
The link was to simply provide evidence we are clearly skimping on investment.
uhh okay but how is this relevant to the ship hitting the bridge?
@WL & Tom …
You’re correct, Tom, a rail bridge would’ve collapsed too (I’m also reminded of the 14th St Bridge in DC that was struck by a plane in the 80s). This is why investments in tunneled rail is crucial. Our society is so automobile-obsessed that if there’s a major disruption to a highway, whether a closure a catastrophe, there’s hardly any viable alternatives for people to move around. Catastrophes shouldn’t be the primary reason for rail investment but does serve as one.
> You’re correct, Tom, a rail bridge would’ve collapsed too (I’m also reminded of the 14th St Bridge in DC that was struck by a plane in the 80s). This is why investments in tunneled rail is crucial. Our society is so automobile-obsessed that if there’s a major disruption to a highway, whether a closure a catastrophe, there’s hardly any viable alternatives for people to move around. Catastrophes shouldn’t be the primary reason for rail investment but does serve as one.
No I heavily disagree. Insisting that rail must only be built underground and not at-grade/trenched/elevated means forcing the most expensive construction method essentially limiting transit to a very small portion of a metro area.
Catastrophes should not be used to scaremonger into insisting on tunneled rail only.
speaking about LA what do y’all think about the voter measure HLA that passed?
(enforced los angeles to implement bus and bike lanes)
https://yesonhla.com/
I’m very curious how it’ll play out implementation wise.
It’s a mandate for complete streets, similar to what Seattle implemented in 2007. I’m a bit cynical that it will actually result in meaningful changes to how LA rebuilds its streets (since it doesn’t do it very often).
It should be noted that this isn’t a new tax measure. The City of LA gets to set how they spend money from the countywide sales taxes (LACMTA) as well as from other revenue sources.
https://www.heraldnet.com/opinion/editorial-community-transit-making-most-of-links-arrival/
Good article on how CT plans to restructure and redeploy resources to leverage off the arrival of Link in Lynnwood. They seem to get it.
Also, in addition to the public Swift Orange events at Edmonds College, apparently there will still be a VIP/press event at Lynnwood Transit Center itself, complete with a Link LRV in the background. Unfortunately the area around LTC is still considered to be an active construction site, so the general public won’t be able to get access.
Also, if the 400 and 800 series buses go away in late August, then that would imply that LLE will be open sometime before that. Good news!
Also, discussion of a possible announcement regarding the opening date for LLE can be found here:
https://www.heraldnet.com/news/expect-a-save-the-date-for-lynnwood-light-rail-within-a-couple-of-weekss/
The article quotes a Sound Transit spokesman as saying an announcement will come “in a couple of weeks”, so I suspect it is trustworthy.
Most of the article discusses Lynnwood’s plans to develop around Light Rail and create an actual “town center”. Good for them.
Finally, real progress.
Even after the Link station has been opened for years, Lynnwood’s town center won’t be the station area.
Like many suburbs, Lynnwood really doesn’t have a town center. It is not like Edmonds, which was a small town and grew before becoming a suburb of Seattle. Lynnwood was basically just forestland before it became a bunch of farms marketed to urban dwellers (as a getaway). As it grew (slowly) they tried to get incorporated into Edmonds, but failed. It wasn’t until 1959 that they incorporated (as their own city).
The closest thing to a “town center” (built after the fact) will include the station, although the station won’t be the middle of it. This is the price you pay when you run the trains close to the freeway.
@Sam,
I followed the various links in those 2 articles and was pleasantly surprised at how extensive Lynnwood’s plans are for their new town center. And how integrated those plans are with rail.
Yes, the LTC Link station won’t be at the center of the new town center, but Lynnwood is basically following the model of what ST did with the UW. Basically bracket it with two stations.
Basically, instead of one Light Rail station near the centroid of their town center, they propose two stations (eventually). One to the SW (LTC) and one to the NE.
This is the TOD superpower of rail in action.
From an inside source I’m hearing that they are aiming for an August 17th opening date for the LLE.
@Liam,
That aligns very closely with what my sources are saying too, although nothing is set in concrete until it actually happens. And smart people with their reputations on the line won’t commit until they know for sure there won’t be any more surprises.
But progress! First ELSL in April and then LLE in August. It’s going to be a great year.
It is a good article but I don’t think there is anything new here. That is probably why it is considered an editorial, even though it doesn’t seem very opinionated. I suppose it is making the case that things will get better and that the various agencies are making good choices. I agree, but most of the choices are obvious and no different than what Metro did. The major change is to truncate the buses at Link stations and then spend the money on other service. It is basically the same thing Metro did after U-Link (and did again after Northgate Link). Community Transit is just doing it at a much larger geographic scale, although it will effect fewer people. Overall it looks good.
As with any restructure though, some of the details are bound to create controversy. The other day you complained about lack of service for a handful of houses on Latona. Community Transit is also moving routes. For example the 130 will be moved from 5th to 9th (a distance of about a half mile). Unlike Latona, there are a lot of apartments there. I’m sure the goal is to better serve Main but a lot of people will have to walk a lot farther to get to a bus stop.
In my opinion the biggest flaw in the restructure is how Swift Blue gets to Link. Having Swift Blue connect to Link at 185th is an excellent choice. But they way it does it is poor. The connection to the RapidRide E is poor and the connections to Link from north King County are poor. It would not take much to have Swift serve stops on Aurora (since the bus travels through King County anyway). It would be “on the way” for Swift, while serving it with a Metro bus would require extra overlapping buses (and thus worse service somewhere else). It is clearly a flaw that will hurt Link ridership and overall transit ridership. Yes, I realize that Community Transit is not responsible for service in King County. But it appears that Community Transit made no effort to work with Metro in providing service there (which would benefit both Snohomish and King County riders). Ultimately it is Community Transit’s route, and it is not as good as it could be.
Despite the flaws and trade-offs, I would say that overall the Community Transit changes are good and quite similar to what Metro did in response to Link expansion.
Service will remain on 5th Ave S in Edmonds with Route 909. While it will be all day and seven days a week, it will be directional and at a non-clock headway.
OK, thanks. I assumed the 909 was a peak-only route, but it is tied with the ferry. That will definitely help.
CT’s service change has a date of Sat, Aug 31st. Which means the Lynnwood extension will be open by then. I really wish CT would overlap old service with light rail for one week. This would give riders a chance to familiarize themselves with Link.
@Jordan,
Yep. LLE will certainly be open before the CT service change. The only question is “How long before?”
Basically LLE can open without any of the restructures as Light Rail can function just fine without them. But the restructures absolutely need LLE to be open and operating before they occur.
The restructures are 100% dependent on a functioning LR extension.
Yeah, it doesn’t make sense to truncate the express buses if the train isn’t ready. On the other hand, you don’t have to truncate the express buses right away. Some overlap is fine (especially since ST is worried about crowding).
One of my favorite local transit-related (mostly biking and walking) YT content creators is bobco85. His most recent video might be of interest to some of you. “Bike the Federal Way Extension.” It’s not just a video of him biking the line, but he stops and films all of the under construction stations.
https://youtu.be/N66OebKb-8c
@Sam,
Good video! Thanks.
I wish he had spent some time at the new bridge over the unstable soil, because that is the pacing item, but oh well.
Maybe you can convince him to do a similar thing on the other extensions? We are looking at 5 new extensions opening in about 2 years! That is truly impressive, but it is also a lot to keep track of.
And it would also be nice if someone did a drone flyover of the LLE in its current state. All I have seen is construction phase, or pre-construction, drone videos.
But in two years transit in this region will be completely transformed. Finally!!!!!!!
Can’t wait.
Where are we at with future fares? When Lynnwood and the 515 start, will Link and ST Express both be a flat $3?
I doubt ST has put any forethought into matching bus fare with the train.
ST had hearings on Link fares in the past six months, and I think it ended up at a flat $3 and would be implemented with Lynnwood Link, but I’m not 100% sure.
Re ST Express fares, the flattening has already happened so I must be thinking of the hearings before that. ST Express is currently $3.25. So I guess ST Express will continue to be more expensive than Link.
Used rapidride D to ballard the other day. Still annoyed that the buses to common locations on 3rd avenue are on different stops meaning it’s hard to know which is the earliest bus stop to head to.
Aka 3rd and james is where the 40 is at. But then Yesler is the rapidride D. If the 40 and rapidride D were at the same stop then I could use either bus to head to ballard.
Of course I know not every combination can be combined as they need to balance the bus stops. But still kind of annoying as it’s hard to tell which bus stop to walk to for the earlier bus
Ah excellent idea!
The problem is the 40 overlaps the D to Ballard and the 62 to Fremont, so you’d have to have all three routes at the same stop. And if the C and E are at the same stop, that’s a lot of busy buses. So the C/D/E are at a different stop from the 40 and 62 at Pike-Pine, but at Virginia they’re all at the same stop because there’s more room. You can add the 28/131/132 too, which stops within a few blocks of the 40 in Fremont and the D in Ballard. Those are with the 40 and 62 at Pike-Pine.
It does seem like it could be paired a little bit better. I think all you need to do is swap the 40 and E. So that would mean:
First stop: 1, 2, 3, 4, 13, 14, 40, 49, 70, C, D
Second Stop: 5, 24, 28, 33, 62, E
In terms of area, the first stop would have this (listed in alphabetical order):
Ballard: 40, D
Queen Anne: 1, 2, 3, 4, 13, 14
South Lake Union: 40, 70, C
UW: 49, 70
For the second stop:
Aurora: 5, 28, E
Fremont: 5, 28, 40, 62
Magnolia: 24, 33
It is worth pointing out that the C only joins those stops at Seneca, but it still works (for trips to South Lake Union). It isn’t terrible right now, but this seems a bit better, with no real cost (if anything there might be better balance).
The only possible problem I see with this is that the C, D and E are RapidRide. They all share the same stop right now. This may be another case where RapidRide is dragging us down.
Thanks, I quite like this grouping.
Perhaps it’s partially a UI problem. It’s just very mentally taxing to calculate and think which bus routes are going to where and lookup next incoming bus and then dash to the correct bus stop.
If it was at least labeled like what you wrote above at each bus stop it’d be quite nice as well
The “animal symbols” in the old version of the Tri-Met mall (pre-Max) were useful that way. The buses that stopped at the Beaver all went to Beaverton and beyond. A little cutesie, yes, but easy to remember then. Now, I can’t remember the others; one was fish I think. A salmon, but I don’t remember what part of the city the buses that stopped there served. There were six or seven sets between the two directions of the Mall. It was quite nice.
It’s just very mentally taxing to calculate and think which bus routes are going to where and lookup next incoming bus and then dash to the correct bus stop.
Google Maps is pretty good for this but you have to put in your destination (which itself can be taxing). It is so much better if the bus stops are grouped to where you want to go. It also means you aren’t reliant on the bus data, which can be flawed. The little transponders on the buses don’t always work right (at least that is where I think the problem is). It hasn’t happened to me but it would be especially annoying to hustle my way to a particular bus stop only to wait a long time and realize I should have gone to a different stop.
For what it’s worth I don’t think the labeling is that important. You are an experienced rider. I’m an experienced rider. We know where the buses go (for our trip) yet we don’t want to have to decide on a particular bus stop at the last second. They are grouped at Northgate, and makes a big difference. Any sort of labeling is just a bonus.
Is it any more mentally taxing than a driver looking at real time traffic reports and deciding whether to take I-90 or 520?
> Is it any more mentally taxing than a driver looking at real time traffic reports and deciding whether to take I-90 or 520?
Well the main point isn’t about the mentally taxing part but that it’s complicated and cumbersome.
> Google Maps is pretty good for this but you have to put in your destination (which itself can be taxing).
That is fine but then I have to quickly calculate say from westlake to SLU there’s the 40, C, 62 and 70; need to quickly calculate which one to walk to and then guesstimate whether the bus bypassed or not and then to walk to pike or pine bus stop. And even then 30% of the time I end up walking to the wrong one and see the other bus bypass me since I’m at the wrong stop.
Also google won’t always show all options since it will deprioritize further walking ones. I can use onebusaway but then need to check both bus stops.
Same for to (upper) fremont need to decide whether pike for rapidride e or union with the 5/28/62.
Or I guess do the rest of y’all just stick with one bus everytime and don’t switch between them?
With Google Maps you just put in your destination (e. g. 3400 Fremont Ave N.) and mode. By default it chooses your current location as your starting point. Under options you can choose “Less Walking” or “Best Route”. Then it will describe step by step how to get there (e. g. walk south on Third …) although in your case you might remember where the bus stop is.
It is not perfect. It is dependent on the data from the buses, and this can be faulty. It also makes some assumptions (e. g. how long it takes you to walk somewhere). Unlike with driving, you also have to deal with timing. In other words if I’m in a car I can take my time and put in the address on the phone (it doesn’t matter how long it takes me to do that). In contrast if I’m standing at a bus stop I might do that only to see my bus go by. Nonetheless it might be your best option, although I really like Skylar’s approach when heading out of downtown. Both the 40 and D serve that stop. North of there the buses diverge (which means you might want to back to there anyway). South of there you can catch almost any bus and will it get you there and you are still heading the same direction (which means it is unlikely that making the transfer will cause you to miss the bus).
Or I guess do the rest of y’all just stick with one bus everytime and don’t switch between them?
Definitely not. Most of the time I have no idea which bus I’m going to take. I often go to the U-District. I prefer the 73 (it is fastest) but more often than not I catch the 347 or 348 (whatever comes first). Going the other direction I check the timing of the 73 and then usually take Link for the first leg. Then I catch the 347, 348 or 75 (again, whatever comes first). It really helps that these buses all serve the same bus stop. I’m not scrambling around at Northgate Transit Center trying to figure out which bus is about to get here. Same goes for folks headed to Snohomish County (the CT and ST Express buses all serve the same stop). It looks like the grouping is just right for every combination. I’m sure the same thing is true for folks who go from Downtown to Uptown. For the most part the buses are grouped fairly well. The 40 and E seem to be the outliers.
We use 3rd & Virginia as our downtown bus route nexus, since basically every N/S route stops there. The block face is long enough that there generally isn’t a lot of contention too.
If we’re not at Virginia, we can take basically any bus on 3rd to get there.
Brilliant! I never knew that. That sounds like an excellent solution.
“The only possible problem I see with this is that the C, D and E are RapidRide. They all share the same stop right now. This may be another case where RapidRide is dragging us down.”
I assumed the H would be at the same stop as the C/D/E to keep all the RapidRides together, but instead the H is with the South Seattle routes at Pike-Union (124, 131, 132). That stop is what I call “the worst bus stop in Seattle” because the block is so derelict and depressing. I hate waiting for the 131/132 there. And that’s where Metro put the H (because the 120 stopped there).
It should stay there because that’s also where the 125 (16th ave) it is. It also heads to west wood village. The C also heads to westwood village, but it’s so much slower as it heads down fauntleroy that it makes more sense to wait for the next 125/H instead
I actually think this might be the worst bus stop in Seattle:
https://maps.app.goo.gl/SUqo4DgwRBo41TYc8
Where the bus shelter is on the other side of not just one but two railroad tracks from the actual stop, which is adjacent to a 40mph highway where the sidewalk just kind of disappears.
Skylar, that actually looks like a pleasant place to wait for a bus. The worst bus stops are on roads with narrow shoulders, no sidewalks, no shelter, and there’s just a bus stop sign post. Eastgate Way used to have stop like that. So did Bellevue Way just south of the South Bellevue P&R.
“The worst bus stops are on roads with narrow shoulders, no sidewalks, no shelter, and there’s just a bus stop sign post.”
Uh, that describes Skylar’s stop almost exactly, except you can add in no shoulder, and a train potentially sandwiching you between high-speed traffic and the tracks, on a little hill of gravel.
[deleted per author’s request]
Eastgate Way example (before they put in a small bus platform).
https://www.google.com/maps/@47.5797109,-122.1462005,3a,75y,118.93h,69.91t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1s_OzHhdFpoyheX21HUf8f3g!2e0!5s20140901T000000!7i13312!8i6656?entry=ttu
Agreed, Cam, it’s not just disrespectful to transit riders but downright dangerous. It’s not even clear that you have a good field of view to the road from the shelter, so you’ll be hoping that you can sprint across the tracks to flag the bus down with only a few seconds warning. And if either of the tracks are in use? I guess riders hopefully are always looking both ways, and prepared to miss the bus if they can’t get across. At least the 113 only runs a few times per day.
Sam, the bus stop you found is certainly not great either. There’s other examples of bus stops like that along Sahalee Way for the 269, and I-90 for the 208, though I’ll pull pedantry and point out this was just for Seattle. :)
What’s more important than ridership, which is the number that transit agencies frequently tout, for that’s what the media eats up, is how much does it cost to get those riders. For instance, this Open Thread cites CT’s big increase in ridership and notes that much was on its BRT lines. Of course, most of it would be, for their BRT is the most frequent, there’s a bus every 10 minutes at most of the hours they run. However, at $200-300 per hour, this is expensive when you consider that, particularly for Swift Green, its ridership is primarily peak to/from Boeing and largely empty the other hours. Just because 1 or 2 people want a bus when nobody else does doesn’t mean that there should be one. Transit should serve the needs of the many, most especially those who cannot afford a vehicle of their own or cannot afford to have a vehicle for each person in their household who needs it.
The link was CT’s press release. Other agencies haven’t made similar statements so there’s nothing to link to. I also notice that this is recovery from the ultra-low covid level; it probably hasn’t increased that much from 2019.
Highway 99 is the highest-ridership corridor, on both Swift Blue and the 101, and it was the highest before Swift.
Swift Green was a politically-chosen corridor. In the early 2010s a German company (Siemens I think) looked at putting a factory in the Everett Industrial Center (aka Paine Field). It asked Snohomish County/Everett officials, “What’s your high-capacity transit plan for the center?” The officials said, “Nothing, we have lots of free parking and highway access.” The company was shocked because that wouldn’t be allowed in Germany: all new industrial centers must have an HCT plan for the thousands of workers, such as an existing S-Bahn station, a new S-Bahn/U-Bahn extension/line, a BRT equivalent, etc. The company walked away and dropped the site from consideration. That lit a fire under Snohomish County’s and the state’s butts, and CT accelerated the Swift Green project (out of six planned lines) and the state gave a grant for it, in order to serve Boeing and the industrial center. That’s also what led to the ST Snohomish subarea to reroute Everett Link to stop at the center.
Of course, we’re skeptical that people will be able to walk from Link to the overly-sprawling jobsites in the industrial center, and we’re crossing our fingers that employer shuttles from the station or a last-mile bus route in the center will come through.
It does not solve the issue completely because a fair amount of workers come from northern snohomish county towns but the swift green line stations “walksheds” (if you could call them that) could maybe be improved by some amount of protected or buffered bike infrastructure.
Its weird because if you’re already on airport road, the highway that is meant to provide access to boeing (boeing freeway) actually becomes a barrier to getting to the main boeing plant if you are not traveling by car. As far as I understand the closest crossing would be the underpass on casino road near the USPS which is pretty far east. Though to be fair my experience with the area was a bit limited to south of the freeway (Sno-Isle)
It is fairly disappointing that the board decided to not look further into alternatives and actually weigh the differences of routings for EVLE. What are the different cost estimates and travel time projections between a paine field routing and a I-5/Interurban/Everett mall routing? I don’t know. I could try to guess and assume similar stop spacing and average speed to LLE and say 45-50 minutes but I wouldn’t really know
I don’t think this would exactly solve the concerns with extending link that far out but it could still give a level of understanding on what choices are being made here. A 45 minute or even 40 minute transit trip if possible depending on some sort of mode between Everett and Seattle could seem appealing to Snohomish county voters. Were they themselves to understand the travel time differences between alternatives they may very well prefer the fastest alternative. But how would a planner approach this?
Good point. A lot of agencies (including Metro) list metrics for the particular bus routes. For example, ridership per service hour. This is a good measure as to whether a particular bus (like the E) is picking up a lot of people because it is cost efficient or just running often (turns out it is both).
When it comes to capital spending it gets more complicated. How much did the work surrounding the E cost and how much time did it save? Sometimes you can find the calculations, but it isn’t easy.
In this case there isn’t a lot of data for CT even in terms of service. They lump all of the regular buses together and they lump all of the Swift buses together (just like they used to lump all of the express buses together). This is useful to get a general view of things, but not that great if you are trying to figure out whether the Blue Line is doing all of the heavy lifting. By my math the two Swift Lines combine for 8,000 riders. If the Blue Line is carrying 6,000 then the Green Line is carrying 2,000 and is not that special. I’m not saying that is the ratio but it wouldn’t surprise if it was.
I got caught in a Link “mechanical issue” today. I took Link from Roosevelt intending to go to University Street for the downtown library, but it lingered at Capitol Hill for several minutes. After a few minutes an announcement said the train was delayed. Later another announcement said Link is running every 20 minutes “due to mechanical issue” (no “a”). Since Capitol Hill is my home and I didn’t want to sit on the train for possibly an hour and get to the library after it closed, I got off and canceled the rest of my errands.
After picking up holds at the library, I was going to take the 12 to Trader Joe’s on 17th. The G would have really helped with that, both by being more frequent and faster. I was at the library this week and saw the eastbound G station is in place right on the side of the library on Seneca Street (where the 2 stop probably is). Currently the eastbound 12 stop is a block away from the library at Marion.
131/132 reliability report: I was at Costco this week waiting for a northbound bus. They’re scheduled to alternate every 15 minutes. One Bus Away said the 131 left 5 minutes ago, and the 132 would come in 20 minutes and was 9 minutes late. That happens every day on those routes. In the mid 2010s they were severely unreliable, then they got somewhat better in the late 2010s, but since 2022 they’re back to their old unreliability.
I’m surprised there hasn’t been a huge outcry from residents on those routes, or the 28 that’s through-routed with them, or the 26 that used to be through-routed but is now gone.
I looked at an adult family home in north Burien for my relative, which was on the 131. Not only is that route half-hourly, but it’s regularly 10-15 minutes late, the bus stop has no place to sit, and there’s no crosswalk to cross six lanes of high-speed 1st Avenue South — the nearest crosswalks are a 10-minute walk away. I saw people with walkers or dogs crossing the street anyway. I was afraid that if I went there monthly, I’d eventually be hit by a car. And I’d inevitably miss the bus someday and have to stand half an hour until the next one (or maybe 45 minutes if it was late). So I didn’t choose that home.
Here comes the 145th St closure! Finally!
https://www.shorelinewa.gov/our-city/145th-street-corridor
This has been in the works for years now, but it is interesting that the “closure” will last well past the opening of LLE. Meaning this is sure to scramble the Metro Link restructure plan.
Is Metro ready? We will see. LOL.
And of course sometime after this done WSDOT will start shifting/closing lanes on I-5 in the same area to upgrade the fish passage.
Thank gawd we will have LLE open.
Yikes, what awful timing. The city said the project was delayed, so I’m assuming they hoped this would’ve been completed before or close to Link opening. The is gonna screw up the new 333 and 365 as there’s no way for them to access 145th without going through 130th or 155th. And delays are likely for 72 and oddly zig-zag-routed 65.
But the end result for 145th is worth it.
@Jordan,
Ya, this is pretty bad timing. With LLE opening at the end of summer, and this project extending into at least the fall, it is pretty clear that Metro is going to have to adjust their Link restructure proposal. At least in the short term.
And all that assumes that this project gets completed on schedule, and we all know how that goes.
However, the CT restructure can go forward as planned as it is not impacted. And those riders who access Link at LTC, MTS, or 185th St Station will also not be impacted. So that is good.
It should also be noted that the next phase of Revive I-5 starts soon, and at some point Shoreline will build the 148th St Ped Bridge over I-5 (should be minor impact), and then the big one starts with the WSDOT Fish Passage under I-5 (also at 145th).
So this area is going to be a mess for awhile. Thank gawd the users of Link will just glide through (for the most part).
The Lynnwood Link August opening date isn’t confirmed; it’s an internal planning target. We saw similar ST progress reports that the Line 2 Starter Line would open in March but ST never announced it, and then when ST did announce a date it was April 27th.
@ Mike…CT set a date of Aug 31 on their website for the new bus restructure to be implemented. In wishful thinking and probably false hope, I’m guessing ST will open Lynnwood Link on Aug 31st.
@Jordan,
CT would not cancel the 400 and 800 series unless they were darn sure the LLE was open BEFORE they did so, or at least on the same day.
Also, that Heraldnet article I posted recently quoted an ST spokesperson as saying an announcement regarding the date would be made in a “couple of weeks”. ST wouldn’t make a date announcement if they weren’t darn sure too.
And Link LRV’s have been plying LLE under their own power for at least a couple of months now. That means they are well into the verification testing phase.
Things are happening! Finally real progress is being made.
Is Metro ready? We will see.
Never mind Metro. The main bus to serve 145th will be Stride 3. Is ST ready?
Oh wait, it looks like this Stride project will be very late. It also looks like they won’t even send the 522 to 145th until much later.
So let me get this straight: Sound Transit messed up Community Transit’s plans and there may be crowding for riders heading to Snohomish County. This will surely piss off some of the CT riders, who most likely will blame Community Transit (for canceling their express bus). Meanwhile, Shoreline is very late in their makeover of 145th. ST is very late when it comes to sending buses to 145th. The problems in Shoreline (and the big delays by ST) have surely made things tough on Metro.
And yet somehow this is Metro’s fault? Why do you hate Metro so much Lazarus? I’m serious — your contempt of the agency is just bizarre. It is inconsistent. You praise other transit agencies and then turn around and attack Metro even when they do the exact same thing. What’s up with that?
So basically we have an additional phase now. It will be like so:
1) 148th Station opens.
2) 145th Street is open to vehicles (including the buses).
3) The 522 bus is sent to 148th Station.
4) 130th Station opens.
Metro is supposed to work around all of it. Compared to previous restructures, the one for Lynnwood Link was not very good (in my opinion). I don’t think they used the A-team. But holy cow, what a mess for them to work with. I believe one of the big problems with the restructure is that they tried to isolate the last two changes. They made a route that combines both segments (Lake City Way and 125th/130th). That way it can be added as necessary without altering the other pieces. I think that is a bad approach (as it leaves you with a poor 77) but it does reduce churn. Now there will be plenty of churn anyway.
I suppose they can simply detour the 333 and 365 to 155th (and put up with congestion with the 72) but it not going to be a smooth opening. It is ironic that they will send the 333 to 155th since that is what they should have it do in the future (just follow the pathway of the 330 west of 5th). The problem is instead of serving two stops on Aurora and quickly getting to Shoreline Community College, it will double back to 145th, further delaying riders heading to the college. If I owned a used car lot I think I would run some ads aimed at the students.
The East Link starter line opens in April. As usual, useful information from ST is non-existant. What’s going to happen, if anything, with the 550. It should truncate at S Bell P&R. Hopefully (I doubt it) it would exit at Rainier to emulate the Link Station at Jenkins Park; probably not. And why can’t Link go to MI P&R? The 554 could divert to S Bellevue P&R. That would be a huge hit to riders trying to get to DT but maybe a win for commuters to Bellevue.
If Sound Transit truncated the 550 at South Bellevue station to coincide with the opening of the starter line, they’d be flooded with so many complaints they’d reverse it asap.
Bus restructures are deferred until Bellevue Link reaches Seattle, a move which I believe is the right call (except for the 566, which should be truncated at Bellevue Transit Center, but isn’t).
Except for the 221, which is about to start ducking over from 148th to serve Overlake Village Station. A good move, IMO.
Seems like there’s an opportunity to leverage the Link service to improve the 249. That might mean breaking it into two routes. Something that should have been done long ago anyway. The north tail could jog over to the new 130th Link P&R and then terminate at S Kirkland P&R. At least it goes to S. Kirkland P&R now which is a huge improvement over the 249 Classic.
ST Express isn’t changing. ST briefly considered truncating the 550 but chose not to. The 550 also serves south Belleve Way stops and the heavily-used Bellevue Square stop (4th NE & B’Way) that gets half the riders sometimes. ST doesn’t want to change ST Express until it has something major to offer — i.e., Link going to Seattle.
Metro does the same thing with its routes. Sensible Metro changes have been delayed for years waiting for (A) a Link project, and (B) additional delays to said Link project.
I’m not saying truncating the 550 now is “sensible”: there are arguments that it’s not. If you’re going from Seattle to somewhere in east Bellevue it would turn a 2-seat ride into a 3-seat ride. I.e., going from “take the 550 to Bellevue TC and transfer to X” to “take the 550 to South Bellevue, the 2 Line to Bellevue TC or an eastern stop, and X from there”. With the 2 Line running every 15 minutes, and most Eastside routes running every 15-60 minutes, that’s potentially 30 minutes of waiting (15+15), or in a worst case 75 minutes (15+60). If you’re starting from Mercer Island, the situation gets absurd, as the 550 goes only one stop and then you wait that extra time.
As to why the Starter Line doesn’t go to Mercer Island, it may be even lower ridership there, or simply that the Starter Line’s champion Balducci was previously Bellevue’s mayor, not Mercer Island’s mayor. Or a sensible logistical issue. Or because of real or assumed opposition by Mercer Islanders of having crowds of non-Islanders transfer there clogging their sidewalks.
@Mike Orr,
Please. The reason the Starter Line doesn’t go to MI has nothing to do with ridership, or Balducci, or anything else like that.
The reason the Starter Line doesn’t go to MI is because of the plinths on the East Channel Bridge. Basically the Starter Line can’t get to MI until the plinth issue is resolved.
This has been discussed on this very blog many times. This is not news.
I thought all the faulty plinths were between Intl Dist and the west Lake Washington shore.
@Mike Orr,
No, the plinths on the East Channel Bridge were bad too. That is way the ELSL doesn’t include MIS.
You can find maps of the problem on various different platforms.
My concern isn’t so much what they do with the 550 north of Bellevue P&R but from there into Seattle. Since they eliminated the flyer stop for me to use transit would mean getting on Link in Bel-Red, transferring at the Swamp & Ride to the 550 and then transferring again to the 554 on MI. I can see maintaining service on Bellevue Way. I just wish it would follow the 554 routing to actually provide shadow Link service.
Re: Plinths. They’ve had plenty of time to fix the short section on the East Channel Bridge. I have no idea why it was such a cluster in the first place? Sure, on the sinking bridge section they had to reinvent the RR tie and use cinder block because… well, it’s on a boat. But why the extra special requirement for the bridge?
I missed the formal announcement, but ST has formalized reductions to their 500 series service in Pierce County. This is in response to the operator shortage:
https://www.soundtransit.org/get-to-know-us/news-events/news-releases/sound-transit-announces-march-2024-service-change
It’s never good to see service reductions, but doing it this way is far superior to injecting chaos into operations by having random spot cancelations.
No reduction in service on Sounder or on Link.
Service reductions start March 30th.
Another reason why ST really needs to stop putting the problem of operational stuff onto local agencies.
Given ST doesn’t have any bus bases, outsourcing bus operations to the county agencies makes sense.
It’s the outsourcing of Link operations, where ST fully owns the OMFs and fleet, that make no sense.
@AJ,
Exactly. The model makes sense with buses, but it doesn’t make sense with LR. ST would do well to bring LR operations and staff under the ST umbrella.
But this is just a case of ST scaling back bus operations to match the number of operators available. It’s the same thing ST and the other agencies have done before. Even Metro eventually did the same thing.
That said, I have no problem with ST pulling as many operators as required from Metro bus operations and converting them to LR operations. Light Rail is clearly the higher priority service (higher ridership, higher ridership per operator, better economics). If operators are scarce, they should be used to support Light Rail first (assuming they want to transition, which most do).
Single-agency only bases would require more total bases, with more empty spaces to accommodate each agency’s uncertain expansions. It’s a similar problem as the spaghetti of half-full buses on Third Avenue until one Link or RapidRide consolidation or through-routing at a time reduces the number to fewer and fuller buses.
Terri Mestas joins Sound Transit as Deputy CEO for Megaproject Delivery.
https://www.soundtransit.org/get-to-know-us/news-events/news-releases/terri-mestas-joins-sound-transit-deputy-ceo-megaproject
She sounds highly qualified. This is exactly the kind of experienced person ST needs to improve their project delivery.
“Sound Transit currently has the largest transit expansion program in the country, including ST3 capital projects totaling an estimated $54 billion.”
If only that meant it would also be the most useful and efficient expansion service in the country.
“Mestas is a seasoned professional with more than 30 years of experience leading large, complex infrastructure programs for space exploration, military installations, national and international antiterrorism physical security, and innovative project delivery for the aviation industry.”
But what about transit networks? Some issues will be the same across industries, but many are specific to metro subways.
@Mike Orr,
Mestas Isn’t being hired to design a “transit network”, she is being hired to perform on mega project delivery.
Stated another way, the basic characteristics of what ST is going to build are already defined, voter approved, and funded. Her job is simply to deliver those projects.
the basic characteristics of what ST is going to build are already defined, voter approved, and funded. Her job is simply to deliver those projects.
Ha! So you are basically saying it really doesn’t matter if what is built is effective transit or not. I think a lot of people would disagree with you.
@Ross
> Ha! So you are basically saying it really doesn’t matter if what is built is effective transit or not. I think a lot of people would disagree with you.
No, Lazarus is just pointing out that the route alignment is not part of their job description. that is for the board to decide
Lazarus, “transit networks” includes building to the decided specs. Rail-line construction –as we’ve recently seen — has signal issues, plinth issues, mechanical issues, and road-sinking issues that don’t exist in those other industries. Some of those other industries are responsible for reliable escalators/elevators, but others just work in buildings where some other entity is responsible for those. I would think a large number of transit megaprojects would need somebody who’s experienced in transit megaprojects so that they can anticipate and keep on top of these things better.
Thanks WL, that is exactly correct.
I made no comment whatsoever about the efficacy of the ST3 projects.
All I said was that, as ST moves into project delivery, they need someone who is experienced and good at project delivery, and Mestas appears to be a good fit for that role.
I didnt think my comments were that controversial.
the route alignment is not part of their job description. that is for the board to decide
So the CEO is not supposed to have any opinion whatsoever when it comes to the efficacy of the project? That is absurd. That would be like a school superintendent not caring about education. I realize the ultimate power lies with the board, but the CEO is supposed to weigh in on the various options if not actually decide how to implement the vaguely defined goals (such as station location).
This is what I find so worrisome. You have a board that doesn’t know much about transit, but pushed through a plan that sounded appealing. Now you have a CEO that doesn’t know much about transit that is supposed to somehow implement the plan. It is reminiscent of how Boeing got into such deep trouble. Nobody cared about the fact that the people in charge didn’t know anything about airplanes. In the case of Boeing there were plenty of complaints by engineers and machinists, but those were ignored. It is quite possible that there are ST employees who are in the same boat. They know a lot about transit and have voiced their complaints to deaf ears. Or maybe the folks below have the same sort of “just build it” or “it is not my job” mentality. This is a prescription for a very bad system. Most of ST3 is poorly designed at a high level. The parts that have some promise are fragile. If they don’t get the details right the region will have spent a huge amount of money for something that is simply not very good.
Mestas is not the CEO, she’s the Deputy CEO for Megaproject Delivery. That means making sure the projects get finished on time and on budget and that they work and are reliable. The things I mentioned are all part of that. The main CEO, which is currently a temporary incumbent until a permanent one is hired, is the one who’s more responsible for second-guessing alignment decisions and pushing back on unrealistic board demands. Mestas’s job is to make the project happen, and only push back if it flat-out can’t be done.
I made no comment whatsoever about the efficacy of the ST3 projects.
You implied they were not part of her job.
Her job is simply to deliver those projects.
Deliver what? Seriously, what do you think she is delivering if not a “transit network”? Shouldn’t those projects actually work?
By your definition she could oversee the building of a system that is highly ineffective (and much worse than what was promised) but she would be doing a bang-up job because it got built. That is Mike’s concern and it is a valid one. Someone with transit experience is likely to push back against really bad decisions, whereas someone else might be completely oblivious to it. The United States has a long history of delivering really bad mass transit systems (not just overly expensive ones). Given the weak fundamentals of ST3 (and the various challenges) the lack of transit experience found on the board and the new CEO is scary.
What is the reason for Link’s mysterious signal problems and mechanical problems that have been happening every couple days for months on end, even after multi-week maintenance periods? Could they have been prevented if the original construction had been better? Would having a megaprojects delivery officer then have helped prevent them now?
“ Mestas Isn’t being hired to design a “transit network”, she is being hired to perform on mega project delivery.”
There are different stages to project openings. There is (very broadly) early planning, environmental impacts combined with most of the design work, final designs with bids and funding/ financing, and construction.
While all could be called “project delivery”, it’s that last step of construction management that is the most critical element for ST this year. That’s what I’m assuming will be her focus.
In terms of revisiting earlier planning, there needs to be institutional change at ST. A good case study is the realignment saga a few years ago. Rogoff tried to get the Board to adjust WSBLE to deal with cost and constructibility issues — and seemingly couldn’t get them to budge. Instead all we got was generalized delay and extended taxation periods as well as a denial that obvious budget problems were no worry. ST seems to be unable to even consider little adjustments to make conditions easier for future riders.
I wasn’t in those meetings, but what they lacked was a CEO that had the air of legitimacy and rail experience to be the bad guy when needed. Had Mestas been on staff, things likely would not be different for WSBLE and realignment.
However, someone like Mestas on board five years ago should more likely have meant that all of East Link would be opening at once this year. Considering that the project was expected to open well ahead of the fall of 2023 original schedule and it’s still not assured for the fall of 2025 — and it wasn’t until early 2022 that the delay was revealed, it’s clear that ST was not paying attention or that someone was suppressing the problem at some level. Who knew what when? No one dates to ask.
Mestas is not the CEO, she’s the Deputy CEO for Megaproject Delivery.
Yes, and my comments implied the opposite. My apologies. But as you wrote, the point still stands. If you are in charge of delivering the project, than the efficacy of the project matters. If you know exactly what you are going to build (and how) then it isn’t that difficult. If that is what she is being paid to oversee than she is being overpaid. The problems occur as you make changes. Which ones are important, and which ones aren’t? That is where transit expertise is helpful.
@Ross
> Yes, and my comments implied the opposite. My apologies. But as you wrote, the point still stands. If you are in charge of delivering the project, than the efficacy of the project matters. If you know exactly what you are going to build (and how) then it isn’t that difficult. If that is what she is being paid to oversee than she is being overpaid. The problems occur as you make changes. Which ones are important, and which ones aren’t? That is where transit expertise is helpful.
Ross it’s like the difference between architect, engineer and foreman.
The engineer isn’t going to be constantly second guessing why for say a building exactly why the architect chose the site or why they wanted the garage facing xyz direction. Their job is to build it on time and within budget. Of course there are some overlapping items but they’re not going to completely upend the plan.
Definitely in the planning phase they’ll have lots of input, but not after the alignment is already chosen.
“If you know exactly what you are going to build (and how) then it isn’t that difficult.”
A Link line “isn’t that difficult”? Building a track, tunneling, procuring trains, preparing trains, testing trains, building stations, making sure the escalators are the right quality and up to spec and installed right, managing several contracts and dozens of people, those are each major projects in themselves. Multiply that by every remaining Link project in ST2 and ST3. A thousand things can go wrong. It’s her job to make sure they don’t. That’s a lot of work to do right.
OK, if that is all she does she is getting paid a huge amount and adding one more layer onto a bureaucracy that has had communication problems for a while now. You can just here the wheels grinding. This seems like the opposite of what you want if the goal is to “cut red tape when construction firms request payment for minor changes”. Now you talk to Mestas who either bumps the issue up to a higher level, or says “good enough”. But is it?
Consider Mount Baker Station. It is clearly in a bad location, and they built it that way to save money. Was it worth it? Not in my book. Anyone who understood transit would have pushed back on the design. Anyone focused on just building it would have accepted the design.
Or consider 130th Station (the Seattle one). Everyone suggested it straddle 130th. Instead they built it to the north. Fair enough. Maybe it just cost too much to build it over the street. But then guess what happened. Their original cost estimates were way off. Turns out someone didn’t measure the street properly. It is steeper than they expected (especially to the north). This has pushed up the cost quite a bit. At this point there are several choices. One is to just accept that this costs more and pay it (what they ultimately did). Another is to rethink the decision about station location (maybe straddling 130th could actually be cheaper or at least similar). Another is to rethink the design of the station. The station will have platforms on each side (which is fine). It will also be largely symmetrical. Not only east-west (of course) but north-south. This means two sets of stairs, escalators and elevators on each side. This is overkill, given that over 90% of the people will come from the south. Get rid of one set of escalators and stairs (but keep the elevators for redundancy) and maybe you save a huge amount of money.
The point is it is very difficult to make these kind of decisions without knowing about transit. Maybe she won’t. Maybe her job is to basically be a foreman (not an architect or an engineer). Fair enough. But given the biggest problem (by far) with ST is lack of transit expertise this isn’t a good sign. Especially since this is a fairly high profile, highly paid position (which pays higher than what her boss is being paid).
“ Consider Mount Baker Station. It is clearly in a bad location, and they built it that way to save money. Was it worth it? Not in my book. Anyone who understood transit would have pushed back on the design. ”
Dare I mention that Downtown Bellevue is designed similarly — a side platform station requiring a grade change located across a busy street from a transit center.
But the biggest bad station design is SODO after it’s expanded — and of course the Pioneer Square to the misnamed CID-N transfer plan.
It’s too late for Downtown Bellevue but these other ones are truly terrible! They’re really really bad! Riders will be punished for decades!
So who on staff can push back? In SODO’s case there is no logical opposition to designing the station differently and ST plans to move the existing platform anyway. With WSLE flying towards a final EID, this should be changed this year. Will it take an obnoxious Board member to change the situation or can senior staff push back? And to be clear, SODO affects not only West and SE Seattle, but at some point every rider in North King and Snohomish going to SeaTac, and every rider in South King and Pierce going to UW and King Street as this station is the best for 1/3 Line transfers (a number that ST staff never tell the Board).
110th Ave isn’t a “busy street.” Bellevue will install an all direction scramble crossing, like what exits on the other side of the TC at 108th & 6th. Even with the grade trade, it will be an easy transfer.
@Sam,
Ya. I saw that this morning. It’s really impressive to see the optimism in the part of the local developers.
And it is not just on the ELSL, you see the same thing occurring at 148th, 185th, MTS, and LTC Stations. Pretty much anywhere there is a new LR station going in you see development. Except of course for 130th St Station. Still crickets there.
“Sound Transit currently has the largest transit expansion program in the country, including ST3 capital projects totaling an estimated $54 billion.”
Impressive. An investment of that size is going to completely transform this region. Both from
A transit perspective and a built environment perspective.
It’s almost like we are finally becoming a real city!
That should have posted under Sam’s post.
Pretty much anywhere there is a new LR station going in you see development. Except of course for 130th St Station. Still crickets there.
Like all the areas around stations this is largely due to the zoning. There is a bigger correspondence between zoning changes and development than there is transit and development. Magnolia would see dozens of large apartments if they rezoned neighborhoods, even if transit remained poor.
But this begs the question: Why hasn’t it been upzoned (yet)? It will be, but it is taking a while. There are several reasons for this. First the station is not opening with the rest of Lynnwood Link. At one point they wanted to open it ten years (!) after Lynnwood Link. Folks managed to convince the board to open it sooner, but it is still opening much later than it should.
It is primarily a feeder station. You could say the same thing about most of Lynnwood Link, but plenty of people feel that development around the station is not that important. I see their point. The vast majority of riders will take a bus to and from the station (not walk).
It got wrapped up in the “One Seattle” housing plan. This plan got delayed several times. Partly because of the churn on the city council but also because the mayor was in no hurry to produce something he knew was going to be controversial. So instead of being a standalone proposal (that probably would have been implemented fairly quickly) it got delayed with everything else in there.
It is interesting to compare it with the Roosevelt neighborhood. In the case of Roosevelt it was a standalone plan. They moved the station away from the freeway. It was seen by some on the council (Richard Conlin especially) as essential that the area around the station be rezoned (otherwise we would have been better with the station closer to Green Lake). Thus there was some urgency by the council to upzone before the station got here. But there was also plenty of opposition. In the case of 130th there has been very little, despite the city talking about upzoning now for years. Ironically, this may have lead to further delay. At Roosevelt I’m sure the mayor and council felt like they needed to start hashing out the details right away, as the opposition could delay things. (As it turns out they actually managed to find a compromise fairly quickly.) In 130th the lack of controversy has lead to it being on the back-burner for quite some time.
Of course now it is in the One Seattle plan, and while the plan has sparked plenty of controversy, it remains one of the least controversial parts of it. I live in the neighborhood and basically there is crickets (as you put it). No major opposition. No yard signs complaining about upzoning (unlike Wallingford). Basically people either welcome the upzone or just don’t care. Eventually the council and mayor will get around to changing the zoning, just as Sound Transit will get around to finishing the station. We shouldn’t have to wait this long for either, but those are the breaks.
Her big qualification is her LAWA (the LAX legal entity) experience. Notably, the LAX peoplemover is already delayed from 2025 to the end of October 2025. There is speculation that more delay is coming.
It makes me wonder why someone would leave managing a project delivery at this point in a project’s completion.
Jus’ sayin’ …
Because she got a better job offer with a higher salary?
@Al S,
Given what the world has gone through the last 4 years, I think any manager that gets reasonably close on schedule or cost is a miracle worker. Get close on both and that manager probably qualifies as a minor deity.
But we will see. Only very rarely is anyone a perfect fit for a given position. And you never know. Maybe after 6 months she enters the transfer portal and ends up somewhere else.
Eastside developers track the light rail rollout with measured optimism
“The Ondina residential complex, under construction, is across the road from BelRed Station. The developer says the location near the light rail was not a coincidence.”
https://www.seattletimes.com/business/eastside-developers-track-the-light-rail-rollout-with-measured-optimism/
The article mentions that the Wilburton station pedestrian bridge that spans NE 8th parallel to the elevated Link tracks will open a couple of months after the opening of the starter line. “The Northeast Eighth Street bridge, a walk-bike bridge crossing over busy Northeast Eighth Street and connecting the trail with the station, will open at the end of June, according to King County officials.” It’s too bad they can’t open the ped bridge on April 27th.
No crossing I-5 at 145th for seven months. It’s closing in less than four days!
Will it reopen before Shoreline South Link Station opens later this year? Should Shoreline South be opened only after the new viaduct is in place? It could get pretty messy if it opens early!
https://mynorthwest.com/3955879/i-5-overpass-145th-seattle-close/?fbclid=IwAR3u07pNy8oD_U90d_B62Zb38q1v8-n6JVrqrY3eWg3WdfBG94sJCQ8R5OQ_aem_ARexyw6bp22IVz0AaDP7R46_JvzWGb2EecE2gYkPezQxrsJV7HSHmbcyTafxHkqrOrM#//
We’ve been discussing this up above (https://seattletransitblog.com/2024/03/24/open-thread-43/#comment-929193).
Will it reopen before Shoreline South Link Station opens later this year?
Probably not.
Should Shoreline South be opened only after the new viaduct is in place?
Definitely not.
It could get pretty messy if it opens early.
Yes, absolutely. But I don’t think it is that messy. Buses will use 155th. It will be a detour for a couple of the new buses, but folks will muddle along. It is kind of funny since the station should be on 155th and the buses should run on 155th (instead of 145th) but it is too late now.
The big question for me is whether or not it will be necessary to close traffic near the eastern roundabout. I’m hoping that at least this step is finished enough so that station traffic won’t be too impeded.
As long as station access from the north is possible, the station should certainly open. I just think that the station boardings will be lower than expected until the bridge crossing I-5 and roundabouts are open.
For PSRC meetings there was some internal debate over whether the funds should go towards freeway expansions or not.
Proposed last year december, but recommendation did not pass this march.
> The Transportation Policy Board considered prohibiting projects on limited access highways that add general purpose vehicle capacity
to compete for PSRC’s federal funds
• Would only limit projects on these specific state highways that add general purpose lanes
• Projects addressing safety, preservation, HOV on these facilities would still be eligible
• Projects adding capacity on other facilities would still be eligible Recommendation did not pass, but staff was directed to continue to research and evaluate this concept
Recommendation did not pass, but staff was directed to continue to research and evaluate this concept
The other idea was
> Setting a threshold for funding projects only above a certain total score, since the final scores and rankings reflect how well each project meets each of the project evaluation criteria and regional policies. The board directed staff to continue working with the Regional Project Evaluation Committee on options and administrative procedures to present to the board later in 2024.
https://www.psrc.org/media/8544
Also if y’all want to see the project selection list for funds https://www.psrc.org/media/6011. Existing funded ones are https://www.psrc.org/media/8547
Notably for seattle would be 3 million for the route 36 improvements. 8 million for Graham Street Infill Station (funds design) and 8 million for boeing infill station (funds design) .
Great article on today’s opening of Orange Swift.
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/transportation/snohomish-countys-frequent-orange-line-bus-debuts-saturday/
I like how Iggyfitz refers to the ability to redeploy service after LLE opens as being a “rail dividend”. I had not heard that terminology before, but he is correct.
After LLE opens CT will have connections to LLE and the Sound Transit Light Rail system at LTC, Mount Lake Terrace, and 185th St Stations. The 185th St tie-in with Swift Blue is not a truncation so it won’t yield a “rail dividend” in the form of redeployable resources, but it should generate increased ridership and better economics on Swift Blue due to increased ridership.
And “Taylor” is a color. So the next line to open shouldn’t be “Swift Gold”. It should be “Swift Taylor”.
Congrats to CT on opening Orange Swift. And on their HFCB and BEB programs (also mentioned in the article).
Lazarus finally said something good about buses, but not Metro buses. :)
When I was growing up we had a thermometer/hygrometer (humidity meter) on the mall with the brand name “Taylor”, so I called it “the taylor”.
@Mike Orr,
The careful observer will note that I have been saying positive things about buses for years. It’s just that I am not against criticizing the agencies when criticism is due.
And it seems like people on this blog are hypersensitive to anything and everything Metro. Even saying something positive about another agency is perceived as being anti-Metro, which clearly isn’t the case.
Being pro-rail isn’t the same as being anti-bus. Nobody should confuse a bus with rail. They are not the same thing, and rail clearly has a key, and expanding, transit role regionally.
In 2 years transit will be completely transformed in this region. Five Light Rail openings in (hopefully) two years is nothing short of transformative.
It would appear that CT understands this with their “rail dividend”. And with their extension of the Blue Swift to 185th St Station.
Good for them.
Probably running before East Link crosses the lake. With the reduced gravity they won’t need to use lightweight concrete plinths ;-(
Apparently the moon surface, made mostly of dust, would make it difficult to move anything of significant amount (passengers or freight) between the two proposed moon bases. A track would be able to spread the weight out.
I expect some sort of modular roller coaster track thing.
I recently read the constructuon timeline of the of the SR-520 to southbound I-5 reversable express lanes to Mercer Street for transit/HOV. The tineline says the construction completion date is in 2024. Later this year. But the opening will not be until 2030. Due to the completion of part of the Montlake sections.
Ah, first ST canceled the agenda for this Thursday’s Executive Committee Meeting (whatever that means), and now they have cancelled the meeting itself.
Interesting.
SDOT got money to move forward with the east marginal way project https://sdotblog.seattle.gov/2024/04/02/east-marginal-way-project-groundbreaking/
“Today, Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell joined the Seattle Department of Transportation and project partners to celebrate the start of construction on the East Marginal Way Corridor Improvement Project.”
More details at https://www.seattle.gov/transportation/projects-and-programs/programs/freight-program/east-marginal-way-corridor-improvement-project
North Segment improvement features:
* New heavy-haul street with 15-inch-thick concrete between Jack Perry Park and S Spokane St
* Two-way protected bike lane on the east side of the street with concrete barriers and fencing
* Upgraded traffic signal at S Hanford St and a new signal at S Horton St
* Rebuilt sidewalk on the west side of E Marginal Way S
* New earthquake-resistant water main from S Horton St to S Massachusetts St
* Weigh-in-motion system for freight
Honestly a bit surprised they got the money for this, I was under the impression it would take them much longer to acquire the funds. Anyways more excitingly would be in the future if/when they build the south segment https://www.seattle.gov/transportation/projects-and-programs/programs/freight-program/east-marginal-way-corridor-improvement-project#southsegment that would build bike lanes to the 1st avenue bridge.
sorry correction the south segment would only build bike lanes down to diagonal avenue, and beyond that just sidewalk repair down to 1st avenue bridge on the east side.
Ah, looks like someone knows that something is coming sometime:
https://www.heraldnet.com/news/lynnwood-light-rail-opening-date-announcement-coming-thursday/
This aligns with what my sources have been saying too.
And i’d also expect clarity on the restructure dates. Should be a big day.
Ah. So it appears that that Everett Herald article on the Lynnwood Link opening date announcement is currently their most read article.
That speaks to the interest and excitement in SnoCo regarding the arrival of Light Rail.
Announcement will be latter today.
Everett Herald is now reporting that the announcement is running late, which is sort of weird because I was told the announcement would be at 1:00, and it is 12:59 right now.
https://www.heraldnet.com/news/announcement-running-late-for-lynnwood-link-launch-date/
So stay tuned!
ST is now reporting that CT and Metro bus restructures will now occur on Sept 14th.
So all this agrees with what a little bird told me awhile back. So at least now it is official and unlikely to change.
Progress! Finally!
Announced: the opening date for Lynnwood Link is August 30th.
Bus reatructures will undoubtably occur after that, probably sometime in meteorological fall.