Midweek Roundup – Open Thread 49

117 Replies to “Midweek Roundup – Open Thread 49”

1. Hypothetical question. Link allows minors to ride free. Link has also considered installing fare gates. How could Link design a fare gate system that also accommodates letting minors in without jumping through an obstacle course? (My teenage niece from Maui is visiting, and she is *dying* to ride Link, even more so when she found out she can ride free.)

   1. On busses, the free ride requires a card. I assume it’s the same with Link.

      1. The horse’s mouth says people 18 and under don’t need an ORCA card or tapping, they can just get on, except for the Seattle Monorail. But tapping is encouraged because it “allows transit agencies to better understand how many youth are riding transit, including where and when. Transit agencies use this information to make future improvements.”

         You can get a youth card online if you upload proof-of-age (a student ID, state ID, or birth certificate). Or you can get it by mail, or in person at Metro’s Pass Sale office (201 S Jackson Street, Pioneer Square).

      2. In my experience, kids just walk onto the bus without a card now. At first, the drivers used to try to tell them that they needed a card, but after a couple months they stopped doing that.

      3. Overheard on the westbound route 271 at the BTC a few months ago. Passenger in his mid-20’s: “You go by the train?” Driver: “At the UW.” Passenger: “Under 18.” Then walks to the back of the bus.

      4. My 17 yo son just walks on. Once they asked for a student ID, but didnt really care. He rides mostly PT, but sometimes ST.

      5. @Sam,

         There is no meaningful fare enforcement on buses, Not like Link.

      6. He does the same on link.

   2. If faregates were to be implemented, I assume the ORCA system would be adapted to accept School ID cards with RFID chips, and/or unenrolled minors would have to apply for a youth ORCA card with a pass that expires on their 19th birthday.

      Or kids would just hop the gates.

   3. The question isn’t hypothetical. Check out how the monorail handles it.

2. With Metro drivers being hired directly to full-time (Hallelujah!) does this mean part-time pick packets will also be phased out?

   Should we expect the furloughed peak-only routes (such as those from last fall’s service change) never to return?

   Does this portend the end of Metro 177 and 193 routes when Federal Way Link opens? As well as Metro phasing its way out of operating any ST Express routes?

   Once ST hires its own operators for STRide, will that lead to ST taking over operation of Link, with operators being able to move between driving STRide or Link if the get tired of one or the other and have the seniority to pick a different service?

   And someday, maybe, ST wins the bid to operate paratransit for all three of its counties?

   1. A lot of the current advocacy push is for all-day service over peak capacity, so I think it’s safe to assume that yes, former mono-directional peak-only routes will not be coming back in any significant way.

      I’d be surprised if they fully eliminate part-time work, though. I bet there are plenty of drivers who are only interested in working part time, for whatever reason. Getting ST to hire their own operators (other than for the T-line) seems like a major uphill battle without getting a CEO that’s motivated to make that change happen.

   2. Metro finally realized that split shift part time is hurting thier hiring?

   3. “Once ST hires its own operators for STRide, will that lead to ST taking over operation of Link, with operators being able to move between driving STRide or Link if the get tired of one or the other and have the seniority to pick a different service?” No and no.

      Stride operation will be contracted out. First Transit, which contracts with CT for much of their operations, is who I expect to win the bid, but I haven’t seen anything public on that front.

      The only operations that ST does in house is T-Link. The political opposition from King County (both within KCM and the KC council) is immense. ST placed the Stride bus station in Snohomish county to avoid Amalgamated Transit Union Local 587, which would have forced ST to partner with KCM on Stride. Snohomish is ATU Local 1576, which already has a working relationship with First Transit.

      I would speculate that if First Transit has the contract with ST for Stride, First Transit drivers will be able to pick between ST and CT routes, but they will operate out of distinct OMFs so just speculating.

3. I cringed at the Stride station name choices. While not innovative, the use heavy use of highway names just reenforces how the stops are lousy destinations. And the one place where the streets are the biggest destination (south Renton) no street name is proposed in any alternative!

   1. Can someone post the alternatives so that we can see them before doing the whole survey?

      1. Stride S3 station at I-405 and SR 522 interchange:
         1. North Creek Transit Center
         2. Bothell/Woodinville Transit Center
         3. I-405 / SR 522 Transit Center

         Stride S2 station at I-405 and NE 85th St interchange in Kirkland:
         1. NE 85th St
         2. Kirkland / NE 85th St

         Stride S1 stations in Renton at I-405 and NE 44th St interchange:
         1. NE 44th St
         2. Renton / NE 44th St

         Stride S1 transit center in Renton between Rainier Ave/ SR 167 and the South Renton Park and Ride:
         1. Renton Transit Center
         2. South Renton Transit Center

         Survey asks to grade each alternative on whether it “avoids redundancy”, is “intuitive”, “reflects the geography”, and is “brief”.

      2. I lean toward:
         Bothell/Woodinville TC
         Kirkland/NE 85th Street
         Renton/NE 44th Street
         Renton TC

         “North Creek” I’ve never heard of and wouldn’t know where it is. “I-405/SR 522 TC” is too highway-centric.

         “Bothell/Woodinville” and “Kirkland” depend on no future stations closer to the city centers, but that’s appropriate for Stride since it’s like Sounder. (E.g., “Tukwila Station” is at the edge of Tukwila, but there will never be a Sounder station at Southcenter.)

         “Renton TC” is OK because the transit center is moving to it. Renton itself is a basket-case that looks like a bomb dropped on downtown: a spaghetti of highways, car-oriented big-box stores west of a too-small historic area, and the rest of the city car oriented. There’s only so much you can do in that environment, so it doesn’t matter as much where the transit center is and what it’s called, because it will suck no matter what, until/if Renton improves its land use.

         I’m somewhat bothered that “Bothell/Woodinville” isn’t in Bothell or Woodinville. It may be in Bothell’s city limits, but you can’t walk to anything except a mile to UW Bothell. Still, I can’t think of a better name, and it does tell people where to get off if they’re going to Bothell or Woodinville. That’s the most important consideration.

      3. North Creek is a suburban section of Bothell, north of Woodinville, on the other side of the freeway from UW-Bothell, and south/southeast of Thrasher’s Corner. It’s been growing rapidly, and the Northshore School District even added the new North Creek High School, where my sister-in-law teaches (go Jaguars!).

         BTW, I’d just use “85th” for the Stride stop and drop “Kirkland”, as Totem Lake is also Kirkland.

   2. The Bothell-Woodinville Stride station drove me nuts. Just name is UW-Bothell…yeesh. The station isnt close to what people think of Bothell or Woodinville but defintely close to what everyone knows: UW-Bothell.

      1. But, but, but the prestige of having your city’s name in the title of a bus station, even if the main draw is actually in the other city sharing the name. We must at all costs not subsidize the branding of our public universities!

      2. Ok. How about UW Bothell / Woodinville Transfer Station?

   3. What really bothers me is using the same numbers as other routes run by the same agency.

      Why not STRide 501, 502, and 503, making it clear we are talking about buses, not trains. Or 2001, 2002, and 2003.

      If they are trying to give STRide its own unique branding, they are doing the exact opposite of that, and will confuse the wayfinding in perpetuity.

4. I somehow missed this excellent article from Tuesday (Seattle Times $): “WA road deaths jump 10%, reaching 33-year high. What are we doing wrong?”

   https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/transportation/wa-road-deaths-jump-10-reaching-33-year-high-what-are-we-doing-wrong/

   Lots of good quotes and references to active projects.

   1. Yeah, the discussion of it on Twitter has been interesting. As someone put it, like a political Rorschach test.

5. Why does Metro and Sound Transit have rules and laws for passengers to follow if they are never enforced?

   1. I’ve seen the rules be enforced multiple times this week.

      1. Really, where, when and how? I ride the bus every day. I rarely see the rules enforced.

      2. I was on light rail this morning shortly after 7 am at Northgate and there were 3 people in the last rows of the car I was in sleeping. The fare ambassadors got on the train at Northgate and asked all 3 for fare verification which they didn’t have and didn’t provide any ID. The fare ambassador told all 3 that they had to get off at the next stop and only one did. The fare ambassador stood right there and didn’t follow up with the other 2 and they continued to ride. So why am I paying my fare and other riders don’t and nothing is done about it.

         I have been on the light rail on other occasions where people were in the last rows sleeping and security people got on and the only thing they did was to wake them up and ask if they were ok. The only times I have seen security people force people off the trains was when the trains arrived at Northgate and all the people did was walk across the platform and get on the train waiting to leave for Angle Lake.

         I am guessing that maybe 1/3 or possible more don’t pay the fare on light rail and there is no enforcement. I know that they stopped because forcing people to pay the fare is unfair to certain groups of people. Well what about people who do pay like myself. Isn’t that unfair for people like that.

      3. If the only riders not paying, as suggested by the description above, are non-destinational and sleeping at the end of the train, then that is a pretty good rate of compliance.

         I can fully understand why ST doesn’t spend much time and money going after the riders who have no money to pay the fare. At best, they’d be diverting staff into long conversations about where to go to qualify for the Subsidized Annual Pass.

         The existence of fare evaders is still not much of an argument for defunding transit by making it free.

      4. I agree Brent. From a financial standpoint, it is important to consider the various people who don’t tap:

         1) Those that are young enough to ride free.
         2) Those that have “unlimited” monthly passes.
         3) Those that wouldn’t ride if they were asked to pay.
         4) Those that would pay, but are are trying to get a free ride.

         The only ones that are actually costing the agency money is that last group*. You can kick off the folks in that third category, but they won’t come back with money in their hands. In other words, the only reason they are riding is because it is free. They may be a nuisance, but they aren’t costing the agency money.

         I get what Jeff is saying, but the vast majority of people don’t want to put up with that kind of humiliation or hassle. I’ve seen people slowly jaywalk across Lake City Way causing cars to slow down. They are clearly messed up. They just don’t care. Not about the danger and certainly not about getting a ticket. The rest of us are a lot more careful. Same goes with the fare enforcers. Someone who is willing to go against an official is no different than someone who refuses to pay when boarding a bus. Sure, the driver probably won’t do much, but you never know. They could call security. They also don’t want everyone looking at them like they are an a**hole.

         * Technically those in the first two categories cost the agency money, but that is simply because the agencies have a silly way of sharing ORCA card money. They divide it per trip based on how people tap. For example, someone rides a bus then the train. If the rider taps both times, then the agencies split the money. But if someone taps on the bus and doesn’t tap on the train then ST loses money. Instead of them splitting the funds, the bus agency gets all of it. There is no good reason for this. The agencies should cooperate and figure out a way to share the money based on statistical sampling.

   2. I think at any given moment on most buses, some rule is being broken. On crowded buses, probably multiple rules. If they tried to enforce the rules, there would be a lot more delays, and a lot more conflict. But they need to keep the rules so things don’t degrade even further, and if they ever do need to remove someone from the bus, they can point to a rule that was broken.

      Metro’s rules … https://metro.kingcounty.gov/tops/bus/pdf/rideright.pdf

      1. Yeah, there has always been a balance. Drivers don’t want to spend a lot of time enforcing the rules, especially if it delays the bus. They tend to step in (or call for help) only when things get really out of hand. But it also varies by driver.

   3. I wonder the same thing about the Seattle Police Department. There are rules and laws for the officers but they don’t seem to be enforced.

   4. Why do state highways have rules and laws, if they are never enforced?

      Lack of enforcement there tends to be a lot more deadly.

6. CityNerd did a video on ABQ Ride’s ART BRT system
   https://youtu.be/qyOHoYqsj4k?si=CDOEv_DAFSqqG7yW
   I think it’s a good example of the good and bad of BRT planning. Reminds of the good and bad of Swift and RapidRide tbh.
   I’ve ridden this system before when visiting friend who currently lives on ABQ and think it’s an overall good system along with improving Central Ave.

   The only problems are besides weird ending of service early on weekends and that the separate lines should have 10-15 minute frequency instead of 24 minutes are really when the lines separate at Louisiana. Where the line quality drops like a rock to becoming a stop with a nice sign on a pole. Like the red line goes to Uptown Transit Center (think Lynnwood Alderwood Mall or Tukwila Southcenter area) and the two stops at Louisiana/Lomas (Fairgrounds) & Indian School/Louisiana (ABQ Uptown and Target) could’ve easily have been center running lines instead of shoved to the street side.

7. I absolutely love this. Thanks for the link, Zach.

   I lived in ABQ for 5 years before moving to Tacoma in the pandemic. I got to see the opening, and rode it some.

   The reason the green line is crappy through the International district/war zone is simple racism and classism. I worked with a community group who fought hard and won to include a stop in the ID. It would have been the only part of the segment that didn’t have a stop for more than a mile. Um…

   I am also conflicted to hear that the owner of local chain of coffee shops (satellite) that fought ART tooth and nail and organized against it did not survive the pandemic. I actually really liked the coffee shops, and there aren’t many good ones in the city. But the fact that they sued an independent (in Tacoma!) and made them change their name to Cosmonaut tips the scales to schadenfreude.

   And he isn’t kidding about the Portlanders. Many of the coolest new projects in ABQ are driven by Portland transplants. Weird.

   That the housing situation has gone to crap is sad, but not surprising. When I was there, it was completely overlooked as a cheap and really pretty cool place to live. I sold a house in Seattle, and bought one near Nob Hill in ABQ. During those 5 years, the house we sold in Seattle went from 725K to 1.2 million. The house in ABQ went from $390K to $380K. So this is definitely a new trend, but not too surprising. Everyone in ABQ feels they have a god-given right to their view of the Sandias. Hard to maintain, if people build up, even a little. So if out of towners have caught a whiff of how neat ABQ is, housing supply is shallow, and rents will start rising, as it sounds like they have.

   The key here though is that they build ART for $110 million!! Less then a decade ago! And it’s touted as the best BRT in the nation! Makes the “paused” $300 million dollar stream look really, really bad.

   I suspect the reason that they were able to push through true BRT is that the populace is often ignorant or disengaged (the first election turnout I experienced with 8%). The best they could do was “NO TO ART!” signs in all the business windows along the route. But because transit was pretty much non-existent in ABQ, they couldn’t actually critique and cripple the details. So when the NO campaign lost, the actually very excellent planners in ABQ got to do it right.

   1. I’m also thrilled to hear they went fare-free. You need to do all you can to help locals realize how useful good transit is. That’s what I hoped Stream would be for Pierce, to bolster a future bond vote to better fund transit.

      The 65% decrease in crashes would do wonders for Pacific Avenue. If they took a lane like ABQ did. It’s the only way to do it near budget. ART was originally budgeted at something like 85 million. You should have seen the op-eds when it “ballooned” to $110 million.

   2. Do you know how they built it? I assume they just took lanes. That would definitely keep costs down. They probably didn’t bundle it with other utility projects either.

      Assuming they took lanes, it looks to me like this wasn’t that painful. The street is really wide, and doesn’t have that many cars on it. This makes it much easier to build this sort of thing. A lot of it is timing. They could have done that on Aurora fifty years ago fairly easily. Now people will complain about traffic. It is almost like a bell curve with these sorts of projects. If the road is very wide and there isn’t much traffic then people don’t seem to care. We are on the opposite side of the curve. People will definitely care if you take a lane. But they also realize that transit is very important, and there is no real alternative.

      1. Yeah, they just took lanes. They did a little bit of weirdness, where some narrow parts are shared going East and West, IIRC, and the downtown detour is a bit annoying, but overall, beyond the platforms and signals, it was just a lot of red paint.

         They were able to take lanes without much complaint because there is another even bigger, wider stroad called Lomas parallel to it that has an absurd amount of capacity and is very fast.

         The main issue was that Central is “The Mother Road,” Rte 66, and there is a fair amount of nostalgia associated with it. It’s heyday was also the last heyday of Albuquerque. That the building of that road actually precipitated the area’s fairly rapid decline is lost on most folks.

         I don’t recall if they added much utility work. They needed to move some things I think, but nothing major.

         The empty lots in the video near Presbyterian are actually owned by the hospital, and they are indeed going to build a whole bunch of multifamily on that land. Or that was the plan 5 years ago.

      2. Thanks, that makes a lot of sense. I was actually in Albuquerque last year. My wife and I like to hike and we flew in and out of that airport. We didn’t get much of a chance to see the city though, which is a shame.

         What you wrote about Route 66 is quite consistent with what I’ve seen. Not only in the Southwest, but in other parts of the country. I understand the nostalgia, and some of the old restaurants are cool, but pretending it was all good is a bit naive.

      3. > The key here though is that they build ART for $110 million!! Less then a decade ago! And it’s touted as the best BRT in the nation!
         > Do you know how they built it? I assume they just took lanes. That would definitely keep costs down.

         It’s a bit complicated than they just took lanes. They used bidirectional center lanes for a good portion of it. Also the bus has left door boarding.

         Avoiding building true center median* bus lanes aka like van ness brt. The advantage of it is that they don’t need to move utilities as much, the bus can just use the general lanes utility work needs to be done. The downside is that the frequency is somewhat capped, though I guess it’s not an issue for this brt.

         The other areas with center bus lanes they used left side boarding buses, so again the buses can detour to use the general lanes. The places where utility lines needed to be moved are a lot less.

         https://www.reddit.com/r/Albuquerque/comments/42dkge/map_showing_the_first_leg_of_the_rapid_transit/ (Map of where it’s center bus lanes)

         *When you have median bus lanes separated from general traffic you need to move the utilities under the bus lanes otherwise the bus will cannot exit/detour when utility work is done under the busway.

   3. Continuing the topic of “The key here though is that they build ART for $110 million!! Less then a decade ago! And it’s touted as the best BRT in the nation! Makes the “paused” $300 million dollar stream look really, really bad.”

      I do wonder if king county could implement a center lane brt without relocating so much of the utilities. The ART implemented has
      * left side boarding so doesn’t need right side bus platforms
      * one lane bidirectional in some sections
      * one lane reversible in others (for example northbound am peak and then southbound pm)

      Maybe such an approach could be done on Aurora avenue if a center bus lane was desired using left side boarding door buses and then do not put in a bus lane barrier so buses can detour. This would allow minimal utility relocation.

      Most of the other roads I couldn’t really think of a good use for it as rarely do we have long stretches of medians that can be converted to a bus station versus just using right side BAT lanes

      1. Actually rapidride A could be a good candidate for it, there’s plenty of medians in pacific highway and adding the leftside doors would work relatively well. The only complicated part would be that left turning traffic would need to enter the ‘bus/hov lane’ if relocated to the center.

      2. A lot of the utility work is just the city tacking on work they needed to do anyway. We discussed this a while back. It makes sense (I would do the same thing) but it artificially inflates the cost of the project.

         RapidRide G (which I fully support Brent!) had a bit of both. There were a few places where they felt the road wasn’t wide enough so they took a bit of property and had to move some utility poles. But a lot of it was related to water/sewer work that was simply tacked on (which made the project seem a lot more expensive and time consuming than it would be otherwise).

         The 522 Stride line has a section that could be improved with cooperation of WSDOT. They want to add lanes but there isn’t quite enough room unless they lower the speed limit. Or they could take a lane. But as of now they are going to spend a bundle on making the street wider by cutting into and then replacing a retaining wall.

         There are a lot options when it comes to center running buses. For example this: https://maps.app.goo.gl/euBAqBqrCHCKR1qU9. The buses are normal buses (with curbside boarding) but the busway is completely isolated. This is great, but requires a lot of width. Another option is this, which we covered: https://seattletransitblog.com/2024/03/08/sdot-ideas-for-aurora/. Notice that the bus stops are not shared. A northbound bus stop is in a different location than a southbound bus. But the buses are still curbside buses. This is great if you are OK having the bus stops be away from each other. In the case of RapidRide G (which I still support Brent!) this would have been tricky. Often the blocks are pretty short, which means if you did it that way it would put some of the stops in awkward spots. Meanwhile, one lane bidirectional is a great way to save space when frequency is less of an issue (and space is expensive). In that sense it is like single tracking trains.

         I agree about the A and E. SR 99 is very well suited for this sort of thing. I could also see Rainier Avenue and Lake City Way doing something similar. Rainier Avenue is basically five lanes wide. The middle lane is a turn lane, which we really should get away from (they are notoriously dangerous). You could simply designate all three middle lanes for transit, and either add buses with left-side doors or do the weave. Personally I would do the latter. That would allow Metro to buy a bunch of buses for not only that line but RapidRide G, which means that all of those could be under wire. (For those unfamiliar with the project, we wanted buses with dual doors and wire. The bus company would sell us that, but only if it was a big enough order. Since pathway is relatively short and fast we don’t need that many buses, so we ended up with diesel-electrics).

         Lake City Way would work for the same reason, but only north of 80th. South of there it is four lanes wide.

      3. Reverse the directions and you don’t need expensive special left-door buses. Bellevue Transit Center has this.

      4. @ Mike

         Yes, I forgot to mention that. That is listed in the second example here (Median Busway with Center Station, Counter Flow for Right Side Boardings): https://www.apta.com/wp-content/uploads/APTA-BTS-BRT-RP-003-10_Rev1.pdf#page=25. I don’t think they are common on regular streets because they confuse people. A pedestrian crossing has to look left, right, left, right which creates a safety hazard.

         They make sense in a closed environment (like a transit center). I would imagine they considered that with the bus tunnel but that would have created a traffic jam of sorts on either end (especially if they continued to add buses). When they transitioned to rail it would have been a good time to also transition to center platforms. At that point they knew the number of buses were going down and would eventually go away. For whatever reason they decided not to make center platforms a priority.

         One variation is to have a shared bidirectional bus lane and have the stops operate that way (https://www.apta.com/wp-content/uploads/APTA-BTS-BRT-RP-003-10_Rev1.pdf#page=11). The picture shows both buses stopping at the bus stop, but it could done in an offset manner (to minimize the space needed).

         Another option is to basically reverse everything. Have the buses run curbside, but don’t allow cars to turn right without a right-turn arrow. This is similar to how the bike lanes operate in some cases (https://maps.app.goo.gl/1Pf8SmuGw8ebDRneA). That brings up another issue.

         The only complicated part would be that left turning traffic would need to enter the ‘bus/hov lane’ if relocated to the center.

         They typically don’t do it that way. That more or less defeats the purpose. Left turning vehicles are only allowed to turn left with a green arrow, which means they basically cut in front of a bus (but not when a bus would collide with them). It does mean juggling the space properly, but sometimes that is fairly easy. The diagrams for Aurora show that working out fairly well: https://i0.wp.com/seattletransitblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/segment3_busway.png?w=987&ssl=1

      5. “I don’t think they are common on regular streets because they confuse people.”

         If you design the center to look like a divider, then the whole thing will look like two sets of two-way streets and people’s instincts will be right. You could do that with a vegetation median like a boulevard, but since there’s not enough room for that, you could have raised poles along the middle line like a cycletrack separator.

      6. Yeah, I’m sure there are ways of making it safer. I think in general they are fairly rare. This is from an ITDP BRT guide (https://brtguide.itdp.org/branch/master/guide/roadway-and-station-configurations/roadway-configurations#contra-flow-busway):

         “Counter-flow” set-ups do have a potentially serious problem with increased pedestrian accidents. Pedestrians can be unaccustomed to looking in the direction of the counter-flow lane, and thus cross unknowingly into a dangerous situation.

         Counter-flow systems are generally not employed in BRT systems, particularly due to concerns over pedestrian safety. …

         In contrast a counter-flow (or contraflow) system that has buses going one way and cars going the other is a lot more intuitive. It is basically just a two-way street to pedestrians, but a one-way street to those driving.

      7. The bi-directional section along UNM campus (one of the few pedestrian friendly areas in all of ABQ) definitely killed at least a few folks looking the wrong way and getting run over by a bus.

8. Wow. Swift Orange almost equaled Swift Green in total ridership in its very first month of operation? That is impressive.

   And even more impressive since Lynnwood Link hasn’t opened yet, and a lot of the reason Swift Orange was designed the way it was is because of the tie-in to Link. Swift Orange will only get better.

   Of course Swift Blue is still the heavy hitter in ridership, and will also get even better when it ties into Link at 185th St Station. That will be a very popular transfer and will add more ridership to Swift Blue. Congrats to CT.

   The Metro transfer from RR E to Link? Crickets…..

   1. Wow. Swift Orange almost equaled Swift Green in total ridership in its very first month of operation? That is impressive.

      Is it? The Orange Line had less than 2,000 a day. The Green Line had 2,600. Just about every bus in Seattle gets that kind of ridership, but in Snohomish County that is considered BRT.

      The Metro transfer from RR E to Link? Crickets…..

      Huh? It doesn’t make sense to connect Rapid Ride E to Link until Link goes from Ballard to the UW. How is that project moving along anyway? Crickets …

      1. Ross, the E could be extended to Mountlake Terrace like the Blue is being extended to Shoreline North. Yes, it would be a double-back for most riders, but for someone at 195th and Aurora headed to the U-District it would be quicker than E to either 44 or 45.

         It’s certainly not the big win that E to Shoreline North is, but is another connection between two trunk lines without a third “intermediate” ride.

         Of course, the right thing for Blue would have been to continue to 185th, skipping the AVTC as you and many others have advocated; that would handle our rider at 195th and Aurora. But that water, apparently, is under the dam.

      2. “Wow. Swift Orange almost equaled Swift Green in total ridership in its very first month of operation?”

         It didn’t, and remember the first day effect. The East Link stub got ten times as many riders as it does normally. Swift Orange wasn’t as dramatic (at least judging from the second day), but we won’t know a typical month until May ends. The graphic is also a bit hard to follow: different panels have different numbers at different scales. That’s savvy marketing but can be misleading if you don’t look carefully at the differences between the scales.

         The most useful stat is the bottom-right panel: average weekday boardings: 6,230 Blue; 2,657 Green; 1,943 Orange. We can expect Orange ridership to gradually increase, as residents one by one realize it’s there, and identify a trip they could use it for, and non-drivers move there because of the transit improvements. Both of those can take several years. I know somebody who lives in 164th — who had taken transit in the past but didn’t then — and I told her the Orange was coming, but I’m not sure if I’ve told her that it’s now open and where it goes. I know another woman who lives near 124th & 8th in Bellevue since the 1980s and drives everywhere. She knows I take the bus to there, but whether she knows that it’s the B or where it goes, I have my doubts. And it has been running for thirteen years.

      3. “Just about every bus in Seattle gets that kind of ridership, but in Snohomish County that is considered BRT.”

         BRT isn’t ridership; it’s a level of service. Having the mobility option is worthwhile in itself even if you don’t use it today. The fact it runs every day means it will be available the day you need it, when your car breaks down or you break your leg.

         Swift is BRT because it’s more frequent than most CT routes, is limited-stop, and has right-of-way improvements (I assume).

         The 20-minute off-peak frequency bothers me, but at least CT is trying and it may get more frequent someday.

      4. the E could be extended to Mountlake Terrace like the Blue is being extended to Shoreline North.

         Right, except that makes no sense. That is my point. The situations are not symmetrical. South of 185th you have pretty much the entire Link line. This includes all of the big destinations that are covered by Link (or will be in a few years). North of 185th you have Mountlake Terrace and Lynnwood — fairly minor destinations.

         The result is that such an extension would carry very few riders (unlike the extension of the Blue Line). We have dozens of more important connections that would carry more riders. For example Bitter Lake to Lake City. Until they build the station at 130th this is a terrible two-seat ride. For that matter Bitter Lake to Northgate. It is a direct bus but it runs infrequently. This means that people making a same-direction trip from one of the more urban places on Aurora have a slow, winding, infrequent ride to Link. How about Greenwood Avenue to Ballard High School (or similar parts of 15th). That is a three-seat ride (that doesn’t involve Link). Same goes for Ingraham High (and other parts of Aurora) to Ballard High (and other parts of 15th). Or how about getting anywhere in Magnolia to anywhere? You’ve got a bus that runs every half hour. Give them a special color and run the buses frequently and they would get more riders than the Blue or Orange Line.

         But we don’t have money to do that. There are a ton of improvement that are a lot more important than trying to deal with the handful of riders who would use such an extension. In contrast, relative to the ridership of the ridership (and ridership per service hour) of the Blue Line, extending to Link is a no-brainer. I definitely expect ridership-per hour to go up on that line (while it would go way down with an extension of the E).

      5. BRT isn’t ridership; it’s a level of service.

         I get that. I’m just saying that the Green Line is nothing special (based on the ridership) and it isn’t clear if the approach is worth it. You can make a very good case for the Blue Line because it has carried a very high portion of the overall ridership for quite some time. There are some very unusual challenges for the route as well. But these other lines are not necessarily any different than a typical Snohomish County bus — especially one with similar frequency. I think Community Transit got carried away with the concept. This would probably be no big deal if it wasn’t for the huge amount of overlap that doesn’t benefit riders. They seem fixated on this Swift concept instead of just trying to build a good overall network.

         To be clear, I’m not saying that the CT network is bad. Overall it is fine (for the money they have). I’m just saying that if they just had normal stop spacing for all the buses (except the Blue Line) and focused on building a higher frequency network they would come out ahead.

      6. The E Line could be extended to Ballenger Village Shopping Center on the way to Mountlake Terrace Station.

      7. We can expect Orange ridership to gradually increase

         I think it will go up quite a bit when Lynnwood Link is built. For example right now Community Transit runs the 413 and 415 from Swamp Creek to Downtown Seattle. That will go away, and the main way for those riders to get to Downtown Seattle will be to take the Orange Line and transfer to Link.

      8. It’s funny how Ross loves BRT when it is being floated as an alternative to rail, then hates it once it is being formally proposed , built, or suggested to be extended. I recall Martin having a post on this syndrome way back in the Before Times.

      9. @Tom Terrific,

         Yes, the E could be extended to Mountlake Terrace, and there have been some plans along that line, but the connection from AVTC is not nearly as good as the connection to 185th St. Going to Mountlake Terrace would simply be a lot slower than going to 185th.

         Additionally, most E riders transferring to Link will probably be heading south. So I’m not sure that sending them north to Mountlake Terrace, just so they can go back south to 185th St makes a lot of sense. Best just do what CT is doing and make a fast, efficient, transfer at 185th St and call it a day.

         But you are right. Many E riders are undoubtably heading to UDS, UWS, or CHS. They would certainly benefit from the Link transfer at 185th.

         But I think Metro is just going to let CT handle it for now. Unfortunately that makes a three seat ride, which will hurt bus ridership, but oh well..

      10. @Mike Orr,

          “ It didn’t,”

          Of course it didn’t, that is what I meant by “almost”.

          But check the math. Swift Orange was at ~75% of the total ridership of Swift Green just in its FIRST MONTH. That is pretty darn impressive.

          And remember, Swift Orange is designed to feed riders onto Link. That is where a lot of its ridership is expected to be generated, and that hasn’t even come on-line yet.

          So I find the numbers to be pretty encouraging. And they will only get better.

          I know some people on this blog think Canada begins at the SnoCo line, or maybe the polar ice sheet or something, but there are some good things going on up there.

          We should acknowledge good transportation progress wherever it occurs.

      11. > It’s funny how Ross loves BRT when it is being floated as an alternative to rail, then hates it once it is being formally proposed , built, or suggested to be extended. I recall Martin having a post on this syndrome way back in the Before Times.

          I don’t think that was anything close to what Ross was discussing.

          Ross was saying he prefers the Rapidride model would more improving/replacing the existing bus routes and shorter station spacing over the Swift model of brt of far station spacing.

          From what ross wrote: “Overall it is fine (for the money they have). I’m just saying that if they just had normal stop spacing for all the buses (except the Blue Line) and focused on building a higher frequency network they would come out ahead.”

      12. @Brent White,

          “ loves BRT when it is being floated as an alternative to rail, then hates it once it is being formally proposed , built, or suggested to be extended”

          It is one of the favorite tactics of the anti-transit, anti-tax crowd. Propose something else that is supposedly better/faster/cheaper just to stop a project, then do nothing.

          I’m very proud of Seattle voters for having seen past that tactic the last few ballot measures.

          As per BRT in SnoCo, they seem to be doing a good job of tailoring the service to the need. And I suspect things will work even better once Link opens and CT can cancel all their expresses to DT Seattle and start redeploying resources,

          It’s refreshing to see.

      13. Not “way down”, Ross. Down somewhat, sure, because as you say, it isn’t a frequent trip at this time. But the ten minutes it would take to get to MLT Station is a small fraction of the time it takes to get from Pioneer Square to Aurora Village TC so it wouldn’t dilute the riders per hour results very badly.

          Since there will never be a Link branch between the UW and Ballard, what you are saying is “never connect the E Line to Link anywhere north of Mercer”. When (and if) Link continues north of Lynnwood, there will be reasons for people in North King County to ride to Mountlake Terrace to catch it. Maybe not now, but sometime.

      14. Lazarus, it sounds like you’re suggesting a fish-hook back to Shoreline North. Sure, that would work and keep the bus entirely within King County. If the politics is better that way, OK. At some point some connection should happen.

      15. It’s funny how Ross loves BRT when it is being floated as an alternative to rail, then hates it once it is being formally proposed , built, or suggested to be extended. I recall Martin having a post on this syndrome way back in the Before Times.

          It’s funny how you feel comfortable putting words in someone’s mouth and clearly violating the comment policy by doing so.

          Just for the record I have never said I am against BRT. Saying I am is pure bullshit. Look, I am trying to give you the benefit of the doubt. Maybe you are confused. If so, then ask a question. Don’t make an accusatory comment that is complete bullshit.

      16. “ loves BRT when it is being floated as an alternative to rail, then hates it once it is being formally proposed , built, or suggested to be extended”

          It is one of the favorite tactics of the anti-transit, anti-tax crowd. Propose something else that is supposedly better/faster/cheaper just to stop a project, then do nothing.

          Yes, some people also shoot other people in the face. Just for the record I have done neither.

      17. Additionally, most E riders transferring to Link will probably be heading south. So I’m not sure that sending them north to Mountlake Terrace, just so they can go back south to 185th St makes a lot of sense. Best just do what CT is doing and make a fast, efficient, transfer at 185th St and call it a day.

          But they came from the south! That is the point. Extending Swift Blue works because all the trips are going the same direction. People from the north head south then cut over to Link where they continue south. There are only a handful of people who would ride north, then head over and then take the train south.

          Look, I get it. Community Transit screwed up. I know a lot of people tried to get them to do the right thing and stop along Aurora before connecting to Link. I tried as hard as anyone (I wrote this: https://seattletransitblog.com/2022/01/18/intercounty-routes-for-lynnwood-link/). There were so many good reasons to add this, and the cost would be minimal. The transfer from bus to bus would be easier than ever. Riders from the Blue Line would be connected to more places in Shoreline (like the YMCA). All for the cost of a few bus stops. Hell, it is quite likely the bus would be faster! The extra fare revenue that would come from picking up the extra riders would probably cover the cost of actually picking them up.

          Oh, and if you really want to look at the big picture you can blame Sound Transit. If they had a stop (or stops) on Aurora this wouldn’t be an issue.

          But we can’t pretend that sending a northbound E looping around to 185th or up to Mountlake Terrace is somehow similar. It isn’t. Folks have proposed this as if it is free (like CT stopping along Aurora) or would get a lot of riders (like Link running up Aurora) but neither is the case. This would cost a lot and not get that many riders.

          That is because very few people would loop around. Imagine you are at 100th & Aurora and are headed to the UW. Would you ride all the way up to Aurora Village and then loop around? Of course not. You would head south and then take the 44. What if you were at 90th & Aurora and were headed to Northgate? You go north and transfer to the 44.

          Then there are people on the cross streets. Imagine you are at 145th & Aurora and are headed to the UW. Now you just take a bus across to the station. Even if you are at 185th you probably just take the bus across. Oh, and this is for the UW! If you are going to downtown, you probably just take the bus directly there. One obvious candidate for such routing are the folks who are close to Aurora Village, but of course the Swift Blue will do that.

          So it only works for those that are very far north, can’t catch a bus that goes across, aren’t going downtown, didn’t catch Swift Blue and don’t mind looping around. In other words, very few people.

          Since there will never be a Link branch between the UW and Ballard, what you are saying is “never connect the E Line to Link anywhere north of Mercer”. When (and if) Link continues north of Lynnwood, there will be reasons for people in North King County to ride to Mountlake Terrace to catch it. Maybe not now, but sometime.

          I could see that, especially with Boeing. But again, I don’t see that as a major priority. There just aren’t that many people trying to get to the Link stations in Snohomish County to Aurora (or vice-versa). The entire Community Transit system carries 27,000 people. That just isn’t that many. For a lot of riders in Snohomish County trying to head to Aurora there are better alternatives. If you are trying to get from Edmonds College to Aurora you would take Swift Blue and transfer to the E (rather than Orange, Link, E). If you are on going from Lynnwood Transit Center to 145th & Aurora you would ride Link to 145th and transfer there. I think it is far more important that we improve the crossing service than worry about connecting RapidRide E (or similar buses like the 5 and D) to Link. Of course it would be nice, but there are a lot more important things lacking when it comes to Metro.

      18. Extending the E Line to Mountlake Terrace via Ballenger Village (which is in King County) would not create a bus path where there is none. Rather, it would piece together parts of existing routes, and add more frequency. It would also encourage upward growth of that multi-family area, and reward those who moved into the existing TOD away from the station walkshed.

          The station is a stronger anchor than Aurora Village.

9. Any new users of the 2 Line? Anyone just go check it out to see what it’s like? Anyone using it as transit? Would be interested to hear your thoughts on it.

   1. Another online forum I’m in has a few Eastside users that have been reporting their use of the 2 Line. It seems that ridership is relatively light (as expected) but not nothing. Haven’t heard of any objectively bad experiences yet. At least one report of a 1-car train earlier this week.

   2. I haven’t used it for regular trips yet because I’m in a 3-week intense work period. I expect to use it in early June.

   3. I’ve used it a few times Westbound to Bellevue TC around 4:00pm. It was a two-car train every time with maybe ~10 riders in the cars I was in. Very quiet.

      I’ve noticed quite a few bicycles given the small rider sample size. It seems like a quiet train on the Eastside is a good fit for the hybrid bike/Link commute. Easy to roll a bike on with no crowd, and of course it’s much more sprawled around the stations so biking tends to win out over walking more often.

10. Once again thanks for all the work Nathan.

    One Seattle Times article you might consider linking to is yesterday’s Seattle Times article, “Seattle drops out of top 10 for growth among large U.S. Cities” by Gene Balk.

    From July 1, 2022 to July 1, 2023 Seattle’s population increased by around 5,900, while King Co.’s population grew by 200. Some cities like Bellevue lost residents. Without in migration from foreign countries with much higher incomes than locals King Co. would be losing over 20,000 residents/year.

    Much of our local and regional planning is based on future population growth similar to growth from 2010 to 2020. The states estimated (in 2019) another 1 million residents will move to WA by 2044.

    We may have to begin to realize population growth throughout King Co. and Seattle will be much smaller than in the past, which may relieve some pressure on lower income residents but also call into question other planning assumptions.

    1. I would be interested to see if household formation in King Count has also dropped.

    2. > We may have to begin to realize population growth throughout King Co. and Seattle will be much smaller than in the past, which may relieve some pressure on lower income residents but also call into question other planning assumptions.

       It’s fine to replan, but I’d consider it short-sighted if by ‘call into question’ means not upzoning. Reminds me of how America thought we wouldn’t need doctors, and then fearing an oversupply restricted the number of residencies.

       1. Regional zoning is specifically based on population. The GMPC allocates housing targets based on projected future population growth. It has nothing to do with “affordability”. In fact, the GMPC discourages cities from taking more housing targets than legally required because it wants to spread population, jobs, and housing throughout the region.

          Regional bodies like the PSRC do believe in TOD, in large part to reduce carbon emissions, reduce road capacity needs, and to allow more people to live without a car, although its 2050 Vision Statement was drafted before the pandemic and work from home so is out of date.

          Housing affordability is separate from upzoning, at least according to King Co. and the Dept. of Commerce, except to the extent ALL affordable housing mandates under ESB 1220 must be in existing dense zones near walkable transit so income restricted citizens don’t need to own a car, and the ONLY housing mandates are for 0% to 60% AMI housing.

          So upzoning especially under HB 1110 in the residential SFH zones has nothing to do with affordability, and really is about housing capacity because King Co. assumes any unit in a SFH zone will never be affordable to someone in the 0% to 50% AMI group. King Co. knows builders have no intent of building anything affordable in the SFH zone, and now the powers that be are worried poor SFH are where the affordable multi-generational housing for Blacks is so wants to DOWNZONE those zones to preserve them.

          This is why Harrell’s approach does not expand on HB 1110 or increase regulatory limits in the SFH zone. All of Seattle’s future housing growth targets must be affordable to those earning 0% to 60% of AMI, and King Co. won’t even consider a new unit in a SFH zone toward a city’s affordability mandates, which is why cities like Redmond are taking less desirable SFH zones near Overlake and simply rezoning them multi-family so those units will count toward its affordable housing targets. Unlike Redmond, Seattle already has a ton of multi-family zones so doesn’t need to REzone SFH zones. No point to “upzone” a SFH zone. My guess is the council will walk back Harrell’s upzones and not touch the SFH zone which still allow four units per lot with 50% AMI.

          Based on the 2019 future population growth targets — which are probably high — jurisdictions are upzoning, but King Co. wants that upzoning in existing commercial and multi-family zones near walkable transit.

          That is the change most don’t understand. Yes, upzoning, but not in the SFH zone because it isn’t affordable to someone without a car earning 0% to 60% AMI, and King Co. won’t count it toward a city’s affordability mandates.

          The reality is upzoning or not builders won’t build until the demand is there. Market rate housing is looking pretty saturated right now and future population growth uncertain, but ironically builders won’t build 0% to 60% AMI housing without government subsidies.

          I know some really want to upzone the SFH zones but King Co. doesn’t care about people earning 100+% AMI, and cities are scrambling to create 0% to 60% AMI housing in existing dense zones that consumed their mandated upzoning from the GMPC.

          It’s crazy I know because the end result is permit applications are plunging because even in a low interest rate market builders are not going to build 0% to 60% AMI housing and few cities are concerned with upzoning SFH zones.

       2. @Fact check

          > That is the change most don’t understand. Yes, upzoning, but not in the SFH zone because it isn’t affordable to someone without a car earning 0% to 60% AMI, and King Co. won’t count it toward a city’s affordability mandates.

          That’s not how the zoning works at all… The entire point of upzoning SFH’s zones is to change them to townhouses/multifamily zones. They are not some special piece of land that upzoning ‘multi family zoning’ results in differing rent than upzoning single family homes.

          > So upzoning especially under HB 1110 in the residential SFH zones has nothing to do with affordability,

          Housing supply and demand is regional

          > In fact, the GMPC discourages cities from taking more housing targets than legally required because it wants to spread population, jobs, and housing throughout the region.

          I’m not sure where you got this falsehood from.

       3. > That is the change most don’t understand. Yes, upzoning, but not in the SFH zone because it isn’t affordable to someone without a car earning 0% to 60% AMI, and King Co. won’t count it toward a city’s affordability mandates.

          > The reality is upzoning or not builders won’t build until the demand is there.

          Just as I said to tacomee before, both claims cannot be simultaneously true. If you are going to claim that zoning will do ‘nothing’ than what exactly do you fear about upzoning extra. And in the “worse” case some extra apartments are built, it will not be the end the world, I trust the American society can shoulder such a “heavy” burden. (sarcasm intended)

       4. WL,

          I’m not really sure where you think I’m wrong? Here’s my take on up zoning and what’s actually getting built.

          Yes, up zoning is going to happen. Mostly because there’s big money in it for builders and speculators, not because working class people like me need housing.

          Up zoning a 4 unit building on a SFH lot will cost in excess of 300K per unit. Before construction even starts. The game is finding people with money wanting to live in Seattle, not affordable housing for those lower income people hanging on.

          Up zoning will end up tied to the number of wealthy people moving in, so the current vacancy rate may never go down . In fact, upzoning might make housing prices worse, as much of the construction industry focuses on only high end builds.

          The construction industry can make plenty of money on the top 10% in Seattle…. so why even bother with the other 90%? Zone anything you like, doesn’t mean anything gets built. The last time I did anything for a project that was affordable was maybe 2012?

          The problem Fact Check is pointing out is Seattle has a percentage of high income people who keep using up all the housing resources…. zoning be damned.

          Zoning doesn’t change free market demands…. market demands actually change zoning.

       5. > Zoning doesn’t change free market demands…. market demands actually change zoning.

          What in the world are you talking about here. Like sure market demands as in incredibly high housing prices will encourage voters to loosening zoning but that’s not called “market demands” a law changing lol

       6. > Up zoning a 4 unit building on a SFH lot will cost in excess of 300K per unit. Before construction even starts. The game is finding people with money wanting to live in Seattle, not affordable housing for those lower income people hanging on.

          Even then the townhouses are cheaper than single family homes. Do you see the Bay Area single family homes in the 2 million range being much cheaper from forbidding townhouse construction? And the cost per unit will decrease if one allows larger apartments

       7. In fact, upzoning might make housing prices worse, as much of the construction industry focuses on only high end builds.

          It is statements like that make me think you are just trolling us. Just to back up here, you keep ignoring the science and offering nothing but seemingly nonsensical speculation in response. No studies, no examples, just “I think this is what they will do”.

          Your statement is absurd on it’s face. Start with the part of the construction industry that only focuses on high end builds. OK, assume that is true. Why would upzoning make it worse? Right now, in most of the city, that is all they can build. But somehow allowing them to build something else will make things worse?

          Let me give you an example. Let’s say I have a large empty lot in Pinehurst that used to be a church (like this one). Right now it is zoned single family. That means that a high end developer will build million-dollar houses (on big lots). Now imagine the area is zoned for apartments like this place which is only a few blocks away. You are saying what exactly? That an upzone will lead to a developer building an apartment building with new units that will be more expensive than a large house on a large lot?

          The zoning basically requires developers to build high-end, upper-class housing in most of the city. But you think allowing developers to build more apartments, condos, rowhouses and other types of housing will somehow encourage them to build more million-dollar houses? Sorry but that is absurd.

          At worst you get a situation where the developer just ignores the zoning. Yes, I could build a 300 unit apartment on that unit, but I want to make houses. That is perfectly legal and happens … sorry, let me check my notes … nowhere in Seattle. The construction matches the zoning. It is perfectly legal to build houses or townhouses on lots that allow apartments, but they don’t. It is perfectly legal to build big houses on big lots in places where they allow town houses, but they don’t. They build as many places as the zoning allows. The fact that construction matches the zoning exactly is just one more example of how it is clearly zoning that is the real issue here.

          Oh, and that is before you consider all the bullshit rules that apply to apartment building but don’t apply to houses. Once you’ve subdivided a lot, that is pretty much it when it comes to building houses. I’m sure there is some paperwork, but it is pretty minimal. In contrast, an apartment building — in one of the few places where they are allowed to be built — requires design review and other bullshit paperwork that can drag out construction for years.

          Look, I get the theory that there is only so much land and rich people will buy it all up. Or that developers are only interested in building homes for rich people. But both theories have not only been disproven time and time again by researchers, but you can see how they are not true by simply looking around.

          Maybe if we liberalize the zoning we will get to that point. But at that point housing will be much cheaper. It is just the economy of scale that comes from adding more units. You can make a lot more money *per unit* when building a house. But you can make way more money *per project* when building apartments.

       8. WL,

          https://www.theurbanist.org/2024/05/15/school-closure-mistake/

          Here’s an op-ed from the Urbanist. It’s mostly about Seattle’s (failing) school system, but of course it veers into housing because the author, Robert Cruickshank, thinks affordable housing is the solution to many of Seattle’s problems ….. and he’s not wrong. What he doesn’t understand is the lack of money and political will to actually build any. Poor Cruickshank still believes there are political solutions to economic problems.

          What Seattle is getting is rich people moving in, forcing home prices up and then sending their kids to private school, cutting funding for really crappy schools full of kids who’s parents can’t afford decent housing in Seattle.

          Right now, buying a house and tearing it down to build a mega-mansion is popular in Seattle. Changing the zoning won’t change this. Contractors love these sorts of projects because they’re high dollar. Re-zoning SFH lots gives builders the option of tearing down a million dollar plus home and building 4 townhomes worth over 800K. That’s not affordable housing, is it?

          With the current zoning changes it might be possible for more of the construction industry to slow down and focus mainly on high dollar 4 unit or under projects for rich people…. you know, well healed refugees from California and the like, as they move to Seattle.

          “Less units, more money!” is what the construction industry is looking for. Instead of 100,000 affordable units…. how about 30,000 lux units for same profit? I know zero people in the trades that feel any need to be responsible for affordable housing.

          It’s the popular myth of urban planning. Money builds cities, not urban planning. Money hires the urban planners to do what they want. The new zoning laws to turn single family homes into expensive townhomes serves “The Money” and were written by the King County Builders Asso. Affordable housing isn’t even the radar here.

       9. “ Money builds cities, not urban planning. Money hires the urban planners to do what they want.”

          Most land use planners I’ve known have complained that they are nothing more than observers. Unlike transportation or park or school planning, much of their job is responding to what development proposal walks in the door. That’s a similar frustration to environmental impact planners whose charge is to identify and maybe mitigate the proposals that someone else comes up with.

          Frankly, I think there should be a way to give bonuses to proposals which help encourage better development proposals — but I’m not sure what they would be. Instead the “game” is to meet the minimum requirements as profitably as possible without ruining a developer’s reputation.

       10. Actually, King Co.’s affordable housing council is concerned that upzoning leads to new development (which is the goal of upzoning) that displaces existing more affordable housing.

           It is why King Co. is pushing cities to rezone existing commercial and office space to allow multi-family hounding as a use to increase the land available for multi-family development and lessen the pressure to redevelop existing older and affordable multi-family zoned housing. It is why Harrell’s plan has lower height limits in S. Seattle, and why the new focus is on something housing experts missed: large multi-generational Black families living in a SFH, which per sf is the lowest cost housing.

           I’ve said it before, but I am not sure some like WL get it: King Co. under 1220 is not interested in any “affordable” housing above 60% AMI. It is why ALL new affordable housing zoning must be in existing dense zones near walkable transit and retail.

           There are two reasons to upzone, or rezone:

           1. To meet future population growth and housing demand, but that is a 25 year process. According to the OFM the entire state must accommodate aground 40,000 new residents/year. According to the GMPC’s 2022 housing and job allocations every city in King Co. already has the existing zoning to meet that growth through 2044, mostly in existing dense zones.

           2. To create affordable housing. At least according to King Co. “affordable” housing is defined as 60% AMI and below, and CAN’T be created in the SFH zone, so NO upzoning in the SFH zone can count toward a city’s affordable housing targets.

           Some want to eliminate SFH zoning as a matter of principle. But arguments that upzoning or really rezoning the SFH zones are necessary to meet future population growth are contrary to the GMPC’s findings and the PSRC’s 2035 and 2050 Vision Statements that growth be focused in TOD, and arguments such upzoning will create affordable housing are contrary to King Co.’s mandate that only 0% to 60% AMI housing counts and any zoning in the SFH zone does not count toward affordability mandates.

           So those wanting to upzone the SFH zones are going to have to make their argument based on principle like privilege, elitism, poor use of land, etc., not housing growth demand or affordability. King Co. is not interested in upzoning the the SFH zone to convert 300% AMI housing to 200% or even 100% AMI housing.

           So we need to stop with studies or papers or arguments that upzoning the SFH zone will create marginally more affordable housing, is necessary to meet future housing demand, or is consistent with the PSRC’s focus on TOD in existing dense zones.

           Unfortunately in Seattle the original 2022 update to the Comp. Plan got pushed to 2024 due to Covid, and between 2022 and 2024 the voters elected a more conservative mayor and MUCH more conservative council who get a lot of their votes from the SFH zone. For urbanists Seattle’s 2024 Comp. Plan is going to be a disappointment, although consistent with the PSRC, and King Co.’s affordability mandates.

       11. @Fact Check

           > Actually, King Co.’s affordable housing council is concerned that upzoning leads to new development (which is the goal of upzoning) that displaces existing more affordable housing.

           > It is why King Co. is pushing cities to rezone existing commercial and office space to allow multi-family hounding as a use to increase the land available for multi-family development and lessen the pressure to redevelop existing older and affordable multi-family zoned housing

           Then you should have no qualms about upzoning richer neighborhoods single family zoning then right? You claim to care about poor neighborhoods but really just bring it up their single family homes to justify not upzoning any single family zoning.

       12. National demographic factors will slowly take hold everywhere. Young adults are less likely to bring kids into the world. There is open war against immigration of able bodied workers who can build housing and do other things. The US population in total will cap in 30-60 years and start to decline.

           The result is that about half of the US counties have been routinely losing population in recent times. It’s pretty much a long-accepted fact of life in middle America, but our region is not mentally prepared for its eventuality.

       13. WL, I am agnostic about “upzoning” the SFH zone. I don’t live in the SFH zone.

           Your fight is with Harrell and the Council if you live in Seattle (good luck outside Seattle). All I am saying is using future population growth or affordability are arguments that won’t work because upzoning the SFH doesn’t address either of those if affordable means 60% AMI and below.

           Now if you have some ideas about how to get builders to build market rate housing affordable to those earning 0% to 60% AMI everyone is interested.

           So state the principles other than housing growth or affordability you think support upzoning the SFH zone, and whether Harrell and Sara Nelson and their supporters are going to buy your personal reasons SFH zoning should be amended or eliminated.

           I don’t really care. At this point I don’t want to live in a SFH zone and can’t afford to, which today really requires two incomes. I can’t afford an $800k townhouse either.

           What I AM interested in is lower rent, because most new apartments are way outside my income and the rest of us are left scrambling for a dwindling number of older affordable apartments, which means I keep moving south.

           What do I care about whether someone can buy a $1 million townhouse in the SFH zone. How does that help me? I don’t want Seattle to say we upzoned the SFH zone for the rich so now we don’t have to worry about the crazy rents and declining number of affordable apartments for someone like me earning around 90% AMI. Do you understand how crazy it is to earn 90% AMI in a city with one of the highest AMI’s in the world and I can barely find an affordable apartment that isn’t a shoebox or in a high crime area. And you are worried about $1 million townhomes in the SFH zone. This whole upzone thecSFH zone to create four $1 million new townhomes seems so elitist to me.

       14. > I don’t really care. At this point I don’t want to live in a SFH zone and can’t afford to, which today really requires two incomes. I can’t afford an $800k townhouse either.

           > What I AM interested in is lower rent, because most new apartments are way outside my income and the rest of us are left scrambling for a dwindling number of older affordable apartments, which means I keep moving south.

           If you don’t care then why so much vitriol for stopping upzoning of single family zoning

           > What do I care about whether someone can buy a $1 million townhouse in the SFH zone. How does that help me

           You answered it yourself above. First, of course it’d be better to upzone to apartments but sometimes we have to settle for townhouses for now. Secondly, even 4/5 townhouses that’s 4 more families than can live on the same plot of land versus 1. You talk about expensive rents moving further and further south — that’s what happens when you don’t allow apartments/townhouses and only build single family homes aka Bay Area or Los Angeles.

           Those 4 housing units that didn’t exist in Seattle people will end up living in Renton and then people from Renton have to end up living further south.

       15. All I am saying is using future population growth or affordability are arguments that won’t work because upzoning the SFH doesn’t address either of those if affordable means 60% AMI and below.

           Wrong. If allowed to do so, developers will build to just about any income level. The only big limiting factor is the cost of development. No one is going to build a house for $20,000. Nor will they build a condo with unites that sell for $10,000. But if not for the zoning the cost of housing approaches the cost of construction.

           Studies have proven this. There are examples in various parts of the world (where they have more liberal zoning). But it is also easy to see using fairly simple game theory. This is how classic economics work. If you are in business you sell to whoever will buy. Sure, you might specialize in selling fancy phones, but someone else is going to sell cheap ones. How cheap? About as cheap as it costs to make them. No less, but not a lot more.

           Or just think of it in real terms. You can make a lot of money selling big houses (on big lots) to rich people. But in neighborhoods like Lake City, it is pretty obvious you can make a lot more money by selling lots of apartments to a lot of not-so-rich people. It is just the economy of scale that comes from building housing.

           Put it another way: Imagine that the actual construction isn’t the issue. Imagine that the city promised every land owner that they will build a place to live if you buy the land. If you own a little bit of land than they will build an apartment. If you have a lot of land they will build a house. Let the bidding begin. Of course some rich people will buy up lots of land. But there are only so many places that rich people want to live (and Lake City isn’t one of them). But upper middle class people want to live in a nice house with a big yard, so they bid. But their bid has to be huge to compensate for all the extra land they are asking for. A normal house in Lake City uses about 8 times the land of a townhouse. A normal house uses maybe 30 times the land of an apartment. Again, there just aren’t that many upper income people. The upper income people who had their heart set on a big house and a big lawn are essentially outbid by all of those who are just fine in an apartment or townhouse.

           Of course it costs more to actually build an apartment but this just shows that the problem isn’t land. No one is tearing down apartment buildings and putting up mansions. People are not buying up huge lots and only putting up one house. From a demand standpoint it is the opposite (which is why the zoning laws are effective in keeping the housing prices high).

           Now if you have some ideas about how to get builders to build market rate housing affordable to those earning 0% to 60% AMI everyone is interested.

           Yes, change the zoning. Also have some public housing (for those close to that 0%). Basically the way that every city in the world has successfully dealt with this problem.

       16. Right now, buying a house and tearing it down to build a mega-mansion is popular in Seattle. Changing the zoning won’t change this.

           Nonsense! Are you actually claiming that the only reason they are building houses on this lot is because mega-mansions are popular? Is that really your claim?

           If so, how do you explain the fact that just down the street they have built apartments? Why didn’t they just build mega-mansions?

           For that matter, look at the various townhouses. Why did they build them, instead of the mega-mansions?

           Seriously, what is your explanation? I have one (zoning) but I would like yours. Why do they always seem to build apartments where they are allowed, and townhouses where they are allowed? Why not build mega-houses everywhere?

       17. At its core, zoning is an end stage manifesting of what people want to see as their urban form. We live in a country where private property predominates (places like Australia and China have more extensive government land ownership in metro areas) so zoning only restricts what private entities want to do.

           And even though we don’t think it’s changed, it has greatly changed since the 1970’s.

           A modest apartment building built in 1980 never had a construction crane, for example. Now it’s pretty much expected because it’s easier to build them with cranes rather than with construction elevators.

           I see the next big change in housing as robotic and printed homes. We don’t have the labor pool to build ourselves out of the housing shortage. New construction techniques are now being applied across the modern world that prints walls onsite or lays bricks quickly. Other companies are building components off site and transporting them at a fraction of building a bespoke house onsite. With these tools, the very forms of a house can be different, like having rounded corners on buildings.

           Our building and zoning codes and entire building inspection process have been developed over the decades to respond to manually built units. The process will need major reforming as automation becomes more commonplace in home construction.

           From hybrid vehicles and EVs to phone systems to TV watching, technology has driven change more than getting people to behave differently or have different wants for their home. Kitchens have grown in size, complexity and appliances because of technology rather than regulation, for example.

           We are entering an age where home designs are not going to be limited by materials. It may becone actually cheaper and greener to fully demolish a house and repurpose the materials than to do a manual renovation. The kinds of housing types we get may be different. In the time it takes to have an apartment building designed, financed, approved by the City (things before construction even begins), We could have blocks of printed townhouses already with inhabitants.

           https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/can-3d-printing-help-address-affordable-housing-crisis-in-united-states-180983821/#:~:text=%E2%80%9C3D%2520printing%2520is%2520about%252010,you%2520build%2520on%2520a%2520site.

       18. “Start with the part of the construction industry that only focuses on high end builds”

           The key point is that’s part of the construction industry. Small players are getting squeezed out by the limited number of multifamily lots and the restrictions on single-family lots. If you allow enough development that saturates the large/luxury developer market, then there’s room for smaller, more modest developers to come back, like the ones who used to build the small courtyard apartments or small row-house developments in the 1950s and 60s.

       19. “Here’s an op-ed from the Urbanist. It’s mostly about Seattle’s (failing) school system, but of course it veers into housing because the author, Robert Cruickshank, thinks affordable housing is the solution to many of Seattle’s problems.”

           I don’t see him veering into affordable housing in this article. He says housing is coming anyway — Seattle has risen to 779K post-pandemic and expects to reach 1 million by 2050, and some think even that’s low. Cruikshank is saying the recent and expected growth needs services: schools, transit, parks, libraries. These aren’t unusual luxuries: they’re a basic part of a balanced city that every neighborhood should have. It’s only in the US that these are controversial and some people think they shouldn’t be funded with appropriate taxes. These aren’t affordable housing units; they’re non-housing amenities. Cruikshank may want a major expansion of affordable housing programs, but he doesn’t get into that in this article that I can tell.

           “What he doesn’t understand is the lack of money and political will to actually build any.”

           The lack of money is an illusion: Washington has a third lower taxes than most states due to lack of an income tax, and US taxes are lower than Canadian/European taxes. Distortions like the 1% growth cap below inflation exacerbate this.

           The issue is political will as you say. But that’s where we need to try to change the will before we end up in a basket case like Kansas or Alabama, where schools and ordinary services struggle to function due to starvation of funds and unwillingness to fix it.

       20. Mike Orr,

           “The key point is that’s part of the construction industry. Small players are getting squeezed out by the limited number of multifamily lots and the restrictions on single-family lots. If you allow enough development that saturates the large/luxury developer market, then there’s room for smaller, more modest developers to come back, like the ones who used to build the small courtyard apartments or small row-house developments in the 1950s and 60s.”

           I believe you have this backward. The small players all pretty much chase the “Big Money” There’s more money in small high end projects. I know small contractors who have a “personal relationship” with a rich family and now they only work for that family and their friends. You’re not part of “the loop” Mike. I haven’t worked on any project worth under a million dollars in like 12 years? I’m trying to retire, but I could book years of high end work easy enough. The whole idea we’re going back to small courtyard apartments or row houses is just silly. That’s just your personal vision of what you want. From a guy with years of working with all the players in the industry…. the 1950s and that sort of affordable development are over. Think rich investor class owned housing… or wealthy family compounds.

           All the zoning changes I see coming at both the local and State level…. they’re written by developers for developers. The idea that zoning would change for affordability? That’s your dream, not the building industry.

           Big landlords are using software to max out the maximum rent to vacancy rates…. you don’t understand how clever these bastards are, how politically savvy they are and how bent they are to making as much money as possible.

           What the zoning changes are is a classic political two step. Instead of apposing change outright, you co-opt your opponents ideas and twist them into whatever suits you.

       21. “buying a house and tearing it down to build a mega-mansion is popular in Seattle. Changing the zoning won’t change this.”

           Maybe it should. Limit the size of houses. Some cities have done something like this, and I think Seattle has; it’s probably just too lenient. Of course, developers can still replace the house with a fancy one that’s just a little larger. That’s where we need to allow more options for more units, so that some developers will choose to.

           “Contractors love these sorts of projects because they’re high dollar.”

           Are they? Do they really generate more profit than multifamily projects or 4-plexes? Is there enough demand for all developers to switch to them? There must not be, since multifamily buildings and ADU clusters are still being built.

           “Re-zoning SFH lots gives builders the option of tearing down a million dollar plus home and building 4 townhomes worth over 800K.

           Look at that again. Each townhouse is $800K. That’s less than $1 million, not the same or more.

           “That’s not affordable housing.”

           Of course not. Lower-middle class houses would be $300K or less, and affordable apartments $700 or less. But it is more $800K units, which are less unaffordable than $1 million or $1.5 million units. And there’s four of them instead of one. That means four families/households can live in them. It also means that three of them aren’t occupying other units and making them unavailable for others.

       22. ““Less units, more money!” is what the construction industry is looking for. Instead of 100,000 affordable units…. how about 30,000 lux units for same profit?”

           “The industry” is more than just one company. One company can work on a luxury building, another company on an an affordable building, then they can switch places. Companies bid on affordable buildings because some profit is better than no profit, or profit on two buildings is better than profit on one building. You’re seeming to suggest that no contractors will bid on any affordable buildings ever. That contradicts actual experience. If the city created an affordable housing program but couldn’t find any builder, then it would have to find a novel way to address it, but nothing remotely like that has happened. So you want to prevent affordable housing programs because no builder will build them, but that’s a self-correcting problem. If the city couldn’t find any builders, it would create a task force to address that directly. We don’t need to pre-emptively asssume it will fail so we won’t do it.

       23. “It is why King Co. is pushing cities to rezone existing commercial and office space to allow multi-family hounding as a use to increase the land available for multi-family development and lessen the pressure to redevelop existing older and affordable multi-family zoned housing.”

           That’s good. But why not extend it into average single-family areas? Those areas aren’t even remotely affordable. A 1940s teardown house with rotting floors that sells for $600K is in no way affordable. So why are people pretending they are affordable and must be preserved? And why aren’t they closing the loophole that allows owners to replace them with $1+ million houses? If it’s bad to upzone them to apartments, why isn’t it even worse to replace them with McMansions? Shouldn’t worse things be more illegal rather than less?

       24. “Harrell’s plan has lower height limits in S. Seattle”

           That’s a temporary measure from what I understand. It’s to give the neighborhoods more time to adapt to future growth, which will definitely be coming, and to create institutions like nonprofits or neighborhood small businesses to serve the existing population, and to create lower-income housing arrangements, before rapid development makes that impossible.

           If the city had loosened zoning in 2003, then prices wouldn’t have skyrocketed as much as they did, and fewer people would be displaced, and growth would have spread out to a larger area and been more gradual. It’s the failure to do that that causes these rapid-gentrification situations that people are worried about in far south Seattle.

       25. “But arguments that upzoning or really rezoning the SFH zones are necessary to meet future population growth are contrary to the GMPC’s findings and the PSRC’s 2035 and 2050 Vision Statements that growth be focused in TOD”

           A small townhouse/apartment building is TOD if it’s a few blocks from a frequent transit route and is designed in a walkable way. What the PSRC is trying to avoid is apartments on isolated mountain roads in Issaquah. Seattle has nothing comparable to that. We aren’t talking about the outermost edges of Magnolia or Broadview. We’re talking about areas like West Woodland, Wallingford, eastern Capitol Hill, Lake City, Columbia City, the blocks around California Avenue in West Seattle, etc.

       26. Re: The Urbanist article, between state and local funding the citizens spend between $18,000 and $23,000 per year per student for K-12 education depending on the part of the state. It is by far the largest expenditure.

           The conservative groups that got the signatures for six ballot initiatives this fall almost considered a seventh that would mimic AZ’s incredibly popular initiative that allows $9000 of state education funding to follow the student to private schools. The law today allows that funding to follow a student between public school districts, and several nearby Districts are offering Seattle students open enrollment for the $11,000/year in state funding that follows the student to the new District.

           I am expecting to see an initiative in 2025 or 2026 that allows the state funding for education ($11,000 to $13,000) to follow the student to any school including private schools. I am sure part of the motivation is to reduce the influence and donations from the teachers union.

           It could pass. In Seattle around 1/4 of parents send their kids to private K-12 schools. The Districts that would be hurt the most are poorer and rural districts, but they don’t always vote for their best interests.

           The vote will come down to the Eastside suburbs that generally have good public school districts, but more and more are unhappy with the education in their district or the funding under McCleary.

       27. @tacomee —

           You still didn’t answer the questions I asked here: https://seattletransitblog.com/2024/05/16/midweek-roundup-open-thread-49/#comment-932111

           Now I know the answer. They don’t exist. No one is building apartments like that anymore (they build only high-end houses). Except I can assure you it is real. You are welcome to visit if you want.

           Just to make it clear, these are apartments that were built in Lake City. They are not high-end (it is Lake City). Oh, and the same thing is true of townhouses. If you think these are luxury, you haven’t been in them. While house shopping with my son we went in one in Rainier Valley and he started pointing out the cheap construction. Personally I didn’t care (I thought it was a good value) but it is pretty big stretch to think that they are building high end luxury townhouses in Rainier Valley and Lake City.

           Look, I respect your opinions in general and your knowledge of the industry. But you are probably isolated and are ignoring the fact that a lot of these places are indeed getting built. More importantly more would be built if the city made it easier to build them. For a brief period they were building Apondments — the cheapest, lowest income type of housing you can build. They found a loophole and developers jumped on it. The loophole was closed.

    3. I was going to link it, but then saw some discussion online about how the population estimates seeming to be way off of reality, especially since 2020. I should have saved some links to what I was reading – there was talk of undercounting of immigrants, overcounting of domestic migration, all sort of stuff.

       But sure, here’s a link to the Seattle Times ($): https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/data/seattle-drops-out-of-top-10-for-growth-among-largest-u-s-cities/

       1. That’s relative growth between cities, not absolute growth in Seattle. Seattle’s rate of growth peaked between 2013-2017 because of so many tech companies expanding so much. That’s unlikely to happen again. But the population models have already been adjusted for a slower, more typical growth rate. That still leads to Seattle having 770K now and 1 million in, if not 2050, then eventually.

          Birth rates are declining and immigration is fluctuating, but it will take years to reach no-growth. And climate issues will continue to attract people to the northwest, so our area may continue increasing after the rest of the country has leveled off.

11. Followup to the “Seattle fell to #14 in growth article”.

    “accessory dwelling units in the city’s formerly single-family zones have been going in at a rate of nearly 100 per month.”

    So that’s the rate.

12. I highly doubt it but does anyone know the recent status of the Fare Gate consideration? I haven’t heard much recently. I feel like if their going to do it getting it started sooner rather than later would be better while we have fewer stations so it wouldn’t be an even bigger Price tag/Timeline in the future. We currently have 27 stations open and will add 4 more by the end of the year for sure. 6 More between Federal Way and the Redmond extension plus the Lynwood infill. And I believe the rest of the East link is really just 1 new station right? Mercer Island. The rest just connects to ID. So that will put us at 38 stations by the end of 2026.

    1. East Link (2 Line) future stations:

       Lake Washington gap
       – Judkins Park
       – Mercer Island

       Downtown Redmond
       – Marymoor Village
       – Downtown Redmond

       Federal Way’s three stations and 130th as you say.

       So that’s 4 Lynnwood plus another 8 by 2026.

    2. ST is now mostly or fully finished with what I’ll call the “Yellow stripe” project where each paid fare area is made abundantly clear. Plus they are still probably assessing how the new approach to fare enforcement is working. Finally, the flat fare is now being implemented.

       So I suspect that they’ll monitor how these things work before taking further steps.

13. Tom mentioned something on a different thread that reminded me of something. Assume for a second that for whatever reason we don’t build West Seattle Link, but decide to spend a lot of money on West Seattle transit. Much of that would go into service, but a fair amount could go into capital spending. One of the first considerations is getting from West Seattle to downtown. Once you get on the upper bridge, there are three potential routes:

    1) Current route of the RapidRide lines. There are a few areas where this could be made faster (especially during morning rush hour) but my understanding is that this is fairly fast. The only drawback is that it bypasses the southern end of downtown.

    2) SoDo busway. Ramps would have to be added as well as an eastbound bus-lane bypass to connect the Alaska Way viaduct with the busway. Once this is done this would be a fairly fast option for a bus, while also connecting quite well to Link (and covering all of downtown). The SoDo pathway could be improved even more which could help both the buses and Link. The train doesn’t stop because of the cross streets but it goes really slow through there. Bridges over the busway/Link at Holgate and Lander would be really nice, but I don’t know if there is enough room to build them.

    3) First Avenue South. For riders to West Seattle this offers little compared to using the SoDo Busway (assuming there are new ramps). If you moved the 21 you would need to cover First Avenue though. It doesn’t seem like it would be that difficult to find layover space somewhere to the south.

    This leaves a couple possibilities as I see it:

    1) Run all the West Seattle buses on the SoDo Busway. Would this overwhelm the busway? I don’t think this would be a problem. As far as I can tell all of the bus stops (except maybe one) have a pullout and are pretty long. This means buses can pass buses (like they did in the bus tunnel).

    2) Run some of the buses on SR 99 and some on the SoDo Busway. You would want to group the buses according to destination. For example the C and 21 could go via SR 99, while the H and 128 would go via the busway.

    Either option would mean that the 50 (or a bus like it) would not go to SoDo. it would instead go from West Seattle directly to Beacon Hill.

    Thoughts?

    1. “Run all the West Seattle buses on the SoDo Busway.”

       What problem are you trying to solve? 99 is faster than the busway, and the buses would have to go pretty far east to get to the busway and backtrack. The C and H have a stop in Pioneer Square now at Alaskan & Jackson. So that leaves only people going from West Seattle to SODO, or going from West Seattle to SODO Station because it offends them to transfer to Link downtown rather than straight east of the Admiral District. If they’re going from West Seattle to the Eastside, they can’t get East Link at SODO Station anyway.

       1. Mike, my proposal is for one –just one — new “express to Link at SoDo” be added for the Plateau area of West Seattle and the 125, the existing southeast West Seattle express to downtown being re-routed to SoDo Station instead of just being truncated at the north end of Delridge.

          I specifically assumed that the C and H would continue running to downtown via the SR99 pathway. But these two other parallel buses would provide a very quick way to Link at SoDo without the slow path on First South past Starbuck’s. I pointed out that since each route shared a stop with the parallel RapidRide route just before entering the West Seattle Freeway riders on the C and H could also gain access to this high-speed access to Link.

          Ross hypothesized switching all West Seattle buses to SoDo. That would be far more radical, though it would ndeed save Metro a lot of money. It is certainly something to consider, though it was not what I proposed.

          Please re-read the proposal carefully and without your dislike of me coloring your opinion. It’s a relatively low-cost idea that would give a lot of West Seattle riders on lines closely paralleling the two RR’s who are going to be taking three-seat rides for a decade to have a single seat ride to Link and two seats to UW, the airport or Capitol Hill.

       2. “Ross hypothesized switching all West Seattle buses to SoDo.”

          That’s what I was commenting on.

       3. Oh, my apologies. I see that was all you commented on specifically now.

       4. “Run all the West Seattle buses on the SoDo Busway.”

          What problem are you trying to solve?

          Better connection to Link for one. If you are heading to the UW, you want to transfer as quickly as possible (and not wait until the bus gets to University Street). But it also connects better to Sounder/Amtrak. I would say it covers more of downtown as well.

          99 is faster than the busway, and the buses would have to go pretty far east to get to the busway and backtrack.

          The idea is based on having ramps on both sides of Alaska Way Viaduct. So the bus would stay on the same freeway for another half miles or so (or roughly 30 seconds). From there it would go north through downtown (like a typical busway bus). A bus has to dogleg to get back to 4th, but that isn’t far. It seems a bit slower but that much slower.

          I’m not sure that is the best approach (that’s why I through it out there). If it is a lot slower than it doesn’t make much sense.

14. Ramps would have to be added as well as an eastbound bus-lane bypass to connect the Alaska Way viaduct with the busway.

    Ross, are you saying that you don’t think that using the eastbound “general lanes” and the Fourth Avenue South off-ramp would be sufficient to keep the buses moving? Why do you think so?

    There are three lanes eastbound on the upper deck from the point at which the cloverleaf ramp to SR99 morth diverges all the way to the Fourth Avenue South off-ramp. The right-hand lane is Exit Only to that ramp, which has a stoplight at its connection to Fourth South about two blocks to the south of Spokane Street. The space within the half-circle the off-ramp makes is entirely used by the Seattle City Light parking lot.

    There is a fairly lightly used “right-turn only” lane on the right of northbound Fourth South. I would propose that about halfway between the off-ramp’s intersection with Fourth South and the intersection of Fourth South and Lower Spokane Street that Fourth South be widened by one lane from there to Spokane by taking a dozen or so places from the parking lot, moving the general traffic right-turn only lane into it and making the existing right-turn lane bus-only to Spokane.

    The buses could then turn directly into the laft-hand lane bus only lane on Lower Spokane from the queue jump lane while general traffic turned into the curb or middle lane.

    I think that would be good enough and avoid the problem of adding a bus-only ramp that connected to an extended busway.

    There are still switch trains using the single track that crosses Lower Spokane at the end of the busway, so a new ramp would have to stay at the level of the upper deck for that long block then cloverleaf down 270 degrees of arc between the switch track and Sixth South OR get down to grade west of the track and turn into the busway from the rightmost lane of Lower Spokane.

    Either ramp would cost quite a bit and save only a minute or so.

    Yes, a westbound ramp would have to be added east of Fourth South, merging with the westbound lane that drops at First South. That would be a tough merge.

    Then, an elevated bus-only connection between the westbound off ramp to and westbound on-ramp from First South would have to be added for the buses to avoid having to merge over a lane.

    The westbound changess would admittedly not be cheap, but they’d be an order of magnitude less than the Light Rail plan.

    But they could certainly be done and would greatly improve access to Link to and from West Seattle without spending $4 billion for the Northwest’s Best Roller-Coaster.

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