This week is all RapidRide as we review the Candidate Corridors analyzed in Metro’s recently published RapidRide Prioritization Plan.
King County Metro Corridor 1049, a potential RapidRide conversion of Route 150, was recently set as a Tier 1 priority corridor, expected to be constructed before 2039 after the current RapidRide projects are finished. Route 150 connects Kent to Seattle via Southcenter and currently averages around 4,000 weekday boardings. When it gets upgraded to RapidRide service, Metro expects a 60% ridership increase and a 22% travel time savings.
This line will be the first RapidRide line to use a freeway alignment. Currently the route follows I-5 and the SODO busway downtown. Because the busway is planned to be taken over by the West Seattle light rail line, it would need to use 4th Avenue South instead.
Alternatives Analysis
Currently Route 150 ends at downtown Seattle, Metro considered avoiding the freeway and truncating the route at Rainier Beach Station on Henderson. While that’s not where most riders want to go, it would increase reliability, schedule adherence, and flexibility but might take slightly longer to downtown due to the transfer and because the 1 Line is not as direct as the freeway/busway. Riders could continue more reliably on Link but also connect to other lines such as the 7 (or RapidRide R by then) along Rainier.
Metro had also considered truncating the line at either SODO or TIB stations. It rejected both potential termini because SODO is already quite close to downtown and TIBS both is too far out of the way and duplicating RapidRide F.
After the main alignment 1 was chosen some further adjustments were made.
- Change northern terminus to 3rd Avenue and Virginia Street from Seattle Convention Center.
- Adjusted current downtown service to use 3rd Ave instead of the existing 2nd and 4th Ave couplet.
- Delaying realigning from SODO busway onto 4th Ave S as suggested in Metro Connects instead continuing to use busway for now.
- Realign service in Tukwila to use 66th Ave S instead of existing 61st Ave S to increase reliability.
Delays and Improvements
Most delays are centered around I-405, on S 180th St (shown on map as SW 43rd), and around Kent Station.
The improvements would increase transit priority percentage of the route from 38% (including the hov lanes on i-5) to 58%. Though it appears that the suggested improvements would surprisingly ignore the high delay regions and instead add BAT lanes in areas that are easier to implement.
- In SODO: On 4th Ave add northbound bus/BAT lane between Spokane St and Edgar Martinez Drive S, and a southbound bus/BAT lane between S Holgate St and S Spokane St. . Most likely done after West Seattle Link impacts SODO busway.
- Tukwila: Adjust Andover Park W & Minkler Blvd signal reducing cycle time. The change to using 66th Ave S instead of 61st Ave S will slightly speed up travel times as well.
- North Kent industrial area: Adds northbound and southbound BAT lanes along long stretches of 68th Ave S
- Around Kent Station: Consolidate westbound right turn lanes on Washington Ave. Add eastbound queue jump at 4th Ave N.
Station Stops
Currently the average stop spacing is 1,600 feet or about one-third of a mile (excluding the freeway segment) and approximately 40% of stop pairs are less than a quarter-mile apart. The proposed station stops would increase the average spacing to 2,400 feet or half a mile. The much farther stop spacing makes this route the closest to Community Transit’s Stride bus lines. The busiest stops would remain Kent Station, Andover Park W (Southcenter) and downtown Seattle.
Costs & Conclusion
Metro estimates that the total cost for the improvements would be approximately $61 million dollars, with 45% for transit speed and reliability, 42% for new bus stations, 9% for charging infrastructure, and 3% for layover facilities.
Now the main question is whether to run it directly downtown or truncate it at Rainier Beach. Assuming the route heads downtown and the transit improvements are completed, Metro estimates there could be an impressive estimated net increase of 4,000 riders per weekday, a 60% increase from current ridership.
The route to truncate at Rainier Beach is 101, ideally added to the I Line, the only RapidRide line not planned to connect to the light rail network.
Route 150 would still have to get on I-5 for a short distance anyway and get back off to get to the wasteland known as Rainier Beach Station.
That Boeing Access Rd Station is not part of 150’s future route discussion is a testament to the pointlessness of that station in the middle of nowhere.
It’s one thing to truncate Route 150. It’s another to enable a Link connection near the south Seattle city limits. It would be pretty logical to leave the route on Interurban Ave and run to or past a future BAR station before getting on I-5. It could have new stops for Allentown. Of course, the BAR station itself is pretty hard to justify and may not open.
Plus there is the potential overcrowding of Link under Beacon Hill that ST won’t talk about. The data that ST presented a few years ago showed that the segment under Beacon Hill had the highest ridership per train anywhere in the Link system. Adding Route 150 riders could add to a Link overcrowding issue.
If the route was no longer going Downtown, it could extend one more stop to the Museum of Flight. Or it could continue on to replace a truncated Route 101 to South Renton by turning about 120 degrees.
The path for the Route 150 buses north of Boeing Access Road is going to be increasingly difficult. I-5 congestion is spreading to several hours a day. West Seattle Link construction followed by DSTT2 construction will disturb and likely close (for several years) the SODO busway. All of this is in addition to the route being already pushed to Downtown Seattle streets. .
It may sound weird today, but I could see a SODO truncation being more attractive at some point, especially if ST started running both the 1 Line and 3 Line into Downtown (creating a high frequency connection) from the same platform.
It’s just one more benefit to a three line DSTT — which of course ST refuses to study.
Does anyone have the ridership stats for the stops along the 64th Ave S jog? I would argue to remove that and just send it on 68th.
There is around 730 ridership in total on the five detour 64th ave stops with 360 for the 64th ave /james st stop. For comparison most of the 68th ave stops have around 20~35 riders.
It seems there’s just a lot of apartments at that intersection of 64th ave and w james st.
Even if there are more people living along 64th than 68th for that stretch, it’s not good to have a bus that zigs and zags back and forth, trying to chase after riders, especially if 68th and 64th are close enough together that people could walk between them.
On the other hand, as this detour is close to the end of the route, there probably aren’t too many people on board that would need to sit through it, and it probably doesn’t add more than a couple minutes of running time. I also don’t know how well lot the streets are, or how safe the walk between 64th and 68th is to do at night (although, really, using poor pedestrian safety as an excuse to detour buses is really just a cop out for not being willing to address the root of the problem and fix the pedestrian safety). Overall, this detour feels a lot less obnoxious than the detours the F line makes; if there existed an all-day Sounder or all-day express bus from Kent Station to downtown Seattle, I think it would be barely noticeable. It just feels bad because Sound Transit cheaps out on bus service, rendering the slow 150 the *only* way to get from Kent to downtown Seattle, outside of rush hour.
Yeah, where the detour occurs matters. Since it is close to the tail, it doesn’t hurt as many people It never returns to 68th, so at least it is only two extra turns (not three).
There is also a huge ridership mismatch between the streets. On that section that is basically nothing but warehouses and parkland on 64th (and to the east of 64th). In contrast there are a lot of apartments to the west of 68th. It is roughly 400 meters between the stops. So many riders would stop taking the bus (based on typical the typical distance someone will take to a bus). It is worse than that though. The street grid is not regular there. A lot of streets between 64th and 68th don’t go through, making for long trips (https://maps.app.goo.gl/LMH5hZESxwF31SR88). That is a ten minute walk (on top of getting to that intersection and crossing the street). That is not a trivial distance.
This is probably the biggest cluster of apartments for a very long ways. So it should carry a disproportionate amount of weight in my opinion. I’m generally not found of detours, but in this case it is definitely worth it.
The north end in downtown Seattle is about to use the Eastlake layover; it would use Stewart-Olive-Howell streets. In downtown Seattle, if several routes were shifted to 1st Avenue from 3rd Avenue to provide good circulation and replace the circulation purpose of the CC Streetcar, routes 101 and 150 could shift to 3rd Avenue from 2nd and 4th avenues. The latter could be devoted to PBL and general-purpose traffic; they are one-way streets. 1st and 3rd avenues are two-way streets that would be better for two-way all-day transit service. If ST does not provide any intercity bus routes, there may be none on 2nd and 4th avenues.
If ST3 disrupts the SODO busway an alternative pathway will be needed; is 4th Avenue South the best choice? How about Airport Way South? (Why does ST3 West Seattle Link have a stub operation period? Why not delay it until it can go into the DSTT; shift the construction later. Or, put the east, south, and west lines into the DSTT!).
The south end in downtown Kent could shift to South 228th Street to avoid conflicts with BNSFRR crossings; they congest James and Smith streets.
After Boeing Access Road, why not continue to Airport Way S into Georgetown and make a stop on Bailey St. before the freeway on ramp going I-5 north. Instead of going to Rainer Beach.