This week (September 30 to October 6) is the annual Week Without Driving.
Washington-based disability advocate Anna Zivarts notes in her excellent book When Driving Is Not an Option: Steering Away from Car Dependence: nearly 30% of Americans do not have a driver’s license. This statistic includes everyone our car-oriented transportation system leaves behind, including children, the elderly, the disabled, and others who must rely on “alternative” transportation options in our cities.
The Week Without Driving offers a challenge to those who jump behind the wheel without a second thought: what if you couldn’t simply drive everywhere you needed or wanted to go? This is the reality for nearly 100 million people in our country.
Starting in 2021, the Disability Mobility Initiative began organizing elected officials and other decision-makers in Washington to a Week Without Driving in order to highlight the weaknesses (and, in some cases, strengths) of our transportation system. In 2023, The Disability Mobility Initiative partnered with America Walks to take Week Without Driving national.
Reducing systematic car dependency has long been a priority of the Blog, and it’s great to see a campaign like this gain national influence.
Two weeks ago, King County Metro reinforced car dependency rather than helping us wean off cars. Metro cancelled the Bus20 route, without replacement for the south half, west of I-5, from Northgate to University District, through the neighborhoods of Licton Springs, Green Lake and East Wallingford. For six weeks in May-June, we put up posters with a QR code along this route. Over 1,300 Bus20 users added their names; their personal stories about the importance of Bus20 are compelling. Bus20 was a vital lifeline for these neighborhoods. (see SaveBus20Service.com). Many students, teachers and school staff relied on it daily (UW, North Seattle College, K-12 schools (public & private), preschools, after school programs). Many seniors and disabled persons will no longer have regular bus service to access health care or groceries. Connecting to light rail for those unable to walk long distances, those with luggage or those with young children in tow will no longer be possible. Metro’s proposed alternatives (44,45,61,62) are unworkable or unsafe for many. For a few million dollars per year, Metro could have preserved basic bus service along this Bus20 route, south half, and prevented harm to hundreds for regular bus users. As our traffic congestion worsens, this decision by Metro is counter-productive.
That’s easy to say in a vacuum, but which bus route do you cut to preserve route 20 service? Do you cancel the 61, or run it half as often?
Like it or not, because money is finite, transit is a game of tradeoffs – in order to make car-free living easier for some people, you have to make it harder for others. Some people inevitably get the short end of the stick. I, myself, got the short end of the stick when the 255 was reduced to half hourly in the evenings, but I’m not asking other people to endure worse service in order to preserve the service I had before.
Get the City of Seattle to pay for 350,000 service hours, like it did in 2019; not the 140,000 that it currently buys. Have Metro allocate its dollars to maintain basic service for established ridership, rather than spend extravagantly for new ridership – e.g. 6 minute headways for RapidRise G with 101 drivers. Former Bus20 users would be happy to have half the service that you enjoy with Bus255.
The city of Seattle should definitely up its service funding to 2019 levels. However, even if they did, it’s not clear cut that restoring the 20 is necessarily the best use of the money. It could also be used to run other routes more frequently, or for more hours of the day. Or, it could be used to address some longstanding unmet needs. For instance, there’s no direct bus between First Hill and South Lake Union. Or First Hill and Rainier Valley. Or, between upper Queen Anne and Fremont.
There is another problem, though, which is the ongoing driver shortage, and until that’s resolved,more service money won’t actually buy any more service. Unfortunately for the taxpayer, the only way to resolve it is likely to be a large pay increase for bus drivers, which means the same levy amount won’t go as far.
Given the ongoing bus operator shortage, which has not recovered despite most Covid impacts having recovered, and given the level of tech talent we have in this region, can we not go all in on driverless busses? Yes, it’s a moonshot, and likely still a decade away (as are many Rapid Ride lines, mind you), but let’s get on this!
@Brandon — I think that makes more sense from a national standpoint. But I wouldn’t mind if Metro was an early adopter, that’s for sure. But there really should be a national push for this.
One problem we have now is the politics. This country is quite messed up. Truck drivers (and other people who drive for a living) should be rightly scared about the prospects of driverless vehicles. They have every reason to oppose an investment in it. But the key is to apply the model used by longshoremen. The union did not fight the improvements in technology — quite the opposite. They simply insisted that they benefit as much as the owners. As a result, longshoremen are extremely well paid, highly trained professionals. But there are a lot fewer of them. The same thing could (and should) happen with driving. Right now, self-driving cars either have drivers in them, or they are remotely controlled. The remote control operation is quite effective. Consider this, from the Cruise company:
The CEO wrote, “Cruise AVs are being remotely assisted (RA) 2-4% of the time on average, in complex urban environments. This is low enough already that there isn’t a huge cost benefit to optimizing much further, especially given how useful it is to have humans review things in certain situations.”
If your goal is to sell a self-driving car to the average consumer (e. g. he can read a book while the car cruises down the road) this really doesn’t work. But for a transit company it is a very good model. If you only need 2-4% of the drivers, this would be huge. Even if you only needed 10% it would be a giant improvement. It also offers an effective option for drivers — a chance to make a very good living as technology replaces labor. People basically just drive the buses remotely. Instead of handling one bus, they handle several as the various problems occur.
Once we wrap our head around that idea, the government should fund and encourage the development of driverless vehicles (instead of letting private companies do it). By all means the private companies can help support it (in the way that companies like IBM invest in open source software) but the government should play a more positive role.
If and when the buses can be operated in this manner it would be huge for transit agencies. You could dramatically improve service without spending much money. I don’t think we are there yet though.
Private driverless technology is being driven by private companies because… well … they have the technology. There is no way the government could ever catch up, and it is public transit where the public unions will object the most. Why would the government want to get in the way of this new technology? Let the market figure it out.
The profit isn’t in public transit when it comes to driverless technology. It also isn’t in private ownership of driverless cars. What Uber has taught every company working on driverless technology is Uber style driverless technology is where the future is because it has all the convenience of not driving (no parking, no parking fees, no stress of driving, no cost of private car ownership, etc. which is what Uber offers) but at a much lower cost.
Driverless Uber technology is not trying to compete with public buses because those are considered dinosaurs in the future and serve a poor demographicc. Driverless Uber technology is trying to close the gap in cost between using Uber or a ride share application vs. the cost of owning your own car and car rental companies.
Some companies have big leads. Google has the maps, Uber the app. technology and charging infrastructure, the large auto manufacturers have the cars and can afford the huge startup costs, and large rental car companies have the capital to buy and maintain the driverless Uber cars. Since there won’t be individual drivers some company will have to have the capital to buy the cars (manufacturers don’t want to retain ownership) and maintain them just like rental cars.
The time horizon before private car owners have driverless technology is pretty far out, but that is not the target customer. The time horizon before driverless Ubers are in the urban cities is pretty short, less than 10 years (and some cities already have driverless taxis), and just like Uber it will be transformational, which is why Metro is desperately trying to get into the game with Flex although my guess is Metro will end up buying hours from the leading driverless platform for subsidized riders because it will be cheaper per trip and Metro won’t want to spend the huge capital costs on its own fleet of driverless cars, maps and apps. No more will we see empty buses plying their routes to proved “coverage”. Demand will equal usage which lowers costs dramatically.
We should all be very excited for this new technology that private companies are creating with no cost to the government. If the government relies upon private companies to send rockets into space it should rely on the market to perfect driverless Uber/Lyft.
Private driverless technology is being driven by private companies because… well … they have the technology.
Yes, but my point is that things are progressing very slowly because private companies are the ones doing it. Companies aren’t sharing their research. Publicly funded research would likely progress much faster and provide more benefit for society. Think of the Internet. It was developed by the government and then eventually leveraged by private companies.
On-demand service (like taxicabs) only make sense in areas with very few riders. If you automate service they make sense in even fewer areas. That is because the dynamic is the same, it is merely shifted (towards lower density areas). You still have limited road space and limited vehicles. You gain a lot by simply asking people to walk a couple blocks and sharing the ride with people going the same way. So roads that could not realistically expect transit every five minutes have them. This pushes the on-demand service (which is fundamentally less cost-effective) to areas with fewer and fewer people.
But the shift has wide implications beyond just providing frequent transit where it would not be feasible right now. One is vehicle size. Without a driver you may see a lot more vans (especially on low-density roads). Community Transit has a large fleet of vans that they loan to people. Prior to the pandemic it represented about 10% of the ridership. Fixed route vans (running frequently along a corridor) would likely get a lot more riders.
Then there is rail transit. One of the big selling points of rail is that you have more capacity per driver. This is why large BRT systems are more common in areas with relatively low wages. But if that goes away, then one of the advantages of rail goes away. Again, you still have limited space and vehicles (it gets complicated) but things shift a bit.
Why would private companies lower prices rather than raking in more profits? Uber is cost-competitive with owning a car only if you make a limited number of short trips a month.
“Driverless Uber technology is not trying to compete with public buses because those are considered dinosaurs in the future and serve a poor demographicc. ”
That’s certainly not the case in King County, where a lot of middle-class people ride Metro and Sound Transit. Pierce Transit has more of a poor demographic, but that’s because service is so infrequent it’s barely usable. Improve service, and the latent middle-class ridership would appear.
Buses are the most efficient way to move significant numbers of people from A to B at the same time. Even the lowliest coverage route that “looks pretty empty” can usually get at least ten riders per hour. Metro eliminated the worst performers in the 2014 cuts.
The problem is, most of the cost of Uber today is not actually driver labor. After expenses, the average Uber driver only makes around $10/hour, with the fare charged to a passenger for an hour-long ride more like $80. The difference between what the driver makes (after deducting vehicle operating cost) and what the customer pays doesn’t get any lower if you remove the driver. If anything, it gets higher, as Uber is going to have to pay royalties to the patent holder of the self-driving tech, plus the cost of the extra hardware.
The end result will be self driving Ubers costing nearly as much as human-driven Ubers, as self-driving Waymo cars already cost today.
And even if the cost were cheaper, the result would be gridlock on downtown streets, and the only way to fix it would be higher taxes and fees to discourage usage.
“On-demand service (like taxicabs) only make sense in areas with very few riders. If you automate service they make sense in even fewer areas. That is because the dynamic is the same, it is merely shifted (towards lower density areas)”.
Just the opposite. Uber is heavily concentrated in urban areas for a reason, and not surprisingly driverless pilots like Waymo are concentrated in urban areas. That is where the people/riders are, and the trips are shorter in distance so less expensive. Today Uber/Lyft account for 6% of all vehicle miles travelled in the U.S. and Uber alone has 131 million monthly users because trips are mostly shorter. Waymo and the rest hope to increase 6% to 12% to 20% of VMT by making trips cheaper.
In less dense areas private ownership of cars is by the far the most convenient and economical, and that is what we see.
I agree rail over long distances makes economic sense depending on the cost of the Uber trip. Rail is grade separated, although ghastly expensive to build. If the $150 billion for ST was actually used to subsidize driverless Uber it would provide the same level of services, especially with shared rides, and avoid feeder buses and be door to door.
I am not saying driverless technology won’t benefit public transit, depending on union objections. I am saying the intended target is the Uber/SOV driver/rental car driver because driverless technology will lower costs closer to rental cars and owning a car while providing all the benefits of not owning a car and having someone else (or something else) do the driving and parking.
The economic model is Uber. All we are talking about is eliminating the driver to lower trip costs to generate more users and more VMT who currently use other modes. If public transit is more convenient or cost is an issue then I am sure folks will continue to use public transit, especially over long distances, but as we have seen Uber/Lyft have grown exponentially for several reasons, two being safety and door to door service with no parking. Uber and driverless tech. (Uber/Waymo) is all about the urban market because those people have more money and the density allows trips to be shorter and thus cheaper.
“The problem is, most of the cost of Uber today is not actually driver labor. After expenses, the average Uber driver only makes around $10/hour, with the fare charged to a passenger for an hour-long ride more like $80”.
Actually, “Average Uber Drivers Driver hourly pay in Seattle is approximately $20.63, which is 17% above the national average”. Driver Salaries in Seattle, WA for Uber Drivers | Indeed.com.
“Waymo reports it is now doing over 10,000 rides/week in 255 square miles of Phoenix, including 1,000 to the airport. This is in addition to their rides in San Francisco, where they are now, for a while, the only robotaxi operator in the city after the shutdown of Cruise”.
“For now, Waymo is content to work very much like Uber, with an app and per-mile fees for rides similar to Uber. But the robotaxi companies aren’t just interested in replacing Uber or being a cheaper Uber, or just being an Uber driver. The real revolution comes in entirely different pricing models, including subscriptions, as well as much lower prices, with eventual costs just 1/5th to 1/4 the price of current taxi and Uber rides. It’s unclear how or if that would be sold through the Uber app.”
You Can Summon A Waymo Via Uber, But Does It make Sense? (forbes.com)
Virtually all of these vehicles will be EV and provide a supplementary service to existing transportation options hopefully with a cheaper cost for consumer.
“the result would be gridlock on downtown streets, and the only way to fix it would be…”
… bus service to replace the ubers.
I don’t see driverless Uber scaling to the masses, either economically or in terms of road space in dense areas and availability in low density outlying areas. It will be great for the wealthy, as we’re already seeing with Tesla’s “full self driving” mode, but I doubt the costs make sense for day to day trips for the masses. With driverless busses (more likely, mini-vans), you would divide the costs among multiple riders. But even then, you would probably need some level of subsidy, which applies to conventional bus service today. Vehicles are just expensive things to run and maintain! Also, you would only need to get it to work for a fixed, well-mapped out route, as opposed to random locations with random variations from the last time the mapping was done. This is a much easier problem to solve. Private-Public partnerships might be a good model to use, at least at first, because as mentioned above, private companies have the expertise. IIRC, Metro’s microtransit services are contracted out to private companies, right?
“Uber is heavily concentrated in urban areas for a reason”
You mean that people are too lazy to take transit or don’t want to get into vehicles with strangers? Why should the public support or subsidize that?
“I agree rail over long distances makes economic sense depending on the cost of the Uber trip.”
For long-distance service you need the inner-city stations and track, because that’s where people get on/off. And they aren’t all going to the Westlake neighborhood in particular.
“Metro is desperately trying to get into the game with Flex”
Metro is getting into Flex because of what I said above, people too lazy to take a bus or phobic to riding with strangers pressuring their governments to offer demand-response taxis or replace fixed-route service with them.
Metro’s investments in Flex is an inefficient use of limited taxpayer dollars. More fixed routes would serve more people for the same cost.
There’s also a semi-fixed alternative that some Metro van routes use, and the Valley Shuttle between North Bend and Duvall. The route is mostly fixed and has a predictable schedule and stops, but it also allows deviations at one or both ends. The Valley Shuttle seems to have 20 minutes padded to the schedule for deviations in North Bend and Duvall.
This semi-fixed model may be the best of both worlds for isolated houses.
“Uber is heavily concentrated in urban areas for a reason”.
” You mean that people are too lazy to take transit or don’t want to get into vehicles with strangers? Why should the public support or subsidize that”?
The public shouldn’t. Waymo and the others are not asking for public subsidies. It is public transit that gets billions in public subsidies. People do use Uber and taxis in urban areas for reasons of safety and door to door service. I don’t know if I would call that “lazy”. Instead I think public transit and progressive councils have done a poor job on urban safety.
“”the result would be gridlock on downtown streets, and the only way to fix it would be…” … bus service to replace the ubers”.
This is a common misconception among transit advocates. Uber, and Waymo/driverless cars, don’t create additional trips like some kind of induced demand. Studies show they replace other modes. The most common is the SOV, which has the added benefit of reducing the amount of parking an area needs. Seattle has one of the highest Uber user percentages, and not surprisingly those living without a car. It hasn’t increased congestion, in part because there are so few commuters on downtown streets post-pandemic. It isn’t even clear Uber has lowered public transit use. That is down for other reasons.
Transit advocates are terrified Uber, and now driverless technology, will eliminate the need for public transit, or poach the middle-income rider on public transit. I don’t think that is true. Some trips like a long trip on Link for $3 will be very competitive although ghastly subsidized, and other trips more economical on a bus because the rider is poorer although the trip is less convenient.
Uber is not going away. All we are talking about is making it driverless, which ideally will lower the cost and allow subscriptions so more and more urban dwellers can live without a car but not have to depend on the vagaries of public transit.
When some write, “I don’t see driverless Uber scaling to the masses, either economically or in terms of road space in dense areas and availability in low density outlying areas. It will be great for the wealthy, as we’re already seeing with Tesla’s “full self driving” mode, but I doubt the costs make sense for day to day trips for the masses” they miss the point that those “masses”, or 95% of them, already make that same trip today, but in a car or truck, or for 6% in Uber. The masses today drive a car.
Moving them to driverless EV’s without the need for so much parking at a lower cost is a benefit to a city, and there is more opportunity to combine riders in one trip with new apps. which actually reduces total cars on the streets. Although this really scales much better in an urban area with greater density so there are more trips and the trips are generally shorter.
Public transit advocates need to stop feeling so threatened by Uber or Waymo. No one has to ride either, and there are no public subsidies like Link to West Seattle or empty buses.
You can fit approximately 7 cars per block per lane, stationary. Less, if the traffic is moving. That’s the capacity limit of autos, be it automated or not.
Therefore, there’s really no practical way for automated taxis to replace transit in any sort of mildly dense environment. In those places, there is no option other than to remain a high priced, limited use service, commensurate with the very limited capacity.
AOJ, are you Kamala’s btother in law flacking for Uber under a Anonymous handle? If so, I’ll vote for your SIL, but, Dude, I will holler if she takes you into the administration.
“On-demand service (like taxicabs) only make sense in areas with very few riders. If you automate service they make sense in even fewer areas. That is because the dynamic is the same, it is merely shifted (towards lower density areas)”.
Just the opposite.
OK, I guess I need to explain (although folks have largely already done that). Of course there will be taxicabs. These are inherently more expensive because they are inherently inefficient. Imagine if everyone in New York City stopped riding the subway and rode a taxi instead. The city would quickly grind to a halt. You can’t possibly move that many people that way. So already you have a major problem that needs to be dealt with. In the past cities have limited cabs (e. g. the medallion system). Uber/Lyft got around that. But cities have moved to things like congestion pricing. Bus (and freight) lanes are one way around it. You basically let regular streets collapse (if it takes an hour to move three blocks, so be it) but everyone else just takes the more space efficient system (transit).
It is also inherently expensive. You have to have a cab ready for every person who wants to ride one. Even without a driver that is far more expensive than simply asking people to share a ride. So taxicabs are a premium service and will forever remain a premium service. It simply doesn’t scale.
Of course you can share a ride in a cab. That is the model of some systems. What happens though, is that once you start sharing a ride they quickly become regular fixed-route, fixed-time transit. It is like figuring out the most efficient independent two-dimensional shape. You can try various shapes (pentagons, triangles, a rhombus) but eventually you settle on a circle, just as expected. The same is true with fixed-route, fixed-time buses.
The reason may not be obvious so consider this example: An airporter. The van takes a bunch of people home. The first question is, when does it leave. When it is full? Maybe, but that could leave a lot of people waiting a long time. So immediately it becomes obvious that a fixed-time system makes the most sense. So where does it go? North, then south? Of course not. You want to group people together. You want to drop off people that are “on the way”. Do you go to every house? Maybe (since this is an airporter) but it would be a lot cheaper to just drop them off at the main arterial and ask them to walk a couple blocks. Not only is it cheaper (which means the airporter can run more often) but it is much better for those “downstream”. It also makes sense to stay on the main corridors. If you can drop off five people on Aurora it is way better than going five blocks this way, then ten blocks that way, etc. Bit by bit (as ridership grows) you are basically reinventing a standard transit network. It is a fixed-route, fixed-time system.
By the way, Jarrett Walker came to the same conclusion (independently). Consider this post: https://humantransit.org/2017/05/the-receding-fantasy-of-affordable-urban-transit-to-your-door.html. To quote him:
[UberPool] is clearly converging on something for which fixed route transit is already the ideal tool.
The only thing that changes with automation is where the cutoff point is. The areas that are cost effective to serve with microtransit increases, but so do the areas that are cost effective with regular transit. Consider this flowchart: https://humantransit.org/2018/02/is-microtransit-a-sensible-transit-investment.html/mircrotransit-flow-chart-02092018. Of course this assumes a driver, but the basics are the same if you don’t have a driver. Vehicles themselves cost money. They require maintenance. What happens is that the numbers change. Instead of 10 riders per hour being the cut-off point for when standard transit makes sense, it shifts to 5 riders or maybe 2. Thus the areas where microtransit is actually providing a cost-effective service goes from somewhat low-density to really low-density. To be clear, we are still talking about a subsidy. But my point is that it is really only cost effective in those areas.
This means that either the state subsidizes people who live in these areas (which is quite reasonable and not that different than “coverage” oriented transit) or it is a premium service, not unlike a taxicab.
“…Uber/Lyft have grown exponentially for several reasons…”
I think this is a pretty big exaggeration. After flat-lining and even declining during Covid, Uber is seeing around 20% growth in trips year over year, for the last few years. Far from exponential.
And last I saw, they are losing substantial numbers of drivers who are increasingly doing the math on subtracting gas, maintenance and depreciation on their vehicles, and realizing they are making pennies. Getting a CDL and driving truck or transit, while not as flexible, at least gives you health insurance and retirement. If that continues, response times will suffer, trip costs will continue to sky-rocket, and the number of trips will go into decline.
That last few trips I’ve taken on Uber were pushing $100, vs 3 bucks for a bus ride. Needless to say, I’ve stopped taking Uber and Lyft, unless in a desperate pinch.
“AOJ, are you Kamala’s brother in law flacking for Uber under an Anonymous handle? If so, I’ll vote for your SIL, but, Dude, I will holler if she takes you into the administration”.
LOL Tom. No, I am not Kamala’s BIL. I didn’t even know she was an Uber proponent although by far Uber is most popular in large, progressive urban cities.
I’m not flacking for Uber but driverless cars and automated vehicles. You know, like the ones you and others have been writing about for days that miraculously will reduce BLE from $20 billion to under $10 billion.
The most progressive city in the U.S. is SF where I once lived. SF is the pilot city because taxis sucked there because they were a monopoly because they were artificially limited by the government. Uber does well there because they are not artificially limited, the residents and tourists are wealthy, it is a dense urban city so rides are cheap even with a driver, and parking is very expensive and difficult to find.
I have no idea who the winners will be when it comes to driverless cars and vehicles. Probably a consortium. I don’t see you getting all worked up about driverless trains or buses.
I don’t think Ross and Cam understand what I and the articles I link to are saying. No one is saying driverless technology will eliminate public transit. Uber is only 6% of U.S. VMTs, but as Cam notes growing 20%/year which means doubling every five years.
Uber didn’t affect public transit. It is too expensive for most public transit users, but those are only 5% of all trips. Uber first affected taxis because the service was so poor, then rental cars in urban cities because you don’t have to park or pay for parking, then walking, and then car drivers who didn’t have to park or pay for parking or worry about drinking alcohol.
As noted in the article from Forbes, the intended customer will be current car drivers who clog the streets. People like Ross claim SOV’s don’t “scale” but there they are, everywhere. Nowhere in the U.S. has congestion pricing I know of. It is silly to argue driverless taxis don’t scale when they are replacing the SOV’s that don’t scale but are on the streets anyway, often idle but parked on streets.
There will be a subscription service. Give up your SOV if you live in an urban area and take relatively short trips. Of course this will be too expensive for public transit riders just like driving and parking are today. Just like today they will still take public transit. Depending on the quality of public transit, people who give up their cars will likely also use transit for some trips.
But for the 90% who drive cars and live in an urban area it won’t be too expensive and it will free them from having to do the driving, parking, cost of parking, owning a car (or two). Or renting a car for the city which Uber has decimated ($40 to park overnight at a hotel in SF last time I was there).
Not 100% of course, but 6% could go to 30% to 50% in the right cities depending on cost, and almost none will come from public transit.
There are lots of benefits. Easier to electrify a fleet. Much less urban parking needed. Less house GFA needed for parking so more for housing. Automated congestion mapping. Fewer accidents. Fewer drunk drivers. According to Forbes driverless will lower costs than owning a car or Uber today. Fewer cars parked on the streets so more bike and bus lanes. Fewer cars parked somewhere idle. It will also be great for those who are disabled and can’t use public transit.
There will still be subways and light rail to West Seattle and Everett and Issaquah, and buses, but more car owners will ditch their cars and subscribe to a driverless car program that will benefit everyone, even those who don’t use it, because it will replace mostly SOV’s making the same trips (taxis and rental cars in urban areas are already dying). I just don’t understand whytransit advocates are so terrified by this thought, because it is coming. And it won’t cost tax payer a dime.
AOJ, the automation required for a train is trivial compared to that for an autonomous car or truck. It’s a little easier for a bus running a fixed route. The repetitive nature of a busvroute makes training much easier.
While I grant the seeming inevitability of fleet autonomy, the testosterone-addled men of the world are not going to sit in the back of an AV obeying urban 25 mph speed limits, stopping completely at every STOP sign, and just generally being hyper-careful to avpid lawsuits. The boys will go nuts!
Maybe they’ll agree to get desirable women to go out with them, but don’t invest your retirement funds in this dream scenario.
Two different scenarios Tom: cars for daily trips, and cars for pleasure. Cars for daily trips probably outnumber cars for pleasure 50 to 1 at least in Seattle although wealthy people can afford very nice cars for daily trips but probably use around 10% of the car’s potential (think Porsche SUV which is overwhelmingly driven by women), but nothing will prevent someone from having a subscription to a driverless shared ride program and a Porsche 911 in the garage. A lot do this now, but with a daily driver and a sports car.
“but don’t invest your retirement funds in this dream scenario”. They said this about Henry Ford and John D. Rockefeller. The car was a fad, the horse forever.
I am not even talking about replacing a mode, the car. Just the driver. My guess is if you offered most people a chauferred limousine they would take it. Kamala uses one.
I just don’t know who the next Ford and Rockefeller will be. If I had to hedge my bets and investments, I would invest in Google, Tesla, and Uber which are leading the pack, which have not done too poorly stock wise, and maybe Microsoft for the AI and Enterprise for the rental car fleet expertise and capital. The car remains the same. Just the driverless technology is the change.
You still will be able to take Link from West Seattle to Issaquah if that is your worry.
I think we are way off of the point that I made (that was in response to the point that Brandon made). Just to reiterate: he suggested Metro invest in automated buses — to essentially be a leader in the technology in response to our driver shortage. Not a bad idea. But I think a particular agency is unlikely to change things. In contrast, if the federal government got involved — and I think they should — it is quite likely they would. It is quite likely they would make progress at a faster rate, and this would be available to a lot more organizations (public and private) as a result.
I made the point about the Internet. Think about the various private network protocols that existed back in the day (SNA, DECnet, HP, etc.) . There was a “protocol war” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protocol_Wars, but it was more than that. At various levels there were a dozen different ways to connect up machines. Ultimately TCP/IP won. Why? Because it was solid and made by the government. It isn’t like those different networks disappeared. But chances are if you are connecting to a machine that is running some old software on an IBM Mainframe, you are just connecting via TCP/IP (not SNA). The point is, government standards and cooperation is a good thing and would likely lead to faster progress on automated vehicles.
As for private cars, of course it would be great to not have to drive. I like to hike, and not only would this remove one of the big burdens (driving to the trailhead) but I could get the car to pick me up at a different trailhead (which is great).
But the point folks have been trying to make is that while self-driving cars are great, they don’t change the fundamentals of driving very much. It costs just as much. It has the same scaling problem. Basically transit has an economy of scale (prices drop and quality increases the more people use it) while driving as an individual is the opposite. But while riding in a car is a bit more pleasant without having to drive, it dramatically changes the world of public transit. Buses that were expensive to operate become much cheaper. The agencies can move a lot more people at no additional cost.
You could say the same thing about taxicabs, but then you get into the fundamental weaknesses of taxicabs: they don’t scale either. Millions of automated taxicabs clogging the street will not work. One way or another you are going to have to limit the number (or effectiveness) of the taxicabs. This can be done by favoring transit (e. g. transit lanes) or restricting cabs (which is what they have done for decades). Congestion pricing is another option (and these apply to all automobiles). Some cities have also started focusing on the “ride share” companies themselves and just taxing them directly.
There are many areas around the city that are similar. What makes this area unusual is that:
1) There is an organized group trying to add coverage in this area.
2) There is an alternative that would be both better for Metro and provide extra coverage.
3) The group seems to be ignoring that option.
Think about this from the perspective of a county representative. A bunch of people want bus service closer to their home. I’m sure they get requests of this nature all the time from all over the city. They are well aware of the issue, but this is just one of the trade-offs that are part of any system. There is really no reason to focus on this neighborhood any more than the dozens of other, quite similar places (or places where the walk to a bus is much worse).
Now think about moving the 62. This is different. Here is an opportunity to make things better at no additional cost. It is quite possible that the people are simply unaware of this issue. SDOT has changed hands. When I talked to Spotts (the SDOT chief) about it, he hadn’t heard of it. Metro planners might be aware of it, but they are a large bureaucracy. The planners aren’t going to keep proposing a route change that SDOT rejected. Yet if people actually bring this to the attention of the city and Metro, there is a very good chance that they fix it, because it would save them money.
I’m honestly quite disappointed in the neighborhood leaders. Maybe they thought just trying to “save the 20” would be easier. Obviously it wasn’t. I could have told you it wouldn’t be (for the reasons I mentioned). The solution is to move the 62, and yet I see no large scale effort by the neighborhood to do that.
“The planners aren’t going to keep proposing a route change that SDOT rejected.”
SDOT didn’t reject moving the 62 to Latona. It just said it would have to harden the street first to support the weight of so many articulated buses. It hasn’t been prioritized in ST’s list of projects with its limited funds, but that doesn’t mean SDOT is against it or won’t ever do it.
This is about authentic community outreach: >1,300 who need Bus20 and over 900 compelling personal stories (see examples below):
“Bus 20 is a critical transportation option for North Seattle College students, faculty, staff and families in the area. Limiting or making this route unavailable in any way will have severe negative impacts on the diverse community the college serves. It will also affect the college’s ability to appropriately serve the diverse community that it relies on for ongoing enrollment. This is a serious issue of equity and inclusion.” MS
“Without Bus #20 my ability to get to the University to take classes is severely hindered. The loss of Bus #20 will have a direct, negative impact on my education. It also puts me, a young adult woman, at a greater safety risk. I work late nights to help pay for my education and without Bus #20 I will have to walk home late at night or pay for an Uber every time which will negatively affect my income greatly.” GG
“The #20 Metro Bus is very important to our non-profit preschool. We run a non-profit business that is on the #20 route. Over the years we have had not only staff members who regularly use that route to get to and from work but we have had families who use #20 to get their children to and from school. I currently have several staff members who rely on the #20 route and it would cause them and our preschool hardship if it were to be eliminated.” FP
“Our residents in the Hearthstone uses the bus for their daily shopping and outing. Our elderly residents need the bus #20, because our residents does not drive due to safety reasons.” JC
“I am a senior without access to a car. I attend fitness classes in Northgate at least twice a week via 20 bus. My doctor and my dentist are both at Northgate and accessible to me only via the 20 bus. I have a monthly doctor appointment. Other means of transportation are either unreliable or too expensive for me on a limited income. Please keep the 20 bus.” RL
““I’m a grad student with a disability that causes mobility problems. I chose to move to this neighborhood because it’s a nice quiet area, but also because the 20 bus line allows me stable transportation to the UW campus.If the 20 bus line is cancelled, I will likely have to move because I can’t walk the 11 blocks to the next closest bus line that runs to campus (the 44). Without the 20 bus line, people who live in these areas will be left without solid public transit.” GL
“Without #20 I’d have to lug my suitcase 6 blocks to get to #62 to the lightrail/ airport. Or walk 8 blocks to go to UW.” CC
Why not reduce the headway for RapidRide G with its 101 drivers and use some of those resources to restore basic vital service to the south half of the Bus20 Route.
James, good luck. Sometimes transit agencies will make a change based on community feedback. I doubt they’ll bring back the route 20, but you never know. Or, maybe someday they’ll slightly alter the routing of some other route. Or give your neighborhood micro transit.
I remember years ago when Metro created a new route in Redmond, but decided to have it bypass the Bear Creek P&R by about 1/5th of a mile. The previous route went to the P&R. Riders of the route complained so much that Metro decided to reroute it back into the P&R. And they didn’t even wait for the end of the service change to do it! I think it was called the route 233. It’s almost unheard of for them to quickly make a route change like that from negative feedback, but they did it. But then slightly changing a portion of a route is much easier than bringing back a deleted route.
This is about authentic community outreach
Yes, I get that. You all are very organized. Kudos to everyone. But that doesn’t mean you are special. You can say the same thing about every part of Seattle Again, look at a map. Consider Sacajawea Elementary School. As the crow flies they are close to Lake City Way. But the nearest bus stop is about a third of a mile away. The trip involves an elevation gain of 110 feet. You either walk along Lake City Way or along streets with no sidewalks. They used to be able to walk up to 15th and catch a bus. More recently there used to be peak-only bus stops on Lake City Way (closer to the school). Both are gone.
You want special privilege. You basically figure that since you were able to put together a website, organize and get people involved, it means more. Sorry, it doesn’t. You got yourself heard. If your case was actually strong, the planners would agree with you. But it isn’t. The area that lacks coverage is small and fairly low density. It is no different than dozens of similar places around the city. That is why you haven’t been effective.
On the other hand, if you were promoting a revenue neutral restructure that provides more coverage (and faster service) you would definitely stand a chance. As luck would have it, there is a plan — yet you seem to be ignoring it. I have been to the website and there is not a single thing there about moving the 62.
Instead you continue to push for a route that is now officially gone. Seriously — the 61 is here. Do you really think Metro is going to resurrect the 20 and run the 61? Do you think they will kill off the 61 now? At the very least you should have a plan for covering the area with a different route (like an extension of the 79). But again, the best chance you have of success is to come up with a solution that the average transit person would agree with. A plan that does not borrow from Peter to pay Paul. Something that is a “win-win” from a transit standpoint. Moving the 62 is that plan.
SDOT didn’t reject moving the 62 to Latona. It just said it would have to harden the street first to support the weight of so many articulated buses. It hasn’t been prioritized in ST’s list of projects with its limited funds, but that doesn’t mean SDOT is against it or won’t ever do it.
Right, but that is still a rejection. It isn’t a matter of priority — it isn’t even on SDOT’s radar. We are talking about a very tiny bit of work. It isn’t on the SDOT sites as a project (at least the ones I’ve looked at). It isn’t even clear exactly what needs to be done. As I noted before, I’ve never seen an official report from the city or anything from a reporter saying this got rejected because they wanted to harden the streets. For all we knew they were more concerned about parking.
The next step is obvious: Talk to your city council member. I don’t live in the area — if I did I would. I would certainly talk to them long before I did all this organizing. I think Strauss represents the area. He is a reasonable, experienced council member. What has he said about this? Does anyone have any idea?
I wonder if people just don’t understand politics. A bunch of stuff just slips through the cracks. It happens all the time. Community organizing can be very effective in raising awareness and getting stuff done. But only when it is clearly a win for everyone. Take the monorail and the ORCA card. If not for this blog the monorail would not accept ORCA cards. We figured out there was a problem and sent emails to the city council. The city council realized this would be an easy win — so they decided to study it. After the study confirmed the obvious (they should accept the ORCA card) it happened. This is how things work.
I don’t see any of that here.
Metro has collected and published actual “data” (in the scientific meaning).
Route 20 had 1558 daily boardings in the second quarter of 2022, and 2,066 daily boardings in the second quarter of 2023, making it 45th among all routes. Not a bad start.
“But that doesn’t mean you are special.”
This is not about me. And this area west of I-5 from Northgate to U-District is special. It has a high percentage of college and university students that rent and that don’t have cars. North Seattle College students and staff near 53rd and Latona now have an 80+ minute daily commute (40+ minutes each way) vs 30 minutes via Bus20 [Walk to catch Bus62 at 56th & Keystone > Exit Bus 62 at Roosevelt Station > Light Rail to Northgate Station > Walk the John Lewis Bridge]. UW students now walk 1/2 mile plus to access Bus44 or Bus45, which is unsafe at night, in the dark. This area also has a high percentage of seniors, many of whom can’t walk long-distances.
“On the other hand, if you were promoting a revenue neutral restructure …”
We should be expanding bus service everywhere, not reducing it. Traffic congestion is bad and it’s getting worse. Housing density is increasing without additional parking. We need to make neighborhood connections to Light Rail more convenient, not less. We need to grow revenue for bus transit, not stick with revenue neutral.
“Moving the 62 is that plan.”
Yes, moving the 62 would help. But that should have been done BEFORE Bus20 was cancelled. Also, Bus45 should re-routed to Woodlawn, 1st Ave NE and 80th Street. But again, that should have been done BEFORE Bus20 was terminated.
“Route 20 had 1558 daily boardings in the second quarter of 2022, and 2,066 daily boardings in the second quarter of 2023, making it 45th among all routes. Not a bad start.”
It’s important to realize that the old route 20 included the Northgate->Lake City Way section now covered by the 61, which was probably the route’s most popular section. Which means the actual number of riders impacted by the deletion of the 20 is much less.
Ross, “moving the 62” just moves the transit desert from the strip along Latona from 50th to 60th to two islands, a small one along Latona for a couple of blocks north of 50th and a larger one along Woodlawn north and northwest of “downtown Tangletown”. TANSTAAFL.
Given the driver shortage and lack of funds, there’s not much relief on tap for these neighborhoods right now, but “moving the 62” is not the anacea you imagine it to be.
@Brent White,
“2,066 daily boardings in the second quarter of 2023, making it 45th among all routes. Not a bad start.”
Exactly. The #20 actually had very solid ridership, and some of the fastest growing ridership in the system. Its deletion was not a result of issues with the #20, but rather with Metro’s internal problems with cost control and service delivery.
Additionally, the old #62 and new #61 are very poor substitutes for the #20. Neither of these routes provide a direct connection between the UW and North Seattle College, and neither of these routes provide direct access to Link at UDS for the residents along Latona.
It’s a shame that Metro did this (using my polite words….).
“Additionally, the old #62 and new #61 are very poor substitutes for the #20. Neither of these routes provide a direct connection between the UW and North Seattle College, and neither of these routes provide direct access to Link at UDS for the residents along Latona.”
Lazarus, the direct connection between North Seattle College and the UW is on Link. Why do you think they built the pedestrian bridge? And the SE Greenlake neighborhood does have direct connections to Link stations with the routes 44, 45, and 62. It’s just not doorstep to doorstep service. Nor should it be. It’s a bus route, not an Uber.
“Neither of these routes provide a direct connection between the UW and North Seattle College”
But, we do have a much faster route between UW and North Seattle College. Take Link to Northgate and walk over the pedestrian bridge. The train runs all day every 10 minutes.
Neither of these routes provide a direct connection between the UW and North Seattle College
That is simply not true. You have the 67 and Link! That was part of the problem. That part of the route couldn’t compete.
and neither of these routes provide direct access to Link at UDS for the residents along Latona.
Again, that is not true. At Ravenna & Latona you have the 62 and 45 (both connect to Link). At 45th & Latona you have the 44. At 40th & Latona you have the 31/32. So you really only have a fairly small gap along Latona that would be largely filled if they moved the 62. Speaking of which:
Ross, “moving the 62” just moves the transit desert from the strip along Latona from 50th to 60th to two islands
Yes, but it is a much smaller coverage hole. Furthermore, it is much easier to fill. The 20 is not coming back. There are really two options for filling what I’ll call the “Latona Hole”:
1) Move the 62.
2) Extend the 79.
The first saves money. The second would cost money. It would extend the 79 by about 50% from my calculation. In contrast, if they moved the 62 they could simply extend the 79 (like so: https://maps.app.goo.gl/nRyQhRtsBxhz3q6N9). That is about five minutes running time.
Now let’s do a little math: Right now the 79 runs hourly. But when we solve the driver shortage it will go back to running every half hour or half as often as the 62. Thus if the 62 saves a couple minutes with this new routing (which seems quite plausible) and the extension of the 79 takes about five minutes (ditto) this becomes a revenue neutral change. It wouldn’t cost a dime.
Btw, as I said, I am in favor of any neighborhood of conducting a campaign to have their bus route service changed. I’m not saying SE Greenlake, or whatever that neighborhood is called, should just shut up and live with whatever Metro decides. If they feel the routing in their neighborhood should look different, it’s their right to try to lobby to try to have it changed.
There are really two issues here:
1) Folks in this area don’t want to walk very far to a bus. This is a reasonable suggestion. It is unlikely — although still quite possible — that this is the biggest service hole in Seattle. If that is the case then Metro should add a bus in the area.
2) Folks want the 20. This is the part that is ridiculous. Sorry, but it just doesn’t make sense. To be honest it never made sense. Look at the plans from Phase 2 of the Northgate Link restructure. You can see the altered 62. You can also see a bus number 23 that helps cover Tangletown. The 23 is quite similar to the 79. In fact it would be connected to the 79 (I have no idea why they considered them two different routes).
The 20 was simply an odd placeholder. A stroke of luck for the neighborhood really. Or maybe an experiment (to see if lots of people from Tangletown would take the bus). The 20 replaced the 26. It should be noted that the 26 never connected to the UW. From what I can tell it existed for decades and never went there. It is pretty hard to argue that this has always been really important given how it didn’t exist until very recently. Furthermore, it wasn’t until UW Link that the 26 went to North Seattle College (although the 16 went there).
In any event, extending the 79 is a reasonable suggestion and probably the only realistic one. With or without a change in the 62, this could happen. Assuming the 62 doesn’t move, that would look like this: https://maps.app.goo.gl/LFYRnDC16Na4pYvF6 (from Sand Point to the U-District). The 79, it should be noted, runs hourly. Obviously this is because of the driver shortage. The baseline for this route is half hour service.
Consider that for a second. Imagine there is no driver shortage and a bit more money. They run this extension of the 79 (every half hour). Now imagine after running the bus every half hour they have a driver shortage and service gets cut to hourly. Would anyone take it? A few, definitely, but most would just walk over to some other (far more frequent) bus. At that point, even hourly service is hard to justify. Metro has basically just skipped the over the painful period. Rather than give this area hourly service (which hardly anyone would use) followed by a truncation of service, they didn’t offer anything (for now).
But at some point it is quite likely there will be another bus. Not the 20, but an extension of the 79. It will run every half hour (at best). It will connect to the UW (but not North Seattle College). Only a handful of people will use it. The best chance of making a bit improvement in the area is to move the 62.
Btw, as I said, I am in favor of any neighborhood of conducting a campaign to have their bus route service changed. I’m not saying SE Greenlake, or whatever that neighborhood is called, should just shut up and live with whatever Metro decides. If they feel the routing in their neighborhood should look different, it’s their right to try to lobby to try to have it changed.
Sure. I agree. I’m just saying they are going about it all wrong. They are begging for something that won’t happen and never really made sense in the first place. It is one thing to ask for better routng or even additional coverage. It is another to cling on to a route that you were lucky to have.
Consider service along Lake City Way. Right now the 522 and 372 combine for the northern section, but between 98th and 75th there is only the 522. This is an area with plenty of apartments. When the 522 goes away, Metro has to cover it or a lot of people have a very long walk to a bus. There are other reasons for service along this corridor. From anywhere along this corridor (e. g. Lake City) it is a much faster connection to Link. It saves about ten minutes on the bus and five minutes of walking. Thus there is a compelling argument for providing service on Lake City Way between Lake City and at least Roosevelt once the 522 goes away.
But folks didn’t push for keeping the 522! They didn’t try and move Stride 3 to follow the 522 pathway (even if there is a very strong argument for that) They know that the days of taking one bus from 85th & Lake City Way to Kenmore will soon be gone.
They focused on the key argument, which is that there should be a bus along the corridor (from Lake City to Roosevelt). Folks in Tangleown aren’t doing that. There whole campaign is based on keeping the route 20 — a bus that clearly makes no sense any more. You want to argue for more coverage in Tangletown? Sure. Move the 62? Yes, absolutely. I’ve been trying to get folks there to push for that for a long time. But keep — sorry, resurrect — the 20? That is just ridiculous.
You have to have a realistic and sensible plan no matter how organized you are.
Gentlemen, there is a straightforward compromise here: Have every other run of route 62 take the eastern path between 45th and 65th. That’s the same level of coverage route 20 had before: half-hourly mi-day. If the streets could handle the 20, they can handle a new 63.
Have every other run of route 62 take the eastern path between 45th and 65th.
Hmmm, that could definitely work. Call the Latona version of the 62 the 26. The 26 would be a bit faster, but at worse you take a break (so that you don’t catch up to the 62 that ran before it). You end up with better coverage but frequency that isn’t as good. If you are headed to Tangletown it might not matter (you take whatever bus comes first). But from Tangletown you have to choose your bus stop. If that is what the neighborhood wants — fine by me.
I also think that the 62 should turn on 65th (while we wait for SDOT to approve using 56th to Latona). That would speed up the 62 considerably while asking riders to walk just a little bit farther (less than five minutes). I assume it is OK to run a bus along 65th between Latona and Woodlawn.
It wasn’t so much that a one-seat ride from south Tangletown to UW was never important. It was that a one-seat ride from Tangletown to downtown (on old route 26) was more important. Until it wasn’t.
Route 44 came along in less than 10 minutes. Now it is 12 minutes, and the ridership isn’t what it used to be. Well, maybe it has gone up again since the deletion of route 20.
Getting a one-seat ride to UDS took care of both those trying to get within a short walk of UW, and those now trying to catch the train downtown, which is faster than the old 28 slog.
Neither the 49 nor the 79 extending into Tangletown would provide a one-seat ride into the heart of campus. Doing that would be an extension of route 48, 65, 75. 255, 271, or 372, and the neighbors would need to support a layover location for the buses.
Route 48 has to go all the way to 50th & Brooklyn for layover space. If the layover spaces are fungible, why not convert the trip to the furthest one from UDS into unique neighborhood service, such as the replacement route for the southern portion of route 20?
@asdf2,
“The train runs all day every 10 minutes.”
No it doesn’t. The train runs every 8 minutes at peak. And it has run at 8 mins for a long time now. It only runs at 10/15 min headways off-peak, when demand is low.
Link 1-Line runs at 8 mins because it has to. Demand for transit on Link is so high that the only way ST can meet that demand is to run 4-car trains at 8 min headways, and even then crowding can be a problem.
And that is what is so weird about Metro’s approach to Link. Metro has a lot to gain by tapping into the river of ridership that is 1-Link, but Metro continues to do the opposite.
Metro keeps making it harder to get to Link. Witness the deletion of the one seat ride to UDS on the #20, or the planned deletion of service to Overlake Village Station on RR-B.
It boggles the mind. And it is hurting Metro.
Getting a one-seat ride to UDS took care of both those trying to get within a short walk of UW, and those now trying to catch the train downtown
Right, which is what an extension of the 79 would do. But that begs the question: How many people would ride that bus if it runs every hour? My guess is very few. So that means somehow coming up with the money to fund an extension that will carry very few riders.
It is also quite likely that very few people rode the 20 in Tangletown. I don’t have the numbers (although I’m trying to get them). Again, it is the same problem. The area just doesn’t have that many people. If is difficult to justify running a bus every fifteen minutes. If you run a bus every half hour, a lot of people end up taking other buses. This is a common problem. It is why infrequent buses really should be geared towards coverage and not providing some sort of unique connection (no matter how convenient).
For example, consider the 73. For a very long time people would ride the bus in Pinehurst to the UW. Then along came the 347/348. Then they ran the 73 less often. Riders heading to Roosevelt and the UW would simply take the first bus that shows up and quite often that was the 347/348. The 73 was much faster. But people hate waiting, and so ridership on the 73 dwindled (and they cut frequency even more).
In contrast consider the 24. It runs infrequently as well. But for much of the route, there is no competition. It is a very long walk to any other bus. So even though it serves a low-density area, it does just fine.
I’m not saying we have the best set of routes. I definitely think the 62 should be moved. I would send the 348 to Maple Leaf and Roosevelt (if not the UW) instead of Northgate. But routes that run very close to other routes (and a lot less frequently) are bound to struggle. The case for the 79 should be based on coverage needs — not because a handful of riders find it more convenient.
@asdfoh, and regarding:
“we do have a much faster route between UW and North Seattle College. ”
Of course Link is faster. It is much faster than taking the bus. That is why Link is so successful.
But not everyone is well served by the long walk to/from the Link stations.
And forcing everyone onto Link isn’t the answer for those who have structured their lives around the existence of the 20 in their neighborhoods, or for those who have a reasonable expectation of “coverage”.
“Bus44 or Bus45, which is unsafe at night, in the dark”
Or people perceive they’re unsafe, taking a few incidents and condemning the entire routes. Then they want everyone to pay for a custom route so that they can avoid the frequent routes that are there.
“The 20 was simply an odd placeholder. A stroke of luck for the neighborhood really. Or maybe an experiment (to see if lots of people from Tangletown would take the bus)”
It was because of previous opposition to deleting the corridor (then served by the 26). The same opposition came up in the Northgate Link restructure, that too many people would have to walk too far without a route on Latona/1st Ave NE. Metro responded with a temporary route 20 to gradually phase it out in two steps. The second step occurred with Lynnwood Link. Metro has to balance all the mobility needs in the county, not just one neighborhood. And Latona/1st is low density compared to neighboring corridors. If it had more multifamily housing it would have a stronger argument for its own route.
The 20 was simply an odd placeholder. A stroke of luck for the neighborhood really. Or maybe an experiment (to see if lots of people from Tangletown would take the bus)”
It was because of previous opposition to deleting the corridor
Not really. I think you are missing my point. It is one thing to cover Tangletown with a second route (to go with the 62). It is quite another thing for that route to go to Northgate and then Lake City (and thus run more frequently than it would otherwise).
Tangletown was supposed to get two routes (the 62 and 23). But neither was going to go to Northgate. Both were supposed to serve Roosevelt Station. But then various things fell apart and next thing you know, they were running the bus from Lake City Way to Tangletown.
If they had been able to modify the 62 — or just decided to keep the general approach they had originally — then Tangletown would have had the 23 (a bus that looped around every hour. This would have changed the dynamic considerably.
Two things happened simultaneously. Transit fans argued to keep a route on Northgate Way/Lake City Way between Northgate Station and Lake City. Latona advocates argued to keep a route on Latona going to Northgate. Metro responded by creating a route 20 that did both. It was clearly a holding pattern until Lynnwood Link, and not a long-term commitment to the south half of the 20.
Agreed. I think the third thing was the inability to move the 62. Move the 62 and the loss of the original 23 is not that big of a deal. At the very least you extend the 79 just a little bit to cover northern Woodlawn. But with the 62 remaining the same there were more folks asking for coverage (as well as the connection to Northgate).
My recollection is that the City of Seattle requested route 20, and Metro was happy to operate it once the City funded it.
Mayoral administrations seem to have holes in their institutional memory.
Seattle changes its TBD route preferences over time. In this restructure it shifted hours from the 10, 11, and 12 to the 49, 60, and 125.
Here’s a Metro system map focusing on bus routes in the northwest service area. Scrolling down to the Greenlake area, the area in question, southeast Greenlake, that used to have the route 20, nothing appears out of the ordinary as compared to other areas. There are plenty of other areas on this map, and on maps of other Metro service areas, that look similar to what former route 20 riders are complaining about. Unfortunately, not everyone can be within a few block walk of a bus route. Sometimes it’s going to be a few blocks more of a walk. If the distance is unfair, then it’s not just unfair to southeast Greenlake, it’s unfair to many other neighborhoods throughout the county.
https://kingcounty.gov/en/-/media/king-county/depts/metro/maps/system/09142024/metro-system-map-nw
Look at our data and the personal stories at SaveBus20Service.com Hundreds have been harmed by terminating this essential bus service – many seniors and disabled persons no longer have useable bus service, many students and teachers and school staff have much longer commutes and many will be walking unsafe long distances at night, many will no longer have workable access to light rail.
https://busgraphs.com/post/2024-08-05-september-2024-service-change/
“Unfortunately, Metro’s choice to eliminate route 20 demonstrates an insufficient understanding of how to assess redundancy. The agency’s outreach materials indicate that alternatives exist in routes 44, 45, 61, and 62. While these routes are proximate to parts of route 20, the significant access loss along its corridor indicates that these routes are not true alternatives. They don’t allow transit customers to get to the same places, at the same time, without a large revision in time budget. Deleting routes is perfectly justifiable when other routes can pick up the slack; a network with less redundancy will deliver greater access for the same amount of service. Failing to assess the viability of alternatives, and thus deleting a route that is enabling unique journeys, is a bad approach to efficiently delivering access.”
I did look at the data and stories. And then I looked at a Metro service area map to see what the southeast Greenlake area looks like in terms of transit, and I noticed the neighborhood looks like dozens, maybe hundreds of other neighborhoods throughout the county. I didn’t see an abnormally large void in transit service in the neighborhood. That kind of service gap seems to be very common throughout the city and county. Btw, I’m not saying you shouldn’t complain or fight to get the route 20 back. I’m just pointing out what I saw on the system route map.
Sam is right. This area that used to be served by the 20 is not special. There are various places around the city that require a long walk to access any transit. Realistically, we can’t serve every place in the city. Not unless we want buses running every hour. There are really two choices here:
1) Take service from some other place (that may be more deserving).
2) Come up with a way to increase coverage that doesn’t cost any money.
In this case the latter is possible! We can improve coverage in the area and have buses run faster through there by rerouting the 62 as originally proposed by Metro with the Northgate restructure. That right there would be a dramatic improvement in coverage at no extra cost. I really don’t understand why this group keeps pushing for the impossible (taking service from somewhere else and applying it here) as opposed to the possible (simply adjusting the route to be what Metro wanted in the first place).
At that point it would leave a smaller hole at around 65th & Woodlawn. This could be fixed by extending the 79. But ultimately, the key here is to push for moving the 62 not to keep pushing for the 20.
Who pushed to keep route 62 right where it is just east of Green
Lake?
“Who pushed to keep route 62 right where it is just east of Green
Lake?”
There was no “pushing”; it just defaulted to following its predecessor the 16.
There was a push in Move Seattle to upgrade the 62 to RapidRide and move it to Latona and not go north of 65th. That was incorporated into Metro Connects. But Move Seattle couldn’t afford all its RapidRide lines so this one was canceled. SDOT said it would have to harden the Latona roadway in order to accommodate frequent articulated buses. Since RapidRide wasn’t going anywhere, SDOT didn’t prioritize that, and it didn’t prioritize it either when the Northgate Link and Lynnwood Link restructures could have moved the 62. So here we are.
Mike is right, but RapidRide had nothing to do with it. The link I gave was for Phase 2 of the Northgate Link restructure. Thus at that point, this is what Metro wanted. But it didn’t happen. The general consensus was that they didn’t do that because SDOT felt like the street couldn’t handle it. (I have yet to see an article confirming that though.) If this is correct (and I am pretty sure it is) it means that Metro wanted to change the route, but couldn’t because SDOT wouldn’t allow it. Thus we need to get the SDOT and Metro to work this out. It won’t happen without public pressure though. But unlike saving (or resurrecting) the 20 it stands a very good chance of happening if enough people push for it.
So far, the People’s Front of Tangletown seems to be a few outsiders, and the Tangletown People’s Front is of unknown size, but its spokespeople have the local Tangletown accent, and plenty who have signed their manifesto. I have no reason to believe the SDOT Empire will listen to the PFT, nor that the TPF will pay any attention to the PFT either. The SDOT Empire has nothing to fear from the PFT, but probably does fear a conflict with the TPF.
There is a rally to improve the mobility options on Rainier close to the freeway: https://actionnetwork.org/events/week-without-driving-walking-and-rolling-tour-of-rainier-ave-s
I have said it before, and I will say it again, if it were not for my disabilities, I would be driving. Seriously, taking transit is annoying at best. With the pro-criminal attitudes of modern tra sit agencies in King County, it keeps getting worse.
I appreciate the transit system the King County Metro has created. I also want to acknowledge that Metro has faced many challenges, including recovering from the pandemic, integrating bus service with Sound Transit Link Light Rail, and deficient funding from the City of Seattle. As my neighbors and I have struggled to understand why Metro terminated Bus20 without adequate replacement for the south half, there are some lessons to be learned. We believe that more extensive community outreach in bus transit planning is needed and that students and school staff, as well as seniors and disabled persons, need greater consideration. We believe that bus transit from local neighborhoods needs to expand, which will require additional progressive revenue from the City and the County. Our future will require more housing density, including more affordable housing and less parking, and much less car dependence. I’m glad that I’ve discovered Seattle Transit Blog as a way to learn more about how we can continue to improve our transit system.
Yeah, a big reason why the buses aren’t as frequent (or don’t cover as many areas) is because the city decided to go with a smaller funding package. Another big reason is the driver shortage. But there are also tough choices that have to be made when it comes to routing. An extended 79 (to cover Tangletown) is quite realistic. But that would mean service every hour (which is simply not very good).
You are absolutely right — increased density would help. If Tangletown was a lot more dense it would probably have two frequent routes. But efficiency matters as well. Parochial interests — no matter how seemingly justified — can wreck havoc on route planning. You end up with a bunch of buses running infrequently because some people don’t want to transfer (or walk a few blocks). Tangletown (which I’ll define as between 45th and 70th and between the lake and I-5) is not a particularly easy place to serve. It narrows to the north (making it harder to justify two routes). It sits close to Link but on the wrong side. It also has less density than the other side. Thus you have a couple choices:
1) Run buses that curve around to connect to Link.
2) Ignore Link and just go north-south.
The latter seems silly (given how close Link is). The former is inefficient. It is not really “on the way” either. It works OK for the 62 but mainly because of the other routes in the area. Consider the 31/32. It could continue north on Latona from 40th and follow the 62 to Roosevelt as well. But that would be silly — riders in Fremont and Wallingford would much rather go to the UW. You have the existing 20, but it is redundant. It essentially overlaps the 45 close to Green Lake (which is why it didn’t get more riders). Imagine you are close to the Green Lake Library and want to get downtown or to Capitol Hill. Do you take the 45 or 20 to get to Link? Not even close, you take the 45. What if you are going to the U-District? Again, the 45 is much better. Is Tangletown a more popular neighborhood than Roosevelt? No, not even close. There is very little reason to take the 20 south from there. That basically leaves the connection to North Seattle College, Northgate and Lake City. This would either be overlapping the 61 or replacing it. Overlapping it means more redundancy (buses run less often). Replacing it would mean fewer riders even though it would be longer (which again means buses run less often).
The geography is just not very favorable, which is why we are back to modifying the 62 and backfilling service around 65th & Woodlawn. That dramatically increases coverage and would be basically free. But first you need to talk to the city about moving the 62.
Routes 20 and 73 were not the only targets for elimination. Sound Transit wants to abandon service on Lake City Way, and let Metro figure out how to backfill service on this corridor which features lots of transit-oriented Development. Some have suggested combining route 20 with a Lake City Way route, by way of Roosevelt Station.
Sound Transit wants to abandon service on Lake City Way, and let Metro figure out how to backfill service on this corridor
Yes, and Metro responded with the 77. It is an odd choice, since it is also the route that will go east-west (to serve the station at 130th). Since ST will abandon Lake City Way long before it finishes 130th Station, it is likely that the 77 initially just goes from the Fred Meyer in Lake City to the UW.
Extending this route to serve Tangletown would be a big service mismatch (extending the 79 makes more sense). But there are no plans for either.
I’m intrigued by Brent White’s idea above. Split the Bus62 route. I would have half the 62 run its current route. Alternate runs would travel the south half of the Bus20 route, west of I-5, from Northgate to U-District & UW, through Licton Springs, Green Lake and East Wallingford. Each would have 30 minute headways. Bus20 would connect these neighborhoods to Light Rail at both Northgate and U-District Stations. It would provide direct bus service to North Seattle College, UW, K-12 schools (public & private), preschools and after school programs along the route. It would provide access to groceries and health care, particularly for seniors. It would provide direct bus access for many disabled persons and seniors with limited mobility along the Bus20 route.
It’s an interesting idea. The big issue is that the two route are different lengths, which forces the buses to be unevenly spaced on one side of the split or the other. I guess you could design the schedules to prioritize evenly spaced buses on the more popular Wallingford to downtown section. But, to do that, you increase the odds that somebody needing to go east from Roosevelt station gets stuck with a 20-minute wait.
Or, you could avoid this problem by making the faster bus sit for a few minutes after the Latona section so that the running times are even, but that’s annoying to passengers riding through on the faster bus. But, either way, it’s less than ideal. Maybe still worth it, but it’s not clear-cut.
Branching a route means it runs at half-frequency on each branch. The 62 is a 15-minute route, so each branch would have 30-minute service. It would no longer be a fully-frequent route, which was one of the keys to its success and makes it a core corridor route. It would reduce service in Tangletown. And given that the 62 is 5-15 minutes late all day every day and prone to bunching, your nominal 30-minute service would have unpredictable 35-45 minute gaps. I doubt One Bus Away could track arrivals on multiple branches, so it would need two route numbers.
Pierce Transit had a split route when I spent a summer there in the 80s. The main branch stayed on S 19th Street. The second branch detoured to S 23rd Street for a quarter mile as some neighborhood activists had requested. That was to bring service to a street with a couple shops. The route was half-hourly, so each branch was hourly. The infrequency made both branches barely usable, and you had to keep track of the schedule and go to one stop or the other depending on which was next.
Brent’s idea (as I understand it) was to simply split the 62 in Tangletown and then reconnect the buses later on. The bus would not serve Northgate or the U-District. It is similar to the route 28 in San Antonio that Jarrett Walker happened to post about (https://humantransit.org/wp-content/uploads/Screenshot-2024-09-30-at-13.39.20.png). His post was about displaying the frequency (notice how the colors fade as effective frequency changes). Anyway, the idea is to branch in the low-density area of the route (Tangletown) to increase coverage. The drawback is lower frequency through there. This is a reasonable trade-off (I could see how people would prefer one over the other).
Anyway, what you are suggesting is completely different and not very good. If I understand it correctly I don’t think it would provide any additional coverage (except maybe in Tangletown) while dense areas have much worse transit. It would basically destroy the 62 all so that a handful of people avoid a transfer. Sorry, but it just doesn’t make any sense.
To be clear, my suggestion was merely a split of route 62 in Tangletown, so one branch takes a western path every half hour, and one takes an eastern path every half hour. The branches would then come back together on 65th. It could have two route numbers.
The problem that one branch would take longer than the other is real, but the difference is unlikely to be more than a couple minutes.
“It would basically destroy the 62 all so that a handful of people avoid a transfer.”
When I observe the 62 on 45th Street or in Tangletown, it often has few riders. Metro’s own dashboard shows that <1% are over capacity. Perhaps split the service 2/3rds 62 and 1/3rd 20 south half. Our community outreach shows great need for this south Bus20 route – 1,300 Bus20 users, including students, teachers and school staff but also workers without cars, seniors and disabled individuals. Many now don't have workable or safe bus service, even with a transfer.
@Brent — Yeah, I understood your proposal correctly.
When I observe the 62 on 45th Street or in Tangletown, it often has few riders.
The 62 greatly outperformed the 20 in terms of ridership per service hour. See page 52 here: https://cdn.kingcounty.gov/-/media/king-county/depts/metro/documents/about/data-and-reports/2023/system-evaluation.pdf
…students, teachers and school staff but also workers without cars, seniors and disabled individuals…
That is true of every route. Again, look at the school I mentioned (Sacajawea). The service hole created by the lack of the 20 is relatively small compared to other places around the city. It is fairly flat, the streets have sidewalks and let’s face it, it is a very nice, pleasant place to walk. Look, I get the fact that you were able to get all these testimonials. Kudos to you. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t people in the same boat all over the city (and that includes people that ride the 62).
Brent proposed a fairly elegant solution. It would not make transit worse in any other neighborhood. It is a straightforward trade-off, but it only effects Tangletown. Folks would have worse frequency but better coverage. This is reasonable because Tangletown is low density.
You are proposing ideas that are simply unrealistic given the nature of the area. If Tangetown had a lot more density, or a major institution, or was at a major connecting point, or had something else going for it then what you are proposing would be reasonable. But it is the opposite.
The correlation between squeaky-wheels and privilege is very high.
Those with the highest needs often don’t have the time or resources to spend advocating for themselves.
I’m glad Metro is using noise cancelation, and hopefully instead using objective metrics.
It’s my understanding that the section of Latona that used to have the route 26, and later the route 20, from about 65th to 50th/45th, had extremely low ridership, mainly because that section of the route is a single family home neighborhood. Also, the route 20 as a whole scored in the bottom 25% in terms of route productivity, whereas routes like the 62 and 44 scored in the top 25% of route productivity.
If any of that info is wrong, feel free to correct it.
Cam wrote “The correlation between squeaky-wheels and privilege is very high.”
The 1,300+ that added their names to our SaveBus20Service.com list are not those with very high privilege; they’re students, teachers, worker dependent on bus commuting, seniors and disabled persons.
Ross wrote: “If Tangletown had a lot more density, or a major institution, or was at a major connecting point, or had something else going for it then what you are proposing would be reasonable. But it is the opposite.”
Census block group data for East Wallingford (45,2) shows 36% rentals – much of that for college / university students with 4-6 students per rental so it’s affordable. North Seattle College, UW & U-District (shopping & health care) & University Light Rail Station, Northgate (shopping & health care) & Northgate Light Rail Station, Green Lake (shopping) & Green Lake recreation & Green Lake Library & Green Lake Community Center are all certain major connecting points.
James, it sounds like what you need to ask Metro for now is “service on Latona to Northgate and U-District”, not “restore the 20”. The northern half of the 20 has already been reassigned to an east-west route (the 61).
“The 1,300+ that added their names to our SaveBus20Service.com list are not those with very high privilege”
Good point, so let’s disentangle this. Privilege generally refers to people living in prestigious areas, where most people are assumed to be middle/upper-class professionals living in single-family houses and driving to work and usually white. “People like us” or like the politicians voting to give them disproportional advantages. West Seattle has a perception of that, like the Eastside. It clearly doesn’t refer to all of West Seattle, but mainly west and northeast of the Junction where this demographic predominates, which is taken to be “West Seattle”.
There’s another kind of privilege which isn’t usually called that, namely lower-income areas that get disproportionate service due to “equity”. I wouldn’t call this “privilege” to avoid confusing it with the other, but simply “equity”.
When Link started and the 42 was restructured, there was a “Save Route 42” movement. The 42 was an infrequent (half-hourly) milk run on MLK from Rainier View (south of Rainier Beach) to downtown, parallel to the more-frequent, higher-density 7 and parallel to Link. Metro restructured the 42’s corridor with one route from Rainier Beach to Mt Baker, the 7 covering north of Mt Baker, and another route south of Rainier Beach (now part of the 107). People at the ACRS (Asian Counseling Referral Service, between Columbia City and Mt Baker) and some neighbors pushed Metro to preserve the 42 as a one-seat ride to downtown. At first Metro refused, but in the final restructure it restored a short part-time 42 temporarily. The hours came out of the newly-created 50, a new east-west corridor. After a year or two, the second 42 incarnation was deleted. That may have been part of the 2014 cuts or not; I don’t remember. The activists continued to push for a 42 restoration. To us they seemed like a few squeaky wheels, asking for redundant service that would replace other service elsewhere that served more people and was further from any alternative. After another few years, Metro responded by extending route 106 to replace south MLK service and extend it to north Rainier (overlapping with the 7) to Intl Dist station. It wouldn’t go all the way to downtown, but to a downtown-adjacent station. That’s the 106 we have now. It arguably overserves north Rainier, which has one of the most frequent route in Metro’s system (the 7). So that’s an example of equity-based service.
Latona is somewhere in between these. It’s a mostly-forgotten area, not prestigious or unprestigious, and not an equity-emphasis area. The 1000-person petition is an equity-based plea. I’m sure all those people exist, as they also do in prestigious areas. (Eg., 20% of Bellevue is low-income.)
East Seattle is also in between, now that the equity part of the Central District has retreated to east of 23rd. There have also been movements to save routes 2 and 12 from any changes. (The changes would be splitting the 2, and deleting service on 19th Ave E.) These arose a few times between 2012 and 2016 (the C/D/E restructures, the 2014 cuts, and the U-Link restructure). Some eastern route 2 riders said everything they go to is on the 2 (e.g., Queen Anne), and they didn’t feel safe transferring downtown. They created the loudest protests of anything I’ve seen to restructuring a route. The 12 supporters were second-loudest. As a result, Metro deferred splitting the 2, and left the 12 as-is, and worked around them. This lasted until the G restructure, when without any public activism, Metro internalized the previous demands and moved the 12 to Pine (thus saving it) and didn’t split the 2 or move it to Pine (contrary to Metro Connects).
Accessibility would be much more reasonable if Metro was able to maintain functional elevators (and escalators). The ones from the Evergreen Point Park and Ride to the Freeway Station platforms have been out at least 4 times in the last year, for weeks at a time. I’ve repeatedly had to carry my bike up three flights of stairs, and while dangerous and extremely unpleasant, I’m privileged enough to be able to do so thanks to a new hip. Other mobility impaired folks would be SOL.
Yes, money is finite, and I’m no expert in elevator mechanics, but it seems like at some point the ADA issues and cost of constant repairs would justify investing in more reliable infrastructure.
The main problem with elevators is not unreliability, but lack of redundancy.
The policy problem is that ST considers having each individual vertical conveyance out of service up to 5% of the time as acceptable, instead of making it a requirement in the contractor specs that each elevator path has to have at least one elevator in service 99.x% of the time.
ST’s plans for installing a second elevator at the east entrance to SeaTac Airport Station is a very positive sign. The bad news for SR 520 riders forced to rely on elevators working at the freeway stations is that TIBS and MtBaker are (prioritized by boardings) ahead of everything else in the retrofit queue. And I have seen no plans for vertical conveyance retrofits at TIBS or Mt Baker.
That said, eastside retrofits would be paid for by the eastside subarea, and outside grants.
The main problem with elevators is not unreliability, but lack of redundancy.
The policy problem is that ST considers having each individual vertical conveyance out of service up to 5% of the time as acceptable, instead of making it a requirement in the contractor specs that each elevator path has to have at least one elevator in service 99.x% of the time.
ST’s plans for installing a second elevator at the east entrance to SeaTac Airport Station is a very positive sign. The bad news for SR 520 riders forced to rely on elevators working at the freeway stations is that TIBS and MtBaker are (prioritized by boardings) ahead of everything else in the retrofit queue. And I have seen no plans for vertical conveyance retrofits at TIBS or Mt Baker.
That said, eastside retrofits would be paid for by the eastside subarea, and outside grants.
Does Sound Transit own the Evergreen Point freeway station? Or does WSDOT or Metro or King County? The owner would be the one to fix it, and to balance it among its other budget priorities.