Update on Silicon Valley transit, biking, walking: San Francisco to Sunnyvale. (CItyNerd)
This is an open thread.
59 Replies to “Sunday Movie: Silicon Valley Check-In”
Thanks for posting this for the STB Mike. This is one of my favorite City Nerd videos ever. The San Francisco Bay Area and California in general gets a bad rap for being car-centric. This video debunks all that.
I personally lived car free in some of these peninsula cities as well as SF proper. I can attest that Caltrain is the lifeline of the car free going up and down the 101 corridor between SF and SJ. I have very fond memories of the train and some of the amazing people I’ve met. I even dated a girl I met on Caltrain. I can honestly say that these experiences on public transportation cemented my being an urbanist for life.
Ray asks how do normal people afford to live in Silicon Valley? For me it was living with roommates, having a minimalist lifestyle, and not having kids. Surviving in this way reinforced for me that living in the high COL city beats the low COL city every time. Period.
> For me it was living with roommates, having a minimalist lifestyle, and not having kids. Surviving in this way reinforced for me that living in the high COL city beats the low COL city every time. Period.
Props to you, but the vast majority of normal people want to have kids not roommates. For them the cost of living and transpo situation in the Bay is totally unviable.
I was going to post two other videos, but when I saw this one I knew it had to be it. This gets at the core of what STB cares about: the experience of living in one of these cities and getting around without a car. It’s not Pugetopolis but it’s the nearest larger metro in the US with better transit and more walkable neighborhoods in some areas. It’s also of personal interest to me because I’m from there.
My mom grew up in Vallejo and San Francisco, and always told me stories of riding the cable cars and Caltrain, and going around with her bike and dog in the 1950s. My dad grew up in Lakewood but went to Stanford. I was born in San Jose but we moved here when I was six in 1972. That was before Silicon Valley or BART or or the tripling of the population size or stratospheric housing costs — so I missed all that. I’ve always wondered what my live would be like if we hadn’t moved.
Surprisingly when I talked about Caltrain, my mom didn’t recognize it. I said, “The train from San Francisco to San Jose you used to ride.” Apparently it had a different name then.
Later in the mid 80s when I was old enough to understand Bay Area transit and San Francisco urbanism, I went down to see it. The thing I noticed most was that Caltrain ran every 1-2 hours and BART every 15 minutes. I thought, “I’d much rather live in San Francisco or the East Bay than on the penninsula or in Silicon Valley.” I was annoyed the high-paying tech jobs were where transit is worst, and I was hoping the jobs would eventually reach San Francisco. They finally did in the late 1990s, but by that time housing prices had exploded. I went down for a visit and partly to see if I could find a job, but I came back saying, “Even if they offered me a job I wouldn’t take it, because I’d have to run three times faster for the same standard of living.”
I’m glad the penninsula cities have become more walkable and bikeable, and that Caltrain is now half-hourly. (The previous video said 20 minutes, but the schedule says 30 minutes midday and weekends.)
Prior to 1980 it was operated by Southern Pacific with a ticket subsidy. After 1980 they contracted with SP to operate it, With more and more government involvement it slowly developed the CalTrain brand sometime around 1985.
Officially, it was The Peninsula Service or something like that. There was probably an unofficial nickname (such as SP applied to “The Pokey” San Joaquin train 51 due to the slow speeds).
I’ve visited the bay area before and rode the CalTrain a few times, and it definitely leaves a lot to be desired considering its status as the backbone transit line for the region. The biggest problems include 1) extremely poor frequency, 2) stop spacing that is both too wide for local travel yet too close for longer-distance travel, because the distance is so big, 3) lack of connecting bus service, 4) CalTrain doesn’t service SFO airport, instead, requiring a connection first to Bart, then to an airport train, which adds considerable time, 5) CalTrain serves only a small part of San Francisco, requiring additional connections to Muni/Bart/bus to reach most of the actual city.
Some anecdotal experiences:
1) Once, while staying in Sunnyvale for a conference at a tech company, I decided to go to into San Francisco for the final evening. I went there on a tech company shuttle bus which took an hour, including considerable time stuck in traffic. The return trip on the CalTrain (no tech company shuttle service at 9 PM) took 90 minutes, a full half hour longer than the bus that got stuck in traffic. And, I still needed a taxi to get the last couple miles from the Sunnyvale train station to my hotel, as there was no bus running at that time without a long wait.
2) Once, I was exploring San Francisco on my own for a day before joining my parents who were visiting family in Redwood City. I took the combination of Bart and Caltrain, but the Bart train kept stopping in between stations, the connection was getting very tight and, being an out-of-town visitor, I did not have a clipper card. So, I was frantically fumbling with the CalTrain ticket machines one minute before the train was supposed to arrive, knowing that the next train wasn’t for another hour, and if I didn’t want to wait the hour, the Uber ride to chase after the missed train was going to be very expensive. Right when I was all set to just abandon the machine and run for the approaching train without paying, the machine finally accepted my credit card and printed my ticket. But, I become very close to become a fare-evading scufflaw for reasons that had nothing to do with the financial cost of the fare and everything to do with not wanting to be stuck and the station for an hour (or paying for a very expensive Uber ride to chase after the missed train).
That said, the Silicon Valley does have one hidden gem in the domain of car-free living, and that’s the bike network. You can get to a surprising number of places using Burke-Gilman quality trails (including, even San Jose airport) and even the arterial-street bike lanes often feel safer to ride on in Seattle because the arterial streets over there don’t have parked cars like the streets of Seattle do. It also helps that the area is generally sunny and quite flat. I once did a trip to San Jose/Sunnyvale where I packed very light and used a Bird scooter and a Spin bike for all of my local transportation, and it actually worked quite well.
I wouldn’t say it “debunks” the notion that the region is car-centric. It shows that there are pockets which are pedestrian, bike, and transit focused, but on the whole presents a region that is primarily developed around private vehicles as the primary means of transportation.
The new Caltrain is vastly better. Its been improving for decades but it’s improvements 6 weeks ago when electrification service began full time are a whole other league. Unfortunately it’s got hit hard by COVID with the nature of its office-oriented ridership (then also extremely tech heavy). It thought it was doing things right by having high farebox recovery, among the highest in the nation, but that made it worse when COVID hit and didn’t have a reliable source of money to make up for it. Voters gave it a greater dedicated funding source in 2020 which has enabled it to cobble along. Ironically systems like the VTA with very low ridership and farebox recovery weren’t in that bad of a situation with COVID.
The beauty of Caltrain is it hits every pedestrian oriented pocket on the peninsula, of course the very reason those pockets exist is because if this train and it’s long standing commuter service dating back to like the 1860s. You get all these wonderful walkable small towns oriented around the stations with their main streets practically leading to the station. Burlingame is one of my favorite. Its a nice small city that kind of feels like a larger city, lots of historic buildings, a thriving retail and restaurant street, tree lined streets around small historic bungalows (of course $2M each). Peninsula has a development pattern like Chicago, Philly, NYC suburbs… actual railroad suburbs, and with continuous rail service (unlike LA with the Pacific Electric).
The new SMART train in Marin and Sonoma counties is worth checking out. Its a historic rail corridor that seeded all these historic towns but hasn’t had rail service since the 1940s (has had fairly robust commuter bus service though), so it’s sprawled entirely. I’m hoping SMART with additional extensions can become like a Caltrain north… Great rail service reawakening these historic downtowns to be more walkable and mixed use. Although Marin is the global epicenter for NIMBYism and ecowarrior hypocrisy so I wouldn’t hold my breath (they literally have an imposed restriction on the number of ferries that can operate out of Larkspur and were turning away passengers pre-COVID, all in the name of being “green”).
Glad to see the CalTrain is electric. Unfortunately, electrifying the train does nothing to improve its frequency, and it’s more frequency, more than anything else, that the line sorely needs.
There are 10 lanes of freeway connecting San Jose to San Francisco. That should be more than plenty travel volume to justify frequent train service.
Electrification brought faster travel times and improved service frequencies.
But, how exactly? I don’t see any obvious technical reason why the train being electric has anything to do with how often it can run? Maybe quicker acceleration can save a few seconds per stop, but that seems like it wouldn’t be more than a couple minutes, all the way end to end.
The electrification facilitates stopping at more stations. The diesel trains could not accelerate and decelerate quickly. When I’ve ridden Caltrain the distance to get up to speed or slow down for a station seemed to take over half of the trip time. So even if the number of daily trains stays the same, an individual station may get lots more service.
The faster trains may also save enough time to add one round trip per day per train. That’s especially true for the local trains that stop many times.
It also makes it easier to schedule use of the third track because switching is faster.
Ultimately the benefit is based on what train patterns are scheduled and run. The benefits are more complex to identify because there are at least four different station stop service patterns. Still, it improves frequencies in the aggregate.
I don’t see any obvious technical reason why the train being electric has anything to do with how often it can run?
The time savings from quicker acceleration are huge. Since it can complete its trip much faster it can run more often (with no additional cost). It also means the time penalty for an additional stop is not that big.
I’m no train expert, but some suggested the diesel trains could have accelerated faster. I’m not sure what this would have required. It likely made the most sense to just do what they did (electrify, which enables much quicker travel).
> But, how exactly? I don’t see any obvious technical reason why the train being electric has anything to do with how often it can run? Maybe quicker acceleration can save a few seconds per stop, but that seems like it wouldn’t be more than a couple minutes, all the way end to end.
It is true that with the electric train running faster caltrain can run more frequently with the same number of trains
… that being said, it’s not as if caltrain couldn’t have ran more diesel trains more frequently than once an hour earlier. What was actually stopping it was the lack of density nearby the train stations due to single family zoning. Electrification is nice of course – the real fix in the medium/long term is upzoning near the stations.
I’ve seen a video comparison between the diesel and electric trains and the difference is dramatic. Some said the diesel train was slower than usual though (and thus an unfair video). Consider the numbers on this official website though:
SAN FRANCISCO TO SAN JOSE IN UNDER AN HOUR
Compared to 65+ minutes today
77 MINUTES FOR THE SAN FRANCISCO TO SAN JOSE LOCAL TRAIN
Compared to 100 minutes today
From what I can tell, the express makes 9 stops in between San Fransisco and San Jose. The local train makes 20 stops in between. Thus it is saving a little more than a minute per stop.
Clearly it is saving quite a bit of money by simply going faster. It is also quite likely that operations are cheaper. They don’t have to deal with refueling. My guess is maintaining them is much cheaper. The trains themselves are significantly lighter, which means that there is less wear and tear on the brakes. You have to maintain the wires, but like maintaining the tracks that scales (it doesn’t cost twice as much to maintain with twice as many trains going by).
But much of the savings just come from it being faster. The same thing is true for buses. If the 8 was faster we could run more buses along the corridor *at no extra cost*. Speed is important not only in its own right, but because it leads to better frequency.
It should be highlighted that California High Speed Rail helped to pay for the project as well as will use the electrified tracks. It’s literally the first (both track and power) segment completed that will someday carry the service.
Getting further to the Sales Force TC will create a whole other amazing connection to Downtown San Francisco.
I have to wonder if there would be value for CAHSR to even operate some train sets with the vehicles that they acquire for the project early (a three stop shuttle stopping at SF, SFO/ Millbrae and San Jose). Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be a timeline to build the connection to the first Central Valley section between Merced and Bakersfield.
There was a video comparison between electric and diesel that went kind of viral. Ross mentioned it below. It was pretty clear the electric left the diesel in the dust. Multiply that by all the stops and it adds up.
I’m still quite skeptical of CA HSR sharing these tracks with Caltrain locals and limiteds plus still many remaining grade crossings and a fairly confined corridor. There are a few small stretches of 3 and 4 track segments but mostly 2 track and much of that is on 25 year old aerial and embankment structures with little room or ability to add track. I hope my concerns are proven wrong.
Fortunately there’s a new bill that makes electric rail except from the anti-environment CEQA process because this corridor is wealthy NIMBY central.
The trains aren’t just electric, but they are the closest we’ve come so far to what Europe uses for commenter service. This means lighter weight than the typical stuff we’ve been using.
Lighter weight means better performance.
My understanding is there was no possible way to get the performance they wanted with diesel, because there was no way to meet the required US safety standards and still be light enough to perform well.
I don’t understand Santa Clara. I’ve had five experiences with it.
(1) As a child we went to Santa Clara beach, all sandy.
(2) Twice in the 80s and 90s I visited different people who lived near Lawrence Station on Caltrain. It was in the middle of nowhere in a single-family area. I asked about downtown Santa Clara; my friend said it’s three miles away from VTA light rail.
(3) In the 90s I rode VTA light rail. At the time it terminated at Tasman Blvd, which seemed to be a brand-new street with a few buildings under construction, but not much else.
(4) In the 2010s I attended two conferences at Old Ironsides VTA station. (Tasman Blvd was now built up, and this was on it.) The first time I stayed at the conference hotel. I asked if there was a supermarket within walking distance. The clerk said apologetically, “No, this is a rather corporate area.” Corporate means no retail? This is what the companies and their employees want? The nearest restaurant was an IHOP a mile south. The blocks were a half mile long! Each block had one six-story office building in the middle, surrounded by wide open space. I took the light rail south to find a supermarket. I had to go half an hour to downtown San Jose before I could see a retail area from the train.
(5) The second conference my cheapskate company put me in a less-expensive hotel two miles southeast on the Montague Expressway. The only bus to the convention center ran every 30 minutes Saturdays, 60 minutes Sundays. I sometimes rode that, but I also found a north-south river with a bike trail (Guadalupe River Trail) that went straight to the convention center, so I walked that and it took 45 minutes. The nearest supermarket was a 20-minute walk east across the expressway overpass. It was a Safeway plaza and had more than I expected, including a good Thai restaurant. I decided to walk to the nearest light rail station. That took another twenty minutes maybe. I came across Agnew Street, with a row of New Urbanist type apartments. I liked the scale of those buildings, but I wished the neighborhood had retail and transit rather than being all isolated.
So when City Nerd says Santa Clara’s downtown is praiseworthy and walkable, I’m like, “Really?” Because my experience with Santa Clara is it’s a hellhole, worse than anything in Pugetopolis.
But I did notice that the buildings along the light rail line in San Jose are two stories, while in Santa Clara they jump to six stories. That seems like a loss opportunity in San Jose, though somebody told me the extreme height limit in San Jose is because of the airport.
Santa Clara is a bit unique in that there is a large Jesuit-ruling university with 9,000 students there. It’s just a block from the Caltrain and next to Downtown. That really helps vibrancy in their downtown.
It does have about 130K population and it grew wildly in the 1950’s and 1960’s. So a large section of town is like similar areas of Seattle and Bellevue — and there’s decent opposition to disturbing the neighborhood character in those places. It results in schizophrenic land use depending on the neighborhood — not unlike Bellevue or Kirkland or Redmond.
One thing that isn’t mentioned in the video is the mad push to add jobs more than housing. Proposition 13 froze residential tax rate ceilings. A consequence of that is that cities in California usueljy want more jobs and sales as opposed to residents. The proximity of the many Silucon Valley companies has resulted in the mega employment district between Caltrain and the Bay. Here’s a map comparing the ration of jobs to working resident. Santa Clara and Palo Alto have the highest. Keep in mind that this is working residents in the ratio — so children and retirees aren’t counted in the denominator. https://siliconvalleyathome.org/resources/jobs-and-housing/
SeaTac Airport is going through the NEPA for the airport expansion. It is open now for public comment.
There are some interesting aspects of the plans including an elevated busway linking the current terminal to a new terminal to the car rental center. The busway station for the current terminal would be next to the light rail station (where that empty land is next to the sky bridge linking to the garage) and would be part of a new transportation center for shuttles and charter buses. Appears this new transportation center will provide a new pedestrian link into the airport going through this new facility and fixing the current long walk through the garage with no moving walkways.
A new terminal would extend to the north from the existing terminal in a linear orientation but at the northern end would have several fingers with gates. Also appears the drop off/ entry/busway station to this new terminal would be east of the access road with secure skybridges over the access road to the gates (like Phoenix Skyharbor).
I found what appears to be the document at https://www.airportprojects.net/sampntpenvironmentalreview/materials-2/ . It mentions one-terminal and two-terminal alternatives but I can’t find what the two-terminal one is or a map of where the bus station or terminal are, or how long the Link walkway would be or what it would be like. I also didn’t see anything saying the airport is leaning toward this alternative.
It mentions a busway between the terminals. The existing terminals are connected by the airport subway. Can’t the new terminal be on a subway extension? What buses would be on the busway? Just the airport circulator? Airport shuttles? Metro and ST routes? Would this affect RapidRide A or the 161 or 574?
When is this expected to open? Is it funded?
The airport people mover are for people post security.
The airport busway would be for people pre security in between the two terminals. Originally this was going to be a people mover but was changed to an elevated busway.
If people are interested in it more perhaps I could write up a short article on the transit/transportation of accessing the new terminal 2
Yes that website is where I saw it.
Yes, WL would appreciate a post on this. As have others, been having a bit of a hard time fully understanding what is proposed, seems to be buried deep in the report, much seems to be text based versus diagrams or maps.
Would be nice if there was more focus on transit as mitigation for environmental impacts of expansion… more transit service (length of service, frequency and more routes), and a better transit experience from the platform to the terminal (which may be the case with proposed, but hard to tell now). Dunno what happens to the 560 when Stride starts, but improved service on that line would be nice, also extending it to West Seattle and maybe Kirkland at the north end. Unfortunately most of this is on Sound Transit, not the airport to provide, but the airport could potentially provide supplemental funds exclusively for airport service.
Hoping the elevated busway as proposed is like the new ‘Trolebus Elevado’ in Mexico City which is actually a very good operation.
A summary article would be great.
A two-lane street just for a terminal circulator seems overkill. I hope it doesn’t look like a highway ramp.
Why can’t the connection between the terminals be post security like the other ones are?
Is the SeaTac airport subway a peoplemover, or what is it?
When Stride service starts, the 560 goes away. This means Bellevue to SeaTac trips will have an added transfer. In exchange, they get a more frequent and reliable bus, and slightly less onerous detour through Renton.
The option will also exist, or course, to transfer between the Link lines instead at International District station, although my guess is that the Stride bus option will be faster.
Kinda baffled they aren’t just building a people mover. Like it seems the most logical choice and would fix a lot of problems people have with walking in the garage and getting to the rental car center as well.
They were originally going to build a people mover
Given the ease of automation and the operation of rubber tired trains inside the airport, I’m kind of surprised that they didn’t pick it too. Maybe it’s because they would move too slowly.
Yeah the new terminal would be just north of the existing terminal.
It’s a bit curious why they don’t want to build a new people mover and downgraded it to an elevated busway but it can probably be converted later.
I did consider briefly maybe the new terminal could be an infill light rail station?? Though what works against that idea is that the new terminal will probably be comparably smaller compared to the existing terminal. Another somewhat complicated idea I had was connecting the elevated busway somehow to sr 518 to allow the stride 1 brt to just head directly to the airport terminals —- that’d let it avoid traffic and easy connection to a link station. Though I don’t know if the elevated busway design could handle an articulated or double decker bus
I’m guessing either an option to have it be an open busway or based on the design of the rental car center. My guess is more that buses would be low floor and work better with the existing curb level of the rental car center whereas a people mover would likely be high platform and require significant rebuilding of the bus drop off areas.
Love that idea if Stride, 560 and future airport transit routes (like Kent, Sumner, Auburn, Puyallup) could use the busway entering from the north by TIBS.
LAX has a robust direct express bus system, the FlyAway that has service to various corners of the LA region.
I’ve always felt that Stride should tie in to SeaTac better. A bus connection between the terminals and the rental car center would already provide well over 95 percent of the distance.
The challenge is bureaucratic. The Port only cares about getting to the rental car center. ST only cares about stopping at TIBS (forcing a one station transfer with a long walk through the SeaTac garage, or forcing a circuitous walk along SR 99 and S 160th St to get to the pedestrian back door into the rental car center where a rider can hop this new bus).
At the very least, us transit advocates should weigh in on better connecting TIBS and the rental car center, especially if this connection comes to pass. The buildings are well less 1/4 of a mile from each other (0.2 miles) — yet a pedestrian can’t get between the two places directly (the pedestrian path is 0.9 miles according to Google maps).
Al, I’ve rented cars from this rental car center… The only way in is via shuttle bus on the top deck. The facility is heavy on security and limited access. You can exit through security turnstiles though not the easiest to find and you can tell is discouraged. Of course I’ve done this to save time by going straight to TIBS, although International Blvd and the on/off ramps is awful to walk along and cross, as is the gauntlet of zombie junkies passed out on the steps from Intl Blvd to the station.
@ Poncho:
Getting in or out of that rent car building is ridiculously restrictive for anyone on foot. It’s even difficult to pick up someone dropping off a car!
The frustrating part about accessing Dodger Stadium is how relatively easily it could be dramatically improved. Adding a series of escalators up the hill on the south side of the stadium and improving the pedestrian overpass crossing the 110 would make the walk from the Chinatown light rail station quite pleasant.
LA Metro included the idea in a study from 1990 on improving transit access to the stadium, but nothing apparently came of the idea.
Our European friend who went on the walk of Lynnwood and was less than pleased, is back with a sequel of Bellevue and the 2 line… https://youtu.be/VUG-eefNDCg
The more I think about it, the SF Peninsula / Caltrain is very unique in that there’s an all day commuter train that stops in each city’s walkable downtown, one after the other. Multiple developed big cities. Do we have anything remotely like that in the Pacific Northwest?
The only thing that comes close are the Sounder stops in Kent, Auburn, Puyallup, Edmonds and Mukilteo. For Vancouver BC it would be the West Coast Express stops in Port Moody, Coquitlam and Mission.
Both New York and Chicago have similar train service. For smaller cities it is rare in the US just because of the way the cities evolved.
In Europe and Japan the towns and small cities are fairly centralized and centered around the train station. For example this is Hildesheim: https://maps.app.goo.gl/ZXP6xXSWZevP1a2K8. It is the smallest city listed on the Wikipedia page for German cities (because it is officially just over 100,000 in population). From the air it looks fairly small. The amount of urban land is actually fairly small. If you zoom into street level you can see that much of it (if not most of it) is as dense as any place in Seattle: https://maps.app.goo.gl/55F6pJdVJUn7BP3d8.
In contrast this is Auburn: https://maps.app.goo.gl/JkMQxNKEi1q7GJN29. The urban area is much larger in terms of land mass, even though the city has fewer people. Quite often it isn’t quite clear where the urban area ends. Some of the areas clearly within easy walking distance to the train station looks very much like a small town: https://maps.app.goo.gl/N8oBQkjyctnrwT656. There are areas with taller buildings, but they are typically surrounded by large parking lots.
Now consider how many people could walk to that station in Hildesheim. My guess is tens of thousands. In Auburn it is a few hundred. Also consider what this means for transit within the city. In Hildesheim you can easily run buses quite frequently. You have a fairly small area to cover and lots of people within the area. In Auburn it is the opposite. It would cost way more money for Auburn to provide the same quality of transit as Hildesheim and you would get a lot fewer riders. Thus Hildesheim has good service to the train station while Auburn does not.
As a result, places like Auburn simply won’t get that many riders on the train, no matter what they do. Auburn isn’t alone. If you look at most of the train stations around here, very few people can walk to the station. With few exceptions the area around the train stations are small destinations. The service to the train stations is poor. The general expectation is that you drive to the station and then take the train into the city. The only time a large number of people are willing to do this is during peak commuting time, which is why commuter trains became so common in the US (and regional trains did not).
Hildesheim, Germany vs Auburn, WA. The contrasting Google Street Views you posted are so depressing.
And yes you are correct about people driving to the suburban station and taking the train into the city. I work with a guy like that. The Sounder Train is the only public transportation he will ever take. He walks from King Street station to our office in the downtown core. I offered to show him how to use Link or to the E Line which would get him the rest of the way to the office but he didn’t seem interested.
It’s because it’s had regular commuter service continuously since like the 1860s, hence the development pattern of small downtowns around more or less each station. If there’s anything similar I’d say Bainbridge Island and Bremerton, by having continuous commuter oriented ferry service to Seattle for over a century.
It is not really the railroad that is different, it is the way in which each town reacted to the automobile. Auburn had railroads back in the 1880s, but the town was small. By 1910 less than a thousand people lived there. If not for the automobile it is quite possible the town would have had about that many people. It really didn’t grow until the post-war period and just about all of that growth was in the form of automobile-based sprawl.
In much of Europe the towns and cities existed long before railroads. That meant that the main form of transportation was walking. Thus they tended to very centralized. The only “sprawl” was in the form of farms. Thus before the train a small city like Hildesheim wasn’t very different in terms of land use than it is today. (It should be noted that the city was bombed during the war, so I’m talking about general land use/density rather than the actual building types). When they started building rail lines they ran them to the center of towns/cities (that were already fairly well established). Those areas may have grown some because of the train, but they were already fairly centralized.
I think that American cities changed more because of the train than European ones. In both cases you had towns that grew because of the train and towns that stayed the same because the train skipped it. You also have towns in Europe and North America based around the train. But I don’t think you have anything like Chicago — a city that became huge in large part because of trains. L. A. also became big because of the automobile and Atlanta was originally a company railroad town.
But the big difference was how the areas reacted to the automobile. In terms of land use, Europe didn’t change that much. In contrast, many of our cities are dramatically different because of the automobile. Various towns have become sprawling low-density cities. It is much tougher to serve those types of cities with transit (or pretty much any form of public good — but especially transit).
“The only “sprawl” was in the form of farms. ”
Even the farms are more clustered. I once asked Martin how Skagit County compares to rural areas in Germany. If you’ve been to the tulip festival, immediately west adjacent to Mt Vernon is a course grid of rural roads. Many large lots have a modern house, and the rest is either a farm or a suburban-like lawn.
In Germany it’s more like pinwheels. The residents cluster in the center in a kind of village, and the farms are around them, and they’d commute to the farms. The cluster has a train station or rural bus route more frequent than our rural transit, so you don’t have to drive far to get to it. The lines are more frequent than ours. The train/bus goes to the nearest city, and from there you can get to other regional and distant cities.
Gemini’s Beacon Hill video says his Eastern European impression of Beacon Hill’s low-density blocks right near the Link station remind him not of European suburbs, but of European rural areas.
It makes me wonder if what Americans call rural areas, like Vashon Island, Skagit or Whatcom Counties, or Eastern Washington or North Dakota — would be mind-blowing to Europeans.
I think there’s a big difference though in being a railroad town with 10 intercity trains a day versus a commuter railroad town with frequent trains all day and night into a big city. Almost every town in the western half of the US is a railroad town but only the SF Peninsula, Chicago suburbs, Philly suburbs, Boston suburbs and NYC suburbs really count as commuter rail suburbs which shows in the urban form of closely spaced independent towns with distinct downtowns. Its comes from the frequent service feeding the big city, being literally built around the railroad and having continuous service for 150 years. You can even compare the SF peninsula to the East Bay between Oakland and San Jose… its like 5 cities versus 20 cities in that same distance. I would attribute that to the commuter rail orientation.
The residents cluster in the center in a kind of village, and the farms are around them, and they’d commute to the farms.
The same thing happens in the US. The difference is that we have suburban sprawl overlaid on top of it all. In much of the west things were also built much later. Mount Vernon was a logging town initially. It grew as the center for mining, logging and eventually farming. The railroad allowed it grow much faster. So at that point it really wasn’t that different than what you had in Europe (farms surrounding a city). Sedro-Wolley and Burlington were also logging and mining towns and once that dried up, remained fairly small. It is quite likely it would have been that way, with Mount Vernon being a bigger and more centralized city and the other two being small towns (like Darrington). But the automobile changed everything. The Pacific Highway and later I-5 altered the dynamics. Mount Vernon still has a fairly small, urban area but it is merely part of the sprawling Mount Vernon-Anacortes MSA. Some of the richest farmland on earth is paved over for outlet malls and car lots.
Almost every town in the western half of the US is a railroad town but only the SF Peninsula, Chicago suburbs, Philly suburbs, Boston suburbs and NYC suburbs really count as commuter rail suburbs which shows in the urban form of closely spaced independent towns with distinct downtowns.
But even then a lot of the areas are not really strongly centered, let alone centered around the railroad. Nobody would mistake this: https://maps.app.goo.gl/eLGD7Cr6hPBjXrPF6 for Europe. Caltrain gets away with it not because these are “closely spaced independent towns with distinct downtowns” but simply because California is just huge. Silicon Valley has over 3 million people. They aren’t clustered around the stations, but they aren’t completely spread out — the natural boundaries limits some of the sprawl. Even so, Caltrain only had about 64,000 riders a day before the pandemic. I don’t think most of the Chicago suburban rail stations are strongly centered either. There is definitely some of this in the Northeast, but even then it is nothing like Europe. Long Island has a huge amount of sprawl. The trains do well there largely because they happen to be trains in New York (not because everyone in the suburbs is clustered around a train station like in Europe).
Copied from the Swift Blue article in case people have stopped checking that:
Lynnwood station’s new P&R is full ($) and cars are circling for a space at 10am. People are parking illegally in diagonal-striped zones (wheelchair-maneuver areas) and in adjacent store lots (partly displacing customers to small businesses).
Some would-be riders are going back to driving because they can’t get a P&R space, and are saying the garage should be twice as large. ST and CT recommend feeder buses to Lynnwood or Mountlake Terrace stations, but these riders aren’t interested in that (or they live where it’s infeasible).
The article also says all the P&Rs on the 1 Line are full, at least on some days. ST will introduce $2 reserved spaces soon at several P&Rs including Lynnwood. ST estimates that will raise $6 million in revenue.
@Mike Orr,
Ya, I read that article on my walk this morning and got several good chuckles out of it. Basically Lynnwood Link is being loved to death and now we are supposed to believe that there is a problem. It’s sort of like, “Nobody goes there anymore — it’s too crowded!”
I just love the people who used to drive, but now complain that the parking lot is sometimes full so they still occasionally have to drive. LOL.
But what the article didn’t mention is that the parking garage at LCC opened at least a year before LLE opened. And there was never a problem with it filling up then. I guess LLE really has changed things. You just have to laugh.
And CT boardings at LCC being up 49% speaks volumes to what a successful bus restructure can do for our bus agencies. It’s hard to argue with success.
But what the article didn’t mention is that the parking garage at LCC opened at least a year before LLE opened. And there was never a problem with it filling up then.
That is because there were more places where you could park to get a one-seat ride into downtown Seattle. Park and ride use was more spread out.
CT boardings at LCC being up 49%
Same idea though. If you were commuting it didn’t make sense to catch a bus to Lynnwood Transit Center since there were other buses going to the same place (downtown). Obviously some people were doing this (especially midday) but now you *have* to do this. Buses like the 413 are gone. You have to get yourself to one of the stations if you want to take transit into Seattle.
I’m not saying there isn’t some overall growth in transit ridership — I would expect there is — but a lot of the growing pains are due to people funneling themselves into the handful of stations (mostly Lynnwood) and assuming the best way to do that is to drive.
“And CT boardings at LCC being up 49% speaks volumes to what a successful bus restructure can do for our bus agencies.”
I was going to mention that. This is the latent ridership that was just waiting for service. And while not all of that increase is at Lynnwood Station, the part that is at the station is probably larger than the number of people circling for parking, and it may even be larger than the number of cars in the P&R.
@Mike Orr,
That 49% number is just at Lynnwood Station, although you are right, there was a lot of latent demand for transit like Link all up and down the line. Even the lot at 185th St Station has been filling up, which is amazing considering that there really wasn’t any substantial service in that area at all before Link opened.
The other interesting thing is that, substantial as that 49% number is, still only 22% of Link boardings at Lynnwood Station are ORCA transfers from CT. That means that 78% of passengers are arriving via other means than CT bus — personal vehicle, TNC, walk, bike, etc. As such, it is easy to understand why some people get agitated about the parking situation.
But hey, if you think the wailing about parking at LCC Station has been entertaining, just wait until Potemkin Station opens at 130th. That station has exactly zero parking, as in “0”, not a single spot. And there is no bus layover space, no bus turning loop, and no bus drop off area directly beneath the station either. The amount of wailing and gnashing of teeth is going to be epic when that station opens.
And there are no businesses nearby either. The nearest one is approx half a mile away. So even sneaking into business lots won’t be an option.
I’m sure many people will drive and try to park in residential areas, but that will trigger its own backlash and calls for RPZ’s and such. And they are reconfiguring 5th Ave to be one-way both north and south of the station, so many drivers are going to get tangled up in the local street grid. It’s going to be pure entertainment for those of us who will never use the station and are unaffected.
But hey, at least LLE is open and working well. Success has its own challenges, and there is plenty of success with this line. Even ST has been surprised.
The other interesting thing is that, substantial as that 49% number is, still only 22% of Link boardings at Lynnwood Station are ORCA transfers from CT. That means that 78% of passengers are arriving via other means than CT bus — personal vehicle, TNC, walk, bike, etc.
There is also the 512 and 513. Your point is well taken though. A very high percentage of riders drive to the Lynnwood Station.
But hey, if you think the wailing about parking at LCC Station has been entertaining, just wait until Potemkin Station opens at 130th. That station has exactly zero parking, as in “0”, not a single spot.
You are confused. The station 130th is in Seattle, not a distant suburb. Most of the stations in Seattle don’t have parking lots. The few that do are basically just legacy lots that they couldn’t get rid of. Few complain about the lack of parking with those stations.
And there is no bus layover space, no bus turning loop
So what? Where do you get the idea that this is necessary or even a good thing? Do you think it would be better if the 62 just ended at Roosevelt station? Or the 45? Do you think this would somehow boost Link ridership? It is irrelevant. There are far bigger issues when it comes to layover space (e. g. we could really use one at 145th & Lake City Way once ST sends the 522 to 145th).
and no bus drop off area directly beneath the station either.
Again, so what? Lynnwood doesn’t have that either. None of the stations have a completely seamless transfers. I think there are only a few like that in the world (where you can transfer from the bus platform to the train platform by walking a few feet on the same level). Hell, we can’t even get the train-to-train transfers right!
The bus to to train transfers vary, but in general the biggest issue is the difference in elevation. UW Station is extremely deep which means that even if you are lucky enough to be let off close to the station it takes a really long time to get to the platform. Northgate is the opposite — it is quite high. In that respect the transfer at 130th — while not ideal — is fairly good. Yes, Sound Transit screwed it up. The platform should have straddled 130th (with entrances on both sides). This probably would have saved them money as well. But the transfer will be similar, if not better than most of them in our system.
The amount of wailing and gnashing of teeth is going to be epic when that station opens.
Wait, what? So you are saying that because the station doesn’t have a park and ride people will freak out. Why? If people want to drive they will just go to Northgate or 148th. Holy shit, we have been over this literally dozens of times and you still don’t get it. The station is not about walk-up riders. It is not about people arriving by car. It is a bus intercept for people who live to the east and west.
Go look at the ridership numbers for the 62. The bus stop with the most riders is the one next to Roosevelt Station. People take it from the east and west and transfer there. Same goes for the 45 (although in that case it is only people from the west). The transfer is not perfect. Quite often you have to cross the street (oh, the horror). After crossing the street you have to walk quite a ways to get to the platform. Yet well over a thousand people make that transfer in those two buses alone.
But if you think that people require park and ride lots than why the hell do you support West Seattle Link? It seems far more likely that the average person in West Seattle will complain. West Seattle in general freaked out about losing something that basically just hurt drivers. Overall, transit was probably better (a bit slower but more frequent). This didn’t stop the complaining, because they wanted to drive. Yet *none* of the West Seattle stations will have park and ride lots. Plenty of people (in places like Alki and High Point) won’t care, but unlike the 130th Station, lots of people will. They will wonder how they are supposed to get to the station if they can’t park.
More than anything this speaks to the one-seat ride mentality of transit users in the area. I’m sure plenty of people are taking the bus and then Link. But even with an enormous parking lot (significantly bigger than Northgate) people are complaining about the amount of space available. I can think of several reasons:
1) People in the area just whine more about parking. I can’t imagine someone complaining about the size of the parking lot at Green Lake (which serves Roosevelt Station). Then again it hasn’t had available spots on weekdays for decades, which leads to the next item:
2) People were used to parking and taking a one-seat ride to Seattle. So they would drive to places like Swamp Creek, Ash Way or Mariner and take a bus that would get them directly to downtown. They have a hard time wrapping their head around the idea of taking a bus then the train. Which leads to another reason.
3) Despite the big improvement with Community Transit service, many of the areas are not served by buses. They could always drive to a park and ride then take a bus to the train, but people are reluctant to do that.
4) Transit ridership is less consistent than it used to be and yet people in Snohomish County aren’t used to taking it for anything but commuting or big events. This is an odd combination. If you are commuting every day you adjust. You soon realize when you can expect to find parking and when you won’t. Over time this balances out, as it has in various park and rides in the area (like Green Lake). Meanwhile, people who regularly take transit just look at Link as another route. I used to take the (3)73 to the U-District, now I have to take a bus to Link and ride it. But I don’t have any interest in driving to Northgate — who the hell wants to drive to Northgate? If I was going to do that I would just drive to Maple Leaf and catch the 67. It is basically just a mentality for me — either I’m driving or I’m taking transit. I think a lot of people in Snohomish County — especially for trips on Link — feel otherwise.
People will adjust, it will just take them time. Eventually they will realize when they can expect to have spots available and when they can’t. On game days they will be annoyed, while some of the savvy fans park in places like Ash Way even at the last minute.
I agree with your opinion that a lot of folks want one-seat rides, as if they were ok with bus + Link, there’s plenty of parking at Ash Way + Swamp Creek that are a reasonably quick trip to Lynnwood City Center (more so in the former’s case).
As for why folks don’t necessarily take a local bus to Link, it’s probably easier to time the bus going to Link rather than Link -> CT local bus. Even though a lot of frequencies in the South County area have been improved to 30m, that can still be a long wait going home. A couple routes like the 103/112 are slated to get 20m frequency next year but further improvements here will make the case for more folks to take CT buses.
My friend in north Lynnwood does:
1. Walk 20 minutes to the 119 stop at 148th & Jefferson Way.
2. Take the 119 to Ash Way P&R (or walk 20 more minutes if it’s not coming).
3. Take the 512/201/202/Orange to Lynnwood Station.
4. Take Link to Roosevelt, U-District, or Capitol Hill.
This is what people in single-family areas not within walking distance of a Link feeder experience.
(Well, I guess the 119 is technically a Link feeder because you can take it the other way to Mountlake Terrace Station, but that would take over 30 minutes meandering through low-density areas you don’t want to go.)
It’s certainly nice that there are lots of park and ride users. For now it sounds like they can drive further to northgate as it looks like that one is now not full.
While the garage is full I wouldn’t really advocate for building even more garages given the amount of space each one takes up. And even at 1,000 spots it can only be used for around 1000 daily riders.
Slightly off topic, but that is one improvement self driving cars even if used completely as single occupancy would help, it’d greatly eliminate the parking to transit issue if the car drives home afterwards. (and also parking minimums for retail in general)
Yeah, it would be crazy to build more parking. Folks need to get over the idea that they can always drive to the parking lot and find a spot. Ironically one of the problems with a really big parking lot is that it can be more annoying when you can’t find a spot. You spend a lot of time going around in circles before giving up. In contrast with a small lot you can tell right away it is full and go to plan B.
I’m not sure what information there is with the parking lot. At the airport, for example, they can tell you which floors have spots available. Something like that would make sense. Similarly I could see an app or a web page that showed how full the lot is. Of course it might fill up in the time it takes to get there, but so much of this is just expectations.
Thanks for posting this for the STB Mike. This is one of my favorite City Nerd videos ever. The San Francisco Bay Area and California in general gets a bad rap for being car-centric. This video debunks all that.
I personally lived car free in some of these peninsula cities as well as SF proper. I can attest that Caltrain is the lifeline of the car free going up and down the 101 corridor between SF and SJ. I have very fond memories of the train and some of the amazing people I’ve met. I even dated a girl I met on Caltrain. I can honestly say that these experiences on public transportation cemented my being an urbanist for life.
Ray asks how do normal people afford to live in Silicon Valley? For me it was living with roommates, having a minimalist lifestyle, and not having kids. Surviving in this way reinforced for me that living in the high COL city beats the low COL city every time. Period.
> For me it was living with roommates, having a minimalist lifestyle, and not having kids. Surviving in this way reinforced for me that living in the high COL city beats the low COL city every time. Period.
Props to you, but the vast majority of normal people want to have kids not roommates. For them the cost of living and transpo situation in the Bay is totally unviable.
I was going to post two other videos, but when I saw this one I knew it had to be it. This gets at the core of what STB cares about: the experience of living in one of these cities and getting around without a car. It’s not Pugetopolis but it’s the nearest larger metro in the US with better transit and more walkable neighborhoods in some areas. It’s also of personal interest to me because I’m from there.
My mom grew up in Vallejo and San Francisco, and always told me stories of riding the cable cars and Caltrain, and going around with her bike and dog in the 1950s. My dad grew up in Lakewood but went to Stanford. I was born in San Jose but we moved here when I was six in 1972. That was before Silicon Valley or BART or or the tripling of the population size or stratospheric housing costs — so I missed all that. I’ve always wondered what my live would be like if we hadn’t moved.
Surprisingly when I talked about Caltrain, my mom didn’t recognize it. I said, “The train from San Francisco to San Jose you used to ride.” Apparently it had a different name then.
Later in the mid 80s when I was old enough to understand Bay Area transit and San Francisco urbanism, I went down to see it. The thing I noticed most was that Caltrain ran every 1-2 hours and BART every 15 minutes. I thought, “I’d much rather live in San Francisco or the East Bay than on the penninsula or in Silicon Valley.” I was annoyed the high-paying tech jobs were where transit is worst, and I was hoping the jobs would eventually reach San Francisco. They finally did in the late 1990s, but by that time housing prices had exploded. I went down for a visit and partly to see if I could find a job, but I came back saying, “Even if they offered me a job I wouldn’t take it, because I’d have to run three times faster for the same standard of living.”
I’m glad the penninsula cities have become more walkable and bikeable, and that Caltrain is now half-hourly. (The previous video said 20 minutes, but the schedule says 30 minutes midday and weekends.)
Prior to 1980 it was operated by Southern Pacific with a ticket subsidy. After 1980 they contracted with SP to operate it, With more and more government involvement it slowly developed the CalTrain brand sometime around 1985.
Officially, it was The Peninsula Service or something like that. There was probably an unofficial nickname (such as SP applied to “The Pokey” San Joaquin train 51 due to the slow speeds).
I’ve visited the bay area before and rode the CalTrain a few times, and it definitely leaves a lot to be desired considering its status as the backbone transit line for the region. The biggest problems include 1) extremely poor frequency, 2) stop spacing that is both too wide for local travel yet too close for longer-distance travel, because the distance is so big, 3) lack of connecting bus service, 4) CalTrain doesn’t service SFO airport, instead, requiring a connection first to Bart, then to an airport train, which adds considerable time, 5) CalTrain serves only a small part of San Francisco, requiring additional connections to Muni/Bart/bus to reach most of the actual city.
Some anecdotal experiences:
1) Once, while staying in Sunnyvale for a conference at a tech company, I decided to go to into San Francisco for the final evening. I went there on a tech company shuttle bus which took an hour, including considerable time stuck in traffic. The return trip on the CalTrain (no tech company shuttle service at 9 PM) took 90 minutes, a full half hour longer than the bus that got stuck in traffic. And, I still needed a taxi to get the last couple miles from the Sunnyvale train station to my hotel, as there was no bus running at that time without a long wait.
2) Once, I was exploring San Francisco on my own for a day before joining my parents who were visiting family in Redwood City. I took the combination of Bart and Caltrain, but the Bart train kept stopping in between stations, the connection was getting very tight and, being an out-of-town visitor, I did not have a clipper card. So, I was frantically fumbling with the CalTrain ticket machines one minute before the train was supposed to arrive, knowing that the next train wasn’t for another hour, and if I didn’t want to wait the hour, the Uber ride to chase after the missed train was going to be very expensive. Right when I was all set to just abandon the machine and run for the approaching train without paying, the machine finally accepted my credit card and printed my ticket. But, I become very close to become a fare-evading scufflaw for reasons that had nothing to do with the financial cost of the fare and everything to do with not wanting to be stuck and the station for an hour (or paying for a very expensive Uber ride to chase after the missed train).
That said, the Silicon Valley does have one hidden gem in the domain of car-free living, and that’s the bike network. You can get to a surprising number of places using Burke-Gilman quality trails (including, even San Jose airport) and even the arterial-street bike lanes often feel safer to ride on in Seattle because the arterial streets over there don’t have parked cars like the streets of Seattle do. It also helps that the area is generally sunny and quite flat. I once did a trip to San Jose/Sunnyvale where I packed very light and used a Bird scooter and a Spin bike for all of my local transportation, and it actually worked quite well.
I wouldn’t say it “debunks” the notion that the region is car-centric. It shows that there are pockets which are pedestrian, bike, and transit focused, but on the whole presents a region that is primarily developed around private vehicles as the primary means of transportation.
The new Caltrain is vastly better. Its been improving for decades but it’s improvements 6 weeks ago when electrification service began full time are a whole other league. Unfortunately it’s got hit hard by COVID with the nature of its office-oriented ridership (then also extremely tech heavy). It thought it was doing things right by having high farebox recovery, among the highest in the nation, but that made it worse when COVID hit and didn’t have a reliable source of money to make up for it. Voters gave it a greater dedicated funding source in 2020 which has enabled it to cobble along. Ironically systems like the VTA with very low ridership and farebox recovery weren’t in that bad of a situation with COVID.
The beauty of Caltrain is it hits every pedestrian oriented pocket on the peninsula, of course the very reason those pockets exist is because if this train and it’s long standing commuter service dating back to like the 1860s. You get all these wonderful walkable small towns oriented around the stations with their main streets practically leading to the station. Burlingame is one of my favorite. Its a nice small city that kind of feels like a larger city, lots of historic buildings, a thriving retail and restaurant street, tree lined streets around small historic bungalows (of course $2M each). Peninsula has a development pattern like Chicago, Philly, NYC suburbs… actual railroad suburbs, and with continuous rail service (unlike LA with the Pacific Electric).
The new SMART train in Marin and Sonoma counties is worth checking out. Its a historic rail corridor that seeded all these historic towns but hasn’t had rail service since the 1940s (has had fairly robust commuter bus service though), so it’s sprawled entirely. I’m hoping SMART with additional extensions can become like a Caltrain north… Great rail service reawakening these historic downtowns to be more walkable and mixed use. Although Marin is the global epicenter for NIMBYism and ecowarrior hypocrisy so I wouldn’t hold my breath (they literally have an imposed restriction on the number of ferries that can operate out of Larkspur and were turning away passengers pre-COVID, all in the name of being “green”).
Glad to see the CalTrain is electric. Unfortunately, electrifying the train does nothing to improve its frequency, and it’s more frequency, more than anything else, that the line sorely needs.
There are 10 lanes of freeway connecting San Jose to San Francisco. That should be more than plenty travel volume to justify frequent train service.
Electrification brought faster travel times and improved service frequencies.
But, how exactly? I don’t see any obvious technical reason why the train being electric has anything to do with how often it can run? Maybe quicker acceleration can save a few seconds per stop, but that seems like it wouldn’t be more than a couple minutes, all the way end to end.
The electrification facilitates stopping at more stations. The diesel trains could not accelerate and decelerate quickly. When I’ve ridden Caltrain the distance to get up to speed or slow down for a station seemed to take over half of the trip time. So even if the number of daily trains stays the same, an individual station may get lots more service.
The faster trains may also save enough time to add one round trip per day per train. That’s especially true for the local trains that stop many times.
It also makes it easier to schedule use of the third track because switching is faster.
Ultimately the benefit is based on what train patterns are scheduled and run. The benefits are more complex to identify because there are at least four different station stop service patterns. Still, it improves frequencies in the aggregate.
I don’t see any obvious technical reason why the train being electric has anything to do with how often it can run?
The time savings from quicker acceleration are huge. Since it can complete its trip much faster it can run more often (with no additional cost). It also means the time penalty for an additional stop is not that big.
I’m no train expert, but some suggested the diesel trains could have accelerated faster. I’m not sure what this would have required. It likely made the most sense to just do what they did (electrify, which enables much quicker travel).
> But, how exactly? I don’t see any obvious technical reason why the train being electric has anything to do with how often it can run? Maybe quicker acceleration can save a few seconds per stop, but that seems like it wouldn’t be more than a couple minutes, all the way end to end.
It is true that with the electric train running faster caltrain can run more frequently with the same number of trains
… that being said, it’s not as if caltrain couldn’t have ran more diesel trains more frequently than once an hour earlier. What was actually stopping it was the lack of density nearby the train stations due to single family zoning. Electrification is nice of course – the real fix in the medium/long term is upzoning near the stations.
I’ve seen a video comparison between the diesel and electric trains and the difference is dramatic. Some said the diesel train was slower than usual though (and thus an unfair video). Consider the numbers on this official website though:
SAN FRANCISCO TO SAN JOSE IN UNDER AN HOUR
Compared to 65+ minutes today
77 MINUTES FOR THE SAN FRANCISCO TO SAN JOSE LOCAL TRAIN
Compared to 100 minutes today
From what I can tell, the express makes 9 stops in between San Fransisco and San Jose. The local train makes 20 stops in between. Thus it is saving a little more than a minute per stop.
Clearly it is saving quite a bit of money by simply going faster. It is also quite likely that operations are cheaper. They don’t have to deal with refueling. My guess is maintaining them is much cheaper. The trains themselves are significantly lighter, which means that there is less wear and tear on the brakes. You have to maintain the wires, but like maintaining the tracks that scales (it doesn’t cost twice as much to maintain with twice as many trains going by).
But much of the savings just come from it being faster. The same thing is true for buses. If the 8 was faster we could run more buses along the corridor *at no extra cost*. Speed is important not only in its own right, but because it leads to better frequency.
It should be highlighted that California High Speed Rail helped to pay for the project as well as will use the electrified tracks. It’s literally the first (both track and power) segment completed that will someday carry the service.
Getting further to the Sales Force TC will create a whole other amazing connection to Downtown San Francisco.
I have to wonder if there would be value for CAHSR to even operate some train sets with the vehicles that they acquire for the project early (a three stop shuttle stopping at SF, SFO/ Millbrae and San Jose). Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be a timeline to build the connection to the first Central Valley section between Merced and Bakersfield.
There was a video comparison between electric and diesel that went kind of viral. Ross mentioned it below. It was pretty clear the electric left the diesel in the dust. Multiply that by all the stops and it adds up.
I’m still quite skeptical of CA HSR sharing these tracks with Caltrain locals and limiteds plus still many remaining grade crossings and a fairly confined corridor. There are a few small stretches of 3 and 4 track segments but mostly 2 track and much of that is on 25 year old aerial and embankment structures with little room or ability to add track. I hope my concerns are proven wrong.
Fortunately there’s a new bill that makes electric rail except from the anti-environment CEQA process because this corridor is wealthy NIMBY central.
The trains aren’t just electric, but they are the closest we’ve come so far to what Europe uses for commenter service. This means lighter weight than the typical stuff we’ve been using.
Lighter weight means better performance.
My understanding is there was no possible way to get the performance they wanted with diesel, because there was no way to meet the required US safety standards and still be light enough to perform well.
I don’t understand Santa Clara. I’ve had five experiences with it.
(1) As a child we went to Santa Clara beach, all sandy.
(2) Twice in the 80s and 90s I visited different people who lived near Lawrence Station on Caltrain. It was in the middle of nowhere in a single-family area. I asked about downtown Santa Clara; my friend said it’s three miles away from VTA light rail.
(3) In the 90s I rode VTA light rail. At the time it terminated at Tasman Blvd, which seemed to be a brand-new street with a few buildings under construction, but not much else.
(4) In the 2010s I attended two conferences at Old Ironsides VTA station. (Tasman Blvd was now built up, and this was on it.) The first time I stayed at the conference hotel. I asked if there was a supermarket within walking distance. The clerk said apologetically, “No, this is a rather corporate area.” Corporate means no retail? This is what the companies and their employees want? The nearest restaurant was an IHOP a mile south. The blocks were a half mile long! Each block had one six-story office building in the middle, surrounded by wide open space. I took the light rail south to find a supermarket. I had to go half an hour to downtown San Jose before I could see a retail area from the train.
(5) The second conference my cheapskate company put me in a less-expensive hotel two miles southeast on the Montague Expressway. The only bus to the convention center ran every 30 minutes Saturdays, 60 minutes Sundays. I sometimes rode that, but I also found a north-south river with a bike trail (Guadalupe River Trail) that went straight to the convention center, so I walked that and it took 45 minutes. The nearest supermarket was a 20-minute walk east across the expressway overpass. It was a Safeway plaza and had more than I expected, including a good Thai restaurant. I decided to walk to the nearest light rail station. That took another twenty minutes maybe. I came across Agnew Street, with a row of New Urbanist type apartments. I liked the scale of those buildings, but I wished the neighborhood had retail and transit rather than being all isolated.
So when City Nerd says Santa Clara’s downtown is praiseworthy and walkable, I’m like, “Really?” Because my experience with Santa Clara is it’s a hellhole, worse than anything in Pugetopolis.
But I did notice that the buildings along the light rail line in San Jose are two stories, while in Santa Clara they jump to six stories. That seems like a loss opportunity in San Jose, though somebody told me the extreme height limit in San Jose is because of the airport.
Santa Clara is a bit unique in that there is a large Jesuit-ruling university with 9,000 students there. It’s just a block from the Caltrain and next to Downtown. That really helps vibrancy in their downtown.
It does have about 130K population and it grew wildly in the 1950’s and 1960’s. So a large section of town is like similar areas of Seattle and Bellevue — and there’s decent opposition to disturbing the neighborhood character in those places. It results in schizophrenic land use depending on the neighborhood — not unlike Bellevue or Kirkland or Redmond.
One thing that isn’t mentioned in the video is the mad push to add jobs more than housing. Proposition 13 froze residential tax rate ceilings. A consequence of that is that cities in California usueljy want more jobs and sales as opposed to residents. The proximity of the many Silucon Valley companies has resulted in the mega employment district between Caltrain and the Bay. Here’s a map comparing the ration of jobs to working resident. Santa Clara and Palo Alto have the highest. Keep in mind that this is working residents in the ratio — so children and retirees aren’t counted in the denominator.
https://siliconvalleyathome.org/resources/jobs-and-housing/
SeaTac Airport is going through the NEPA for the airport expansion. It is open now for public comment.
There are some interesting aspects of the plans including an elevated busway linking the current terminal to a new terminal to the car rental center. The busway station for the current terminal would be next to the light rail station (where that empty land is next to the sky bridge linking to the garage) and would be part of a new transportation center for shuttles and charter buses. Appears this new transportation center will provide a new pedestrian link into the airport going through this new facility and fixing the current long walk through the garage with no moving walkways.
A new terminal would extend to the north from the existing terminal in a linear orientation but at the northern end would have several fingers with gates. Also appears the drop off/ entry/busway station to this new terminal would be east of the access road with secure skybridges over the access road to the gates (like Phoenix Skyharbor).
I found what appears to be the document at https://www.airportprojects.net/sampntpenvironmentalreview/materials-2/ . It mentions one-terminal and two-terminal alternatives but I can’t find what the two-terminal one is or a map of where the bus station or terminal are, or how long the Link walkway would be or what it would be like. I also didn’t see anything saying the airport is leaning toward this alternative.
It mentions a busway between the terminals. The existing terminals are connected by the airport subway. Can’t the new terminal be on a subway extension? What buses would be on the busway? Just the airport circulator? Airport shuttles? Metro and ST routes? Would this affect RapidRide A or the 161 or 574?
When is this expected to open? Is it funded?
The airport people mover are for people post security.
The airport busway would be for people pre security in between the two terminals. Originally this was going to be a people mover but was changed to an elevated busway.
If people are interested in it more perhaps I could write up a short article on the transit/transportation of accessing the new terminal 2
Yes that website is where I saw it.
Yes, WL would appreciate a post on this. As have others, been having a bit of a hard time fully understanding what is proposed, seems to be buried deep in the report, much seems to be text based versus diagrams or maps.
Would be nice if there was more focus on transit as mitigation for environmental impacts of expansion… more transit service (length of service, frequency and more routes), and a better transit experience from the platform to the terminal (which may be the case with proposed, but hard to tell now). Dunno what happens to the 560 when Stride starts, but improved service on that line would be nice, also extending it to West Seattle and maybe Kirkland at the north end. Unfortunately most of this is on Sound Transit, not the airport to provide, but the airport could potentially provide supplemental funds exclusively for airport service.
Hoping the elevated busway as proposed is like the new ‘Trolebus Elevado’ in Mexico City which is actually a very good operation.
A summary article would be great.
A two-lane street just for a terminal circulator seems overkill. I hope it doesn’t look like a highway ramp.
Why can’t the connection between the terminals be post security like the other ones are?
Is the SeaTac airport subway a peoplemover, or what is it?
When Stride service starts, the 560 goes away. This means Bellevue to SeaTac trips will have an added transfer. In exchange, they get a more frequent and reliable bus, and slightly less onerous detour through Renton.
The option will also exist, or course, to transfer between the Link lines instead at International District station, although my guess is that the Stride bus option will be faster.
Kinda baffled they aren’t just building a people mover. Like it seems the most logical choice and would fix a lot of problems people have with walking in the garage and getting to the rental car center as well.
They were originally going to build a people mover
Given the ease of automation and the operation of rubber tired trains inside the airport, I’m kind of surprised that they didn’t pick it too. Maybe it’s because they would move too slowly.
Yeah the new terminal would be just north of the existing terminal.
It’s a bit curious why they don’t want to build a new people mover and downgraded it to an elevated busway but it can probably be converted later.
I did consider briefly maybe the new terminal could be an infill light rail station?? Though what works against that idea is that the new terminal will probably be comparably smaller compared to the existing terminal. Another somewhat complicated idea I had was connecting the elevated busway somehow to sr 518 to allow the stride 1 brt to just head directly to the airport terminals —- that’d let it avoid traffic and easy connection to a link station. Though I don’t know if the elevated busway design could handle an articulated or double decker bus
I’m guessing either an option to have it be an open busway or based on the design of the rental car center. My guess is more that buses would be low floor and work better with the existing curb level of the rental car center whereas a people mover would likely be high platform and require significant rebuilding of the bus drop off areas.
Love that idea if Stride, 560 and future airport transit routes (like Kent, Sumner, Auburn, Puyallup) could use the busway entering from the north by TIBS.
LAX has a robust direct express bus system, the FlyAway that has service to various corners of the LA region.
I’ve always felt that Stride should tie in to SeaTac better. A bus connection between the terminals and the rental car center would already provide well over 95 percent of the distance.
The challenge is bureaucratic. The Port only cares about getting to the rental car center. ST only cares about stopping at TIBS (forcing a one station transfer with a long walk through the SeaTac garage, or forcing a circuitous walk along SR 99 and S 160th St to get to the pedestrian back door into the rental car center where a rider can hop this new bus).
At the very least, us transit advocates should weigh in on better connecting TIBS and the rental car center, especially if this connection comes to pass. The buildings are well less 1/4 of a mile from each other (0.2 miles) — yet a pedestrian can’t get between the two places directly (the pedestrian path is 0.9 miles according to Google maps).
Al, I’ve rented cars from this rental car center… The only way in is via shuttle bus on the top deck. The facility is heavy on security and limited access. You can exit through security turnstiles though not the easiest to find and you can tell is discouraged. Of course I’ve done this to save time by going straight to TIBS, although International Blvd and the on/off ramps is awful to walk along and cross, as is the gauntlet of zombie junkies passed out on the steps from Intl Blvd to the station.
@ Poncho:
Getting in or out of that rent car building is ridiculously restrictive for anyone on foot. It’s even difficult to pick up someone dropping off a car!
Walking in LA, to the Dodgers game. ($)
The frustrating part about accessing Dodger Stadium is how relatively easily it could be dramatically improved. Adding a series of escalators up the hill on the south side of the stadium and improving the pedestrian overpass crossing the 110 would make the walk from the Chinatown light rail station quite pleasant.
LA Metro included the idea in a study from 1990 on improving transit access to the stadium, but nothing apparently came of the idea.
Our European friend who went on the walk of Lynnwood and was less than pleased, is back with a sequel of Bellevue and the 2 line…
https://youtu.be/VUG-eefNDCg
The more I think about it, the SF Peninsula / Caltrain is very unique in that there’s an all day commuter train that stops in each city’s walkable downtown, one after the other. Multiple developed big cities. Do we have anything remotely like that in the Pacific Northwest?
The only thing that comes close are the Sounder stops in Kent, Auburn, Puyallup, Edmonds and Mukilteo. For Vancouver BC it would be the West Coast Express stops in Port Moody, Coquitlam and Mission.
Both New York and Chicago have similar train service. For smaller cities it is rare in the US just because of the way the cities evolved.
In Europe and Japan the towns and small cities are fairly centralized and centered around the train station. For example this is Hildesheim:
https://maps.app.goo.gl/ZXP6xXSWZevP1a2K8. It is the smallest city listed on the Wikipedia page for German cities (because it is officially just over 100,000 in population). From the air it looks fairly small. The amount of urban land is actually fairly small. If you zoom into street level you can see that much of it (if not most of it) is as dense as any place in Seattle: https://maps.app.goo.gl/55F6pJdVJUn7BP3d8.
In contrast this is Auburn: https://maps.app.goo.gl/JkMQxNKEi1q7GJN29. The urban area is much larger in terms of land mass, even though the city has fewer people. Quite often it isn’t quite clear where the urban area ends. Some of the areas clearly within easy walking distance to the train station looks very much like a small town: https://maps.app.goo.gl/N8oBQkjyctnrwT656. There are areas with taller buildings, but they are typically surrounded by large parking lots.
Now consider how many people could walk to that station in Hildesheim. My guess is tens of thousands. In Auburn it is a few hundred. Also consider what this means for transit within the city. In Hildesheim you can easily run buses quite frequently. You have a fairly small area to cover and lots of people within the area. In Auburn it is the opposite. It would cost way more money for Auburn to provide the same quality of transit as Hildesheim and you would get a lot fewer riders. Thus Hildesheim has good service to the train station while Auburn does not.
As a result, places like Auburn simply won’t get that many riders on the train, no matter what they do. Auburn isn’t alone. If you look at most of the train stations around here, very few people can walk to the station. With few exceptions the area around the train stations are small destinations. The service to the train stations is poor. The general expectation is that you drive to the station and then take the train into the city. The only time a large number of people are willing to do this is during peak commuting time, which is why commuter trains became so common in the US (and regional trains did not).
Hildesheim, Germany vs Auburn, WA. The contrasting Google Street Views you posted are so depressing.
And yes you are correct about people driving to the suburban station and taking the train into the city. I work with a guy like that. The Sounder Train is the only public transportation he will ever take. He walks from King Street station to our office in the downtown core. I offered to show him how to use Link or to the E Line which would get him the rest of the way to the office but he didn’t seem interested.
It’s because it’s had regular commuter service continuously since like the 1860s, hence the development pattern of small downtowns around more or less each station. If there’s anything similar I’d say Bainbridge Island and Bremerton, by having continuous commuter oriented ferry service to Seattle for over a century.
It is not really the railroad that is different, it is the way in which each town reacted to the automobile. Auburn had railroads back in the 1880s, but the town was small. By 1910 less than a thousand people lived there. If not for the automobile it is quite possible the town would have had about that many people. It really didn’t grow until the post-war period and just about all of that growth was in the form of automobile-based sprawl.
In much of Europe the towns and cities existed long before railroads. That meant that the main form of transportation was walking. Thus they tended to very centralized. The only “sprawl” was in the form of farms. Thus before the train a small city like Hildesheim wasn’t very different in terms of land use than it is today. (It should be noted that the city was bombed during the war, so I’m talking about general land use/density rather than the actual building types). When they started building rail lines they ran them to the center of towns/cities (that were already fairly well established). Those areas may have grown some because of the train, but they were already fairly centralized.
I think that American cities changed more because of the train than European ones. In both cases you had towns that grew because of the train and towns that stayed the same because the train skipped it. You also have towns in Europe and North America based around the train. But I don’t think you have anything like Chicago — a city that became huge in large part because of trains. L. A. also became big because of the automobile and Atlanta was originally a company railroad town.
But the big difference was how the areas reacted to the automobile. In terms of land use, Europe didn’t change that much. In contrast, many of our cities are dramatically different because of the automobile. Various towns have become sprawling low-density cities. It is much tougher to serve those types of cities with transit (or pretty much any form of public good — but especially transit).
“The only “sprawl” was in the form of farms. ”
Even the farms are more clustered. I once asked Martin how Skagit County compares to rural areas in Germany. If you’ve been to the tulip festival, immediately west adjacent to Mt Vernon is a course grid of rural roads. Many large lots have a modern house, and the rest is either a farm or a suburban-like lawn.
In Germany it’s more like pinwheels. The residents cluster in the center in a kind of village, and the farms are around them, and they’d commute to the farms. The cluster has a train station or rural bus route more frequent than our rural transit, so you don’t have to drive far to get to it. The lines are more frequent than ours. The train/bus goes to the nearest city, and from there you can get to other regional and distant cities.
Gemini’s Beacon Hill video says his Eastern European impression of Beacon Hill’s low-density blocks right near the Link station remind him not of European suburbs, but of European rural areas.
It makes me wonder if what Americans call rural areas, like Vashon Island, Skagit or Whatcom Counties, or Eastern Washington or North Dakota — would be mind-blowing to Europeans.
I think there’s a big difference though in being a railroad town with 10 intercity trains a day versus a commuter railroad town with frequent trains all day and night into a big city. Almost every town in the western half of the US is a railroad town but only the SF Peninsula, Chicago suburbs, Philly suburbs, Boston suburbs and NYC suburbs really count as commuter rail suburbs which shows in the urban form of closely spaced independent towns with distinct downtowns. Its comes from the frequent service feeding the big city, being literally built around the railroad and having continuous service for 150 years. You can even compare the SF peninsula to the East Bay between Oakland and San Jose… its like 5 cities versus 20 cities in that same distance. I would attribute that to the commuter rail orientation.
The residents cluster in the center in a kind of village, and the farms are around them, and they’d commute to the farms.
The same thing happens in the US. The difference is that we have suburban sprawl overlaid on top of it all. In much of the west things were also built much later. Mount Vernon was a logging town initially. It grew as the center for mining, logging and eventually farming. The railroad allowed it grow much faster. So at that point it really wasn’t that different than what you had in Europe (farms surrounding a city). Sedro-Wolley and Burlington were also logging and mining towns and once that dried up, remained fairly small. It is quite likely it would have been that way, with Mount Vernon being a bigger and more centralized city and the other two being small towns (like Darrington). But the automobile changed everything. The Pacific Highway and later I-5 altered the dynamics. Mount Vernon still has a fairly small, urban area but it is merely part of the sprawling Mount Vernon-Anacortes MSA. Some of the richest farmland on earth is paved over for outlet malls and car lots.
Almost every town in the western half of the US is a railroad town but only the SF Peninsula, Chicago suburbs, Philly suburbs, Boston suburbs and NYC suburbs really count as commuter rail suburbs which shows in the urban form of closely spaced independent towns with distinct downtowns.
But even then a lot of the areas are not really strongly centered, let alone centered around the railroad. Nobody would mistake this: https://maps.app.goo.gl/eLGD7Cr6hPBjXrPF6 for Europe. Caltrain gets away with it not because these are “closely spaced independent towns with distinct downtowns” but simply because California is just huge. Silicon Valley has over 3 million people. They aren’t clustered around the stations, but they aren’t completely spread out — the natural boundaries limits some of the sprawl. Even so, Caltrain only had about 64,000 riders a day before the pandemic. I don’t think most of the Chicago suburban rail stations are strongly centered either. There is definitely some of this in the Northeast, but even then it is nothing like Europe. Long Island has a huge amount of sprawl. The trains do well there largely because they happen to be trains in New York (not because everyone in the suburbs is clustered around a train station like in Europe).
Long transfer walks at airports reach over 2 miles. ($)
Copied from the Swift Blue article in case people have stopped checking that:
Lynnwood station’s new P&R is full ($) and cars are circling for a space at 10am. People are parking illegally in diagonal-striped zones (wheelchair-maneuver areas) and in adjacent store lots (partly displacing customers to small businesses).
Some would-be riders are going back to driving because they can’t get a P&R space, and are saying the garage should be twice as large. ST and CT recommend feeder buses to Lynnwood or Mountlake Terrace stations, but these riders aren’t interested in that (or they live where it’s infeasible).
The article also says all the P&Rs on the 1 Line are full, at least on some days. ST will introduce $2 reserved spaces soon at several P&Rs including Lynnwood. ST estimates that will raise $6 million in revenue.
@Mike Orr,
Ya, I read that article on my walk this morning and got several good chuckles out of it. Basically Lynnwood Link is being loved to death and now we are supposed to believe that there is a problem. It’s sort of like, “Nobody goes there anymore — it’s too crowded!”
I just love the people who used to drive, but now complain that the parking lot is sometimes full so they still occasionally have to drive. LOL.
But what the article didn’t mention is that the parking garage at LCC opened at least a year before LLE opened. And there was never a problem with it filling up then. I guess LLE really has changed things. You just have to laugh.
And CT boardings at LCC being up 49% speaks volumes to what a successful bus restructure can do for our bus agencies. It’s hard to argue with success.
But what the article didn’t mention is that the parking garage at LCC opened at least a year before LLE opened. And there was never a problem with it filling up then.
That is because there were more places where you could park to get a one-seat ride into downtown Seattle. Park and ride use was more spread out.
CT boardings at LCC being up 49%
Same idea though. If you were commuting it didn’t make sense to catch a bus to Lynnwood Transit Center since there were other buses going to the same place (downtown). Obviously some people were doing this (especially midday) but now you *have* to do this. Buses like the 413 are gone. You have to get yourself to one of the stations if you want to take transit into Seattle.
I’m not saying there isn’t some overall growth in transit ridership — I would expect there is — but a lot of the growing pains are due to people funneling themselves into the handful of stations (mostly Lynnwood) and assuming the best way to do that is to drive.
“And CT boardings at LCC being up 49% speaks volumes to what a successful bus restructure can do for our bus agencies.”
I was going to mention that. This is the latent ridership that was just waiting for service. And while not all of that increase is at Lynnwood Station, the part that is at the station is probably larger than the number of people circling for parking, and it may even be larger than the number of cars in the P&R.
@Mike Orr,
That 49% number is just at Lynnwood Station, although you are right, there was a lot of latent demand for transit like Link all up and down the line. Even the lot at 185th St Station has been filling up, which is amazing considering that there really wasn’t any substantial service in that area at all before Link opened.
The other interesting thing is that, substantial as that 49% number is, still only 22% of Link boardings at Lynnwood Station are ORCA transfers from CT. That means that 78% of passengers are arriving via other means than CT bus — personal vehicle, TNC, walk, bike, etc. As such, it is easy to understand why some people get agitated about the parking situation.
But hey, if you think the wailing about parking at LCC Station has been entertaining, just wait until Potemkin Station opens at 130th. That station has exactly zero parking, as in “0”, not a single spot. And there is no bus layover space, no bus turning loop, and no bus drop off area directly beneath the station either. The amount of wailing and gnashing of teeth is going to be epic when that station opens.
And there are no businesses nearby either. The nearest one is approx half a mile away. So even sneaking into business lots won’t be an option.
I’m sure many people will drive and try to park in residential areas, but that will trigger its own backlash and calls for RPZ’s and such. And they are reconfiguring 5th Ave to be one-way both north and south of the station, so many drivers are going to get tangled up in the local street grid. It’s going to be pure entertainment for those of us who will never use the station and are unaffected.
But hey, at least LLE is open and working well. Success has its own challenges, and there is plenty of success with this line. Even ST has been surprised.
The other interesting thing is that, substantial as that 49% number is, still only 22% of Link boardings at Lynnwood Station are ORCA transfers from CT. That means that 78% of passengers are arriving via other means than CT bus — personal vehicle, TNC, walk, bike, etc.
There is also the 512 and 513. Your point is well taken though. A very high percentage of riders drive to the Lynnwood Station.
But hey, if you think the wailing about parking at LCC Station has been entertaining, just wait until Potemkin Station opens at 130th. That station has exactly zero parking, as in “0”, not a single spot.
You are confused. The station 130th is in Seattle, not a distant suburb. Most of the stations in Seattle don’t have parking lots. The few that do are basically just legacy lots that they couldn’t get rid of. Few complain about the lack of parking with those stations.
And there is no bus layover space, no bus turning loop
So what? Where do you get the idea that this is necessary or even a good thing? Do you think it would be better if the 62 just ended at Roosevelt station? Or the 45? Do you think this would somehow boost Link ridership? It is irrelevant. There are far bigger issues when it comes to layover space (e. g. we could really use one at 145th & Lake City Way once ST sends the 522 to 145th).
and no bus drop off area directly beneath the station either.
Again, so what? Lynnwood doesn’t have that either. None of the stations have a completely seamless transfers. I think there are only a few like that in the world (where you can transfer from the bus platform to the train platform by walking a few feet on the same level). Hell, we can’t even get the train-to-train transfers right!
The bus to to train transfers vary, but in general the biggest issue is the difference in elevation. UW Station is extremely deep which means that even if you are lucky enough to be let off close to the station it takes a really long time to get to the platform. Northgate is the opposite — it is quite high. In that respect the transfer at 130th — while not ideal — is fairly good. Yes, Sound Transit screwed it up. The platform should have straddled 130th (with entrances on both sides). This probably would have saved them money as well. But the transfer will be similar, if not better than most of them in our system.
The amount of wailing and gnashing of teeth is going to be epic when that station opens.
Wait, what? So you are saying that because the station doesn’t have a park and ride people will freak out. Why? If people want to drive they will just go to Northgate or 148th. Holy shit, we have been over this literally dozens of times and you still don’t get it. The station is not about walk-up riders. It is not about people arriving by car. It is a bus intercept for people who live to the east and west.
Go look at the ridership numbers for the 62. The bus stop with the most riders is the one next to Roosevelt Station. People take it from the east and west and transfer there. Same goes for the 45 (although in that case it is only people from the west). The transfer is not perfect. Quite often you have to cross the street (oh, the horror). After crossing the street you have to walk quite a ways to get to the platform. Yet well over a thousand people make that transfer in those two buses alone.
But if you think that people require park and ride lots than why the hell do you support West Seattle Link? It seems far more likely that the average person in West Seattle will complain. West Seattle in general freaked out about losing something that basically just hurt drivers. Overall, transit was probably better (a bit slower but more frequent). This didn’t stop the complaining, because they wanted to drive. Yet *none* of the West Seattle stations will have park and ride lots. Plenty of people (in places like Alki and High Point) won’t care, but unlike the 130th Station, lots of people will. They will wonder how they are supposed to get to the station if they can’t park.
More than anything this speaks to the one-seat ride mentality of transit users in the area. I’m sure plenty of people are taking the bus and then Link. But even with an enormous parking lot (significantly bigger than Northgate) people are complaining about the amount of space available. I can think of several reasons:
1) People in the area just whine more about parking. I can’t imagine someone complaining about the size of the parking lot at Green Lake (which serves Roosevelt Station). Then again it hasn’t had available spots on weekdays for decades, which leads to the next item:
2) People were used to parking and taking a one-seat ride to Seattle. So they would drive to places like Swamp Creek, Ash Way or Mariner and take a bus that would get them directly to downtown. They have a hard time wrapping their head around the idea of taking a bus then the train. Which leads to another reason.
3) Despite the big improvement with Community Transit service, many of the areas are not served by buses. They could always drive to a park and ride then take a bus to the train, but people are reluctant to do that.
4) Transit ridership is less consistent than it used to be and yet people in Snohomish County aren’t used to taking it for anything but commuting or big events. This is an odd combination. If you are commuting every day you adjust. You soon realize when you can expect to find parking and when you won’t. Over time this balances out, as it has in various park and rides in the area (like Green Lake). Meanwhile, people who regularly take transit just look at Link as another route. I used to take the (3)73 to the U-District, now I have to take a bus to Link and ride it. But I don’t have any interest in driving to Northgate — who the hell wants to drive to Northgate? If I was going to do that I would just drive to Maple Leaf and catch the 67. It is basically just a mentality for me — either I’m driving or I’m taking transit. I think a lot of people in Snohomish County — especially for trips on Link — feel otherwise.
People will adjust, it will just take them time. Eventually they will realize when they can expect to have spots available and when they can’t. On game days they will be annoyed, while some of the savvy fans park in places like Ash Way even at the last minute.
I agree with your opinion that a lot of folks want one-seat rides, as if they were ok with bus + Link, there’s plenty of parking at Ash Way + Swamp Creek that are a reasonably quick trip to Lynnwood City Center (more so in the former’s case).
As for why folks don’t necessarily take a local bus to Link, it’s probably easier to time the bus going to Link rather than Link -> CT local bus. Even though a lot of frequencies in the South County area have been improved to 30m, that can still be a long wait going home. A couple routes like the 103/112 are slated to get 20m frequency next year but further improvements here will make the case for more folks to take CT buses.
My friend in north Lynnwood does:
1. Walk 20 minutes to the 119 stop at 148th & Jefferson Way.
2. Take the 119 to Ash Way P&R (or walk 20 more minutes if it’s not coming).
3. Take the 512/201/202/Orange to Lynnwood Station.
4. Take Link to Roosevelt, U-District, or Capitol Hill.
This is what people in single-family areas not within walking distance of a Link feeder experience.
(Well, I guess the 119 is technically a Link feeder because you can take it the other way to Mountlake Terrace Station, but that would take over 30 minutes meandering through low-density areas you don’t want to go.)
It’s certainly nice that there are lots of park and ride users. For now it sounds like they can drive further to northgate as it looks like that one is now not full.
While the garage is full I wouldn’t really advocate for building even more garages given the amount of space each one takes up. And even at 1,000 spots it can only be used for around 1000 daily riders.
Slightly off topic, but that is one improvement self driving cars even if used completely as single occupancy would help, it’d greatly eliminate the parking to transit issue if the car drives home afterwards. (and also parking minimums for retail in general)
Yeah, it would be crazy to build more parking. Folks need to get over the idea that they can always drive to the parking lot and find a spot. Ironically one of the problems with a really big parking lot is that it can be more annoying when you can’t find a spot. You spend a lot of time going around in circles before giving up. In contrast with a small lot you can tell right away it is full and go to plan B.
I’m not sure what information there is with the parking lot. At the airport, for example, they can tell you which floors have spots available. Something like that would make sense. Similarly I could see an app or a web page that showed how full the lot is. Of course it might fill up in the time it takes to get there, but so much of this is just expectations.