South Link Connections Phase 3 Proposal

88 Replies to “South Link Connections Phase 3 Proposal”

1. Community Transit seems to have abandoned most of its peanut-butter frequency improvements approved by the Board in 2023. They are using the language that the times in the proposal were “approximate”. Instead, they are now leaning into Swift improvements (including capital), plus more .Zip service zones.

   Metro’s approach seems more about frequency bumps, and then slow degradation after the hoped-for ridership does not materialize.

   1. Metro’s approach seems more about frequency bumps, and then slow degradation after the hoped-for ridership does not materialize.

      What? I can’t think of any example of that. The degradation in service was due to COVID, budget cuts and driver shortages. They could be more efficient with their routes, but that has nothing to do with “frequency bumps” or “slow degradation”.

      1. There has been a reduction in service at Metro in recent years, but it has probably not been due to ridership decline entirely.

         One factor has been the STBD (now STM) adds. The revenue stream was higher under the fall 2014 measure than under the fall 2020 measure. The VLF portion was under the cloud of litigation. The Council debate one tenth v. two tenths and compromised on .15 cents. Two tenths would have been better; transit reductions are more regressive than the sales tax. The Sierra Club lobbied for two tenths.

         Seattle pulled its funding from the split of lines C and D. Metro kept the lines split and cut several other routes instead in fall 2020. for example, the span of Route 33 was reduced. One reduction I hated was Saturday service on routes 5-21; it is now 20-minutes and had been 15-minutes for many years. The 2014 TBD brought routes 65-67 to 10-minute headway; they fell to 15-minutes.

         Another factor seems to be the SDOT-Metro promise on G Line six-minute headway. The contract may predate the 2020 reductions. So, in fall 2024, the headway of routes 10, 11, 12, and 49 got longer. There were better reductions to consider, but they were not brought to the public. SDOT shifted some hours to Route 60; that is not a bad choice. (I would like to see its reliability data on Madison Street compared with the pre G Line construction period; was that fall 2018?).

         The fall 2023 reductions were to reduce the network to the size that could be operated by the available drivers. This included suspension of several one-way peak-only routes (e.g., 15, 18, 16, 268) and longer headway on some weaker all-day routes (e.g., 230, 231, 225, 20, 28, 73, 79). Subsequently, some of the weaker routes were deleted in the Lynnwood Link project (e.g., 20, 73).

         Some routes were suspended for Covid and have not been restored yet. As the number of operators grows, the service will grow back.

2. Can anyone explain Metro’s fetish for setting service levels at multiples of 15 minutes? As opposed to multiples of 10 minutes to better pulse with 1-Line arrivals?

   1. In a word, money. I’m sure Metro would love to run most of their buses every ten minutes. For that matter, they would love to run them all every six minutes. But running every every ten minutes costs a lot more than running every fifteen. When it comes to frequency, everyone has a different perspective. But for a lot of people, fifteen minutes is the point at which you feel it works for spontaneous trips.

      Timing with Link is extremely difficult. Even if the buses and trains are 100% reliable (and they aren’t) you have to deal with the time it takes to get down to the station. Despite having “transit centers” we don’t have multi-modal stations. You can’t just walk a few feet from a train platform to a bus platform. This means that a transfer takes time and that time varies per person. This further complicates things. If the trains and buses are very infrequent (e. g. hourly) then you can time it for the slowest person (i. e. worse case scenario). This is how the bus and ferries are timed. People who are very fast end up having to wait. But that impractical with reasonably buses and trains. The best thing to do is try to improve the frequency of either mode. Look at SkyTrain. The buses aren’t “timed” because the train is frequent enough that it doesn’t really matter. At least not during most of the day.

3. I would love to see route 168 get bumped up to every 20 minutes all day weekday. Certainly not among the busiest routes, but still a crucial route connecting southeast king county with the rest of the system.

   1. The 168 is one of the most productive routes in South King (page 52 on Metro’s System Evaluation), it would be a good candidate for more service.

      https://cdn.kingcounty.gov/-/media/king-county/depts/metro/documents/about/data-and-reports/2024/2024-system-evaluation.pdf

   2. I would suggest extending the 168 to Kent Des Moines Station, bumping it up to every 20 minutes, and only bumping the proposed 164 (the southeastern half of current 165) up to every 20 minutes. And then time their departures from KDM Station so one or the other departs every 10 minutes.

   3. An express version with fewer stops during peak hours would encourage additional ridership from farther points like Covington/Maple Valley.

4. It is frustrating to review half of a feeder bus network. I really wish that this was comprehensive systems transit network showing Metro, PT and especially ST Express buses to review. It’s like commenting on a home’s livability when you have no idea what half of the rooms are.

   1. Yep. Route 161 (one of the most productive and resilient in South King County) won’t get a frequency bump, while ST Express 574 will almost certainly cease serving the airport. Southeast SeaTac riders are getting a stealth frequency decrease.

      That said, a chunk of the 161 riders will shift to proposed 164 for the fastest path to the 1 Line.

   2. The jewel in the crown of the ST Express route restructure would be to simply add a stop at Federal Way to the 594, and to have it run every 10 minutes all day.

5. I like the 182/187 through-run a lot. It eliminates those awkward one-way loops, and those on the far end of the routes can take it in either direction to/from Federal Way.

   1. I agree. The through running loops (also the 902/903) are a great solution for this area. Some stops will see 6 busses an hour, despite the 30 and 60 minute frequencies. I tried to think of other areas that could use a similar approach and could only think of Magnolia after the Ballard Link Extension opens.

   2. Yes being able to get to Link in either direction a good option to have!

      I am able to take Route 50 in either direction to get to a Link station when headed to SeaTac. While one direction is faster than the other, I have missed the preferred bus and still been able to get to Link in the other direction.

      Circumstances like this are when the real-time bus arrival info app is particularly useful. Going in the other direction is a much tougher decision without the app.

      When stops get posted, it is important for stops in the two directions to be near each other. Metro has a penchant for offsetting them a block or two or even three on Route 50 — so I suggest giving them additional feedback to locate the stops across the street from one another here. Offset stops makes direction switching harder.

6. This quickly becomes more relevant: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/transportation/federal-way-could-get-light-rail-this-fall-before-eastside-crossing/

   1. Thanks! The Urbanist also ran a story on this.

   2. @AndyL,

      Ya. A few of us have been talking about this possibility for a while now, either as a starter line to KDM, or as the complete FWLE if Full ELE continues to get delayed. Nice to see it finally happening.

      But there are some questions this raises that aren’t addressed in any of the articles:

      1). How does fleet availability get addressed?

      2). How much of the additional ~20,000 new riders will bleed over onto the already crowded CHS-UDS segment in North Seattle?

      I suspect ST will address #1 using more distributed storage, but getting their gap and spares ratios under control would also help.

      #2 is a bit more difficult, but I suspect the effect in the current peak direction will be small enough to live with for now. Moving to 7.5 min headways would also help, but that drives up the fleet size.

      And there are political questions too. Is this a promise Dow made to certain politicians to secure his position as ST CEO? Or is Dow just following Olson’s recommendation.

      And is Balducci really onboard with this? Because she seems to think her ascension to KC Exec goes through the Eastside. And this doesn’t help the Eastside at all.

      1. I’m guessing ST expects to be able to bring trains from the Eastside by the time Federal Way opens.

      2. #1… As Delta notes, the East OMF should be reachable so that vehicles should be available to be accessed. Even if not, the tracks headed towards Judkins Park appear to be available for additional distributed storage.

         #2. Even though cross-lake service won’t be open, the simulation should be — and that will mean twice as many trains from Downtown to Lynnwood. Even before simulation begins, ST maps now show 2 Line in place in North Seattle — so ST could just run some extra “short 2 Line” trains in North Seattle during the busiest hours.

      3. @Delta,

         I doubt very much that ST would rely on the ability to bring LRV’s back and forth from the Eastside every day.

         ST doesn’t really know when the contractor will get the 2-Link fully functional, and the goal here is to get FWLE into Revenue Service while not delaying Full ELE.

         Attempting to shuttle large numbers of LRV’s across Full ELE while simultaneously attempting to finish testing on Full ELE is a recipe for more delays, and for unreliable operation of 1-Link.

         The most expeditious way to get both extensions into revenue service as soon as possible is to keep it simple and keep the two lines as separate as possible as long as possible. And that most likely means using distributed storage and reduced spare and gap ratios for FWLE, at least until Full ELE is completed and ready for daily use.

         But hey, we will see what ST does. And hopefully we won’t have to wait very long.

      4. “2). How much of the additional ~20,000 new riders will bleed over onto the already crowded CHS-UDS segment in North Seattle?”

         First of all, those 20K average weekday riders are for 2035. You have admitted already that it takes at least a few years for ridership to grow as recent as a few hours ago.

         The 20K additional average weekday system boardings for Link as a whole come from the EIS. It was dated April 2015. It’s now 10 years old, with the actuel forecasts likely developed a few years before that. That EIS also said that these were new Link system riders and not new transit riders. Many are coming from ST Express expected to be deleted as well as diverted riders from RapidRide A.

         https://www.soundtransit.org/sites/default/files/documents/fwle-draft-eis-executive-summary-sections-1-3.pdf

         After the wildly overhyped ridership numbers from Lynnwood Link (about 16K total or 8 K boardings after a year of operations as opposed to the publicized 47-55K — with many of the 16K merely shifting from accessing Link at Northgate and still more from former downtown express buses) ST seems to now suppress the expected ridership in press releases and background materials .

         *****

         What will be the total number of boardings at the three new stations? Well we could begin by comparing Lynnwood Link. If they got only a third of the projected 2026 ridership, then the Federal Way station boardings projected at 27K total in 2035 from the EIS (13.5 K boardings and 13.5K getting off trains) would yield about 4.5 K boardings for the three stations added together.

         I think that’s probably too low. I’m expecting about 5-7K more boardings for the three stations combined — with Angle Lake losing about 1-2K boardings to one of the new stations. I may be off 1K or 2K but I’ll be surprised if the three station boardings combined reach 9K (and then subtracting 1-2K for the Angle Lake drop) and the system ridership adding a very optimistic 15K more riders. I think Link will be lucky to add 10-12K more Link system riders upon the Federal Way opening this time next summer.

      5. I wish that the train capacity had been covered in the article as well. Building a plan for Federal Way based on getting trains across the bridge before there has even been a live wire test is pretty risky. I have to think that ST at least has a contingency plan that doesn’t require access to the eastside OMF.

      6. It doesn’t seem to HURT the east side either. That was her main sticking point. She has acknowledged she can’t complain about the eight (now ten) 2 line stations staying idle and be fine with the FWLE sitting idle especially if it doesn’t delay the bridge.

         As far as the relevancy to the article, there is no chance in heaven that the above plan will be finalized done and dusted by December. That means the Kent Des Moines bus loop will remain idle for the time being it seems. Federal way downtown will continue serving riders so that will at least be an option.

   3. If so, when does ST plans to release its bus network change associated with this?

      1. That’s the million dollar question, isn’t it. I don’t think anyone knows. With the recent announcement that Federal Way Link may open before the end of the year, the clock is ticking. [Note: expect full coverage of that announcement soon. This topic will definitely come up there. ]

         It doesn’t take especially long to actually change the routing of buses. But it does take some time to get feedback. This is phase 3 for Metro and ST hasn’t completed phase one (getting general input). I don’t think the changes are trivial, either. No matter what, they will be controversial. I don’t expect any ST buses to serve SeaTac (except maybe late at night) but other than that, who knows what will be truncated and where they will put the service.

      2. ST said the Federal Way and East Link restructures would be addressed in its ST Express 2026 operational plan, whose first proposal would be in June. June has come and gone with no sign of it.

         An editor found a Title IV analysis that suggests some ST Express changes, but we don’t know whether they’re definitive or not, and the chart just has a route numbers which doesn’t tell us which areas unfamiliar numbers will serve or whether familiar numbers would be truncated.

         Going from what we’re guessing from the chart, the 594 may be deleted in favor of the 574 and 592. The 578 may be deleted without replacement (so no Puyallup-Auburn-Federal Way service). The 554 proposal may be restructured again.

         In the earlier 554 proposals that were not in the final East Link Connections, ST would consolidate the 550/554/556 into a new 554 from Issaquah to South Bellevue Way to Bellevue TC, running every 15 minutes all day. The 566’s UDistrict-Bellevue peak segment would be deleted, so there would be no Bellevue-UW express service. In Issaquah it would move from Newport Way (at the edge of downtown with a one-sided minimal walkshed) to Gilman Blvd and add stops for the retail district. The map/description was inconsistent on whether all runs would continue to the Issaquah Highlands, or only a few “select trips” that also continue to Sammamish.

         I’ve later seen a couple newer 554 alternatives. I don’t remember whether it was in the Title IX report or just elsewhere. One would add a Bellevue-UDistrict extension. It might also modify Bellevue Way/South Bellevue station; I don’t remember that part. Another would revert back to Newport Way.

      3. Also, ST is targeting September 2026 for the restructure. So it would be after the two Link openings and the World Cup. ST’s World Cup plan is extra service on the 550 and 545 if needed. Those routes were going to be deleted in the last East Link restructure proposal, so ST can’t add extra service to them if they’re already gone.

      4. We’re not sure whether the Title VI chart means ST will propose these, or it just analyzed them so it could propose them but it hasn’t decided whether to yet.

7. Not really a fan of what’s being done with the 187, I think there’s a missed opportunity to send the route straight down 312th instead of duplicating the 181 on 320th. Glad Metro isn’t abandoning NE Tacoma anymore though.

   1. Not really a fan of what’s being done with the 187, I think there’s a missed opportunity to send the route straight down 312th instead of duplicating the 181 on 320th.

      I agree. Current plans are to have a frequent and an infrequent bus on 320th. This doesn’t really improve transit on the corridor (unlike running two frequent or two infrequent buses which can combine for better headways). At best you can say that the 320th corridor is just much stronger and you are connecting riders along that corridor with the western side (via a one-seat ride). But I really don’t see that when looking at the ridership data (or what is on each corridor). Very few people take the 187 bus to anywhere east of 26th & 320th other than folks heading to the transit center. Overall it is clearly a coverage route and you would improve coverage dramatically by going up to 312th. There are several apartments along the way. It would duplicate the 901 but that actually gives you the opportunity for frequency service along 312th. The DART bus runs every half hour much of the day. A little bit of coordination and the corridor would have fifteen minutes service (to Federal Way Station or just for travel along the corridor).

      So yeah, they should shift the 187 to 312th.

8. I was wondering what the 162 elimination brought as I vaguely remembered that 164 was seeing an increase from before anyways, but this post and the list is very helpful. I think that’s a decent improvement

9. So East Link and South Link both avoided Fairwood and Benson Hill, both of which pay for Sound Transit. Conveniently cropped out of the map. They already received subpar service, and it’s very difficult to connect to ST routes. The Sounder train is possible, but there is no connection to Link and the transfer to ST express to Bellevue is far too difficult or too long waiting times.

   1. Hopefully once Stride is done, they perform some realignments for the area.

   2. Yes, they absolutely need better connections. There was a debate about Stride’s service to Renton earlier this week where someone brought up the great point about how much of Renton is southeast of 405.

      That area absolutely needs a restructure – I don’t know yet what would work well, but one’s absolutely needed, and it’s going to have to involve better 405 service.

      1. The new Rapid Line will help, but areas east of that corridor are still left in a transit desert. Plenty of people live there. Renton Highlands is getting all day 111 service on the other hand, and have even lower density and few apartments.

   3. This is what ST’s South King and East King subareas and the mayors/councilmembers in those cities wanted. South King insisted that their highest priority was the 99/I-5 Link corridor to Federal Way. East King (which includes Renton) said its highest priority was Bellevue-Redmond, the Issaquah line, and Stride. So complain to your Renton, Tukwila, Kent, and other politicians: they’re the ones who steered ST in that direction.

   4. Also, this is a Federal Way/Auburn/Des Moines/Kent restructure. Metro listed a number of routes at the beginning that might be affected. Renton restructures will come with Stride 1 and RapidRide I.

   5. in 2013, South Sounder was improved to 20-minute headway. It is fast, about 20 minutes between Tukwila and King Street station. So ever since then, it has made sense for routes 102, 143, 157, 158, 159, (now 162) to be restructured and a local network provided that met the Sounder service. It appears that routes 102 and 148 could be consolidated and extended to the Tukwila station, meeting the service network at South Renton. The fall 2020 project did not quite get there. Since Covid, there is plenty of capacity on Sounder.

      1. The Sounder does not have all day service. They need fast Link connections too.

      2. 906 goes to Tukwila station, but through an inefficient route and wasted time in Southcenter. It should go directly to the station first, then to Tukwila Link/SeaTac from there. Allows for Sounder/Light rail transfers.

      3. @South King Resident, sending the 906 first to Tukwila Sounder Station would be way out of the way for off-peak riders, when the train isn’t running. But indeed, the existing routing is so indirect I can hardly believe anyone rides it all the way through Southcenter.

         How about instead sending the 906 straight up 178th/176th to Seatac Link Station? And then, if there’s money, there could be a new peak-only route from 208th or 192nd that intersects the 906 at 108th/Petrovsky and goes straight to Tukwila Sounder Station.

      4. The Sounder does not have all day service.

         Neither do any of the buses eddie mentioned. That is the point. Replace the peak service with connections to Sounder.

      5. The 148 is an all day bus… So it should connect with Link or have improved connections to the 101 (right now the timings are absurd and random, continuing as 107 and resulting in huge delays for both routes that nobody transfers between). The 102 running to Sounder is duplicating 906, and unnecessary. I think it should either receive a more direct express connection to Seattle, or be sent up to South Bellevue instead like the 111, but that should’ve been done during East Link.

10. [ad hom about Metro’s attitute to South King County, with no specifics about what it’s doing wrong or what it should do]

    1. Another baseless accusation against Metro.

       1. Not really. King County as a whole, in my experience, really does not care about South King County. Metro is just a reflection of this attitude.

       2. You can’t continue to claim to be a victim if you can’t explain what Metro can or should be doing to better serve South King County.

       3. @Nathan Dickey more service for starters? Most of Southeast King County have limited transit options and they’re slow and inefficient.

       4. Just look at the map in this blog. Can you even call that proper bus service? The East Link areas on the other hand have a much more extensive network.

       5. @South King Resident: if it’s that simple, why can’t MPR be bothered to articulate it?

       6. Moderated the baseless attack on Metro. Left the King County attack as-is because that’s new, to clarify the complaint. Future occurrences will be moderated.

          I’ll start a top-level thread on whether South King County’s service is disproportionately bad.

       7. @Mike Orr,

          I disagree with the moderation of that comment, as I find it to be mainly true.

          Additionally, Pete von Reichbauer has been saying essentially the same thing, although he uses more “diplomatic” language.

          I find it “odd” that a comment that basically aligns with what a longtime elected official is saying would be subject to moderation.

       8. Pete von Reichbauer never said ST hates South King County or is underserving it out of malice. He is pro-Spine, as are all the politicians in South King, Pierce, and Snohomish.

       9. I used to live in south king county. Sure the cancelations seem to be excessive there. But the service levels at least suggest they do care about the area. The A line has more service than any other route that does not enter Seattle. They didn’t have much cuts from 2023 when they had to cancel 20 routes (only the 190 was deleted from routes south base is / was responsible for).

          If anything sound transit has shown how committed they are to providing link service to federal way. Kudos to them.

       10. “I find it “odd” that a comment that basically aligns with what a longtime elected official is saying would be subject to moderation.”
           Because he’s been repeating his accusation here with no real evidence to back up what he is saying.

           If he was criticizing Metro with cited sources, no one would mind his critique and people would welcome it. But he hasn’t really shown evidence to back up his statements other than well “vibes”. And “vibes” don’t really tell anything as to what is going on at metro in their planning department.

    2. The obvious short coming: too little service. It was probably a mistake to get rid of subarea equity in 2011. With subarea equity, 40 percent of new hours would have been allocated to the south. (In 2021, the Exec took a chunk of Route 41 hours from the project area; the old financial policies would have kept the hours in the subarea of origin).

       It was more important to improve local service, especially in south King County than to add ST3. ST3 was over reach: the wrong projects, with the wrong taxes, and too early. It was more important for transit mobility, fairness, and land use to provide the Metro local option.

       A very different ST3 could have helped. South Link in the I-5 envelop does not help South King County much. Tacoma Link to the TDS and not extending to pedestrian centers is very weak and costly. A network of south King County BRT would have allowed Metro hours to provide improved coverage to the vast areas of south King County with no or poor service. Of course, we will never know.

       How will King County provide more service to South King County? We have free youth transit funded by the state but several secondary schools have no proximate service.

       King County has many players; it is not monolithic. Dow led us to ST3. Many, including Seattle, asked for the new guidelines in 2011.

    3. There are two possible problems here. One is that Metro is underfunded. This is obvious. Voters in King County rejected the levy that would have added more service. The second is that it is possible South King County is getting short-changed. That is a bit more complicated. The first thing to keep in mind is that Seattle is paying extra for service. Even so, most of the Seattle routes outperform the other areas. So you have to compare the south end with other suburban areas.

       Looking at the latest system evaluation (https://cdn.kingcounty.gov/-/media/king-county/depts/metro/documents/about/data-and-reports/2024/2024-system-evaluation.pdf) it does appear that the East Side is getting a disproportionate amount of service. Most of the poorly performing routes are in the 200s.

       A lot of this is influenced by Link as well as the geography. For example the 348 performs well. It runs from Richmond Beach to Northgate. It is a relatively short route. If it was extended to downtown it would be more popular but it is quite likely it would perform worse. The north end routes take advantage of Link — very few run to downtown anymore.

       The same thing will soon happen with the East Side. A lot of the buses will suddenly get a lot more efficient. While Federal Way Link will help Metro improve some of the routes it really isn’t a major change in the region. Not like East Link or the extensions to the north. When Link got to the UW, a huge amount of bus service was suddenly swapped. Instead of buses spending so much time shuttling riders from the UW to downtown, Link did that. When Link got to Northgate the same thing happened with the 41. All of this made the remaining buses a lot more efficient. Ridership on the buses may have gone down (as many switched to Link) but the remaining buses carried a lot more riders per service hour. The same thing will happen to East Link. But it won’t happen — at least to the same degree — with Federal Way Link.

       This means that when the dust settles a year from now (and both East Link and Federal Way Link are operating) it is quite possible that East Side service will have rallied. A lot of the routes that are underperforming right now will be doing OK. If that happens, then it is quite likely that South End service will just be average. Maybe underperforming the north end by a little bit, but overall similar to the rest of the suburbs in the county. The root problem remains — the county isn’t spending enough money on transit service.

11. Somehow Bonney Lake and Puyallup and areas in Pierce County were able to get ST expresses, but areas closer to Seattle in S King County needs to sit through 2 hours of bus and light rail to get into Seattle, the biggest city in the area. And don’t get me started on Bellevue. Even tougher for us. 405 service is a joke.

    1. The Sounder Train is great but it doesn’t help if you don’t have a bus to it. Same with light rail.

12. Is South King County Metro and ST service disproportionately bad compared to the rest of King County and Puyallup/Bonney Lake?

    South King County has a larger population than Seattle but it’s spread out over a very large area. South King was ca. 850K last time I saw an aggregate. City populations: Seattle 817K, Bellevue 151K, Kent 133K (highest in South King), Renton 104K (second-highest in both South King and East King), Kirkland 91K, Auburn 84K, Redmond 80K, Tukwila 21K.

    South King also has an average lower-income, less white, less 9-to-5 demographcs than either Seattle or the Eastside. Metro noted that its ridership didn’t fall as much during the pandemic lockdowns as either Seattle or the Eastside. All the governments switched to an “equity” priority posture in 2020. These led to Metro protecting and increasing service in South King County relative to the other subareas, and doubling down on RapidRide I and another South King RapidRide or two after that. First on the list is the 150 (probably in the 2030s), followed by the 164 and 181.

    Metro is trying to serve all of South King with limited resources. It can’t run routes like the 164, 168, 181, or 105 every 15 minutes full time even though it wants to because it doesn’t have the resources.

    Metro has a Metro Connects 2050 plan with better service. There’s plenty of debate on whether this map is optimal or sufficient, but at least it’s an official vision and alternative. It’s not fully funded yet: it depends on a future countywide Metro levy or other funding.

    King County has talked since 2016 about putting a Metro Connects levy on the ballot but it still hasn’t. The last countywide Metro levy failed; it’s why Seattle has its own levy for additional Metro service. South King has consistently voted against both Metro and ST levies, saying they’re too poor for additional taxes (but somehow thinking they’re not too poor to leave themselves car-dependent). I think Kent voted for some of them, but the subarea as a whole didn’t. That has left Metro without the funds to expand bus service in South King County.

    I don’t think South King’s Metro network is worse than the Eastside. None of them have full-time frequent service on more than one or two routes, and 15-minute daytime service is limited to the biggest corridors.

    South King has three unique transit problems, one geographical and non-fixable, the other by ST1 Link’s alignment, and the third ST’s choice.

    The distances from Seattle to South King and Pierce cities are longer than to comparable Snohomish and Eastside cities:
    Renton: same as Bellevue.
    Kent: (north side at 240th): same Lynnwood.
    Federal Way: almost as far as Everett.
    Tacoma: same as North Bend.

    Longer distances require more travel time, and make it harder to keep travel time under an hour.

    Link’s Rainier/SODO surface segments and east-west detour add 12 minutes to travel time by my estimate. So SeaTac is 39 minutes instead of 27, Federal Way 55 minutes instead of 43, and Tacoma Dome 75 minutes instead of 63. (The latter two are my estimates based on existing service.) ST can’t do anything about that with the current Link infrastructure.

    Many cities have all-day expresses to downtown Seattle, but Kent conspicuously doesn’t. The 150 takes an hour or longer from Kent Station to Westlake station most of the day. Sounder takes only 20 minutes but it has limited hours. Auburn has the 578, but Kent has nothing. STB has pleaded with ST and Metro for over a decade to rectify this; e.g., by rerouting the 578 via Kent or adding a new Seattle-Kent route. They have always refused. Metro Connects in the late 2010s had a Seattle-Kent-Auburn express to replace the 578 when it was deleted for Federal Way Link, but it removed it from the plan sometime in the 2020s.

    We have suggested a Puyallup-Auburn-Kent-Renton Stride line to complement S1. WSDOT is anticipating potential BRT during future SR-167 renovations. ST has done nothing more than say it might think about it someday.

    1. It’s really hard to offer great transit service in a less wealthy but low density area like South King. It reminds me of the San Gabriel Valley or East LA county. It’s a conundrum. It’s never going to be great without major denser redevelopment or some amazing technological changes.

       I also feel that ST placing Renton in the East King subarea but not providing light rail to Renton is a tad unfair. IKEA and the car dealers create healthy sales tax revenue that is going to instead build light rail to Issaquah from Bellevue. Outside of merging the subareas and revisiting ST3 I don’t think it’s possible to overcome that disadvantage.

       1. Renton wanted to be in East King. It reflects its upwardly-mobile aspirations, and many Rentonites’ desires to travel to the Eastside rather than to elsewhere. It could have gone either way to East King or South King, but I think Renton city officials and public feedback tipped the balance to East King.

    2. Metro Connects is not funded. It is a wish list. ST3 is funded but as constituted, unaffordable. But ST3 does not address the south King County coverage issue.

13. Safety on south King County transit has also been one of Matthew’s repeated complaints. This raises three questions.

    1. Do Metro and ST pay less attention to safety issues in south King County than in Seattle and the Eastside? Issues might be misbehavior/drugs/urinating on vehicles or at stations/stops.

    2. What can Metro and ST realistically do? Especially with their limited resources. Metro can’t put police officers full time on all of the thousands of bus runs and bus stops.

    3. Should Metro reject passengers who don’t have fare money? In Europe agencies do and people get citations. But Europe also has a better social safety net and walkable cities, so people aren’t as desperate, or needing transit to access necessities or keep warm, or having untreated mental health issues. And avoiding fare confrontations is a driver-safety and driver-retention issue because passengers have assaulted or shot drivers over fare disputes.

    1. Without outing him, i can sense based on previous comments what routes he uses and it seems that the route he cares about is getting a frequency boost if the plan goes through. But he thinks they don’t listen.

       I can tell you they do listen. You can respond to the survey (best way as it’s easier for metro to package it together) or send them a comment or call them to express opinions.

14. Why is the Metro network restructure separate from that of ST and PT? The three networks should be complementary and interdependent. the readers and riders need to consider all three simultaneously. That used to be the case; see restructures in 2002, 2008, 2011, 2016, 2021. But now, the Lynnwood Link, East Link, and Federal Way Link project have awkward timing. What is going on?

    All one-way peak-only routes should be deleted. Even Route 193; it does not matter that it serves First Hill. in the 2024 System Evaluation report, Route 193 was late 34 percent of the time; Route 193 attracted only 8.2 rides per platform hour, about one-third as many as the South King County local routes in the project area. the design is poor; it weaves on and off I-5; it is too transfer adverse both at both ends of the route. The report shows ridership from the falls of 2022 and 2023; that of Route 193 FELL to 292 from 314. Please delete it and reused its hours.
    See: https://cdn.kingcounty.gov/-/media/king-county/depts/metro/documents/about/data-and-reports/2024/2024-system-evaluation.pdf?rev=4c1b3fab720049ea8c28079e50a3dca2&hash=9A675590F1479A11010C4AB8C018156D

    First Hill is served by robust network of service. It could be improved.

    There are huge swaths of the east part of South King County without service. What is their fate? Instead of adding Metro Flex atop the existing local network, could it added to east Kent?
    The system evaluation also shows that rides attracted by Metro Flex are quite costly.

    Why does Federal Way still get DART? DART has poor reliability as a feature, not a bug. Instead, routes 902 and 903 could be local fixed routes. Note how large the Route 901 DART vehicles are today.

    In the north half, the proposed partial through routes of routes 164 and 166 appears risky. Route 164 will cross the BNSFRR main line just west of the Kent Station and TC; that will make its westbound trips have poor reliability. It will not be a good partner for the north-south Route 166; it should run independently.

    Will PT improve the service level on the south part of SR-99?

    Will ST continue routes 590, 594, and 574 as is? Could they be consolidated or streamlined. Why are the not included in this process. Will routes 577-578 be deleted or truncated?

    See Route 635. It is not included in project; it serves Angle Lake Station. Should it get improved span and frequency? See: https://kingcounty.gov/en/dept/metro/routes-and-service/schedules-and-maps/635.html#weekday

    Now, it seems FWLE will open in late 2025. The translake crossing was further delayed. The South Metro bus restructure cannot get done for fall 2025. The best they can do is March 2026. They will have one-way peak-only routes duplicating both Link and Sounder.

    1. The 901 is set for deletion as part of the 182/187 restructure. That leaves the 902 with revised routing.

15. Will ST have enough LRV for the longer 1 Line without longer headway? Were they not stating they needed the storage capacity of the East base to implement the FWLE? What changed? Do they have more of the two subfleets of LRV available?

    1. They are likely going to get creative like they did with lynnwood. Sure, the storage blocks south of angle lake will be gone once testing begins (they can actually put one train per signal block all the way to Kent Des Moines right now) but federal way downtown has space south of the station as well. Northgate has a pocket track as does rainier beach SeaTac/ airport and stadium.

       1. I don’t think they’ll need to get especially creative.

          MAX worked OK with only one of the twin bore tunnels with operable rails in it, and MAX cars shoved through under diesel power. If they can get one train across the lake with a dead tow test, they can get a dozen across doing that as well.

          These things take a hell of a lot of detail work, which isn’t required for dead tow. If they schedule the moves for start or end of service day, these moves wouldn’t interfere with the work. You’re talking about an hour or so of time needed late at night and again early in the morning. The moves could happen during pre-night shift organizational and safety meetings.

    2. The latest post (https://seattletransitblog.com/2025/07/13/accelerated-federal-way-opening/) mentions those very issues. Hard to say what they will do.

    3. I thought East Base is only for 2 Line and future 4 Line. Was it the plan that some 1 Line fleets will be parked at OMF East?
       In terms of fleet, I think the all 152 Siemens S700 should be delivered by now and only 10 more in the next couple years. When they placed the order, they definitely assumed thought 2 Line would open by now.

       1. Operationally, I don’t think ST would consider L1 and L2 to have separate fleets? From a staffing standpoint, OMF-E will likely serve only L2 while OMF-C will serve both, but from a fleet standpoint I’d imagine vehicles to move between location, in particular because OMF-E can’t do all major maintenance events.

       2. The whole reason for the ridiculous 3rd track in the center of International District station is to move out of service trains from the East Link to South Link lines.

          (TriMet, by the way, virtually never runs out of service trains for this type of thing. Instead, they’d do something like schedule some 1 Line and 2 Line trains to change places as part of their daily schedule. Every day, some green line trains become blue line trains, blue line trains become yellow line trains, etc.)

       3. “in particular because OMF-E can’t do all major maintenance events.”

          Yeah I understand some LRVs need to have some non-revenue run to Seattle for some maintenance OMF-E cannot do, but how does this compromise Federal Way Link Extension’s operation before 2 Line full opens?
          Some discussion made it sound like after FWLE opens, some LRVs serving 1 Line (Lynnwood City Center-Federal Way) during the day need to come from OMF-E so the Crosslake section being not open will impact the frequency of 1 Line operation. That’s why I wonder if facility along 1 Line has enough space just to park the LRVs during a weeknight.

16. I really hope that lot of you commenting on this are filling out the surveys because the more people who can tell King County Metro to not cut the commuter routes, the better. I understand a small reduction in total number of trips but we need to bring back all suspended routes and not force people to have to either drive to a light rail station take a separate bus to a light rail station and then take light rail or take local buses all the way to downtown because they no longer have their commuter routes.

    Also we need to be reminding King County Metro that a lot of people who are currently driving to downtown Seattle will not swap to all of a sudden park at a light rail station and take light rail to downtown Seattle when the commuter route they used to ride, that is currently suspended, was faster than the projected travel times between the new light rail station you would be forcing them to use and the station in downtown Seattle at which they would get off at

    I’m all for it like we’re going to Federal Way 100%. I will always vote and support Light Rail expansions but when it comes at a loss of good alternatives for when light rail goes down, such as every single South and commuter route, then the decisions on the local agencies to 100% support light rail and failed to support commuters who would have a massively increased travel time is a negative. This negative will become completely apparent during the first time that the federal link extension shuts down during commute hours.

    I absolutely think that getting rid of the commuter routes, which we don’t have an exact understanding of when this will actually occur next year, but if it occurs before the World Cup then that is going to mean that people who would have used those commuter trips to get into downtown Seattle early in the morning and spend the entire day in Seattle ahead of a World Cup match hey now have to take light rail with all of the commuters when seeing that the 177 or if they’re staying in the billion area the 121 122 and 123 go to Downtown Seattle they will take that versus if they see something that’s longer like the eight line from burien to downtown and they take that and experience a lower than ideal travel experience they may turn around and not want to use King County Metro and when they next come to Seattle.

    I’m still all for light rail but at this point Light Rail is now going to exceed a length at which nobody is going to want to ride for that long and only make it as far as they would make on a 45 to 50 minute bus ride prior to the pandemic.

    The fact that the only commuter route in South King County that we know of that is impacted by the opening of Link light rail to Federal Way that will be maintained is the 193 and it’s still getting a reduction of one round trip a day, this trip only serves Hospital workers and people who work in the vicinity of the hospitals but also doesn’t truly cater to win Hospital workers actually travel since there are Hospital workers that have to be at work at 9:00 p.m. at night and others that have to be at work middle of the day but do they get commuter service no and that’s something we should be advocating for so more Hospital workers who work odd shifts don’t have to worry about driving home when they’ve had a stressful day and they could be overly tired from their work and instead they have a good boss that gets them closer to home where they can relax before they need to drive.

    With that in mind we really need to be advocating for all commuter routes to be maintained even if slight frequency reductions occur due to the fact that we know people will go and take light rail although the minute Light Rail fails to be an alternative to the buses we need the buses there to serve the Riders who no longer have the train in the moment.

    The train will break down at some point and when it does if your commuting from Federal Way to Downtown Seattle and you’re coming off of a shortened 590/594, or starting at Federal Way and you have missed the last 193, your commute has just ballooned to longer than what Link light rail would have taken and a lot of riders are just going to turn around go get their cars leave the garage and drive to downtown Seattle because that’ll be easier than calling out sit or taking the RapidRide A Line up State Route 99 to tukwila and then the 124 from there.

    Let’s advocate hardcore for King County Metro to not delete a single commuter route, and instead reinstate all of them while increasing select routes to have reverse commute trips and for every single First Hill commuter to get reverse commute and bidirectional midday Service as well as seven day a week commuter service because the hospital workers deserve to not have to drive home after a stressful day on the clock.

    1. If you’re talking about the 5XX routes those are under Sound Transit, you may want to focus your messaging there (link below). Sound Transit has not yet said what they will do with the 59X or 57X routes.

       https://www.soundtransit.org/help-contacts

       You might also want to talk to your local representatives, especially those on the board (link below). My impression is that South King and Pierce County officials have been pushing hard for the extension to Tacoma above all else.

       https://www.soundtransit.org/get-to-know-us/board-directors/board-members

    2. I sadly agree that King County Metro shouldn’t delete a single commuter route, because we have seen recently that – for all the fanfare – Link is unreliable and keeps getting cancelled.

       I would love Metro to be able to redirect money to a stronger network. But that depends on Link actually running reliably.

       1. Another note:
          The southern portion of the 1 Line is extremely unreliable for commuters. The commuter buses are much easier to use, unless you’re going further north to Capitol Hill or the UW. On the other hand, the 2 Line was designed much better for commuter connections. The Sounder works but obviously neglects Federal Way and Tacoma… And it only runs during peak hours.

          We need better train tech that follows the most direct corridors connecting major cities. It should be frequent, all day (and driverless). Sounder should be upgraded as well. I-5, I-405, 167, 520, and I-90 all could use this sort of service. If these trains operate at decent speeds and only stop at each city once (ideally at their transit center or freeway station), then buses can easily connect to it without much loss.

          That is obviously impossible to do. So we should keep commuter routes with HOV 3+ lanes, the closest we can get to that level of service.

       2. I have tried multiple ways of getting to downtown from the Renton/Tukwila area. The 101/150 (from Tukwila P&R or Renton TC) are almost always faster than Link from Tukwila Intl. station except during the worst peak hour traffic northbound. For some reason, the Southbound rarely gets crowded (with the only choke point being the SR900 exit from I-5 getting backed up at the traffic signal which affects the 101). Sounder is obviously the fastest, so I think we should be designing Southeast King commuter routes more towards that… Along with Stride/East Link. As for Southwest King… They have no good options except to maintain their commuter bus.

       3. But I’ve also found that 101/150 can actually be quicker than the Sounder too and it serves more places.

    3. If anything we need more commuter routes serving more places including suburbs. And they should be made to be fast and reliable, with high frequency shuttles/DART serving those express buses and transit centers from lower density areas. Commuters cause a lot of the congestion on our freeways and cities, so the investment on commuter buses will help transit.

       1. The core of the issue. Link is too slow and Sounder is too frequent. Both are indirect from Tacoma commuters. Direct express buses give people a peace of mind for commuting. If we had faster, more direct, and more frequent trains, I wouldn’t mind the idea of transfers. But the fact is, if someone living in East Kent wants to get to Seattle, they have to take an hour to get to Link, then another hour up into Seattle. Then they have to navigate the buses within downtown itself. It is a pain! So instead we should have one seat rides that get you to Westlake. Improvements should be made so buses can get through the city streets without getting stuck in traffic.

       2. Those one seat rides should be faster too. Maximum one hour. Unfortunately many of them take much longer. The 101/102/150 for example is a disaster for serving places that aren’t that far from Seattle. Simple infrastructure changes can help the routes but it won’t happen.

       3. Even Canada can do the job better than we can. They’re a car centric country as well, but buses can take you to any major suburb easily. There is no excuse.

       4. @South King Resident, no, Canada does not give one-seat rides from every suburb to downtown. Look at Vancouver – basically every bus connects to Sky Train.

          That said, our connections should absolutely be faster.

       5. I didn’t mean a one seat ride necessarily. But even in King County, a two or three seat ride can’t take you to every suburb. Some suburbs are completely unserved, such as between Covington and Kent Meridian.

Comments are closed.