On the Fourth of July, Everett has a downtown parade, a festival at a waterfront park, fireworks in the evening — and two bus shuttles running every 5 minutes. I used it as an excuse to check out American Legion Memorial Park and the arboretum there in the afternoon.
Everett’s geography has some parallels with West Seattle. It forms a penninsula pointing north like Alki. Marine View Drive runs along the shore in a U shape. The Everett Marina and the naval station are on the west side like Fauntleroy. At the northern tip, Alverson Blvd runs south to American Legion Memorial Park and further to the northwest Everett residential area. From there, Colby Avenue goes south through the residential area to downtown Everett. The park is at the latitude of 1st Street, although there is no 1st Street. At 10th Street is the Everett Marina, the northern part of the residential area, and Everett Community College with a Washington State University Branch. Between 28th and 33rd Streets is downtown Everett. Everett Station is at the southeast corner of this.
This means the park and the marina are three miles away from Everett Station in different directions. The college is two miles from the station.
My roommate and I went to Westlake station at 12:30pm and took the 1 Line to Lynnwood. We transferred to ST Express 512. My friend in north Lynnwood got on the bus at Ash Way P&R. When we got to Everett Station, a multimodal transit hub, the three of us spent a few minutes in the art deco building with real bathrooms. We took ET 7 (Everett Transit route 7) north to Everett College (“College Station”). It runs half-hourly Sundays/holidays. All of our transfers this trip were lucky: we never waited more than ten minutes each.
At the College Station transit center, the festival shuttle was a couple blocks away, with a loud sign saying “FREE SHUTTLE” and a booth. The shuttle was an Everett Transit bus running every 5 minutes from 2:30pm to 9:30pm, and after the fireworks. We arrived ten minutes before it started, and there was a line that filled the bus. There was no parking at the festival, so everybody had to come by shuttle. The shuttle made a one-way loop, going north on Broadway and west on Marine View Drive past the park to a turnaround, then backtracking to the park stop.
The northern part of Alverson Blvd was closed, and the festival booths were on the street. On the west side of the street a linear strip of grass overlooked the shore, looking down from a bluff like at Discovery Park. The music stage was there, and the offshore fireworks in the evening. On the east side of the street was Legion Park. One of the booths was Visit Everett, the city’s tourist board. I was impressed a city so small has such a well organized outreach. My friend in north Lynnwood goes to the Everett library, and says Everett is cooler during summer heat waves. She’ll be able to ask Visit Everett questions when she has them.
The highlight for me was the Evergreen Arboretum inside Legion Park. It’s a 3 1/2 acre arboretum with white gravel paths going through a variety of trees and flowers. We spent an hour walking through it.
Afterward we took the shuttle back to Everett College. There I discovered that at least three ET routes go from the college to Everett Station: 4 (Walnut Street), 7 (Broadway), 19 (Colby Ave). The 7 is half hourly Sundays; the 4 and 19 have irregular frequencies varying between 20-60 minutes.
I chose the 19 on Colby Ave through the northwest residential area, to retrace my North Everett walk in 2015.
If you want to visit the arboretum or Legion Park on a regular day, you can take a bus to Everett College and walk a mile north on Wetmore Ave and Alverson Blvd to it.
This is an open thread.
It’s interesting to compare the 2016 North Everett Walk article and comments to now. Then I said the northwest Everett routes were 4 and 5. I don’t remember exactly where they went. Now there’s the 19, the 5 is gone, and the 4 may be in the same place or further east. Then the WSU branch was under construction, the 512 went to downtown Seattle, and Swift Green (“Swift II”) was still in planning.
Bruce Engelhardt wrote, “I hope that Swift II brings some kind of solution to the 128th Street overpass that can be shared with CT 201/202 (which could be split into two sets of routes at Everett Station to avoid these kinds of problems).” Did it?
Routes 4, 7, 19, and 29 serve College Station. CT 201/202 has an on-Broadway stop pairing by the college.
CT has already approved funding for construction of the Swift Gold Line terminal stop at Everett Station (which I presume will be next to the Blue Swift Line terminal stop). I have no idea whether they conferred with ST where the Everett Light Rail Station will end up, and what that will do to the sprawly bus transfer facility.
The 201/202 also has a stop on Pacific Ave, the restaurant row north of Angel of the Winds Arena. The Gold Line will add a stop pairing shared with the Blue Line downtown, for the quickest transfer and at the expense of travel time for everyone else traveling between Everett Station and points further north.
What are the pedestrian connections to Everett’s waterfront across the railroad tracks now? I saw two on the map. Bruce in 2016 mentioned a Grand Avenue Park pedestrian bridge under construction, which must be one of them.
It looks like you can take ET 6 from Everett Station to the marina. Where is the best part of the waterfront? Right at the 6’s terminus? What’s worth looking for on the waterfront?
The Grand Ave. park bridge is done, and is worth exploring. ET6 also works, but it runs once an hour, and takes multiple detours, so it’s a slow bus, even when nobody is on it.
Once you’re at the Everett Transit waterfront, the big attraction is the ferry to Jetty Island, with park trails covering the island.
The ferry route is also short enough that one could probably kayak across if you don’t want to wait for the ferry.
https://www.theurbanist.org/2025/07/10/federal-way-light-rail-extension-on-track-for-early-opening/
Federal way link might open later this year
June ridership data for Link is now available on the ST website.
Despite all the service interruptions, both the 1-Line and the 2-Line showed solid month-to-month ridership gains, with 1-Link ridership now at 109,000 daily boardings. That is solid!
Total Link ridership is now 42% ABOVE its 2019 level. Some of that is obviously due to system expansion, but it is still excellent news.
It will be really interesting to see clean ridership data once all these scheduled service interruptions are complete. It’s only going to get better.
Can’t wait.
Do you happen to know what daily 2 line ridership was?
@Liam,
8506. Up 24% from May.
That is a solid gain. And it is without the ridership boost that May got from looky loos just checking out the new system.
In other words, this is real usage for transit purposes.
Good news all around.
Hurrah!
I’m not surprised that Downtown Redmond hugely boosted the 2-line; it’s a walkable destination that people want to go to! For the first time ever, Downtown Redmond and Downtown Bellevue have fast transit connecting them every ten minutes!
(Well, when it’s running, but that’s another issue.)
@William C,
The Eastside has never before had fast, reliable, and frequent transit service between DT Redmond and DT Bellevue. It is an absolute game changer for the Eastside. And just imagine what will happen happen when DT Seattle gets tied in.
Now if Bellevue can just solve their wire theft problem.
“Total Link ridership is now 42% ABOVE its 2019 level. Some of that is obviously due to system expansion,…”
And there are now 106% more Link stations than there were in 2029. So boardings per station is actually down.
Looking at just 1 Line, there are 44% more stations but only 32% more riders. That’s also a lower boarding total per station.
The data in the survey provides same station boardings between 2019 and 2025. When looking at same station boardings of those opened in 2019, the increase looks flat to dropping for those stations — except for the three southernmost ones. That is where an increase has occurred. Some of that appears to be increasing SeaTac airport station “shuttling” to the adjacent stations. I’ve heard anecdotally that the South King Link stations are busier and that parking is tight. SeaTac boardings are now way ahead of Capitol Hill boardings (the #2 and #3 busiest stations); before Lynnwood Link opening, Capitol Hill was busier. Federal Way Link opening seems like it could be quite timely.
Anyway, except for SeaTac/South King, the entire increase appears to be instead mostly due to the opening of new stations and deliberate bus route changes forcing riders onto Link — and not some enticing behavioral change. In contrast, SeaTac boardings are notably up 113% from 2019 but there haven’t been any new stations opened south of UW since 2019 — and that does suggest a big behavioral change.
@Al S,
“And there are now 106% more Link stations than there were in 2029. So boardings per station is actually down.”
Yes, but so what?
As Link expands into more suburban areas of course the new stations will get lower ridership. Nobody should ever expect a station like North Shoreline/185th St to get the same daily boardings as Capital Hill Station or Westlake Station. But that doesn’t mean that North Shoreline Station isn’t a valuable station, or that it won’t generate a significant amount of ridership later in the systems life. Because it only gets better from here.
Additionally, these new stations offer other benefits. My sister-in-law used to take a bus from Shoreline to NGS and then transfer to Link. Now she has a station in her neighborhood and can completely skip the bus. So more stations, yet her ridership on Link is the same. And she doesn’t have to take an Uber as often. And that is a good thing.
But having ridership be 42% above pre-pandemic ridership is still awesome. No matter how you slice it, a 42% gain is still a huge accomplishment.
And boardings per station isn’t a real transit metric anyhow.
Yes, exactly. The three southern stations have seen an increase. That’s about it. This is striking given the massive expansion. For example Pioneer Square Station ridership is down. The city has grown quite a bit since 2019. Almost all of the buses that used to go to Pioneer Square from the north have been replaced by Link. Buses that used to carry tens of thousands of riders have been replaced by Link. Ridership at the southern suburbs have actually increased as well. Yet ridership at Pioneer Square is down.
It isn’t just downtown. Consider Columbia City. While not a major destination it is quite reasonable to assume that plenty of riders want to go from places like Northgate and the U-District to Columbia City. Many want to then transfer to get to the V. A. or some other place further south. Yet ridership there is down.
It is not all doom-and-gloom. Capitol Hill ridership is up. Unlike a lot of stations, there are a lot of people taking advantage of this important improvement. The problem is that so little of Link serves places like this. So many of the stations to the north are geared towards downtown commuters that simply aren’t commuting anymore.
“Nobody should ever expect a station like North Shoreline/185th St to get the same daily boardings as Capital Hill Station or Westlake Station. “
North Shoreline is getting lots fewer boardings than even Rainier Beach. It’s even less than half the boardings that Columbia City, Mt Baker and Othello have — all modest stations with no parking garages.
Granted the TOD has not yet evolved. Still, I have no problem saying that a Link station should have a minimum number of boardings in principle.
And the low Shoreline station boardings don’t bode well for the Pinehurst boarding data next year.
But having ridership be 42% above pre-pandemic ridership is still awesome. No matter how you slice it, a 42% gain is still a huge accomplishment.
Yes, but that is merely because of the massive expansion. The ONLY reason there are more riders is because there was a huge expansion. For trips that existed before (e. g. Beacon Hill to Westlake) ridership remains well below 2019.
And boardings per station isn’t a real transit metric anyhow.
Sure it is! So is ridership per mile. In both cases it is down despite finally completing the core part of our system (U-District to downtown).
@Al S,
“North Shoreline is getting lots fewer boardings than even Rainier Beach”
LOL. Shoreline North/185th Station hasn’t even been open for a full year yet, while Rainier Beach Station has been open for about 16 years! And already Shoreline North/185th Station is generating 60% of the ridership of the much more “mature” RBS. That is pretty darn good and bodes well for the future or Shoreline North/185th Station.
But hey, I think we can all agree that Potemkin Station at 130th is an unmitigated disaster and should never have been built. But it was built for political reasons and not transit reasons. Rogoff needed to buy an endorsement for ST3 from a certain politician, and Potemkin Station was the price. It’s a monument to dysfunctional politics.
They should rename it “Rogoff Station”.
Nobody should ever expect a station like North Shoreline/185th St to get the same daily boardings as Capital Hill Station or Westlake Station.
You are missing the point. Imagine we never expanded. Clearly ridership would be well below what it was in 2019. The ONLY reason that Link has more riders from before the pandemic is because of the expansion.
But there is more. Northgate Link was huge (as expected). Those three stations carried well over 20,000 riders before Lynnwood Link. If we just stopped there (and didn’t build Lynnwood Link) I have no doubt that ridership would be very similar to what it is now. Those three stations are the ONLY reason that Link has as much ridership as it did in 2019.
Now consider Lynnwood Link. That helped as well, but not that much. Just look at the seven stations from Lynnwood to the U-District (inclusive). You can select them via the dashboard. Now sort by average boardings by day. As expected the month with the highest ridership is after Lynnwood Link. But you can also see that various months in the top ten are from before Lynnwood Link was added. For those seven stations the second best month was July of 2023 — before four of the stations even existed! Of the top ten routes, most are from before Lynnwood Link even existed.
Of course Lynnwood Link was a welcome addition. It most definitely saved a significant number of riders a significant amount of time. But it didn’t add to Link ridership very much and most likely it didn’t add to transit ridership much (if at all). We have spent an enormous amount of money during the pandemic. This includes building Northgate Link — a hugely important expansion. Yet overall transit ridership is still way down. Other than Northgate Link we just aren’t spending our money wisely.
Shoreline North/185th Station hasn’t even been open for a full year yet
… But hey, I think we can all agree that Potemkin Station at 130th is an unmitigated disaster
So let me get this straight. 185th station gets a free pass because it hasn’t been open a full year and yet Pinehurst Station is an unmitigated disaster even though it isn’t even open. Wow. It is rare to read such a ridiculous and contradictory argument. Apparently 185th needs a decade before it can fully realize its full potential but the deadline for Pinehurst station is several months before it opens.
As for these stations you are missing the big picture here. From a ridership standpoint, Lynnwood Link can currently be considered a failure. It costs billions to run rail up there and yet overall ridership *on Link* hasn’t changed much. At best you can argue that at least those riders saved a lot of time (which is what you did).
But more importantly if you are going to run rail to Lynnwood then of course you have stations along the way. Stations are cheap compared to running rail. 185th Station may be a disappointment but you sure as hell build it. Same goes for Pinehurst. It is ridiculous to suggest otherwise.
Total Link ridership is now 42% ABOVE its 2019 level. Some of that is obviously due to system expansion, but it is still excellent news.
Some of it? More like all of it. Very few of the stations that existed before 2019 have higher ridership, despite the enormous expansion. Northgate Link was huge (and misnamed). They finally had trains from the U-District to downtown. This is what they should have started with, but better late than never. But it also came with major bus truncations. Pretty much every Metro and Sound Transit express bus from the north end was truncated at a Link station. Riders had to switch from buses like the 41 and 522 to Link. Lynnwood Link was the cherry on top. It meant that even the Community Transit buses stopped going to downtown. Riders were forced to ride Link whether they wanted to or not. Of course this led to an increase in transit ridership.
But overall ridership has gone done. This is striking. The numbers are for unlinked trips. This means they don’t look at whether someone is just making a transfer. If someone switches from taking an express bus to downtown but is now taking a bus then Link there would be an overall increase in “ridership”. Instead of counting one ride they count two (one for the bus, one for the train). Yet even with this major expansion that is clearly added a ton of extra transfers, overall ridership is still way down.
There are a number of reasons for this. COVID and working from home is one of the big ones. But various agencies across the world have recovered and are stronger than ever. But we aren’t, despite continued population growth. It isn’t just sprawl, either. The urban areas are adding the most people. Seattle added the most people per area. The dense areas are adding the most density. Since the relationship between density and transit ridership is not linear but exponential, this should be adding a lot of riders. Yet this improvement in density and major expansion isn’t enough to even make it look like we have more than before the pandemic, let alone actually have more riders.
The budget cuts to Metro and driver shortage are probably the biggest problem. The loss of funding in Seattle (due to the STBD changes) probably had the biggest impact. Seattle has always carried a high portion of the riders and a lot of bus routes remain underfunded. The planners could do a better job but it is hard to argue that the routing is worse — it just isn’t as good as it should be.
But ST isn’t innocent either. Building a massively expensive subway system focused on suburban commuters was always a bad idea. Now it is worse. Given the cost and mileage of Link it should be carrying around 250,000 people right now. But it isn’t, and that’s because it is aimed at the wrong thing. It is getting farther and farther away from the core, replacing trips that were pretty fast to begin with (and have been disproportionately replaced by working at home). At the same time, the trips within the urban core — the ones that always have the greatest potential for riders — are barely covered by Link. Instead it is up to the buses — often caught in traffic — to carry the load.
Which brings up another guilty party: SDOT. While the work on the RapidRide G is clearly flawed (as I wrote in a sloppy essay well before it happened) at least they made some key improvements. Yet various corridors — like Denny — remain largely unchanged. It isn’t that they are focused on the wrong thing — they just haven’t kept up. This goes back to ST as well. If ST was in the process of building a “Metro 8 Subway” or even a half-ass gondola then you could excuse the folks in charge for ignoring one of the key corridors in the region. But instead ST is busy trying to get trains to Fife while SDOT barely has enough money to add a few BAT lanes on Westlake (which, to be fair, are most welcome).
Which leads to one of the biggest culprits: balkanization. These various agencies aren’t cooperating well at all. There is no holistic vision for transit in the region — or if there is it is poorly thought out with the wrong priorities. There is this assumption that Metro and SDOT will just magically build a great system in the city despite major funding issues. While at the same time ST is spending way too much on much smaller problems. There is this ridiculous notion that all we need to do is just build enough light rail and everything will be great. But unless you believe the ridiculous maps being put out by Seattle Subway, the vast majority of riders will take the bus just as they do in freakin’ Vancouver! Think about that for a second. Vancouver has a much better subway system than Seattle. Even when the dust settles and we will have spent more money on a subway line than any city our size we won’t have anywhere near the ridership of what SkyTrain has right now. Yet more people ride the buses in Vancouver than SkyTrain! That’s because their system is integrated. When they build the rail line they are thinking about the buses. They are focused on the urban core with their subway even though it works quite well for the more distant suburbs. The two go together. Not everyone from the suburbs is heading to downtown. In Vancouver someone can take a train into the city and then take another train somewhere else. Or they can transfer to a bus that runs quickly and frequently. Our buses do neither because we have focused on the wrong things.
The only thing that makes me optimistic is the increasing number of people who seem to get it. Gone are the days when the first priority in the city was cars. Plenty of people want the city to do more even though the last couple of years — under a conservative mayor and a reactionary city council — have seen some excellent improvements. A lot of people are realizing that while Link remains essential, ST3 is not. It will help, of course, but improvements to the bus system will be more important if we want a good transit system. Whether that happens or not (and whether we switch the direction with ST3) remains to be seen.
The low ridership at Pioneer Square cab be attributed to vacated buildings and holes in the ground waiting for construction permits.
It is not just Pioneer Square. Overall ridership at the four downtown stations is still below what it was from before the pandemic. This is despite the massive expansion to the north, Link replacing buses and an increase in population in the city.
Yes, Pioneer Square is pulling the average down, but Westlake is still king at 382k boardings for June.
SeaTac is not far behind. It has been awhile since I’ve heard the 1 Line belittled as the train to the airport.
The shuttle could have had a much shorter route by going up Wetmore/Alverson to the other end of the festival. That would also have put the stop right near the Legion Park entrance rather than blocks away. So why didn’t it? To travel on highways? Because residents would have complained about a bus every few minutes?
“we can all agree that Potemkin Station at 130th is an unmitigated disaster and should never have been built.”
You know several people here disagree with that because we’ve debated it several times. You may be the only one with that position, and especially the only one so insistent on it. Even if it’s a mediocre station, it’s hard to see how it can be as bad or unused as Star Lake or Boeing Access.
“Rogoff needed to buy an endorsement for ST3 from a certain politician”
It wasn’t just that politician, it was transit fans. Councilmember Juarez was just following transit best practices.
I wouldn’t call Pinehurst station a “disaster” but I will be stunned if it gets even 1000 average weekday boardings. At least the Shoreline Link stations have more feeder buses as well as adjacent parking garages. Finally, the City of Seattle hasn’t proposed massive TOD strategy to compensate for the lack of density or connectivity there — so I am expecting that the station will not grow ridership much over time. I’d merely call it relatively unproductive and a time waster for Snohomish residents who ride Link.
Pinehurst Station gives two whole urban villages the quickest access to Link. Lake City is the fifth largest in Seattle and a likely regional center candidate when the governments get their act together. As it grows, it will be good that Pinehurst Station is already there to absorb the ridership increase, encourage residents to be more transit-oriented, and attract people who want to live in a large walkable village with Link access.
Even a modest TOD strategy around the station is worthwhile. It can always be expanded later. Future councils are more likely to be more open to density, not less. They’ll have to as the population increases and demand for housing gets more acute, as people get more alarmed about climate change, and as driving gets more irritating and expensive and congested.
“as people get more alarmed about climate change”
What does this have to do with climate change?
Heat waves and extreme events will continue to get worse. I think eventually a critical mass will get alarmed enough to overcome the political blockages in addressing it. We’ll then be glad Pinehurst station is already done so that people on both sides of 130th can get to Link more conveniently.
There will be development around Pinehurst Station despite the foot dragging by the council and Harrell. This is a map of what they currently propose: https://www.theurbanist.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Pinehurst-Center-revision-spring-2025.jpg. The dotted line is the latest revision. The Urbanist has an article about how the city is being way more conservative than what the neighborhood wants (https://www.theurbanist.org/2025/05/23/harrell-chops-off-dozens-of-city-blocks-from-planned-growth-centers/). Even so, there is potential for growth close to the station. The biggest weakness is that a lot of the land close to the station can’t be developed. That is true of every station in Lynnwood Link. Lynnwood Link was not designed to maximize walk-up ridership. Obviously.
I understand that an infill station 130th is possible because the line is elevated, but it’s crazy that 130th and 145th stations are so close together with poor walksheds in low density areas when Capital Hill and UW stations are three times further apart and First Hill and Belltown got shafted.
We really need to redevelop Jackson Park. So much potential there.
We tried to get 130th and 155th instead of 148th, but ST refused to budge on 148th. There’s no point in pitting 130th and First Hill against each other: omitting 130th would not make First Hill happen. We tried again to get First Hill with DSTT2 (at 8th & Madison) but ST said no again.
The two stations are not close together. It is a long walk between them: https://maps.app.goo.gl/EiXD7W1T2ErJrwps9. They serve different transit corridors. Imagine a future bus on 130th. Do you really think someone is going to walk that far to catch Link? From a practical standpoint they are in two different worlds.
The walkshed is poor because Link was built next to the freeway in the north end. All the stations north of Roosevelt have poor walksheds. The best you can hope for is good connections from the east and west (as part of a good network). That is the case with the Pinehurst Station. The east-west corridor is strong.
Yes, Capitol Hill and UW stations are too far apart. This is well known. But that doesn’t mean that we should make the same mistake elsewhere. Same goes for First Hill or Belltown being shafted.
There is definitely a good case that we should have built stations at First Hill, Belltown, 23rd & Madison and a lot of other places before we built Lynnwood Link. But that misses the point. If you are going to build a train line to Lynnwood then it makes sense to add stations along the way — including one at 130th (or 125th if it had been further east — it is the same corridor).
It is always worth looking at Vancouver when it comes to transit. They are a model for cities like ours. The Canada Line is a great example for this part of the network. The line runs north-south while buses run east-west. There are stations at just about every major east-west corridor. Sometimes that means the stations are fairly far apart (Marine Drive to 49th). Other times they are fairly close together (41st to 49th). So be it. Again, the big difference is that Link follows the freeway, while the Canada Line does not.
Mike is right. The 148th Station should have been on 155th. It would have been better for the buses and would have have been a bit better in terms of potential walkshed.
> I understand that an infill station 130th is possible because the line is elevated, but it’s crazy that 130th and 145th stations are so close together with poor walksheds in low density areas when Capital Hill and UW stations are three times further apart and First Hill and Belltown got shafted.
It’s the downside with tbm that people kinda skip over sometimes. The deep tunnel means mining a station for them is very expensive
A bit off topic but 220th street is one extra infill place link has planned for a station
My issue isn’t so much that they are too close, but that there isn’t a critical destination density within the half mile walkshed of the Pinehurst station.
Lake City in particular is almost a mile away. So is Aurora Ave. To say that the station serves them is like saying that South Bellevue Link serves Factoria or UW Station serves U Village or Westlake Station serves South Lake Union or Pioneer Square Station serves Harborview. It rings hollow to me —especially when other Metro routes combine to offer better frequency to Northgate and other Link stations. People will tend to board the first bus headed to Link. Even the planned Route 77 turns at 125th and will run several blocks south of major Lake city destinations like Fred Meyer.
It’s not like how Seattle could redevelop public housing projects in SE Seattle or create stadiums south of Downtown. The area around Pinehurst station is half taken up by freeway and golf courses, and half by mostly single family residences who would oppose heavy densification.
We are at the point that we will probably just have to expect low ridership for now. To do anything major won’t happen for at least a decade if not two or three decades. Probably the only viable way to add riders at this point is to encourage frequent free shuttles to serve it — like to NW Hospital. It would be bold to eliminate or reduce the golf course footprint — but that looks too politically difficult to me.
“Lake City in particular is almost a mile away. So is Aurora Ave. To say that the station serves them is like saying that South Bellevue Link serves Factoria or UW Station serves U Village or Westlake Station serves South Lake Union or Pioneer Square Station serves Harborview.”
It doesn’t serve them directly, but having it is a lot better for them. It makes the difference in how much time overhead the neighborhood has to get to a regional transfer point. That in turn affects how much transit riders are willing to live/work/shop in those neighborhoods; i.e., how much those neighborhoods can contribute to the non-car housing solution.
Factoria is actually in a similar position with South Bellevue Station. It’s better to have it than not. With it, Factoria has access to the 2 Line running every 10 minutes to downtown Seattle, downtown Bellevue, Redmond, and beyond, immune from traffic congestion. Without it, Factoria has route 550 running every 15 minutes weekdays/Saturdays, 30 minutes Sundays/evenings, and stuck in bridge traffic and less reliable.
Even if Metro has a bad route 77 that doesn’t fully leverage the station for Lake City, that’s not the station’s fault it’s possible for Metro to reroute the 75 to it in the future. I don’t think those other routes will be more frequent than the 77, and frequency can change in a couple years. People can’t just “take the first bus” as easily when the different routes stop at different blocks with intersections between them. That puts more pressure to choose a route ahead of time.
My issue isn’t so much that they are too close, but that there isn’t a critical destination density within the half mile walkshed of the Pinehurst station.
That is true for just about everything north of Northgate if not north of Roosevelt. It is also true of stations like Mercer Island. The vast majority of riders will arrive by bus. It is about the network.
Of course it is better if you have a network *and* you serve good destinations along the way. The stations at Roosevelt and the U-District do that. They connect to buses but a lot of people also walk to the station. But since Lynnwood Link followed the freeway this is what we are left with. What exactly are you suggesting Al, that we shouldn’t have built Lynnwood Link? That we run the trains up there but without any stations?
People will tend to board the first bus headed to Link.
And what bus is that, Al? Seriously, here is a trip from a bus stop in Bitter Lake — where there clearly is density — to Capitol Hill Station: https://maps.app.goo.gl/SSDPBxtWxhUqur5B8. The trip starts at noon. At best you get there a little before 1:00 pm. Link is largely irrelevant despite being only about a mile away. The only option involving Link is to take a bus that goes to Northgate Way but has to loop around 92nd to get there. Wait, sorry, there is one more option which is to take the E Line all the way downtown and then ride Link back north. So I guess I should say Lynnwood Link is irrelevant.
Why? Because there is no station there. Despite being half way in between the two biggest destinations in north Seattle (each bigger than anything in Shoreline, Mountlake Terrace or even Lynnwood) there is no station. Obviously there should be.
Look at another way. Imagine we could do Lynnwood Link over again. Our argument is pretty simple: Go up Aurora. This would serve Bitter Lake as well as similar areas along the way. You would probably have stations about a half mile apart (typical for a subway line).
But of course, ST decided to go via the freeway. OK then. Since we are going by the freeway, lets get rid of all the stations. What? That makes no sense. The whole point of going by the freeway was to save money. Now you want to destroy functionality entirely by getting rid of stations at the cross-streets? Bitter Lake is much worse off without a station there and yet you want to make things even worse for them? Seriously? Just to save money *on top of* the money you saved by running by the freeway. Hey, let’s save a lot of money and just not have any stations!
“People can’t just “take the first bus” as easily when the different routes stop at different blocks with intersections between them. That puts more pressure to choose a route ahead of time.”
Let me give you a specific Lake City example, Ross. Let’s say you are on 125th and want to go to Downtown Seattle. The 125th St stop (almost certainly the same stop) will have both Routes 75 and 77 westbound. Route 75 will go down 125th and turn south to head to Northgate Stetion . Route 77 will go down 125th and jog northwest to go by Pinehurst Station. They both will run at 15 minutes.
While some people may wait for their preferred route, many others will simply get on whichever bus comes first. They know that the Northgate bus takes longer to get to Link but they also know that riding Link from Pinehurst takes a little extra time so they don’t perceive that one is not that much different than the other in terms of travel time, especially if there is a few minute extra wait in Lake City for the Pinehurst bus. And on bad weather days, the first bus is particularly attractive to board!
I’ve lived this similar situation for 16 years of my life. I watched my neighbors commute every weekday too. Most took the first bus that came along even though the two bus routes went to different rail stations — one faster to its train station but with a longer train ride. .
Now let’s talk about that return trip from Link to Lake City. If I get off at Northgate, I’ll have both Route 75 and 61 to get to Lake City. If I get off at Pinehurst, I only have a Route 77 unless I want to walk a mile. That’s 4 buses an hour from Pinehurst and 8 buses an hour from Northgate. While Pinehurst will be a shorter bus ride by a few minutes, Northgate has twice as many buses an hour to catch to get to Lake City.
Real time arrival apps can influence this behavior. Riders will probably check the next bus arrival on their phones to see if they can catch the fastest route. But if it looks risky that they’ll miss the next bus they’ll choose the least risky path.
@Al S,
“ Lake City in particular is almost a mile away. So is Aurora Ave. To say that the station serves them is like saying that South Bellevue Link serves Factoria”
You are correct. Defending Potemkin Station at 130th on the grounds that it serves these distant neighborhoods is a joke.
Ya, a small number of people might find 130th to be slightly more convenient, but most of those riders would have boarded Link at 148th or Northgate anyhow. This is precisely why the original ST ridership analysis showed zero (0.0) net new riders added to the system via a 130th St Station. $240 million dollars is a lot of money to spend on a zero.
And even Metro seems to think the station is a loser. One bus at barely 15 min headways? Ya, that will really change the world. But with zero bus infrastructure at the station I guess they had no choice.
And the site is hemmed in on all but one side by parks, freeways and wetlands, so not very developable.
And no parking structure either. What’s a car dependent commuter from Pinehurst supposed to do?
But hey, at least the land is cheap near the station. So maybe the city can find a way to shoehorn in some homeless housing and services.
Let’s say you are on 125th and want to go to Downtown Seattle. The 125th St stop (almost certainly the same stop) will have both Routes 75 and 77 westbound. Route 75 will go down 125th and turn south to head to Northgate Stetion .
But it shouldn’t! Come on, Al. You are talking about a clear error with the routing as a reason why the station is somehow redundant. That is just silly. Send the 75 to Bitter Lake and you don’t need that part of the 77. That is one of the keys to this station. Riders get to Link faster while you build a better network. But even with the poor routing there are clearly places where riders will use this because it saves them time. What part of this don’t you understand: https://maps.app.goo.gl/SSDPBxtWxhUqur5B8
You (and Lazarus) keep missing the point here. Every argument against Pinehurst Station applies to every station in Lynnwood Link. Consider 148th. It has very little potential for walk-up ridership. There was basically no development until very recently. Only one bus served it, an infrequent 347. The bus stop nearest the station averaged one rider a day. That’s right, one. The 347, like all the buses in the area, served other stations. Riders could always take a bus to Northgate or the UW — whatever comes first, right? There is really no need to build a station, let alone extend a bus route like the 65 to the station. There is nothing there.
Thankfully, they ignored such advice. On average, 260 riders take the 65 to that station. Other buses deliver another 450 riders. Despite some very flawed routing, it still saves those riders quite a bit of time versus the alternative.
You can’t have it both ways. You can’t argue that Pinehurst Station is not worth it without also saying Lynnwood Link isn’t worth it. You can’t build an extension without stations. On the other hand it is pretty easy to argue that while Lynnwood Link itself was not a great value, adding each individual station was. If anything, they should add more (e. g. 220th).
@Lazarus
We all agree that building on aurora avenue would have more density, weren’t you the same one that argued we can infill along i-5 more? if that is true than what exactly is wrong with the pinehurst station
> And no parking structure either. What’s a car dependent commuter from Pinehurst supposed to do?
I’m not sure why you keep thinking this a strong argument. It’s not like the shoreline north, south or mountlake terrace stations have high ridership with their parking garages. sure lynnwood has ridership from some commercial and being the end station but the other three are at ~1.3k ridership per day.
You can’t argue for both placing the lynnwood link along i-5 saying we’ll infill and then saying we should build no stations.
“You are talking about a clear error with the routing as a reason why the station is somehow redundant. That is just silly…. What part of this don’t you understand“
Hey don’t blame me that Metro already adopted the route network! I’m smart enough to know that the route network has been adopted, and isn’t going to change before the station opens! And don’t summarily tell me that I don’t “understand” when I explain that this is how a rider can easily think given the adopted bus network plans and you have not!
And I’m not saying that the station is “redundant”. I’m simply saying that it’s going to have a lousy number of boardings — partly because Lake City bus riders will have several decent choices to connect to Link if they want so they won’t always use Pinehurst.
Isn’t having several route choices the outcome of a great network in the first place? Of course it is! You often extol the flexibility of this when recommending a grid network! Most riders are not obsessive and will be flexible in realtime about what bus they take. And half the time those Lake City riders will still take Route 77 to Pinehurst in this scenario. It just won’t be all of them. Depending on how the actual bus arrival schedules get offset it could be more or it could be less than half the time.
And there are other places along Route 77 where there won’t be this kind of flexibility. Those riders will rely on Route 77.
But the fact remains that the station will likely have low ridership. Little of what’s been done so far will significantly increase it. And summarily throwing insults at me doesn’t change the Pinehurst situation.
Finally a note about comparing the other four Lynnwood Link stations to this one. The other four have large parking garages for riders. The other four are served by more than one bus route, including some that are trunk routes that have higher frequencies and ridership. Three of the other four already have hundreds of apartments or hotel rooms near the stations. Two have nearby retail destinations. There has been a much bigger effort made to create station demand at these other locations and yet it’s still week at three of them. The efforts at Pinehurst Station pale in comparison — and that can only mean much lower ridership than the other Lynnwood Link stations are currently getting.
@Wesley Lin,
Of course I support more development around the station areas. Who wouldn’t?
But this is exactly one of the problems with Potemkin Station at 130th. It has the least amount of developable land of any station in the entire ST network!
All the stations along the freeway have some undeveloped land, but Potemkin Station is the worst. You have the freeway, the golf course to the NE, the park to the SW, and the wetland/natural area to the East. And a church immediately adjacent to the east.
Additionally the station is minimalist. No bus infrastructure, no ped bridge over the freeway. It’s horrible.
I get it that most people on this blog don’t have a background in the hard engineering disciplines, but at least people should get out and see the reality on the ground.
This is a horrible place for a station. And the data backed that up.
> I get it that most people on this blog don’t have a background in the hard engineering disciplines, but at least people should get out and see the reality on the ground.
@Lazarus you repeatedly advocate for the worst performing variant ridership of rail transit freeway-running only and focusing on park-and-rides garages. Why don’t you look at how badly the dallas rail transit is or other’s that did the freeway + park & ride only model. If sound transit had followed your advice we’d have a very awful freeway with park and rides only rail system. with the poor ridership it’d likely running every 20/30 minutes as well.
There’s a reason why sound transit does not follow your advice.
> Additionally the station is minimalist… no ped bridge over the freeway. It’s horrible.
Shoreline south station needed a pedestrian bridge because it was poorly sited north of the 145th street at 148th instead. pinehurst station didn’t need it because it is placed just nort of 130th street
> No bus infrastructure
We’ve been over this like 40 times already. you don’t need bus layover if the bus is passing through. Are you going to say wilburton station is awful because it doesn’t have a bus layover.
> Finally a note about comparing the other four Lynnwood Link stations to this one. The other four have large parking garages for riders.
I think perhaps both of y’all should actually check density maps / google maps briefly. The other 3 stations of mountlake terrace, shoreline north and shoreline south sure they have like one or two infill apartment complexes built/being built. but if you look at the rest of their east-west road there’s not much else. If you look at NE 125th street there is much more housing.
Next to greenwood there’s apartments, then in pinehurst and then again at lake city. and there’s also retail at on aurora avenue.
In the previous article https://seattletransitblog.com/2025/01/16/exploring-better-density-maps-and-link-station-areas/ also checked the density map and overlayed it with the 77 bus route in green. https://i0.wp.com/seattletransitblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/Screenshot-2024-08-20-at-11.44.47%E2%80%AFPM-copy-2.png
That is also why king county metro had the 77 extended west past the station to reach the apartments over on greenwood ave/ 130th street.
> Three of the other four already have hundreds of apartments or hotel rooms near the stations
We can also just check the density maps directly.
If you look at Shoreline north along n 185 th street yes there’s the one kinect apartment but then there’s nothing else nearby it’s just single family homes. same for shoreline south. it’s just 2k people per square km
Around Mountlake Terrace it’s a bit better . it is higher around ballinger way/ 19th ave at 3k but that is also around 4000 feet away as well.
For the along 130th street, around aurora avenue its 4.5k per sq km. around 15th avenue it is also at 4k per sq. then over at lake city 125th street it 5k
https://www.arcgis.com/apps/mapviewer/index.html?layers=38b7672a1977426caa6cf4c62e37b777
@Wesly Lin,
“ and focusing on park-and-rides garages. ”
As I have stated repeatedly, Potemkin Station at 130th fails on essentially all available transit metrics, not just on parking. Please look at the entirety of my comments.
Ridership due to parking is relatively small at all these “suburban like” stations. That is obvious. And, yes, I have seen the data.
But parking is also the most obvious omission to the transit uninformed. And it is also the omission that is most likely to greater the loudest complaining once this station opens.
Mark my words. When Potemkin Station at 130th opens, people will complain loudest about parking.
@Wesley Lin,
“ For the along 130th street, around aurora avenue its 4.5k per sq km. around 15th avenue it is also at 4k per sq. then over at lake city 125th street it 5k”
Nothing you cite is within the 1/2 traditional walkshed for a station. And nothing you cite is unique to 130th St Station. 148th St Station and 185th St stations are almost identical distances from Aurora and 15th.
And you really need to get out and see these areas with your own eyes. Ya, 185th has Kinect open and ready for business, but it also has an even more massive apartment building under construction just across the street. And one scheduled to go in across the street to the north of that. And a massive apartment in North City proper right in the edge of the 1/2 mile walkshed.
And what is happening at 148th is even more impressive. Absolutely awesome (if you like TOD).
Honestly, get out and see these places with your own eyes. It’s the best way to learn.
So let me get this straight Lazarus. You think Sound Transit made a huge mistake but you think Metro routing is perfect. (Nothing contradictory there, I just find it odd that someone who normally praises ST and denigrates Metro suddenly does the opposite).
You think the original ridership estimates were correct but the more recent ones are not. You keep claiming there is some “data” to support your argument but you fail to link to it. When WL presents data you dismiss it, and say we should “get out and see these places with your own eyes”.
You think that 185th Station will eventually get a lot more ridership (it “hasn’t even been open for a full year yet”) but Pinehurst Station “is an unmitigated disaster” even though it isn’t open yet. You claim that the area the station is “not very developable” for having the same characteristics as other stations (“parks, freeways and wetlands”).
You claim that parking is necessary (” What’s a car dependent commuter from Pinehurst supposed to do?”) then turn around and say it isn’t that important.
You have trouble even writing the correct name for the station or referencing it by the cross street. You resort to name calling as if this somehow bolsters your argument.
You don’t think the station is needed because most of those riders would have taken a bus to a different station but the station at 185th is great because someone you know finds it more convenient than riding a bus to Northgate.
You completely ignore the main argument we have made repeatedly, which is that it improves the transit network. Yes, of course riders can take other buses to other stations. That is true of every station in Lynnwood Link. But the network will be better with the station even if it takes Metro a while to fully take advantage of it.
Your arguments are contradictory, absurd and insulting.
I want to say more about transit networks. There are some big advantages to grids, as explained here. It is no coincidence that Vancouver BC has extraordinarily high transit ridership and what Walker calls “an almost perfect grid”. Having a cost-effective, fast, frequent system that allows for anywhere-to-anywhere travel is ideal, and Vancouver’s ridership reflects that.
Of course you can’t always create a grid. Natural and unnatural obstacles exist. But the more “grid like” your system, the better. You also want your mass transit system to enhance the grid. You want the routes to be as “grid like” as possible while also connecting to a station. To do that the stations are best placed at key intersections. They can be placed in other places as well but if you don’t have a station at a key intersection the buses are forced to go out of their way to connect to the station.
An example of a good station placement is Roosevelt Station. It is on a major junction. The 522 approaches it from the northwest and ends nearby. Every day (on average) over 700 riders get off the 522 at Roosevelt Station. The 67 also approaches it from the north and it keeps going, to the U-District. About 250 riders from the 67 use the bus stop closest to the station. It also works for east-west travel. About 350 riders take a 62 bus from the east and 250 from the west. All of this possible while retaining a “grid like” network. None of the buses have to detour to serve the station.
In contrast, consider Northgate Station. It does not sit on a major corridor. It is not even on the street grid. You can’t go directly east or west from the station. You have to go north or south. Various buses detour to the station because it is considered essential to serve it. This makes life miserable for riders who aren’t heading to a Link station. Every day, thousands of people ride buses that pass by Roosevelt Station (or similar stations like the U-District) and it doesn’t delay them one second. Meanwhile, riders heading across town have extremely long delays.
For example, consider this trip. It starts at Lake City — a major transit hub with buses that head on 8 different corridors. It ends at a cluster of apartments on Greenwood. Note that Google gives you six different options — none of them good. The one that is fastest (at that hour) involves taking the bus all the way down to Northgate, then riding the train back up to 145th, then catching an infrequent (half hour) bus from there. Ten minutes later the best option is to take the 61 to Northgate again but this time take that same bus as it heads further south (to 92nd) before finally heading north again. The option using the most frequent buses involves taking the 61 down to 85th and then heading back north on the 5. Thus a rider would go south to 85th even though they started at 125th and ended at 137th.
And yet it is better than it was before! Until recently that first option wasn’t available. Keep in mind, as awkward as that first option is, it is the only one that completes the journey in less than an hour. For perspective, driving takes less than fifteen minutes and biking takes less than a half hour. So while a 45 minute trip is certainly bad, it is important to remember that it was worse until recently.
It is also worth noting that this doesn’t just hurt people making those trips. It hurts everyone. Remember what Walker wrote (and I referenced) at the beginning. A grid is more efficient. It costs a lot of money to have buses overlap in awkward ways and make a lot of turns. While it is easy to point fingers at Metro planners — and I do think they could do better — there is only so much they can do. The station is an an awkward place.
Now imagine the station was at Roosevelt & Northgate Way. It doesn’t take an expert transit planner to see who much better that would be for buses. The 40 would just keep going straight, connecting riders from Ballard to Lake City (with a fast connection to Link along the way). A diagonal bus like the 61 would still be a good route, but otherwise the buses wouldn’t be funneled to the station. The 345/365 could stay on that side of the freeway until at least 65th (instead of looping around). You would have a much more grid-like system which means that those buses — or other buses – would run more often. In short, the Link station would be “on the way”.
But of course, we don’t live in that reality. It was cheaper to build the station where they built it, so there it is. But that doesn’t change the fact that serving it is extremely awkward. In contrast, serving 130th is much easier. For a bus going from Lake City to Bitter Lake — an obvious transit corridor — the station will be “on the way”. The bus will not detour to serve it. It won’t even layover there. It will just keep going, which is ideal. As a result, the network will be better. The potential network will be much better.
That gets to Al’s complaint. The network supporting Pinehurst Station when it opens will be poor. I agree. But bus networks are not permanent. It took years before Metro finally realized that Lake City/Northgate/Greenwood was a very strong transit corridor (unlike every other bus serving Northgate Transit Center the bus doesn’t detour). It would be better if it kept going (and made a connection to the 40 and D) but at least the agency has made progress with its routing. The same goes for Pinehurst Station. I have no doubt that eventually Metro planners will serve the station with adequate and sensible routing.
But the main thing is that the station makes it easier for planners to make a better network. You can change the bus routes but it is very difficult to change the station locations.
> Nothing you cite is within the 1/2 traditional walkshed for a station. And nothing you cite is unique to 130th St Station. 148th St Station and 185th St stations are almost identical distances from Aurora and 15th.
No that density doesn’t exist for aurora on 185th nor for the east west portion of mountlake terrace. You can look yourself.
> fails on essentially all available transit metrics, not just on parking.
I’m not exactly sure what you’re going to be arguing for here? If you always advocate for freeway stations then having the bus line connect the nearby density to the rail station is the best we can do.
You cannot simultaneously 1) prefer freeway stations over avenue stations 2) then claim 130th station shouldn’t be built because we can only connect it by bus
If you really hold the latter is true then why do you also so strongly support the i5 routing over the Aurora avenue? It doesn’t make any sense
“I think perhaps both of y’all should actually check density maps…”
Residential density maps have limitations.
1. Most professionals get that residential trips are about half of all the trip ends. The better density maps for transit is of trip end density; not merely residential density. Pinehurst Station would get lots more riders if there was a reason to get off Link there besides as a way to get home!
Actually that lack of great non-residential destinations is a fundamental problem with the corridor segment. It leads to direction-heavy ridership and heavy peak ridership. Contrast that eith all the destinations near Northgate Station and its much higher station ridership .
From a demand perspective, think about how many more riders throughout the day the Pinehurst Station would get if it was next to Notthwest Hospital. Or appreciate why the John Lewis Bridge connects North Seattle College to Link even though there is no residential density on the campus.
2. A better outcomes map is to look at the land use planning and zoning maps. The area is transitioning and will look different in a few short years.
3. Density maps often ignore that a piece of the measured area is taken up in non-residential land. Unless the denominator is in only residential acreage, it’s going to mask the effect. Lake City and the Aurora Corridor have lots of non-reaidential acreage.
4. There are other fundamentals that set the stage for a more productive light rail station. First of all, is there metered parking? The abundance of free parking near stations is a contributing reason why Dallas, San Jose and Charlotte light rail do so poorly with ridership.
Second, is the terrain suitable? I’m sure most of us are aware that if Pioneer Square Station was the same elevation as Harborview that the station would have lots more riders. It may not be as big of an issue for Pinehurst but it still factors in.
Simply put, the other Lynnwood Link stations have more basics going for them — and they still struggle to look productive outside of Lynnwood CC because it’s the end station and has mammoth parking available to intercept trips. Pinehurst Station will not even have what the other stations do.
@Al
1. Employment density is one proxy for destination density. On The Map (https://onthemap.ces.census.gov/) shows a swath of good employment density that stretches northwest from Northgate to Bitter Lake. It then ends before 145th. There is another bit of density close to the college. Other than that, employment is pretty minor until you get up Lynnwood (where employment density is largely along SR-99). There are social services (that I already mentioned) in both Lake City and Bitter Lake. Like colleges, these tend to have a higher proportion of riders than typical establishments. From a destination standpoint the corridor is strong.
2. Yes, areas change. But there is a limit to that. Some places change more than others.
3. I don’t believe that is true. You can find really low density areas downtown. That is because there are office buildings there. So while they have big employment density they have very low residential density. (In general downtown has increased its residential density so it isn’t quite that dramatic but the point remains. Density maps look at all of that.) That doesn’t mean there aren’t statistical anomalies. But those tend to be on the edges of things. For example a high density city block happens to be next to a park and they drew the census borders to include the park. That is why it is good to look at different maps.
4. Yes, there are other fundamentals that set the stage for a more productive light rail station. One thing that is obvious but people have failed to mention is that the 130th Station is of course, in Seattle. Since the vast majority of trips are in Seattle it is closer to those destinations. Trip time influences ridership. The longer the trip, the less likely someone will actually take it. All other things being equal, someone is far more likely to take a bus to Pinehurst and then ride the train to Capitol Hill than they are to take a bus to Mountlake Terrace and ride the train to Capitol Hill.
Of course to analyze any corridor you have to consider the distance as well as traffic. Denny is an outstanding corridor in terms of (all sorts of) density but traffic is terrible. In contrast the 125th/130th corridor is fairly short and fairly quick to traverse. Yet it has density at both ends and really isn’t bad in the middle. The apartments and various destinations spread north and south — it isn’t really narrow like Phinney Ridge. For example this is a five minute walk from some apartments to a bus stop on 125th: https://maps.app.goo.gl/maRyQEmUzPPoFatXA.
Simply put, the other Lynnwood Link stations have more basics going for them
No they don’t. None of the stations have a great walkshed but the potential is quite similar for all of them. The Pinehurst Station is closer to the major destinations (to the south). The areas within a close bus ride of Pinehurst have higher population and employment density than every station to the north except Lynnwood. Existing transit ridership to those areas is higher as well. This suggests a higher proportion of people without cars. Determining destinations is difficult but again I would give the edge to the areas surrounding Pinehurst over any of the stations to the north (with the exception of Lynnwood).
In short, Pinehurst has more potential than any station other than Lynnwood (and that is mainly because Lynnwood is the current terminus). When Metro actually takes advantage of that potential remains a mystery.
Folks are talking about 148th Station. We now have the data from the last restructure (which included Lynnwood Link). Here is the ridership at that station for the buses (rounded a little bit):
Bus number — ridership
65 — 260
333 — 230
345 — 100
346 — 60
365 — 90
So that adds up to 740 riders. Average ridership at the station was about 1,000 during this time period. It is possible some of those riders were just taking the bus to or from a local destination but probably not many. There aren’t any major destinations nearby and not many people live close to that bus stop. Given all that, I think it is safe to say that the vast majority of riders get to the 148th station via the bus.
It occurred to me that some of the riders might be transferring from one bus to another (e. g. 65 to 333 to get to Shoreline College). Even with that I would guess a majority are headed to Link.
Oh, and 185th Station gets about 400 riders a day from Swift, another 200 from the 148 and another 50 from the 365. Again it is quite possible a majority of riders arrive by bus.
“Heat waves and extreme events will continue to get worse. I think eventually a critical mass will get alarmed enough to overcome the political blockages in addressing it.”
Heat waves and extreme weather events will definitely get worse. But, I’m pessimistic that this will cause nimby’ism to go away in the name of fighting climate change. The problem is, it’s a giant prisoner’s dilemma problem. In theory, if every single community agrees to take every measure possible to reduce their emissions, climate change is less bad. But, in practice, the individual incentive of every jurisdiction is to do nothing because climate change is happening anyway, no matter what they do or so not do. Unless, of course, an emissions-reducing action is something they would be doing anyway for non-climate-related reasons, such as reducing cost of transport or improving local air quality.
As you get into larger entities, such as countries, whose emissions are enough to actually matter, the situation changes a bit, but even then, a country is really only incentivized to reduce its emissions to the extent that doing so bolsters their economy (e.g. China is taking big measures to reduce its emissions, but it’s because they want to control the world’s energy management systems and avoid an economic dependency on imported oil, with the actual emissions reductions just a nice add-on).
And, of course, any country that goes too far, pushing emissions reductions for the sake of the climate, even if it costs the economy, the politicians pay for it at the ballot box and get replaced with climate deniers. Even Europe, I think it’s a matter of time before the right wingers take control and wipe out all of the EU climate policies.
And, no, I don’t see a greater frequency of climate-changed induced extreme weather events really changing this. While climate change makes extreme weather events more likely in general, you can never prove that any particular extreme weather events was caused by climate change. At the same time, disinformation on social media is only going to get worse, and people the puppet masters that control it will always be able to find something else to blame.
It’s a fundamental problem with how humans are wired, and I have rather low confidence that humanity as a species is capable of fixing it.
So the Route 40 bus lane painting in Ballard has pretty much completed.
I noticed that there is actually a section of bus lane on westbound Leary Ave NW between 15th NW and NW Market. In SDOT’s website, it only highlight the section as street improvement (striping and some street repair).
https://www.seattle.gov/transportation/projects-and-programs/programs/transit-program/transit-plus-multimodal-corridor-program/route-40—transit-plus
Going to Tacoma tomorrow for the SciPy conference sprints in the Pixi group at the convention center. Anybody else going?
(Yes, Tacoma has a convention center. I didn’t know it either.)
I happened to notice that some of the new routes to be created in proposed in King County Metro’s East Link Connections are now in King County Metro’s GTFS package updated most recently on July 11th.
102752,1,”223″,””,”Eastgate P&R – Downtown Redmond Station”,3,https://kingcounty.gov/en/dept/metro/routes-and-service/schedules-and-maps/223.html,FDB71A,000000
102753,1,”222″,””,”Redmond Technology – Education Hill – Cottage Lake”,3,https://kingcounty.gov/en/dept/metro/routes-and-service/schedules-and-maps/222.html,FDB71A,000000
102754,1,”256″,””,”Woodinville – Downtown Seattle”,3,https://kingcounty.gov/en/dept/metro/routes-and-service/schedules-and-maps/256.html,FDB71A,000000
102755,1,”203″,””,”Issaquah Highlands – South Bellevue Station”,3,https://kingcounty.gov/en/dept/metro/routes-and-service/schedules-and-maps/203.html,FDB71A,000000
102756,1,”DART 249″,””,”Spring District Station – South Bellevue Station”,3,https://kingcounty.gov/en/dept/metro/routes-and-service/schedules-and-maps/249.html,,
215, 220, and 270 are still not there yet.
Route 187 got a new GTFS ID for some unknown reason.
Also, based on the calendar files in the latest GTFS, 203, 222, and, DART249 will start on Aug 30th and 256 will start on Sep 1st.
If some of you are curious of the exact routing. I think you can easily check them in Pantograph as it is pulling KCM’s GTFS feed all the time.
I sent the STB contact an email with schedules of each service I was able to processed out of the GTFS files.