Friday Roundtable: the world is riding Seattle transit

92 Replies to “Friday Roundtable: the world is riding Seattle transit”

1. It’s amazing to see how well link responds to these sorts of events. A bus only system handling this would have been nigh impossible, even with the bus tunnel.

   1. I think it’s important to recognize that the entire transit system is working hard to move everyone around, and the effort to build Link’s high-capacity trunks has allowed Metro, CT, PT, and others to focus on providing frequent coverage instead of running platoons of buses. For events like this, the bus operators are able to provide critical buffer when even Link’s capacity (max 150-200 people per car, or 600-800 people per 4-car train) needs to be supplemented to move tens of thousands of people exiting a major event at once. We can also see this in practice in the fall when Metro lines up dozens of buses outside Husky Stadium to help clear game-day crowds.

      Even if only 20% of a sold-out Lumen Field (capacity ~66,000 seats) wanted to leave via transit, it would take a Link-only system at least an hour (likely two hours or more) to serve all those riders. I agree that a bus-only system would also struggle to clear the crowd in a reasonable amount of time, but the combination seems to be handling the crowds well thanks to preparation and coordination between the various agencies.

      1. The big factor that helps is a huge percentage aren’t jumping on the train to leave. They are hitting the bars. Boston sold out of beer. The double whammy is the Mariners game. When they have an afternoon game my commute home is absolutely PACKED!. It lets up a little at MI and a lot at the Swamp & Ride. More to come with my scoff-law riding Link today with my bike… same Bat Channel.

   2. That’s the power of a high-capacity subway. UDistrict-downtown was melting down in the 2010s with overcrowding and unreliability and congestion. There was no room to add more road lanes for the express buses. Link solved that. Link also provides a solution for the north, east, and south. Not just a few express-bus endpoints, but all the station neighborhoods in between too. Link does reach capacity sometimes and has to leave people on the platform, but it transports a lot more people than our existing bus fleet on existing roads could, without getting caught in congestion, and also serving urban neighborhoods that never had express buses available.

   3. “I think it’s important to recognize that the entire transit system is working hard to move everyone around, and the effort to build Link for high-capacity trunks has allowed Metro, CT, PT, and others to focus on providing frequent coverage instead of running platoons of buses”

      Good point. Link addresses the highest-volume corridors, or at least most of them. Buses step up for the secondary ones Link doesn’t serve, where fewer surge buses are necessary.

   4. “high-volume moments where even Link’s capacity … needs to be supplemented with buses”

      Yes, Link this afternoon will probably have entire trains full and entire platforms and mezzanines waiting to get on. Those in the know will take parallel local buses to get around it, where they won’t have to wait in the crowd and might be able to get a seat.

   5. What’s really amazing with all the propaganda is that they never ever mention actual revenue. What is really lneed is to see a month by month summary of revenue vs operating expenses to see if they are even coming close to breaking even? But they probably can’t and won’t show this because it would show how horrible run the system is? Again, I’m not even asking about cost to create the system just how it does covering the operating costs.

      1. I’m sure you can find Sound Transits yearly operating revenue and expenses by mode through the National Transit Database. Spoiler: it’s not making a profit. The NYC subway gets close – I think it costs under $3 per ride. But it has major capital needs plus it’s a much more extensive network.

         Passenger rail isn’t generally profitable, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a good service for the public to provide.

      2. Pete

         Public transit systems haven’t made money since the 1940s and WW2. They are a public service that provide value to society in ways other than the cost to operate. If you want to talk propaganda, you may have been watching too much reasonTV or other libertarian thinktank garbage that seems to think that transit should wither away simply because it doesn’t pay for itself.

         My question for you is this: Do the roads pay for themselves via tolls? No? Then why don’t we just get rid of them because clearly it isn’t worth it.

         Ridiculous argument.

      3. This is off-topic and can be raised in an open thread. The issue now is World Cup ridership. We can’t expect ST to have a revenue breakdown for just that day, and the general farebox-recovery issue belongs in an open thread. We know transit is a public service, not a break-even or for-profit endeavor. We know drivers are getting a much bigger subsidy for their roads and parking lots and policing. We know Link’s cost per distance fell below Metro’s in the early 2010s as ridership increased. We know farebox recovery was high in the 2010s, maybe 50%. We know it has dropped precipitously low since 2020 because fare evasion went from 3% to maybe 30% and ST has been struggling to bring it back down again, and the latest extensions are lower ridership per mile than the inner core, and the future extensions will be lower still. We know ST has “human fare gates” at several stations now, and is thinking about piloting mechanical fare gates later this year.

         1. “This is off-topic and can be raised in an open thread.”

            Apologies, Friday Roundtables are open threads. I guess I wish this article hadn’t been a Roundtable.

      4. It’s okay PeteT, most of us real Mossbacks get it. Transit folkx are defending their livelihoods, so expect fierce resistance to this idea that they don’t spend money wisely.

         They are the ultimate good in society.

         Once you realize that they are coming from an almost cult-like perspective it starts to make sense. Some people really do drink the kool-aid.

         1. “Transit folkx are defending their livelihoods”

            You think most transit fans work for transit agencies or their contractors? Almost none of the past or current STB authors have, and few of the commentators have said they do so.

      5. Let me know when the roads pay for themselves.

      6. With no fare enforcement, turnstile, and very vague places to pay, I rarely see anyone pay. Same with the buses. When I get on, most peeled aren’t paying. I imagine revenue will be up if people had to pay. World Cup could have helped a lot with deficit.

2. A small sign at NW 54th St & 30th Ave NW in Ballard was installed that indicates the seasonal Golden Gardens Direct service will run every 30 minute between 11 am and 9 pm.
   https://flic.kr/p/2sjFXuN

   1. It has Metro’s logo on it, so I guess maybe it will be similar format to Trailhead Direct unlike Discovery Park shuttle which was single-handly contracted by Seattle’s Park department?

      1. Looks like SDOT issued a press release at the end of the day yesterday announcing “Golden Gardens Direct” as a bus running between Market Street and Golden Gardens Park every 30 minutes from 11am to 9am daily starting June 27 and ending August 30. It will have a $3 fare. Presumably it will accept transfers but that’s not explicitly stated in the announcement.

         There’s a press event on Monday (6/22) at Golden Gardens.

         1. Great to know that it also runs on weekdays.

         2. Do you have a link to the press release? I couldn’t find it and was hoping for more details.

      2. Hooray, hooray, on my way to San Jose Golden Gardens. I’ve rarely been there because of the lack of transit.

         What’s the Discovery Park shuttle? I thought the 24 and 33 were the only ways to access the park. I usually take the 24 and either go in to the sea bluff and back, or go all the way through the park to the 33.

         The English Gardens has flowers, right? I should visit it this summer.

         1. https://parkways.seattle.gov/2026/06/17/free-2026-summer-beach-shuttle-at-discovery-park/

            There is a shuttle that takes people from North Parking lot where 33 turns around to beach near the lighthouse. Walking takes quite a while and there is only ADA parking at the beach although they have been abused all the time.
            The shuttle is run by charter bus (sometimes school bus) and I believe it only runs on the weekend.

         2. “ The English Gardens has flowers, right?”

            Yes there were good amount of peony a month ago and now rose start to bloom

         3. I did not know that Golden Gardens actually had a garden. I thought it was just a beach with a cute name. Probably not the Portland Rose Garden but I will definitely have to check it out. A great topic for a future post on how to access from different directions via transit.

         4. “ I did not know that Golden Gardens actually had a garden.”

            No, it doesn’t. When Mike mentioned to “English Gardens”, I assumed he was referring to Carl S. English Jr. Botanical Garden north of Ballard Lock. That place is not at Golden Gardens Park.

         5. Yes, I was referring to the English Garden next to the Locks. I saw a glimpse of the name somewhere when I was reading this thread and following the links, and the shuttle will presumably go past it.

         6. OK, still looks like worth a visit. I’ve been to the locks many times and through it on racing sailboats many more. I didn’t know there was a garden associated with it. Will definitely have to check it out. And coming from the eastside transit is the only way to fly (or ride… definitely not drive).

            Assuming riding with bikes on a non-high capacity time slot; Eastlink to what station and then get the Burke to Ballard. The only way I know how to do this would be get off at Montlake. There’s probably much better options if you don’t want to be a road warier.

         7. Via transit from the Eastside, you can catch the D or the 40 from downtown and transfer to the 44, or just go to the U-District and catch the 44 there.

            If you have a bike, you can ride through almost 100% separated bike lanes from Westlake to Ballard; the same if you get off at UW and take the Burke all the way across.

            The only problem with biking is the Missing Link of the Burke-Gilman in Ballard, but you’ll encounter it regardless of whether you start riding in downtown or at UW.

         8. I will vote for SR 520 transit transferring 44. Ballard Bridge has been insanely unreliable lately. It usually won’t take you more than 60 minutes and you can catch 44 at its first stop so you will get a seat before UW students fill the bus.

            If you plan to come on weekday afternoon and have to transfer at Downtown Seattle, time your trip to catch 17X at Downtown Seattle to get to Ballard Lock is definitely worth. How fast 17X takes from Downtown Seattle to Ballard Lock always amazes me.
            Definitely don’t drive to Golden Gardens even if you have to drive to Ballard. You won’t find a parking there without hard looking. Anecdotally, Golden Gardens Park generates highest parking ticket revenue for city of Seattle outside downtown.

         9. Thanks for the ideas for taking transit to the locks. The idea of using bus only via 520 is appealing if I’m traveling with friends. With my Senior RFP Orca it’s no big deal switching from Link to Metro. But if a couple has to transfer they end up spending $24 round trip. Cutting that in half is significant. Plus they can use the bus w/o needing to drive to a P&R. I’d probably take the 2 Line to DT Bellevue but my friends could use RR-B. Then 271 and transfer to the 44 at Montlake. Of course for a longer ride it’s possible to use the 520 trail all the way from the eastside. A combo of bike in and transit home is a nice option. Just going to see the locks and the gardens the 17X from DT Seattle sounds like a great option. Probably should take advantage of that while the 255 is still going DT.

3. Also noted with pleasure a Summer 2026 Regional Transit Map with FIFA type branding (Let’s Play Sea 26). Purple cover. Picked one up from a bus pamphlet rack today. Shows the heavy hitters of the transit system in a map from Everett to Lakewood to Issaquah to Poulsbo. Decently laid out. More please!

   1. Does this FIFA version mistakenly includes some of the change not happening until fall?
      A couple weeks ago, I picked up an eastside only version of regional transit map in a very similar mapping style from a Metro outreach event at work. That map looks good but it mistakenly includes many remaining eastside restructure items that won’t happen until this fall.

      1. Not sure, as I use only a few eastside buses. I still see the 550/554 on it, and the map isn’t specific for the eastside.

4. Seems like Route 102/162 got to try every single type of bus in the past two weeks except for the DE60LF only used on Eastside routes. Probably one of the weirdest routes in terms of diversity of buses. Most routes are pretty consistent in which model they use.

   Model
   Xcelsior (XDE60) 75 trips (49%)
   DE60LFR 26 trips (17%)
   Orion VII 21 trips (14%)
   Low Floor 19 trips (13%)
   DE60LFA 7 trips (5%)
   Low Floor Plus 2 trips (1%)
   Xcelsior (XE40) 1 trip (<1%)
   Xcelsior (XDE35) 1 trip (<1%)

5. Friday mid-game report, USA-Australia match. Kickoff was at noon. I got to Westlake station at 12:30 and took Link to Pioneer Square. Train and platform loads were normal. I wandered around the pedestrian zone, which is really Occidental Park extended out a block or two. The zone and surrounding sidewalks were busy but not packed. The TV screen was at the south end of the park; it was big but not as big as I’d expected. The southern half of the park in front of it was packed.

   I couldn’t get a good view so I went straight to my second destination, Pacific Place, which I assumed would have plenty of space and be air conditoned. Again Link was normal. But Pacific Place had a line to get in (!). It was a short line but I didn’t want to wait, so I walked to my third destination, Pike Place Market, for my weekly shopping.

   At the northern end of Pike Place, behold, there was another large TV screen I hadn’t heard about. So I watched the last part of the match there. And then did my rounds at Frank’s (fruits & vegs), Market Spice (white peony tea), De Laurenti (salami, and tomato paste in a tube), and Woodring’s (jam, kimchi, honey, although I didn’t need those today).

   On the way home at the 4th & Pike bus stop, several small waves of people in Australia jerseys passed, and one wave got on the #3 bus and got off at 6th. Two people in another wave had large kangaroo dolls on their shoulders.

   1. Yeah, it was definitely busy. I left work at 2 to ride all different modes offered as fast as I could (something I’ve been mulling over since moving here), and trying to get an ST express bus on 2nd Ave was a bad choice. Basically gridlock, ended up walking to get the Sounder I was hoping for instead. But that was right at the end of the game.

      Huge crowds. Think it will be a bigger ridership day than the Super Bowl parade day.

      1. I don’t think it’s possible to match Seahawks Day. That had a stadium rally and a parade, and people came from all over Pugetopolis for it. I was at CID station when the rally at the stadium ended. I expected rally attendees to go to the parade afterward, but instead many went home. So it was a second set of people in the parade (although there was presumably overlap).

         After the rally ended, the CID southbound platform had a crowd out to the street. More fans were going toward Rainier Valley and Federal Way than toward the U-District? Northbound had a crowd but only half the platform. I got on a northbound train and got off at Symphony. Both the Pioneer Square and Symphony platforms were packed through the mezzanines in both directions, and nobody could fit onto the northbound train I got off of. These were presumably rally-goers going home, because the parade was happening simultaneously on 4th Avenue but 4th was fenced off, so nobody enter/exit the parade at those points but only at the end.

         I don’t know why 4th Avenue was fenced off; it never is during other parades or protests.

         1. I think today had similar sized crowds of people downtown, at least from what I saw in Pioneer Square. And it had a Mariner’s game too. My impression is that the limiting factor for the Seahawks parade was capacity period, and it was before the 2 Line fully opened. Two events means more all-day demand. My train heading south through downtown was crush loaded at 4:30 with a mix of soccer fans, baseball fans, and commuters.

         2. 4th. Avenue was fenced off likely due to FIFA security requirements.

6. Overheard at stadium “Next time we visit Seattle we can take light rail to Ballard from downtown!”

   Seattle residents “LOL”

   1. Public service message to visitors expecting Ballard in 11-15 years: Don’t hold your breath. Take the D or 40; they only take half an hour.

7. Today I rode down to Marymoor on the 520 trail. First time using the bike in years. I met up with friends and we rode north along the slough. I wasn’t too surprised when my rear tire blew up just north of 60 acres (set up for the Crossfire summer tournament). I walked the bike back to 90th St and took RR-B to Red-Tech Station. Security Personnel approached me and said no bikes allowed on the train today and pointed out they had bike lockers. I said I just need to get home because I’ve had a mechanical failure and he waved me on. That was right around 3PM. There was nobody on the train; like as in how many people are normally on the train when I commute in from the eastside at 7AM. In fact the only other people in my car were a couple with their poodle on a long leash and two police officers enjoying a cool drink (non-alcoholic of course). I got off at Bel-Red. I’m sure it would have been a mess if I’d gone into DT but the No Bikes all day on match days is stupid. I’m glad that the private security is smart enough to recognize stupid. Of course they actually have no enforcement ability anyway but they all as far as I’ve seen to date have been great ambassadors for Link.

8. Guys I js noticed that these routes are testing route 16X, 116, 121, 312, and 320, today

   1. What? Didn’t the 16X disappear in the 2000s? And the 121 was an old Des Moines peak express? I don’t remember a 320. Maybe the numbers were wrong. Or if they were 2019 routes, maybe that’s what Metro is planning to do when it restores all the pre-covid service hours next year. But that’s over a year away, so I wouldn’t imagine Metro would be testing them this early.

      1. At least for 121, it was added to final version of South King Connection in the last minute and will be restored this fall, but it might not be the same 121 pre-covid.

      2. 16X was suspended in 2023 Cs there’s no passengers on the bus and low ridership due to a shortage.

         1. Was it an express 5 then?

            The 16X I’m thinking of was an express 16, from downtown and the Ravenna Blvd exit to north-central Seattle and Northgate.

            Metro has been shifting hours from peak expresses to midday, evening, and weekend service, following post-pandemic travel patterns. I’m expecting it to do that with the restored hours, so only the highest-volume peak expresses like the 15 would be revived.

            Your sentence appears to be contradictory. (1) No passengers, (2) low ridership, (3) a shortage. No passengers is the lowest number, so it wouldn’t be necessary to add low ridership. If shortage means driver shortage, that has nothing to do with ridership. If you mean it was first on the list to be suspended due to low ridership, then it would be the least likely to be restored.

   2. So what were all these routes?

      16X: Broadview/Greenwood peak express?
      116: Vashon Island peak express?
      121: Burien peak express?
      312: Bothell/Lake City peak express?
      320: No idea. Another Bothell/Lake City peak express?

      1. 320 appeared to be something short lived during the pandemic.
         https://cptdb.ca/wiki/index.php/King_County_Metro_route_320_%27South_Lake_Union_/_Kenmore_P%26R%27

      2. Yes true

9. As of about a year ago, I use several regional services to visit Seattle and surrounding areas pretty regularly. Except for a couple of specific spots where modes of transit don’t quite meet up well, I’m very pleased with all our agencies.

   I needed to visit several places today while there was a match going, and I was a little worried about timeliness/traffic, being uncomfortably packed or overheated on the various transit services, but everything was running really smoothly and I had no problems.

   I’m really happy with the public transit we have now. Good job everyone!

10. Some help please with the transfer tangle. ST website is clear as mud. I thought that there was no transfers between Link and KC Metro bus service. The KC Metro website appears to be a little more understandable. If I read this correctly, and it’s up to date, that if paying with an ORCA card your fare seamlessly applies to the new mode of transit (within the 2 hour windows) regardless of agency or mode; WSF and Monorail excluded. At least that apears to be the case for ST and KC Metro. Not sure if it would apply to say CT or other regional bus agencies. But if you pay with a credit card you will not be able to transfer between agencies (e.g. KC Metro and ST) and have to pay a separate fare. I’m not clear on if you are able to tranfer between modes operated by the same agency. For example if you tap on to the 550 on Bellevue Way and transfer to Link at S. Bellevue and tap the credit card again will you be charged another $3 or does bus to train work if it’s the same agency? I’m pretty confident that with KC Metro you can transfer with a credit card tap between the street car and a bus. Anyway, is it currently the case that if paying with ORCA you can seamlessly transfer for free between KC Metro and ST?

    1. Yes, it’s a free transfer all handled by ORCA. WSF and the monorail are special cases, but you can transfer between ST, KC Metro, Pierce Transit, Everett Transit, and Community Transit for free within the 2 hour window. I believe that applies to paying by card as well. You get the 2 hour transfer regardless, and it applies to all the major agencies.

    2. Even better, get the $6 all day pass on your ORCA card. Fare for departure and return, but with unlimited trips in between. Pretty much no reason not to use a day pass unless you can start your return trip within 2 hours, which would make more sense to use a single $3 fare… Or if you’re using a service that is cheaper than $3. You can do the math.

       The $3 also carries over to more expensive trips including the Monorail and Water Taxi. You just pay the difference. E.g. if a ticket is $6, you pay $3 only. The only thing not included regionally is WA state passenger ferry tickets, though it would have been nice if they did include it.

    3. And if you’re a regular transit user, the monthly/annual passes can be more economical.

    4. ORCA transfers are transferable between all Sound Transit modes, Metro, Community Transit, Pierce Transit, Everett Transit, and I think Kitsap Transit and the Seattle Streetcars. They likely aren’t to/from the Monorail or Washington State Ferries; those agencies have changed their policies multiple times. I don’t know about the King County Water Taxi or Kitsap Fast Ferries.

       That’s why everyone is urged to get an ORCA card, because the fee (I think $3 now) pays for itself in one transfer. If it’s too inconvenient for your guests to go to a TVM to get them or order them by mail, you can get two guest cards for them and reuse them for future visitors or give them to somebody afterward.

       If you tap within two hours of when you last paid a fare or surcharge, the transfer is free even across agencies. If you ride a bus for $3 and then transfer to Sounder at $5, it charges the $2 surcharge and gives you two more hours. Now that all bus/Link/streetcar fares in King County are an identical $3, you rarely encounter a surcharge any more except when transferring to Sounder. CT, PT, and ET’s fares are less than $3, so you’d pay a surcharge transferring from them to Link, ST Express, or Metro.

       The Monorail and Washington State Ferries have been more stingy, so your transfer is probably not valid on them, and you’d have to get a separate agency-specific pass from them separate from your shared PugetPass.

       Metro still has paper transfers, valid on other Metro buses, and they may be cut for longer than 2 hours (e.g., near the beginning of a long run, or for the entire late evening and night and the first run in the morning). No other agency has paper transfers anymore or accepts other agencies’. Or maybe there’s one other holdout still, KT?

       The new credit-card tap has the same free transfers if you use the same credit card. It aggregates your trips at the end of the day and charges all of them together.

    5. ORCA has a special 3-day pass for $18 through August 31. That’s equivalent to one round trip a day in King County. https://www.soundtransit.org/get-to-know-us/news-events/news-releases/orca-releases-limited-time-promotional-3-day-pass-tap . They start immediately with your next tapin.

       1. It’s not really a discount over their one day Puget Pass though, right? The day passes are already $6. Not sure what’s the benefit of this versus getting three day passes.

          1. It’s convenience. You only have to get it once every three days.

    6. Monthly passes are priced at 18 round trips per month. So if you go to the office Monday-Friday for 3 1/2 weeks out of the month, they pay for themselves, and then additional trips that month are free. Or if you commute less than that, maybe you make up for it with shopping trips on the weekend.

    7. So credit card tap (using the same card obviously) has the same transfer ability as ORCA. Good to know for friends/family that don’t have an ORCA card. Does anyone know if you can/must tap your credit card at the ORCA reader when boarding Link? If I’m traveling with someone it seems it would be better to use a credit card to tap on rather than my ORCA card to pay their fare at the TVM. Before I got my ORCA I used the ticket vending machine to buy a day pass. No need to buy a day pass if you can tap your credit card at the ORCA reader and that time savings can mean the difference of catching a train at the platform vs having to wait for the next arrival. Really you don’t want to purchase a day pass if using either ORCA or credit to tap on. You might not get the same transfer benefit purchasing a day pass and the system will automatically give you the day pass rate if you pay more than cost of the pass (two fares with KC Metro and/or ST).

       1. There isn’t fare capping so if you have 3 trips that are all more than 2 hours apart the day pass is cheaper

          1. There’s been talk about fare capping and the second-generation ORCA readers have that capability, but I don’t remember if it has been implemented.

          2. Unfortunately it has not. I think it requires action from the ORCA board which is slow as molasses
             .

       2. Well this just proves the complete chaos that is the current fare system; or at least the ability easily find and understand how it works. Even transit nerds from Seattle don’t quite know what the current rules are. How in the heck is someone from out of town or an infrequent transit user supposed to figure it out? Signage is abysmal. I’ll have to check back with my cousins from England and see if fare capping worked correctly. In real time they were seeing two different fare structures for each of their credit cards which are actually the same account (different numbers on the card for identification but the same master account). It’s a card they use for international travel and works perfectly in the EU but had several hiccups over here in the colonies.

11. This points out that the effort to build a functional world class transit system is well worth while. However, the light rail system as planned must be completed. Then, it must be further expanded. Even the planned system has some significant gaps:
    1. Complete the Ballard extension. Eventually extend it to connect to the north bound trunk line at North Gate or in Shoreline.
    2. Providing a south bound linkage from West Seattle to SEATAC and the trunk line further south.
    3. A south bound linkage from Bellevue to Renton, SEATAC and the trunk line further south.
    4. A north bound linkage from Kirkland to the north bound trunk line serving Everett, near the junction of I405 & I5.
    5. Maybe eventually making another Lake Washington crossing paralleling HIghway 520, as the existing crossing parallels I90.

    Thus would make an all encompassing Sound Transit light rail network that would serve all of the mdtropolitan area. Seattle is no longer a small, isolated city. Rather it is rapidly becoming part of a major international cosmopolitan area. Eventually, building a high speed rail transit system to link Vancouver, BC with Eugene, OR would link the entire cosmopolitan area centered on major urban areas of the PNW.

    1. 3 and 4 are Stride lines and tons of express buses run on 520 in lieu of 5. (Though to make those express buses work better, there needs to be HOV lane enforcement, bus lanes between Montlake lid and UW station, and a 520/405 HOV interchange.)

       1. In so far as I am aware the stride lines are basically still buses and do not really work. They have the same problems other bus modes have.

          Regarding Item 5, IIRC the 520 pontoons were designed to accommodate future light rail using cantilever construction. The express buses are a poor substitute; I commuted across 520 by bus from Capital Hill for over ten years; they simply do not provide adequate capacity and get bogged down in traffic. Transit needs exclusive ROW. Nevertheless, bring an engineer, I know fully that the assumptions made for future use frequently are insufficient. We found that out in the downtown tunnel conversion and the I90 express lane conversion.

          1. “ In so far as I am aware the stride lines are basically still buses and do not really work. They have the same problems other bus modes have.”

             405 corridor bus like 532/535 doesn’t have the problem other 520 transit routes have on its freeway portion because it doesn’t need to compete system ramp capacity with general traffic at congested system interchange like I-405 at SR 520 or I-5 at SR 520.
             Projects associated with Stride further make sure that S2 doesn’t need to pull over to any general-purpose ramp to make a stop, so I think it will work.

             S1 almost makes sure of that except for the part in Renton, but it will still be so much better than 560 today between Bellevue and Renton.

             The bigger question is whether S1/S2’s popularity will grow enough to deserve its all-day frequent service level. 532/535 are very commuter-dependent service. If this doesn’t change, I wouldn’t consider Stride successful.

          2. One advantage I can see with Stride North is that it skips the meandering around the UW Bothell/Cascadia College campus, and instead stays on the highway. This will greatly improve the travel time between Lynnwood and Bellevue. Also, the busses will run more frequently. The idea is that UW Bothell/Cascadia loses the one-seat ride to Bellevue, but benefits by having better frequency to work with.

       2. “the stride lines are basically still buses and do not really work. They have the same problems other bus modes have.”

          They haven’t started yet, so we don’t know if they’ll really work or not. They’ll be more frequent full time than ST Express is, so in that sense they’ll be more like rail. It will have inline stations so buses won’t have to get off at a freeway exit, turn, and maybe wait for a traffic light before continuing: that’t the extra overhead that conventional bus infrastructure has but BRT doesn’t have to. Stride 2 (Lynnwood-Bellevue) in particular is supposed to be significantly faster than the 535, with some estimates at 20 minutes faster. That will make it more viable for more people’s trips when they have little extra time. WSOT is supposed to manage the HOT lanes on 405 to ensure the buses run at least 40 mph.

       3. “The bigger question is whether S1/S2’s popularity will grow enough to deserve its all-day frequent service level.”

          That’s the wrong way to look at it. The 405 corridor intrinsically needs BRT or comparable because it’s the Eastside north-south corridor in a metro area of 4 million. It’s cut off from the primary north-south corridor by Lake Washington with only two bridges across it. The central Eastside is the second-largest jobs/activities/commercial center in the region, and a highly successful one. Those are enough reasons for frequent express transit between Lynnwood, Bothell, Kirkland, Bellevue, Renton, and Burien. This is what every similar well-functioning city would have.

          If ridership lags behind off-peak, then the answer is not to deprive the people who do use it of basic north-south regional transit. It’s to ask what else is wrong that is preventing people from doing natural trips that typical people will do, or preventing them from using transit for it. Then fix that. Then the buses will be busy all day with riders, so much that we’ll have to keep expanding it.

          In the 405 corridor we see two things:

          • The existing 535 and 560 are completely inadequate. They’re at best half-hourly, drop down to hourly, and the 535 has no Sunday service. That means there’s no bus when people want to travel, so they use another means (e.g., car), go to another destination instead (another shopping center when they can’t get to their first choice reasonably), or forego the trip). All those are bad outcomes.

          • Land use is such that people can’t walk from neighborhood centers to several of the stations. They can’t even get from one part of their own city to another. They have to walk past excessively large stroads and parking lots, in depressing inhuman landscapes. All that hinders people from getting to where they want without a car, and depresses ridership, and makes them less willing to use transit for non-work trips. So fix it.

    2. World-class transit would be something really excellent, like what Vancouver BC, Paris, Zurich, the Netherlands, or Japan would build. In other words:

       A city subway with closer station spacing and more lines, with stations right in each neighborhood center, not off at the edge some blocks away or at a freeway exit. Each line would run every 2-5 minutes. Build it right the first time. The city would have the attitude that since we spent so much on grade-separated infrastructure, we should run trains as often as possible to maximize ridership and not waste the investment. Don’t skimp on escalators. Make sure transfers between lines are as short as possible, ideally at the same platform, and make sure the walking paths from sidewalk to platform are as short and straight as feasible. Don’t let non-transit issues get in the way of this.

       A faster regional S-Bahn like system for longer distances (Tacoma, Everett, Redmond), running every 10-20 minutes. Don’t try to do everything with one hybrid technology: it’s mediocre at both in-city trips and longer regional trips. Or have final rail termini at a second-ring burb (Lynnwood, Federal Way), and express buses/BRT every 5-10 minutes beyond that.

       A comprehensive bus network to fill in the corridors rail doesn’t serve, running every 10-15 minutes minimum, so that people can get anywhere in the metropolitan area conveniently without a car.

       We’re far short of that. Simply building out the Link network, adding extensions like Ballard-Northgate, or questionable lines like Kirkland-Everett or South Kirkland-Issaquah in burbs that haven’t made a commitment to walkability everywhere and discouraging unnecessary car usage and where people can’t walk from neighborhood centers to stations, won’t do it. It will do something, but not world-class transit.

       1. Is arguing to run a Link alignment in a low-density corridor, because that’s that easiest and/or cheapest place to put it, mutually exclusive from wanting to build transit right the first time, and wanting to build world-class transit?

          1. Yes, but there are tradeoffs. Some countries like Germany, Switzerland, and Japan pursue a maximum-rail alternative, which is what I outlined above. Others have a higher BRT to rail mix, like Latin American countries. The very high volume corridors require rail for its capacity, while in secondary corridors you can go either way.

             The real measure of quality is people’s access to more places (jobs and destinations) in a half hour or hour on transit at any time. That’s what transit is for. It should be convenient, so that transit is their first choice if they’re not walking or biking, and something they feel is a good choice. That’s what Switzerland and The Netherlands and Japan have, and Vancouver BC to a perhaps lesser extent. And Germany has, although it currently has some overhauling disruptions and reliability challenges.

             So the first job is to make sure it has all that. The second job is to do it the most efficiently. There are arguments on both sides on when rail or bus is more efficient and cost-effective long-term, so that’s where alternatives can come in. But the biggest need is to do it somehow. And don’t put a bus that’s vulnerable to traffic congestion and runs less than every 15 minutes and say you’ve solved the problem, because you haven’t, the problem is still there, so it will need to be fixed again when the government stops being in denial about it. And also don’t build two subway tunnels that have more than a 2-3 minute transfer walk between them, because again you’re not fully solving the problem. Until you fully solve the problem, the city won’t fully function well, and that will be a drag on people’s ability to access places or contribute to the economy and to society’s well-being and tax base. That’s what The Netherlands has: well-functioning cities and a country that functions about the best it can. There’s always room for improvement, but it would be better to have their small problems than our huge gaping gaps in non-car mobility.

          2. The book Human Transit has a list of principles for a well-functioning transit network: I don’t have a copy on hand, but from memory, for the largest number of people in the area and the widest cross-section of demographics and trip pars feasible:

             Transit takes me to where I want to go, when I want to go, reliably. It’s a good use of my time, and of my money. It and the staff respect me. I feel safe on it.

             There may be more but that’s all I remember for the moment.

       2. I think it’s important to note that Zurich doesn’t have a metro, and most tram lines run every 10 minutes. It’s a great transit city, but I think the relevant lesson is how much space and priority the trams get. Mainline trains and S-Bahn service obviously are also big factors, but Swiss transit planning is predicated on making the most of what already exists. That’s often a bus, and it’s often at grade rail. But whatever it is, there’s investment in good service. The Swiss post buses are legendary for a reason.

          But it’s hard to map things one to one. American cities are often qualitatively different than European ones, and those differences matter when doing transit planning. The Seattle metro is quite large, both in area and in population, for a European place. That makes transit more difficult to provide economically.

          We still have a lot to learn, but I’d say the lesson is first and foremost one of priority. Link has worse priority on MLK than fully street running trams do in Zurich, and that’s ultimately just a transportation policy choice. Before we bother with a metro or S Bahn, we should try giving absolute priority to our wacky light rail system running in semi mixed traffic.

       3. To add to the note that Zurich doesn’t really have a metro, it is the same for Australia big cities for a long time until recent years.
          Sydney’s transit before the opening of its first metro line was just as good as it is today.
          With Metro or not, Sydney still has world-class transit, but to some extent, Sydney and Melbourne’s suburban rail networks are sort of similar to many 70s era US heavy rail that has strong focus on connecting the suburbs. Australia is far away from Europe and Americas, so probably they just didn’t follow the trend such as big cities need metro system and focus on what works for them.

          Most US cities’ unique urban land use perhaps also make an unorthodox metro system by European and Asian standard not good fit, but that’s not important. The important thing is to have something that is fast and well-utilized. If you can build a RapidRide line that take you from Downtown Seattle to Downtown Bellevue in 20 minutes, that is just as world-class as having a fancy whole package of Seattle Subway.

    3. A functional word-class system has cross-platform transfers between lines. The extensions are more useless without good transfers.

    4. Seattle simply does not have enough total people or enough dense nodes to support the Seattle Subway dream you listed. Tracks <> Great Transit.

       If the region is overwhelmed by climate refugees, maybe it would make sense, but they’ll all be MAGAts and vote against transit.

       1. You do know it’s primarily rural and exurban areas that are the most MAGA, right? Houston, Dallas, and Atlanta aren’t MAGA. By definition rural and exurban areas have few people. They just have outsized influence because of structural issues in our election system that give more representation to a few people distributed over a large area than a lot of people concentrated in a large city, and to small states, plus gerrymandering, plus voter suppression. if they move here to a large city they’ll lose that structural advantage.

          Oh, and Washington state doesn’t have enough water for millions of more people. We’re close to our limit now with the more frequent droughts. We could build desalination plants I guess.

          1. Mike, well then, you just demolished my caveat that sort of agreed that the region might need all that rail that Tom proposed. If water is a limit on further growth, then for sure there’s no reason for a Seattle Subway sort of self-indulgence.

             [ot]

          2. You’re getting into side issues. Seattle Subway’s recommendation is an unofficial third-party suggestion. Nobody mentioned it until you did. The other Tom may not know it exists. His suggestion seems to be independent of it, his own estimate of corridors that need to be served, and how to serve them. Neither of them are in danger of being built, so you don’t have to worry about that.

       2. The more you travel, the more you realize a city doesn’t have to be a mega city to have a frequent transit system with multiple rail lines. And also, many larger cities have worse transit systems than Seattle. Not everything is controlled by total population, and policy decisions can matte much more.

          1. The more you travel, the more you realize a city doesn’t have to be a mega city to have a frequent transit system with multiple rail lines.

             Brandon, well sure in a hypothetical sort of way. Please list three.

             Any way, five of the six lines that Tom has proposed are through SFH sprawlsville and that is not where to put rail lines. He didn’t even mention First Hill. His lines are all suburban express-bus replacements, and Rail. Is. Not. Good. At. That.

             It should get rave reviews from The Bored Suburbanistas. [A new Punk band playing at the old train station.]

          2. Tom, I’m almost always on board with your comments, but just off the top of my head here are three decidedly not mega cities that have frequent transit and multiple rail lines: Lisbon, Porto, Copenhagen. I use transit in the first two quite frequently and the third fairly often, so they came to mind pretty quickly. They’re all about half to 2/3 the population of the Seattle metro area. Your “dense nodes” point is valid although all three of those cities have few of what we call “dense nodes”; they as most European cities have a more consistent density than most American cities (including Seattle, of course) do.

             (Lisbon, with which I am most familiar, has about 4x the population density of Seattle in their respective metro areas, but within the cities proper it’s closer to 2x.)

    5. If West Seattle and Ballard are built as planned, it will be almost impossible to extend them any further due to the cost of cutting into an existing tunnel.

       The exceptionally bad transfers between lines at Westlake will mean the busiest station in the south section of Line 1 (SeaTac) will be permanently hobbled by a time consuming series of escalator rides for anyone coming from the busy stations from Capitol Hill northward.

       It will be much like the situation TriMet is in: after two poorly chosen routes by the Metro regional planning agency, any expansion plans have foundered at the ballot box.

       1. Glenn, they aren’t including a TBM extraction stub beyond the Junction Station? And isn’t Ballard going to be elevated? If there is an extraction stub, it can be used to make the junction, though the possibility of an extension means that the surface over the stub has to remain undeveloped. It makes the most sense to extend a quarter of a mile beyond the terminal station and put the extraction box there. Leaving a few acres undeveloped a quarter mile from the station isn’t a catastrophe, and the truth is that the cost per foot isn’t all that high.

          Obviously, extending an elevated station just means taking down the bumpers and adding track across the new joint in the structure.

    6. Please let’s not entertain the drawing of lines on a map as if Link lines are freeways. Extending light rail is not like extending a freeway. This is how we got ourselves commuted to the ST3 light rail expansion that will cost tends if billions with no better transit travel times once completed — especially when new transfer stations will be hard and time consuming to use. Rail transferring is not like driving through a freeway interchange.

       I suggest this simple exercise to quantitatively demonstrate where stations are better justified first: Divide the city populations by the number of stations inside their city limits. You will find that Seattle is several cities from the top — even though Seattle has more non-residential activity destinations and parking shortages as well as many paid parking areas. Using stations per capita as a guide, Seattle is due many more new stations than just West Seattle and Ballard extensions plus Graham.

       The fairness issue is bent oddly because every new Seattle light rail station is considerably more expensive than those outside of the City limits. The extensions could be built at grade or aerial but there’s no way politically to extend further than Alaska Junction or Ballard to do that.

       Another issue is Link as a light rail technology. Light rail was often recommended to save capital costs because light rail can run in street medians at-grade. However it’s inefficient for new, long grade-separated segments. This is remarkably still something that the Board stubbornly refuses to see.

       There’s also the overcrowding/ emptiness phenomenon where the same long four-car train in central Seattle can be too crowded while that same train operating beyond the halfway travel time points from Downtown Seattle (Alderwood and KDM assuming ST3 extensions) will be running with mostly empty seats. ST3 Link will be considerably less productive than what’s running today.

       Of course, ST3 expansion is so substantially underwater with future capital money that planning further expansions beyond it are at least a decade away if not more. The time lag could be used to plan rail expansion more analytically — including the best technology as well as station locations and track design. That’s really what’s needed — rather than drawing extension lines on a map like what was done in 2016 in the rushed ST3 assembly shopping spree.

       1. Seattle and Pugetopolis continue to be plagued by the concept that we are a small isolated city in a largely rural area. That is mistaken. Rather we are an integral part of a rapidly developing international cosmopolitan complex running from Vancouver, BC to Eugene, OR. That small minded complex is the reason that Seattle was the last major city in the West to build a rail transportation system. That is the reason that Seattle turned away substantial federal funding for a rail transportation system during the Forward Thrust era. It still poisons our debates. It is the major reason that cross town transportation both public and by private vehicle is so difficult in Seattle. East-west transportation inside the city is a nightmare.
          Regarding the debate over exclusive right-of-way versus shared right-of-way, that is so 19th Century. In central Seattle effective public transit must use exclusive right-of-way because of our topography with avaliable land and transportation corridors being few and crowded. Consider the shared right-of-way service along Martin Luther King Way. It is the most problematic section in the present rail network. It should have been tunneled as originally anticipated. But politically, shared right-of-way had to be used for cost reasons, because the small rural minded concept with its lower initial costs had much greater appeal to many.
          That concept seemed to develop during the Depression, and continues to have a great deal of appeal to many. Seattle up to that time was forward thinking and thought big. Slowly the Central City is beginning to have that forward thinking approach once again.
          BTW, I moved to Seattle proper when I enrolled as a veteran at the UW in 1967. I have lived in the tri-county area since 1959. So I have been around for the entire public debate over rail transportation and most of public debates over large municipal projects. I remember the debate over the formation of Metro for waste water treatment. All these debates, ultimately condense into the question of whether Seattle is a small rural minded city versus a big urban minded city. I think that we need to realize we are a big city which is a major part of a rapidly developing large international cosmopolitan region. Afterall we are almost as populous as San Francisco.

12. “the lesson is first and foremost one of priority. Link has worse priority on MLK than fully street running trams do in Zurich”

    The entire problem is priorities and values, and Link’s physical priority on MLK is a symptom of it. The starting point is the values of effective. We need a comprehensive local+regional network that does that. Some if it will be high-capacity lines in strategic corridors; others will be local neighborhood bus routes and coverage routes. People need an efficient non-car/non-taxi method available to get everywhere to do all the things. This should be high priority in terms of politicians’ attention, revenue allocation, and making sure it gets done. SOV infrastructure should be lower priority: it doesn’t scale and is the most inefficient way imaginable.

    That’s how Paris does things: it prioritizes people’s mobility over car infrastructure, nimbyism, arbitrary favored stakeholders, etc. If a BRT line or cycletrack is needed somewhere, it takes car lanes or parking spaces for it. It doesn’t spend thirty years imagining those people and trips don’t exist, or worrying whether we can spend a leetle bit of money for it, it just does it. It has a comprehensive network of metro lines and RER lines that get a lot of the population to where they need to be.

    Once a region has the right vision and priorities, and the politicians are championing it, and showing the public how effective it is/will be so that the public supports it, then everything else will fall into place. They’ll be motivated to make an effective plan and milestones to get it done. If money isn’t readily available, they’ll prioritize finding it, and putting achievable milestones in the plan so the public can see progress on the ground each year and use it. They won’t let non-transit issues get in the way of it.

    1. The biggest difficulty of rail signal priority on MLK is basically that the street is overly wide so pedestrians need lots more time to walk across. That’s the root of the train signal priority challenge.

       Streets in Zurich are just not as wide. That’s means that a train doesn’t have to sit nearly as long to get its priority phase.

       The Link signal priority on MLK works reasonably well given this rather significant limitation. There are certainly some problems with it that need to be addressed — but they’re seemingly logic problems rather than capital problems. That said, the hardware is at least 17 years old so an upgrade may be in order.

       I think it’s also important to mention that the MLK median segment is about four miles long. From central Zurich, that distance would be significant. The MLK Link surface portion runs from 3400S to 10000S — at a diagonal! That’s 66 blocks north to south and 14 blocks east to west!

Comments are closed.