David Lawson

A Closer Look At Metro’s Cuts: Seattle and North King County

November 8, 2013November 8, 2013 by David Lawson

26 Bus — Metro Route 26, by WhenEliseSings

As most STB readers probably know by now, Metro published its proposal for 17% service cuts yesterday. No area of the county escapes significant pain, and any service that smells even slightly of empty seats would be cut or restructured. In this post I’ll have a look at some of the more interesting (or scary) specifics within Seattle and North King County. (A future post will cover the Eastside; cuts in South King County are more straightforward, although just as painful.) A holistic look at the cuts, which are presented by Metro only route-by-route and in some not-so-informative area maps, reveals much more about what Metro is thinking for a funding-free future — and possibly a well-funded future as well.

Go below the jump for the details.

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Bellevue’s 2030 Transit Service Vision

October 28, 2013October 28, 2013 by David Lawson

As part of the process of updating its Transit Master Plan, the City of Bellevue has published a “Transit Service Vision Report.” The report is the culmination of a year-long public process intended to help the City of Bellevue identify its future transit priorities. The report includes proposed networks for 2030, 2022, and 2015, modified for each of three funding scenarios.

Bellevue Vision Map — Part of the map for the “Growing” funding scenario

The unifying theme of the proposed networks is “Abundant Access,” which incorporates goals of frequency, convenience, efficiency, simplicity, directness, and effective regional connections. The networks include only service that serves Bellevue destinations, although the maps cover almost the entire Eastside, so some mental “filling-in” will be necessary as you look at the maps.

At a high level, the proposed networks are outstanding examples of frequent, gridded network design. High-ridership lines connecting major destinations are improved, with more frequent routes than exist today even in the Reduced funding scenario. Coverage to extremely low-ridership neighborhoods is mostly eliminated in the Reduced and Stable funding scenarios, with priority given to services that accommodate high numbers of riders. Construction impacts from Link are taken into account in the 2015 and 2022 scenarios.

Some specific changes in the 2030 proposals, below the jump, are likely to get riders’ attention.

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Mayor McGinn Proposes Transit Improvements in 2014 Proposed Budget

September 24, 2013September 24, 2013 by David Lawson

Multimodal afternoon jam on 4th Avenue South. Photo by zargoman.

Yesterday, Mayor Mike McGinn issued his proposed budget for 2014. The $4.4 billion total proposed budget represents a 1.9% increase over the 2014 budget endorsed as part of last year’s budget process. The mayor’s office reports that the increase is possible largely because of better-than-expected tax collections resulting from the sustained economic recovery. SDOT fared better yet in the Mayor’s proposal, receiving a 3.9% increase (bottom of p.3) from last year’s endorsed budget, to a total proposed amount of $407 million. (The existing Seattle Streetcar, which is a separate line item from SDOT, saw no change.)

Buried in the details of the budget proposal are some items of considerable interest to transit riders. There are direct improvements to the city’s transit network, as well as street improvements with the potential to have a disproportionately positive impact on transit service quality. Further details below the jump. The descriptions in the budget documents are relatively basic; text in italics represents my commentary.

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Your Bus At Night, Only A Little More Often.

September 4, 2013September 3, 2013 by David Lawson

One of the very first questions I expected when I published the Frequent Network Plan about two weeks ago was “How much frequency would we get at night?” And, indeed, reader lakecityrider brought the topic up in the second comment to my original post. I wrote at the time that I needed to crunch the numbers.

21 bus on 3rd Ave at night — Metro at night: Skeletal, and raggedly efficient. Photo by zargoman.

Now I’ve done that. And the results, summarized in this map, show just how badly Metro’s night network has suffered in recent years. Night service has borne the brunt of all the cuts and efficiencies in the last decade. As a result there are just not a lot of hours to put into core-route frequency. The existing all-day network in the area covered by the FNP uses about 324 buses; the existing night network uses only about 196 buses during early “night” hours (about 7:30 to 10:30 p.m.), with the number rapidly diminishing as the night wears on. Further, there are no peak trippers at night that may be made redundant by a superior all-day network, so there are no “extra” buses to add to the new night network, either to provide more frequency or to add recovery time. Night service does run faster than day service, but not by enough to make a huge difference; there is no alternative but to cut frequency substantially from daytime levels, and to cut a small amount of service entirely.

Speaking in broad terms, most 10-minute routes in the FNP would have to become 15-minute routes in the early part of the night, except for two that become 20-minute routes. Most 15-minute routes become 20-minute routes, although there are several that become 30-minute routes. The 30-minute routes stay at the 30-minute level, but several suffer truncations of varying severity. A couple of through-routes that would be impossible during the day would be used at night to save additional hours. Further details after the jump.

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Frequent Network Follow-Up: University District

August 29, 2013August 29, 2013 by David Lawson

I was impressed and gratified by the reader reaction to my post last Monday introducing the Frequent Network Plan. Almost 300 comments, lots of interesting and knowledgeable discussion, and not a single post needing moderation: this is what an online community should be, and STB readers rock.

The discussion helped me to figure out a few areas of the plan that I wanted to refine. In this post, I’ll talk about one neighborhood in particular — covering both the general ideas there, and a couple of specific improvements I’ve made in response to last week’s comments. That neighborhood is the University District. Other neighborhoods warranting special attention — particularly Magnolia, northern West Seattle, Rainier Beach, Fremont, and Madison Valley/Park — will be covered in future posts.

FNP U-District Map — The revised FNP in the U-District

Details below the jump.

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Your Bus, Much More Often. No More Money. Really.

August 19, 2013August 29, 2013 by David Lawson

What if almost every bus in Seattle came every 8, 10, or 15 minutes? And gave you a fast, reliable ride?

That may sound like a pipe dream. But it’s entirely possible. And the best part is: we don’t need more money to do it. We just need some inventiveness, a lot of political courage, and the occasional willingness to walk a couple extra blocks or to make a transfer.

This post, together with the linked documents, sets out a proposal called the Frequent Network Plan—a new idea for the core all-day bus network for the city of Seattle. This initial presentation is general and covers the whole city; specific neighborhoods seeing big changes will be addressed in more detail in future posts.

A small piece of the route map — A bit of the map, in a neighborhood seeing a lot of change

I built two versions of the Frequent Network Plan map: one where each route has a separate color, and one where each frequency level has a separate color. The first shows where routes would go, while the second shows just how much more frequently buses would be running along any given corridor. I also wrote three reference documents, linked at the end of the post. Further explanation after the jump.

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Metro’s New Beta Trip Planner: Try It

August 7, 2013August 6, 2013 by David Lawson

Most of us have had to rely on King County Metro’s trip planner at some point, particularly when traveling to parts of the county we don’t know well. It works, most of the time, but isn’t always fun to use. Results come in a stark, dated-looking text format that requires a lot of interpretation. Control over itineraries is limited, and transfers are only skeletally explained — you are mostly on your own figuring out how to get from one leg to the next. As Google and other transit agencies have steadily improved trip planning tools, Metro’s planner has been showing its age. Experienced transit riders will often recommend using Sound Transit’s trip planner or Google Maps transit directions instead..

Metro has been working on this problem for some time, and now we can see the fruits of the agency’s labor. A beta version of an all-new trip planner is live. The new planner includes live maps based on the Google Maps engine; much more detailed directions; and lots of reference material. More screenshots and details follow below the jump, but the verdict is: Metro’s back in business. The new planner could use some refinement (as expected for a beta product), but it is once again competitive with the alternatives, and even occasional transit users shouldn’t hesitate to try it out now. It also includes goodies not strictly related to trip planning which may be even better than the trip planner itself; as we will see, it may be a more useful reference tool than the normal Metro site.

Default View — The default view in the new trip planner

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Sound Transit Board to Vote Thursday on P&R Parking Permits

July 22, 2013July 22, 2013 by David Lawson

Tukwila Int'l Blvd. Station — Tukwila International Boulevard Station, by l0st2

Paid P&R parking is getting its nose under the tent at Sound Transit.

In its meeting last Thursday, the Operations and Administration Committee of the ST Board voted to recommend that the full Board approve a parking pilot program. The Board is expected to vote in favor at its Thursday meeting. The pilot is described in this draft board motion which was attached to the agenda for the committee meeting.

By far the most noteworthy component of the pilot program is paid parking permits, which would guarantee parking availability at high-demand P&R lots to permit holders, even if they arrive later in the morning. This is a first in the Puget Sound area. ST would initially reserve 20% of the spaces at the following four ST-operated P&R facilities for permit holders:

Tukwila International Boulevard Station
Issaquah Transit Center
Sumner Station
Mukilteo Station

This is fantastic news. Details below the jump.
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