All posts by Martin H. Duke

• Better access to NE 130th and NE 148th Stations
• SBB on bike access to lots of stations
• Northgate train testing has started
• Complete streets in Bellevue
• ST donating land for affordable housing; you can comment
• Olympia floats a big transpo package
• Bellevue’s ADU rules are not good
• Peter Rogoff talks about ST3 woes
• West Seattle, Ballard tunnels don’t seem so expensive now
• Another bill would let monorail authority fund light rail
• Uber, Lyft drivers now earning more
• PT Chief Sue Dreier retiring
• Comment on the curb space around Climate Pledge Arena.
• More research about high infrastructure costs
• Biden USDOT starts staffing up
• ST gets $1.4m from feds for commuter rail
• Sounds like infrastructure week again
• New stimulus proposal has $20 billion for transit

This is an open thread.

As the Sound Transit 3 news gets worse and worse, Sound Transit 2 continues a stream of good news as the bulk of the projects converge on opening. Today, we found out the South Bellevue parking garage will open in September, which restores the spaces for route 550 and 241 riders, and then some. This may be as much as two years before the Link line itself.

The garage has 1,500 spaces.

This publication is not a big fan of parking garages. But if there’s anywhere in the Link system there ought to be a garage, it’s here: hemmed in by a wetland and a neighborhood that won’t countenance upzoning (also up a steep hill), this station exists because it is on the way to downtown Bellevue, sits at an elbow in the line that allows it to draw from a wide swath of the Eastside, and proximity to two interstates.

As the County returns to full economic life, Metro is ramping up service. In keeping with their normal service reorganization procedure, there will be a citizen advisory board:

We are looking for participants for a workshop to provide input on how we prioritize what service to restore. 

Participants will: 

·         Attend a virtual workshop in the first two weeks of February 2021 to review Metro’s response to the COVID outbreak, 

·         Help Metro planning staff evaluate what types of service are most important to communities, 

·         Be compensated for their time and participation, and 

·         Be accommodated through interpretation and ADA access, as needed.  

If you are interested in this opportunity to participate in Metro’s planning, please respond to mjahshan@kingcounty.gov by January 21, 2021.

Longtime readers know I did one of these boards back in 2008 (unfortunately for me, well before one got paid to do so). It was an interesting window into the many considerations planners actually balance, as well as an education into what ordinary people in your community really think.

As always, I think people with a solid grasp of planning principles and a system view can be a useful corrective to narrower interests, as long they are willing to listen, open-minded, and empathetic.

• Kirkland considers 300′ towers around BRT stations while Seattle tinkers with 4-story buildlings around Link; maybe suburbs deserve HCT investment more than Seattle
• Point Defiance Bypass testing resumes
• Learn about last century’s streetcars
• Redmond hiring a transportation manager [UPDATE: this position closed in September]
• C-Tran will turn off diesel engines where pollution matters most
• Senate considering $10 billion for highway removal

This is an open thread.

• Free vanpools for West Seattle
• Uber prices rising due to new regulations on labor costs
• An excellent preview of the coming Transportation agenda ($) in the legislature
• Washington’s draft “Active Transportation Plan“
• It’s likely it’ll turn out fine, but the fact that the I-90 bridge is so innovative is a cause for concern as well as pride
• City rankings are dumb, and the article title is simply incorrect, but 10th best carfree city in the US sounds about right
• 20 years (!) of Tacoma freeway construction
• How to pick a bus battery
• Paid parking coming to the Junction
• Sounder mudslides are back
• Another grant means another “microtransit” program instead of just more buses
• Alon Levy reports that the Seattle Process is spreading, which is bad news
• Demand dropping, rents drop too, upending years of sloppy thinking about gentrification
• Seattle Children’s Hospital seeks a transportation planner

This is an open thread.

2020 was not… great, but 2021 will be a major year for transit openings and restructuring:

• Northgate Link will revolutionize transit in North Seattle beginning in September
• ST Express will have a ton of service changes at the same time
• as will Metro
• and Community Transit
• CT route 111 improves in March
• We should also expect Covid-19 route suspensions to melt away
• Sounder has new concession fares on March 1
• The Seattle TBD should restore (some of the) other cuts from the previous measure expiring

• Is the Bike Master Plan obsolete?
• A “diverging diamond” interchange ($) seems like it might help some I-5 chokepoints in Seattle; kudos to Lindblom for acknowledging bikes, pedestrians, transit, and climate in an article about Lacey roads (!)
• A transit-aware list of hiking possibilities
• Essential workers get free scooter rides ($)
• Submit public comment on RapidRide I

This is an open thread.

• Interesting Q&A with Metro GM Terry White ($)
• Point Defiance Bypass testing begins January 16th
• Covid-19 is causing all those Metro trip cancellations
• UW foot ferries are the best of a not-great bunch
• Improving access to U District Station
• New stimulus not great news for ST
• Almost half of helmet citations go to the homeless
• Gov. Inslee has a new climate change agenda ($)
• Metro marking inactive bus stops
• West Seattle gondola agitation starts, but comparing Link program costs to gondola conceptual costs is apples and oranges
• Seattle’s per capita VMT is dropping
• Bridge seismic costs ($) out of control
• ST’s 2021 budget
• Clallam Transit’s budget
• Federal Way station art discussion grinds on
• Peter Rogoff forgoes bonus and raise ($), ST staff skipping annual raises
• New Link trains are testing

This is an open thread.

In addition to formally approving lower concession fares for Sounder, last week the Sound Transit board approved a fare enforcement pilot which would replace fare enforcement security contractors with Sound Transit staff “fare ambassadors” with different uniforms and an emphasis on rider education and de-escalation. As part of the pilot, there will be no citations in 2021.

The board is pushing the clearly reluctant CEO, Peter Rogoff, to severely weaken the threat of getting caught. The “Fare Enforcement Action Plan,” a guideline for what the Board expects from staff in 2022, envisions no law enforcement involvement in pure payment disputes, more warnings, and a lower fine.

The big question, of course, is if lax enforcement eventually leads to much less observance by the fare-paying public. Letting the poorest riders keep their $1.50 will not make a real difference in Sound Transit’s finances, but broader indifference to fares (which some activists ultimately want) definitely would.

• Article on signal timing ($) is rather incredulous about the pollution savings, as though making driving easier doesn’t encourage more driving (and therefore more emissions)
• Cascadia HSR vision process grinds on
• Welcome to Seamless Seattle
• RapidRide H (Delridge) slips to 2022
• Crossroads Connect expands its service area
• Big zoning reforms in Everett
• Someday, only ads for tofu will be allowed on buses ($). I’d rather they just ran it to be revenue-maximizing
• ST board is split on decriminalizing fare non-payment
• Goodbye to CT CEO Emmett Heath ($)
• CT says hello to longtime ST Exec Ric Ilgenfritz ($)
• You can still get a Safe Routes to School grant
• Making a TriMet public safety plan is fraught these days
• Happy Birthday to Cascadia’s best transit technology

This is an open thread.

Yesterday, Metro announced “The Dash“, a new data visualization tool (also available in Spanish with other languages coming soon). Metro continues to lap other agencies in putting data about its service quality out in a timely and attractive format.

If you’re just trying to catch a bus that won’t pass you by due to capacity limits, this data isn’t particularly helpful. Instead, this data might provide a more informed kind of public comment, leveraging data instead of anecdotes, and aware of how other routes are faring in the current environment.

“King County Metro is committed to providing mobility for all, but that does not just mean providing the mobility services themselves, but also the information that will empower the public to use them,” said Terry White, Metro’s general manager. “At Metro, we value transparency and continuous improvement, and recognized the interconnectedness between the two. We’re pleased that The Dash will help move us forward on both of those fronts, and help the public be better informed about our services.”

• SDOT updates us on RapidRide J (Eastlake)
• Highlights of the King County and Seattle transportation budgets
• GIG Carshare expanding its operating area
• Even electric vehicles kill salmon
• West Seattle gets an update on ST3
• People love to propose fast ferries ($) but I just don’t know
• Durkan floats allowing peds and bikes on the Duwamish Link bridge
• More chatter about art at Federal Way Station
• LFP Council debates whether to require community benefits when Sound Transit builds it a parking garage. The legislature really ought to do something about city permitting power
• Legislature considering a big infrastructure bill
• Toll revenue down ($)
• Help catch the bus assault suspect in Pierce County
• How trains shaped Everett ($)
• Automated trains are one of those obviously good ideas that get no traction in the real world

This is an open thread.

Last month Mayor Durkan decided to repair the West Seattle Bridge instead of replacing it. This is faster and cheaper, but means the next big bridge project in this corridor (except Link construction) will be decades sooner.

I don’t know if the war-on-cars people ever converged to a position on this subject, but this is the right call, for three reasons:

1. It’s a bad time for new capital commitments. We all have opinions on the post-pandemic future of commuting, but any honest person doesn’t know for sure what traffic patterns will be in 2025. It makes sense to wrap up projects that are almost done (like Sound Transit 2), or putter along in the planning phase of far-out stuff (like ST3), but it’s a uniquely bad time to start motion on a giant transportation project. In other words, it’s premature to take a big step back by canceling something, but also unnecessarily risky to add big new commitments.

In what is becoming a remarkable year of operational failures, beginning Monday Link peak frequency will drop to 12 minute intervals (from 8 minutes) because they’re running out of operators due to Covid-19. Things will remain the same at off-peak times.

Link operators are provided by Metro. While Link is obviously more critical than most (if not all) bus routes, Metro’s Jeff Switzer explains that “Transit operators in bus operations aren’t directly interchangeable with Link light rail operators, so it’s not as simple as taking a bus driver off the street and putting them in a light rail vehicle.”

Tacoma Link, directly operated by Sound Transit, will run a Sunday schedule both today and December 12th, for similar reasons.

The various online schedule and real-time tools are likely to be inaccurate during this period.

There is no word on when the previous week’s level of service will be restored, which in itself is reduced from what we enjoyed in the before times.

• Meeting today at 10am on Sounder concession fares.
• Congrats to Terry White, now the permanent Metro General Manager.
• ST has a new tool to see when Link is crowded.
• Snohomish thinking about housing around Link.
• Amtrak now thinks they’ll reopen the Point Defiance Bypass next summer.
• A snapshot of Link construction.
• West Seattle Bridge camera enforcement not happening yet.
• Link now operates with 100% carbon-free power.
• Mukilteo Ferry Terminal now 2 feet higher ($) because of sea level rise.
• C-Tran about to begin construction on a second Vine BRT Line.
• Flixbus to Ellensburg returns in January.

This is an open thread.

Yesterday Metro announced that they are waiving the $5 ORCA fee through February 28th, 2021. The stated reason is to encourage contactless payment during the pandemic.

To avoid hoarding, adults are limited to three cards and youth to one. However, adults can get the cards at ticket vending machines, so I’m not sure how this limit is enforced. From the announcement:

“You can get your free ORCA card by:

• Calling ORCA Customer Service: 888-988-6722 (ORCA cards typically take 5-7 business days to arrive by mail) – adult cards only
• Visiting a store that sells ORCA cards – adult cards only
• Using ORCA ticket vending machines – adult cards only
• Completing and mailing in this ORCA Card order form – adult or youth cards
• Visiting an ORCA Customer Service Office (NOTE: You may experience extended wait times in person while measures are in place to limit the spread of COVID-19) – adult or youth cards

Please note that this offer is NOT available for cards purchased on ORCAcard.com. Due to technical limitations, cards on the website will continue to be $5.“

Agencies have been extremely reluctant to reduce or eliminate the fee, but instead have had free ORCA events every few years. If you’ve been holding out, it’s a good opportunity to finally get a card.

There were many interesting themes in the recent struggle over a legislative “striker” trying to keep North Seattle service hours from moving south. But one of the interesting threads is a shift of emphasis in transit activism from quantitative ridership metrics towards economic and racial equity.

In public comment to the King County Council, Disability Rights Washington’s Anna Zivarts proposed a fairly extreme version of this trend, which deserves to be quoted in full: