All posts by MartinP

The Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) recently requested feedback on their plans for the future of Amtrak Cascades service. They call it the Preliminary Amtrak Cascades Service Development Plan (SDP). We (STB authors) responded:

We expect that the region will continue to grow and our airports and freeways won’t be able to handle the traffic increase. We should make sure that we don’t need flights within Cascadia. While UHSR [ultra-high speed rail] service may be nice, the California HSR made it clear what cost/effort/time it takes to do that along the West Coast. Our climate is changing and we don’t have such time and we entice travelers to switch from cars to rail asap! We propose to take a more incremental approach. Germany extended their rail network with specific upgrades and a few high-speed portions which straightened some hilly routes by using tunnels and viaducts. They did not build a whole separate infrastructure as France did. We already have a rail corridor on which we can build upon. We endorse hourly (clockface) service along the corridor as proposed in Alternative E and then make incremental improvements.

Here are some considerations for further studies:

Speed: Faster travel will increase the attractiveness of the service. 90-mph is nice, but we understand the original master agreement with BNSF called for 110-mph service. What would it take to get to 110-mph? That would make a huge difference! Can we rebuild portions where the current track has tight turns and trains need to slow down to 30-mph creating a bottleneck for both passenger and freight trains? Do we need to add tunnels in some places? (May be even reach 125-mph on new track/alignments)

Can we electrify the line to allow for better acceleration (besides reducing carbon output)? That may reduce the advantage of running express trains and avoid express service violating the clockface service.

Reliability: What efforts are necessary to maintain 95% ontime performance? Are there any portions where we need to address issues which cause delays? For example Sounder-North is often canceled, can we elevate the tracks so that runoffs don’t cause delays?

Connectivity: Can we add a Thruway service or even a gondola between Tukwila and Seatac airport to allow for quick transfer between international or long distance flights and Amtrak/Sounder?

PS: A blog post with ideas on how to improve service: There’s No Path Forward for Ultra High-Speed Rail in Washington State; We Are Better Off For It. | Transportation Matters (wordpress.com)

Seattle’s bus network used to be focused on bringing people to work downtown. As our city grew, it spread its wings across First Hill, Capitol Hill, Fremont, and the Eastside. Though Amazon was earlier in the middle of downtown, it now occupies South Lake Union (SLU) and Bellevue. While a one-seat bus ride to downtown used to be the norm, once you have more destinations to cover, it becomes more important to develop a network of interconnecting lines. Besides the frequency on the lines, the connecting points between the lines determine how easy or time-consuming the transfer is. We built transit centers to help connect lines. With light rail construction, most stations also became places where multiple bus lines would intersect. Mount Baker Station is a good example where transfers could be much better if the buses would serve the Link station more directly instead of having to walk and cross a busy road.

Last week German local public transit came to a stop while the union demanded better working conditions for transit operators. They asked for fewer working days and hours, to mitigate increased traffic stress and increase the attractiveness of transit jobs again. Operator availability and pay has put a limit on service recovery and expansion since the pandemic. I have written about automated metro trains and gondola lifts before, to reduce this dependency and offer higher frequency and longer operating hours. In this article I want to focus on automated shuttles and buses and how it may affect Metro’s plans for the next few decades as recently discussed.

The Ballard and SLU light rail segment is expected to get up to 57,000 riders. That’s higher than any of the other Link projects planned for ST3 (Everett, Tacoma Dome, West Seattle, or Issaquah). Construction cost rise faster than Sound Transit’s income, transit ridership has dipped, and rush-hour peaks have flattened. In this environment Sound Transit should focus on the Ballard line, and postpone the others until demand justifies the construction and operation.

With the departure of Sound Transit’s CEO, the beginning of the year would be a good opportunity for the Board or an interim CEO to reassess their construction priorities. When ST3 was envisioned a decade ago, the largest job center was in downtown Seattle. Now growth has spread out to other parts of the city and the Eastside. Amazon, Google, and Facebook have offices in both downtown and the Eastside. Since the pandemic many of those offices are often empty. Work schedules are not as rigid anymore, reducing the demand during the morning and afternoon peaks. While midweek demand in general has dropped, demand on the weekend has increased, some Saturdays have seen higher ridership than on a weekday. Some people have switched from transit to e-bikes or back to their car as bus services had become less reliable due to staff and maintenance parts shortages. It seems the shortages are now getting addressed. If we are not careful and ignore all these changes, we may end up with light rail lines with low ridership and less frequent service which would make transit even less appealing. We may be better off with high frequency bus lines until the ridership supports construction of high frequency rail. The demand along the Ballard line corridor seems to be the only line which meets these criteria besides some of the lines already under construction.

While traditional steel rail works well on the surface, Sound Transit and many other transit agencies favor elevated tracks in more semi-urban areas (tunnels in the urban core). To expedite construction of elevated guideways for the 1962 World’s Fair, Seattle turned to Germany for trains to run on a prefabricated monorail. Now another German manufacturer is testing a prefabricated dual guideway system with integrated maglev propulsion.

What does transit look like from West Seattle currently? Will light rail service improve it? Let’s look at getting from Alki, the Admiral District, Alaska, and Morgan Junctions, the Fauntleroy ferry terminal, or Westwood Village to other places such as downtown, First Hill, UW, Bellevue, Ballard, Columbia City, or the SeaTac airport.

Sound Transit and the city invited the public last Wednesday (Oct 25th) to the Alki Masonic Center to review their plans for station access along the West Seattle Link Extension (WSLE).

Various publications have summarized the March 23 decisions on the West Seattle and Ballard Link Extension (WSBLE): Publicola, Crosscut, NW Asian Weekly, and the Urbanist. Mike Lindblom even mentioned the single tunnel alternative in his Seattle Times ($) article. Most surprising were the late additions:

• APPROVED: “North of CID” and “South of CID” (N/S) stations.
• APPROVED: “4th Avenue Shallower” station alternative.
• REJECTED: Keep Rainier Valley in DSTT1; move West Seattle to DSTT2.

The result of these is that the preferred alignment moves Midtown and CID stations south. Midtown is replaced by a “North of CID” station at the King County Administration building. CID is replaced by a “South of CID” station at 6 Ave S & Seattle Blvd S. A new alternative is added: “4th Avenue Shallower”, which is like another CID alternative at 4th & Jackson but less deep. This alternative would keep Midtown station at Madison Street. The rejected alternative would have reversed the spine split, keeping Rainier Valley in DSTT1 going to UW and Lynnwood. Ballard and West Seattle would be in DSTT2. In the current plan, Rainier Valley will be switched to Ballard when Ballard opens.

[UPDATE: Several factual corrections, courtesy of Sound Transit. – MHD]

Sound Transit’s System Expansion Committee met on February 9th to review the results of studies on details of the West Seattle and Ballard Link Extension (WSBLE). The full ST board will meet February 22nd to consider this, and March 23rd to choose a preferred alignment (routing) for project, if it’s ready to do so. This article explains the study findings without much opinionating. Future articles are in preparation that will make specific recommendations.

ST has released a 3.5 hour webcast of the meeting, and a 124-page slide deck of the study results. Meeting timestamps: 0:00:00 roll call, 0:04:30 intro reports, 0:16:30 public testimony, 1:14:00 Everett Link studies, 1:43:00 WSBLE studies.

Last year the board selected a preferred alignment in West Seattle, but asked staff to study Chinatown/International District station (CID) and a few other details a bit more. The studies ST ordered last year concern how to avoid negative impacts in the CID, opportunities to mix and match South Lake Union stations from the two routes studied in the DEIS, refinements to the Smith Cove / Interbay stations, and how to reduce cost and improve access in Ballard.

The report presents a lot of alternatives. These address some of the issues identified last year. They may also add construction time, risk, and another $900 million to the already much higher cost than originally planned and promised to voters. Skipping some stations may eliminate those cost increases.

CID

The report first presented ways to reduce the impact of the 4^th Ave Shallow option which was studied in the DEIS. This would avoid impact to existing buildings, but would add $700 million in costs, raising the cost of the Pike St to Holgate St segment to $3.1 billion, and the Midtown station would still be 200 ft deep.

On January 11th, Sound Transit held the second Interbay-Ballard workshop to prepare for a route selection by the Board in March. The workshop summarized the findings from the first workshop and online responses, and then presented a few new options for tunnel stations along 14th and 15th Ave NW. These options were to address some of the Board’s concerns and to reduce cost with the goal to deliver the Ballard extension closer to 2037 rather than 2039. The presentation also provided more details on construction impact.

For Ballard, Sound Transit is trying to refine the options by limiting property acquisition costs and improving station access, in particular from both sides of Market St.

1. Sound Transit could save $100 million by locating the station on the East side of 15th Ave NW. The main entrance would be in the middle of the station on the Southeast corner of Market St. A pedestrian tunnel would also connect to a Southwest entrance and could potentially be extended to another entrance on the Northwest corner for an additional $30 million. There would also be small emergency exits on the South and North ends of the platform.
2. Similarly, they could locate the line right under 15th Ave for similar savings. Lanes on 15th Ave would need to be reduced for up to 4 years. By pushing it further North straddling Market St, they might be able to add an entrance North of 56th Ave.
3. By locating the station on the East side of 14th Ave straddling Market St, they could avoid acquisition of Safeway and save $140 million. They pointed out it would reduce the opportunity for TOD and make the entrances less visible.

One of the concerns with the 14th Ave station is that riders would need to cross 15th Ave. They presented various ways to improve the crossing using bulbs, a pedestrian bridge or a pedestrian tunnel. They also envisioned an underground retail concourse combined with TOD which would connect the 14th Ave station underground and extend under 15th Ave for an additional cost of up to $100 million.

Even though during the DEIS public input many residents had requested better access to downtown / historic Ballard, they did not look at alternative stations along Tallman Ave, Russel Ave, Market St, or 56th St. When I asked why not, they responded that they had not looked at those but that a station requires a large enough staging area, and they try to avoid impacting historical buildings.

During their December 12th workshop Sound Transit had presented a few alternatives for the Interbay section to address earlier concerns. Sound Transit now presented some new findings:

1. A station under Dravus St would require a partial closure of Dravus for 18 months but save $30 million.
2. A Mercer Place tunnel portal turned out to be infeasible though the alternative station locations may also work with the tunnel portals already under consideration.
3. More tunneling with a single consolidated station along 15th Ave may reduce impact and simplify transit connections but reduce neighborhood connectivity and increase cost by $210 million.