All posts by Ross Bleakney

It has been over a year since Metro restructured the buses because of the Lynnwood Link Extension. We now know not only the monthly ridership of the routes but also more advanced data like the ridership per service hour from 2024 and 2025 . This is an analysis of those changes as well as a proposal based on that analysis. We will report on Community Transit routes as that data becomes available.

Continue reading “Lynnwood Link Metro Bus Restructure Analysis”

The recent election of the former head the Seattle Transit Riders Union Katie Wilson to be Seattle’s mayor occurred less than a month after Councilmember Alexis Mercedes Rinck announced her ‘Better Bus Lanes’ Campaign. In the spirit of that campaign I offer suggestions for improvements that can be accomplished in the near future:

Continue reading “Better Buses in Seattle”

The following is our set of endorsements for the 2025 General Election. We didn’t weigh in on every race. We focused on transit-related issues with candidates representing parts (or all) of Seattle. Feel free to comment on other races. Keep the discussion about the candidates and not other transit issues.

Mayor: Katie Wilson. While Bruce Harrell hasn’t been a terrible mayor when it comes to transit, he has been poor on housing issues. Seattle is now more conservative than Spokane when it comes to allowing density. This not only pushes up the cost of housing but it makes transit worse. Katie Wilson will not only allow a lot more housing to be built but she is probably the strongest transit candidate we’ve had in the last fifty years. As head of the Seattle Transit Union she has shown great leadership in fighting for various transit projects. I’ve worked with her on relatively obscure, minor issues (e. g. the monorail fares) and she was obviously smart, very responsive and reasonable. She has open mind when it comes to projects that many leaders have been afraid to tackle (for example her comments on the streetcar). She is the clear choice for mayor.

Seattle City Council District 2: This is a very close call. Both Eddie Lin and Adonis Ducksworth are good candidates when it comes to transit. Ducksworth has more experience when it comes to transportation and the endorsement of the Amalgamated Transit Union (Local 587). Lin supports the streetcar, while Ducksworth doesn’t. We agree the cost of the streetcar isn’t the best use of SDOT funds so we endorse Ducksworth, but it is a very close call.

Seattle City Council District 8: This race isn’t. Alexis Mercedes Rinck is a strong advocate for transit, Savage is not.

Seattle City Council District 9: Again, Dionne Foster is the clear choice. I would vote for a rock over Sara Nelson given her anti-transit positions. Dionne Foster is much better than a rock. She is a well qualified candidate with a wide range of endorsements and a strong pro-transit approach.

King County Executive: This one is very close. Both candidates are outstanding. There is very little difference in terms of policy. We give the edge to Claudia Balducci given her experience with transit issues, especially with Sound Transit. She can be criticized for letting the agency struggle, but unlike other board members she seems well aware of the problems and willing to consider alternatives. While Girmay Zahilay would be good, we feel that Balducci would be a little bit better.

Ballots need to be in by November 4th. Strongly consider using a drop box instead of mailing in, as the USPS may not post-mark your ballot in time.

Pinehurst Station is scheduled to open sometime in 2026. When it does, Metro will run buses to it from nearby neighborhoods like Lake City and Bitter Lake, saving riders a lot of time on trips that involve Link. As part of the Lynnwood Link restructure Metro has proposed the following:

Most of what is on that map has already been implemented. The only changes scheduled for the Pinehurst Station opening are:

• Route 72 — Will replace the 372 and go to Shoreline South/148th Station instead of Kenmore.
• Route 77 — New route between Bitter Lake, Lake City and the U-District, serving Pinehurst Station along the way.
• Route 522 — Will go to Shoreline South/148th Station instead of Roosevelt.

We can do better.

Continue reading “Better Bus Service to Pinehurst Station”

Sound Transit is in the early stages of building Stride 3, a new bus rapid transit service. It will run along SR-522 and Northeast 145th Street between Bothell and Shoreline South/148th Station. Additional right-of-way will be added along parts of the corridor to allow the buses to avoid congestion. One of the more controversial areas for such work is in Lake Forest Park. There has been both local opposition as well as high cost overruns in the area. This is a proposal for a solution.

Lake Forest Park Issues

One of the goals for Stride 3 is to provide bus lanes both directions along SR-522. At the same time, the various cities want to retain two general purpose lanes heading both directions. This means at least six lanes. While they plan on eliminating many of the center-turn lanes, they will still retain quite a few (e. g. northbound Bothell Way to 35th Avenue NE). Therefore, for much of the route they require seven lanes. In most of the street it is only wide enough for six lanes.

Thus Sound Transit plans on making the street wider. In some cases this won’t cost much at all. But it gets challenging as you go north. If you want to widen the street between 153rd and 155th you need a new bridge over Bsche’tla Creek. This involves a deep ravine and is thus expensive. Other work north of the creek would require taking some property and rebuilding a lot of the retaining walls. This has led to local opposition. This too adds to the cost, as it is likely residents will fight this in court. This relatively simple project already has a fairly high price tag ($581.5 million). This is in addition to the bus barn. The combination of local opposition and environmentally sensitive land could lead to much higher costs.

Continue reading “Fixing Stride 3”

Ryan Packer had a recent editorial about adding bus service on First Avenue. I completely agree. There are many options and issues to consider.

Center Running with Normal Buses

Many of you are familiar with the RapidRide G buses on Madison Street that run in the center of the street and use center platforms. These buses avoid congestion that occasionally occurs with BAT lanes. There are no turning cars to worry about: it’s is like a busway in the middle of the street. On Madison Street they achieve this with special buses that have doors on both sides. This is very effective but it limits flexibility.

There is another technique that can achieve the same goal but does not require special buses. The buses serve center platforms from the right side (like a normal bus) even though the platform is in the middle of the street. You can see this in action for part of Van Ness Avenue in San Fransisco. You can also see how this works in these diagrams for a potential Aurora rebuild. By staggering the bus stops in this manner you can use regular buses to serve center platforms while still using a limited amount of street space. You would take just as much right-of-way from First Avenue as they planned on taking for the streetcar (with just as much of a speed improvement) but be able to serve it with any bus in our system.

Continue reading “Add Bus Service to First Avenue”

The Transit Riders Union alerted us to important legislation in Olympia that could use your help. The Urbanist covered this bill earlier in the legislative process, which seeks to improve service on Amtrak Cascades. To achieve these goals, WSDOT would likely implement upgrades described in the most recent service development plan.

The following is largely copied from Mary Patterson’s post (which you need to be a member to view):

The Amtrak Cascades bill ESHB 1837 has now been scheduled for a hearing in the Senate Transportation Committee and organizers have a goal of 2000 “pro” sign-ins by the time that window closes at 3pm on Tuesday April 1st (tomorrow). Here’s the link to the sign-in page for the bill. Choose ESHB 1837, your preferred testimony style, and “Pro” as your position.

Continue reading “Action Alert: Sign in “Pro” for Amtrak Cascades bill by Tuesday 3pm”

It has been several months since the RapidRide G Line opened. Along with the new bus line — arguably the region’s first BRT line — there was a restructure in the area. To get an idea of how effective the new bus line and restructure was, I decided to look into the ridership data.

Route Data

Unlike Michael Smith’s outstanding series of posts, this essay does not contain stop data. It is too early for that. Instead I’ve looked at the monthly data that Metro provides on their “dashboard“. The change occurred in the middle of September, so I’ve looked at the last three months of the year. Rather than compare it to earlier in the year I’ve compared it to the same months a year earlier. This avoids some of the seasonal changes in ridership (due to things like school) that typically happen. Ridership year-over-year across Metro also went up but in this particular area it went up about twice as much.

NOTE: The original version of this post stated that Metro ridership went down system wide. This was incorrect. The error was caused by Metro not including Link data the last few months and the author not realizing that.

Continue reading “Early Assessment of RapidRide G and Restructure”

Stop spacing is a trade-off. If the stops are too close together it takes too long for the bus to get anywhere. Too far apart and riders can’t walk or roll to a bus stop. Although the basics are fairly simple, the geometry surrounding stop placement can be a bit complicated. Jarrett Walker has a great primer on the subject. The RapidRide J Line in particular has some interesting geometric issues. Much of the corridor is fairly narrow. For example Eastlake & Galer is hemmed in by Lake Union and the freeway. This is where you can walk from there in five minutes. In contrast, a stop like Eastlake & Boston is much wider. A five minute walk from there resembles a standard diamond shape. Narrow areas can get away with longer gaps between stations for this reason.

Using the standard walking distance of 400 meters (mentioned by Walker) and the geographic particulars of the route, I’ve decided to analyze the stops of the J Line. I was inspired by this comment which questioned the elimination of a particular stop. As it turns out I don’t see that particular bus stop as a problem although I do see some stops that could be changed (and one stop that could be added).

Continue reading “RapidRide J Stop Spacing”

The private company Seattle Monorail Services is proposing a fare increase to use the Seattle Center Monorail. Fares would go from $3.50 to $4.00 for adults, $1.75 to $2.00 for youth, and $1.75 to $2.00 for reduced-fare riders. This is substantially higher than what King County Metro charges to ride the bus and Sound Transit charges to ride Link light rail.

	Full	Youth	Reduced
Monorail	$4.00	$2.00	$2.00
Metro Bus	$2.75	Free	$1.00
Link Light Rail	$3.00	Free	$1.00
Seattle Streetcars	$2.25	Free	$1.00

The Monorail is not an amusement park ride. It is a vital part of our public transportation system. For people who live in Uptown it is quite often the fastest way to get downtown and thus to the heart of our public transportation system. There are hundreds of people who work inside the Seattle Center as well as a public high school.

Seattle Monorail Services should adjust its fare structure to match King County Metro. Rides on the bus are FREE for youth, $1.00 for reduced fare riders, and $2.75 for adults. Setting the adult fare to a flat $3 would be appropriate as well, given that it costs that much to ride Link and it will probably cost that much to ride a Metro bus soon.

It is also quite reasonable to charge more for those not using an ORCA card. Regular users — especially low income users — would get a standard transit fare while tourists (those more likely to pay with cash or credit card) would pay more.

Standardizing fares to the level of a Metro bus would likely cost the privately owned Seattle Monorail Services a little bit of money. It would also cost the City of Seattle some money as well. This could be made up any number of ways. One would be to charge the standard (Metro) fare for the streetcars (instead of the current discount). Others include raising the cost of parking or concession fees inside the Seattle Center. Transit riders should not be asked to pay such a high burden.

The public is invited to comment on the proposed fare increase before a deadline of October 21, 2024 by emailing valancy.blackwell@seattle.gov.