Holiday Schedules for July 4th and DSTT Closure This Weekend

Posted on by Bruce Englehardt
2016 Independence Day Fireworks
Last year’s Independence Day fireworks viewed from near Westlake Station

After two years of government observance shenanigans, Independence Day is back to being a one-day holiday and has brought along some great gifts to those enjoying the nighttime fireworks show. Sound Transit will be running Link light rail trains every 30 minutes between midnight and 2 a.m. and Metro will deploy extra buses on 20 routes until midnight, as suggested by the King County Council earlier this year. The last northbound train leaves Angle Lake Station at 1 a.m. The last southbound train leaves University of Washington Station at 2 a.m. The Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel closes at 2:20 a.m.

Before we even get to the 4th of July schedules, however, there is a major service disruption for the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel this weekend. From Saturday, July 1 to the end of Sunday, July 2, buses will not operate in the tunnel due to construction at Convention Place Station; instead, tunnel routes will use their respective surface stops. Link light rail trains, however, will operate with normal weekend service at Westlake, University Street, Pioneer Square and International District/Chinatown stations. 4th Avenue will also be closed between South Washington and South Jefferson streets due to Yesler Bridge construction.

The full list of which schedules each transit service will operate with on July 4th is below the fold. Continue reading “Holiday Schedules for July 4th and DSTT Closure This Weekend”

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Link Connections on SR-520: survey closes tomorrow

Posted on by Dan Ryan
ST 545, with 9,500 weekday boardings, is among ten routes that may be restructured (Image: Atomic Taco)

This is the last week to take the survey on proposed revision to SR 520 bus service. The survey closes Friday midnight.

With the planned closure of the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel, the transit agencies have offered two alternatives that would extricate SR 520 buses from anticipated congestion on Seattle surface streets. Both would require most bus riders from Kirkland and Redmond to transfer to Link Light Rail at UW Station. Option B is frequency-focused, with more service truncated to UW at all hours, but more frequent service on major routes from Kirkland and Redmond. Option C is connections-focused, with somewhat less frequent buses, but more connections between more markets.

We described the alternatives here, and a recent open house here. Our complete One Center City coverage is here.

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News Roundup: An Early Peek

Posted on by Martin H. Duke

Northgate TC platform

This is an open thread.

27 comments

Community Transit Forecasts More Transit Improvements By 2022

Posted on by Bruce Englehardt
CT 29707 leaving Everett Station
A Swift bus leaving Everett Station

Community Transit has released a draft version of their 2017–2022 Transit Development Plan (TDP), which will guide the expansion of bus service across Snohomish County in the lead-up to Lynnwood Link’s opening in 2023. The 0.3 percent sales tax increase approved by voters in 2015 has now been funding expanded service for a full year, and will enable CT to spend an additional $30 million annually for new service and capital improvements. In total, Community Transit will use $1 billion in sales tax revenue and grants from state and federal sources to fund service improvements and capital projects.

Continue reading “Community Transit Forecasts More Transit Improvements By 2022”

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Next Generation ORCA Will Not Include Day Caps

Posted on by Brent White
$2.50 in cash, iPhone with Apple Pay, ORCA card, pre-paid debit MasterCard
Next Generation ORCA will accept more ways to pay for your ride
photo by Oran

The Regional Fare Coordination Board (ORCA Joint Board) has been working toward a new version of the ORCA product to be rolled out in 2021, currently dubbed “Next Generation ORCA”. As part of the new product, London-style daily caps on fares were high on the list of elements to be considered for development, with software development to commence in 2018.

The Regional Transit Committee, a panel of elected officials from around the county that has some authority to block council decisions on policies covering King County Metro, recently gave its green light to a report from a 2016 Fare Forum convened by the ORCA Joint Board. While referring the report to the RTC was not mandatory, it is a common practice to keep that panel in the loop.

Three major recommendations came out of the 2016 Fare Forum:

• Eliminate zone-based fares in order to reduce Next Generation ORCA system development time and costs, reduce customer confusion, reduce operator interactions, and improve boarding times.
• Eliminate trip-based peak fares but allow for time-based peak fares in the ORCA system design, in order to reduce Next Generation ORCA system development time and costs, increase regional fare coordination, and make fares simpler for customers to understand.
• Not to pursue fare capping because it could increase Next Generation ORCA system design complexity and costs and is expected to negatively impact agency revenue.

This recommendation not only means the ORCA pod does not plan to institute day caps, but also that it will not even develop the software to make it an option. The intent is not to preclude such a feature, but developing it would cost additional money down the road.

Continue reading “Next Generation ORCA Will Not Include Day Caps”

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ST Wins $88 million Federal Loan

Posted on by Lizz Giordano
The preferred alternative location for the Operations and Maintenance Facility East (OMF East) Credit: Sound Transit

Calling it “good news,” Peter Rogoff, CEO of Sound Transit, told the board during the June 22 meeting that the agency had secured a second low-interest TIFIA (Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act) loan through the U.S. Department of Transportation.

The $88 million loan, with an interest rate of 2.73 percent, will be used to construct a new maintenance base in Bellevue.

Last year, Sound Transit signed a $1.99 billion master credit agreement with USDOT that included four low-interest loans. Rogoff estimated the master credit agreement will save taxpayers between $200-300 million in borrowing costs.

This is the second TIFIA loan the agency has secured and the first under the new presidential administration. In January 2015, ST was awarded its first below-market loan from the federal program. Two more low-interest loans are expected in 2018 — one for the Lynnwood Link extension and the other for the Federal Way Link Extension.

Sound Transit applied for TIFIA loans “to insulate the agency from unexpected downturns in the economy and provide taxpayers savings from agency borrowing costs,” according to a press release.

With the amount of federal funding still uncertain for the Lynnwood and Federal Way link extensions, the agency warns it would not be “prudent” to assume a specific amount of additional financial capacity from the loans.

Rogoff also updated the board on the status of federal funding or grants, telling members not to expect clear answers for several months or even years.

He said the current presidential administration has reiterated its opposition to funding any new projects. “Board members should be aware this is likely to be a long and difficult slog in terms of getting a firm fix on what our federal assistance will continue to be, if any.”

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Sound Transit will not Change Redmond Alignment

Posted on by Lizz Giordano
Redmond’s preferred downtown station (Image: Redmond TRAIN study)

In a unanimous vote, Sound Transit board members moved forward a proposal to elevate the downtown Redmond Station, directing staff to complete an environmental review and preliminary engineering on the changes. The proposed design changes by the City of Redmond shift the Redmond Town Center station, previously proposed as an at-grade station near Leary Way, to an elevated station closer to 166th Ave. NE.

During the June 22 meeting, the board concluding the project was too far along in the process declined to also consider changes to track alignment.

“Without major backtracking we are probably at a point where it’s too late to consider other alignments,” said Claudia Balducci, King County Council member and Sound Transit Board member. “It’s always worth questioning where we have been, but when there is this much public work and planning, it’s not just the cost to lay the tracks and build the stations. It’s also the cost that’s gone into the land use planning, and the development and park work that been done,” she said.

During public comment, the former chair of Sound Transit’s Citizen Oversight Panel and Redmond resident, Josh Benaloh, had urged Sound Transit to reconsider a previous track alignment studied in 2011 now that an evaluated downtown station was being considered.

The older alignment, referred to as E4, leaves State Road 520 west of the Sammamish River stopping at the downtown Redmond station first, before continuing south east. In an STB guest post Benaloh argued, “the E4 alignment has far more potential to be extended in future years to the foot of Sahalee Way where it could provide service to the significantly underserved city of Sammamish.”

Instead, in the approved alignment the light rail tracks follow SR-520 traveling east to the Southeast Redmond station then turning steeply west to head to the final station in downtown Redmond.

Continue reading “Sound Transit will not Change Redmond Alignment”

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A “Precedent Setting” $10 million Mercer Island Settlement

Posted on by Lizz Giordano
I-90 Floating Bridge and Mercer Island (Image: Joe Wolf)

The Sound Transit Board approved a $10 million settlement agreement with Mercer Island after residents lost special access to Interstate 90 due to the expansion of light rail. Tacoma Mayor Marilyn Strickland, a Sound Transit board member, cast the only dissenting vote during the board’s June 22 meeting.

“As a fiduciary of this organization I’m not going to be able to support this today,” Strickland said. “We have to look at things such as equity and fairness.”

“Some of this agreement does include the mitigations we would make, but it’s not a $2 million settlement, it’s not a $4 million settlement, it’s not a $6 million settlement, it’s a $10 million settlement,” she added. “In the world of Sound Transit maybe that’s budget dust, but we are setting a precedent. It’s not about the amount, it’s about setting a precedent, despite the fact that we, Sound Transit, keep winning in court.”

In February the Mercer Island City Council voted to sue Sound Transit and the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) after the town lost special access to I-90’s high-occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes to make room for light rail. Mercer Island drivers would now have to abide by the HOV-2 standards. Mercer Island argued that a 1976 agreement provided them with lasting rights to HOV lanes, while WSDOT said that single-occupant vehicle (SOV) access to HOV lanes was intended to be temporary, and allowing continued SOV use of HOV lanes would violate federal law and jeopardize funding agreements.

Bellevue Councilmember and Sound Transit board member Claudia Balducci defended the settlement, calling it fair, reasonable, and the board’s responsibility after conditions changed and Mercer Island was no longer able to retain the same access to I-90. Continue reading “A “Precedent Setting” $10 million Mercer Island Settlement”

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