RapidRide Corridor 1012 (Route 44)

A Route 44 bus heads east from Ballard. Photo by Bruce qu via the STB Flickr pool.

This week is all RapidRide as we review the Candidate Corridors analyzed in Metro's recently published RapidRide Prioritization Plan.

King County Metro Corridor 1012, a potential RapidRide conversion of Route 44 - traveling between Ballard, Wallingford, and UW - was recently set set as a Tier 2 priority corridorfor future RapidRide expansion.

Conversion of Route 44 would build on upgrades included in SDOT's recently-completed Transit-Plus Multimodal Corridor project, and include additional transit priority treatments in Ballard, Wallingford, and around UW.

Metro's summary of the potential RapidRide corridor.No Alignment Changes

Unlike many other RapidRide conversions, Metro has decided to not adjust the route from the existing Route 44. The existing route follows Alignment 2 (in yellow) after U District Station heading down 15th Ave NE to UW Station. Whereas in Metro Connects the new RapidRide would instead continue straight on NE 45th St to University Village and ending at Seattle Children's Hospital.

There were no differences in delay nor real advantage in transit connections given Alignment 2 connects to UW Station whereas Alignment 1 would connect to Route 65 and Route 75. There were other analysis of residents and jobs but generally scored around the same. Alignment 2 slightly performed better from the additional connection to a Link station and how Alignment 1 further east on NE 45th St require 3 more miles of trolley wire.

RapidRide Route 44 shown alongside existing transit routes above.

Bottlenecks and Improvements

Differing from most north-south bus routes which have areas of free flowing and pockets of heavy traffic, Route 44 suffers from severe delays almost along it's entire length.

End to end currently can be as fast as 24 minutes or take as long as 41 minutes during PM peak.

Existing near term changes for Route 44 are restricting left turns on N 46th St from Route 44 Transit Plus, adding curb island installations, and continuing the NW Market St Paving Project. The still postponed NE 45th St Bridge Protected Bike Lane is taken into account as well.

Further addressing the delays, the RapidRide would increase transit priority miles from 21% of the route to 77% with the following improvements:

• In Ballard: Add eastbound and westbound Bus or BAT lanes on NW Market St from 28th Ave NW to 5th Ave NW
• Around Wallingford: Add westbound Bus or BAT lanes on N 46th St from Phinney Ave N to Stone Way. Add westbound Bus or BAT lanes on N 45th St from Stone Ave N to Roosevelt Way NE by removing the center lane.
• Next to U District Station: Convert second general purpose lane on 15th Ave NE and NE Pacific St into a westbound Bus or BAT lane

Some of these improvements were originally part of the Route 44 transit plus level 1 draft concepts however were watered down.

NW Market St westbound bus lane from 20th Ave NW to 15th Ave NW shown above would be brought back.

Surprisingly, an eastbound bus-only lane on N 46th St between Phinney Ave N and SR 99 is not included in the RapidRide proposal.

For Wallingford, Metro is prioritizing parking and does not attempt removing any for the BAT lanes; instead, the bus lane would be created by removing the center turn lane.

Stations and Stops

The current average stop spacing is 1,000 feet (about one-fifth of a mile) with 80% of stop pairs spaced less than a quarter mile apart. The newly proposed stations above would have an average of 1,940 feet or about one-third of a mile. The longest stretch between stations is between 8th Ave NW and Phinney Ave N, where there would be no stops along the climb up 46th street.

These changes all together would would greatly decrease the PM peak travel time from 40 to 30 minutes, a 25% savings.

Costs and Conclusion

The total construction cost is $43 million dollars with 51% for transit speed and reliability, 44% for stops and stations 3% for trolley infrastructure and 2% for layover and terminus facilities. The improvements above would increase ridership by 1,900 riders per weekday.

Converting Route 44 to a RapidRide will transform east to west travel in Seattle. It'll enable riders from Ballard to U District fast and reliable service using dedicated bus lanes, which is sorely needed as the route is one of Metro's busiest transit corridors.