Swift Blue Improvements

Community Transit will be improving Swift Blue along Evergreen Way in Lake Stickney (an unincorporated area north of Lynnwood) and Everett. The Swift corridor consists of Aurora Avenue, Pacific Highway and Evergreen Way. It currently has some BAT lanes with gaps. The new projects will fill in those gaps with new BAT lanes and potentially the missing sidewalks along the corridor.

These improvements follow up after the recent Swift Blue extension to Shoreline North Station via 200th St, Meridian Ave, and 185th St.

BAT lanes

BAT lanes (Business Access and Transit lanes) allow cars to enter the lane briefly to turn right to businesses, but only transit vehicles can remain in them for a prolonged stretch and cross intersections in them.

Evergreen Way Current State

Evergreen Way is heavily trafficked and lacks sidewalks or BAT lanes. It typically consists of 5 traffic lanes in total: 2 general lanes in the north and south direction, and 1 center turning lane. In addition there are sometimes two outer parking lanes.

Evergreen Way 148th to Airport Road new BAT lanes https://www.psrc.org/media/5938#page=211

The WSDOT SR 99 / Evergreen Way: 148th ST SW to Airport Road project will add in the missing sidewalks and BAT lanes. They sent out the bid January 4, 2024 . Previous WSDOT studies set the estimated cost at $37 million.

From the bid proposal:

• restriping and traffic island modifications at the intersections of Hwy 99 / 148th St. SW and Hwy 99 / Lincoln Way to allow bus through movements in the outside travel lane, and
• restriping of the southbound outside lane of Hwy 99 between Shelby Rd. and 148th St. SW to be a business access and transit only lane.

Pacific Highway and 148th Street SWEvergreen Way and Lincoln Way

Currently some of the traffic triangle islands would block the outer lanes from continuing straight. Those will have to be shaved off slightly to allow for BAT lanes.

There's an SR 99 Lynnwood and Unincorporated Snohomish County study to help design the future improvements.

Evergreen Way Everett improvements

While the original design showed north and south bound BAT lanes on Evergreen Way/SR 526, the actual bid sent out only includes the northbound direction.

WSDOT jurisdiction work includes restriping of the northbound outside travel lane on Evergreen Way at SR 526 to be transit and right turn only

It'll probably be most useful for in the afternoon when traffic is the highest from noon to 5pm. (Boeing shift change is at 2-2:30pm.)

Additionally in Everett there will be transit signal priority upgrades between Rucker Ave/41st St. South along Evergreen way for 7 intersections as previously shown above.

Swift Bus station Improvements

Several Stations will also have seats replaced with leaning rails, and receive new Handrailing or In-fill Panels, L-shaped Windscreens, security cameras, WiMAX antennas, and supporting electronics

Beyond that there are some general Swift Blue bus station improvements with better seats and wifi.

Airport Road to 46th Street Future BAT lanes https://maps.app.goo.gl/8RTe8fSVFT6GhU5k7

North of Airport Road, Evergreen Way already has 7 lanes consisting of 3 general lanes northbound 1 center turning lane and 3 general lanes southbound.

Everett proposes converting the existing curbside general lanes (or northbound parking lane) into a BAT lane by 2030. No large construction is needed, and it generally only involves repainting, so the ~4.5 mile stretch of BAT lanes costs only $2 million to implement. This project is unfunded and low priority, but given the low cost could potentially be implemented sooner.

Conclusion

These BAT lane improvements will give Swift Blue better speed and reliability. The missing sidewalks added will increase pedestrian safety along the corridor as well. More specific data on the estimated speed improvements was not found in recent Community Transit documents, but if found the article will be updated accordingly.