Link Disruptions: Spring 2025

A slide from the March 6 meeting of the Sound Transit Board's Rider Experience Committee looked ahead at construction impacts planned into 2026.

As Sound Transit continues to grow the Link light rail system and works to establish a state of better repair" for its existing infrastructure, more impacts to its critical trunks of transit service are expected. Ongoing and upcoming work expected to impact service includes replacement of rail clips at Wilburton Station, construction at the upcoming Pinehurst Station, and replacement of 600 feet of rail near International District/Chinatown Station.

Wilburton Station Rail Clips

Riders of the 2 Line have noticed the trains moving much slower than usual around Wilburton Station, indicating an unannounced slow order" for that section of track. When reached for comment, Sound Transit provided this explanation:

The slow order was instituted [in February] when we found breakage of some E-clips near the Wilburton station. We have not seen issues with the clips anywhere else in the system, and we are still conducting a root cause analysis as to why these clips broke. The broken clips did not constitute a safety hazard, but we decided out of an abundance of caution to replace all of the clips in the area with heavy duty clips.At this time, all clips on the nearest platform rails of both tracks have been replaced as these are where the vast majority of breaks occurred. The total number of repair and proactively replaced clips at this time is approximately 800 of 1400. To date, no replacement clips have been reported to have failed.

We are in the processing of receiving the final batch of clips for replacement. Once we have processed them, the replacement program will recommence on the two remaining rails furthest from the platform edge. The complete replacement process at Wilburton is estimated to require three evenings.We anticipate that we would be able to remove the slow order in early April.

E-clips are the loops of metal which hold the rails to concrete supporting them. Although these repairs and the associated slow order to not appear to be significantly impacting service across the 2 Line, a return to normal operations in April will be more than welcome by riders sitting through the slow roll through Wilburton.

Pinehurst Station Stairwell ConstructionCompletion of the north and south stairwells at the Pinehurst Station, visible in this preliminary design rendering from 2019, will require slowing service along the entire 1 Line (Sound Transit).

Sound Transit has announced that starting this Monday, March 24, construction crews will be working after 7pm on weekdays and all day on weekends to finish the stairwells at Pinehurst Station. During construction, Link 1 Line service will be be slightly reduced with trains arriving arrive every 12 minutes and trains will arrive and depart from one side of Shoreline South/148th Station as follows:

March 24 to April 13: All trains will use the Lynnwood City Center (northbound) platform at Shoreline South/148th Station

April 28 through May 30: All trains will use the Angle Lake (southbound) platform at Shoreline South/148th Station

The single-tracking only impacts Shoreline South/148th Station because Link trains are able to change tracks at crossover switches located north of Northgate Station and north of Shoreline South/148th Station. This will allow workers to safely finish the stairwells on the side of Pinehurst Station opposite of the active track while trains are running.

This work is scheduled to to be completed on May 30, but stairwell construction will be paused from April 14 to April 23 to accommodate the major service disruption in Downtown Seattle required for a rail replacement project. Construction will also be paused during the weekend of May 17-18 and Memorial Day weekend, May 24-26. As of Sound Transit's December 2024 Monthly Status Report, Pinehurst Station is on schedule to open in the first half of 2026.

International District Station Rail Replacement

According to the a presentation during the March 6 meeting of the Sound Transit Board Rider Experience & Operations Committee, another section of rail in the Downtown Transit Tunnel needs replacement. This time, it is a 600-foot section of rail that has reportedly needed multiple temporary repairs. Details on the exact section of track or the cause of the breaks have not been released, but the repair will require closure of the southbound tunnel for nine days.

Sound Transit has scheduled this repair to start on April 14 and finish on April 23. During this time, the agency expects trains will only be able to serve Downtown Seattle every 25-30 minutes, and is currently working on a passenger care plan" to improve service to passengers during service disruptions like this one. Hopefully more details will be released during the next Rider Experience Committee meeting on April 3.

Other Disruptions

Sound Transit had expected to use an extra weekend earlier this year to finish electrical integration of the 2 Line as part of Operation Chilly", but that last batch of work was delayed. It now appears to be tentatively scheduled for the weekend of May 17-18, but the agency says it may be postponed to later this year. The full 2 Line is expected to open by the end of this year.

Other projects, including installation of pedestrian crossing gates at four at-grade stations along the 1 Line, are scheduled to kick off in September.