Seattle Transit Blog

[CLARIFICATION 7/15/19: anecdotal evidence suggests that most people are quoted a rate of 25 cents a minute.] Last week, frequent commenter asdf2 made an important observation: On another note, the per-minute price to ride a Lime bike has now gone up again to $0.30/min., exactly double what it was just 6 weeks ago. Assuming 6-8 … Continue reading "Comment of the day: bikeshare"

I spent much of my childhood weekends playing Transport Tycoon. There is now a free version of the game called OpenTTD. This is an open thread.

SDOT is planning two more bus lane additions under their “spot improvements” program. This winter, SDOT plans to add a half block or so of westbound bus lane along N 45th St west of Stone Way. Only the 44 uses that stretch of road, around six buses per hour, just before it slips over to … Continue reading "Two small gifts for bus riders"

Community Transit has long discussed its plans to radically restructure its commuter and local bus networks in anticipation of Lynnwood Link, and its first concepts were presented to the Snohomish County Council this week. First noticed last month by The Urbanist, the agency briefed the County Council on its preliminary plans for its 600,000 annual … Continue reading "Community Transit begins study of Link-based restructure for 2024"

625 more battery buses ($), and a new base for them. Kent charging ST $6.7m for permitting work. Mountlake Terrace permitting in its last throes. Open House about a North Sammamish Park and Ride on July 11th. Seattle approaching 750,000 residents, is the fastest-growing large city in Washington on a percentage basis (!) Amazon to … Continue reading "News Roundup: Happy Fourth"

District 3 has six candidates running for the Seattle City Council, including incumbent Kshama Sawant. For some background on how our ratings work, read this. Excellent Among the candidates, one stands out as being unabashedly with us, full-tilt, on pretty much every issue. Logan Bowers is a small-business entrepreneur whose platform is entirely about urbanism. … Continue reading "Seattle District 3 candidate ratings"

Danny Westneat, in a very good Seattle Times column last week, tears into the hypocrisy of parking being built at downtown and SLU corporate campuses, particularly Expedia: This two-step between quietly nodding to our car-focused reality while espousing the greenest dreams perfectly captures what passes for transportation planning in the Emerald City. We wish you … Continue reading "On transit priority to Expedia"

Community Transit and Everett Transit are rolling out new low-income fares today, expanding the reach of the ORCA LIFT program that debuted in 2015, and expanded upon Kitsap Transit’s low-income fare program in place since 1985. Meanwhile, Everett Transit regular fares climb to $2 (and remain $2.50 on route 70). If your household income is … Continue reading "Snohomish County agencies roll out low-income fare today; Everett Transit regular fare goes up again"

There is a real estate bubble growing in China and massive cities of mostly empty buildings are going up. This is an open thread.

Some time ago I contemplated whether our buses—wherever they are on Coast Salish lands—would bear place names in dxʷləšucid (Lushootseed), the language of indigenous Coast Salish peoples from Nisqually all the way to Skagit. It was early winter of 2018 when I began packing for my trip to the Samoa archipelago. Something caught the corner … Continue reading "dxʷləšucid signs"

In 2009 the City of Seattle commissioned a study that called Third Avenue “uninviting, unattractive and generally a dreadful place to walk, shop or wait for a bus.” In 2014 Metro commissioned a design study on ways to fix the street. That led to the Third Avenue Transit Improvements Project, and will eventually result in … Continue reading "The Downtown Seattle Association wants to re-imagine Third Avenue"

After years of protests that it couldn’t be done, and six years of study and work, Sound Transit has finally found a way to put next train arrival times on the existing message boards at stations that opened in 2009. Capitol Hill and UW Station opened with this capability in 2016. Between Angle Lake and … Continue reading "Next train signs are finally here"

by SEATTLE SUBWAY People love riding Link. The more Sound Transit builds, the more Seattle votes with our feet. But planning and building expansions can take decades. It’s clear that we need Link expansion beyond what is currently planned, and our rapidly growing city and the burgeoning climate crisis demand we take action without delay. … Continue reading "Seattle: It’s time to start work on ST4"

District 2 has seven candidates for an open seat on the Seattle City Council. While none of them are uniformly outstanding on transit and land use issues, some are much better than others. As a reminder, here’s our rating system. Excellent The two candidates in this tier share a lot of common ground. They are … Continue reading "Seattle District 2 candidate ratings"

The Moving All Seattle Sustainably Coalition held a candidate forum for the Seattle City Council’s 4th District on May 30, 2019. Rooted in Rights made the video, and provided a transcript. Candidates attending included, from left to right: Cathy Tuttle Frank Krueger Beth Mountsier Joshua Newman Ethan Hunter Heidi Stuber Shaun Scott Emily Myers Sasha … Continue reading "Sunday Open Thread: District 4 MASS Forum"

The long-awaited second generation of Link light rail trains has arrived at Sound Transit’s OMF in SoDo. The Siemens-built S70 car was put on display for local media on Wednesday, giving a small look into the future of our light rail system. The display car, number 202, is the first of 152 Siemens light rail … Continue reading "Sound Transit shows off new Siemens light rail vehicles"

I recently returned from a week-long trip to three of Canada’s great cities, of which two have already been covered by previous Transit Report Cards (Vancouver and Montreal). While I may return to write about the latter, which has since undergone some significant changes in wayfinding, today’s transit report is focused on the third and … Continue reading "Transit Report Card: Ottawa"

Earlier this year, the King County Council ordered a review of funding options for Metro Connects. This Wednesday, the Regional Transit Committee receives a status update on the effort. It considers a $220 million increase in annual funding for Metro, enough to get Metro to its long-range service goals. Metro Connects is Metro’s long range … Continue reading "A funding plan for Metro Connects comes into view"

It appears Seattle may finally allow various types of Accessory Dwelling Units (ADU) in most of the city. These units generally provide inexpensive rental opportunities, but are frequently illegal to build. For a summary of where we stand today, you can’t do much better than the City’s onepager. (A somewhat longer summary is here.) The … Continue reading "ADU legislation moves along, with new wrinkles"

The Moving All Seattle Sustainably Coalition held a candidate forum for the Seattle City Council’s 3rd District on May 29, 2019. Rooted in Rights made the video, and provided a transcript. Candidates attending included, from left to right: Logan Bowers Zachary DeWolf Pat Murakami Ami Nguyen Egan Orion Kshama Sawant (incumbent) The forum for District … Continue reading "Sunday Open Thread: Seattle District 3 MASS forum"

There are two possible futures for Cascade rail service. Are they mutually exclusive? It’s been a whiplash-inducing year for intercity passenger rail in the US. The “Green New Deal” suggests the possibility of sweeping high speed investments at the same time as California’s project is retrenching. Colorado, a growing Western state where the population is … Continue reading "Which Way for Washington’s Intercity Rail Program?"

The Moving All Seattle Sustainably Coalition held its forum for Seattle District 2 city council candidates on May 28, 2019. Rooted in Rights made the video. Go to their website if the above video doesn’t work on your platform. Rooted in Rights also provided a transcript for the forum. Candidates attending included, from left to … Continue reading "Seattle District 2 MASS forum"

Michelle Baruchman in The Seattle Times, on Metro’s new 5-year contract with MV Transportation to provide Access service: Advocates in King County say they have raised concerns about Access for more than a decade, but it wasn’t until 2015 that the county began planning for an audit of the service, said Deputy King County Auditor … Continue reading "A new contract for Metro’s Access program"

The original genius (or sin, if you prefer) of the legislation that created Sound Transit was that it yoked together the region’s high capacity transit needs. The suburbs and the cities had to work together to get what they wanted, or no one would get anything, like a municipal prisoner’s dilemma. The West Seattle – … Continue reading "West Seattle – Ballard Link staggers towards the EIS"

Overview of the current state of high speed rail in the United States. This is an open thread.

The draft ST3 plan in March 2016 extended rail beyond Lynnwood in two steps. The first, in 2036, would bring service to North Lynnwood, serving stations at West Alderwood Mall, Ash Way, and Mariner. The second, in 2041, extended around the SW Everett Industrial Center (Paine Field) and north to Everett Station. When the plan … Continue reading "Could Link to Mariner open early?"

Seattle’s Congestion Pricing Report looked at ten different schemes that could reduce the volume of cars in congested areas, from variations on a toll, to bans on non-electric or non-autonomous vehicles, to allowing only certain license plate numbers on a given day. After considering environmental impacts, congestion reduction, equity, and feasibility, SDOT ended up with … Continue reading "The congestion pricing report"

For the past two weeks, the American Planning Association has been running a Transit Bracket Challenge, pitting the largest transit agencies in the U.S. against each other in a popularity contest. King County Metro has so far quashed its competition, namely San Francisco’s Muni and the Maryland Transit Administration, leaving us as the sole West … Continue reading "Metro Needs Your Help Toppling Other Metros"

By BRAD HAVERSTEIN Bellevue may have decided to make the 108th Ave NE bike lane it built last year permanent, but when it comes to expanding the city’s downtown cycling network the Bellevue Transportation Commission seems to be at odds with City Council. On May 23rd the Commission split 3-3 over whether to add bicycle … Continue reading "The Bellevue Transportation Commission is stalling on downtown bicycle lanes"

Everett starts its e-scooter pilot ($). Plans to “transform” the Mountlake Terrace station area. Seattle Children’s is hiring three transportation planning interns (1, 2, 3). Cascade hiring a Policy Manager. New Flyer buying a double-decker company. ST selling parking permits for Angle Lake starting July 1. Pierce Transit releases its 2018 annual report. The News … Continue reading "News Roundup: Hiring"

by JOSHUA NEWMAN, Candidate for Seattle City Council District 4 Once upon a time, it was easy to get around Seattle. Hop in the car and in 15 minutes, you were downtown; and outside of downtown, parking was easy. At least, that’s how many long-time residents remember Seattle. Congestion was infrequent and parking was plentiful. … Continue reading "Thinking outside the car"

If done right, congestion pricing can reduce pollution and improve mobility. by HESTER SEREBRIN, Policy Director, Transportation Choices Coalition Seattle has a traffic problem. According to the 2018 Global Traffic Scorecard, Seattle is the 6th most congested city in the country, robbing people who drive 138 hours and nearly $2,000 annually. Congestion also contributes to our … Continue reading "How Seattle can shape an equitable congestion pricing plan"

Follow up: Via (2:48) Congestion pricing report (7:56) Amtrak NTSB hearing (24:37) West Seattle – Ballard preferred alternative (32:57) OMF South (43:47) Scooters (50:03) Download link

The interior layout of a train car has a direct effect on capacity. Here is some interesting research on riders’ preferences and optimizing layouts. This is an open thread.

Mike Lindblom, The Seattle Times: More than 50 Talgo railcars that have served the Amtrak Cascades line since 1998 will be replaced “as soon as possible,” the state announced Wednesday, a day after the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said the lightweight vehicles didn’t adequately shield passengers in the 2017 fatal Amtrak crash near DuPont. … Continue reading "What makes a train safe?"

[Update: corrected an error in the matrix of travel times at the end of the post, where the matrix previously miscounted the transfers in the representative project. Also updated the associated text in the paragraph just above]. Work has begun on SR 522 BRT, with the first BAT lanes in Bothell coming online in late … Continue reading "Reevaluating Woodinville BRT"

The National Transportation Safety Board held a hearing yesterday on the fatal December 2017 Amtrak derailment on the Point Defiance Bypass. The Seattle Times, Trains, and Curbed have reports. Here are a few takeaways, after watching the briefing: Responsibility for safety was diffused, but the buck stops with Sound Transit. Amtrak, the Federal Railroad Administration, Sound … Continue reading "7 Takeaways from the Point Defiance NTSB Hearing"

The Sound Transit board will likely vote on Thursday not to include a controversial Federal Way Kent site on its short list for a South Sound maintenance base. The system expansion committee voted unanimously on May 9 to remove the site, which hosts several auto-oriented retail businesses including a newly-opened Dick’s Drive-In. It was controversial not only … Continue reading "Three sites remain for a south light rail maintenance base"