Seattle Transit Blog

NE 130th construction update: Current construction at NE 130th St Infill Station is focused on the concrete platform and canopy structural steel. This work will be completed prior to electrification of the Lynnwood Link Extension overhead traction power, which allows operational testing prior to Lynnwood Link's projected opening in July 2024.... The station finishes contract ... Continue reading "Open Thread 9"

Two weeks ago, Metro announced the decision to temporarily suspend twenty peak-only routes as part of its service cuts. The focus on peak-hour reductions aligns with Metro's current operational challenges, like fielding the high number of operators required for lots of peak-time service. But some riders are disappointed that their peak routes will be shut ... Continue reading "Understanding King County Metro's Suspensions of Peak-Only Routes"

Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell's solution to revitalizing downtown includes reviving the City Center Connector streetcar ($). Where the pitch for the line was once purely transit-based, its new title as a Culture Connector' bestows a loftier purpose of injecting life into a part of town lacking it in recent years." The article says transit advocates ... Continue reading "The Streetcar is Back"

The West Seattle Link extension (WSLE) is proceeding to a final EiS expected in 2024. The Ballard Link extension [BLE] with DSTT2 is heading to a new Draft EIS, timeline TBD. (Per Sound Transit email update.) Federal Way Link is now expected in 2026. The bridge over weak soil will add $72 million ($) to ... Continue reading "Open Thread 8"

Matt Driscoll writes about the political dangers of struggling transit projects. The mission of Trailhead Direct has changed slightly ($). I-5 traffic will be re-routed onto and off of Montlake Boulevard this weekend, likely slowing down the 48, 255, 271 and 542. Sound Transit report mentions cost overruns for West Seattle, along with other issues. ... Continue reading "Open Thread: Priorities"

Sound Transit is reenvisioning Sounder South, and will update its strategic plan this year. Sign up for email announcements; there’s not much else to do at this point yet. ST had been planning to lengthen trains and platforms, but is now looking at running more trains at more times instead. It will depend on negotiations … Continue reading "Open Thread 7"

On September 2nd Metro will suspend or reduce some bus routes to make the remaining service more reliable. The problem is a shortage of bus drivers and mechanics, and supply-chain challenges. Currently 5% of scheduled bus runs are being cancelled due to lack of drivers or buses. The change aims to shrink the schedule to … Continue reading "Metro Cuts in September"

Sound Transit CEO Julie Timm answered questions in a forum hosted by The Urbanist. Among the questions were the Link downtown reduction, the East Link Starter Line, Lynnwood Link, Federal Way Link, the CID station alternatives, all-day Sounder, and ST Express in the ST2/3 era. Alon Levy is not impressed with the overuse of transit … Continue reading "Open Thread 6: Timm Q&A"

Last night, Sound Transit reported that Link service will finally be restored to regular service starting tomorrow today, May 8th: CEO Julie Timm had actually broke the news on Saturday, revealing that there was a push to restore service as early as that evening, but with the caveat of further disruptions down the road. Fortunately, … Continue reading "Link service returns to normal today"

Metro’s weekend newsletter has several things this weekend: 3rd Avenue will be closed for construction between Pine and Union Streets from 8am Saturday to 5pm Sunday. RapidRide C, D, E, and other north-south bus routes I spot checked will stop at 2nd & Pike southbound or 4th & Pike northbound. Route 49 westbound will stop … Continue reading "Open Thread 5"

(Part of a series on high-performing transit routes in the Puget Sound region) Every year, King County Metro provides statistics on their bus services in their System Evaluation, available online. One measure that is presented for all regular bus routes is Rides per Platform Hour. It answers a core question: “how many people does this … Continue reading "The Surprising Efficiency of RapidRide A"

Trains are running every 15-20 minutes. All trains terminate at Pioneer Square Station and require transferring to the other platform continue further north or south. ST has a useful chart of bus alternatives for various station pairs, and urges people to use them if feasible to avoid the downtown tunnel. ST’s alert page has the … Continue reading "Link Reduction Day 3"

This is an open thread for miscellaneous comments related to transit or land use. The News Roundup will resume when things calm down. A Link update will be coming later today, and a non-Link article in couple days. The RapidRide G article is still open for comments, two articles before this.

Update 4/28/2023 11pm: Trains are running every 15-20 minutes. All trains terminate at Pioneer Square Station and require transferring to continue further north or south. ST urges people to use other alternatives if feasible. (The link has a very nice chart of bus alternatives.) Westlake, University Street, and International District/Chinatown are using only one platform … Continue reading "Link Reduction Downtown"

The RapidRide G (Madison) restructure is finally here. Construction is 50% complete, and the line is expected to launch in Fall 2024. Metro has a survey until May 8 about changes to other routes around it. Metro proposes to reroute the 10, 11, and 12, and to delete the currently-suspended 47. The G will run … Continue reading "RapidRide G Restructure"

Overflow topics from the Park & Ride article. This is an open thread.

Ever since the advent of commuter express routes, park-and-rides (P&Rs) have been a mainstay in the built environment of the American suburb. You can see why it was an easy proposition to make: after postwar suburbanization but with jobs still in city centers, policymakers needed a way to keep transit viable among white-collar workers. The … Continue reading "The age of the park-and-ride is over"

I’ve started numbering open threads if there’s no compelling title. A Link contractor blames the T-line delay ($) on government red tape. (This is the MLK extension to Tacoma Link, not related to the 1 Line extension to Tacoma Dome.) The article has a few quotes applicable to general ST/contractor/Link issues, too many to list … Continue reading "Open Thread 2"

More people are falling behind in car debt. (NPR) People whose car is repossessed need transit to do errands. Bye bye Southport ($). The office complex near Renton Landing will be auctioned due to no leases. The hotel, convention center, and apartments in the business center don’t appear to be affected. It’s another blow for … Continue reading "Open Thread"

The Sound Transit System Expansion Committee met yesterday and heard the latest briefing on project updates. Of note is East Link’s frustratingly sluggish progress, largely due to poorly built plinths, which now have to be entirely scrapped in the segment between International District and Mercer Island. Mike Lindblom has more details in the Times: Kiewit-Hoffman decided … Continue reading "East Link delayed to spring 2025 at earliest"

Transit in rural America. An NPR radio story about rural transit in various parts of the US. Nobody Lives Here ($), an exhibit at the Wing Luke Museum on the impact of I-5 on Chinatown. Where people who move from King County go to ($). Denver transit. (Alan Fisher video) Toronto rail junction is completed. … Continue reading "Open Thread: Rural Transit"

Redmond 2050 is having hearings on the Southeast Redmond and Redmond Downtown Link station areas. I can’t find the specific proposals online, but maybe somebody can describe them and the recent open house. (Thanks AJ and Nathan D for the link.) Pike/Pine rechannelization. Next year SDOT plans to extend the one-way streets on Pike and … Continue reading "Open Thread: Redmond"

RapidRide G construction is closing East Madison Street between 16th and 14th westbound to extract “old cable car infrastructure located under the roadway. This closure is expected to be in place for at least a week.” (SDOT) Sound Transit press release on choosing a preferred alignment for the West Seattle and Ballard Link Extension (WSBLE) … Continue reading "Open Thread: Cable Car"

Various publications have summarized the March 23 decisions on the West Seattle and Ballard Link Extension (WSBLE): Publicola, Crosscut, NW Asian Weekly, and the Urbanist. Mike Lindblom even mentioned the single tunnel alternative in his Seattle Times ($) article. Most surprising were the late additions: The result of these is that the preferred alignment moves … Continue reading "Still No Final CID Plan"

A little light reading after a busy transit week. Train Daddy is Andy Byford, a British transit administrator who has gotten a lot of accolades for his work at train and subway agencies in Sydney, Toronto, New York City, and London. He’s now moving to Amtrak to become executive vice president. Sound Transit needs one … Continue reading "Open Thread: Train Daddy"

This is a live discussion of Sound Transit’s monthly board meeting, which is choosing a preferred alignment for the West Seattle and Ballard Link Extension (WSBLE) environmental impact statement (EIS). Meeting page with video link and documentsAgendaProposed amendments Update: The following amendment descriptions weren’t quite accurate, and they’re too complicated to explain here. Amendment #2 … Continue reading "ST Board Meeting on WSBLE"

Destinations on RapidRide H. (Urbanist) Hannah Krieg of The Stranger compares the arguments for and against the North of CID Link station. (The list is useful even if the wording is juvenile.) Mike Lindblom on ongoing repairs in DSTT stations. ($) The worst transit project in the US is canceled, on an extension in Philadelphia. … Continue reading "Open Thread: RapidRide H Destinations"

In his recent article, Martin Pagel outlined why a single downtown tunnel is a win-win. I’ll emphasize mainly that transfers are crucial in a world where the suburb-to-downtown commute is no longer as common as it was. And transfers are a million times better when one only has to switch platforms in a tunnel than … Continue reading "A single downtown tunnel is completely possible and provides the best outcomes"

New proposals for a second tunnel would increase cost, but none provide a compelling rider experience. Let’s just improve our existing tunnel and use the savings to make up for lost time on other projects. ST3 promised higher capacity transit through downtown by building a second tunnel with seamless transfers at Westlake and Chinatown/International District … Continue reading "A win-win for the CID dilemma: Stick with current tunnel"

Washington Supreme Court struck down fare-enforcement checks by police. ($) Fare ambassadors, who are not police and focus on education, still appear allowed. Sound Transit and Metro switched to fare ambassadors several months ago. The decision (thanks Tlsgwm). Downtown Seattle work commutes continue to evolve. ($) (Mike Lindblom) 60% of 320,000 workers come to the … Continue reading "Open Thread: No Fare Police"

In my last post a few weeks ago, I argued that Sound Transit is uniquely exposed to changes in regional commute trips caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, that it has yet to pivot the ST3 package of investments in a meaningful way (aside from the wrong-headed proposal to consolidate the Madison and CID stations), and … Continue reading "How I’d pivot ST3 post-Covid and mitigate the CID conundrum"

In “Every City NEEDS a Transit Hub”, Reece Martin at RMTransit explains how sticking with the originally-planned second CID Link station is a unique opportunity to create the biggest and most-used multimodal transit hub in the Pacific Northwest. It would connect all of Link lines 1, 2, and 3, Sounder, Amtrak Cascades, Greyhound, the First … Continue reading "A CID2 Link Station is Important"

“North of CID” station concept for the Ballard Link extension: Portland transit network review (RMTransit) Mostly MAX, a bit on fares, buses, WES commuter rail, and bikeshare. Are urban growth boundaries effective? (City Beautiful) With examples of Seattle and Portland. Yes, there’s walking in L.A. ($) A meditation on Rosencrans Avenue. It’s not a walker’s … Continue reading "News Roundup: Walking in LA"

Metro has several bus route changes starting next Saturday, March 18. The reroute on routes 11 and 49 is part of Seattle’s Pike-Pine rechannelization, which is optimizing the corridor for pedestrians, bicycles, and transit, while still allowing cars. The city is currently widening the sidewalks at 1st & Pine. It recently added traffic lights or … Continue reading "Spring Service Changes"

It’s fairly well-established at this point that bus driver shortages nationwide are hampering transit recovery efforts. The problem is particularly acute at Metro, which is currently short over 100 full-time operators. These impacts have bled downstream to affect a substantial number of riders, who often endure cancelled trips and gutted service with insufficient notice. While … Continue reading "Transit recovery will not be successful unless the operator deficit is fixed"

We have until this Friday, March 10th to comment on the Metro Bus Restructure for Lynnwood Link. I’ve written about the initial plan, made suggestions and explored ideas on the subject. Here are my recommendations, in order of priority: To visualize these changes. I came up with two maps, the first of which is oriented … Continue reading "Comment Soon on the Lynnwood Link Bus Restructure"

Metro will expand its on-demand taxi service ($). (Official announcement.) These are app-hailed vans like Uber, charging regular Metro fares within a few last-mile service areas. Starting Monday, It will unify existing services (Via, Pingo, Community Ride) under a new brand “Metro Flex” wth a new app. Service areas are “northern Kent, Tukwila, Renton Highlands, … Continue reading "News Roundup: Metro Taxis"

Get Link done ($), says ST’s Technical Advisory Group in a report to the board. The group suggests taking a harder line against local government requests, and treating contractors better. Reconnect South Park gets grant to study removing Highway 99 through the neighborhood. Zoning, Explained (City Beautiful) New York state considers joining the zoning-override bandwagon … Continue reading "News Roundup: Get Link Done"

Seattle is currently soliciting input until the end of February for phase 2 of their Transportation Plan engagement efforts: https://seattletransportationplan.infocommunity.org/ – Seattle should strive to become a city of 15min neighborhoods and if necessary use ultra-high frequency transit such as urban gondola lines, people movers, funiculars or 3min BRT lines on dedicated lanes to bridge … Continue reading "Seattle Transportation Plan: How to achieve a 15min city with the help of ultra-high frequency transit"

Last week, Amazon announced a three-day return-to-office (RTO), sparking muted fanfare among the downtown business community but backlash from its workers. Starbucks announced a similar policy several weeks back and it remains to be seen what the long-term trend will be for major employers in our region. I’ve been thinking a lot about the post-pandemic recovery … Continue reading "Cities can’t rely on employer RTOs to recover"

This is another in a series of posts about the bus restructure following the Lynnwood Link extension. This one is geared towards Seattle, although the maps include north King County as well. As before, they cover a number of themes. There is one additional theme worth mentioning: There are advantages and disadvantages to this approach. … Continue reading "Seattle Bus Restructure for Lynnwood Link"

Following a Seattle Times article, the Seattle Bike Blog joins the discussion. (I think the buildings should wear more visible clothing, and stop talking on their phone.) The Urbanist looks at Sound Transit adding retail to the stations. There will be some late night work on the Link rails starting tonight. For a complete list … Continue reading "News Roundup: Cars Running into Buildings"

ST3 passed enthusiastically in the Seattle region because voters were excited to get mobility improvements. However, Sound Transit has had trouble coming up with compelling designs to deliver on this promise. To address this problem, we should revisit some of the design assumptions. Vancouver’s SkyTrain and Montreal’s REM took far less time to design and … Continue reading "The case for Automated Light Metro Technology for Ballard and South Lake Union"

The deadline for comments on studies for the West Seattle and Ballard Link extensions is today. Please ask the board to study sending the trains into the existing tunnel, rather than building a new one. Benefit to Riders From a rider standpoint, reusing the existing tunnel would be fairly simple. All the trains would mix, … Continue reading "Ask Sound Transit to Study Sending Ballard and West Seattle Trains Through the Existing Tunnel"

[UPDATE: Several factual corrections, courtesy of Sound Transit. – MHD] Sound Transit’s System Expansion Committee met on February 9th to review the results of studies on details of the West Seattle and Ballard Link Extension (WSBLE). The full ST board will meet February 22nd to consider this, and March 23rd to choose a preferred alignment … Continue reading "Sound Transit reviews WSBLE study results"

The Pierce Transit Board of Commissioners voted unanimously today to approve a proposal to have Pierce Transit join the ORCA LIFT low-income fare program, bringing its extent to all transit services that accept ORCA except Washington State Ferries. Pierce Transit’s ORCA LIFT fare will be $1, joining King County Metro, all Sound Transit services, the … Continue reading "$1 low-income fare will expand to Pierce Transit"

Bangkok has four rail systems. (RMTransit video) Thailand’s development went through a car-oriented phase, but is now turning toward transit, and is building high-speed rail lines and improving Bangkok transit. This is similar to the trajectory The Netherlands went through forty years earlier. At 12:39 you can see a train door and interior that looks … Continue reading "News Roundup: Bangkok"

Seattle’s streetcar dithering criticized in federal audit ($). Federal grant administrators are getting anxious about delays in spending the City Center Connector grant money, and grants for the Broadway streetcar extension (from Denny to Roy), and a SODO overpass grant. But the feds also gave Seattle a grant to improve SODO’s pedestrian and bicycle safety. … Continue reading "News Roundup: Streetcar"

There is also an online election, not on the mailed ballot, for the King Conservation District Board of Supervisors, on February 14. Correction: Although the King Conservation District is countywide, “County” is not in the name. That is a statewide practice, not a local attempt to make the district even more invisible than it already … Continue reading "Weekend Open Thread: Initiative 135 on Feb 14"

This is another in a series of posts about the Lynnwood Link bus restructure. This covers the area north of Seattle. I have two maps, but neither should be considered a full-fledged proposal. They are a set of ideas, and I doubt either would be adopted in its entirety. The first one is austere — … Continue reading "North End Modifications to the Lynnwood Link Connections Plan"