Seattle Transit Blog

Seattle Transit Blog Moving!

2008-06-21T13:54:00.000-07:00

We're moving to SeattleTransitBlog.com. I originally made this decision a long time ago. The reasons are mainly that blogger doesn't allow a lot of flexibility on the display of our posts, the ability to create and maintain edit posts in WordPress is far superior, and WordPress allows us to do a lot more in keep the site working and attractive. In short, we basically out grew it.

All the content has been migrated, so please feel free to continue the conversations there. If you notice something that hasn't been migrated, please let us know.

We won't continue to post here any more, so please update your links. Sorry if this causes any inconvenience, we're just trying to continue our commitment to being the best transit blog we can be.

Tri-Met WES unveiling

2008-06-20T08:10:00.000-07:00

Tri-Met's new Commuter Rail "WES" was unveiled by the media yesterday. This is one of the first new generation DMU's (Diesel Multiple Unit) from Colorado Railcar.

So why a post regarding Oregon in a Seattle Blog? A lot of us here have been curious to see what the new DMU would look like and most importantly, it's features. These vehicles would be one of 3 vehicles selected for service on the Eastside Rail Corridor. It's time on WES will prove that they are truly worthy of their cost with other start-up agencies looking at ways to save fuel but also haul a number of passengers. Colorado Railcar offers the Aero model that Tri-Rail has received and a Double Decker version that seats 40 more people than our own Sounder equipment. That alone is savings by using less coaches, less coaches = less fuel to get up to track speed, etc.

The bigger question is since they are still rather unproven in the United States, would other agencies besides Tri-Rail in Florida and Tri-Met in Oregon see a use for them? Portland as usual, will look hard at these and there is discussion to go as far as Salem in the future.

Some features that WES will have -
High Speed Wireless Internet
Comfortable seating
Free Parking
Space for 4 bikes per train (2 per car)
27 minute, 60mph run from Wilsonville to Beaverton - A Direct Connection to MAX
Real-Time Arrival via MyBus.

The entire line was revamped starting last year with new concrete ties, welded rail, new gated crossings and is slated to open this Fall.

Seats: 74 (engine car); 80 (trailer)
Mobility device spaces: 2
Bike spaces: 2
Average speed: 37 mph
Top speed: 60 mph
Travel time (Wilsonville-Beaverton): 27 minutes
Service frequency: Every 30 minutes during rush hour
Personnel: 1 engineer and 1 conductor

Overhead Lines: A step beyond hybrid

2008-06-20T00:05:00.000-07:00

A little technical tidbit came up at the aforementioned Link tour which hadn't occurred to me.

We were looking over the trains, which by the way are quite handsome, and I was wondering about regenerative braking, such as is done with hybrid cars and buses and such. Specifically I asked the question, based in the context of hybrids, of "where are the batteries?"

The answer, obvious in retrospect, is that there are no batteries, no need for them. When you're tethered to the network of electrical lines, the power recovered on braking is simply fed out into the network.

This strikes me as a beautiful detail of these systems. That this power flows in and out of the movement of Link, the trolley buses, and back out into the system, to feed your alarm clock, your lights, your water heater. Meanwhile, it dispenses with the need for the complex chemicals associated with creating and disposing of batteries, and may raise the efficiency of the storage and retrieval, moving from the chemical process to the electrical.

Anyway, to dampen the moment of zen, and while we're on the subject, I have to wonder: why can't we design overhead lines for the trolley buses which reliably stay put? Any ideas? Do buses elsewhere get their ties knocked off occasionally, as here?

Why Link Will Cross I-90 First

2008-06-19T11:21:00.000-07:00

above: a representation of why I-90 is a better choice

I'd imagine a fair portion of the people who read this blog already know some or all of these reasons that Link is going over I-90 before it goes over SR-520, but I thought I'd enumerate them for easy linking and just to fill in any holes.

I-90 offers a direct connection to the downtown Seattle transit tunnel. If you looked at my earlier tour of Central Link construction, I had a google maps link to the south transit tunnel entrance - you can see there the two tracks we've built, plus the space to either side where feeder tracks join with the I-90 center roadway. This kind of a connection offers us the opportunity to interline service - both trains going to the airport (or farther) and trains going to the eastside will come into downtown from the south and run on the same tracks in the tunnel.

It so happens that demand for the northern line (Northgate) is very close to the combined demand for an eastside line and a south line, so having East Link enter the tunnel from the south means that our commute patterns will much more efficiently use our infrastructure. This is also the big reason we didn't pick buses for building from Seattle to Bellevue - they couldn't efficiently interline with North Link to increase capacity there. With rail, people can get on a train in Redmond and go all the way to Northgate, without transferring.

If we were to cross 520, we'd have two choices, both of them bad: One, we could build a surface level station to transfer at Husky Stadium, and force a transfer for commuters to already full trains coming in from Northgate - we'd create crush loaded trains. The other option would be to build a direct connection into the tunnel toward downtown - which would cost hundreds of millions on its own, potentially have large construction impacts on a residential area, and could be risky due to the depth. Such work would probably also delay University Link.

Even ignoring the capacity and technical issues in Seattle, the eastside would have a problem of its own. 520 is significantly north of downtown Bellevue, so trains would have to turn south first to serve the Bellevue downtown core, then north again to get to Redmond. When using I-90, we don't have to go out of our way to serve south Bellevue, and the time between downtowns is lower.

Issaquah poses another problem with a 520 crossing.. We're already planning to build to Redmond, but if we chose 520, later construction to Issaquah (part of the Sound Transit long range plan) would really necessitate an I-90 crossing anyway. With an initial I-90 crossing, it's much simpler to continue east in or near the interstate right of way.

A 520 crossing would also impose any delays attached to construction of the new SR-520 bridge on Sound Transit's schedule. The risk added by working with WSDOT on the project would likely also make Sound Transit less competitive for Federal Transit Administration grants.

All this, and I-90's center roadway was built with conversion to high capacity transit in mind. I think it's always been the clear choice, but hopefully this convinces more people who were worried about the decision!

Vanpools up over 10%

2008-06-19T09:24:00.001-07:00

Metro's reporting that their supported vanpools have increased by over 100 vans in the past year, to a total of 1,058 vanpools and vanshares.

I would imagine that the total number of people moved has increased even more: as the costs of driving increase, it follows that the size of existing vanpools would increase, especially since the inconvenience of setting up your own vanpool is larger than simply joining an existing one.

Given how many employees have commutes that are very poorly served by transit, vanpools are an important part of the system, and cheap because the labor is free. I was unaware that King County's was the first such program in the nation. I'd be curious to know what burden these vanpools place on the park and ride system; it would make a lot of sense to make agreements with churches that aren't near transit lines to allow parking there, freeing up more spaces for transit riders.

Dump the Pump day tomorrow, and last day for public comment

2008-06-18T15:35:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow is national Dump the Pump day.

The day is designed to encourage people to get out of their cars and ride public transportation to raise awareness of the financial and environmental benefits of public transportation. Public transportation has the ability to save people money, conserve gasoline, and reduce the harmful greenhouse gases emitted into our environment.

On June 19, public transit agencies from coast to coast will join together to encourage their communities to dump the pump by leaving their cars at home and riding public transportation

Also tomorrow is the last day to give public comment on Sound Transit's ballot expansion plans. Make sure to go there and give your opinion if you haven't. I've told them I want light rail at least to Overlake.

Community Transit to increase fares by 75 cents

2008-06-18T08:26:00.000-07:00

In sync with the raising fuel prices, Community Transit is increasing fares upwards of 75 cents for it's popular commuter buses.

This increase in fares may benefit Sounder now that the time and fares are equal to each other. With the new parking garage coming online early next year, the increase may be even greater. While one could argue that the parking garage would be a bad thing, however Community Transit or Everett Transit unfortunately does not have the service capacity or ability to serve the rural communities - At least from what I have seen and heard from many people I spoke with.

LINK Wraps

2008-06-18T07:45:00.001-07:00

Andrew Austin at The Bus Stops Here spots the latest in local transit advertising:What makes this sort of difficult to accept is that I find the Sound Transit paint scheme to be quite appealing.

Andrew also points out the key factoid:

In the case of the CLICK ads I will say this. At least they did not cover the windows of the light rail cars, also it is good that it is local ‘company’ that is covering our little light rail that could.

He's right: covering windows is a dealbreaker, and I'm glad they didn't. How would you feel if they started wrapping Central LINK's cars like this?

BTW, there are way too many Andrews in transitland.

Streetcar Meetings

2008-06-18T00:30:00.001-07:00

Jan Drago, transportation chair of the Seattle City Council has schedule public outreach meetings on streetcar expansion plans. The meeting times and places:

Wednesday, July 2nd - Proposed Central Line at Seattle City Hall, 600 Fourth Avenue, Bertha Knight Landes Room, First Floor, 4-6pm

Tuesday, July 8th - Proposed Ballard/Fremont Line at Nordic Heritage Museum, 3014 NW 67 Street, 4-6pm

Wednesday, July 9th - Proposed U-District Line at University Heights Center, 5031 University Way NE, 4-6pm

Tuesday, July 15th - Proposed First Hill Line at Yesler Community Center, 917 E. Yesler Way, 4-6pm

You can see the expansion plans here. It's worth noting that the First Hill line will likely be part of a Sound Transit expansion.

Maybe I'm off base, but I'm basically for these routes with the exception of the "Central" line through downtown, I think it makes it too easy to fight a future (ST3?) light-rail route through downtown. The Ballard line could have the same effect, but it'd be lessened by the fact that line doesn't really serve the other areas in the west part of the city that need rail: Belltown, "Uptown", Queen Anne, and the part of the city north of Ballard.

Capitol Hill Art Again

2008-06-18T00:12:00.001-07:00

The other artist whose work is going into Capitol Hill Station, local artist Ellen Forney, has her concepts up on her website. If you don't remember, Brooklyn-based Mike Ross caused some controversy with his jet-plane sculpture for above the platform. I like Forney's art, but I'd say it's possibly more risque than Mr Ross's. Images below.

What do you think?

Suburban Slum Watch

2008-06-17T13:56:00.001-07:00

A few months ago, the Atlantic picked up on it, and now it's CNN.

...once rundown downtowns are being revitalized by well-educated, young professionals who have no desire to live in a detached single family home typical of a suburbia where life is often centered around long commutes and cars.
Instead, they are looking for what Leinberger calls "walkable urbanism" -- both small communities and big cities characterized by efficient mass transit systems and high density developments enabling residents to walk virtually everywhere for everything -- from home to work to restaurants to movie theaters.

I think it's important to point out how important rail is to this kind of car-free vision. Rail encourages the high-density housing that spurs high-density retail within walking distance. Furthermore, as someone who sometimes uses the bus mid-day and weekends, I'll point out that without the large capital investment in rail (and ever-spiraling gas prices) the temptation to reduce bus service to inconveniently long intervals is just too high.

When distances are at most a couple of miles and parking is free, the only way transit can compete is with frequent and reliable service, which is much easier to do with rail. The easy platform-level boarding is also a big plus for those pushing carts and strollers (because they're going about their daily lives!).

The so-called New Urbanism movement emerged in the mid-90s and has been steadily gaining momentum, especially with rising energy costs, environmental concerns and health problems associated with what Leinberger calls "drivable suburbanism" -- a low-density built environment plan that emerged around the end of the World War II and has been the dominant design in the U.S. ever since.
Thirty-five percent of the nation's wealth, according to Leinberger, has been invested in constructing this drivable suburban landscape...

I wish they'd broken down that 35% figure a bit more, but it's a useful reminder that the current drive-everywhere status quo isn't some sort of state of nature, but a directly intended product of subsidies and that right-wing bugaboo, "social engineering."

The result is an oversupply of depreciating suburban housing and a pent-up demand for walkable urban space, which is unlikely to be met for a number of years. That's mainly, according to Leinberger, because the built environment changes very slowly; and also because governmental policies and zoning laws are largely prohibitive to the construction of complicated high-density developments.

Zoning is the ultimate affordable housing issue. Today's "luxury condos" are tomorrow's middle class flats, and the day after's run-down apartments. If our laws essentially prevent building this kind of landscape, Seattle will become an unattractive place to live, which will, uh, solve a lot of our growth management problems.

(Via FP Passport)

More Madness from Montlake Multimillionaires

2008-06-17T12:30:00.001-07:00

Update: I am an ass. I looked at this op-ed and thought of what I have seen of the Pacific Interchange project and what was going on at the beginning of the SR-520 alternatives selection, and it came across to me as rich people against transit - something we've been seeing a lot of lately in this region. It turns out I was totally off base, and I apologize to Jonathan Dubman and Rob Wilkinson for the following piece, which I will leave up so that people can continue to lambast me in the comments.

In actuality, it seems like these guys really do want to improve transit, and at least Mr. Dubman uses it, and while I disagree with them that this would be a good use of Sound Transit money this round, I see the utility of the project eventually. I'm still concerned that this would drastically change the routing and availability of the buses that use 520 and start from I-5, and I still think it's far more useful to use North King or East King money to extend light rail, especially because we can't build Snohomish light rail until we get North King built out.

But this post was out of line, and I'm sorry about that. I wish the best to both of you authors in becoming multimillionaires, and I hope we can be allies even though I'm a jerk. Mr. Dubman, thanks for replying and setting me straight, and thank you jamesk for making me say "uh-oh" and go have a second google.

Today's Times makes me cringe with a sneaky op-ed by two Montlake Multimillionaires who have worked hard for years to undermine the SR-520 bridge replacement and HOV project, and now want to bring their delaying tactics to light rail in a sad attempt to keep a bad idea alive.

The gist of it is that these guys do not care one whit about transit, but want money for their pet project. They spearheaded the "Pacific Interchange" alternative for the SR-520 bridge replacement, with the aim of getting commuters (outsiders!) out of their once-elite neighborhood by building flyover ramps from 520 to Husky Stadium. They already lost that battle - WSDOT chose the six lane alternative (the same two general purpose we have now, with an extension of the HOV lanes all the way to I-5), and these jokers think they can get their project back with Sound Transit money.

Their myopic view ignores the region's actual commute patterns. They point out that an uncongested express bus trip takes 14 minutes from Montlake to Microsoft - but (intentionally) ignore the fact that the vast majority of commuters at Montlake are not coming from the immediate neighborhood - they're coming from Capitol Hill, the UW, Ballard, Roosevelt, and Wallingford neighborhoods, among others. They say the trip from Husky Stadium to Microsoft on Link would be 41 minutes - but ignore the fact that someone living near Roosevelt or Capitol Hill stations would still have a shorter commute boarding there than transferring to the bus at Montlake, and someone at Brooklyn might just take the train for the convenience of a one-seat ride. I would personally save time by boarding at Roosevelt than using my current bus down to Montlake.

The claims here by our Montlake Multimillionaires (who have probably never even taken a bus across the bridge) are stretched, if not simply bogus. Taking money from East Link to get commuters out of their neighborhood would be a horrible use of public funds. This is another example of fake transit support - these people claim to be really interested in "bus rapid transit", but take a layer off the onion and you see they have another agenda entirely. When they pitch this kind of thing to the Laurelhurst Community Club, they even suggest that their direct access ramps could later become "high occupancy toll" roads so the rich can avoid the Montlake interchange.

Everett Streetcar

2008-06-17T03:01:00.000-07:00

It seems streetcars are all the rage these days. According to the Everett Herald, Everett Mayor Ray Stephanson has reversed his previous position on the Everett streetcar, and has sent a proposal for a $30,000 study of a streetcar line in Everett, on top of a previous $115,000 study already approved.

Ironically, leaving an Everett streetcar line off the Sound Transit ballot may help a Sound Transit ballot measure in Snohomish, since voters outside of Everett may not want to pay for a streetcar there. Either way, it's great to see Everett taking even small steps toward better transit.

$4 gas = Light Rail Ballot in 2008

2008-06-16T18:02:00.000-07:00

The Seattle Times is talking about $4 a gallon gas and the possibility of a ballot measure this year, this time with a twist: the northern light rail expansion, so-called North Link, to Lynnwood instead of stopping at Northgate, and South Link going as far as Federal Way. I love it. It's a compromise between the package from last year's Prop. 1, and the fast-package being considered this year. If they can guarantee rail to Overlake Transit Center, the package would prove popular. Apparently, the board has until the 12th of August to decide.

I'm unhappy with a bit of the reporting. From reading this passage, you'd barely know there was a massive road expansion on that ballot measure:

Last year, voters in urban Snohomish, King and Pierce counties trounced the $38 billion "Roads & Transit" proposition that included a 0.5 percent sales-tax increase to build 50 miles of rail over 20 years.

After the loss, Sound Transit began studying a scaled-back, 12-year approach, with only 18 to 23 miles of new Link light rail, and perhaps a slightly lower tax increase.

The other thing that annoys me is this quote from Mark Baerwaldt (at least he wasn't called a transit advocate):

Some Sound Transit skeptics argue that if the problem is gasoline, the answer is to increase buses and toll lanes, which can be done relatively fast.

"The relief cannot be provided by Sound Transit; it takes decades to complete their mission," said Mark Baerwaldt, a leader of last year's opposition campaign.

No challenge on the assertion that buses can be done faster? King County Metro has been waiting more than 3 years now for its last order of buses, and the coach manufacturers have more orders coming online than they did three years ago.

Transit Report Card : San Francisco

2008-06-16T01:01:00.000-07:00

Martin usually does the transit report cards. This time I'm posting about a place where I know transit fairly intimately.

Segments ridden:
Caltrain

Bart

Most Muni Metro Routes

The 'F' Heritage Line

Muni Buses

Scope: C+
BART covers the Eastbay well, parts of the San Francisco well, but only goes one station past the airport toward Silicon Valley in the Pennisula. Not only that, it doesn't serve Marin County at all. In order to serve Marin, BART would need to be extended north and west across the city, and a bridge over, or a tunnel under, the Golden Gate would need to be built. So unless transit money gets a lot easier to come by, I don't expect this to happen for a long time.

The Muni Metro's six lines are something between Link and the SLU streetcar. They only cover the parts of San Francisco south and west of Downtown. The F Heritage Line does go along the Embarcadero waterfront to Fisherman's Wharf, but that route is mostly for tourists and has relatively low capacity. The planned E Hertiage Line will continue to all the way to Fort Mason. There is a future plan to put the T Third Street into a new "Central Subway" that would cross the Market Street Subway and extend to North Beach, but funding for that extension has only been partially secured. Even then, the entire northwest portion of the city is only served by bus, though a BRT route has been planned for some of that area, currently Geary and Van Ness

Service: B+

BART runs in the City and downtown Oakland with five or six minute headways, but the suburban commuter portions have much longer headways, sometimes as long as fifteen or twenty minutes. BART runs from 5am to a little after midnight. Capacity maxes at 1500 per train. Muni Metro runs on ten minute heads at peak times, and service is from 5 am to about 1am. A single-car Muni train can hold up to 250 people, and a two-car train can carry 500.

Caltrain runs 98 trains per day, most of them local trains that stop at nearly all 28 stations. Some trains, designated "baby bullets" make just four stops, and there are other levels of express trains in between. ACE runs four trains per day, and Amtrak Capitol Corridor runs 32 trains per day.

Routing: B

Much of BART in the Eastbay runs near or parallel to highways, partly because of cheaper right-of-way, but also partly because of how these communities developed. In the 1960s and 1970s, building next to highways was all the rage.

Muni covers the south and west parts of the city well, most on that area aren't farther than ten blocks from a Muni line or Bart.

The Pennisula toward the south is only served by Caltrain, which stops far from job centers in the South Bay and in the City. Caltrain runs parallel to 101, but through the historic downtowns. This routing is not perfect, but surface-rail corridors are difficult to come by. Many reverse-commute San Franciscans are taken from their Caltrain station to work by company-shuttle, and into city commuters are forced onto a transfer at Fourth and King station in San Francisco

Grade/ROW: B-
BART, like all third-rail systems, is entirely grade-separated. In San Francisco it's entirely underground, and it's also underground in Downtown Oakland, in Berkeley, and in a couple of the cities south of San Francisco, outside of that it's elevated.

The Muni Metro is underground in the Market Street Subway, which makes for nine underground stations. Some of the other portions run in there own right-of-way, the new T-Third street is almost entirely in it's own center street right-of-way, much like Link in the Rainier Valley. Ironically, the right-of-ways and subway sections of the Muni Metro are the major reason the Muni Metro still exists: in the 1940s and 1950s when streetcars were being taken out, the five lines that had their separated right-of-way couldn't be replaced by buses.

The commuter rail lines, Caltrain, Amtrak Capitol Corridor and ACE, obviously run in their own right-of-way with grade crossings.

TOD: B+

San Francisco is the second densest city in the US, and easily the densest in the West. Many of the suburbs are also very dense: Oakland, Daly City and Berkley, among others, are in fact much more dense than Seattle is. Part of this is because of age of these areas, but there has been a lot of development around BART stations.

One of the main impetuses for the new T-Third street was the development of areas served by the line, including China Basin, Mission Bay, and Hunter's Point.

Caltrain is running in a 19th-century rail corridor, so it runs through the historic downtowns of most of the cities it serves.

Culture: A-

San Francisco is one of the few cities in America where driving is not the majority. More than 35% of commuters take transit, and another 20% bike. San Francisco is also one of the few cities where nearly everyone knows where the transit lines are. East Bay commuters have been pushed away from driving by $4 tolls across the Bay Bridge, and reliable BART commutes. However, Marin County is only served by Golden Gate Transit, which runs relatively few buses, and most commuters along the Pennisula, in and out of San Francisco, still drive.

*************

San Francisco's rail network is far suprior to Seattle's, but the major modes are relatively analogous. Caltrain is like Sounder, BART is what Link could be with expansion, and I think the Muni Metro is a major inspiration for Seattle's Streetcar network. One thing Seattle can learn from Muni is that two-train stations are worth it; you never know when transit demand will out-pace supply by huge amounts.

BART can also be a lesson: make sure to get commitment early when building transit systems. Marin County to the North dropped out early in the BART planning process, making it virtually impossible to extend BART there now, and Santa Clara county, to the south, now wants BART, but is forced to build it through the East Bay because San Mateo county was so opposed to BART. Also, duplicating highway corridors by may be the best way to serve current population and residential centers, but does not create future transit-orient development to the same extent new corridors might.

Also, Caltrain has 98 runs per day compared to 18 for Sounder. But Caltrain gets just 37,000 riders per day compared to 11,000 for Sounder. How can you run more than five times as many trains, through a far more dense corridor and get fewer riders per run? It's simple: charge a a reasonable amount to ride (fares top at $11 for Caltrain), go to downtown job centers (Caltrain stops at few), and provide adequate parking (I know, I know: more parking is heresy). ACE and Amtrak Capitol Corridor show that suburb-to-suburb rail can work, but it needs to go through job centers, and again, parking is hugely important.

Finally, density is important. San Francisco is dense, as are a number of the older suburbs. But the South Bay, where a lot of growth has been over the last twenty years, is very low density and sprawling. Same thing goes with the areas East of the hills in the East Bay. San Francisco could have absorbed more of that sprawl, but, like Seattle, made a choice to try to "perserve" the 1960s way of life. What happened? The 1960s way of life was lost, but along the way so was affordibility and scope. Now there's a huge region that is difficult to serve easily by transit, has chronic "natural" challenges like wild fires and floods (we just get floods here), and surprising congestion. Our area still has a chance to avoid sprawl and geographic expansion on the level seen by the Bay Area, let's hope we can get everyone on board.

I contemplated whether to write about the South Bay's VTA system, but I decided that system was worth a post of it's own.

Central Link light-rail to Tukwila push run!

2008-06-14T15:27:00.000-07:00

Sound Transit pushed the ST 105 to Tukwila Station before parking it next to I-5 near 144th Avenue for "public" viewing.

It'll be visible to all along I-5 and it's already caused quite a stir..all positive :D

Pictures can be viewed here - I only resized them.

I'll update the captions and such later on and a full story on Monday.

Thoughts on the Amtrak Funding Bill

2008-06-14T09:59:00.000-07:00

Frank over at Orphan Road has been keeping track of the $15B Amtrak bill that just passed both the US House and Senate with a veto-proof majority. A lot of this bill is for grants, so this could mean something for Seattle.

The first thing the bill does is ensures Amtrak can operate for the next five years without fear of losing funding. Amtrak wasn't designed with a consistent funding program, so they're unable to issue bonds like Sound Transit does - they'd have no way of paying them back, because they can't levy any taxes. Basically, this means Amtrak service gets worse every year as their equipment ages and the small portion of track they actually own slowly becomes the worse for wear. This bill will buy Amtrak some new equipment, and it funds some capital upgrades so they can improve service in the Northeast Corridor, the high speed line between Washington DC, Philadelphia, NYC, and Boston.

Some background before we go further: In Washington, we have a partnership between the Washington State DOT (WSDOT) and Amtrak to provide more service than Amtrak would normally be able to fund. I've never been clear on exactly how the costs are split up (Brian might be willing to comment to that), but the state owns most of the trains themselves and pays for most of the service we have. This partnership service is a route called Amtrak Cascades.

Cascades currently runs four daily round trips from Seattle to Portland, one Seattle to Vancouver BC, and one Seattle to Bellingham - although that last one will be extended to Vancouver as well sometime in the next year. The Oregon DOT also funds two round trips from Portland to Eugene. In 2007, the Washington State routes got more than 675,000 riders, the vast majority of those riding between Seattle and Portland.

When there's bad traffic or a big border delay, this service is already often faster than driving. It takes 3h30m from Seattle to Portland, and 3h55m from Seattle to Vancouver. This really isn't consistently competitive, though - so WSDOT has a nominally 20 year plan of incremental upgrades to get Seattle-Portland down to 2h30m, and Seattle-Vancouver down to 2h45m. This comes from a lot of small projects, and a few big ones, like building some new segments of passenger-only track on which we could operate at 110mph, instead of the current 79 (and often slower).

Back to the bill: There are two types of grants this bill offers that could affect our service very positively. The first is that it offers grants to develop state passenger corridors. Guess what Amtrak Cascades is? This bill provides $2.5 billion in matching grants, where the federal share can be up to 80%, for state corridor projects. The other type of grant is for the 11 corridors in which the federal government thinks high speed rail is a good idea - these total $1.75 billion. Guess what kind of corridor Amtrak Cascades runs in? Now, we might not get a penny of this money, because the California High Speed Rail Project has a $10 billion bond issue going before voters this November, and their plan is very competitive, but there's a good chance we'll get some of this money to improve intercity service.

We Need a Light Rail Vote This Year

2008-06-13T13:35:00.000-07:00

Coming from our discussion over the last day of where to put our next rail spine, I want to make the case for voting to extend what we have this year, in the November general election, rather than delaying for two years.

The big argument for waiting until 2010 is that we'll see light rail in operation for a year - people will have a chance to ride it. I think this would have a positive impact, but that impact would be much smaller than the huge positive turnout impact of presidential and gubernatorial elections. It seems that most of the potential riders - those who will be directly affected - are already galvanized. They're either aware of and looking forward to having the system online, or else they're shaking their fists at Sound Transit for causing construction delays and road closures. Having rail open won't change the minds of anti-transit detractors, it'll just give them two more years to think up new smears.

This year we will really benefit from strong turnout for the top of the ticket. Barack Obama is on the ballot - easily the most well spoken and charismatic Democratic presidential candidate in decades. Voter turnout was astronomical in the primaries, with some states seeing higher turnout than previous general elections. One of the reasons we failed last year was because it was an off year - there were no good candidates bringing people to the polls, only initiatives. Many of the regular off-year voters are motitvated by anger and frustration with government, and are very likely to vote against propositions and referenda. If Obama wins this year, we'll be in a prime position to compete for the first new Federal Transit Administration grants from a more transit friendly administration.

High gas prices will work for us this year as well. Yesterday we saw a $15B Amtrak reauthorization bill pass the US House with a veto-proof majority, after a similar showing in the Senate, on the heels of big increases in ridership on all of Amtrak's routes, including our own Cascades. We've seen Sounder ridership jump dramatically, with most of the Sounder South trains standing room only, and overall ridership up some 30% over the same period last year. My bus to work is packed as ever, despite new service coming online recently and some of the trips only 5 minutes apart. The cheap gas is $4.39 down the street from me - and that's up from $4.29 a few days ago. If those prices keep up, we're going to keep seeing the ridership gains we have been, which means more people aware of and interested in a better way to work. We don't know what gas prices will be like in 2010 - some of our current run-up in oil futures is due to speculation, and some of that money will return to securities as the real estate bust smooths out.

This year, constitutents are looking for solutions. Government at all levels is commonly criticized for being behind the times, being unable to respond quickly to changes. We shouldn't wait two years before submitting a plan to voters, when they are looking for something now. This is a great chance for Sound Transit to show that they have a plan and they're ready to take action. The fact that the retooled ST2 plans are accelerated works strongly to our advantage - and with University Link construction beginning next year, to the untrained eye Sound Transit will get credit for groundbreaking only months after a vote. You can't buy PR like that.

Look at all the things 2008 gives us: High gas prices make people want an alternative. Unprecedented gains in transit ridership show that we have strong and growing demand. Obama and Gregoire ensure that we'll have great progressive turnout who will support transit projects. Let's put ST2 on the ballot this November.

Expansion Pays for Itself in 15 Years

2008-06-12T17:11:00.000-07:00

A study done by Parsons-Binckeroff for the Sound Transit board shows that a mass transit expansion will pay for itself in increased local economic growth within about 15 years of completion. After that time the benefits would continue to pile up for a century or more.

From the press release:

These are the key findings of a benefit-cost analysis prepared for Sound Transit and released to its Board today. The Board currently is considering options for Sound Transit system expansion. Benefit-cost analysis of projects costing more than $100 million is required by the Puget Sound Regional Council as it reviews conformity with the regional transportation plan, a state mandate.

“This confirms that investing in mass transit makes sense for the bottom line," said Greg Nickels, Sound Transit Board Chair and Seattle Mayor. “By expanding Sound Transit and giving people more alternatives to sitting in traffic, we'll save both time and money."

The impacts of new transit on travel patterns in the region were assessed in five categories:
· number of new transit riders,
· travel time savings for new and existing travel riders,
· savings in vehicle (highway) miles traveled due to new transit riders,
· paid parking saved for new transit riders,
· reduction in delay caused by traffic congestion.

Benefits-cost analysis is an economic tool used to measure the relative difference between the benefits and costs of projects or investments. Public investments generating benefit-cost ratios greater than one-to-one, or more than break even, are considered justifiable.

The study’s methodology is modeled upon state-of-the-art, conservative assumptions for U.S. transit investments. It compares expanding transit with taking no action. Anticipated regional population growth will cause significantly more congestion on existing highways by 2030. The study finds that expanding the rail system will yield significant mobility benefits, resulting in time savings of between 13 million and 34 million vehicle-hours from reduced vehicle delay per year, depending on the expansion option.

Let's go to the ballot in 2008!

Nickels on The Federal Government's Obligation to Cities

2008-06-12T17:06:00.001-07:00

Nickels has an opinion piece in the Times that I think is worth reading for great quotes like this:

Federal transportation policy must reflect the obvious climate benefit of linking mass transit and regional development.

We need to encourage density, so the biggest commute decision in the morning is which pair of shoes to wear on the walk to work or transit.

Past federal housing and transportation policies transformed American cities, and not always for the better. We need to break the outdated pattern of highway and sprawl and respond to the needs of the 120 million new Americans expected to live here by 2050.

Emphasis added. Read the whole thing.

The DSTT Will Be Full.

2008-06-12T12:00:00.000-07:00

When we talk about building West Seattle or Ballard service, there's often an assumption that this service could use the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel we have now. As far as I'm aware, it can't.

The light rail spine we're building now will eventually go through Federal Way to Tacoma, and through Lynnwood to Everett. The tunnel will be used not only for trains that run straight through from Everett to Tacoma, but also for trains that run from Everett (or at least somewhere north of downtown Seattle) to Bellevue and Redmond.

We're starting with service on Central Link every six minutes during peak times. It's probably reasonable to consider service down to headways (time between trains) of two minutes - the closest headways I've seen in any Sound Transit documentation are 2.4 minute, from their 2005 long range plan.

After University Link opens, I sincerely hope we'll be looking at lowering headways during peak times. Maybe this will be to five minutes. If we build Sound Transit 2 just to Northgate and Bellevue, we're going to add trains to the tunnel to bring headways down further. We'd have trains to the Rainier Valley every five minutes, and then trains to Bellevue every 10 minutes. The easy way to figure out combined headway is to figure out how many trains that is per hour - 6 for Bellevue, 12 for the Valley - and then divide the number of minutes (60 in an hour) by the number of trains (18). Let's round this to 3 minutes.

This is a hundred year plus system - it'll still be operating after all of us are long dead. We're certainly going to increase the frequency of the trains on this line in the future - maybe even soon. We need the flexibility to do that.

Ten years ago, the monorail project was talking about 3 minute peak headways for Ballard-West Seattle. Combine that with just the potential ST2 service, and you're talking about 1.5 minute peak headways. Those are physically possible, but that's it, then. We wouldn't have any room for ST3, no room for ST4, nothing.

New rail through downtown will need new right of way.

Light Rail Through Duwamish?

2008-06-12T10:18:00.001-07:00

The P-I talks about re-development plans for the Duwamish valley as part of the Superfund clea-up, and I noticed light rail on the map. Obviously, there's no funding source for it, but wouldn't it be nice? Taking a train to Georgetown is probably a distance dream.

The West Seattle alignment is intersting also. I wonder if the Spokane street viaduct could hold light rail. Even if it could, I am not sure those trains could actually travel through the Downtown Transit Tunnel. I think after ST2, that corridor's capacity would be essetially maxed out.

BRT vs Rail Again

2008-06-11T23:26:00.000-07:00

After listening to Rob Johnson debate Mark Baerwaldt on KUOW (you can listen here, it starts about 15 minutes in), I read this article by conservative rail supporter Paul Weyrich (via Orphan Road) on the problems with Bus Rapid Transit (BRT), and why he supports Light Rail Transit (LRT) over BRT. Definitely worth a read.

He brings up a couple of points that I missed in my argument on LRT versus BRT:

Then there is the matter of speed. Both buses and rail cars can run at the same top speed. But the acceleration and deceleration rate of a rail car or train is much faster than that of a bus. That is why rail systems can maintain better schedules than buses. And there is the question of replacements. Buses don't last for more than 15 years, with overhauls maybe 20. Electric rail cars, on the other hand, if well maintained can operate indefinitely. The SEPTA Red Arrow Division operated streetcars and interurban cars that were some 60 to 70 years old before they finally were replaced. Ever come across a 70-year-old bus in regular service? Boston, Philadelphia, Kenosha and San Francisco operate PCC streetcars from the 1940s and 1950s seven days a week. Those are modern quiet streetcars developed by the President's Conference Committee in the 1930s to attempt to stave off competition from automobiles and buses. They will be able to operate for at least another 15 years.

At the Tour we took, Link Light Rail maintenance chief John Zastawniak said that Link cars last 20 years without overhauls.

It's The Little Things.

2008-06-11T08:14:00.000-07:00

This morning I read the same article Daimajin did, but I noticed something that I see from our local papers all the time: Ridiculous small 'errors' making Sound Transit look bad. It should be clear that I don't think these are unintentional.

Have a look at part of today's article:

But it's a choice between cost and time. Layovers and travel times are far longer, but riders can get from town to town on a bus cheaper than by car or even private coach. The one-way, nonrefundable Greyhound fare from downtown Seattle to downtown Tacoma is $11.50 for a 45-minute trip. The same trip on a Sound Transit bus is 30 minutes longer but costs $3. By car, the trip is about 40 minutes without traffic tie-ups.

Did you notice? Larry Lange claims Sound Transit takes 30 minutes longer than Greyhound from Tacoma to Seattle? I checked the schedule to be absolutely sure - nope, Sound Transit's buses actually take 46 minutes to get to 4th and Union - and they're faster than Greyhound if you're going to get off in south Downtown. Sound Transit pads their schedules up to 58 minutes during peak times to account for congestion, but the fact that Greyhound doesn't bother doesn't mean Greyhound is faster - just more inaccurate.

ST's 590 (and similar) don't stop between Tacoma and Seattle, and they get to use the HOV lanes the whole way. For downtown to downtown trips, they are almost always faster than driving alone, especially considering you don't have to park.

But it's the 30 minute difference thing that gets me. Larry Lange knows perfectly well no such difference exists.

Exurban and Rural Transit Trips

2008-06-11T00:26:00.000-07:00

In a seemingly continuing series on the possibilities of public transit the P-I has an interesting article about using public transit to get to far-away places, like Port Townsend to Olympia (!!!). The farthest I've ever taken local transit was from San Francisco to Big Sur (seriously, and it was awesome). Any of you gone on a really long bus ride? I know STB reader DJtroksy has taken public transit on some pretty long rides.

Monorail vs Light Rail

2008-06-10T22:59:00.000-07:00

Mark Baerwaldt (of Monorail fame) and Rob Johnson (Policy Directory for Transportation Choices Coalition) will be debating tomorrow (Wednesday) on KUOW's Weekday at 10:15 am. Rob Johnson is a big light-rail guy, and Mark Baerwaldt is a big Sound Transit hater. It should be an interesting debate.

Sumner Park and Ride

2008-06-10T13:25:00.001-07:00

Sound Transit Park and Rides are back in the news again this week, though this time it's Sumner in addition to Puyallup. Park and Rides are almost always full at both stations, and the over-flow commuters are taking up parking on nearby city streets. Sound Transit is considering more parking garages as well as station-access-funds.

“One of the lessons we have learned is that we have to define the scope of projects,” [Joni Earl, Sound Transit CEO] said. “The board (of Sound Transit) has changed its focus from garages to access to stations. We want to work with communities to find” solutions.

One of those solutions already is being implemented in Sumner, Earl said. Working with Pierce Transit, bus service from the Bonney Lake Park & Ride connects to the trains at the Sumner station both in the morning and in the evening. The shuttle service has meant more riders for Sound Transit with no added impact to Sumner, she said.

I wonder if Sound Transit couldn't partner with a local developer for some kind of mixed-use, park-and-ride/condo project to bring people into the downtowns of these areas and help pay for the new parking projects. But I guess that might be illegal? At least Sounder is getting a ton of riders.

Screeching to a Halt?

2008-06-10T13:23:00.000-07:00

The Washington Post ran an editorial Sunday describing the funding gap we need to make up just to maintain public transit in the US:

Washington's inattention to public transportation is bipartisan and longstanding. Congress and the Bush administration have done little to fix it. In the omnibus transportation bill signed in 2005 (covering the period from 2003 to 2008), annual funding for mass transit is targeted at around $10 billion, of which about $7 billion goes to capital infrastructure projects. Add that to state and local funding, and the nation's total capital spending on transit amounts to roughly $13 billion annually. But even by the administration's conservative estimates, the minimum need is closer to $20 billion. And the American Public Transportation Association reckons $45 billion to $60 billion annually would be optimal to replace and modernize aging buses, facilities, subways and rail systems. That's quite a gap.

It's worth reading the whole thing.

Advice for New Transit Riders

2008-06-10T00:11:00.000-07:00

The P-I has a primer for bus riders, in response to higher gas prices, including tips to making your bus commute more enjoyable, and figuring out whether transit will be cheaper than driving (it nearly always is cheaper than driving alone). They do run a story about a woman puking on the bus, for what reason, I don't know. In all my years riding public transit, I've never seen anyone puking.

The article is really basic. How to buy tickets (the P-I notes you cannot use credit cards), how to signal your stop (pull the cord) and how to find your route. Rides are free downtown (anyone who has been downtown must know that by now, right?).

Ok, if I had to give advice to new transit riders, I would say the following:

Have your cash ready when you board, or get off. Better yet, buy a pass or tickets before riding. You'll be happier, and your fellow riders will appreciate (or at least hate you less).
Don't be shy to ask questions, just don't hold up the bus doing so. Does the bus go to Pioneer Square/Pike Place Market? If you're in the ride free zone, pretty much yes.
Don't talk to the crazies unless you are prepared to talk until you get off. This is an easy mistake that I see a lot of noobies make. You can't tell who is crazy easily, so you may not want to talk to anyone until you've riden a dozen times or so.
Please be respectful of others when using your phone.

What am I missing? What advice would you give transit noobs?

Gentrification and Old Buildings on MLK

2008-06-09T09:31:00.000-07:00

When discussing transit, one of the issues that comes up the most is that of gentrification - the idea that those currently living near new transit will be forced out by high rents and developers, forced to move someplace far away, replaced with childless yuppie couples who drink bad lattes and wear clothes from REI and Patagonia, their key-laden carabiners jingling, Keens squeaking on the sidewalk as they walk by local bookshops, bahn mi and bakeries in favor of Starbucks, Barnes and Noble and Urban Outfitters.

MLK's one story strip malls, populated by a rainbow of independent groceries, restaurants, nail and hair salons, do not stand a chance against such an onslaught of money. Not even Seattle's pervasive fear of the "south end" (read: people with various shades of skin colors who are clearly all Out To Get You) will stop the growth of poorly designed, vinyl-skinned faux mixed use, sporting spacious high end first floor coffee shops with brand new factory-aged furniture topped with shoddy apartments and condos at astronomical prices.

That's the bad news.

Now for the good.

The buildings on MLK are fairly old. While some have been rebuilt more recently, many are easily 40 or 50 years old, and on top of that, they are generally very cheap, single story construction. When they were first built, they did not house small, independent businesses. They represented a new, low density construction boom during and after WWII, lots of subsidized temporary housing and the businesses to support them. As the construction loans were paid off, the carrying costs for these buildings became very low, so the small businesses we see today trickled into the aging structures.

This happens everywhere. The market doesn't build new buildings with the intention of housing small businesses - they can't pay the rent of new construction. New buildings house high-margin, often cookie cutter businesses, with the exception of those helped along through local government (artist lofts, subsidized housing) or rare business partnerships (Vivace). It is only when those buildings age that the space in them gets cheaper; the business diversity that makes cities great appears only where small and unique becomes affordable.

Here's the kicker: It is cheaper per square foot for a business to build a new one story building than to tear down an existing one story building to build a two or four story building. One story buildings are cheap. When people are using transit to get around, though, one story buildings don't offer enough density. The rewards for building a little higher and closer together are greater because so many of your users are pedestrians. Highways are the only reason that business economics don't overwhelm the low construction cost of short buildings - if everyone's driving, they can go further, so the original one story buildings survive.

Before the highways, you saw higher density. In Columbia City, you see two story (and higher) brick buildings, packed close together, without parking lots. As the city grew, these would have been replaced with four or six or eight stories, like we see in Pioneer Square. But this growth was stunted by the highways' massive reduction in the marginal cost of traveling farther.

This is how MLK (then Empire Way) grew. Small one story buildings filled in along the boulevard, commercial closer to the city, industrial farther away. As the highways were built, instead of being replaced, these buildings simply aged. Now wait a minute. Why is this bad? We need old buildings, right? Here's the problem: Given some demand, it's profitable to replace a one story building with a six story building. When there's enough demand, your one story buildings really don't stand a chance.

However, six story buildings do. Look at Pioneer Square again, Belltown, and the International District. Most of those aren't chain stores, and many of those buildings are old. It's unprofitable to replace a six story building with anything short of 20 or 30 stories - and local resistance to high-rises outside the downtown core make that kind of zoning very unlikely on MLK.

The key here is this: Anything we build on MLK today will not only be there just as long as the buildings there now have lasted, it will also be more resistant to further development. The first wave of construction will be opportunistic and perhaps not of the best quality, but the second wave, after light rail opens and as demand increases, will be better, just as second wave construction in Pioneer Square, Belltown and the ID were stone and brick and easily protected by today's community groups. Those buildings will last lifetimes.

Aurora

2008-06-09T07:13:00.000-07:00

Metro still hasn't released anything about Ballard or Aurora RapidRide, but tidbits continue to drip out in the P-I:

If adopted, the proposals would bring wider sidewalks and an end to the center turn lane to a 35-block-long stretch of Aurora Avenue from North 110th Street to the Shoreline border, said Rick Sheridan, a spokesman for the Seattle Department of Transportation. Three lanes would carry traffic in each direction, including one lane reserved for bus and business traffic...
A bus rapid transit line would be included in the redesign. The proposed line would shuttle people into the city's core with minimal stops and buses coming at 10-minute intervals.

Sheridan said the designs are preliminary and that construction wouldn't start until 2011 at the earliest.

So it seems that there will be a bus lane for at least part of the Aurora line, much like Ballard. Good.

That makes four of the five RapidRide lines (Ballard, Aurora, W. Seattle, Pacific Highway) that will have at least some portion of the route with a semi-dedicated right-of-way. It's just the Eastside that gets nothing in this department.

But hey, maybe we can overcome Ron Sims' objections to East LINK, so that they can get something too.

Search for "RapidRide" in the bar at the top of the page for our other coverage of this topic.

UPDATE 8:46 AM: Business Access and Transit (BAT) lanes are explained here.

Image from www.metrokc.gov.

New York Without Subways?

2008-06-09T06:33:00.000-07:00

Martin's Transit Report card for New York got me thinking about how much rail can effect a city. Here's an old link to a NY Times article about what New York would be like without subways.

The first note is how much more development there is now compared to when the lines were put in:

The subway forever altered the city it was designed to serve. In 1910 most of Brooklyn was undeveloped, and much of it was still farmland. But the BMT changed all that. By 1940 Brooklyn had more residents than Manhattan, and neighborhoods like Sheepshead Bay, Canarsie and Bay Ridge were no longer remote. Similarly, the Bronx counted only 200,000 residents in 1900. By 1940, the population was seven times that, and the Grand Concourse, Loews Paradise and Krum's ice cream parlor were already legendary.

Transit causes development, no question.

Without the subway, it's hard to imagine that New York would have remained a great city, indeed the ultimate city. Urban greatness, in the 21st century no less than the 20th, requires an efficient, safe and effective rail transit system. Without the subway, New York might very well have turned out to be Bridgeport.

What would Seattle be like if we had built a subway? I don't know. But we are building rail transit now, and if we continue to build it we can see whether Seattle can achieve "urban greatness".

Sound Transit tour video

2008-06-08T20:00:00.000-07:00

Thanks to all the people that showed up on Friday for our Light Rail tour. Eric from "Ride the Link" took video, which you can see here. See if you can pick out the four STB contributors with speaking roles.

And thanks to the good people at Sound Transit for making it possible.

Ben on KOMO

2008-06-07T13:58:00.000-07:00

If any of you were listening to KOMO radio Monday around lunchtime, you know that our very own Ben Schiendelman was on for about 30 seconds talking about bus etiquette. I can only applaud KOMO's exquisite taste in guests.

Here's the audio. Thanks to Frank from Orphan Road for hosting the file, since Blogger doesn't seem to think that's worth its while.

New CT Maps!

2008-06-06T12:33:00.001-07:00

I've been meaning to blog about this for a while, but whoa, look at the new Community Transit Route Maps! They're attractive, clear, and have tons of information. It's such a substantial improvement over their old maps, which were both hideous and uninformative.

In particular I appreciate the ability to understand how the routes fit into the context of the other routes in the area.

I'd wouldn't want to have the sparse service that CT provides, but I'm continually impressed with the creativity and resourcefulness they display with limited funding.

Transit Report Card: New York City

2008-06-06T06:50:00.000-07:00

Third in an occasional series where I wildly generalize about a transit system based on limited experience.

Segments ridden:
More or less all of the Manhattan Routes
D train to Coney Island & Downtown Brooklyn
7 train to Shea Stadium
Various approaches to Yankee Stadium
Bergen County NJ Transit Line (Waldwick - NY Penn Station)
PATH: Pavonia to 14th St
Staten Island Ferry

Scope: A+
If you're reading this blog you probably know that the subway more or less blankets the city. But what you might not know is the extent of the commuter rail system, which covers all of Long Island, half of New Jersey and deep into Connecticut and upstate New York. Look for yourself; it's truly massive.

And don't forget the PATH subway system into New Jersey and run by the Port Authority, as well as the Newark and Hudson Shore Light Rail systems run by New Jersey Transit.

Service: A+
24-hour service on the subway, unparalleled anywhere in the world. As for commuter rail, I rode into the city on a Sunday and found myself with 36 trains a day in each direction to choose from.

Routing: A
Not an A+ because there's very little in the way of routing that bypasses Manhattan. The city could use some ring lines like they have in Tokyo, London, and Paris.

Grade/ROW: A+
As with all third-rail systems, no pedestrian or auto is ever going to get anywhere near the track.

TOD: A+
New York has extreme density where there's rail transit, not so much where there isn't. On the other hand, the not-so-dense places would give the average resident of, say, Greenwood some sort of aneurysm.

Culture: A+
Undoubtedly, the city in America where it's most foolish to own a car, unless you go into the outer suburbs a lot. If not here an A+, then where?

*************

If you have even a little bit of transit tourist in you, get thee to New York City before airfares go up again. Driving is a nightmare, parking can cost over $20 for a half hour (plus tax), and the subway system approaches perfection (unless you require wheelchair accessibility, as I discovered when trying to cart around a baby stroller on this trip).

If you're a total cheapskate, get a hotel out in the suburbs and take the commuter rail in.

What's a little frightening is that with all the transit options available, there used to be more. There are tons of transit tunnels and stations abandoned at the peak of the automobile age. The city tore down dozens of miles of elevated track in the last century as well. And yet the system still carries more daily riders that all the nation's other systems combined.

Smart NYC travelers fly into Newark and take one of the various New Jersey transit options into the city, rather than suffering through a 2-hour AirTrain and Subway slog into Manhattan from JFK.

Multimodalism is at its best here. At Penn Station, for instance, you have Amtrak, PATH trains, commuter rail, 6 subway lines, and God knows how many buses all coming together in one gigantic terminal. The Newark airport has an AirTrain system that connects all the terminals with not only the car rental complex, but also a train station that supports both commuter rail and Amtrak.

This kind of integration makes it plausible to nearly eliminate "puddle-jumper" aircraft, since outlying residents can simply take the train to take advantage of the many destinations available out of the New York airports. I think this kind of thing is very useful as gas prices skyrocket and scarce landing slots have to be devoted to bigger aircraft.

I'm told there are a few traditional tourist attractions in the city as well.

Reminder : Meet-up tomorrow

2008-06-06T00:32:00.000-07:00

6:30 pm, Collins Pub (Yesler & Second). Hope you can make it!

Re: Rising Gas Prices and Transit Agencies

2008-06-05T09:14:00.000-07:00

Daimajin posed the question about how Metro should compensate for higher fuel costs. Systematically, this is how I see it:

Raising taxes
Pro

No negative impacts on ridership

Con

Introduces tax fatigue, poisoning the well for capital projects like light rail.
Is likely to be regressive

Raising fares
Pro:

The usual suspects (Kemper Freeman, et al) don't object.
$2.00 is easier to pay than $1.75.
Corporate pass purchasers (eg, Microsoft) are relatively price-insensitive

Con

Highly regressive to poor, occasional transit users.

Capital Investment for less diesel dependence
Pro

Sustainable, both environmentally and economically

Con

Makes the funding squeeze worse in the short term
Takes a long time

Although cheaper passes and higher spot fares would benefit me personally, I don't think it's a good idea. First of all, as noted above many pass purchasers are corporate and therefore price-insensitive. Secondly, a lot of cash payers are poor, either because they use transit irregularly, or they can't scrape together the money to buy a pass up front.

I would hate to see a 0.1% tax increase go to maintaining current service hours instead of getting light rail out to Microsoft, etc.

So what do I propose? How about going to $2.00/$2.50 across the board (aligning with ST express two-zone), and a tax increase for capital improvements like trolley bus lines, streetcars, and light rail?

Source Request

2008-06-05T08:21:00.000-07:00

If you're an employee at Metro working on the reorganization of routes in the Rainier Valley after LINK starts running, and I haven't contacted you already, I'd love to hear from you for a piece I'm working on. Please email the address at right (seattletransitblog@gmail.com).

I'd be happy to talk on or off the record.

Thanks!

Rising Gas Prices and Transit Agencies

2008-06-04T23:12:00.001-07:00

The Times has a chart of how the rise in gas prices are going to hurt the transit agencies in our region. It's surprising that for an agency like Metro with a budget of more than $500 million, even with higher prices fuel is less than ten percent of costs. The $13 million shortfall Metro has, may require cuts in new Transit Now projects just to keep current service levels.

The increase in ridership is great, but it's worth keeping in mind that adding more service could take a long time, and we should begin taking those steps now.

If Metro has to choose between raising fares, cutting service or raising taxes, which would you prefer? Since my employer pays for my pass, I would personally benefit if they raised fares rather than taxes, but I know that most people buy their own passes, and depending on the tax, that might be they way to go. Cutting service seems like a terrible ideal to me.

Seattle's Funding Gap in the DJC

2008-06-04T22:53:00.000-07:00

Claire Enlow has a guest editorial (behind paywall) in the DJC.

We’ve got lots of plans, and many transportation needs. But when it comes to funding, Seattle has the biggest gap of any city in the nation. It amounts to more than $700 per year, per person, according to a report called Infrastructure 2008 commissioned by the Urban Land Institute. That’s how fast we are falling behind. The runner-up—Dallas—has only half that gap. New York City is tenth on the list.
Why are we first in this race to nowhere? Former Seattle mayor Charles Royer, who appeared on a panel at the event releasing the ULI report, offered his assessment: “We are very good at making plans, and really bad at pulling the trigger.”

...

The room where Royer spoke was full of people accustomed to making plans and carrying them out—developers and their professional milieu. We could safely say that this group has a strong bias toward predictability and rationality over chaos.
And they are worried. Votes for transportation funding around here have been very hard to win. Deciding just what to do, even in the face of failing infrastructure like Seattle’s viaduct, is more difficult than ever.

To be fair, underlying the gap is a high expectation: 1.7 million more people in the central Puget Sound region in 2040 than there were in 2000, a figure the Puget Sound Regional Council uses in transportation planning. If they all commute in single-occupancy cars, that kind of increase could cause chaos.

At the same time that the Federal Highway Trust Fund is going bankrupt, the report tells us, a congressional commission has recommended that the country spend $225 billion annually over the next 50 years on its transportation systems.

There’s an estimated gap of $170 billion per year between national needs and funds, according to keynote speaker William Hudnut, four-term mayor of Indianapolis. Previously unthinkable disasters like the collapse of levies in New Orleans and a bridge in Minneapolis remind us that this gap is tragically real.

In the ULI report, comparisons to Europe and Asia make things look particularly stalled. While the European Union is banding together for infrastructure funding, the U.S. has yet to build its first high-speed train or even make plans to build a system.

...
Capacity on our roads and highways is already passing its limits. Relief can only be found in patterns of development that are self-contained and served by transit. And that’s going to take long-term investments in a number of areas, including rapid transit and transit-oriented development.

It won’t be cheap and Proposition 1 failed to impress the voters. The Regional Transportation Investment Authority asked for approval of a confusing, something-for-everyone list of roads and transit projects.

...
If regional voters are ever going to “pull the trigger” on big infrastructure investments or long term funding mechanisms, they need a convincing narrative of the post-oil future. Ongoing climate change and stratospheric gas prices should point the way to smarter development and more transportation choices. With a little more national and regional leadership, political will and voters just might be close behind.

I actually disagree that we need to convince the voters of a "post-oil future", they can already sort of see it with gas prices going higher. I think now is the time to put a transit expansion on the ballot, and without the expensive and controversial roads portion.

Rapid Ride

2008-06-04T12:34:00.000-07:00

The West Seattle Blog knows a lot about Rapid Ride after a brief to the Council made yesterday. Some details from the longer WSB piece:

Rapid Ride Routes will be given letters instead of numbers. For example, the West Seattle route will be the "C" route.
The buses will have space for three bikes on the racks.
Wi-Fi will be available on all coaches.
There will be ticket machines in "stations" that will enable off-coach payment. This, I think, will be the biggest improvement over regular bus service.

The troubling paragraph from the WSB is this:

The briefing also brought pointed questions from city councilmembers including Transportation Committee chair Jan Drago, who is concerned that the RapidRide bus won’t be so rapid — with a variety of stops planned in addition to the “stations” that will be about a half-mile apart. Metro acknowledged that in fact, while certain parts of the route might save commuters time, in some cases RapidRide will NOT be the most “rapid” way to get downtown — express buses will still beat it.

Not so rapid, huh.

I get this sinking feeling about Rapid Ride sometimes. I asked Sims how many new service hours Rapid Ride would have and he wouldn't say, I worry there's very little. And when I read things like this about Metro's operation budget evaporating as fuel prices sky rocket:

Service increases scheduled for September are not at risk, said Kevin Desmond, Metro's general manager. But the extent of future service improvements funded by the Transit Now sales tax could be in question. The plan, approved by voters in 2006, calls for bus rapid-transit service every 10 minutes at peak hours to five corridors: Pacific Highway South, West Seattle, Ballard, Aurora and Overlake, to begin in the 2010s.

If only we had electric rail transit. It wouldn't have these spikes in operating cost...

Seattle's Transit Use Rising Faster Than Normal

2008-06-04T00:50:00.000-07:00

Sorry to keep posting stories like this but here's a nice video about the recent transit ridership increases.
It's interesting to think that transit use is rising nationwide, but even more so in our area. According to the American Public Transportation Association (APTA), the Seattle area had the third highest net-increase in transit ridership in the first three months 2008 of the twenty largest metro areas. That's huge.

My 545 this morning was standing-room-only, even in the pouring rain.

Seattle Transit Meet-Up

2008-06-03T22:49:00.001-07:00

We're doing our monthly meet-up for June this Friday, June 6th, starting around 6:30 at Collins Pub on the border of the Financial District and Pioneer Square. We'll be sitting in the back.

Hope to see you there!

World's Most Impressive Subways

2008-06-03T12:49:00.000-07:00

WIRED has a photo essay of some nice subway systems around the world. Check it out.

Via Yglesias.

Riders Swamp Transit

2008-06-03T05:50:00.000-07:00

As gas goes up so do the transit riders:

This month, researchers from International Business Machines Corp. surveyed 4,091 drivers in 10 U.S. cities, including Atlanta, Los Angeles and New York. With national gasoline prices averaging $3.67 per gallon at the time of the survey, 9% of drivers said they already were seriously considering other commuting options. At $4.50 a gallon, the figure jumps to 46%.

At $5 a gallon it goes to 66%. This actually a problem for transit agencies who are having a hard time finding money because of lower economic activity due to the recession and are fighting higher diesel prices at the same time. From the WSJ:

After decades trying to gin up enthusiasm for their services, public transit agencies are now having trouble meeting rising demand as more commuters dodge high gasoline prices by hopping on a train or bus.

Under normal circumstances, the surge in ridership would be a boon to the agencies, which have long argued that public transit is one of the best ways to combat social ills such as traffic congestion and global warming.

But at the very moment they should be investing to expand their services, the same driver that is ballooning ridership is crippling transit budgets: steep fuel bills. As record numbers of people board buses and trains, higher costs are forcing public transit agencies to scale back on services, further straining capacity. Local transit agencies fret that the capacity problems may squander the opportunity to convert more Americans to public transportation.

The P-I editorial board hopes that Metro won't have to cut service, I do too. I think the opportunity that could be squandered is the good will of the voters that will enable Sound Transit to win a the ballot. Electric light rail doesn't get more expensive when diesel prices rise. It'll be interesting to see what happens, but if service does get cut, how will we cope with our commutes?

You learn something new every day

2008-06-02T20:04:00.000-07:00

For the first time in a while, I used a Metro peak-hour transfer to get on a Sound Transit bus this morning. The driver insisted that my transfer, which had cost me $1.75, was only good for $1.50. I paid the extra quarter to avoid a scene, but didn't think it was right.

Lo and behold, he knew what he was talking about:

Valid transfers from Community Transit, King County Metro Transit (Metro) and Pierce Transit are accepted on ST Express as a one-zone ST Express fare (Adult $1.50, Youth $1.00, Senior/Disabled* $0.50).

In retrospect, this actually simplifies things, since the different transit agencies have different fares. Nevertheless, this highlights the tradeoffs in having at least four different fare systems (and soon a fifth, RapidRide) in the three-county region. If the fare system is intricate enough to confuse someone like me, it's too complicated; on the other hand, I woudn't want tax-averse out-of-county voters forcing lower service levels on us in a combined Puget Sound super-agency.

On a different note, the driver also was enforcing "Pay as you enter" at the Rainier/I-90 stop outbound from Seattle. I suppose this is correct, but certainly isn't SOP for most drivers on the 554. All in all, not a good day for me in terms of bus etiquette: today, I was the idiot without his fare ready.

Bus Lanes to Ballard

2008-06-02T10:00:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure how this escaped our notice up to now, but the giant repaving project going on on Elliott and 15th Avenues NW involves installing peak-only bus lanes. This is a crucial improvement if RapidRide BRT in this corridor is to be worth anything.

We still haven't seen any other details about what Ballard RapidRide will entail.

Of course, the project is mentioned in the context of a driver whining about losing road capacity, but the P-I at least makes an effort to acknowledge the number of people this will help.

It's good to know there will be a decent option for densely packed Ballard residents before light rail gets there 2030-ish. Hopefully, the existence of this capacity won't be used as an argument against eventually getting there with LINK.

"Sustainable" Parking Garage

2008-06-02T09:55:00.000-07:00

No seriously. The Port of Seattle has sent me a mail touting the "sustainable project" that is the $413 million parking garage near Sea-Tac:

Consolidated Rental Car Facility

In mid-May, the Port of Seattle Commission gave final approval for the construction of a consolidated Rental Car Facility (RCF) adjacent to Sea-Tac Airport.
...
10,000 to 14,000 Vehicles Processed Each Day
Don’t think of the RCF as a parking garage. Instead, think of it as a processing facility with 10,000 to 14,000 vehicles entering and leaving each day.
...

A Sustainable Project
The RCF is the very first sustainable demonstration project and sustainable asset management pilot project for the Airport, meaning it is designed to be built and operated in as economically and environmentally advanced manner as possible. Key attributes include:
Reducing/’right-sizing’ its dimension’s to decrease areas that need cooling, heating and ventilation;
Requiring all interior construction to use low volatile organic compound paints, sealants, adhesives and carpeting;

Implementing an on-site recycling program throughout the facility and,

Fully treating both construction and RCF stormwater to prevent sediment and pollutants from reaching local creeks.

We are proud that construction of the Consolidated Rental Car Facility will begin in the coming weeks. The amount of detailed planning that has gone into the RCF is nothing short of extraordinary and I am confident the state-of-the art facility will be embraced by both the rental car industry and its customers. I also believe that the RCF will become a source of pride for the region, a signature landmark for the City of SeaTac and set the bar for what truly represents a sustainable rental car facility.

For the record, I dislike this project because it costs $413 million. I don't care about the parking garage itself; if it were free I wouldn't think twice. And I don't mean to belittle the seemingly earnest attempt to make the project as environmentally friendly as possible, but nonsense about sustainable parking garages comes off as kind of hilarious.

For an agency that gets $40 million each year in public money, and essentially runs a monopoly on our region's air transportation, I don't think this a good way to spend its money. For comparison, the portion of link from Tukwila International Boulevard to the Airport (including the station) cost $145 million.

American Bullet Trains?

2008-06-02T07:16:00.000-07:00

There's action in Congress to pour $14 billion into improving the tracks between New York and Washington, reducing the travel time from 2:45 to under 2 hours. Hooray for that.

It's still early going, of course. Besides budget-cutting zeal and NIMBYs, there are two big things to worry about. First, stations may be added for political reasons, defeating the "express train" concept:

The Wilmington [Delaware] station is Amtrak's 11th-busiest in the nation, so Castle said he would "fight like heck" to make sure any high-speed trains stopped here.

I won't comment on Wilmington specifically, but we can expect to see this kind of thing all along the line.

Secondly, they're looking for a public-private partnership. Now, I'm not ideologically opposed to this kind of thing if it gets projects done. But if one of Amtrak's few profitable routes gets cannibalized by a private operator, that can only hurt service elsewhere in the nation.

TGV image from Flickr contributor vorgefuhl

Ridership Data @ Orphan Road

2008-06-01T23:45:00.001-07:00

I imagine that most readers have seen these charts on Orphan Road that bgtothen has put together of the ridership of bus routes operated by Metro (includes Sound Transit routes within King County, as those are operated by Metro). They are awesome and I appreciate tremendously bgtothen putting them together.

The data is great. I meant to post on this before, but I didn't have much to add to the discussion until I read the last sentance:

One last point. The highest ridership route for the Eastside is the 550 at 19th place. The highest none UW/CBD to Eastside route is the 230 at 29th place. Pretty pitiful. This just goes to show how much wealth and sprawl kill transit.

There's really no argument about density and transit (more density, more ridership) but the 550 route is less than ten years old (the same goes for all 5XX routes), while the single digit bus routes are ancient, and most of the double digit metro routes are old too. A brand-new service in Seattle might have low ridership as well, give those routes a little bit of time: transit also leads to density as well as getting riders off of it.

These routes lead directly into a question about sub-area equity. Why are Sound Transit and Metro wasting their money running buses in the suburbs when the buses in the city are a way better deal per dollar? The answer is because those in the burbs are paying for those buses. They deserve something for their tax dollars, and even at 10 riders per service hour, that's cheaper for society than those riders driving.

More on Mukilteo: Blogging from Sounder

2008-05-31T11:32:00.000-07:00

Martin's let you know that Mukilteo Station is now open on Sounder North, but I actually went!

First, though, I have a sad story about bus transfers in Seattle. I nearly missed the entire thing because my bus passed its timepoint early, but fortunately, as some of you know, I live where I have many options - so another route came along soon enough.

I caught a Sound Transit bus (the 510) to Everett, and then an Everett Transit bus (23) out to Mukilteo. There was already quite a crowd at the new station - I took some pictures that I can post later on.

On the 510, I met a seasoned train rider who had come to be on the first train that stopped at Mukilteo. He wasn't the only one who mentioned it - several on the bus from Everett to Mukilteo were Clinton-Seattle commuters who are looking forward to using the train instead of driving or bussing. I also learned that while the ferry schedule lists a 20 minute trip from Clinton to Mukilteo, the actual time taken is often only some 15 minutes - especially during the calmer waters of the summer months - so the transfer to the train in the morning isn't as bad as we thought.

At the new station, several tents were set up by local transit agencies, and a few food stands were serving free clam chowder (thanks Ivar's!) and other goodies. There were a few hundred people, and several speakers: the Snohomish County Executive, the mayor of Mukilteo, Deanna Dawson (an Edmonds city councilmember), Senator Mary Margaret Haugen (D-Camano Island), and Greg Nickels.

I'm blogging from the train right now - we've just gotten south of Edmonds, and it sounds like the train picked up 350 in Everett and more than another 300 in Mukilteo. Sounder South tops out at a bit over 1000 people per trip with seven cars - we have five cars, and they're all packed! This won't be normal ridership, of course, this is game service being offered for free, but it's nice to see people interested!

Congratulations, Mukilteo!

2008-05-31T07:00:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the family of cities that have rail transit.

Mariners service is free today, with regular-fare commuter service starting Monday, June 2.

Eugene BRT: Rosy Outlook and Harsh Reality

2008-05-30T18:08:00.000-07:00

Eugene's BRT service is great! Check out the adorable video, complete with butterflies and whistling music. Hmm, though - they sure seem to make an effort to be anti-rail - note the line at the end: "There and back, with no clickety-clack."

Apparently avoiding "clickety-clack" (which doesn't exist on modern rail systems anyway) wasn't such a great idea after all: fuel prices are forcing the Lane Transit District board to cut service - possibly dramatically, with some routes potentially going from 30 minute headways to 1 hour headways, some routes being completely eliminated, and increases in fares. Their base fare is already going up from $1.25 to $1.50 on July 1st, and that doesn't eliminate the $2-3 million shortfall in their $36 million budget.

So, next time you ask yourself "When was the last time a bus route disappeared?" - here's your answer, and it's only going to get worse. All these areas have hydroelectric power with stable prices, too - I learned on a trip to Grand Coulee Dam last year, for example, that they have never increased their rates, and don't plan to. MAX won't be going anywhere, and nor will Link.

Do Seattlites Really Not Know How To Ride A Bus?

2008-05-30T01:05:00.000-07:00

This blogger, kj at RajeKaje thinks that Seattlites don't know how to ride the bus. His problem is on a crowded bus, standing passengers don't always file to the back.

Apologies for the rant below: I've found this true, I think it's mildly a protest about more people boarding the already-crowded-bus, but this is no where near worst problem. The worst problem for me is the people wasting time figuring out how to pay when they get on or off (whatever the pay time may be). I don't have the problem on my commuter route very often but I do have the problem when riding around town.

A friend once put it this way: "When it my stop comes, I'm ready like I'm a parashooter over Normandy; I am ready to jump when the read light goes on. Pass out or correct change and standing near the door." Oh, if only all bus riders were like that. Maybe we need a union!

This has happened more often recently, but we have more and more noobies riding the bus. I welcome them, and after a while, I'm sure they'll share the same feelings I have. But in the mean time, I get just a little peeved.

What's your most annoying trait of rush-hour transit riders?

Reminder: Metro Route Changes

2008-05-30T01:00:00.000-07:00

Martin wrote about this before, but I wanted to remind you that the route changes take effect this Saturday. Here's the KC Metro site, and here's a Times story for an overview.

Rail, Not Buses

2008-05-29T09:13:00.000-07:00

One of the common questions we get from commenters is "why are you so sure that rail is the right solution?" and "why are you so enamored with rail?" Both these questions are often followed with "buses are cheaper". I want to explain the main reasons why high capacity rail transit gets so many more riders, is so much more effective at moving people and why it is in the long run cheaper than bus transit. I want to focus on the argument between "bus rapid transit" (BRT) and light rail transit (LRT), so I'm going to ignore the elephant in the room: most bus rapid transit does not run in its own right of way, thus adding the largest knock against bus transit: buses get stuck in traffic.

Rail transit is more permanent than bus transit. As famous conservative rail transit supporter Paul Weyrich points out, one of the main arguments for buses is their "flexibility". But this flexibility is the source of one of the largest draw-backs of bus transit: inconsistency. That a bus is "flexible" means that the routes are also flexible, and riders aren't sure that a bus line will remain in place into the future. If someone is making a decision about where to live for the foreseeable future, say they're buying a house, they won't make that choice based on a bus line that may not be there in the future.

I've forwarded this argument before, and people have said "when was the last time a bus route was removed in Seattle?" When I was in high school I took the 43 to my running start classes at Seattle Central Community College. We moved from Capitol Hill to Wallingford, and I could take the 43 straight from Wallingford to Broadway. Then, in the middle of the year, Metro split the line: the 43 no longer went from Downtown through Capitol Hill to Ballard: most runs ended in the U District, where the 44 route to Ballard began. I can think of a couple other routes that did this same thing, the old 7 has been split into the 7 and the 49, the old 65 now stops in the U-District. So it happens; service can stop or shift dramatically. That makes people far less inclined to change their life around the bus.

The permanence of rails also leads to more development than buses. For the same reason as above, new development near rail transit tends to be higher density than development near bus transit: if you are building a large project, part of your plan has to be transportation. That's the reason Microsoft settled next to SR 520, one of the reasons downtown Bellevue is so much more developed than, say, downtown Everett, and one of the reasons South Lake Union is currently attracting so much development (this is the streetcar and I-5). Imagine if I-405 weren't permanent; would Bellevue be experiencing so much growth?

Rail is much more attractive to the non-dependent rider, and thus get more riders. As Carless in Seattle has pointed out:

[A]mong bus-based [High Capacity Transit] users, more than 60% of US bus riders do not own a car. But of rail-based HCT, nearly 60% of subway, streetcar and light rail users DO own a car. (Those numbers include Manhattan, where less than 20% of people own a car, vastly depressing the number of rail users in the rest of the US who could own a car but choose mass transit).

Seattle's highest ridership bus routes go through the most transit dependent areas. Even with those routes, ridership is no where near the ridership of a rail line. Each Link station will get as many riders as most bus routes, and some will have far more boardings than even those routes with the most riders - and these estimates do not take into account development spurred by the system. University of Washington station, for example, is supposed to get some 27,000 daily riders in 2020. Recent light rail construction in the US has almost universally has almost universally exceeded pre-construction estimates, with only one exception (VTA, in the South Bay).

Stepping on a train is enough to see why the difference exists. Trains have a smoother ride, more comfortable seats, and more space. Boarding is also far simpler - instead of a dozen people fumbling with fares, there are several doors, and payment is done on the platform where it doesn't affect operation. Anyone who's ever been on a standing-room-only bus can attest to the discomfort. A forty-five minute 545 ride standing up in Friday evening traffic is enough to convince people to drive to work. Here's photographic evidence of the difference.

The most expensive part of building high-capacity, reliable transit is the right of way - with very similar cost between BRT and LRT. Even Ted Van Dyk, the most adamant BRT supporter and light rail opponent, admits that BRT costs at most 30% less than LRT to build. For University Link, for example, 95% of the costs are for tunneling and stations. A BRT system that would serve the same corridor would need also to build its own right-of-way, and would cost just as much as light rail. And since BRT ridership projections tend to be more than 30% less than LRT in the same corridors, even if the Ted Van Dyks of the world were right, LRT would still be cheaper per passenger to build than comparable BRT.

Rail is cheaper to operate per passenger than buses are. Labor is over 50% of King County Metro's costs. Each bus needs an operator, but an articulated bus only carries 80 at maximum, compared to 800 for a Link LRT train. And with diesel already over $5 a gallon, the gap in operations expenses will continue to grow. Even in bus systems with little to no right-of-way costs, total costs for BRT are higher per passenger mile than LRT. Metro takes a .9% sales tax share now, and moves about 365,000 people per day. A fully built out LRT package from Prop. 1 would have moved that many people by 2030, admittedly a long time, but would have cost just .15% to operate. The capital costs for rail are temporary expenses - Metro will keep spending .9% to move that many people for the next hundred years, but Sound Transit would build three Prop. 1 packages with the same money in that time. Considering about two-thirds of the Sound Transit district is King County, Metro would have to move 1,400,000 million people per day, nearly the entire population of King County right now, to be as cost effective in the long run.

Absolutely rail is expensive and takes longer to build than most bus service. But the investment pays off over time in lower maintenance, higher ridership, and more dense development around stations - which can allow for less density pressures away from rail lines. High-quality transit service ultimately makes a region more affordable, more sustainable, and in some ways more fun. That's why we at this blog prefer rail over buses.

Sound Transit: Time to Decide

2008-05-28T18:25:00.000-07:00

What do you think of this?

Apparently these have been airing on cable television in our area. I like it for the most part, but the wave at the end is a little cheesy.

14 Miles of Track Completed

2008-05-28T18:03:00.000-07:00

Sound Transit has completed 14 miles of track from Tukwila International Boulevard to Westlake Station today. There was a ceremony at the Link Operations and Maintenance to mark the occasion. I'll post the photos I took tonight when I get home, but in the mean time you can check this link for some details and video, and here's the official press release.

Five board members, Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels, King County Council Member Julia Patterson, King County Council Member Larry Phillips, King County Council Member Dow Constantine, and King County Executive Ron Sims. took part in "hammering the golden spike" signifying the completion. They took turns offering speeches, and I think from their speeches it's possible to glean their support for an expansion ballot measure this year.

Greg Nickels is the ST board chair, and he went first, giving a speech about how great the progress has been, but how just as this project is not finished, the road to expansion of Sound Transit isn't either. Nickels is a vocal supporter of going to the ballot this year, and his speech showed that as well.

Ron Sims was next, and he had no speech prepared, and instead grabbed Link director Ahmad Fazel and sort of put him on the spot to give a speech. It was funny, and while it's refreshing to Ron Sims still have a sense of humor, it also shows how little engaged he is in Link that he couldn't be bothered to give a speech.

Julia Patterson gave an impassioned speech about how much Puget Sound residents are going to want light rail when it gets up and running. The speech was great, I've never head Patterson talk but she's got a definite knack for engaging the listener with fresh phrases, and not tired cliches. However, I wasn't completely happy with the subtext of her message, which I felt was that Sound Transit may want to wait until 2010 to go to ballot.

Larry Phillips I've heard talk before, and he has a natural inclination for straight and clear talk. He made it clear to me that wanted Sound Transit back on the ballot this year.

Dow Constantine was last, and he strikes me as a bit of an intellectual, and spoke about transportation and land use planning, and sustainability. He reminded me a lot of Ben talking.

So of the five that showed up to the ceremony, it looked like two were definitely for going this year, one was leaning against, one made no indication either way, and one looked completely unengaged.

Ok so on to my other thoughts:

The trains coming out of Beacon Hill into SODO are going to have a great view of downtown, First Hill (which is getting a little skyline of it's own) and the stadiums.
The Kinkisharyo cars that link will be running make an old-school "clang-clang" to notify pedestrians (and cars I guess). Kind of like a horn on a car, but some how much cooler.

Capitol Hill Station Art Project Getting Cancelled?

2008-05-28T01:02:00.000-07:00

Via Daryn blog, I find that Mike Ross, the artist who was chosen to work on the art in Capitol Hill Station, is concerned his project might be canceled due to public outcry over the use of decommissioned fighter jets in the installation:

————— Forwarded message —————
From: Mike Ross mikenon@gmail.com>
Date: May 22, 2008 11:04 AM
Subject: Sculpture may be canceled — please help
To: Mike Ross mikenon@gmail.com>

Hey folks. As some of you know, I was selected to make a sculpture for Seattle’s new subway station in the Capitol Hill neighborhood. I proposed a sort of stylistic sequel to Big Rig Jig, using a pair of fighter jets. The jets would be deconstructed into pieces, painted pink and orange, and spread out along organically-inspired curves above the station platform between the ceiling beams (they have high ceilings in this station). The exact design is not yet finished. But you can see mock-ups of some early variations here:

http://www.mikenon.com/capitolhill/

The project is in now in danger of being canceled, and I need your help.
Several people have written letters to Seattle’s transit agency, Sound Transit, complaining that the piece is offensive, a glorification of war, and culturally insensitive to neighborhood residents. The area’s 43rd-District Democrats have even passed a resolution officially condemning the sculpture:

http://blog.seattletimes.nwsource.com/davidpostman/…

Unfortunately, the only people who have been moved to write letters are those who object to the sculpture, and the transit agency is seriously considering canceling the project. It has been demoted from “approved” to “not yet approved,” and the rest of the station development is now proceeding without the sculpture, until we can
demonstrate significant community support.

I am hoping that some of you might know people in or near Capitol Hill, Seattle, who can see the potential of the sculpture, and who disagree with the idea that it is offensive or a glorification of war. It may use military technology, but it is not just a pair of jets — it’s jets, chopped up, painted pink, and made to look like two birds
kissing. There is a peaceful message there, and I believe the artwork will ultimately be accepted by its detractors as an object and process which references many of their own views. But before that can happen, the transit agency needs to know that there are people in the community who support the sculpture.

If you know anyone who might wish to write a letter or email (emails are just as good), they should send it to the following two people:
Joni Earl, CEO
joni.earl@soundtransit.org
Sound Transit
401 S. Jackson St.
Seattle, WA 98104

Barbara Luecke, STart Program Manager
barbara.luecke@soundtransit.org
Sound Transit
401 S. Jackson St.
Seattle, WA 98104

Thanks for any help you can offer. Please feel free to forward this email.

Mike Ross
mikenon@gmail.com

The 43rd Democrats protested the piece for being culturally insensitive? That's embarrassing. I can understand thinking a local artist should do the piece, though I've seen a lot of local art and I'm not always impressed. Knowing these people are out to sabotage the art, and put something in that inspires less conversation makes me more attracted to the art than I was before. I think using the warplanes as art pays homage to Seattle's former reputation as the Jet City, though it's fair for recent migrants to Seattle to not appreciate this. I also think two pink fighter jets kissing is a nice play on "swords to ploughshares". I also think it's ironic that people who claim to fight for tolerance and a range of ideas oppose something that falls outside their way of thinking.

I like it, and I've written emails to those mentioned above. What do you think? Is this really culturally insensitive or an over reaction?

Non-Transit Related: Prefab Apartments

2008-05-27T22:29:00.000-07:00

These pre-fab apartments on Westlake could be really interesting. The article focuses on the affordibility aspect of the units, which cost far less to build than traditional buildings. I wrote a little about them late last year, and I was concerned because the designs I saw at the time were hideous. But the proposed design (warning! huge pdf) is actually attractive, and especially attractive relative to the standard building being thrown up around here. And if this can be built to be affordable to "work-force" renters (those earning between 80~120% of the city's median income), then I would love to see more of these being built when compared to this areas average beige and green building being thrown up.

What do you think about prefab apartments? Would you live in these?

Car Era Coming to an End...

2008-05-27T11:42:00.000-07:00

This is a pretty interesting opinion piece about the approaching end to the car era. These days you can't open anewspaper without reading about people moving their commutes to transit, or how expensive gas has become and how it will only get more expensive. So there's nothing really new in this piece, but its succinct and I thought it was worth sharing.

Oh now it makes sense, that's per year!

2008-05-26T22:27:00.000-07:00

Carless in Seattle explains what I couldn't figure out from the P-I article on the ULI report last week. I wrote that I couldn't understand how the shortfall was just $800 per person, less than the cost of the any of the major road or rail projects in the region. But CIS explained the missing piece: it's $800 per person per year. Wow. That's a lot of money, more than four times the cost of the failed Prop. 1 measure from last year.

Private Commuter Rail?

2008-05-26T22:16:00.000-07:00

Snohomish County has given a private company, GNP Railway rights to operate commuter rail in the portion of the old BNSF railway in Snohomish county. Currently that portion of the former railway is a trail. GNP railway wants to operate commuter rail service from Snohomish to Bellevue or Renton, with a station in Snohomish (the city) where there was one the larger part of a century ago.

In order to accomplish this, GNP would need to make a similar deal with the Port of Seattle, get the capital to add rails where there's currently just a trail, and build stations along the line. It sounds a little iffy to me, because I doubt the line would get enough ridership to make this a profitable enterprise, but GNP chairman Tom Payne has a history of bringing railroads from the dead:

Payne, a former locomotive engineer, transformed a failing rail line into Canada's third-largest railroad in the 1980s and 1990s. He operated a tourist-oriented excursion train out of Tacoma in 2006.

I would be awesome if this works, though I imagine some sort of public-private partnership would be needed. This is going to be an interesting one to watch.

Wow, in a country with bad transportation infrastucture, we're the worst

2008-05-23T16:50:00.000-07:00

That's what the ULI is saying. We've got a backlog of about $800 per person in this region, for about $800 per person. Seems low: that's only about $3 billion, the 520 bridge and the viaduct are each more than that. Dallas-Fort Worth is second at about $400 per person, so we're twice as bad as the next worst.

American cities are falling behind Asia and Europe in investing in roads, transit, bridges and other systems needed for growing populations, the study said.

Among U.S. cities/metro areas studied, the Seattle-Puget Sound area's infrastructure-funding gap was nearly twice that of Dallas-Fort Worth, which was second at nearly $400 per capita. ULI, a nonprofit education and research institute that focuses on land-use, population growth, urban planning and the environment, worked with financial consultants Ernst & Young to produce the 60-page study.

"By 2040, the population of the Seattle area is projected to grow by 1.7 million new people, with 1.2 million new jobs ... that's like dropping the population of greater metropolitan Portland into the Puget Sound area," John Hempelmann, co-vice chairman of the Reality Check Task Force for ULI Seattle, said Wednesday.

"That's a big number, and a huge challenge, given the lack of infrastructure capacity and lack of funding."

America is losing the transportation race quickly. If you go to Singapore, China, France, Korea or practically anywhere else the airports are nicer, the trains are nicer, sometimes even the highways are nicer, and it's generally easier to get around than in most US cities, wonder why? Infrastructure spending:

"It's kind of discouraging," he told the audience, that in 1960, the U.S. spent 12 percent of its gross domestic product on infrastructure and now spends 2.4 percent. Japan spends 10 percent, China 9 percent and India 4.6 percent, Hudnut said.
Earlier this year, he said, a bipartisan congressional commission estimated the U.S. needs to spend at least $225 billion annually on transportation systems alone "just to catch up and keep pace with the rest of the world."

It shows in Americans' daily lives. Europeans are connecting major cities using high-speed trains traveling 200 mph, Hudnut said.

But Seattle-area drivers spent about 45 hours in traffic delays in 2005 -- more than a week of vacation -- in contrast to 12 hours in 1982, according to the report.

Some are hoping for a reauthorization of the depleted federal Highway Trust Fund in November 2009, but with a shifted focus from cars to transit.

That'd be a start. But we'd also need to start approving funding for these project on a local level. Let's hope ST2 gets through this year...

A mini-vacation on Metro

2008-05-22T11:50:00.001-07:00

This Seattle Times article about miniature vacations on Metro to summer hotspots around town is pretty interesting. Pike Place Market, Pioneer Square, Seattle Center ... Just kidding. The article is about semi-natural and outdoorsy places such as the Ballard Locks, Golden Gardens and Alki. And since it was in the Times, it was written by someone who lives on the Eastside (this time Kirkland). I honestly learned how to get to Snoqualmie falls by transit (271 from Bellevue TC or 209 from Issaquah PNR), which is awesome for moving my carless life forward. Snoqualmie falls is a great place to take friends from out-of-town, and now I can do it without a car.

The Alki directions miss the mark: West Seattle Water Taxi, guys, come on! This is really the only way to get to Alki in the summer months, I can't imagine why someone would want to take the 56 there.

Ok, so what other interesting places can you get to by bus in this area? I can think of the Museum of Glass in Tacoma (a worthwhile visit on ST route 594), Magnuson Park (65), Emerald Downs (152), and the Arboretum (48, 11)? Help me out!

Nickels wants you to consider leaving the car at home

2008-05-22T05:13:00.000-07:00

Mayor Nickels is back in the act of encouraging people to consider alternatives to car ownership in the city. The City will provide the following incentives to encourage carless commutes:

To find out more about how to participate, go to www.seattlecan.org. Seattle residents who commit to reduce car trips at the Web site are eligible for the following:

• Commit to eliminating a few car trips, and qualify for a drawing for a $50 gift certificate for bus passes or REI.

• Commit to reducing commute trips for several months, and receive a $150 cash card.

• Sell or donate a car, and receive $200 in gift certificates for bus passes or REI; a $100 discount to Tiny's Organic; $50 off a Zipcar membership; free membership in the Cascade Bicycle Club and Bicycle Alliance of Washington; and a signed proclamation from the mayor.

• For those who already bike, walk or take transit, the city will hold a quarterly drawing for an iPhone.

There used to be flexcar incentives, but when zipcar bought flexcar, they decided to not participate in the program. That's kind of a shame, zipcar is a great way to ween people off car ownership, but I guess that option is still available.

Final South Sounder Project now with pics!

2008-05-21T20:41:00.000-07:00

Starting this Friday, BNSF Railway will start cutting over the new main line relocation project which will move the normal main tracks from it's current location to the new construction tracks between King Street Station and South Lander Street. The new main line will enable faster trains between Lander and Spokane Street shaving a few minutes off passenger train schedules.

At Lander Street, the main line will curve from it's current location and shift to the right next to the Seattle School District building. The garbage cars and coal train approaching me were in the way to see the new tracks.

The schedule is as follows

May 1st - 3rd - BNSF installed new crossing gates at Royal Brougham and Lander Street which will protect the new tracks. This also includes quad gates at Royal Brougham to prevent pedestrian incidents. (Completed and Operational)

Friday, May 23rd - MUD Track cut over - This is the Eastern track of the 5 tracks at Lander Holgate Street.

Saturday, May 24th - Main 2 (Northbound track) cut over...since this is CTC (Centralized Traffic Control) trains can run on either main in either direction

Sunday, June 8th - Main 1 (Southbound track) cut over...read note above.

The Lander Main (Main 3 - Work Lead Main for Argo and Stacy Street Yards) is set for cut over June 16. On June 17, track speeds go up! F20/P20 will go to F35/P50 at Stadium. This means 50mph passenger trains between Holgate Street and Spokane Street.

At Holgate Street, shows the new Stadium control point and cross overs and new gates.

Looking the other direction towards Lander Street

The old Main 1 and Main 2 tracks be turned over to Amtrak for switching, storage tracks, etc between Royal Brougham and Lander Street. The photo below showing Sounder approaching on Main 1. The new main lines is on the left on the photo.

Once all of this work is completed, it is to be said that construction will start on the new Amtrak/Sounder maintenance facility. This will be a medium sized facility with a new State of the Art Indoor Wash Rack, Wheel Truing building, Machining shop that will handle medium service repairs, a new PIT track, and 7 more storage tracks that will hold a 14 car train sets. I'll get more information on this later to make sure this is correct but the last I heard on this was 2 months ago from Amtrak themselfs.

We'll see.

Want to see the progress of the Seattle Construction Project? Check out this post which has been following the construction projects since 12/31/2005 !!

Editors Note: I do not include the Lakewood Extension as part of the "BNSF South Sounder Project"

Amtrak Cascades ridership up due to fuel costs

2008-05-21T15:26:00.000-07:00

Today, King 5 did an interesting story regarding how fuel prices are improving ridership on Amtrak Cascades. Check out the crowd getting off Sounder!

On another note.. King Street Station needs to hurry up and get remodeled.. the brief video clips they showed were terrible....

Metro Service Changes

2008-05-21T12:43:00.001-07:00

Along with Sound Transit, Metro has rider alerts for their service changes. It's basically a bunch of shuffling of routes around the new Issaquah Transit Center, shifts of stops for the 5X, 358, 230, 914, and 916.

There's one more trip each for the 212, 221, and 271, a nice bonus for the Eastgate area.

The 74 local will be renumbered as the 30.

Also, in July they're raising Off-peak Senior, Disabled and Youth Fares by a quarter. I suppose that's in line with the recent adult fare increases.

New Sound Transit Schedules

2008-05-21T08:47:00.000-07:00

It's that time of year again: in a little more than a week, we have new bus and train schedules. Sound Transit's changes, effective June 1, are already online. Highlights:

The Mukilteo Sounder station opens.
The Issaquah ~~Park & Ride~~ Transit Center re-opens, affecting the 554, 555, and 556.
More trips for the 550, fewer for the 540.

Cost of Doing Nothing is Not Zero

2008-05-21T06:11:00.000-07:00

The California High-Speed Rail Blog, a relatively new blog, devoted to the California High Speed Rail project. The site is mostly specific interest, though some of these posts, like the one above are general interest to any transportation discussion.

The post points to this article in the Fresno Bee about the cost of doing nothing. This bit is particularly interesting:

Opponents of the high-speed system often sound as if this is a choice between spending the $40 billion or spending nothing. That notion is just dead wrong.

Take just one instance. Expanding existing highways and airports to meet the transportation needs projected to come with growth in the state's population would cost two or there times as much -- and would make air quality and congestion even worse. In some cases -- San Francisco, Los Angeles -- existing airports can't be expanded. Bigger and better freeways? Expanding Highway 99 in the Valley to an eight-lane interstate would cost as much as $25 billion alone -- and that's just to serve the Valley, not the entire state.

We have a similar effect here, replace "high speed rail" with "transit" and "airports and highways" with just plan old "highways". Adding one lane each direction to I-5 was projected in the late 90s to cost $25 billion, just within the city limits. The I-405 widening is an $11 billion project, and increasing capacity on I-90 would cost more than SR 520, and just that will cost about $4 billion.

We can't hope to pave our way out of congestion, and if we tried, we might end up worse off, with a sicker economy and a less healthy region. Transit in general, and light rail specifically, is the cheapest way to move people around this region. We can't afford to do nothing.

Kent Station in the DJC

2008-05-20T18:50:00.000-07:00

The Daily Journal of Commerce (subscription required) ran a very positive article on Kent Station (built around the Sounder station) and how it is effecting their downtown.

When Kent Mayor Suzette Cooke talked to city residents in 2005, she was shocked to hear some people say they hadn't been to downtown Kent in 15 years. Kent Station, the 18-acre mixed-use development that is about to break ground on its fourth phase, has changed that.

“Downtown was sort of becoming forgotten,” Cooke said. “Clearly the reality of Kent Station has helped residents see what's possible for Kent... It was a wake up call to residents that they actually deserved such services.”

Kent Station, owned by Seattle-based Tarragon, is the public-private centerpiece of Kent's effort to revitalize downtown. Before it was built, the site was home to a functioning glue factory. Today, it's a 240,000-square-foot hub of retail, education and entertainment with a Sound Transit commuter rail station nearby. When complete, the project will stretch across 470,000 square feet.

...

Looking back, Kent Station's success can seem like a well placed bet. “I'd like to say it has been fun,” Hanson said. “All of us were kind of at the edge of our seats thinking when Kent Station was built... where are the people going to come from?”

Wolters said he's always looking to learn from other cities' experiences. Overall, he said it is important to attract a variety of uses to create the needed dynamic. He said Kent chose to pursue retail and entertainment, then housing. Other communities, like Burien and Federal Way, are doing both at the same time. Working with Sound Transit to develop a commuter station nearby, was also crucial to the project.

I think losing a glue factory is kind of sad, but it's cool to see how transit orient development can take root even in low-density suburbs.

Our ever expanding rush hour...

2008-05-20T10:15:00.000-07:00

Traffic today was horrible. My 545 bus took 40 minutes, about 15 minutes more than usual starting at 9:30. I got this picture at 10:15 from WSDOT, and you can see traffic still is a disaster. I was listening to Mayor Nickels on the Dave Ross show, and the traffic man said it was 70 minutes from Federal Way to Seattle on I-5, and 50 minutes from Lynnwood to Seattle. 70 minutes at 9:45 am.

What was that thing about light rail being too slow?

Rising Oil Prices: Save Your Money, take transit

2008-05-20T09:34:00.000-07:00

Paul Krugman, Economist and New York Times columnist, has been writing a number of blog posts about rising fuel prices and what they mean to the average American. The opinion piece is great, and has nice tidbits like this:

Any serious reduction in American driving will require more than this — it will mean changing how and where many of us live.

To see what I’m talking about, consider where I am at the moment: in a pleasant, middle-class neighborhood consisting mainly of four- or five-story apartment buildings, with easy access to public transit and plenty of local shopping.

It’s the kind of neighborhood in which people don’t have to drive a lot, but it’s also a kind of neighborhood that barely exists in America, even in big metropolitan areas. Greater Atlanta has roughly the same population as Greater Berlin — but Berlin is a city of trains, buses and bikes, while Atlanta is a city of cars, cars and cars.

And in the face of rising oil prices, which have left many Americans stranded in suburbia — utterly dependent on their cars, yet having a hard time affording gas — it’s starting to look as if Berlin had the better idea.

Changing the geography of American metropolitan areas will be hard. For one thing, houses last a lot longer than cars. Long after today’s S.U.V.’s have become antique collectors’ items, millions of people will still be living in subdivisions built when gas was $1.50 or less a gallon.

Infrastructure is another problem. Public transit, in particular, faces a chicken-and-egg problem: it’s hard to justify transit systems unless there’s sufficient population density, yet it’s hard to persuade people to live in denser neighborhoods unless they come with the advantage of transit access.

As they say, read the whole thing. This picture is from a post on his blog (via the Sydney Morning Herald).

It's the percentage of income residents of Sydney spend on gas. As you can tell, those in the city's center spend far less on gas than those in the city do. In Sydney, the lack of public transport has left families in the Western suburbs struggling to pay for their commutes.

Pretty scary, I imagine a map for our region would look similar, though the numbers would likely be a lot higher (6% is probably pretty typical here). Metro has a calculator that can help show whether you'd save on your commute by taking transit. If you're not taking transit, at $4 a gallon I bet it's worth taking a second look.

Bridges are Bad sometimes....

2008-05-19T15:49:00.000-07:00

Got this in a e-mail not that long ago, regarding Portland's TriMet MAX Light-Rail system:

During a bridge lift on the Steel Bridge this morning, a Union Pacific bridge tender raised the bridge too high, damaging TriMet's overhead electrical system that powers MAX. Three trains traveled through the span section and were damaged. Repair efforts are ongoing, with TriMet staff and contractors working to expedite the repairs.

There is no MAX service along the Yellow Line or the Blue/Red lines between Rose Quarter Transit Center and PGE Park stations.

Buses are serving riders in these areas and riders should expect minor delays.

The shuttles will continue through rush hour this evening and possibly through the rest of the service today. There is also the potential that Tuesday's morning rush hour will be affected.

A friend of mine said it was one hell of a light show on the second train that crossed the bridge.

What If We Did Just Tear It Down?

2008-05-19T15:08:00.000-07:00

I think there's a killer argument here that's hard to refute, and hasn't come up yet, and in the interest of continuing this conversation, I'll just post it!

Our viaduct options are basically a) build something else, and b) tear down the failing structure and leave it torn down. I don't really consider the retrofit an option - WSDOT will probably shoot it down as unfeasible and unsafe.

So here's the 2000 pound elephant in the room. For the first several years of implementation, both of these options look exactly the same. The old structure has to be torn down, and even in the best case rebuild scenario, you still have complete closure for years.

Immediately, every viaduct user finds a solution to their commute problem. They get on I-5, or they take a bus, or they plan ahead and change jobs or move before the mess starts - they'll have plenty of lead time.

Two years later? They're still doing it. I-5 can only carry so much traffic - it'll worsen the most at first, but traffic will taper off after this time. Most people will have solved their problems, many more will be interested in transit and trying out the bus service we already have (and maybe 'Rapid Ride'). I don't know when this would be - maybe 2012, maybe 2014. Link Light Rail will be rocking our socks off. University Link will be mostly complete - everyone will be holding their breaths for subway stations. Maybe we'll even have passed Sound Transit 2 by then, and Northgate and Bellevue will be groundbreaking soon.

Another year. Gas will be $8/gallon, or $10/gallon. Maybe speculative bidding on oil futures will have dropped off, and it'll only be $6/gallon - this scenario doesn't require $10 gas. A lot more of the urban condo projects will be done. Developers will be continuing to build in the core, and the renewed demand from people previously commuting across downtown Seattle will help bolster that. Again, all this is regardless of what we choose. Few commuters will just grin and bear it.

One more - say 2016. Four years of closure - the minimum on any of the WSDOT construction alternatives I've seen. This is where our choice matters. In scenario a), we have a new freeway. U Link opens. Some people return to their cars. The waterfront is dead - construction kills some of the businesses, and with the viaduct another 20 feet closer, it's no longer pleasant. By this time, fewer are driving, and it looks like 5 won't be as congested because so many people can't afford to anymore. But we have a new freeway that we've already gotten used to not using.

In scenario b), the waterfront is still dead from construction, but now it has the chance to come back. Seattle has rebuilt the waterfront streetcar line, and four new mixed use buildings are on the way in the old shadow. The same pressures exist to build high capacity transit - the city is ripe for a new western corridor ballot measure. U Link opens, Bellevue is 50% complete, and Northgate is 70% complete. Sound Transit is ready to go to ballot with ST3, where North King money won't quite cover Ballard-West Seattle, but will cover Ballard-Downtown, including a tunnel under 2nd Avenue. The city puts another measure on the ballot to build the other half. With new city residents clamoring for transit, Sounder ridership at 20,000 a day and climbing, and ST3 Link expansion promising Tacoma, Redmond, and most of the way to Everett, both pass.

Sighing?

2008-05-19T11:27:00.000-07:00

I have a different take on Jim Veseley's Sunday article than Ben Schiendelman did. In case you didn't read the article, Mr Veseley's argument is essentially that Americans have been adjusting their expectations downward on a number of issues, and the viaduct is the one foremost in Mr Veseley's thoughts. Veseley says he's "ready for a retrofit" of the viaduct, rather than a tunnel, elevated replacement, or surface option. This "lowered expectations" argument is a perspective I hadn't thought of or heard, and it certainly is thought provoking. I think Mr Veseley gets bull's eyes on a few big points, but I think he misses the mark on some of the details.

David M. Lampton, a much-honored China scholar and head of faculty at the vaunted School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, pointed out last week that China now has 68 subway projects under way — and the U.S. has none.

He cited the decaying Interstate Highway System that spans America, but was built in the 1950s and '60s. A trip on Interstate 5 bears him out. If not for the patches, we'd be looking at rebar.

...
I don't see a weakening of our hopes and values, but a realization that some of them belong back in the 1990s. One of our most intensely popular television series, "Lost," comes at a perfect time.

Roads and transit are just two signs of our decaying infrastructure in the United States, airports and seaports also spring to mind. Still, when most of our best new highway and transit systems were built, the US was spending ten percent of its GDP on infrastructure (H/T to Frank for the link), today it's just one percent. If a show were to come at the perfect time to describe the state of infrastructure in this country, it'd be called "Broke".

Veseley puts a sly dig in on Sound Transit expansion:

We see that in the calls for a pause in the funding of transportation projects. Megaprojects are on hold everywhere. A Sound Transit vote for the fall has as many supporters as it has people saying give it a rest, come back to us the following year, or maybe later.

That's not what the polling I've seen has shown, support is much higher for an ST2 expansion than against it. The rising gas prices certainly have something to do with that.

As for the viaduct, I certainly don't want a large one, as a new elevated option would be, or any super-expensive option, such as a tunnel, when in my mind that funding could be better spent on transit expansions. I've heard a retrofit would have a shorter life span, and thus might not get much bang-for-the buck, but as long as it's cheap enough, I won't get upset. What about you?

SLU Streetcar ridership up

2008-05-19T08:59:00.000-07:00

While not official from SDOT/Metro Transit, the SLU Streetcar ridership has climbed from 960 riders a day to 1325 riders a day. With the start of the Summer tourist season, new buildings in Downtown Seattle opening, and the recently opened Lake Union Park contributing to the increase.

Per the operator of Sunday's run, weekdays between 6am to 8am and 4:30pm to 6:30pm are the busiest, being near crush load (130-145)

Average ridership appears to be gaining as construction eases however some trips are still only 2-6 passengers.

He did mention that the City is trying to improve the signal timing and add priority queue to the Streetcar, giving the operator the ability to change the light or leave the light green an extra 15-30 seconds. By doing this, would shave the run to dramatically but SDOT is studying if this would benefit the system or not. (duh)

Re: No Question...

2008-05-19T07:47:00.001-07:00

A few points that I think were missed in this weekend's Battle Royale about the Rainier Valley segment:

Federal funding rules don't allow transit agencies to take TOD into account when doing ridership projections. So a line through Sodo's warehouses would have had lousy ridership projections, and probably not have earned any federal dollars. So a Sodo alignment means no alignment at all. People actually live near the Rainier Valley line.
Seattle's neighborhoods are famously risk-averse, and likely to fight a rail line that will ultimately benefit them. Poorer neighborhoods are generally less litigious and less politically active, meaning that both political and engineering risk were lower for this segment.
The Rainier's valley development pattern was unique. MLK is/was a fairly underdeveloped strip of auto repair shops and small, run-down apartment buildings, but also is two or three blocks from major arterials on either side: Rainier Avenue and Beacon Avenue. This made it uniquely suited to draw ridership from two vibrant and transit-intensive populations while still being capable of inspiring large TOD projects with minimal political opposition.
I would have liked to have seen our Ballard/West Seattle contingent -- leading advocates of in-city before regional rail -- come out a little more strongly for the Rainier Valley segment. I think the Seattle-first argument would have substantial merit if transit were being funded by a dictatorship, but fortunately we actually require democratic assent in this country. Unfortunately, the electorate is shackled with extremely narrow parochialism. At any rate, Central Link was an opportunity to provide substantial in-city service while also meeting regional goals: the best of both worlds.

Furthermore, as several commenters pointed out, what's done is done. If you're concerned about operating delays incurred by the Rainier Valley segment, the proper response is to pressure the city and Sound Transit for additional safety improvements to improve operating speeds. For instance:

Pedestrian overpasses, instead of signalized, at-grade crossings.
Crossing gates at all auto intersections.
Fencing along the route to discourage pedestrian crossing at unauthorized points. It doesn't have to be triple-strand concertina wire; even a tasteful, 4 foot black iron fence would be a sufficient deterrent in 90% of cases.
Construction of underpasses for major arterials.

Most of this stuff is relatively inexpensive, and can be added incrementally as funding and political will allow.

The American Way

2008-05-19T07:24:00.000-07:00

Buried deep in the PI business section a few days ago:

The Commerce Department reported Friday that housing construction rose by 8.2 percent in April to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.03 million units. While apartment construction rose by 36 percent, building in the much larger single-family sector of the market fell by 1.7 percent, the 12th consecutive monthly decline, pushing single-family activity down to a 16-year low.

This is another data point showing that a home in the "country" and a huge yard aren't irreducible demands by Americans, but just another taste that is responsive to economic incentives.

Bad economy or no, the population is in a very pro-transit mood right now. 2008 is the year to go to the ballot.

Comment Etiquette (III)

2008-05-19T07:14:00.001-07:00

It's been a couple of months, so I'll make this request again:

Please select a nickname and type it in under the "nickname" box on our comments page. Going through a comments thread with "Anonymous" is tedious and confusing. I can distinctly recognize at least two regular commenters using the Anonymous tab, and it's annoying.

It doesn't require getting an account or anything. Just type in a name, like SLOG.

Example above, with the correct box indicated in red. For whatever reason, Blogger doesn't allow you to turn off "anonymous" without doing the same for "Nickname".

Thanks!

Widening Our Highways Will Never Make Sense - But Narrowing Them Already Does.

2008-05-18T22:09:00.000-07:00

Jim Vesely, one of the editors of the Seattle Times, commutes to work in the I-90 express lanes and on the Viaduct. On the Mercer Island to Seattle stretch, he doesn't even have to be HOV, because Mercer Island residents are apparently worth two plebians. He has likely never ridden a bus or a train. He is one of the last remnants of a school of thought that can no longer add knowledge to their understanding of traffic - he can't grasp that adding more lanes causes more congestion than it could ever relieve, or that congestion can never be reduced through promotion of alternatives, but only through a limitation of capacity.

The mayor of Bogota understands these things. The mayor of New York understands these things. The mayor of Seattle understands these things. Urban planners and transportation engineers know that while you can smooth intersections, you cannot reduce congestion by adding capacity, because every minute of congestion you reduce on the highway you expand, you add twice or more to every roadway it connects to - because you create an inbound and an outbound trip elsewhere for every new trip on the highway itself.

This makes sense to everyone, doesn't it? It's not rocket science. But Jim Vesely and his ilk just don't get it. They cling to the ancient idea that if you add a lane to SR-520, you'll somehow separate people from each other - but you don't. You just make room for more people.

Now for the contrary - and this is what terrifies people like Mr. Vesely. If you narrow a highway, you will, indeed, reduce congestion. Not on the highway itself - but on all the roads around it. We've heard plenty of times that light rail will only carry a small percentage of traffic (a ridiculous argument anyway) - but so do our highways. The streets surrounding them carry far more trips.

So when I hear Mr. Vesely champion retrofitting the Viaduct, I can only regard it as the sad selfishness of someone completely out of touch. We have an opportunity here to change our urban landscape, to erase a horrible mistake made many years ago. Why would we accept as sound advice the opinion of someone who has been so wrong on so many issues - someone who has always come out in favor of things that benefit him personally, and damn the rest of us? It's obvious that this man supports retrofit because it is the one thing that will delay major closure of the viaduct until after he has retired.

Don't let those with prehistoric ideas plan our future.
We know better than that.

No Question: Rainier Valley was the perfect place for Link

2008-05-16T22:48:00.001-07:00

Matt the Engineer questions running light rail through the Rainier Valley because Matt thinks it's slower to the airport than a bus and the train isn't building communities by going through existing neighborhoods.

I think Matt is wrong about a couple of things. Sure, the line may be slower to the airport than the 194, but the 194 is much slower to the airport than Link will be from Beacon Hill, the Rainier Valley, and also Capitol Hill and the University District when U-Link gets built. That's an important thing to think about, Central Link was not built to be the only line, and U-Link construction is ready to start.

I'm sure Martin, who lives in the Rainer Valley, can comment on the level of development taking place on MLK due to link, including bike trails people will actually use, some 1,500 homes by now (the line doesn't open for a full year) and massive revitalization in general. The line would have gotten a fair ridership without that TOD, but the ridership with it will be massive. As the city shows, car ridership in the Valley is the lowest (pdf link) in the entire city.

I think it's a great routing. Better than the industrial areas by a fair amount, better than Rainier Ave by a fair amount, and a lot cheaper than West Seattle. We will definitely need a route through West Seattle some day (ST3?!?), but, for now, I think they've made a great decision.

Pause for Light Rail

2008-05-16T11:41:00.000-07:00

Lance Dickie, who I'm not very familiar with, has written a pretty convincing op-ed piece arguing for Sound Transit to wait until 2010 to go to the ballot. Here's a choice quote:

Sound Transit first got traction in 1996, another presidential-election year. Turnout matters. After voters slapped down a package of roads and transit this past fall, there is a strong pull to try again, sans roads with a transit-friendly cohort.

The other view — one I tend to share — counsels a pause until 2010. By then, mobs with pitchforks and torches will be demanding more transit. Gas prices will resemble those in Europe, without Europe's plentiful alternatives to a car. Taking the bus or riding Sounder commuter rail will move from being mocked as a personal virtue to unvarnished economic necessity.

Most important, the 16-mile line from downtown Seattle to Sea-Tac International Airport is scheduled to open in 2009. After years of talking about how great it is going to be, light rail finally will be a visible, tangible and popular reality.

Emphasis added. I agree that by 2010 the desire for transit will be more urgent, but isn't that almost an argument to start early? We don't want to fall another two years behind. As gas prices rise, construction prices will as well, so the sooner the better from the cost standpoint. I also think that we're already seeing the realization from a lot of people that transit really is an alternative.

The next big suburban land rush will be aboard light rail. The cliché about driving till you qualify for a home loan will be updated. Homes in Arlington will sell to young families whose daily car commute is to a park-and-ride lot and transfer to the light-rail station in Everett.

Want a sure bet in public transit? The Seattle streetcar extension from South Lake Union to the University District. An absolute no-brainer. The future is at Westlake Avenue and Denny Way. An urban neighborhood is blossoming. The employment base is already an extension of the University of Washington, so a line north via Eastlake makes perfect sense. As Portland discovered, investment flourishes along streetcar rails planted in the ground.

I have been hearing homes out in the far-off exurbs are those that are falling in prices fastest, while those close to jobs centers are retaining value for the most part. This is, again, an argument in my mind to go forward now. We don't have a lot of time to spare, and we'll lose competitiveness as a region if we let transportation costs get out of control before we approve an expansion. Gas prices have risen tremendously in the last few year. Do we really want to wait for $6 a gallon gas to start building a transit expansion?

Really, I was surprised to read such a pro-transit article in the Times, which usually ranges from lukewarm support to outright hostility to transit. I think the argument is pretty well-reasoned that 2010 will be a sure thing, but I think 2008 will be as well, and I don't see any advantage to waiting if we think it'll pass this year.

Puyallup Herald asks the same question

2008-05-16T01:25:00.000-07:00

What to do with all the transit riders?

Our Slow Construction Will Save Thousands.

2008-05-15T12:12:00.000-07:00

For the last few days, we've all been reading about the earthquake in China - tens of thousands dead, many more homeless, whole towns destroyed.

There's speculation that this quake could have been caused by the massive shift in weight caused by the construction of the Three Gorges Dam, the addition of millions of tons of water (175 meters, eventually) to an area near the Jiuwanxi and Zigui–Badong fault lines. It is, so far, unclear which fault line caused this quake, and it may not be either of these.

Regardless, though, of what caused the quake, one line about a collapsed school in a horribly depressing (take that as a warning) New York Times article today caught my attention:

One man said officials built two additional stories on the Xinjian school even though it had failed a safety inspection two years ago — allegations that could not be verified.

There are two problems here. One is the obvious - two additional stories on a structure that failed a safety inspection? The other problem is far more insidious - you can't even check. The result? Hundreds of kids crushed to death.

Every time I tell someone that Link Light Rail will get to Husky Stadium around 2016, I know to expect the immediate response - a complaint that it takes too long. I have a new answer:

In eight years, I'll probably have a child of my own. Some of my good friends here have kids already who could be going to school on Link. And inevitably, we will wake up to an earthquake one morning - maybe a 7, maybe an 8, but it could devastate our city. As emergency crews are cut off by collapsed fifty year old bridges, and I am running down the street to pull people out of a hundred year old apartment building, the one thing I do not want to worry about is kids on their way to Roosevelt or Franklin on our brand new light rail system.

I don't feel a need to "speed up" the processes through which we build infrastructure. Public meetings, design reviews, these are all time in which people with knowledge can speak up. The real answer is the same answer to a lot of our problems: We must learn to plan ahead.

Update: I want to add something to this. I know that much of the time taken between, say, now and when U Link opens has to do with the way money is collected. I am not writing about that - I'm writing about the public comment periods, the design reviews, everything that makes more people aware of what's being built and able to say something. Don't you suppose that if we were building a Three Gorges Dam here, a group of USGS seismologists might have had something to say? I'm saying that while I'd rather not see East Link delayed or cost more because people in Beaux Arts are NIMBYs, I'm happy to let them complain to the Sound Transit board when it means that someone with a real issue can bring that forward as well.

Sound Transit survey

2008-05-15T11:37:00.000-07:00

Sound Transit is asking your opinion again. 0.4%, 0.5%, 12- and 20-year plans are all on the table. So are both 2008 and 2010 ballot measures.

I'm really skeptical of the actual value of these kinds of self-nominating survey responses, but I figured I'd suggest what I'd heard at the meetup, which is that the 0.4% measure go to the ballot, with an additional 0.1% measure. That maximizes our chance of getting something passed.

Of course, what'd happen is that the 0.4 would fail and the 0.1 pass, leading to more confusion.

More than anything, I just want them to propose whatever their polling tells them has the highest chance of passing. The details aren't important, because I know that the highest priority segments are the ones that are going to be built, regardless.

ST Ridership up 15%

2008-05-15T11:13:00.000-07:00

UPDATE: Correction Below.

Sound Transit's Quarterly Ridership Report is up, and it's good news. It's brief, so go have a look. Weekday boardings are up 15% from the same time last year, which is pretty impressive given the relatively small amount of service added in that time. Some interesting nuggets:

South Sounder ridership is up 30%, largely because of added trips. I think this shows that ridership is a little less elastic with respect to parking at the station than some would assume. In other words, creative solutions (like satellite parking) are able to continue building ridership after the nearby lots are saturated. That isn't to say that parking shortages aren't a problem.
Sounder cost-per-boarding is down slightly to $10.79, while the express bus cost is up slightly to $6.73. Without seeing the station breakdown, that puts farebox recovery for Sounder at around 40%, about the same as ST Express and pretty good for a transit system. That includes essentially empty reverse-commute trains. As economies of scale build up on Sounder and gas prices increase, I expect the comparative numbers to improve further.
Tacoma Link ridership is only up 1%. It may simply not have the scope to serve many people, especially since the 594 ~~most Express buses~~ takes a needless detour into downtown on its way South.

Picture Credit: Seattle Times, August 14, 2007.

Transit Report Card: Washington, DC

2008-05-15T08:43:00.000-07:00

Second in an occasional series where I wildly generalize about a transit system based on limited experience.

Segments ridden:
Red Line: Shady Grove - Union Station
Blue Line: Springfield - Stadium/Armory
Orange Line: W. Falls Church - Stadium/Armory
Yellow Line: Gallery Place - National Airport
Green Line: Gallery Place - Navy Yard
Time ridden: You name it. I grew up here, so I can't even begin to recapitulate it.

Scope: A
There aren't a ton of places to go in D.C. and the surrounding area that you can't get to via Metro, but it falls a bit short of the blanket coverage you see in New York. The vast majority of the service lies inside the Beltway (analogous to I-405) which has all kinds of benefits for preventing sprawl and allowing a car-free lifestyle.

Service: A
Service is frequent except in the wee hours. Message boards tell you when the next train is coming, in pretty much every station.

Routing: B
The Red Line in Maryland follows some major arterials, rather than the nearby freeway. That isn't the case along the Orange Line in Virginia, however. Inside the beltway, where most of the system lies, there really aren't enough freeways to even tempt planners to route along them.

Grade/ROW: A+
As with all third-rail systems, no pedestrian or auto is ever going to get anywhere near the track.

TOD: C
Revisiting this with a newly critical eye, the TOD is kind of disappointing. The city itself is really dense, which was the case before the Metro came. Although many stations are underground and therefore impossible to evaluate without stopping there, my limited experience in the Maryland and Virginia suburbs at the ends of the line is pretty disappointing. My read is that local authorities are really starting to get it, however.

Culture: A
For many suburbanites, driving to work is unthinkable. They're certainly not deterred by park-and-ride fees approaching $5.00 a day, on top of a fare of as much as $4.50 each way. I don't personally know any people that work in the city anymore, but what I gather from sources like Matt Yglesias is that in the core a car-free lifestyle is increasingly viable and popular as the city emerges from epic mismanagement a couple of decades ago.

*************

If you are visiting DC for the traditional tourist itinerary, there's no good reason to rent a car. Driving and parking are difficult in the main tourist areas. The Metro goes right to National Airport, and there is straightforward bus service if you must fly into Dulles or BWI.

I happened to be in town the very day the USDOT reversed itself and gave the go-ahead to Dulles Rail. Having spent most of that trip in the Dulles Corridor, I can say that there's tons of high-rise office space surrounded by parking. That's a good sign, as it indicates that there's tons of available real estate with mild zoning restrictions. Furthermore, it's certainly interesting to see how the attitude of federal bureaucrats can change when the system is in their direct experience, while it's "let them take buses" out here in the stix. But let's give Virginia's leaders credit for persevering in the face of really negative feedback.

In terms of sheer beauty, little in the transit world really compares to a DC Metro Station. The underground architecture, while composed mainly of concrete, is roomy and appealing. Interestingly, as far as I can tell, exactly 0.0% of the capital expenditure was devoted to public art. If it were up to me, I'd encourage all transit systems to build intrinsic beauty into their architecture, rather than add some art of controversial value to each station.

I'll finish with a brief anecdote. I attended a game at Nationals Stadium downtown, which was built half a block from the Navy Yard station. I was impressed with WMATA's event management, with the nearest gate to the stadium being exit-only before the game and entrance-only afterwards. Additionally, there were lots of WMATA personnel around to direct the crowds in the station and make sure that every last car was packed to the gills. It was an extremely well-organized operation, especially considering the stadium had only been open for a month.

At any rate, I soon was waiting for a transfer at L'Enfant Plaza, when I overheard this conversation:
"The next train comes in eight minutes."
"Eight Minutes?!"

Think of the implications of that conversation:
(1) The agency is able to predict with precision the next arrival.
(2) They inform riders with a simple-to-use message board.
(3) The riders are conditioned to think that 8 minutes is an unreasonable time to wait at 10 pm.

Jealous, aren't you?

Photo courtesy of washingtontravelcast.com

What to do with an overcrowded park-and-ride?

2008-05-15T06:48:00.000-07:00

That's the question Sound Transit and Puyallup are asking themselves. The Puyallup station has 680 spots between four lots near there, but the spots are nearly always full. The News Tribune likes the idea of having the drivers park at satellite lots and take buses to the train station.

One remedy would be a healthy-sized parking garage at the station. A garage would have been built had voters approved the Roads and Transit package last November; now the project awaits possible approval of a scaled-down package.

Sound Transit has already been pursuing a more elegant solution: satellite parking, a decentralized form of park-and-ride. The idea is to let workers park their cars outside the core and take a bus to the station. The bus gets the commuters to the train quickly and on time. There’s already a satellite parking center on South Hill and another in Bonney Lake (which takes people to Sumner Station).

Assuming the bus connection is fast and reliable, this works for everyone. Downtowns don’t get buried in parked cars, and commuters can leave their cars closer to home and not panic about finding a spot near the station before the train leaves.

If satellite parking lots are extended to the suburbs, train service will become more accessible and the reach of mass transit will be extended.

As one of the first small cities to get big-time transit service, Puyallup is a laboratory for other Puget Sound communities. Its parking solutions are probably going to be the region’s parking solutions.

The idea is interesting, to put the parking lots closer to peoples homes and run shuttles. However, the transfer might not be appetizing to all riders, and it could turn some riders off of Sounder. The whole problem makes me think about an idea Martin had at our last meet-up: charge a small amount for parking each day at the main lots, and let the people who don't mind as much park in the shuttles. I imagine you'd see more carpools, more people walking, and more people biking. The parking money could go to possibly getting more parking, installing bike lockers, operating the shuttles, or really anything. The article also mentions people driving from Sumner to park in Puyallup to avoid crowding, these people might decide to stay in Sumner and park there. As long as Puyallup is a laboratory, we should really try something different.

What do you think? Would you pay for a park-and-ride to avoid crowding? Anyone here bike to a park-and-ride?

California Highspeed Rail Interactive Map

2008-05-14T20:01:00.000-07:00

Take a look, it's awesome. I hope to be able to ride this someday.

H/T to Frank.

Re: Waterfront Streetcar

2008-05-14T11:46:00.000-07:00

I finally got a response back from SDOT:

Dear Mr. Bundridge:

Thank you for contacting Mayor Greg Nickels regarding the Waterfront Streetcar. I was asked to address your concerns on the Mayor’s behalf.

As you mention in your letter, restoration of the waterfront trolley is connected to the final solution for replacing the Alaskan Way Viaduct. It is prudent to have a full understanding of the details of the viaduct replacement, what the impacts of construction will be and how the waterfront will function after construction is complete to ensure there will be no conflicts with the streetcar. A final recommendation on how we replace the viaduct along the central waterfront will be made by December 2008

The city of Seattle believes that unique opportunities exist for Seattle to expand its streetcar network. Currently, analysis is underway on which additional lines should be pursued for early implementation as part of an overall streetcar network. Part of that analysis will also include looking at the best north-south lines and whether a waterfront line or a line on First Avenue would provide the best opportunities for moving people in Seattle. We just delivered a draft of the report to the Seattle City Council, and you may access it online at http://www.seattlestreetcar.org/future.asp.

Finally, you wrote that you have heard that the Waterfront Streetcar facilities would be removed, beginning this summer. There is currently no plan for removal of the Waterfront Streetcar facilities.

Thank you again for contacting the City of Seattle on this issue. Should you require additional information, please visit our website at http://www.seattle.gov/transportation/.

Sincerely,

Grace Crunican, Director
Seattle Department of Transportation

Mukilteo Sounder Station Opening

2008-05-14T06:23:00.000-07:00

Mukilteo sounder station opens at the end of the month, and Sound Transit is having a free return trip for north bound Sounder riders for the mariners game May 31st.

Join us as we celebrate this new station and train service Saturday, May 31. In honor of Mukilteo Station’s opening day, Sounder Home Run Service will be free from Everett, Mukilteo and Edmonds stations.
Project info:
Mukilteo Station includes a platform on the north side of the tracks for passengers, 68 parking stalls, and public art by Whidbey Island artist Linda Beaumont. The second phase of the project will include a south platform, pedestrian bridge and additional parking spaces.

Schedule of events:
10:00a.m. --- Grand Slam Family Fun Celebration Start
10:30a.m. --- Speaking Program and Station Dedication
11:26a.m. --- Inaugural Train leaves Mukilteo Station for a Free Ride to Safeco Field.
(For SnoCo and other North end residents: 35 Minutes AFTER the Mariners games ends - Free return train leaves King Street Station for Edmonds, Mukilteo and Everett Station)

Old Guy At Crosscut Hates Rail, No Surprise

2008-05-13T17:27:00.000-07:00

Ross Anderson, a sixty-something retired journalist has the most insulting anti-rail screed I've read yet at Crosscut. While Ted Van Dyk embarrassingly admits that "governance" is about killing light rail in its cradle and generally comes off as obsessed, Mr Anderson manages to interview and complement nearly every anti-rail activist in our area. Not surprising from a man who used to work on transportation for the Discovery Institute, a group who thinks deep-bore highways are the solution to Seattle's transportation problems.

First Mr Anderson sets out to belittle trains and those who like them, first with the title "Seattle goes gah-gah over choo-choos". Who says "choo-choo"? Mr Anderson must actually want transit supporters to appear juvenile.

We have seen the future of Seattle mass transit, and it looks suspiciously like the past. It is shiny and red and goes clackity-clack between South Lake Union and Westlake. It travels at a maximum speed of 20 mph and costs about $40 million per mile to build.

First, the streetcar doesn't go "clackity-clack". It has a welded rail and has a smoother ride than anyone trying to drive a car on city streets.

Second, as we learned this morning from the Mercer street mess (nearly $400 million a mile), as we are learning from the 520 bridge (over $2 billion per mile), and as we are learning from the Alaska way viaduct (also $2 billion per mile), roads cost a lot more than $40 million per mile. What's the maximum speed on Mercer? And the Ikedon Trio, the train type the SLUT uses, has a maximum speed of about 45 mph. The trolley tops at 25, which is the speed limit.

Seattle, it seems, has gone downright gah-gah over choo-choos. Whatever the price in dollars and aggravation, the city is determined to take the A-Train. We haven't yet completed that $2.7 billion-dollar rail lines to Sea-Tac, but Sound Transit is desperately seeking more billions to extend that line to Northgate. We have the new South Lake Union Streetcar. And this week, planners unveiled their sketchy visions for streetcar lines in neighborhoods like Capitol Hill and the University District.

All this stokes the ongoing debate: How do we best relieve traffic, or at least provide an alternative way to get around? More roads? Or buses? Or rails? If the rail buffs have their way, we'll soon be looking at and living in a cityscape reminiscent of another century — the 19th.

Sure there have been streetcars since the 19th century, but there have been paved roads for some six thousand years (talk about old technology), and cars and buses have been around since the 19th as well. And don't get me started on those old-fashion boat things, or dare I say it, walking. So unless Mr Anderson is fighting for helicopters or Segways, there's nothing new under the sun.

And has Seattle gone "gah-gah" (Mr Anderson writes like rail supporters are two year olds) over trains? I wouldn't say so. We have one streetcar line, two commuter rail lines, and are building a first light rail line. You know a place "gah-gah" over trains? New York, where the vast majority of people use public transit, or Tokyo where there's an average of a train station every 1.5 square kilometers. Seattle rejected Prop. 1, and most other transit expansions in its history. Hardly "gah-gah".

Not statisfied just trying to make modern trains seem silly and old-fashioned, ironic coming from a man whose ideas involve brand new super-highways, Anderson decided to interview practically every anti-rail critic in the region, none of whom provide an alternative:

Rail critics see their own conspiracy. Randal O'Toole is an Oregon economist and self-styled libertarian who argues that Seattle is about to join dozens of cities that have got little or no benefits from the billions spent on light rail. Trolleys and streetcars are 19th century technology that is too slow, too dangerous and too expensive, he says. "Light rail is simply one more way to take money from the pockets of ordinary taxpayers and put it in the pockets of wealthy businesses."

Is that what Light Rail is? I thought that people ride it to work, too.

John Niles, a transportation consultant and critic of light rail, is a little kinder toward streetcars. They are probably a mistake, he says, "but the scale of the error is so much smaller than with light rail."

By "consultant" Anderson means John Niles is on Kemper Freeman's payroll. Niles is about sixty, and grew up during the auto boom in 1950's when 10% of the GDP went toward building highways. In his way cars and buses are the only way anyone should want to get around.

Streetcars aren't the answer to our traffic mess here. Neither is light rail, but its a great alternative to driving. But to oppose rail so strong as Mr Anderson, Mr O'Toole and Mr Niles do, it makes me wonder whose thinking is old-fashioned: the people trying to bring progressive public transportation options to Seattle, or the people stuck with 20th-century, carheaded thinking.

Chief Sealth Trail

2008-05-13T13:00:00.000-07:00

One of the things I learned on the lunch bus from Roger Pence is that the contractor who built light rail in the valley helped build Chief Sealth Bike Trail

For years, SDOT has heard requests for this trail from southeast Seattle neighborhoods as part of the planning for the City's non-motorized transportation and neighborhood plans, and light rail on MLK. In early 2004, RCI/Herzog offered to build the trail as a method of recycling excavated soils and concrete from the Link Light Rail project along MLK. The City welcomed this innovative construction approach as it resulted in a major savings of taxpayer dollars and it provides the City with a new trail within a reduced timeframe—at least two years earlier than was originally envisioned. Over the summer of 2004, SDOT worked hard to design and acquire all required permits for the trail and with Sound Transit, completed the environmental analysis. In May 2007, RCI/Herzog and SDOT completed the trail along the Seattle City Light right of way.

Pretty cool stuff, and a nice side-effect to getting a rail line. The bike trail crosses MLK at the same place as the Rainer Beach station, and it goes the New Holly development.

In a Continuing Series on How Expensive Roads Are

2008-05-13T09:27:00.002-07:00

Making Mercer a two-way Boulevard for just one half a mile from SR-99 to I-5 will cost $192.9 million dollars and the widening of the Spokane Street Viaduct from Marginal Way to 6th Avenue (about half a mile) will cost $168.5 million.

Link Under Budget?

2008-05-13T01:12:00.000-07:00

According to the Daily Journal of Commerce, Central Link from Seattle to Tukwila may be as much as "$150 million cheaper than expected," though the airport extension is over budget.

With 90 percent of construction complete, Fazel estimates the final price tag will be $2.294 billion, down from $2.437 billion.
...
The 1.7-mile light-rail extension to the airport, unlike the Seattle-to-Tukwila segment, is over budget.

The "float" in schedule for the construction has all but disappeared, though it doesn't seem to be getting worse:

Work in the Beacon Hill tunnel, which has already eaten up most of the cushion in the light-rail project's construction schedule, is still challenging, Fazel told the board. Originally that cushion was six months, but now it has shrunk to nine days.

“We're honestly a little bit edgy about it but (the 9-day cushion) has held now for several months,” said CEO Joni Earl.
...
Work in the Beacon Hill tunnel is on the critical path of the entire project.
With so many tall buildings under construction around Seattle, finding workers to install the high-speed elevators at the Beacon Hill station will also be a challenge.

“They're highly skilled and very much in demand,” said agency spokesperson Bruce Gray.

The Beacon Hill station will have four elevators with a 165-foot drop between the surface and the station platform. It will take 20 seconds to travel from the surface to the station.

SDOT Changing South-End For Link

2008-05-13T01:04:00.000-07:00

The Daily Journal of Commerce has the scoop on proposed changes for South-End neighborhoods the City is considering when light rail opens. SDOT wants want your comments:

The Seattle Department of Transportation wants public comments on transportation improvements it is planning for southeast Seattle when light-rail service begins next year.
SDOT wants to make it safer and more pleasant to get around in these growing neighborhoods, and to improve access to light-rail stations.
Between Rainier Beach and Columbia City, SDOT recommends that Rainier Avenue South be converted to three lanes from four lanes.
On Beacon Hill, SDOT wants to extend the median on Beacon Avenue South through the business district and add pedestrian crosswalks. It also wants to build a public plaza between the Beacon Hill Station and El Centro de la Raza.
...
In Rainier Beach, SDOT recommends providing a safe bicycle route from the Othello light-rail station to Renton Avenue South. SDOT also wants to make the Rainier Beach business district more pedestrian-friendly.

In Mount Baker, SDOT recommends improving two high-collision intersections and reconfiguring the intersection at Rainier Avenue South and Martin Luther King Jr. Way South.

In Columbia City, it wants to improve South Alaska Street to the light-rail station. SDOT also would make three pedestrian crossings on Rainier Avenue South safer.
SDOT would also add bike routes at both ends of Rainier Valley and connect the Chief Sealth Trail across Interstate 5.

To read the plan and to make comments ... Comments must be received at SDOT by May 31 at 5 p.m ... can also be emailed to Tony.Mazzella@Seattle.gov.

The neighborhood already looks completely different on MLK than it did before, and I'm really excited about what light rail is going to down there.

Danger of Speeding Buses!

2008-05-12T03:19:00.000-07:00

I just watched the silliest "special report" on Komo news (no link, sorry) about speeding buses and how dangerous they are. It was embarassing. Sure, I can see it could be a problem if buses are running red lights or breezing through stop signs, but is a bus going 37 in a 35 zone really news worthy? I really bet most drivers even would rather buses go faster. Why does Komo want buses to go slow?