Light Rail Projects

Some years ago Seattle passed several measures to create a network of electric Light Rail throughout the metropolitan region.

Once upon a time Seattle, like many cities, had a huge network of trolley cars, but all that was ripped up to create roads for cars. In 1962, Seattle built an electric monorail which connects the Seattle Center & Space Needle to downtown Westlake Center, the hub of commerce and transportation. Beginning in 2009, the first link of the ambitious Light Rail project began to serve Seattle between Westlake Center and the SeaTac Airport: For $2.50 I could ride the ST-545 Express Bus from Redmond, across Lake-WA into Seattle, transfer to Light Rail and go straight to the Airport within 70-90 minutes. No more parking fees or shuttles!

From the initial leg, the next major segment will link downtown Westlake to UW (University of Washington) via Capitol Hill (the highest density sector), and eventually onward to Northgate (a major shopping center located mid-city). Getting to Capitol Hill is a challenge and boring began towards it from UW and Downtown. The link below describes in video the detail of the boring process. There’s a 30-seond advert at the beginning; can’t do much about that – but the video is very interesting.

Tunnel boring machine breaks ground at Capitol Hill station

There is one other segment that is also underway called the East Link that will connect Bellevue/Microsoft with Seattle via Mercer Island/I-90 Floating Bridge. Eventually this line will extend into Redmond proper… and then it shall be door-to-door rail service to the Airport!

There are optimistic plans to extend Light Rail: The new SR-520 replacement Floating Bridge will be able to accept Light Rail, and there is a plan in the works to take a link from Northgate up to Lynnwood, possibly even Everett. Also one heading south from the SeaTac Airport to Federal Way, possibly to Tacoma. However these are all fancies without funding that can’t start before 2020. Even the route to Redmond, only the right-of-way is sanctioned and nothing more; I could be retired before it’s built.

Light Rail, mile per mile, is probably the most expensive form of transit to construct – however I believe it will pay for itself in the long run. 8)

~KF

Thanks for the post KF, I like to follow transportation issues and this is especially meaningful to me as my daughter is moving to Seattle this summer.

I don't have any links..
But Utah is rarely mentioned when talking about light rail.

http://www.rideuta.com/mc/?page=uta-home-trax

So far, it covers every metropolitan area in the state, except Provo. As we were on vacation out there, we saw them tearing up streets and highways left and right putting in the provo light rail system.

This is a bit easier of a task since Utah's major population lives within a ~120 mile radius of Salt Lake City.
The majority of the state is pretty walkable/bikeable too.

I believe it will pay off in the long run as well.

neptronix said:

I believe it will pay off in the long run as well.

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In the past, I've been a project manager on well over $5 billion in light-rail transit projects. I'm sad to say that, to my knowledge, there has not ever been any public transit system that has broken even on fare box revenue, much less "paid off".

advancedelectricbikes said:

neptronix said:

I believe it will pay off in the long run as well.

Click to expand...

In the past, I've been a project manager on well over $5 billion in light-rail transit projects. I'm sad to say that, to my knowledge, there has not ever been any public transit system that has broken even on fare box revenue, much less "paid off".

Click to expand...

Are you allowing for cost savings from reduced congestion on the roads? One recent estimate for my town pegged the loss at $3.3 billion in lost productivity annually because of traffic congestion.

Just curious...

Kingfish said:

From the initial leg, the next major segment will link downtown Westlake to UW (University of Washington) via Capitol Hill (the highest density sector)

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I'm moving back to Seattle in June 2013. Although I'll be in West Seattle (living with the mother-in-law--can't beat that for cheap rent!) if I do end up landing a permanent job in the Seattle metro area I'll do my best to align my workplace and home along one of the light rail lines. I have no desire whatsoever to spend my days in I-5 (or 405, 520, or 167) traffic.

If said job is, say, at the UW med center, then the planned 2016 opening of the U-Link could be a real boon.

I werq for the light rail system here in the Portland Metro area. It does cost allot to build that is for sure. The great thing about it here is it does not matter what the public wants they get light rail anyway they just can't stop us. Lots of money can be had for expansion so get as much as you can before it's gone but there is very little money available to maintain it once it's there.
We were elected the number one transit agency in the US so from a certain point of view all is good. We sold our trains as many agencies have done now we lease them back. Sold most of our property, lease it back, cost less in the short run and you can use the money to expand, expand, expand. Going to have to pay the piper some day though.
Have to say I do like it and it's easy to get around with the bike and light rail. I have a huge area available to me because of light rail it's thirty-five plus miles wide by near seventy miles long, actually a bit more than that because of the expansion thing. Nice to duck out of the rain now and then as well. Still the ebike is just as fast but limits me to just a thirty-five mile square.
Oh, and remember and the gangster wanabees and druggies you meet are just there for entertainment.

Lock said:

Are you allowing for cost savings from reduced congestion on the roads? One recent estimate for my town pegged the loss at $3.3 billion in lost productivity annually because of traffic congestion.

Just curious...

Click to expand...

Light rail transit (LRT) generally increases traffic congestion. LRT vehicles are given priority at at-grade crossings and signalized intersections, thereby delaying street traffic.

advancedelectricbikes said:

Light rail transit (LRT) generally increases traffic congestion. LRT vehicles are given priority at at-grade crossings and signalized intersections, thereby delaying street traffic.

Click to expand...

Tks AEB... any links to studies that show this effect please?

Lock

Lock said:

advancedelectricbikes said:

Light rail transit (LRT) generally increases traffic congestion. LRT vehicles are given priority at at-grade crossings and signalized intersections, thereby delaying street traffic.

Click to expand...

Tks AEB... any links to studies that show this effect please?

Lock

Click to expand...

http://www.worldtransitresearch.info/research/3693/

http://cts.virginia.edu/docs/UVACTS-5-14-68.pdf

http://skytrainforsurrey.org/2012/0...her-surrey-corridors-lrt-would-be-infeasible/

Bespeaks of bad planning and management. Are we trying to make money building the transit (contractor-driven), or are we trying to show face-time towards popular agendas (politians)? Realistically, a lane taken up by mass-transit is lame because population density will only go higher, therefore MT solutions need to go over, under, or around and not displace. That’s just plain simple math. :|

It becomes equitable to replace lanes with MT if there is a willingness to give up cars. I don’t think we’re there yet, especially since there is not a compelling reason to do so, such as global war or natural catastrophe. Some of us still live in a fishbowl believing that granola and switchgrass are the future; the majority of the world though drives to get by because we’re not yet smartly integrated. Cheap housing, safety, personal freedom come as an expense in the City; it should be the other way around:

We need to recycle our city centers, repurpose old dilapidated sectors to prevent devaluation, rot, and crime. Keep the center dense, where shopping, work, and entertainment are close and convenient.

In the Seattle-Metro, we have a new multi-billion dollar floating bridge replacement in the works. When finished, it will have one more lane in each direction; whoop-dee-do. However, at least they got their heads screwed on tight and added a much needed bike & ped lane, and provisioned for width expansion to allow MT; lanes aren’t lost.

The opposite is true with the Hwy-99 Seattle Alaskan Way Viaduct Replacement: An old earthquake-weakened elevated seafront byway is being replaced with a huge bored tunnel through the heart of the city. The number of lanes dropped from 3 to 2, with the overflow dumped onto city streets. I think this was a bad plan: Tunnel – I’m good width, but it should have been 3-lanes each way. Furthermore, there is no more room to expand I-5 through Seattle; this is going to add to the bottleneck no matter how it is spelled.

Meanwhile over on the Eastside, in anticipation of bottlenecks Redmond is now actively rebuilding the core of “downtown”: Single- and two-story shops and businesses are being torn down and in their place is a cookie-cutter style of development that matches the following pattern: Excavate 1-2 stories deep for parking, street-level business, topped with 3-4 levels of apartment or condo living. In short, integrated high-density, high-tax revenue community living. Light Rail, when it arrives, will bisect the town once again along the old B & N right-of-way. I’m hoping this will be elevated because the city spent a chunk of change 20 years ago to convert an old golf course into a modern white-collar/retail commerce center located on the other side.

As far as LR from Seattle to Eastside, there are some problems: Mainly the loss of two lanes across I-90 and the dividing median north from I-90 up to Downtown Bellevue. From there, LR will partly take the old rail RoW until it reaches Microsoft Main Campus, and then it will run along beside SR-520 in Cut-and-Cover RoW until Redmond when it again links with B & N for future expansion, should we afford it.

Some years ago there was a stalwart businessman that was buying up all the rail RoW through Seattle to prevent it from being converted into bike paths, forward-thinking that once these are gone, it would cost kazillions to develop new routes without stealing from narrow streets and demolishing homes. I think partly he was correct to do so – if at least it caused pause for City Council to stop and think, to gaze maturely into the crystal ball of the future: What will this city need in order to thrive 50 years from now?

Our leaders need to be accountable for good planning if we are to have any chance of getting there.
~KF