Comments for Seattle Transit Blog

Comment on Metro Waters Down Fall Changes by Bill

Bill — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 07:00:48 +0000

It is interesting to note that the proposals for bus service reduction occur in the densest parts of the region, where the urban area is built for transit and where population is growing, in part because there is good transit. It seems as though the Metro planners and the Council Members are favoring the less dense areas of the County at the expense of the central City. For instance, the tops of Queen Anne and Capitol Hill are growing and have become more dense while the response is to gut existing frequency. You need to give folks an assist getting up the hills but instead the proposed service “improvements” are being made with ill-suited diesel coaches that groan noisily up the hills at pathetic speeds and can’t stop because they can’t start on the hill. In addition, bus stops have been removed (and will be moreso with the plan) so that the increasingly aging populace must walk greater distances to less frequent services. Makes you want to shop in the U Village in your auto rather to take transit to Downtown. Seems short-sighted. There ought go be an effort to better serve this growing population with transit. As an example, the West Side of Queen Anne, a definitely densifying area, does not have any way excepting the automobile for folks to get up or down the significant hillside to access to the Number 1 or 15/18 services. Perhaps a route extension into that void would be of utility. It would also appear that access to Seattle U., Virginia Mason and possibly Swedish will be diminished for patients, students and employees by the proposed changes. The City’s routes are the more heavily used and therefore the more efficient to be operated by Metro.

Comment on Bellevue to Seek Input on Transportation Projects by Martin H. Duke

Martin H. Duke — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 06:46:17 +0000

I’m not a Bellevue Resident, but can we get some love for fixing the roads and bus service around Bellevue College?

http://seattletransitblog.com/2011/01/31/bellevue-college-and-eastgate/

This kind of thing is the City’s responsibility and is off the charts in terms of cost-benefit.

Comment on Wanted: A Party of the Future by Martin H. Duke

Martin H. Duke — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 06:32:12 +0000

But seriously, the problems of densification will be solved by the increased cost of fuel.

Not if it’s illegal to densify!

Comment on Wanted: A Party of the Future by Martin H. Duke

Martin H. Duke — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 06:29:13 +0000

Duverger’s Law is irrelevant to Seattle politics, which has non-partisan elections and in any case would be dominated by the Democratic Party if it were partisan.

Comment on Bellevue to Seek Input on Transportation Projects by mephistopheles

mephistopheles — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 06:11:36 +0000

There was also this.

If a partnership is not in place by the end of 2011, the funds will be re-directed to HOV/bus rapid transit in the I-405 corridor. Sound Transit 2 does not include any additional funds for commuter or passenger rail on the Eastside BNSF corridor.

I have heard something about plans for a trail. Do you know what happened to them?

Comment on News Roundup: Number One by Eric

Eric — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 06:07:38 +0000

Name one transfer you can do at Yarrow Point that you can’t do just as easily at Evergreen Point.

Comment on Bellevue to Seek Input on Transportation Projects by Morgan Wick

Morgan Wick — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 06:04:03 +0000

Aren’t there plans to run a trail in the BNSF corridor?

Comment on Bellevue to Seek Input on Transportation Projects by Morgan Wick

Morgan Wick — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 06:02:43 +0000

There’s a lot of places of employment west of 110th that wouldn’t be directly affected…

Comment on Bellevue to Seek Input on Transportation Projects by mephistopheles

mephistopheles — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 05:34:45 +0000

Honestly, they should lid 405 through Bellevue and put a trail on top. It would remove the barrier between DT Bellevue and Overlake and, as Eric said, for a non-hardcore cyclist to easily get even to Seattle.

Seattle was lucky enough to have I-5 put in AFTER there was already stuff on the to-be-other side, but Bellevue doesn’t have that luxury. So, we get such first-world problems, if you know what I mean =P

Comment on Driver Interaction by Eric

Eric — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 05:33:46 +0000

After 10 PM, the 545 runs only once an hour, so it’s entirely possible that if the customer did get off at Montlake, he/she would have been stuck at Montlake for an entire hour. If that’s the case, 550->B is probably better. Maybe the driver did know what he/she was talking about after all.

Comment on Driver Interaction by Eric

Eric — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 05:27:57 +0000

There are lots of routes out there, especially during off-peak times that are unreliable and the unreliability has little to do with traffic and everything to do with dwell times at bus stops.

Normally, drivers learn that freeways are faster in the best case, but surface streets are more reliable. However, during non-rush hour, I discovered that freeway-running buses are often more reliable than their surface-running counterparts because the freeway routes make fewer stops and the risk of a bus being delayed at a bus stop is much more than the risk of a bus being delayed at traffic.

For example, if I want to go from the U-district to downtown on a Saturday morning, I always go 510/511. Since they have very few stops, I can trust them to be right on time. And since the 510 and 511 come back-to-back, I get some extra redundancy because if one of them gets delayed, I can still take the other. (Normally, I plan to be at the bus stop right at the moment the 510 is supposed to come, but don’t start running unless I see the 510 go by leaving me 3 minutes to make the 511). By contrast, the 71/72/73 are a lot harder to trust. On paper, they come more frequently and require less walking to access. But in practice, you just never really know when they’re going to come, even with OneBusAway. Anyone who’s seen OneBusAway claim a bus is 5 minutes away, only to observe 5 minutes later that the bus has advanced from 5 minutes away to 4 minutes away knows what I’m talking about.

Comment on Clarifications on Fall Restructure by jeff

jeff — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 05:12:03 +0000

Where in the world does “no-brainer” transit involve 30 people getting off one bus, waiting on a god-awful street, and then getting on another bus?

Comment on Driver Interaction by Charles

Charles — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 05:03:53 +0000

So, if the bus stopped at EVERY stop along the route what would happen to the timeliness of the bus? It’s likely going to be late. The route is tuned based on an average number of stops and I would posit that the route timing should also anticipate regular congestion, and the occasional bumbling passenger or person with a question.

What I’m also irritated at are buses leaving starting points or passing timed points several minutes early in part because they know by mid-route they’re going to be late. Today, I had to run to catch the ST 594 because it was going to arrive at it’s time point more than 3 minutes early. Fortunately, the driver saw me and was nice enough to wait. But he still left that stop 2 minutes early.

Comment on Scheduling and Common Corridors by David Seater

David Seater — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 04:48:22 +0000

The 43 also has this problem on the corridors it shares with the 8 (John/Thomas) and 48 (23rd/24th/15th). The schedule usually had both coming within a few minutes of each other. It’s particularly bad weekday mornings SB on 23rd, when the 43 and 48 usually travel as a pa ir all the way from where they first Interline at john.

Comment on Seattle Waterfront: Mobility and Access by Mike Orr

Mike Orr — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 04:40:51 +0000

I haven’t heard anything about tunnel financing since the vote. So… it’s all paid for and everything’s hunky-dory?

Comment on Driver Interaction by Beavis McGee

Beavis McGee — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 03:56:03 +0000

Thing is, U-village isn’t just a mall, its a neighborhood. 7 blocks from the mall proper reasonably falls within your limited question. I once was driving the 1t and had a passenger get angry at me because I answered “yes” to the question “do you go to Ballard?” This person wanted Ballard avenue and Market (17 or 18), not 15th and market. Should I have taken the time to ask this person more questions? Or should I assume that this person wanted a simple answer to a simple question?

For you got on a bus after asking the wrong question. Bla’ing the driver for your mistake is just plain lame.

Comment on Driver Interaction by Charles

Charles — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 03:13:26 +0000

And I’ll repeat a sentiment from last fall: Seattle is now a huge tourist destination and in my travels over the summer I spent many a time assisting these tourists. People from out of town have a natural disorientation, our signage while adhering to standards isn’t all that helpful to these types of people and the signs often get lost in against the backdrops especially walls plastered with large ads.

One of the most common points of confusion is which platform to be on to get to the airport. I’ve even made this mistake on at least one occasion.

Just today, someone asked me if the bus I was waiting on 1st Ave for went to Pioneer Square. Well, I knew that the bus would turn East and probably before the square so I advised them to walk the 7 or so blocks down the gentle grade to get there rather than risk the bus.

Comment on Wanted: A Party of the Future by Glenn Roberts

Glenn Roberts — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 03:12:17 +0000

Brent, We’re at an impasse with the history and current events here. If you lived in an apartment and had rats and cockroaches infesting every corner of it you might say something to the landlord, or you might move. For 30 years the neighborhood has tried to deal legally with Sisely and the city has failed on every turn. So the city opeted for the easy way out this time. Over that same period zoning regulations have been altered in Seattle by due process, not only in Roosevelt but in other neighborhoods as well.
Have you ever had a parking ticket? And have you paid it? Well Sisley has violated laws here to the tune of $600,000-800,000. I sure hope the city gets it.
But Sisley has never been my argument. Design is what it’s all about whether you’re talking about a room, house, block or neighborhood. In our case, the neighborhood wanted one thing but an owner/developer wanted another. Most people thought the neighborhood lost, but I think we won big time.
Either the developer came in with a pack of lies (which I believe he did and I choose not to have anything to do with him as far as compromise now or in the future), or he lost out big time. If you were paying attention 3 years ago you would know that.
He could have come in with reasonable requests and perhaps been better off now. That’s all water over the dam. The city made their decision and I can live with that. Your interpretation that the developer wants to “do right by Seattle” is an opinion of yours and a few others but not many who actually live in the neighborhood, unless they have a parcel to sell that fits with the plan.
A few units in Roosevelt will never make or break the light rail system. Plenty of other units will be built here and would have been otherwise.
I’m glad we did what we did. Left to the developer and a moronic government who knows what might have happened without some form of resistance?

Comment on Driver Interaction by Charles

Charles — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 03:02:04 +0000

It would be much better to have knowledgeable greeters and people on site in the downtown area for a period of time at the switch over. Far more efficient than a “batphone” to Customer Service.

Comment on Driver Interaction by Charles

Charles — Sun, 12 Feb 2012 02:59:38 +0000

The question was do you go TO U Village. The correct answer was either no, or I go near it but not to it.

Yes, I fashion myself a bit of a transit nerd and I had already planned a route using my favorite tools but I saw this bus and it seemed to be going to the neighborhood I wanted so I asked. I placed my trust in the driver to tell me the truth and I made a decision to trust serendipity.

This Libertarian attitude of don’t you dare ask for clarification is rather disturbing.