Due to construction on the University of Washington campus, several King County Metro and Community Transit bus routes, as well as ST Express 540, will be diverted off Grant Lane and Stevens Way on weekdays for the next two weeks, as well as for the weekend of June 24 and 25.
Westbound, Metro routes 31, 32, 67, 75, 78, and 372 will all serve:
- a temporary southbound stop on Montlake Blvd north of the Hec Ed pedestrian overpass
- a temporary westbound stop on NE Pacific Pl just west of Montlake Blvd
- the westbound stop on NE Pacific St a block east of 15th Ave NE
Eastbound, routes 75, 78, and 372 will serve:
- the eastbound stop on NE Pacific St a block east of 15th Ave NE
- the eastbound stop on NE Pacific Pl at the west point of the Rainier Vista triangle
- the northbound stop on Montlake Blvd NE in front of Alaska Airlines Arena (formerly known as Hec Edmundson Pavillion)
Metro route 277 and ST Express 540 will skip their campus loop, and just serve their regular stops on Campus Parkway, 15th Ave NE, and NE Pacific St, plus a temporary drop-off-only stop on inbound runs at the flagpole on Memorial Way.
All six Community Transit UW routes (810, 821, 855, 860, 871, and 880) will loop around campus clockwise, using three of its normal stops, serving:
- the regular eastbound stop on Stevens Lane, just east of Memorial Way
- the regular southbound stop on E Stevens Way NE, just north of Pend Orville Rd NE. This is the last regular stop before the reroute begins.
- a temporary southbound stop on Montlake Blvd north of the Hec Ed pedestrian overpass
- a temporary westbound stop on NE Pacific Pl just west of Montlake Blvd
- the westbound stop on NE Pacific St a block east of 15th Ave NE
- the regular northbound stop on 15th Ave NE just north of NE 42nd St
Bruce Engelhardt contributed to this post.
It’ll be interesting to see how Pacific St performs at peak during the reroute, since it’s already close to saturation. I wonder if Metro can extend the length of the stop east of 15th so that multiple buses can stop there; right now it seems up to the driver’s discretion whether to let someone off in the planting area west of the stop. As it is, only two 40′ or one 60′ bus can make a stop right at the stop.
It also would help if ST would stop running the super-tall coach buses on the 586. Those take forever to load normally with their tall stairs and narrow aisles, and are even slower if the lift has to be used. If the driver isn’t familiar with how to use the lift, it can take over 5 minutes to load a single person, and no other bus can use the stop in that time.
I’ll be curious to see how commuters react to Montlake Blvd southbound in the afternoon. Sometimes I catch a “To Base” bus bus to the station and it goes that way. Traffic varies from a couple buildings back to past 45th. On those days, I haven’t timed it, but I guess around ten minutes’ overhead.
I have seen the travel time to 520 sign near U-Village hit 30-35 minutes on several occasions around 5 PM. That is a 3-4 minute drive without traffic. A 10 min delay would be considered a good day.
With UW not in session it will probably be better this week, hence the timing of the construction.
You can catch a “To Base” bus?
If you’re going their way they’re supposed to take you. But it’s only practically feasible in a few kinds of cases where there’s time for the driver to say which way they’re going and for you to say whether one of those stops will work for you. So if you’re standing at a stop and the bus whizzes by it usually won’t stop because it would take too long to determine whether it would work for you, and half the time it wouldn’t or the passenger would be so confused they wouldn’t understand what’s going on. But if you’re already on the bus when it finishes its run, or it’s one of the few places where it’s common like when the 44 goes down lower Broadway to the base, then there’s sometimes an opportunity.
[Off Topic]
Is the 271 affected? There is no mention, but it does go where it says the intersection is xlosed.
I’d assume not, since the 271 only lays over on campus. Its regular route already takes it down 15th to Pacific before reaching Montlake. The 277 is affected since it normally takes the Stevens Way loop.
Hec Ed is still called Hec Ed. The arena inside is called Alaska Airlines Arena. Just like Husky Stadium is still Husky Stadium, but the field is now called Alaska Airlines Field.
One time last summer I got off a Link train to catch a 75, and it was re-routed due to construction on Stevens, but it detoured to 45th street across the bridge, father away from UW station and not closer. I’m glad to see them doing it right this time.
I took a 75 in this morning. Generally the home/75/Stevens Way walk/light rail/work combo takes me about 50 minutes, this time it took 50 minutes. A wash, in other words.
The driver on my # 372 this morning was not aware of the reroute and drove up to the first stop on Stevens Way where he was stopped by a UW Transportation Coordinator right behind a Community Transit bus whose driver was also not aware of the street closure.
All passengers had to get off as the buses were not going beyond that point and we had to walk from there to the Light Rail Station. Not exactly a great way to start the morning. From what I understand they were going to have the drivers back up the buses past the intersection and then go back down the hill to 25th Ave NE but not until they talked to their respective control centers.
The return home was great as it was just a short walk from the Light Rail Station to the bus stop going north on Montlake Blvd. and certainly a heck of a lot better then the hike up to Stevens Way and it is too bad that Metro won’t route the # 372 that way all the time.
I rode the 75 reroute today. It would be great if every few 75’s took this rerotue permantly. I like getting on at Pacific after getting off Link.
My 75 yesterday around 6:30pm southbound was stopped in traffic from the U-Village stop all the way down to the station. I didn’t feel like timing it but it must have been 10-15 minutes. I could go either way on a longer-term reroute, but it would add more rush-hour delays and unpredictability than people are used to. Maybe only southbound, because that’s where cars are packing up trying to get onto 520.
It seems like the 75 and 372 are still predominately used by UW students and employees, not Link transfers. Most people get off the bus at the top of Pend Orielle, not at Rainier Vista. This morning I counted 6 buses stuck in the southbound Montlake mess at 7:30 AM, even with reduced traffic this week because of UW not being in session.
The 2021 restructuring will be interesting–I imagine it will become faster for many of the current 75 and 372 riders to take the 62 to Roosevelt Station. It might also make sense for a revised 74/30 hybrid to terminate at the Brooklyn Station. The 75/372 can continue serving UW via Stevens.
Thursday afternoon was a mess on multiple routes. The backup started at 36th & 45th and went all the way through to just north of the stadium. Of course the first third would have caught a Pend Orielle bus too.