This week’s Transpo Notes highlights: extended service reductions on King County Metro, Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell joining Sound Transit’s board, new transit-oriented development at Tacoma Dome Station, and Community Transit’s zero-emissions study.
Extended Metro service reductions
King County Metro continues to struggle with service delivery as an operator shortage persists. On Friday, the agency announced that widespread trip cancelations would continue for an undetermined period, extending a service reduction that was set to end on Saturday. The notice did say that more than 90% of scheduled trips would go forward, but that some routes would remain suspended, including Routes 162, 177, 304, 320, and 330 on weekdays and Route 125 on Saturdays.
Metro is facing a double-whammy of staffing shortages from the pandemic with simply lower staffing levels than needed and more staff on leave due to sickness. Over the past month, the Omicron variant has hit the region hard and reducing staffing ranks across industries.
However, the severity of trip cancelations may begin to recede in the coming weeks due to two factors. Firstly, Omicron cases peaked more than a week ago in King County and have been on a very sharp and steady decrease since. Secondly, Metro just completed training of a very large group of full-time operators (25 in total) over the weekend. And another set of part-time operators are set to wrap up training in early February. Every other week, beginning today, Metro also plans to provide new part-time operator training courses to ramp up staffing to needed levels for service plans.
Mayor Bruce Harrell to join Sound Transit board
Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell is expected to join the Sound Transit board of directors, succeeding former Mayor Jenny Durkan. A first step to this is formal appointment and confirmation by the King County Council on Tuesday, which is all but assured. A proposed motion by the Sound Transit board of directors has penciled Mayor Harrell in to serve on the Executive Committee and System Expansion Committee. Both were committees that former Mayor Durkan served on, though her attendance was sporadic.
The committees that Mayor Harrell is proposed to serve on are critically important ones given that Sound Transit is planning two light rail expansions (Ballard and West Seattle) and several infill stations in Seattle (Boeing Access Road, Graham Street, and 130th Street Stations) and the agency is evolving in how it serves communities.
For its part, the System Expansion Committee is responsible for oversight of all transit expansion projects, including their project development, scope, budgets, schedules, and construction activities. The committee also has unilateral authority to approve system expansion activities that are under $50 million and outside the Sound Transit Chief Executive Officer’s spending purview. Conversely, the Executive Committee is responsible for all oversight of agency policies, government relations, legislative objectives, and system program strategies and budgets. Like the System Expansion Committee, the Executive Committee can also approve certain items unilaterally that are under $50 million andthe Sound Transit CEO’s spending purview.
A TOD project breaks ground at T Dome Station
Last week, a mixed-use transit-oriented development (TOD) project broke ground next to Tacoma Dome Station, making it the closest TOD project to the station yet. Named Trax, the project will deliver 115 apartments, an indoor farmers market, and other retail space. Residents of the project will benefit from transit passes along with a variety of on-site amenities, such as a rooftop terrace, secured bike storage, balconies in all units, and active common spaces.
The commercial portion of the development will be two stories with the farmers market panning both levels, which is hoped to have a variety of vendor types (e.g., florists, artisans, butchers, restauranteurs, and seafood sellers). The mezzanine level is designed to have an outdoor terrace and viewing spaces. Conversely, ground floor commercial spaces are set to have roll-up garage doors that open onto the E 25th Street sidewalk, creating a welcoming and active connection to the street. The developer also expects there to be outdoor cafe-style dining areas on the street. The leasable area is planned to cover just under 15,500 square feet.
