Letter to the Editor – no trains along the BNSF Trail
The joint PSRC/Sound Transit Study called for by House Bill 3224 (or ST-2) confirmed how little benefit taxpayers would get by spending over $1 Billion dollars on the Eastside corridor to run passenger trains, no matter where the money comes from. And, this does not even include other important hidden costs.
But, not surprisingly, there are already pro-train people projecting 154,000 ‘North-South trips/day on the Eastside’ by 2030, rather than the mere 6,270 trips/day projected for 2020 by the ST-2 between Tukwila and Everett. So, let’s consider the effectiveness of this new number and see how cost-effective the same 1 Billion dollar investment (railroad-only cost, no trail) would be.
- 154,000 trips/day (yr 2030) = 77,000 people traveling round-trip during the day.
- Using only buses that carry 75 people seated, we’d need 2,053 bus-trips per day (154,000 / 75). Everybody seated!
- If we spread the bus service over only 12 hours/day to move those people, we’d need 171 buses, assuming that the buses can make – on average- ONLY 1 trip per hour. That means that we’d be able to transport 12,825 seated people per hour (171×75).
- If we get the fancier buses at $1 Million each, the total cost would be $171,000,000 (assuming that we buy them all today and park most of them until 2030!). That is 17% of the estimated rail-only cost on ST-2.
- 171 buses deployed each hour would theoretically allow individual bus-departures every 21 seconds throughout the Eastside. Thus, if they were to start from, say, 11 key points, they could run every 4 minutes. Or, if 14 key starting points were chosen, they could run every 5 minutes.
WHAT’S OVERLOOKED
Service
The 171 new buses could have many starting and ending points, as well as stops along the way and serve the people who live in the denser/central areas, as well as those farther away. They would run on existing roads and use P&Rs.
Trains envisioned in the ST studies would make stops only every 3 to 5 miles in odd locations requiring transfers to buses. However, this is the type of service provided elsewhere in the world to connect central stations of cities far apart, not in the same urban area. Buses, tramways and subways are used in urban areas, depending on the city size and density. In King County, we don’t need many major train stations, only a good one in Seattle that is well connected.
Buses could also start immediately on the Eastside for a fraction of the $171,000,000 cost estimated for 2020 or 2030, and routes could be modified at will over time to achieve optimal results and eventually mesh up with the Light Rail line that will be built.
Urban Sprawl
The train will service mainly people living near the outer limits of the RR route. Thus, it will actually encourage further growth away from Bellevue and Redmond, rather than motivate people to live near downtown areas. This will make the future regional traffic problem worse, rather than better.
Urban Planning Issues
Any effective, urban, train or light-rail transportation system will eventually REQUIRE a DOUBLE track, greater frequency and many more stops. So, looking into the future, what would the Eastside and Kirkland look like with a double rail bed through the middle of existing residential areas of the city, instead of on some of its existing streets or highways? Where would the trail be?
UNTIL we have just a few attractive ‘dense-living areas’ with a wide range of apartment prices on the Eastside, we will NOT reduce car driving. We will simply waste taxpayers’ money. There are currently too many must-go-to areas, for work, exercise, and doing errands, dispersed around the Eastside, to which one must drive a car to get to them in a timely fashion.
To achieve higher density in and near downtown areas on the Eastside, they must be people friendly, not just business friendly. Downtowns need to be places where people WANT to go to relax, not places where they HAVE to go to shop or do business. They should include many types of amenities, galleries, pedestrian-only streets, and summer and winter parks.
The North-South through traffic challenge cannot be solved by using trains. But, discouraging car-use by people near city centers will help a lot. Over the very long term, new roads and/or tunnels will have to be built.
Meanwhile, the loss of a potential ‘linear park & trail’ for the Eastside along the BNSF Corridor would be a tragic loss for a large swath of the heaviest residential area on the Eastside. This linear park and non-motorized transportation corridor could service many cities and neighborhoods, as well as connect innumerable already existing parks, bike trails and even some beaches on Lake Washington. All of this, without people having to get into a car or, if coming from farther away, by simply driving to the closest P&R.
A well-developed, multi-use linear park would be an enormously attractive urban feature for young and old Eastside residents. Its cost? About $60-70 Million dollars (if the RR tracks are removed).
Best of all, if the density of the Eastside ever justifies the use of the space for something else, the corridor will still be there. In the interim, one or more generations of people would have enjoyed this public asset.
SHOULDN’T THE $1 BILLION SAVED after buying the 171 buses and building a multi-use Trail/Park ($1.3 Billion, minus $171M in bus cost and $70M in Trail cost) BE BETTER used on Education, low-cost Housing, downtown Transportation, urban improvements, etc.?
Sincerely,
Shawn Etchevers
Posted by Admin on Tuesday, January 20, 2009 at 11:10 pm
Filed under Letters · Tagged with BNSF Trail/Rail, Letters, Sound Transit
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Shawn,
Your letter hits all the important points, which you’ve highlighted in red. Any way you slice it, rail along the BNSF corridor will not solve our transportation problems. Your ideas about an increased bus system make perfect sense. The ability for buses to have so many starting points/routes/destinations all make for realistic usability of the system.
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Shawn Etchevers has done a great job analyzing the transit situation for Kirkland and the whole eastside. He wrote an earlier letter regarding the proposed Transit Oriented Development at the South Kirkland Park and Ride – http://www.kirklandviews.com/2008/12/03/letter-to-the-editor-south-kirkland-park-and-ride/ which had similar, spot-on reasoning. In his current letter, Mr Etchevers does a great job looking beyond the emotions and logically analyzes what it would cost to put operating trains on the corridor. According the the second PSRC/ST it will cost over $1B to put an operating commuter train on the system, minimally. The costs in the study don’t include grade separations which would have to constructed at 124th in Kirkland, 8th in Bellevue, and 139th in Woodinville both for safety and the sake of congestion. But even more so, the trajectory/geometry of the track is poor the report states that it is too “curvy”. So after spending all that money, the average operating speed of the trains would be 24 mph (again, according to the second PSRC study). The time has come to move forward with lifting the tracks (which should be done before BNSF is allowed to abandon the rail line) and putting a trail on the railbed. It would greatly reduce the cost of trail construction and the people of the Eastside could start enjoying the benefits of a beautiful linear park in the near term.
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I appreciate Shawn Etchevers taking the time to do the financial analysis comparing the cost effectiveness of rail versus bus on the Eastside using the information from the PRSC/Sound Transit joint study. As a long time resident and business owner in Kirkland, I have been very concerned about the negative impact to our community of running rail on the BNSF corridor. I am also quite excited about the prospect of a non-motorized trail that would be a long term asset to the region. And now, when you look at the reality of the costs of putting in rail and the limited benefit, it makes the decision very easy. In these difficult economic times, it would be foolhardy to spend over $1billion dollars when you can get the job done for so much less.
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We agree. No trains on old BNSF corridor for all the reasons given .
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With the current (and probably future) economic climate, the great expense of rail makes no sense. The emphasis on Active Transport, promoted by the city’s Active Living Task Force, to enhance ways for Kirkland’s citizens to be more physically active with biking and walking is right in line with development of biking and walking trails on BNSF right of way.
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Well put Shawn! Study and after study and dollar after dollar continues to show that commuter rail on the BNSF line makes no sense.
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The economic analysis provided by Shawn is well thought out. It provides another form of proof that trying to instigate commuter train service on the BNSF corridor continues to be a very poor idea. The money involved, if even available, could be better spent for other transportation alternatives that would provide more “bang for the buck”!
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We agree with Shawn’s analysis and strongly oppose commuter trains on the BNSF corridor. It makes no economic sense to us to spend what will likely be well over $1B for a train service that too few will use., and that will create safety and noise problems for our residents. Let’s be practical about this matter, especially during these economically depressed times.
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OK, how many of those of you who commented already live within 1/4 mile of the BNSF right of way? If you do, you’re entitled to want to see the trains go away, but also please be up front about your desires and why, instead of hiding behind an economic argument. Thanks.
BTW, I live ~1-1/4 miles away and believe that we should leave all options for transit open for the future; that’s the reason the tracks shouldn’t be torn up. Once they are gone, they’ll never come back (an attractive idea for anyone living near them I”m sure).
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am extremely disappointed by the comments of our elected representative, Deb Eddy, regarding running mass transit through Kirkland neighborhoods on the BSNF corridor. She blithely dismisses the conclusions of two legislatively authorized studies that the Eastside line is not an appropriate location for commuter rail. The line does not follow any existing transportation corridor and is not near any concentration of commuting destinations; a train running through Kirkland backyards to Belleuve auto row would serve the transportation needs of very few (if any) Eastside residents.
[As noted in one of the other blog comments, “The first study suggested that the best near to mid-term use of the corridor would be for a non-motorized trail. The second study (conducted at the request of the pro-rail lobby) states: “In general, the BNSF Eastside corridor is not well oriented to serve the Eastside’s urban and activity centers and instead winds its way through low density residential and industrial areas. The corridor does not directly serve downtown Bellevue, the Eastside’s largest activity center (and a designated regional growth center). In addition, most of the Snohomish County portion of the corridor is outside the region’s designated urban growth area.”]
Representative Eddy ignores the high cost per rider, the incredible safety issues, aggravation (rather than alleviation of) traffic through Kirkland because of the numerous on-grade crossings, major environmental concerns of commuter trains on this corridor, and better return on investment in an infinitely flexible bus system – and fails to acknowledge, in contrast, the almost immediate and substantial benefit to the Eastside of a park-like, non motorized, pedestrian and biking, commuter and recreational corridor. Instead, Eddy implies (if not outright states) that it is wrong for Kirkland residents to have a primary interest about what is best for our Kirkland communities. She disparages the many who advocate for a pedestrian and biking trail as the best public use of the corridor by saying they are trying to limit the corridor’s “utility to the broader public”. This comment ignores the expectation (gleaned from usage statistics about other bike/pedestrian corridors like the Burke-Gilman trail) that substantially more of the “broader public” would utilize and benefit – for many years to come – from a trail system, rather than absurdly expensive short hop trains.
In an email to me from a year ago (June 15, 2008 to be exact), Deb Eddy stated “Some portions of the right of way MAY be useful (it is rather lengthy), but I sincerely doubt that the entire length of the right of way provides the right alignment for mass transit.” All the objective evidence (thoroughly detailed in some of the other comments) has shown that the Eastside corridor, especially the section through Kirkland, is not the right alignment for mass transit. However, in her current blog, while she continues to acknowledge that the corridor is not suitable for mass transit through the Houghton area, Deb Eddy now apparently begrudges this objective conclusion (she finds it “unfortunate”), and attempts to cast as revolutionaries all those who agree with the evidence that mass transit is not now appropriate on the BSNF corridor through Kirkland. She states, “Some portions of it – for instance, through Houghton – may NOT be suitable for mass transit, which will hurt Kirkland in the long run, unfortunately, but will keep the Houghton neighborhood from complete revolt.”
Deb Eddy was elected to advocate for Eastside constituents, most of whom are Kirkland residents. Her blog comments raise the question – is she now beholden to some other special interests? Based on her comments, she has lost my vote (and I am fairly certain, the votes of other like minded Kirkland “revolters” – oops, I mean voters.)
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