An August Transportation Ballot?

Link light rail cost $160 million per mile, averages 22,000 boardings/weekday.

SWIFT superior bus service cost about $1.8 million per mile, averages 3,500 boardings/weekday.

Light rail cost about 90 times as much, and averages 6 times as many boardings. So, light rail cost about 15 times as much per boarding as top-rate bus service.

And SWIFT has lower operating costs per boarding than Link.

So, why would the city even consider building light rail, instead of just superior bus service? Go ride SWIFT rapid buses, and see how good bus service can be. For 1/15 the cost of light rail.

Because of the ever-rising cost of gasoline?

That, and the simple fact that buses ride on roads. Roads in our city tend to have pretty bad traffic I hear.

SWIFT buses, as far as I’m aware (mainly because I’ve never seen one stuck in traffic in Seattle), drive around the boondocks where there is little traffic issues.

The deal here is that there are only so many cars that can move through a dense environment like Seattle. We have long ago reached and exceeded those levels. Hence traffic.

The only way we can continue to grow and increase our economic and cultural development is to find ways to move people in other ways besides on our congested roads.

Nice load of B.S.

Buses take cars off of roads. One bus can hold up to 90 people — that is up to 90 cars taken off a road by one bus.

And, would you pay 15 times as much to ride light rail as to ride a bus? IF the bus cost $2.00, would you pay $30 to ride light rail instead? If not, why should taxpayers pay 15 times as much to build light rail?

The cost of gasoline is not “ever-rising” in real dollars. In 2008 dollars, the price of gasoline has been between $2.00 and $3.00/gallon for most of the last 70 years, except for about 20 years between the mid-80′s and the mid-2000′s, when it was below $2.00/gallon in 2008 dollars. Sort of destroys you entire premise, doesn’t it?

http://inflationdata.com/Inflation/images/charts/Oil/Gasoline_inflation_chart.htm

You curiously ignore the billions it took to build the roads upon which the bus drives.

Your muddled arguments and insults only convince me that I should pity you and ignore your weak and tiresome rants.

You curiously ignore the billions it took to build the roads upon which the bus drives.

Your muddled arguments and insults only convince me that I should pity you and ignore your weak and tiresome rants.

Here we go again. Let’s not also forget that buses have a far shorter lifespan than trains and to move the same amount of people, buses require far more drivers than trains.

It is ever rising because it is a limited resource that we are continually using more of. The last few years oil has dropped a bit in price because of the recessions ability to keep people and goods from moving around the world at the same pace as it was before.

Also, out of curiosity, where did you get your cost per mile for SWIFT?

To be fair, most of the rail cost is a one time expenditure, whereas the lower bus cost is annual and ongoing due to fuel and the need to repair/upgrade/replace buses, which aren’t as durable as rail cars.

I should add that oil’s relatively stable price in relation to inflation was obviously due to the past increased supply to meet the increased demand of the world.

The reason why this is changing now is that it is very unlikely that we will be able to increase the amount of supply to match the new demand by the developing world – particularly from China and India. Peak oil is real and what is left to be found is much harder to get out of the earth than what we previously dug up. That’s why we need to find oil in deep water and Canadian oil sands – both of which are much more expensive to extract than what we used to get in Texas.

Before you say anything stupid about ANWAR, even the most optimistic estimates of the amount of oil there is a drop in the bucket.

I’ve made these points before, but Grover refuses to concede or acknowledge that one particular transportation solution does not fit all. It seems fairly intuitive to most of us that a snowmobile may be the vehicle of choice in a small Alaska village, a personal automobile in a rural county, a bus along a highway route, and grade/ROW-separated rail in a dense urban setting, but not for Grover.

Swift runs on 99 in Snohomish County and is actually a very successful service. You’ve obviously never been up there during rush hour there are enormous ‘traffic issues’. That said, no, Swift is not a replacement for Link.

The roads already exist. We don’t need to build new roads. We just to need to use existing roads more efficiently. Buses allow many more people per lane per hour on the very same roads we already have.

http://www.seattle.gov/transportation/sdot_can.htm

Bottom of this page. Buses take less room than cars or bikes.

T Chen, like a little boy, refuses to admit that Link light rail is insanely expensive. Ever hear of “cost-benefit” T?

SWIFT: $30 million for 17 miles.

SWIFT: $30 million for 17 miles.

Operating cost of Link is about double the operating cost of the Metro buses it replaced. And, Link operating cost is higher than SWIFT bus operating cost.

So, you have that exactly backwards.

“One bus can hold up to 90 people — that is up to 90 cars taken off a road by one bus.”

So I guess we just need to force everyone to ride buses, and then there shouldn’t be any more traffic and we’d probably never run out of transportation capacity with our growing regional population. Is that what you’re advocating? Because otherwise, there is still going to be traffic, and buses are still going to be stuck in it…unlike U-Link and North Link.

Can you post a link to where you got that number? I can’t seem to find it on Community Transit’s page.

Apples and oranges. Different technologies in different corridors. To better compare Swift buses to Link light rail, find a corridor that’s essentially full up, and then compare the costs of adding right-of-way for buses (new lanes and ramps) vs. for trains (rail guideway).

Oscar th… , er… Grover, also clearly must not have heard about the 10 billion or so that we are planning to spend over the next few years just to maintain our antiquated and crumbling road infrastructure. Crumbling in large part due to buses.

And even that amount is woefully inadequate. That doesn’t fit very nicely with his “they are already built” silliness that he seems to mistake for a reasonable argument.

You don’t need to “force” anyone to ride buses. On many routes the buses are packed during peak hours. Add buses and more people will ride the bus.

You seriously don’t get this?

How much are you willing to pay to ride light rail? 15 times as much as a bus?

Biliruben, don’t forget freight trucks. The recent Seattle Times article that mentioned buses causing road damage completely “forgot” about all of the trucks that weigh more than buses running through the city and region delivering goods. Metro has about 1,500 buses, I’d bet there are more trucks running around King County every day.

“The roads already exist. We don’t need to build new roads.”

Roads need to be maintained. They can’t handle weight like rail. Come look at the work SDOT’s doing on 15th Ave now, which is a bus workhorse. It’s expensive and major work to maintain roads, and buses take a heavy toll on streets.

“T Chen, like a little boy, refuses to admit that Link light rail is insanely expensive. Ever hear of “cost-benefit” T?”

You know I’ve conceded that Link is extremely expensive. Of course, all major transportation projects are hugely expensive: The DBT, the 520 bridge replacement, expansion of I-5 or I-405 near Seattle or Bellevue. Any of these projects would/will cost billions each. Since we know that the projection is for increasing growth and density in Seattle, is the best option for the future more road projects or an option that other cities have successfully turned to as density grows–grade separated rail. I argue the latter is a better option for a future of greater density and raising oil costs.

There is no corridor that is “full up” of buses. Central Link’s corridor was obviously not “full-up” before Link was built, was it?

But Central Link is already built! U-Link and North Link are under construction/planning, and represent a much denser transportation corridor.

At least we’re fighting between trains and buses, not SOV and buses. That’s progress!

The article refers to a “transportation ballot.” Did you read it, T? Has nothing to do with North Link or U Link. It is about possible other light rail lines which would be built by the city of Seattle.

And, Central Link’s corridor was not “full-up” with buses, was it? What possible corridors in Seattle where light rail might be built are “full-up” with buses?

“You don’t need to “force” anyone to ride buses. On many routes the buses are packed during peak hours. Add buses and more people will ride the bus.

You seriously don’t get this?

How much are you willing to pay to ride light rail? 15 times as much as a bus?”

Yes, I ride buses. The buses are packed, and the roads are packed. That makes for a slow, lurching ride. Rail with its own ROW is much smoother and quicker through dense urban areas.

Rail is not 15X more expensive. First, its operating costs will be significantly lower than bus once U-Link and North Link are running, and your bus cost calculations don’t take into account wear and tear on roads, pollution externalities, faster depreciation of buses, higher labor costs per rider, etc.

15th is costing about $2.5 million per lane-mile to completely rebuild most of that street. Compared to $160 million per mile for Central Link and $600 million per mile for U-Link. And for just repaving asphalt roads, which is what most street maintenance in Seattle is, costs only around $150,000 per lane mile, a tiny fraction of what light rail construction costs.

SWIFT did not require any new streets. None of the RapidRide bus routes require any new streets. As I said above, repaving city streets costs a tiny fraction of building light rail.

Light rail is at least 15 times as expensive as first-rate bus service.

Central Link light rail: $160 million per mile.

SWIFT rapid bus: $1.8 million per mile.

Do the math.

The price of gas is not “ever-rising” in real dollars. Can’t you read a chart?

First you make something up, and then you keep repeating it. Who are you, Rush Limbaugh?

Your point about roads is that they’re “already exist.” I was just making the same point about Central Link.

Your arguments seemed to be generally against rail, and did so by specifically attacking Central Link, not any particular future corridor, so that’s why I’m making the points about U-Link and North Link.

As for a future corridor, I think U-District to Wallingford to Ballard (Route 44, basically) is a pretty full corridor, and rather slow and lurching as well, that might benefit from a Link between the future Brooklyn station and Ballard via Wallingford.

http://www.heraldnet.com/article/20091202/NEWS01/712029855

“Amazing. It took the same amount of time as if I had a car,” said Amy Allman, 24, of Edmonds, who rode the bus north from Aurora Village to Casino Road. Her trip took 34 minutes.

Allman was one of about 1,500 people who rode Community Transit’s new, $29.6 million bus system on Monday, its first day of operation. The line runs more than 17 miles between Everett Station and Aurora Village in Shoreline, mostly on Highway 99.

“15th is costing about $2.5 million per lane-mile to completely rebuild most of that street. Compared to $160 million per mile for Central Link and $600 million per mile for U-Link. And for just repaving asphalt roads, which is what most street maintenance in Seattle is, costs only around $150,000 per lane mile, a tiny fraction of what light rail construction costs.”

So about $10 million a mile then just for the surface? That doesn’t include the costs of the buses, the electrical infrastructure for the trolley lines, the buses or trolleys themselves, etc. Furthermore, the surface will need more maintenance and resurfacing long before the rail tunnel and tracks are likely to need to be replaced. The point is, you’re comparing apples (only looking at SWIFT bus costs, or only road costs) to oranges (tunnels, rail, stations, train cars) and ignoring the lower operating costs per passenger of U-Link and North Link, the significantly faster and more frequent service it will provide, and the fact that it will not be bogged down in traffic, lurching slowly up and down Seattle’s hilly terrain. You also ignore the fact that rail adds “choice” riders who won’t ride buses but will ride trains. All these main that rail is a good choice for certain routes, for all of the advantages that buses cannot duplicate.

Mike McGinn, the City Council, Dow Constantine, Chris Gregoire and Bill Gates, Sr should all be sitting down to produce a rectified property tax law for all of Washington State.

Get the brain trust to stop their petty and wasteful arguing and start producing answers for the People.

You are confused, as usual.

New concrete street about $2.4 million per lane mile. SWIFT bus line, including all buses, stations, et. al. $1.8 million per mile.

U-Link $600 million per mile. Central Link $160 million per mile.

BRT gets the same “choice riders” as light rail.

Would this be on the November ballot?

The Bus vs Rail debate is not the subject of the article. All modes of travel form the complete transportation policy goals. Good things happen with Bus-Rail integration, also, some land-use elements favor this integration for topographic-problem sites like seattle. SDOT has employed losing strategies of late and historically so the agency isn’t entirely trustworthy.

I missed where the SWIFT line included the costs of highway and road lanes, which would make it closer to comparable to Link. Furthermore, what’s the capacity of a SWIFT “station?” A dozen people or so? Link stations can hold hundreds of people. Again, hardly apples to apples.

Where’s your source about BRT getting the same “choice” riders as light rail? You’re saying that the upcoming BRT to Ballard will attract the same riders as a grade separated, or even mostly ROW-separated line would attract? You’re saying that there won’t be significant numbers of people riding between downtown, Capitol Hill, U-District, Roosevelt, Northgate on Link who didn’t previously ride on the 70-series buses, or the 41, or the 49/43 etc.?

You missed that part where SWIFT did NOT NEED new highway and road lanes? Not necessary. Guess that is too complicated for you?

Are you saying there would not be more people riding buses if they increased the number of buses on popular routes?

When have you ever seen “Hundreds of people” at a Link station? lol There are hundreds, even thousands, of people boarding buses at the same time outside stadiums in Seattle after games.

My source is a national study on BRT vs light rail.

Too busy arguing about potential cost overuns, very important, grumble this that. You’re right though. McGinn has to win his fight against the stupid bore tunnel soon. The city transportation department needs a shakeup on that project whose proponents ignore the incredible risks and poor engineering unjustly.

Grover, are you ten years old? You can’t just ignore valid points and then simplify the problem to a dollar per mile figure and not account for the full price! How about you think about what you are saying and as you say, do the math. Take into account all of the factors, not just the ones that you want to use.

Can’t you think beyond a chart? Do you deny that oil is a limited resource?

Well SWIFT takes away highway capacity from other uses, wears down the surfaces, requiring more maintenance, produces pollution etc. These are costs not factored into your comparison between building a dedicated, mostly grade-separated rail and a BRT “line.” Link wouldn’t be so costly if Sound Transit just took over existing bridges and roadways and laid rail tracks either. It’s more expensive because it adds a lot of new capacity and doesn’t take any away from current uses, which is different than a BRT line. Again, for some places, this is fine. SWIFT closely mirrors the highway. Link doesn’t. It goes to Broadway, it goes to Husky Stadium and Brooklyn Ave. These are not equivalent routes. They have different needs.

Have I seen hundreds of people at a Link station? Sure, after Mariners and Sounders games. I’m sure there’ll be hundreds at future Husky football and basketball games too when U-Link is finished. The loading process on Link under peak conditions is vastly superior to those bus boarding scenarios you describe. Everytime I’ve been on a 70-series bus crammed to capacity, lurching toward the U-District after a big game or event, there’re always people talking about how they can’t wait for U-Link so they can load quickly and be home in 7 minutes instead of several times that time.

As for your national study, I noticed you didn’t provide a link…

we had a plan for grade separated rail, it was called monorail. it got killed. the technology worked, the contract was about 20% over budget, but the finances and agency leadership was a problem. Sadly, the city did not work to get new leaders or improve the finances. Now you say you want rail from UW to Ballard. Grade separated. I assume that means a big light rail elevated over 45th street.

Why wouldn’t putting monorail or elevated light rail in the ST 99 corridor be a better choice?

“Everytime I’ve been on a 70-series bus crammed to capacity, ”

There you go again, proving that buses are extremely popular, since you routinely describe them as “packed.” Why should taxpayers pay hundreds of millions per mile so that those people who now ride buses can change to riding light rail? I’m perfectly happy having them ride buses.

SWIFT takes people out of cars and puts them on buses, thus reducing traffic congestion.

“There you go again, proving that buses are extremely popular, since you routinely describe them as “packed.” Why should taxpayers pay hundreds of millions per mile so that those people who now ride buses can change to riding light rail? I’m perfectly happy having them ride buses.

SWIFT takes people out of cars and puts them on buses, thus reducing traffic congestion. “
Yes, the 70s, the 48, the 43 and the 49, the 41 are all popular routes that are often crammed to capacity. Coincidentally (not really), U-Link and North Link will serve the highest volume points of these routes. When you start having routes in dense, growing areas that are packed, that’s when high capacity rail alternatives start to make sense. Sure you could add more buses, but they’re still stuck in traffic, and your cost per rider will tend to stay roughly flat as you add capacity. For high capacity rail, your cost per rider will drop significantly as ridership scales up to 4-car trains. Just as Portland’s MAX is cheaper per trip than its bus service, as Link matures and grows ridership while its cost stay roughly fixed, its cost per rider will drop well below that of Metro or ST bus service. Thus, ridership will be able to grow along this growing and dense corridor without having to add many more buses and drivers. Remember, one driver can carry 600-800 passengers on a 4-car train, compared to about 70-80 in an articulated bus.
Let me put it this way. If you live in a rural, low density place it may be cheaper to dig a well or transport bottled water from somewhere else for your needs. But what if that area is growing in population and density? At some point the investment in a water system makes sense in cost and convenience in the long run. Building a rail spine in Seattle gives us extra capacity without taking away road space from other uses, it gives residents a reliable, traffic-free option to get around the city, it is significantly faster than buses in dense, urban areas, it is smoother and more predictable in its motions, its marginal costs per additional rider are extremely low compared to buses, and it provides some redundancy when things go wrong. For example, when snow or ice paralyze Seattle roads, light rail keeps on humming. Grade separated rail is something virtually every major city in the industrialized world has added as its density and population starts to grow past a certain point. Seattle is growing denser and more populous. How long do you propose we wait? Until we have Chicago density? Vancouver, BC density? San Francisco density?

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grade separation where? 31 minutes ago in reply to T_Chen

• we had a plan for grade separated rail, it was called monorail. it got killed. the technology worked, the contract was about 20% over budget, but the finances and agency leadership was a problem. Sadly, the city did not work to get new leaders or improve the finances. Now you say you want rail from UW to Ballard. Grade separated. I assume that means a big light rail elevated over 45th street.

Why wouldn’t putting monorail or elevated light rail in the ST 99 corridor be a better choice?
I would just noted that grade separated could mean tunneled or elevated.

Why wouldn’t a monorail or elevated light rail along 99 be a better choice? Well, I’m not an expert on the corridor, but what route are you suggesting? What would be the population centers that route would stop at? Are you talking about a route just within the city from downtown through Queen Anne and then to North Seattle? I don’t know, I guess. I’d have to hear more about your idea before I could tell you if I thought it should be prioritized over a UW-Ballard line.

Route 44 could not handle more buses? There are as many buses on that route now as are possible for the streets to handle? lol It currently operates from 4 to 6 buses per hour. You think they could not easily double the number of buses per hour on this route if the demand were there and they had the money? This is a joke, right?

Roads between downtown, the Rainier Valley and SeaTac already existed before Link was built. Central Link was not necessary.

Can’t you admit that you are lying when you keep writing that the price of gas is “ever-rising”? Do you understand the concept of “real dollars”? In real dollars, the price of gas has not changed much in the last 70 years.

There are a lot of substitutes for gasoline, one of which is natural gas, which is abundant in the U.S. Are you aware that motor vehicles can easily be switched from burning gasoline to burning natural gas?

http://www.nbrti.org/docs/pdf/WestStart_BRT_Ridership_Analysis_Final.pdf

“a significant portion of the
ridership gains made by the 72R came from so-called “choice” riders, those that have
other means for traveling to work but instead choose to take transit. A full 32 percent of
those taking the Rapid bus either traveled by car, by another non-transit form of
transportation, or did not make the trip altogether before Rapid service began.” p. 16

You have no idea what the operating costs or ridership on any future Seattle light rail lines will be. You just make that up, or refer to Sound Transit, which has been way off on their projections for ridershipa and cost of the light rail they have built so far. All you know for sure is that the current light rail costs about twice as much per boarding to operate as the Metro bus routes it replaced.

mature cities have it all: roads, cars, express busses and rail, sometimes useful multiple rail lines. In other cities people use it all, and they are glad to have bus lines on top of rail lines and it all works together. What they do not have is tribal allegience to busses VERSUS rail, or this rail versus that rail, or such a conflict of cars v bikes, the way Seattle has. IF your focus is mobility and good policy, you ask “what is the next chunk of investment return per the cost considering qualitiative values, too” not are cars, busses or rail better in general. If your concern is feeling like part of a group or tribe, or displaying your moral or intellectual superiority over others, you might like to debate modal tribal wars in the abstract. But it doesn’t seem to ever leade to system type thinking; it only seems to lead to “build every road proposed!” or “add every rail line proposed!” or “don’t do that, put SWIFT busses everywhere!” which is really just tribal display and identity, not a policy debate.

Can you build a BRT line that will get me from Westlake to the UW in 6 minutes like light rail will? No.

And I’m glad to see that you’re over here trolling instead of stinking up the Seattle Transit Blog as usual, Norman, err Grover or Copernicus or whatever troll name you’re deciding to use today.

But trains are stuffwhitepeoplelike.com

It *could* be. Honestly, despite concerns about ballot overload and competing measures, I am hopeful we’ll take the time to do it right, and not rush something to the ballot just to have something on the ballot. We just named the committee members – and it’s already January.

There was a recent expert panel report to the state on a state study calling for two express toll lanes in each direction on the Eastside I-405/SR167 corridor. Highlights and a link to the source doc are here: http://bit.ly/eh77ha Details include suggested tolling exemptions (transit and vehicles with 3+ passengers) and finance options for the $1.95B “mega-project.”