Seattlest Pix 09Nov07
Around the Sound: The Week in News
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Seattlest Pix 09Nov08
Coming home from work on the bus last night, we got to thinking about how even getting to vote on a light-rail package this year is going to be an uphill fight. The dire prospects for light rail anytime soon pushed us to extrapolate the costs to our psyche of waiting during the ride home.
First we had to run a few blocks in the rain to catch the 8. While admittedly, we should have left the office a few minutes earlier, we know from experience that such runs don't happen in cities with real mass rapid transit. In places like New York City and Portland, people just know the next train will be along in a few minutes.
Walking to our seat, we noticed the guy in the picture as he examined a mint-condition Dokken LP which warmed our fast-beating heart. Seeing him love his new purchases was the only moment of the trip that didn't make us yearn for a train to ride. Mostly, because we figured he'd probably have been on the train too.
After the bus inched down a jam-packed Denny Way, we finally made it to Lower Queen Anne where we were forced to hustle to the 33. We don't think we even need to say this but we will: Real mass rapid transit is separated from all the schlubs driving cars so you always know how long it's going to take to get to get to the next stop and make connections easily. Trains don't deal with gridlock.
We made the 33 though and, just like Seattlest Dan's experience, it was packed. We finally got a seat though and settled in for the remainder of the ride when we had our last understanding about why trains are better than buses.
In Seattle, you might have noticed, it's often dark and wet. When you're new to a line, as we are on the 33, it's really hard to identify what stop you've reached. On trains, each station is well lit, marked and announced by a conductor or a robot voice. At the few stops when the driver grumbled into his microphone, we couldn't tell what he was saying.
"How nice," we thought as we paid our fare, "it would be to sit on one of many speedy, quiet trains making our way home."
As we crossed the street, we looked back and noticed the ad on the side of the bus. It was one of those King County Metro ads encouraging people to use mass transit. "Change the World One Commute at a Time," it said. How we wish this city would try harder to change a lot of commutes all at once.
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Oh, if I had a bank of Recommends, Charles, I'd use 10 of them on this post!
We need a city leadership with balls.
I've noticed about half the metro drivers either barely mutter into the mic, or refuse to use it altogether -- as if in some kind of protest. I almost always end up sitting (or standing) up front for this reason.
I hate the dark, new route stop guessing. You always wind up three stops early which is at least half a mile away. And, of course, it's rainy.
I miss even the mass transit system we had in England, and back then everyone bitched about how rubbish it was.. Little did they know! - I would love to have that system here.
The first time I took that 33 I was so confused i got off before Dravus and was trying to get to Emerson. For those unfamiliar with Magnolia (everyone I know) that's a good long walk, in the cold, in the rain. All thanks to non-talking, mumbling drivers.
To top it off, I think metro drivers are supposed to announce all stops because of ADA laws. Makes it even more messed up that they don't if that is true.
I'm pretty fed up with the bus after this morning's commute.
7:25am - Hop on the ALWAYS packed #36 near Amazon.com HQ up on Beacon Hill. How they justify making most #36 runs a single car instead of a double beats the living hell out of me.
7:38am - Get to 5th and Jackson to make my connection to the #256 in the bus tunnel.
7:53am - #256 arrives; 12 minutes late.
8:10am - We get to the convention center stop and a stalled #550 is blocking the exit ramp. A guy is directing busses to an alternate exit from the tunnel. Our driver somehow misses his directions and ends up back in the bus tunnel...going the other freaking direction we just came from. You can't turn around anywhere until the other end. Have to make all the stops still. People start yelling at driver. Fucking awesome.
8:30am - Get back to 5th & Jackson/King St. station stop. Turn around(while getting honked at by another bus for cutting them off). Have to wait 5 minutes with no one in front of us for some reason.
8:55am - Back to convention center and the exit is cleared. Take exit ramp. 1 hour and 17 minutes after entering the tunnel; we are finally leaving.
9:00am - Stuck in traffic pretty much as soon as we get on I-5 north to head to 520.
9:30am - Finally get to my office in Bellevue near 140th and Bell-Red.
I can't wait to see what the ride home holds for me.
I wonder if passing Prop 1 would have helped. I was perfectly happy to get the money and then fight over how much really went to transit, rather than being where we are now - with no transit plan and no funding. We may get one more stop on the light rail courtesy of the feds, but nada across Lake Washington and only one stop north of the Ship Canal for the foreseeable future.
Are there no politicians with both vision and guts in King County? Maybe we should create an incentive for Paul Allen to build the thing. He got his trolley after all.