In Snowy Seattle, Rail Rides You

As we were delivering people to the airport on Monday morning--by the power of Subaru!--one of our passengers glanced up at the light rail line under construction and said, "This ought to be the last winter you have to shuttle people to the airport." Which we were pleased about. But then we got to thinking.

During the snow, Amtrak canceled service. A Sounder train couldn't make it from Seattle to Tacoma. And the South Lake Union Streetcar shut down. The thing goes, what, a dozen blocks?

Ah, the reliability of rail. Seattle can't get that right, either.

The Orange Panther? was lurking in the Seattlest Flickr pool, caught by Seattle Daily Photo.

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By MvB in Miscellaneous on December 23, 2008 4:00 PM

Comments [rss]

Troy Morris

Um... hurray?

Doesn't this just lend more credibility to the idea our city has it's head up it's own ass?

Top down, I'm sure.

11/09.

It's coming.

Matt G1

Well, I sent an e-mail to SDOT about this about a half hour ago and they immediately added a note to the streetcar website in bold letters. They may not be proactive, but at least they're responsive.

bigyaz

Streetcar status is on Metro's site showing all the suspended routes: http://metro.kingcounty.gov/up/rr/adverseweather.html

Matt G1

True, but to be fair Seattle doesn't operate the streetcar - King County does (who does list it being down on their website). I agree the shutdown should appear in bold letters on the streetcar website, though it seems like the site was meant more as an advertising campaign than an agency website (I'm not even sure who runs it - SDOT?).

zagreusmd

OK, fine: three cheers for NextBus.org for providing accurate SLUT status. But how about seattlestreetcar.org, the allegedly official site for the SLUT? Nary a word.

Outsourcing your system status reports to a third-party, commercial site that's only tenuously linked from your own site? Not such a good idea.

Troy Morris

ANGER!

Matt G1

The SLUT saved me a good 20 minutes walking on Thursday, when the bus system was a mess. And it's free until December 26. It's just too bad they didn't spend the money on heated switches, which predictably froze on Friday.

[zagre] It was running fine and on time up until Friday. If you check the web page that tells you exactly when the next SLUT will come, it tells you that it's out of service.

zagreusmd

After the first big snow I went to the SLUT website to see if they were still in service, check weather advisories, etc. Nothing. Not a single word. They have a "news" page on that site that hasn't been updated since December 11, 2007.

A couple days ago I was walking to Whole Foods and saw the SLUT tracks, which are completely buried in ice and snow. I wouldn't expect the trains to start running again until pretty much everything has melted away. Good to know that the mayor's pet transportation project makes no attempt whatsoever to operate in bad weather.

Amy

The SLUT isn't running either! The one time I actually tried to ride the damn thing. The one time it might be a usually complement to our sorry bus service.

Yuppers

Yeah, Seattle just sucks. Can't do anything right.

Oh, wait... Amtrak sucks everywhere, and strands people in Chicago (not unlike Greyhound did here). http://consumerist.com/5117225/amtrak-strands-passengers-without-food-water-toilets

Guess it sucks to be everywhere.