Seattle commuter rail's challenges

[CHamilton]

A nice summation of the problems facing the Seattle region's Sounder commuter service. Despite the title, mudslides are just the beginning.

How Do Mudslides Affect Sounder North’s Low Ridership?

 

[fairviewroad]

A nice summation of the problems facing the Seattle region's Sounder commuter service. Despite the title, mudslides are just the beginning.

How Do Mudslides Affect Sounder North's Low Ridership?

Yes, the limited schedule also hurts. And counterintuitively, so does the limited parking (i.e. the trains are "empty" but the parking lots are "full"...obviously

the planning folks were wildly optimistic about the # of people who would carpool or walk to the stations.)

Syncing up the ferry and train schedules seems like a no-brainer. Why isn't it like that already?

Would running the trains further north to Marysville, Stanwood and Mt. Vernon make any sense? Is that even feasible?

 

[George Harris]

For the most part mud slides are preventable. Sometimes the prevention is not cheap, but there are also relatively low cost methods that can eleminate a lot of the small scale slides. It seems that these issues are being treated as if they were the result of unstoppable force of nature, and this is simply not true. Unfortunately, there tends to be a lot of armwaving by a lot of "environmentalists" when anything other than let the hillside collapse in proposed. There are however quite a few methods that are not as disruptive or ugly in the mind of the beholders as high retaining walls which should be able to get past the objections once the outcome is understood.

 

[CHamilton]

It's my understanding that the technical reasons for the mudslides, and the best remediation for them, are well-known and -understood. A lot of the problem stems from property owners who have been cutting down trees on the bluffs overlooking the tracks in order to improve their views.

So there are arguments between the state, BNSF, and the property owners as to who is going to pay for what. Meanwhile, BNSF uses their "any mud puddle on the tracks and we close down all passenger service for 48 hours" rule as a bargaining chip. The state did get some federal money to study the problem some more, but no one wants to step up and pay for actually fixing it. But can you imagine the outcry if I-5 was closed for two days in similar circumstances?

 

[CHamilton]

The Seattle Times on Sounder light rail: "Fix it"

Sounder North: No way to run a commuter line

Better scheduling and more parking spaces are huge, but the primary reason commuters would not and do not ride the northern line is reliability.

Sounder North is a beautiful ride, but Lindblom reports that mudslides along the scenic path canceled 70 train runs last year and 41 this year.

Commuters have every reason to flee to a more predictable bus ride, or drive. And they do. Getting to work cannot be a roll of the dice.