BUS CANCELLATIONS: Here’s Metro’s explanation

| Transportation | West Seattle news | West Seattle weather

If you were affected by bus cancellations, announced and unannounced, this afternoon and evening – we asked Metro, and here’s the reply:

Earlier Monday, Metro made changes to its trolley fleet operations as a precaution.

Articulated 60-foot-long buses are the workhorses of Metro’s fleet; however, the 60-foot-long articulated electric trolley buses were temporarily grounded due to the expected inclement weather – a regular measure for Metro with its trolley fleet due to difficulty operating in snow conditions. Some bus trips were temporarily canceled Monday morning and afternoon in order to shift buses to serve those electric trolley routes.

Metro will continue to evaluate when it is safest to return the 60-foot-long articulated electric trolley fleet to service depending on weather conditions in Seattle

That explanation is also included in Metro’s look ahead to more possible snow tonight and tomorrow. We’ll have a wider update later this evening about the overall forecast and how other local agencies are getting ready.

WS December 5, 2016 (6:22 pm)

So essentially west Seattle routes served infrequently are the least important ones for metro to serve., lovely.

WSB December 5, 2016 (6:34 pm)

West Seattle runs were not the only ones canceled, fwiw. See Metro’s twitter feed. http://twitter.com/kcmetrobus
- WS December 5, 2016 (6:59 pm)
  
  Completely understand but the routes they cancelled in west Seattle are mostly ones a with limited runs.

Rick Cook December 5, 2016 (6:43 pm)

Is there a more eloquent way to say they can’t do their job?

A D December 5, 2016 (6:47 pm)

Metro refers to earlier Monday .. What about all of the last minute cancelled stops over the years because there were no drivers. I thought that us what they would address.

Craig December 5, 2016 (7:12 pm)

No drivers available. Might snow today. Skipped your stop because the bus was too full already. All reasons that have good logic behind them, but really hard to build ridership on a transportation system that can’t be relied upon. The results are real people, elderly, hourly wage workers, carless that get penalized by exposure to the weather, docked pay for not being at work, and so on. I’m a fan of metro, but hope they can solve for these gaps in their core competency.

CAM December 5, 2016 (7:37 pm)

I’ve been a daily rider of Metro for over a year. I’m also an experienced user of public transit in other cities and dealing with cities with no viable public transit options. Days like today are frustrating but they happen in every major system. I’d much prefer a bus not run than be on the bus that is sliding down a hill uncontrollably. The solution to this problem is systems of transit that don’t involve use of the roads when conditions are dangerous. This is why lightrail is desperately needed as soon as possible. But yeah, it sucks to stand there and not know when a bus might show up.

Kara December 5, 2016 (8:32 pm)

Thank you Cam for the logic factor! Geez people they are awesome 97% of the time. All I do is bus from the age of 12 to 32. I remember a terrible snow storm years ago and those drivers took 9 hours to get me home. I will never forget the hard work they do and how frustrating it can be for them. The negativity of Seattle is getting ridiculous.

cheese December 5, 2016 (9:15 pm)

i cant see them justifiably raising the fare all the time when either a bus is allways late or the driver is way less then polite to its riders. metro sucks, when i was down in portland they didnt seem to hav this many issues w/ trimet

WestCake December 5, 2016 (9:33 pm)

If Metro knows buses will be pulled from use, can they let riders know ahead of time? I mean we’ve been talking about the snow for how many days now?

JD December 5, 2016 (10:04 pm)

They did. If you subscribe to their alerts, they sent out an email on Sunday and another tonight to let us know the buses would most likely be affected by the weather. Depending on what lines you are subscribed to, they also sent out alerts all day today of specific routes/times that were not going to run.
- WestCake December 5, 2016 (10:54 pm)
  
  The article states there were, “unannounced” cancellations. Is that true?

newnative December 6, 2016 (5:34 am)

saying routes may be affected by weather is completely different from specifying that certain buses will.taken out of use as a precaution. it did not snow enough yesterday to warrant reroutes or chains many buses were cancelled. that is impossible to plan for. how can we advocate bussing to work when Metro does this sort of yhing?

Mary December 6, 2016 (11:47 am)

Metro is already so unreliable for my routes that I used Uber yesterday, worked until 7p.m., and was picked up by spouse post-rush hour. Why unreliable already? Bus no shows and skip stops because then the next bus is full. One day was a 45 minute wait for my 5mile trip downtown. Even the bus apps don’t show when a bus was pulled for that stop. So take Metro in “bad” weather. No way. Uber took 15 mins and when the bus is on time my trip is 45 mins. We pass all those levies, without attracting new riders not forced onto transit use.

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