12:42 PM: Speaking of the West Seattle Water Taxi, just announced at the West Seattle Bridge Community Task Force meeting – it will stay on a 7-day-a-week schedule throughout the upcoming bridgeless winter after all. Until now, plans had been in place to switch the service back to a 5-day-a-week schedule in mid-October. The topic came up at last month’s CTF meeting; city reps said at the time that it would be costly. How costly? We asked Metro afterward; they said it would cost at least a million dollars. We’re still pursuing more specifics but apparently the city found the cash to pay the county to keep the 7-day-a-week service going through the winter.
1:32 PM: SDOT has since sent a news release that has this added information:
Thanks to SDOT funding, Water Taxi service this fall and winter will remain similar to the summer daytime schedule:
*Seven day a week service between Seacrest Park in West Seattle and Pier 50 downtown from approximately 6:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m.
*Ships will leave the dock every 35 minutes during weekday peak commute hours and every hour mid-day, evenings, and weekends.
*The expanded service will not include late night Friday and Saturday sailings after 7:00 p.m.
According to information we had previously obtained from Metro, the estimated cost of keeping the late-night sailings would have been about a third higher:
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