WEST SEATTLE LIGHT RAIL: City Council Transportation Committee gets briefed before ‘transit way’ votes

| Sound Transit | West Seattle news

(Full Seattle Channel video of this morning’s meeting)
Though the price-tag problem remains unresolved, planning for West Seattle’s Sound Transit light-rail project proceeds, and the City Council’s Transportation Committee got a status report of sorts this morning.

The city has to give its official blessing to the project’s current designated route, including “transit way” rights for Sound Transit to use it, and this briefing was the first step toward future committee and full-council votes granting those rights. (Just rights, not possession, it was made clear.)

The first “transit way” rights were granted in 2000, it was explained, and this will be the fourth time the agreement has been changed.) Here’s the full slide deck from the briefing, which included – in case you’ve forgotten or are just catching up – succinct descriptions of each segment of the West Seattle Link Extension, still projected to start running in 2032.

Two numbers of interest – Sound Transit says they’re currently projecting the West Seattle extension (SODO to The Junction) will force 150 residential households and 130 businesses to move. But they insist they’re trying to find ways to lower those numbers in the final design, which they said they’re starting on “soon.”

And what about that price tag, last estimated around $7 billion? “We do have significant cost pressures on all our projects,” the ST team acknowledged. “That’s a risk.”

District 1 Councilmember Rob Saka, who chairs the committee, asked when the agency might decide on scoping changes required by those pressures. The ST team said they’ll be talking about it at next week’s board meeting (Thursday, June 26) but not expecting any changes in the “near term.”

No vote followed today’s briefing – that’s expected to happen at committee and full-council meetings in July. (Other related documents are linked from the agenda for this morning’s meeting, including the resolutions that would put the city’s “approval” of the plan on the record too.)

EVGuy June 17, 2025 (2:01 pm)

We just had to raise taxes across the state and still haven’t fully funded education, but SDOT wants to spend $7B for a 3 mile track.

WSB June 17, 2025 (2:14 pm)

This is not an SDOT project. It’s Sound Transit, a regional aency. And this extension is 4 miles.
- Brandon June 17, 2025 (2:37 pm)
  
  Yeah EVGUY, this is another tax that is wasted. Get your agencies right.
  - Jay June 17, 2025 (3:38 pm)
    
    A huge portion of the waste comes from obstruction. NIMBYs, grifters, and greedy municipalities (like Mercer Island). I know some people on this project personally and they aren’t the demons that obstructionists portray them as.
walkerws June 17, 2025 (3:29 pm)

This is a connection to a regional transit system. Calling it a three mile track is disingenuous and you know it.
- EVGuy June 17, 2025 (10:14 pm)
  
  It’s a three mile track, whether it connects to regional transit or not. That is part of the problem, you can’t ride this to Kirkland, you ride it to downtown then get off and get on another train. Seven billion could buy how many buses? They also can take you three miles and kick you to another transfer. For seven billion we could probably afford a thousand buses. Think about it – no traffic, because the entire route is filled with buses. They’d come immediately after one left, you’d never have to wait, and would provide way way more jobs.Or, we could just buy ten more buses, and accomplish the same thing. Maybe take, oh I don’t know, a hundred million and make the buses more secure so people actually want to ride them. Problem solved, no need to spend more than a literal aircraft carrier.
- Ex-Westwood Resident June 18, 2025 (8:44 am)
  
  No, it is NOT a “connection” it is a separate line that ends in a station where you have to transfer to a different “train” to continue.
  - BlairJ June 18, 2025 (9:52 am)
    
    … until the extension toward Ballard opens, at which time the West Seattle Line will go all the way to Lynnwood, and eventually to Everett.
  - Jake June 18, 2025 (10:53 am)
    
    Not forever. And transferring is fine. Whatever doesn’t compete with cars for lanes and is not a bus is good with me.
  - T June 19, 2025 (9:15 am)
    
    All the complaints about having to transfer are clearly from people who don’t use transit. It’s really not that difficult/inconvenient.

Jeff B. June 17, 2025 (2:53 pm)

tRump is not going to let federal funding support this project in Seattle so tack on another 4 years before they can even start to consider building. By then the cost will be over 10 billion and I think at that point, people will come to their senses that this is a train to SODO that costs way too much money, and the environmental harm is irrevocable.

North Admiral Cyclist June 17, 2025 (2:58 pm)

Glad to see this moving forward. West Seattle would have had an operating monorail by now save Sound Transit leading the charge to kill that project 20 years ago. So at least we will finally get light rail. Anyone that must travel around the Seattle region realizes that a car no longer works. Between never-ending freeway construction and sports events, etc., just to check on or visit family on weekends takes hours if you need to drive to the East Side or North Seattle.

My two cents June 17, 2025 (4:27 pm)

The monorail? The 2000 era ‘ gondola’ ….
EVGuy June 17, 2025 (10:16 pm)

Sure, so you wait 20 minutes for the light rail, ride it 20 minutes, get off downtown, wait another 20 minutes for the next one, and maybe in an hour you’ll have managed to go 10 miles. Totally beats the car right? Right?Seven. Billion. Dollars.
Canton June 18, 2025 (7:34 am)

“Anyone that must travel around the Seattle region realizes that a car no longer works”… 🤔😁😅😂🤣… No they don’t,… But nice try.
bill June 18, 2025 (8:27 am)

The monorail was undone by voter frustration with well-meaning but naïve, unprofessional leadership.

Cheery June 17, 2025 (3:05 pm)

Shout out to our airport shuttle smashing pre pandemic ridership numbers last month 💪Always been seeing the trains busy the whole way from UDistrict to Columbia City.

WSEvironmentalist June 17, 2025 (4:15 pm)

My question: How is Light Rail going to cross the Duwamish? It’s a Superfund site so no dredging or deep construction without a big deal EPA review and permit. I have asked this question a number of times but never get an answer. Did WA State buy the railroad bridge?

Cheery June 17, 2025 (5:52 pm)

Section 5.4.13 in the final EIS covers it. Looks like they’re going to clean the sites where they’ll be constructing, so a bonus reason to build! (also likely a cost contributor, but definitely something that needs to be done)
Platypus June 18, 2025 (8:01 am)

wsenvironmentalist, they are going to build a new separate bridge right next to west seattle bridge. https://seattletransitblog.com/2024/08/15/first-look-at-wsles-high-bridge/I personally love it and cant wait.

Meeee June 17, 2025 (4:40 pm)

High costs are also due to oversized and too deep underground stations.This interesting OP-ED in The Urbanist explains this Sound Transit phenomenon and directly points out the West Seattle station as an example.Op-Ed: Shrinking Sound Transit’s Oversized Stations Could Save Hundreds of Millions

JC June 18, 2025 (7:07 am)

Thanks for linking that article, that’s a great explainer. I really wish US transit agencies as a whole would do more of this kind of international best-practice analysis- encouraging to see that MTA might be going in that direction. Trevor Reed, the author is a great transit advocate. Here’s another excellent piece by him that I really liked on state-level reforms needed for sound transit to do its job: https://www.theurbanist.org/2024/12/10/op-ed-state-must-reform-sound-transit/(As always, transit nerds and policy wonks are hard at work looking for solutions while NIMBYs yell and complain…)

Uh, Mike June 17, 2025 (5:15 pm)

They’ll discover the accursed bridge will not support light rail.It almost collapsed under road traffic.

WSB June 17, 2025 (6:03 pm)

The plan has always called for a new, separate, light-rail-only bridge, not to add it to the current one.
Seth June 17, 2025 (9:43 pm)

Just goes to show that most who oppose the bridge haven’t even really understood the project.
- Foop June 17, 2025 (11:05 pm)
  
  Yeah this is low effort trolling. Big “I voted for rob Saka because I never listened to a word he actually said” energy.

Derek June 17, 2025 (8:11 pm)

We need light rail now. NIMBYs be damned.

Scarlett June 18, 2025 (9:56 am)

Like most things in life, there is no end to the fantasies that people will tell themselves in order to justify what they want at whatever the cost (usually to others, though.) And, if you’re curious, this streak of irrationality and selfishness seems to be evenly sprinkled on both sides of the political spectrum.

98126res June 18, 2025 (10:05 am)

Please stop. Not a foot of this link’s track has been laid yet, nor the anticipated 150 residential homes and 130 businesses been forced to move yet. Rethinkthelink.org. Yes Rethink This $8 billion (so far) unnecessary link. There are peaceful not destructive no build options not fully explored and tried.

WSEvrionmentalist June 18, 2025 (10:29 am)

To all bridge replies: Thanks, but these still do not answer my question. The old railroad bridge is pretty close to the WS Bridge. Have we gained the rights to the RR bridge? The WS Bridge was built with the huge elevation because the old WS bridge was a draw (bascule) bridge. The replacement bridge was built in its current style at the request of the shipping industry and US Coast Guard in order to expedite passage. However, we still have the old turnstile low bridge and the 1st Ave draw bridge. I point this out as obvious misguided thinking. The current WS Bridge was 1) built before the Superfund designation and 2) built with enormous design flaws. I’m not a nay sayer, I am only asking what the plan is. The only plan cannot be just a dedicated bridge for Light Rail. And when will the WS and Federal EPAs begin the testing of the sediment? Personally, I think that immediately after the City signs off, the next step is soil sampling with a plan for mitigation. Without it, the WS LR extension could be the “ramps to nowhere”, built in the 60s and finally torn down in 2024. A newer example is the First Ave trolley system that had to be scrapped because the City bought trolly cars that do not fit the tracks nor to the cars fit inside the maintenance barns. These are the types of regularly reoccurring errors made mostly in Seattle but throughout WA State. Someone mentioned the monorail project. Do you know why it was killed after 12+ years of talking, collecting taxes to pay for it, and property condemnation? Not because WS did not want it. It was due to cost overruns amping the price tag up to ….$44 billion. It was killed in 2004/5 and Seattle still has not resolved issues from that colossal error. So, how is Light Rail going to cross the Duwamish?

CARGUY June 18, 2025 (11:48 am)

@WSEVIRONMETALIST – Check out the WSLE Record of Decision release on 4/29, it outlines all of the EPA recommendations regarding the new bridge and the LDW Superfund site. Appendix C Pg. 2 – This might answer some of your questions and concerns regarding a new bridge in this area. If anything it shows that they are thinking about it.https://www.soundtransit.org/sites/default/files/documents/WSLE-Record-of-Decision.pdf
WSEnvironmentalist June 18, 2025 (5:20 pm)

Thank you! Thinking about the impact is great. Dealing with sediments needs to be actual not ideological. The final cleanup of the Duwamish finally began last year, 2024, after a decade of planning. It’s expected to cost $400 million and take approximately 10 years to complete. Is Light Rail planning to be a participant? All of the arsenic, lead and heavy metals have to be dredged and removed with Harbor Island as the last location for cleanup. In the mean time, Light Rail is planning to build a bridge right in the midst of the cleanup operation. Seems so Seattlesque to me. And EPA recommendations are not the same as permits. We’ll see. As you wrote, at least Light Rail is thinking about it. My guess is that we may have a link here by 2038 – 40 but at what financial and environmental costs?
- Jake June 18, 2025 (9:45 pm)
  
  Are these types of concerns ever overly criticized when 405 or developers cut into mouintains near rivers and creeks around Renton, Issaquah, etc etc.? Why the hyperfocus on a much needed dense rail bridge? We are doing more than enough.
  - WSEnvironmentalist June 19, 2025 (12:56 pm)
    
    Jake: Are you familiar with the history of the Duwamish? Do you know how polluted a site must be in order to be designated a “Superfund” and the criteria for not disturbing the sentiments of the site? I 405 was built 5 decades ago. I 90 in the 1960s. The “new” I 90 bridge was built in the 1980s for many reasons including an overhead sign that broke loose during a bridge accident, sliced through the cab of a truck and decapitated the 2 occupants. We have come a long way in recognizing the impact of projects on the people and the environment. What was OK half a century ago, in the 20th Century, is no longer safe or OK now.

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