(WSB photos and video)

By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor

The atmosphere was relentlessly upbeat at tonight’s overflow-crowd West Seattle light-rail forum, organized by King County Councilmember, Sound Transit Board member, and North Delridge resident Teresa Mosqueda as a sequel to the one she presented last November.

Last time, the beef was that there wasn’t enough time for Q&A, so she promised at the outset tonight that her two-hour event would allot fully half the time to that – and that’s exactly what happened.

No major new information was presented, but some takeaways of note did emerge. Mosqueda declared that “this is a critical moment” for the West Seattle light-rail plan, which doesn’t yet have a full-speed-ahead commitment from the ST Board, while ST staff keeps trying to close multi-billion-dollar budget gaps. We recorded the full meeting on video in four sections – here are the introductions, which also included welcomes from Rachel Porter of the West Seattle Chamber of Commerce and Shannon Woodard of DNDA (which owns the venue):

Youngstown Cultural Arts Center brimmed with people – including an overflow area (where Zumba would usually be happening this time). West Seattle Urbanism members were out in force, sitting together in the audience in special T-shirts, holding signs, and spiritedly applauding many of the points made.

Along with Councilmember Mosqueda, other elected officials on hand included Mayor Katie Wilson – who spoke – and City Councilmember Rob Saka – who did not, as well as State Representative Brianna Thomas and School Board president Gina Topp. Mosqueda did much of the talking and had enough ebullience for a trainload of supporters, stressing that the West Seattle project is “shovel ready” (that was explained later) and recapping some points of ST’s latest proposal, as well as two things she hopes to get the agency to do – give displaced businesses the right of first refusal for the new spaces in stations on their old sites, and partly offset their rent before they have to vacate, so they can stay as long as possible. Meantime, she handed the mic to Mayor Wilson, who’s also a new ST Board member, and spoke enthusiastically of ST’s big event last Saturday, opening the cross-Lake Washington line, and elaborated on the “shovel-ready” term, saying she expects “shovels in the ground this year.”

Mayor Wilson said West Seattle light rail is a “historic opportunity we need to seize.” She expressed confidence that the ST Board would come up with a plan to deliver light rail, and vowed that as a “lifelong transit rider and longtime transit organizer,” she would ensure it happens. She wasn’t around for questions later because she left after speaking, saying her “little orange tornado” – aka daughter, who had accompanied her – had to get to bed.

Councilmember Mosqueda then introduced the Sound Transit team – CEO Dow Constantine (who noted he started the job almost exactly a year ago) and executives Brad Owen and Jason Hampton.

Constantine, like Wilson, noted the cross-lake service launch and said the fulfillment of a decades-long dream was proof “we have the expertise, creativity, resolve,” to get ST3 done. And he specifically promised: “We will get to Tacoma, we will get to Everett, we will get to Issaquah and other points on the Eastside, believe me, we will get to Ballard, and we are going to get to West Seattle. It won’t be easy – nothing worth doing ever is.” The latter declarations were tonight’s only allusions to potential “approaches” shown to the board during its recent retreat, potentially cutting out Ballard and in one case deferring West Seattle. The “approaches” weren’t mentioned in the presentation by Owen and Hampton at all:

What they did focus on, as the video shows, is the proposal we reported three weeks ago, when it was first presented to an ST Board committee – dropping the Avalon station, shifting part of the Delridge alignment north and relocating the tunnel portal, and shrinking the Junction station.

This is all part of a plan that could cut the cost by up to two and a half billion dollars.

Some of the notable points:

-The presentation (here’s the full slide deck) included a look at the rendering of the new cross-Duwamish bridge that would be built for light rail – which they also noted would not put any supports in the water.

-Not only would the Junction station be shallower (35 feet instead of up to 70), the Delridge station would be “brought up” so escalators and stairs would be shorter

-They’d said previously that dropping the Avalon station would have little impact on ridership; tonight, we learned how little – 200 riders

-The “crossover” area that would be dropped from the Junction plan would have been up to 130 feet deep

-The new plan “does not preclude extending (light rail) to the south

“We believe there’s a lot of opportunity,” they concluded.

Then, the hour of Q&A, with some comments thrown in:

First and most recognizably was Chris Mackay of the West Seattle Junction Association, saying that while it’s not perfect, this just needs to get done.

Takeaways (including some clarifications, and some reiterations of long-made points) from the rest of Q&A

*No, WS is not a dead end – it will connect to the “spine” and take people all the way to the Everett end eventually

*How does projected ridership compare to the rest of the system? The ST execs said they didn’t have comparison numbers but Delridge was projected around 5,800 daily and The Junction aroud 7,600, while SODO would be an increasingly important transfer spot.

*It was clarified that no grocery stores will be affected by the revamped Junction plan

*The fact that Jefferson Square will be spared – yes, even Nikko Teriyaki! – was reiterated

*This has been said time and again but it was said again tonight – Metro won’t change bus routing until Ballard light rail opens, so the downtown lines will remain in service at least until then (separate from the “approaches,” Ballard still is officially expected to be running in 2039).

Two Metro reps indicated extensive planning continues for bus routes’ future

*Speaking of buses, someone asked, how many light rail riders would have been bus riders instead? The ST duo didn’t really have an answer for that.

*They’re expecting “lots of good union jobs” in constructing the West Seattle Link Extension, confirmed Katie Garrow of MLK Labor, who had spoken briefly earlier in the evening. And she and Councilmember Mosqueda promised those would be available widely.

*What does “shovel-ready” really mean? Owen replied that it means early work paving the way for construction – first acquiring needed property, then drlling test holes, and working with SDOT to see what could be done in the right of way. “It’s not like we hit the ground running and the whole area’s torn up on day one.” A bit later, he said they’re working on contracts now so that if and when the official green light is given, they’d be ready to “push them out” and start getting contractors on board.

*Couldn’t the second downtown tunnel be dropped to save billions? Owen said it would be “incredibly complicated” to try to operate the expanded system without a secod tunnel.

*Would both West Seattle stations open at the same time? Yes.

*Will special efforts be made to ensure people from Alki and Beach Drive can get to Link, since they’ve lost bus service over the years? The Metro team said there’s an effort under way to study long-suspended service, and that there would be community involvement.

One of the last questions – when will a decision be made? End of the second quarter, Owen said. Mosqueda, though, said she hoped sooner, like May.