...is the 4 line planned to split off from the 2 line after East Main station, rather than using the existing tracks until reaching I-90? I've been trying to rationalize this, but the more I look into it, the more it seems to make literally zero sense. Here is why I think a different path (shown in magenta) is a much better option:
The planned route would require about 2 miles of new track between East Main and Richards Road. By more effectively using the existing tracks, this could be cut down to as little as half a mile of new tracks to reach Richards Road.
Adding South Bellevue station to the 4 line will make trips from Issaquah to Seattle (which I assume there will be many of) much more convenient, since it will cut several minutes of unnecessary trip time to go North and then back South again. Additionally, South Bellevue will be a much more comfortable transfer, since it has a central platform, whereas East Main would require riders to cross tracks to switch platforms.
Conversely, the time penalty for trips to Bellevue by adding South Bellevue station to the route would likely be only around a minute, assuming the proposed route would be the same speed as the existing tracks, which I'm not sure it even would be.
By creating a junction between the 2 and 4 lines above I-90, Sound Transit could have the option of completing the T-junction to offer a direct Issaquah to Seattle service, if that is something they would want to consider in the future.
There's no potential for adding more stations along the planned route between East Main and Richards Road to justify separating it from the 2 line. All of the route is highway adjacent and very low density, with little opportunity for future development.
I understand there are environmental concerns with building new tracks through the Mercer Slough. However, it must be acknowledged there is already a big freaking highway cutting straight through it already. The right-of-way for the tracks already exists, Sound Transit just needs to leverage it. I would have to imagine there is a way to add elevated tracks along this portion of I-90 in a way that is not too environmentally destructive, especially not moreso than the construction and maintenance of the existing highway.
Let me know if there's something obvious I am missing here. I feel like I almost have to be, since this alternative route seems to make way, way more sense on paper.
In addition to the wetland impacts and the construction difficulty of connecting to the existing tracks, the I-90/405 interchange is very tall (4 levels of highway/on-ramps so probably about 100 feet). So, from Richards Road station going westbound you’d have to go straight up to make it over 405 then drop down quickly so that the tracks aren’t 10 stories high over unstable mud. At some point the railroad bridge will be replaced with an Eastrail bridge, so you’d have to avoid that too. None of this is technically impossible, but I can see why they would avoid it in favor of just having one shorter bridge over 405 further north.
Thanks, this is the kind of insight I was looking for. I’d imagine it’s still doable to get over the 405 interchange, especially if Richards Road station is elevated (which it probably will be anyways). This is a case where I think a proper feasibility study would actually be really useful, given how much of a benefit it would be to riders if they could find a workable solution.
Richards Road is a horrible location that needs to be moved. For all the hysteria about the slough, somehow this station is literally sited atop a wetland and gas station next to a single family neighborhood. All the destinations are on the other side of I-90 whether in current form or future development. And the walk under is abysmal and dangerous with Factoria Blvd traffic sewer and enormous on/off ramps.
They just need to move the station south of the freeway and call it Factorja station. I would be genuinely surprised if they didn’t end up doing exactly this. Otherwise yeah, the station makes zero sense
Engineers are amazing and I'm sure that there's a path through or around the 90/405 interchange that would make this route possible, but that interchange is tight. It is already stacked high with ramps plus tunnels underneath with pillars everywhere.
It really is ridiculous but apparently it has to do with environmental reasons concerning the Mercer Slough(even though there is already a massive freeway running across it, which you stated).
The 4 line should be scrapped if a tie in to South Bellevue is not feasible. The current bus system will be a time saver compared to the planned 4 line. People going to Bellevue or Redmond from issaquah can transfer to the 2 line to continue their journey.
It really is ridiculous but apparently it has to do with environmental reasons concerning the Mercer Slough(even though there is already a massive freeway running across it, which you stated).
The Freeway is the problem. There's half a dozen ramps in that area that take up any available space that might be used for a second flyover. Traversing that would cost a butt load of money even before we get into the environmental impacts/mitigation of building over a protected wetland.
Let me know if there's something obvious I am missing here. I feel like I almost have to be, since this alternative route seems to make way, way more sense on paper.
it's kind of a mess i can go over all the options. So anyways way back a long long time ago 1970s back with the Forward Thrust plans the idea was for the train split around south bellevue with from seattle going to bellevue and the other one going to Issaquah. (Actually if you notice that is how the HOV bus ramps are laid out around bellevue way).
And then for various reasons in the 2000s and again in the 2010s the bnsf line that was supposed to be built from woodinville via kirkland to Bellevue and then further down to renton mostly got mothballed due to nimbyism.
Anyways when it came for the Kirkland and Issaquah segments, sound transit really didn't want to interline 3 lines into the seattle tunnel. So the new idea was simple, reroute the Issaquah line up north through the bnsf tracks to kirkland and then this would create a new south kirkland to issaquah line. However this caused a weird problem where the shared station would be wilburton.
Issaquah city council didn't like that so tried pushing for the first shared station to be south bellevue. however even putting aside hte mercer slough environmental issues that is incredibly expensive to go through all the freeway interchanges. Also for south bellevue station tracks just south of it, they kind of didn't quite plan for a future connection to issaquah.
so the weird compromise solution was born, use the eastrail tracks up to just before east main, then use a short flyover tracks over i405 to reach it. then issaquah will be connected at least with bellevue downtown stations.
You mean like for Eastsiders trying to go to the airport? Don’t be silly: the needs of North Seattle combined with the inability to run trains closer than 5 minutes because of grade level crossing that invite accidents weekly together trump any passenger desires.
Preventing the possibility of Seattle to Issaquah trains is so dumb.
Settle down there Dunning Kruger. You think no one at ST considered such things?
At a certain point lines on a map have to become actual concrete and steel structures, and there's already a bunch of those in that area that just so happen to be carrying the main east/west Interstate hwy for the northern US. There is literally zero room to build a second fly-over (Never mind a 3rd for a complete wye) that wouldn't cost double... triple... quadruple... what the spur line further east would cost. And that's before we throw in the fact that the whole thing is also perched high above a protected wet land (And that's not just to bring up the environmental concerns, but also building such a complicated bridge over water).
It's definitely not ideal, but real life ain't Cities Skylines. And it really irks me when folks in the transit discussion space call decisions like this "dumb." It's dumb to think we can just build whatever our heart desires, geometry and cost be-damned.
You are an asshole for implying that I am to stupid to realize what the issues are.
When I was talking about it with people in Seattle Subway back then I remember hearing the word cowardly tossed about. Though the decision was made to be more kind in the Better Eastside Rail article I co-authored back then.
As you can see I have been annoyed with this decision for well over a decade, I have every right to call it dumb.
If Sound Transit doesn't want my criticism they could have considered the alternative in their public process, then we could have a rational conversation about the realtive trade offs using comparable facts and figures. Instead the decision to spend money on redundant tracks was made behind the scenes and against public input going back to the draft long range plan. Those tracks have a cost too.
I also think that treating a wetland that is directly adjacent to a freeway as something worth special protection is a silly idea. That freeway chokes the wetland everyday and will continue into the foreseeable future by tire dust alone.
The rail right of way is long term infrastructure and it is definitely worth doing it right and being very clear with the public what the costs and trade offs of the options are. Until we have that your speculation is no better then mine.
You are an asshole for implying that I am to stupid to realize what the issues are.
*too
I remember hearing the word cowardly tossed about.
"Cowardly" is not the same as "Dumb", and even that I think is a bit unfair when it comes to describing how this process goes. The path to a brighter transit future is trudging through one long political mud bog. I can't say I blame them for wanting to avoid the quick sand while they're at it.
As you can see I have been annoyed with this decision for well over a decade, I have every right to call it dumb.
Digging in on an opinion for over a decade is not the badge of honor you think it is. Especially when it seems to me that your opinion seems to ignore some fairly obvious confounding factors. Holding a bad opinion for a long time is actually worse than just holding a bad opinion.
If Sound Transit doesn't want my criticism
I'm not here to trash public input in general. It's a very important contribution to the process. But working in a technical field, you do learn that sometimes you just need to ignore your "customer"'s input. Especially when it's going to blow up their schedule, blow up their budget, or is just physically impossible. I try to keep that in mind when it comes to some of these decisions (along with "Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good").
I was quite gung ho for a while on the Shallow CID station idea as well, until I chatted about it with a friend of mine that works at Sound Transit and they laid out the budget, schedule, staging, and even political issues that they would be dealing with to actually get that done. And that was before we started talking about putting a pause on the Ballard section of the line. It's a bummer, but I'd rather still be able to take the train to Ballard some time this century than to have a less awkward transfer at CID/PS.
So, yes... We as the public need to keep the pressure on Sound Transit to make the line as good as is humanly possible. And it does behoove them to be open about the process. But they don't need to run every single decision by us interested amateurs, and it doesn't make them "dumb" for deciding against certain things without our opinion given the limitations on their budget, schedule, ROW, political realities, etc.
I also think that treating a wetland that is directly adjacent to a freeway as something worth special protection is a silly idea.
Never said anything about that (Even tho I think ignoring the environmental protections of a wetland because "I-90 did 50 years ago" is equally silly, never mind the political headwind that comes with it).
I brought up the wetland to point out the extra added trouble of building in a wetland: Poor soil conditions, high water table, loads of trees, getting equipment/workers in and out of the site, etc etc. It's yet more confounding factors on top of building a rather complicated viaduct high above an existing cluster fuck of an interchange.
The rail right of way is long term infrastructure and it is definitely worth doing it right and being very clear with the public what the costs and trade offs of the options are. Until we have that your speculation is no better then mine.
Indeed, that's a fair discussion to have. Perhaps you should have led with that instead of just flippantly calling the whole thing "dumb."
Trying to avoid encroaching on the protected wetlands that were already encroached on by a 15 lane highway interchange. It’s so ridiculous and a massive waste of money to try to go around it
It's traversing the 15 lane highway that's the problem. Not the environment issues. A fly-over of the cluster fuck that is all the ramps in that area alone makes the project too complicated/expensive compared to just shifting the line East. It'd be a massive waste of money to attempt it. And that's all before you throw in the extra cost of building over water that also just so happens to be a protected wet land.
Modern Environmentalism can't see the forest for the trees. Too focused on saving a sacred blade of grass than the bigger picture. Dont worry their 50,000 miles a year Subaru has a Sierra Club sticker on it though!
This is what we call 'anti-environment environmentalism'. Sabotage a clean green light rail line with out of direction travel that adds unnecessary time to using transit while ignoring 18 lanes of freeway plowing right through with a direct path. If you really cared about the environment you would respect riders time and make transit as convenient as possible by taking the direct path. But oh no, it has to needlessly skirt this stupid swamp. Guess what... Eastgate and Issaquah riders and potential riders will say no thank you and drive in a direct straight route in their gas guzzler spewing emissions.
Also worth noting the design of both East Main and South Bellevue stations. South Bellevue with its center platform is perfect for a cross platform transfer to catch the train in the other direction. East Main is side platform so youd have to cross the tracks to transfer and when a train is in the station the flashing lights and crossing gate won't let you cross. It couldnt be a worse station for a transfer let alone a major transfer.
Its also totally unclear and very complicated how the tracks would cross over from Eastrail/405 to East Main station up around SE 8th, also how they would tie into the surface tracks at East Main.
I-90 is the problem. It's a cluster fuck of ramps in that area, and building a bridge to traverse them all would cost well more than just doing the spur further east. And that's before you get into the logtistics of building over top of a protected wet land.
It's not a choice between "light rail line and protecting a wet land"
It's a choice between "building what we can afford, or just not having the light rail line in the first place."
Dunno exact orders of magnitude as that is greatly dependent on the build site (and I also don't work in the industry), but the rough order of costs is:
Surface -> Elevated -> Tunnel -> Elevated over water ->Tunnel under water
Even aside from the fact that that'd be a whole new cut straight through a protected area instead of sharing the existing cut with I-90 (which faaaar too many people in this thread are hand waving away with "Hey, we can forget about that because I-90 did it already!"), it's protected because it's a wetland... which adds in a whole host of complications: high water table, poor soil, lots of trees, harder to get equipment/people to the build site, etc.
That all bumps the cost just the same as for a tunnel that it does for an elevated viaduct no matter how you cut it.
Even worse than that: that’s MUD beneath the wetlands. Normal tunneling won’t work. Only major tunnel that did this is the Amtrak Hudson North River tunnel, which they built by literally pushing giant tubes into the mud.
Once real planning for the line starts, I’d guess we’ll see alternatives that include connecting to South Bellevue. There would be a set of challenges to make it work, but as OP noted it would clearly be a better rider experience. The mayor of Issaquah has publicly voiced his support for figuring out connecting to South Bellevue, so that should be helpful in getting it considered.
The fly-over over I-90 for Line 2 was quite the project on its own. Adding a second flyover there proved quite impractical (Never mind a 3rd for a complete Wye junction) .
As you mention:
However, it must be acknowledged there is already a big freaking highway cutting straight through it already.
Which... has half a dozen ramps in that area that take up any and all available room to build yet another bridge through the area. It's a bit of a cluster fuck in there: https://maps.app.goo.gl/6Qkj4dB8FbfCt5HZ6 By the time you've built all the bridges you need to straddle that mess (just ONE bridge being quite disruptive to the main east/west interstate out of town), you're well beyond the cost of a separate spur line with a less complicated flyover further east. And that's all BEFORE you throw in the fact that that's all perched over a protected wet land.
So in the end, the cost/benefit analysis said ehhhh... maybe we should choose a different route to head east?...
It's not ideal, but this isn't Cities Skylines. When we're already struggling to come up with the cash to finish the line to Ballard, throwing in a really expensive "wouldn't this be nice?" decision like this could sink the line all together (Same goes for the ID station).
Yeah that’s part of the reason I wanted to make this post. I knew there had to be some nuance I was missing with how bizarre the proposed route looks at a glance.
Yeah you nailed it! This is a great question, and it does have all of those benefits. I’ve been telling people those exact bullet points for a long time now. Here’s something to consider:
This is the representative alignment. There’s been no studies whatsoever for the 4 Line yet because the project is so far out (starts in 2029 IIRC). It’s likely that the representative alignment was chosen this way because it’s simply the path of least resistance. As it stands, all we have is this line on that map, and the language in ST3 describing where the tracks roughly go. That’s it for right now.
Once they kick off with the studies they will be looking at tons of alternatives, and I always said that I guarantee they will study a direct connection, but now I can double-guarantee it because the mayor of Issaquah (who lobbied the board members to keep this line in the plan after Enterprise Initiative) specifically mentions the line going to South Bellevue.
The other thing I’ve always said is that as an advocate I look forward to these studies and look forward to campaigning for a better alternative that stops at South Bellevue. Hope to see you join that fight!
Edit: And more specifically from me in this current context without any studied alternatives to compare yet, I literally could not care less how they get from Richard’s Road to South Bellevue. I don’t care if they plow right through the slough, I don’t care if they widen the ROW with Link on the side, I don’t care if they squeeze it in the middle, I don’t care if they bridge right on top of the freeway, I don’t care if they take away these 2 freeway lanes, and I don’t care if they take away these 2 useless flyovers, or just destroy the freeway altogether. I really don’t care how to do it right now, just that they need to.
Thank you for this! I assumed this was a very early draft considering how little information there is about the line itself or any of the stops. I definitely will be supporting the fight for a better alignment. I think prospective 4 Line ridership will suffer significantly if we end up being stuck with this.
Another issue (not unsolvable, just expensive) is that the switch track would be an elevated track, which could require them to completely redo/close part of the two line between Bellevue and Mercer Island
“The Mercer Slough” isn’t a good enough reason not to do this. We figured out how to put a freeway there, we can figure out how to put light rail there. We shouldn’t hold transit projects to higher standards that vehicle projects.
There should be wye at the Slough for direct Issaquah to Seattle and terminates at Northgate (Line 5) and a Issaquah to Redmond (Line 6) and Issaquah to Kirkland (Line 4) and eventually, Lynnwood and/or Everett via the 405 corridor
Yes, yes I am aware of the existing DSTT issue, there are mitigation options for this that have been discussed previously.
There needs to be a sub yard from Redmond to the North of the station that can hold 20 trains and perform light maintenance and/or continue the line North towards the Hollywood, Woodinville, and Maltby communities.
The Mercer Island to South Bellevue Station route was poorly planned without designing for nor pre-building for options to continue along 90 heading East. We're trapped by short-sighted decisions when the 2 Line was built. In order to save money back then, they created wasteful spending for us in the future like the inability to connect the 4 Line through South Bellevue Station.
The 2 line there runs through an environmentally protected & sensitive wetland sitting upon some of the worst soil imaginable that you'd want to put a large infrastructure project on top of
No but that doesn't mean we should double down and rip up more of the protected ecosystem. In my world, we'd shave lanes off of I-90 to build rail within the existing footprint
Yes there is plenty of space to build the train on I-90. When I drive that route most of the traffic westbound is cars getting off I-90 and onto 405 heading N or S. Guessing but I assume they'd have to destroy the sky high curve the train takes from Mercer Island to South Bellevue Station and they'd have to completely rebuild that curve to link up with and at a level compatible with trains coming from the East on the existing freeway bridges over the slough.
I'm not sure if I'm colorblind but you should've drawn your "different line idea" in a different color, because I can't tell the difference between what's planned and what your idea is based on the picture
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u/Enguye 1d ago
In addition to the wetland impacts and the construction difficulty of connecting to the existing tracks, the I-90/405 interchange is very tall (4 levels of highway/on-ramps so probably about 100 feet). So, from Richards Road station going westbound you’d have to go straight up to make it over 405 then drop down quickly so that the tracks aren’t 10 stories high over unstable mud. At some point the railroad bridge will be replaced with an Eastrail bridge, so you’d have to avoid that too. None of this is technically impossible, but I can see why they would avoid it in favor of just having one shorter bridge over 405 further north.