We’ve been talking a lot about Northgate recently, and for good reason. The future construction of the Link light rail station at Northgate provides a once in a lifetime opportunity. This is our chance to transform a 1950’s part of the city dominated by an ocean of parking lots into a bikeable, walkable and transit-rich community where everyone who wants to can safely bike or walk to the station.
According to Sound Transit, today, the Northgate Transit Center serves more than 5,000 riders each weekday, 70 percent of whom get there on bike, foot or transit. In 2030, 92 percent of the 15,000 people accessing the light rail station each weekday will get there on bike, foot or transit. 92 percent.
But right now, instead of working to figure out how they can provide the 92 percent of people who will access the station on bike, foot or transit with safe and convenient ways to get there, Sound Transit might spend $40 million on a 900-stall parking garage benefiting the 8 percent, and less than $2 million on the 92 percent. That’s just not fair.
Sound Transit should focus their investments on benefiting the 92 percent of people who will get to the station on bike, foot or transit. Investments like cycle tracks and neighborhood greenways accessing the station, a bike/pedestrian bridge over I-5 to North Seattle Community College and Licton Springs, sidewalks in the surrounding neighborhoods, and improved bus service to the station.
Northgate’s 92 percent deserve a fair deal. Sound Transit should spend at least as much on making it safe and convenient for the 92 percent of people who will access the station on bike, foot or transit as they are for the 8 percent.
Tonight, Monday, June 4, Sound Transit is hosting an open house from 6-8pm at the Olympic View Elementary School, 504 NE 95 St, Seattle. Please join us to stand up and speak out for Northgate’s 92 percent and tell Sound Transit:
- In 2030, 92 percent of the 15,000 people accessing the light rail station each weekday will get there on bike, foot or transit. Yet you are proposing to spend $40 million on a 900-stall parking garage benefiting the 8%, and less than $2 million on the 92%. That’s just not fair.
- Northgate’s 92 percent deserve a fair deal. You should spend at least as much on making it safe and convenient for the 92 percent of people who will access the station on bike, foot or transit as you are for the 8 percent.
- Your investments should benefit the 92 percent of people who will get to the station on bike, foot or transit. Investments like cycle tracks and neighborhood greenways accessing the station, a bike/pedestrian bridge over I-5 connecting to North Seattle Community College and Licton Springs, sidewalks in the surrounding neighborhoods, and improved bus service to the station.
We’ve also received a number of questions about this complex issue and we wanted to take a moment to answer a few of them.
Northgate Station Access – Frequently Asked Questions
Why should I care about Northgate station access issues?
Sound Transit is preparing to start construction on the North Link light rail extension project from the University of Washington to Northgate, as approved by voters in 2008. Construction in the Northgate area is scheduled to begin in late 2013, and the extension is scheduled to open for service in 2021. Northgate will be the first light rail station located at an existing transit center.
The construction of the light rail station at Northgate represents a unique opportunity to transform a traditionally auto-dominated neighborhood into a more walkable, bikeable, and transit-oriented community with greater access to retail, grocery stores, medical services, schools, libraries, parks, and more. The decisions Sound Transit makes over the next few months regarding their funding priorities at Northgate can help or hinder this future.
Vision 2040 and the Regional Growth Strategy identify Northgate as an important place to accommodate some of the 1.5 million new people projected to live in the region by 2040. With the construction of the new Link light rail station and acres of underutilized land, Northgate has a real opportunity to transform into a complete community for thousands of new residents and to benefit the surrounding neighborhoods.
What is Sound Transit proposing to do to improve access to the station?
Instead of working to figure out how they can provide the 92 percent of people who will access the station on bike, foot or transit with safe and convenient ways to get there, Sound Transit might spend tens of millions of dollars benefiting the 8 percent at the expense of everyone else. Even though construction of the Northgate station will permanently displace only 117 park & ride stalls (P&R) and 64 private stalls, Sound Transit is proposing to build a 600- to 900-stall parking garage that will cost between $25 and $40 million. The garage would be built before station construction begins, increasing traffic to the station and making it more dangerous and uncomfortable for people to walk or ride their bicycle to the station.
As part of construction of the station, Sound Transit is proposing a few new and widened sidewalks and parking for 200 bicycles. They have also adjusted the station design to incorporate other bike access improvements recommended by the Seattle Bicycle Advisory Board and to accommodate a future connection to a potential I-5 bicycle/pedestrian bridge. All other bicycle and pedestrian access improvements are either “being considered” or “under study” and could be funded through a $1.4 million federal grant recently awarded jointly to Sound Transit, King County, and the City of Seattle (that would also fund TOD planning).
All of this adds up to $40 million for the 8 percent and less than $2 million for the 92 percent. That’s just not fair. Sound Transit should spend at least as much on making it safe and convenient for the 92 percent of people who will access the station on bike, foot or transit as they are for the 8 percent.
What should Sound Transit do to provide the most people with safe and convenient access to the station?
According to Sound Transit, “it is not feasible to meet future transit demand at Northgate and achieve land use goals without shifting focus to non-driving access modes such as expanding rail-bus connections and pedestrian and bicycle access.” Therefore, Sound Transit should focus their investments on benefiting the 92 percent of people who will access the station on bike, foot or transit. Investments like cycle tracks and neighborhood greenways accessing the station, a bike/pedestrian bridge over I-5 connecting to North Seattle Community College (NSCC) and Licton Springs, sidewalks in the surrounding neighborhoods, and improved bus service to the station.
Sound Transit should commit to funding a substantial percentage of the construction costs of the bike/pedestrian bridge and convene a task force of the local agencies, WSDOT, NSCC, UW Medicine, local business and property owners, community leaders, and advocacy organizations to begin a transparent process for designing and building the bridge. Providing direct access from the station to the west side of I-5 will reunite the neighborhoods and provide station access to thousands of potential light rail riders, including the nearly 7,000 students, faculty, and staff who attend and work at NSCC.
Will the 900-stall parking garage really cost $40 million?
It’s hard to know exactly how much the 900-stall garage will cost because Sound Transit has stated that the “actual final use arrangements and cost of these stalls will be negotiated in the future.” But a comparable project primarily funded by Sound Transit in Burien – a five-story 462-stall parking garage and adjacent surface lot with 43 stalls – cost $20.8 million, approximately $41,000 per stall. At $41,000 per stall a 900-stall garage would cost just shy of $40 million.
Why would Sound Transit build a 900-stall garage to replace the permanent loss of 117 park & ride stalls?
It’s a great question, especially since most of the current users of the transit center live nearby and that in 2030, 92 percent of the 15,000 people accessing the light rail station each weekday will get there on bike, foot or transit. It’s also unclear how Sound Transit will decide whether to build a 600 or a 900-stall parking garage as they have not stated what factors will affect this decision. What is clear is that despite Sound Transit’s legal obligations to mitigate parking displaced during construction, they have many options beyond just building a parking garage, making mitigation a complex but solvable issue through creativity and innovation.
First, Sound Transit has committed to the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) to provide one-for-one replacement of all 117 P&R stalls permanently displaced by the project in the North Link record of decision (ROD). However, Sound Transit could petition the FTA to waive this requirement. Given that the ROD was signed two years before regional voters approved extending Link to Northgate, Sound Transit would have a strong basis for this petition.
Second, under the terms of the North Link ROD, ST must provide “best effort” mitigation for the 428 stalls of P&R capacity lost during construction. This could involve improved bus service (either direct to downtown, or connecting service to Northgate), pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure improvements, satellite parking lots with shuttles, leasing P&R stalls from adjacent private lots, or more structured parking.
Third, and most challenging, Sound Transit needs to use a substantial part of the Northgate Mall property for construction of North Link, and it has an obligation to mitigate the temporary displacement of these 462 privately owned stalls. In addition, construction of North Link will permanently displace 64 other private stalls that Sound Transit must mitigate. Sound Transit can either pay compensation to the owners of these stalls for the loss of parking, or provide replacement parking.
When you remodel your kitchen you don’t build an entirely new house to mitigate the temporary inconvenience. You get by as best as you can for the lowest cost in a manner that prepares you for the future. Sound Transit should take a similar approach.
Why is Sound Transit in such a hurry to reach a decision?
The Sound Transit Board will consider approval of the final North Link project scope schedule and budget for the Northgate station in late June. However, at the May 24 briefing to the Sound Transit Board regarding this project, Sound Transit staff stated that they could push this back a month if necessary. Figuring out how to provide the most people with safe and convenient access to the station is the last remaining scope issue Sound Transit needs to resolve. In addition, construction activities in the Northgate Station area are scheduled to begin in late 2013.
Was the public involved in reaching this decision?
Kind of and no. The North Link project has had extensive public outreach over the last decade. Throughout this public outreach process the community and the Northgate Stakeholders Group have asked for investments that would align with their vision of transforming Northgate into a walkable, bikeable, and transit-rich community.
At the March 21, 2012 open house on 30 percent design for the Northgate station, Sound Transit staff included a shared-use parking garage as one of a number of potential options for providing people with access to the station (though they buried it at the bottom of their potential options). Then, at a May 24, 2012 briefing to the Sound Transit Board, agency staff presented the plan they developed behind closed doors to build a 600 to 900 stall parking garage while making minimal (and nearly entirely unfunded) improvements that would benefit the 92 percent of people who will get to the station on bike, foot or transit.
Until a group of community leaders and advocacy organizations sent a joint-letter and over four hundred people emailed the Sound Transit Board expressing their deep concern with this deal (and Sound Transit subsequently scrambled to schedule an open house), Sound Transit did not have any plan in place to solicit public feedback on this decision before making it final.
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Northgate’s 92 percent deserve a fair deal. Sound Transit should spend at least as much on making it safe and convenient for the 92 percent of people who will access the station on bike, foot or transit as they are for the 8 percent.
Please join us tonight, Monday, June 4, at a Sound Transit open house on the Northgate station from 6-8pm at the Olympic View Elementary School, 504 NE 95 St, Seattle and stand up and speak out for Northgate’s 92 percent.
Maybe I’m missing something, but the cycletrack, pedestrian bridge and so forth (while nice ideas) don’t seem to benefit the light rail riders arriving at Northgate by transit. The key number for the argument in this blog entry is what is the percent of light rail riders arriving as pedestrians or bicyclists; my guess is that that number is similar to or less than the car number of 8%.
Thus, the numbers work out as 84% arriving by transit, 8% by car, and 8% as pedestrians or bicyclists. Given that, this article’s “majority rules” argument would actually be AGAINST bicycle and pedestrians investments, and argue for directing all investment only for folks arriving by transit, not by bikes. Pretty silly argument for a supposed bike advocacy organization!
Mondoman,
Actually, your estimate of 8% pedestrians and bicylists is likely way off. ST doesn’t break down its estimate that 90% of the 15,000 daily boardings will come from buses, walking, or biking, but it does estimate that during the “PM peak period,” when park & ride trips will be at their *maximum*, a full 30% of people riding light rail will arrive on foot. Since that number is bound to be higher during non-peak periods (when fewer will park & ride), it seems pretty safe to assume that *one-third* of the 15,000 daily boardings will be from pedestrians. If more than three times as many people are walking to light rail as compared to driving, it does seem ludicrous to spend tens of millions on a parking garage without first committing to building the ped/bike overpass to North Seattle Community College.
ST’s estimates for bicycle access are admitedly meager (only 2% are predicted to arrive at light rail by bike during the “PM peak period”), but is that any wonder given where they are planning to spend money? Bike share won’t increase if you don’t build bike infrastructure. Park & ride use won’t decrease if you keep providing free parking (even though, by ST’s own estimates, most of the drivers who park and ride actually live within walking / biking distance).
I wish we had the guts to eliminate *all* P&R parking going forward and, instead of building a new parking lot, using the money for transit and bike infrastructure to bring those passengers to light rail in a more sustainable (and scalable) way. In that case, we could use the current P&R stalls leased in the neighboring garages to mitigate the lost mall parking during construction and could turn Metro’s P&R lots into dense TOD sites. But, as Craig points out, we can’t get rid of any (much less all) P&R stalls under the current ROD. I hope that ST takes on that fight, but I’m doubtful that they will.
Anyway, I really appreciate that Craig brought up the ROD and mall property parking issues, along with suggestions for how ST could work around them. I wasn’t able to make it to the open house today, but I hope that Cascade members made their views clear and held ST’s feet to the fire. And for pete’s sake, if we do end up paying for a new, expensive garage, I hope that we get our overpass too.
What you’re missing is Sound Transit’s own numbers which don’t bear that out at all.
Whats really not fair is Cascad Bicycle Clubs refusal to collect retail sales tax on it’s riding event registrations. How can you guys expect to be taken seriously in your opinions on tax dollar allocation when you refuse to contribute to the general fund by properly collecting sales tax.
Antoine, thanks for your detailed reply!
Even your numbers support my point: with 60% arriving by transit, 30% by foot, 8% by car, and 2% by bike, using the silly “majority rules” argument in Benjamin’s piece, Sound Transit should spend all its money on improving the roads to better serve the vast majority of riders arriving by transit. Whether Cascade decides to make signs proclaiming “We’re the 8%” or “We’re the 32%”, I don’t think the response will be positive (except perhaps for some chuckles).
As for your suggestion that removing station parking will force people to walk or ride to the Northgate station rather than to drive there, we can test that by looking at Central Link’s ridership numbers by station. The two stations with significant parking, Tukwila and Airport, have vastly more ridership (2x to 4x) than do the stations immediately northward (Ranier Beach through Beacon Hill). This strongly suggests that rather than switching to walking/cycling to a nearby station, if deprived of parking at that station, most people will just avoid that station, most likely by driving a car. Again, increasing automobile use like this doesn’t seem like a reasonable goal for an organization like Cascade. I hope you’ll rethink your ideas.
Andy, Cascade is in compliance with all state tax laws.
Mondoman, i suspect the discrepancy in ridership between Airport, Tukwila, Rainier Beach and Beacon Hill have more to do with distance from downtown and socio-economic issues than with available parking. i’d argue that the latter two don’t need vehicle parking at all! their potential ridership should come mainly from nearby neighborhoods with riders arriving by foot and bicycle rather than from drivers arriving from a greater distance.
Lamar, You should probably check with DOR since things have changed a bit in the last few years. I would be happy to discuss it with you if you haven’t been following developments about taxation on amusement and recreation services. There is no exemption for adult non-profits.
[...] The following email is cross-posted from the Cascade Bicycle Club Blog. [...]