A community group that bridged the Central District, Capitol Hill and First Hill happily tells CHS this afternoon that Metro has decided against lopping off the portion of Route 2 the transit agency was proposing to do away with in a fleet of coming service changes. We’ve yet to confirm the details with Metro officials but, according to the Bus2 group, Metro has agreed to maintain the route’s connection to Queen Anne. Here’s the update we received from the group:
Metro just announced at a meeting at the Tate-Mason house that they are (1) taking the proposed changes to the Route 2 off the recommendation, and will maintain it at least as far north as the Seattle Center (Mercer) at its current frequently; (2) the #27 till remain the same route, although it may be less frequent; and (3) the trolley bus changes and deletions are all being re-examined as it the service to Queen Anne now on the trollies (and also to the Seattle Center). An official announcement will be made within 24 hours or so.
Ashley DeForest, who made the announcement, said that the reason they have reconsidered changing Route 2 is that they heard from so many different constituencies and so many neighborhoods — all with the same message: it’s a great bus route so why change it?
Bus2, our little group of advocates, is quite relieved, and very happy.
The debate over the 2 has been raging on CDNews ever since the changes were announced. Some saw the gains in system efficiency to be worth the re-route, while others did not like the loss of a connection from the CD to Westlake (among other concerns). Here are some materials the group posted at several bus stops:
A previous campaign to save the 27 was largely successful, as Metro scaled back it’s complete deletion of the 27 to a plan that would reduce its frequency.
Hooray! Now we can wait for 20-minutes-late buses that take 20 more minutes to crawl up the hill forever and ever and ever!
I can see the minutes and hours of my future slipping down the drain!
Good job, Luddites!
Thank you to Joanna and all others who helped make this happen!
The current route of the #2 gets me where I want and need to go, and it gets me back, and usually when I need to get there.
Life as I know it WILL go on!!!
“Life as I know it WILL go on!!!”
And it will be SLOW!
So we maintain the status quo. At what cost? The proposed changes would have improved the timeliness of the 2 and could have been a positive for the neighborhood. Being resistant to change is not something to be celebrated.
I was rather stunned when Metro proposed such a major route change and not talk to the riders first. I hope they learned their lesson!
The route will move faster and more reliably when the low floor buses arrive! A decent part the delay today is because people with mobility problems have to step up into the bus.
Opposition to the 2 revision was always about three things:
– Fear of walking two blocks (ever, for any reason)
– Fear of transferring (ever, for any reason)
– Fear of big, bad, scary downtown Seattle
There were never going to be “cuts” to the 2, and any suggestions to the contrary constitute an intentional campaign of misinformation. On all segments of the route, revised service was designed to dramatically increase efficiency, speed, and reliability.
So if you are someone who, in the course of your normal daily life, EVER walks two blocks, EVER transfers between routes, and doesn’t think of Seattle as a horrible, dangerous, terrifying city in which to live and move around, then these changes would have made transit better and easier for you!
But yet again, the liars and the fearmongers win the day!
Low-floor buses will help a little (in 2015).
They won’t make the horrible traffic disappear.
Why only fix one problem when you could fix them all?
Why can we not get a bus that goes Lake to Sound, east and west on Madison the whole danged way? 41st to 1st and vice versa for example? I’d give up my car completely if I could get the 23 blocks to work straight down madison, without transfering or spending 40 minutes on the damned 11 circling around downtown.
exactly.
I am not sure we have won until it is done.
Yes, and those of us who depend on the bus to get places other than the Seattle Center have lost.
I proudly accept being a Luddite compared to those who uncritically and enthusiastically embrace every new fad and buy into the newest shiny toy.
Both Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emerson extolled the virtue of unaltered nature and perhaps were Luddites of their time worth reading today.
Both Reform Luddism and Neo-Luddism express significant doubts about the nature of benefits from uncritically embracing new information technology.
I use it to get to many places that are not Seattle Center. I always just wonder why those who worry about parts of it aren’t into looking at the solutions that would make it even more wonderful.
Really test the current figures on lateness for the #2 against one of your favorite well-used routes. Lets compare notes on the rapid ride and the #2, along with productivity. Have you examined any of the remedies presented by bus2rders?
If you supported these changes, then some of you should’ve shown up at one of the community meetings Metro attended to voice your opinions. As I just said over on the CapHill blog, I was about the only one at the Madrona Comm. Council meeting to speak up in favor of at least some of the changes, and I was vastly, significantly outnumbered.
If all of you felt so strongly about it, you should’ve shown up for the meeting. And if you were there, you should’ve spoken up. Nobody did.
If you seriously believe Metro places as much weight on someone who completes an online survey, as they do someone who shows up for an in-person meeting, you’re naive.
No one has lost or won. It is not that type of contest. This is about the community connections and moving forward means remaining engaged.
Jim S. – you definitely raise good points about the need to come out and support changes just as much as those who come out to oppose changes (and that filling out a web-based form isn’t nearly as effective as showing up in person).
However, Metro still has a slew of meetings scheduled for this month, some in and around the CD. If they have actually decided to not make any changes to the 2 (and there’s a comment from a typically fairly reputable source on Seattle Transit Blog that this latest news is *not* accurate), you’d think they’d at least wait until their own public comment period was over…
Al – I’ve certainly seen folks struggling to get on/off the #2, but do you have data that shows that “a decent part” of the current delays on the #2 are due to folks with mobility problems rather than other factors (e.g. traffic, etc.)? Anecdote does not make for good facts…
If it’s not that type of contest, then why did you say “I am not sure we have won until it is done” earlier in this thread? While I appreciate the sentiment in your last sentence, you’ve always positioned this as a “us vs. them” dispute, even going so far as insinuating the Metro was out to screw over the CD for the benefit of the rest of the city…
I was at the Madrona Community Council meeting. But I would hope Metro is evaluating proposed changes based on ridership projections and providing the best service to our region rather than who can turn out the most people to a meeting.
Serious question here – what remedies were proposed by the bus2rders?
The #2 is not a great route. It is always late. I can walk from downtown to Madrona about as fast as the #2 during the evening commute.
I don’t care about the #2 — I care about having a good transit network that will reliably get me to the places I need to go in a reasonable amount of time.
Did you seriously just compare yourself to Thoreau and Emerson?
I don’t know a lot about the bus system- but I think I can follow the basic idea of Light Rail running North-South and the correlate that more bus lines should run East-West to leverage the grid. If that makes the most sense for transportation, then Metro should suck-it-up and make the smart changes. There will always be users who are happy with their current route (I’m one of them- the #8 is great!).
One comparison might be Maria Goodloe-Johnson and the School Board making the tough and smart call to switch to a Neighborhood priority school district policy. If the Seattle school district had made their decision based on all the folks complaining (often with legit self-serving cause) at the Board meetings, the change never would have happened. It was the right change and despite all the fallout from the superintendent’s resignation, that’s one issue I don’t hear her successor trying to rehash.
Keith, I was both surprised and not surprised to read this so-far-unconfirmed news about the changes being dropped. The Metro people encouraged people to go online and submit comments and take the survey. That was barely a week ago and it does seem awfully quick to give up on their changes already.
That being said– the opposition by those attending was overwhelming. I am rarely easily intimidated but it took me a long time to dare open my mouth to voice any support for the changes. It would not surprise me if Metro just decided they don’t have the energy to fight the very vocal opposition while they have so many other routes to worry about. I think that’s unfortunate, because most (though not all) of the opposition was from people whose stated use of Metro was far more leisure than commuter (again, not all).
THey did make a few very good points. But a lot of it was, in fact, people who don’t want tany transfers, don’t believe connections on 3rd Ave will improve with these changes, and are scared of being downtown. Most were Seniors, and many have mobility challenges and security concerns. Almost nobody from the daily-commuter crowd. If every neighborhood puts up this much resistance to ANY changes, Metro can forget their whole plan.
I’d like to see BOTH of these #2 routes going forward. We could have a revised 2-Express via Madison that reverses at 1st Ave downtown and goes right back through the CD; alternate that with with the existing #2 route which continues on to Seattle Ctr. The majority who voiced mobility concerns were seniors who probably have more time to wait for the bus they want. This solution would help some to speeding up 3rd Ave, but still retain the 1-bus route that some people need, especially seniors. In the off-peak and evenings, they could just run the regular #2 route, because 3rd Ave congestion isn’t as bad.
If you still want to make comments you should go online at http://www.kingcounty.gov/metro/HaveASay or email [email protected]
The comment period ends Feb 29th
Ugh – I think a lot of people would like to see something like this. The big challenges as I see them are 1) the demand along the Madison corridor varies depending on where you are (meaning that 30 minute headways may be suitable for Madison Park, but that would be woefully insufficient for parts of Madison closer to downtown so you either have to augment those portions with additional service like we do today or totally overserve Madison Park) and 2) you’d really like such a route to be a trolley and there is resistance (at least anecdotally) from folks in Madison Park to stringing trolley wire (not to mention the cost of doing so).
I don’t think either of these is insurmountable and maybe you could get the bulk of the potential gain simply by having the #11 stay on Madison rather than it’s current meander…
I will say it again…
If anyone seriously believes Metro places as much weight on the input of someone who completes an online survey, as they do someone who actually shows up for an in-person meeting, they’re naive.
Given that all the proposed changes have (supposedly) now been shelved, and the existing route will continue exactly as it is– what exactly are those “solutions that would make it even more wonderful”? Maybe I missed any of those alternate suggestions, drowned out by all the “NO!” that I heard…? They would’ve been easy to miss….
I was really excited about the proposed changes. Just yesterday I was standing at the bus stop by the library on Spring, watching the 2 sitting there on the other side of 4th, missing light after light because of all the cars turning right on red from 4th Ave (actually, I think if you just didn’t allow those rights-on-red from 4th Ave it would make a huge difference), and I was thinking to myself how great it’s gonna be when the 2 moves to Madison/Marion. Darnit.
Did you live in a house in a city?
Do you receive and benefit from electricity?
Did you organize your “No To All Changes/No To All Progress” campaign from a personal computer?
The perhaps you’d like to consider shutting up about your quasi-pro-Luddism!
And since when is transit service that actually works a “new fad” or “shiny toy”?
Funny thing about Thoreau… He made so much of his return to pristine naturalism on the shores of Walden Pond.
But when he wished to — and frequently, he did — he could take a train the 11 miles into Boston in less than 15 minutes. That’s faster than you can go a mile and a half on the freakin’ 2!!
You can’t “not mention” the cost of stringing trolley wire all the way to Madison Park (whether they like it in Madison Pk. or not). It’s far more expensive than you think it is, and there’s no budget for that kind of expense. It’s a lot.
I didn’t hear any of them, if there were any.
WHO CARES ????????????
I was using “not to mention” in the typical rhetorical context of “of course you also have to take into consideration”. :-)
I don’t know the exact number, but, yes, stringing new trolley wire is a fairly expensive proposition and is probably only feasible in areas with very high frequency and/or where it could be shared by multiple routes and/or it’d help bridge a gap between two existing sets of trolley wire (e.g. some of the proposals to electrify the 8 by adding wire in Madison Valley)…
The communities that have been working to save the #2 have a sense that Metro is listening and hope that this will lead to no proposed changes to the route. Each connection is discretely related to another. As a group we fully support the goals of our amazing group to keep the pressure on Metro to get the QA connections right.
As it is, the #2 is a productive route. It would be great if at the Seattle City Council on Tuesday, Feb 21 Metro can tell all concerned that the Route #2 (and #13) changes are off the table. Metro should look into efficiency improvements for the existing Route #2. It truly is a great route and an important crosstown bus.
Reasons to look at how to improve and not cut the #2 bus route:
1. Recent Seattle DOT traffic counts on Madison vs. Seneca show that Madison has three times the number of vehicles every day, as compared to Seneca — and these numbers are before the addition of more buses to Madison as proposed.
2. Madison is a designated already corridor for all emergency vehicle access, and many patient are dropped-off at clinics along the street, making it diffcult for a bus only lane.
3. Metro has heard from many bus #2 riders about how moving the route off Seneca, stopping at 1st Avenue, and cutting Route #2 through downtown bus service to Seattle Center and Queen Anne — without transfers — will disrupt and negatively impact their lives. What will it take for Metro to take changes to the #2 (& #13 which it connects with to reach the Queen Anne Community Center and Seattle Pacific University) off the table?
4. If it’s not broken, why ‘fix’ it?
“If it’s not broken, why ‘fix’…?”
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!
20-30 minutes to travel a mile. Nothing broken about that!
Joanna,
I asked this in another thread and I don’t know if I ever saw a reply – how does Metro measure “productivity” in this context?
Regarding your other points:
#1 – The # of vehicles isn’t the right metric to be looking at. Madison is 4 lanes and has dedicated left turn lanes at some key intersections. Seneca is only 2 lanes through much of its slog through 1st Hill. Comparing # of vehicles on an arterial vs. non-arterial street is apples to oranges. What you really want is some measure of throughput (# of vehicles per unit time) or the avg time it takes a vehicle to travel a given distance.
Two other aspects of Seneca that I haven’t seen discussed in this months long debate are a) the incredibly long waits at 6th going westbound. That is a messy intersection with traffic coming off I-5 and fairly high northbound volumes on 6th. If you’re unlucky, you can be waiting at that light for what feels like 5 minutes (although it’s probably less). b) frequent stops at crosswalks between some of the buildings on 1st Hill. This may seem fairly minor, but these unexpected stops add up, especially if they cause you to miss lights because they throw off the timing. I think Madison is better in both these regards.
That said, I definitely think Madison could be improved to make it an even better route for buses. They should permanently remove all on street parking (at least west of Broadway) and clean up some of the eastbound left turns east of Broadway (the one onto 12th Ave northbound can be particularly annoying). The right turns when heading east bound in that same general location onto either 12th Ave southbound or E. Union eastbound can also be impacted by pedestrians, but I don’t know if there’s a lot you can do about that (or if the issue is big enough to warrant doing anything about it).
#2. Who is arguing for a bus only lane along that stretch of Madison? I haven’t seen anything from Metro arguing that their proposed changes are dependent on a bus only lane. Claiming that something that isn’t needed is infeasible isn’t really compelling. Besides, don’t all the clinics along there have their own entrances? It’s not like tons of clinic patients are being dropped off on the street.
#3. Metro’s priority can not and should not be preserving people’s one seat rides. It is counter to how you build a good transit network. We have been over this point ad nauseum in the various discussions on these changes and I know you feel that people who support this view are just transit wonks who don’t care about how things work in the real world, but that’s not a fair assessment. Having a fast, reliable network where people can easily get from point A to point B (for a very larger number of A’s and B’s) has the potential to be transformative for the region. Beyond that, how disrupted and inconvenienced will people be if Metro has to make more drastic cuts down the road because it can’t get additional funding? Remember, Metro is on life support now and they only got a short reprieve. They need to show the state they are serious about making changes to improve the overall network or things will get much worse in a few years. If Metro pulls back from the changes it feels it needs to make now in order to preserve a longer term funding stream down the road, it may be forced to make such drastic changes that people will fondly look back at this current set of proposals and wish they had supported Metro rather than fight them tooth and nail.
#4. I don’t even know if I should bother to respond to this one since people are either on one side or another on whether the #2 is broken and no amount of argument from either side is likely to sway anyone’s opinion. But, at a minimum, I will say that Metro must have thought is was broken (or at least could be improved) or they wouldn’t have proposed the changes to begin with. There seems to be this perspective from some of the “no change” folks that Metro planners live in ivory towers and have their heads up their asses and only propose changes to irritate people or shortchange the CD or … I don’t know any planners so I suppose that perspective could be true, but I’d like to give them the benefit of the doubt and assume they’re like the rest of us – they’ve been given a job to do and limited resources and they’re doing the best they can. So, in that context, ask yourself why Metro would have proposed these changes to begin with and whether “if it ain’t broke” is really a valid position…
Clearly Metro is not listenning. We are asking them to make simple changes to improve efficiency.
The only solution is to remove large amounts of funding. Time for some Greek austerity for Metro.
JIm- I read your point above and I think it’s a good one. That’s politics. I’m glad you’re attending the meetings. I haven’t gone. However- I can’t really get too excited about duking it out with my friends and neighbors on this one. My opinion is that Metro should make smart changes- I haven’t got much self interest in the particular route changes. On the other side of the aisle are a lot of nice folks who feel their lives will be significantly disrupted by the change. Participating in that argument doesn’t sound terribly appealing to me and I expect there are other folks who feel the same way?
The online survey can be found at: http://www.surveymk.com/s/Sept2012TransitRestructuringP2
Sorry Keith. I don’t have that. Maybe Metro does. It’s not up to me as a rider to prove anything.
Metro is the one that wanted to change things and the agency that has paid staff for research. Still, they never proved why to the public. They never showed any analysis which demonstrated why the change would help travel time for us riders. They never divulged how many riders of the 2 stay on the bus past where they wanted to split the route. They never surveyed the riders of Route 2 to ask their opinions about the service or the change. If Metro staff are licking their wounds, they only have to blame themselves.
Thanks KeithS for putting in words what so many of us feel. But this episode reminds me of the movement to hang on to the “right” to buy incandescent light bulbs. The opponents of change are only concerned with keeping exactly what they have now, and seem incapable of considering that their life, and the Metro transit system as a whole, could be improved with reasonable adjustments. They refuse to listen to the reasons for change and, in fact demonize Metro planners as unthinking fools aiming to stick it to the C.D.
Keith,
Metro uses “productivity” only as an umbrella term; it does not equate to any specific performance metric nor imply any quantifiable value judgment.
Joanna, on the other hand, habitually uses “productive” interchangeably with “high-ridership,” as if her repetition of the word somehow demonstrates the “success” of the status quo.
She does this even though NO ONE DISPUTES that lots of people use the 2, and even though advocates for change cite the 2’s high ridership as a reason to streamline it for the benefit of those many riders.
As part of her campaign of misinformation, Joanna seems to hope that the uninitiated will see the word “productive” and mistake it for “efficient” or “optimized.” She has even claimed that the route is a net revenue generator for Metro (which couldn’t be further from the truth).
One relevant “productivity” statistic that Joanna wouldn’t want you to see is “passenger miles per revenue hour”: http://metro.kingcounty.gov/am/reports/2009/2009-RtPerf.pdf
The 2 performs quite poorly here, because all those hours stuck in traffic and climbing First Hill at a snail’s pace require Metro to devote many simultaneous buses to the route. Each bus spends quite a bit of a time crawling in “revenue service,” thus diluting the efficiency that one would otherwise garner from a well-used route. (i.e. The 2’s riders, cumulatively, don’t GET VERY FAR for the number of hours of bus service devoted to it!)
Al,
I agree that I haven’t seen a lot of data directly from Metro to motivate the proposed change, although I seriously doubt they’d propose such a big change without some reasonable backing data. There’s been good discussions on Seattle Transit Blog about the #2 over the years (including ridership data), but I agree that folks shouldn’t necessarily have to trudge through all of that to understand Metro’s motivation. I really don’t know what standard of “proof that change is needed” Metro is required to live up to. It kinda feels like a no win situation for them – the folks who think the #2 is “broken” don’t feel a need for data to support what they feel they already know and those who don’t think the #2 is “broken” are unlikely to be swayed by any data Metro happens to roll out.
I do take exception to your claim that it’s not up to you to prove anything. You made an assertion that the existing #2 will be faster and more reliable once low floor buses arrive because a “decent” amount of the delay currently experienced is due to people with mobility issues have to climb up the stairs. You tacitly acknowledged that there are speed/reliability issues with the current #2 and clearly implied that Metro’s proposed changes aren’t needed because the new low floor buses will address the issue responsible for a “decent” amount of the delay. Is there any data that shows your assertion is correct? You can’t hold Metro to a standard of needing to provide data to support their proposed changes while at the same time saying you don’t need to provide data to support your claim that no changes are needed because the issues will get better when the low floor buses arrive.
OK, I’m going to play devil’s advocate here for a minute.
As to your comment that people “demonize Metro planners as unthinking fools aiming to stick it to the C.D.”, I did see a lot of that attitude at the MCC meeting– and I called people on it in Metro’s defense. A lot of people playing the “poor CD victim card”, and it was bullshit.
OTOH, even though I support some of the re-routes, I heard a few points worth considering. Several older people said the #2 is their link to groceries at the QFC on Union and Broadway. Walking downhill from Madison & Broadway is no big deal without groceries. But an older person might have a pretty hard time of carrying groceries uphill from Union to Madison. It’s a pretty steep incline. I thought that point was valid.
I did hear a lot of people who doubted the premise that buses on 3rd would be sped up by these changes and connections would be fast. They weren’t buying it. I disagree with them on that.
Many complained that getting up/down from the bus was hard and transfers downtown would make it worse. I’m skeptical of that one– what happens when you get downtown? A lot of walking downtown anyway. If getting on/off the bus is too much, then walking around downtown will be too.
Some complained about security downtown at night with transfers. I think security is an issue any time. I don’t think this makes it any worse.
There were some good points made, but in general I think Metro is paying disproportionate attention to a group that takes the #2 non-frequently, a lot of lesiure trips, at the expense of a larger # of people who use it multiple times every day to commute.
I think 2 routes might fix this– a #2Express, coupled with preserving the bulk of the traditional #2 as a “local” for those who need the full route and can’t transfer, and/or can afford the slower service in exchange for the convenience.
Yes, you are right. There is a grade from Union to Madison. I’m not unsympathetic to those for whom that one block trip might be a burden. At what point however, should it be expected that those people make an adjustment for the greater good?
Safeway, I think, delivers groceries to one’s home for as little as $3.95. I don’t know about QFC.
I’m not saying some opponents of change will not be required to make inconvenient or even burdensome adjustments, but there’s not enough money in the bank to provide every person the transit service that suits him/her perfectly. Should not alternative ways of serving transportation needs be part of the discussion?
I just received this notice from Metro via email:
Thank you for taking the time to participate in our outreach process for the September 2012 service change – your input has been very valuable.
We undertake our outreach efforts to develop a better understanding of how the community uses our services, so that the changes we propose balance the needs of riders of a particular route with the needs of current and future riders of our entire system.
The proposals Metro presented for feedback were designed to improve the efficiency of our service to serve more people to more places. Talking with you and others helps us understand how existing service is an important part of your lives and neighborhoods. When proposals include long established high ridership routes within a diverse and multifaceted setting, public outreach helps Metro weigh technical considerations with human factors.
We have received valuable feedback. We’ve heard that there are factors that deserve further review, analysis and understanding. As a result, Metro has decided to postpone the route 2, 4 and 27 proposals. Issues were raised of coverage and traffic congestion on Madison Street, and more information about the unique travel needs of those that live and work in the area is needed. For now, we are not proposing to change existing routing of this set of routes. Instead, we are proposing to just make small adjustments to the frequency and running hours of routes 4 and 27 consistent with demand.
You can expect to see updated web content and materials detailing a recommended proposal in mid-March. You can send us comments by email at [email protected], or phone our message line at 206-263-9768.
I agree….I would hope Metro evaluates all the input and makes their best professional judgement. I won’t second-guess that. If they think after all the histrionics we’ve seen so far, that those against the changes have made solid points–so be it. I’m not inclined to fight it out further. I can live with whatever they decide. So let those with the most at stake (or at least the most time to argue about it) duke it out.
Many of those who have been working to save the #2 have long been transit advocates and continue to be advocates for transit. They have embraced mass transit for years to decades and also have advocated for policies and projects to make their communities more livable and walkable. They not only contacted Metro, they worked to make a good case and find solutions. There is work to be done on many different levels, and it would feel a little better if we could be a little less divided and work to find real solutions. Congestion on Madison is much worse than on Seneca with at least 3 times the number of automobiles. Some ideas to make the existing Route #2 more efficient are 1. Clear the 3rd Avenue bottleneck at Spring by moving the bus stop north one block to Seneca (or have two half-block stops on the north half of each block) to allow other buses to continue past the #2. 2. Spring Street Improvements would include: a. provide a bus only left lane between 3rd and 6th. b. build a bus stop island east of 5th for left lane to end weaving left-right-left through I-5 bound cars.
The grocery store issue was perhaps the only counter-argument to the 2 changes that ever made any sense. It is regrettable that Seattle was built as such a low-density city that so much of the population lacks a grocery store within walking distance.
This alone should not have scuttled the revision and streamlining, however. That QFC is not Seattle’s only grocery store, and even for those who prefer that particular location, the 2 would have retained a stop at 11th Ave — two blocks from the store and a COMPLETELY FLAT walk.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA oh god you’re serious.
“Embraced mass transit for decades.”
Seattle has no mass transit.
It has dozens of scattered, infrequent, unreliable, pathetic snail’s-pace routes that the public avoids like the plague. Statistically, most of your neighbors drive rather than use the bus. Did you ever bother to ask them why?
“Clear the 3rd Avenue bottleneck at Spring by moving the bus stop north one block to Seneca (or have two half-block stops on the north half of each block) to allow other buses to continue past the #2.”
So let me get this straight: You won’t accept ANY changes for your route, but 15 other routes should move to accommodate you? That sounds fair.
“build a bus stop island…”
In all of that extra available lane space the street has? Gee, why didn’t I think of that?
Somebody just can’t imagine change.
Keith S. Do you honestly believe “although I seriously doubt they’d propose such a big change without some reasonable backing data” ? If so you must be living an unusually charmed bureaucratically free life.
Nope. It has been about rerouting a bus to where its current riders don’t wish to travel, and removing the ease of not transferring. No-one afraid of Downtown rides the number 2 bus to downtown.
Boo hoo Herman. You Troglodite.
Jim S.
I agree that another bus run perhaps called the 2 express to follow the proposed changes would be a great idea. Start running it every half hour 7 1/2 minutes after the existing number 2 as an auxiliary run not a replacement run. This would end the debate.
Joanna is playing into my hands as usual. Being permanently stuck in the mud with the proverbial pole stuck up….. means that Metro will wallow in shame for another year and then be cut down to size.
Grumbo,
It is perhaps time to update your spellchecker. It seems to have replaced thoughtful with troglodyte.
Yes, change is always an improvement.
Yes, let us blindly work to keep the broken thing broken!
Glad you weren’t around when scientists were curing smallpox.
I’m not supporting a bus route designed around one person’s imagination that they might go to Seattle Center once every two years. There isn’t actually any reason to go there anymore. The whole place should be bulldozed and turned into…uhmm. Heck, I’d settle for a whole in the ground rather than that old ugly center.
We are fighting among ourselves while there is need to unify in advocacy for mass transit.
Agreed Joanna. We must all agree that Metro must become more efficient, cut out the terrible jerrymanders like #2. Run faster shorter trips that all can enjoy. We must get Metro in a straith line or it will be cut in half.
Although Joanna has spent the last three months with her fingers in her ears and yelling “LALALALALALALALALA” so as not to hear anyone’s opinions other than her own, the plan was in no way poorly considered!
The routes had been considered, the schedules had been drawn, the driver-hours had been counted, the ridership predictions had been crunched, and the time savings had calculated.
The conclusions were unequivocal: the restructure plan would have offered FASTER, BETTER service to MORE PEOPLE without wasting one additional cent of our limited funding resources. Precisely ZERO people would have seen a slower trip; precisely ZERO people would have been harmed by the change.
You know what else does not “go forward”? The 2 bus, much of the time!