Orphan Road

Starting Monday, there are a couple of extra trains going back and forth between Tacoma and Seattle. New schedule here. Interesting nugget from the press release:

Today, more than 10,500 riders board Sounder trains on a typical weekday, which is nearly equal to the number of Sounder riders that boarded on the first weekday day of I-5 construction and lane closures in August 2007.

Ho hum. Another quarter, another ridership record for Sounder, up 31% YOY.

Gee, it sure seems like people in the Puget Sound like their rail transit and want to see more of it. Too bad the Seattle Times is looking down their noses at these folks and basically telling them to go screw themselves.

Sorry to be crude, here, folks, but where's the last place on Earth where people still buy and read printed newspapers? THE GODDAMNED TRAIN, THAT'S WHERE. The paper's worth peanuts these days, you'd think that an injection of tens of thousands of new rail riders into the area would make them smile.

I know, I know... the Times editorial board and ownership is staffed by honorable public servants who would never use the editorial page to advance their financial self-interest.

Oh wait.

I think I posted this a while back, but I've updated my Google maps of Link and Sounder alignments based on the proposed 15-year plan from Sound Transit.

http://maps.google.com/maps/user?uid=103428233658015669918&hl=en&gl=us&p...

Largest percentage increase of any rail system in America.

But, you know... it's hard to get people out of their cars.

Around the country, local governments are relying on existing freight tracks to provide commuter rail service quickly and cheaply. In the Puget Sound we have the very popular Sounder running on BNSF tracks, South Florida uses CSX tracks to run Tri-Rail commuter rail, and Utah's FrontRunner and New Mexico's Rail Runner operate with similar arrangements.

These services require complicated leasing arranements with the freight companies involved, and service is often limited or delayed because the freight trains have priority on the tracks. This is the major reason Sound Transit hasn't been able to offer as many round trips as it would like to.

Today I came across not one, but two stories from back East on this issue: one involving Florida and CSX, and the other related to Massachusetts and CSX. Both issues center around liability agreements: CSX is saying to both states, in effect, "sure, you can lease our tracks, but we don't want to be liable in the event of a passenger train crash, even if it's caused by our neglegence."

Lawmakers are understandably skeptical about agreeing to such conditions. But what else can they do? We've let our passenger rail system atrophy over the last 100 years, and building new rights-of-way is time consuming and expensive. Even Amtrak only owns the Northeast Corridor tracks -- their trains run on leased freight rail everywhere else in the country, as far as I know.

Add to this the fact that demand for freight rail is surging in America. You've no doubt seen the factoid being pushed by the freight rail industry that it can move one ton of freight 400 miles on a gallon of gas. With business booming, freight companies have little incentive to give up track capacity to passenger rail.

And so we have a bit of a crisis simmering between local goverments and big rail companies, one that could evenutally come to a boil as demand for rail -- both for freight and passenger travel -- continues to rise. Could we nationalize the freight rail industry like France? I very much doubt our Congress would do something that bold. Yet even if the two sides can come to an agreement on the liability issue, the capacity problem will still be there, and getting worse.

Dave Boling at the News-Tribune writes:

Although I recognize the historic value of the “Sounders” name to local soccer fans, it’s going to remind a lot of people of mass transit.

And that's a bad thing?

Sound Transit adds human beings to its stations. From the press release:

These new Sounder staff will be at each Sounder station to assist customers with things like buying tickets, directions, information about delays and emergencies, or help for disabled passengers. Station agents had their first official day on the platforms on Friday.

...The station agents will also help manage stations by reporting maintenance issues and offering an additional security presence. Having station agents allows for Sound Transit to re-deploy the fixed post security guards, offering greater flexibility to security staffing. Sound Transit will continue to use the roving patrols and police patrols at certain stations. The station agent program is in addition to our established security program and brings an additional presence to the stations.

It's a bit of a throwback in an era of computerized ticketing machines, but I can see the appeal, especially when you're trying to bring commuter rail to a region that hasn't really known it.

The "reverse-commute" Seattle-to-Tacoma Sounder train has posted pretty tepid numbers thusfar, but it has other benefits:

[ST Spokesperson Linda] Robson said the reverse commute allows the agency to offer a fifth northbound train in the morning despite having room to house only four trains at a time in Tacoma. The fifth train starts in Seattle and picks up passengers on its way to Tacoma before heading north again.

Robson said the train gives commuters another option besides driving or taking the bus. And she said Tacoma’s growing economy was a factor in the decision to begin the service.

The number of passengers heading south is relatively small.

In January an average of 38 people boarded the southbound train each morning. By comparison, the new northbound train departing Tacoma at 5 a.m. saw an average of 509 passengers in January.

Robson said the number of reverse-commute passengers is about what the agency expected. But she thinks it will grow as the agency expands service.

Sound Transit will launch another reverse-commute train – along with a sixth northbound morning train – in September. Early next year it plans to add a seventh northbound morning commute trip.

We're still far away from the 30 trains a day that we were originally promised, and both BNSF and ST share some of the blame for not being able to meet that promise.

Still, Sounder's making great strides. If, in fact, we're not going to build light rail to Tacoma, it makes sense to really invest in the Sounder system, with more dedicated rights-of-way, switches, and grade-separation. Clearly that's a big piece of the so-called "ST2.1," so we're getting there.

That was fast.

Two weeks ago, I linked to a KOMO story about the lack of parking at the Auburn Sounder station.

Today, the City of Auburn announced the availability of 85 more stops, the News-Tribune is reporting.

...and they'll be very annoyed that there's no place to park:

"I appreciate that and my suggestion would be to keep calling and e-mailing and writing to Sound Transit and ask them when will the second parking garage be built," he said.

"We understand and are sympathetic that parking is a major issue in the south corridor. It's an extremely popular service," said Bruce Gray of Sound Transit.

Sound Transit says voters hold the key.

"We would like to build more parking in Auburn. We don't have the money to do it today and to do that, we need voter approval," said Gray.

Look to see a transit measure on the ballot, possibly as early is this November.

Auburn's mayor warns that parking is only going to get more challenging later this year when two more trains are added to southern route.

November, eh? ST2.1? I wonder what the source is on that. The implication is that it's coming from Bruce Gray himself, but that could just be way it's written.