Op-Ed: Join the Save Ballard Rail March on April 19

By Carl Aslund


Transit advocates are marching from Ballard to Smith Cove, drawing attention to plans to jettison this section of promised light rail.

Three weeks ago, my enthusiasm for Sound Transit was at an all-time high. Seattle had a proudly transit-focused mayor. And at long last, the Crosslake Connection was opening, the first passenger light rail across a floating bridge – right on the heels of Federal Way light rail opening earlier than expected.

Then I saw the news.

Sound Transit was considering indefinitely delaying the Ballard extension. The core Seattle neighborhood where it can take me 80 minutes to bus home from a Mariners game, where I’m happy if I only pay $100 for my airport Uber, and where, to my friends in Capitol Hill, I’m farther away than Tukwila or Bellevue? My immediate reaction matched that of our district’s city councilmember, Dan Strauss: “unacceptable.”

Ballard is the only one of Seattle’s seven regional centers not connected to light rail today, and Ballard Link is expected to be by far the highest ridership line added in the Sound Transit 3 (ST3) measure. It will not be cheap, but waiting will only make it more expensive. Why defer such a critical project?

https://www.theurbanist.org/op-ed-join-the-save-ballard-rail-march-on-april-19/