King County is hosting a public meeting Tuesday morning on routing and station locations for its new RapidRide E Line, which will travel along Aurora Avenue North from Shoreline to downtown Seattle. The RapidRide E Line should start in Fall 2013.
RapidRide is intended to run 19 hours a day, seven days a week, with special buses arriving at least every 10 minutes during the weekday morning and evening commute. RapidRide buses have low floors and three doors, so people can get on and off quicker.
The meeting by the County Council’s Transportation, Economy and Environmental Committee begins at 9:30 a.m. Tuesday in King County Council Chambers, on the 10th floor of the King County Courthouse, 516 Third Ave. If you can’t make the meeting, you can email comments to testimony@kingcounty.gov. You can also watch committee proceedings online at http://www.kingcounty.gov/kctv.aspx.
The full County Council is expected to make its final decision in late July or mid-August.
Doree,
For those who can’t make it, it’s streaming live on King County TV, and on Channel 22.
http://www.kingcounty.gov/KCTV/schedule.aspx?day=07/17/2012
If I read their map right, they’ve fixed the main problem for those who live in Phinney.
Under the original plan, the Rapid-E bus would not exit Aurora and stop in front of the Greenlake Presbyteria Church like the #358 now does. Instead, it would stay on Aurora and there’d be a new bus stop on Aurora where the pedestrian crossing now is. That’d be quite dangerous, since people would be crossing traffic that hasn’t had a red light since the Queen Anne area.
The current map isn’t that clear, but it has an stop at 65th, which seems to be the either the same as the current one at 64th (Greenlake Presbyterian) or one just a block north of it.
Of course, that doesn’t deal with the main problem I suspect this new scheme will create. The elderly and those with disabilities may find themselves forced to take two buses rather than one. They’ll have to take feeder buses E-W to get to the Rapid E and then the Rapid-E downtown.
Mike Perry, I fail to see how the Rapid Ride E line will create any new problems for the elderly. The route will be exactly the same as the current 358, except the buses will come more often and be easier to board. If anything, the lower ground clearance will allow people with wheelchairs and walkers to enter the bus much more quickly.
The fate of the stop Woodland Pl N is discussed on the page that the map above was taken from without citation. There, you can find this news and much more from the source at king county metro. As you can see in the map detail, the southbound stop will be moved to Aurora and the northbound stop will stay where it is now. This allows buses heading downtown to stay on Aurora while also keeping all bus stops on the western side of Aurora.
http://metrofutureblog.wordpress.com/2012/06/14/council-to-consider-preferred-route-designs-for-rapidride-e-and-f-lines/
“RapidRide buses have low floors and three doors, so people can get on and off… more quickly.”
Thanks “markwalt”.
The video is also available now, subsequent to the event.
The following testified regarding Proposed Ordinance 2012-0225:
– Marilyn Smith.
Councilmember Phillips stated an intent to further review the concern that she raised.
I hope keep the rapid ride buses on Aurora and get rid of the current waste of time that is the loop west of the highway. This is supposed to be a rapid bus service, and it already has too many stops. People can walk a block over to save everyone else a lot of time.