Mass problems for Western Washington’s mass transit
Oct 22, 2024, 9:12 AM | Updated: 9:23 am
A security guard rides the escalator out of the Sound Transit Link Light Rail tunnel. (Getty Images)
(Getty Images)
Those who take Western Washington’s Sound Transit are having their patience challenged.
A breakdown in North Seattle Saturday is just the latest in a series of problems that Sound Transit is investigating.
“Especially as we’re expanding our system, we need to up our game to provide the service our riders deserve,” John Gallagher, a spokesperson with Sound Transit, told The Seattle Times.
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It seems the opposite may be happening at the moment. Saturday’s incident caused significant delays and crowded trains throughout North Seattle.
Trains on the 1 Line operated on a single track from around 9 a.m. until past midnight, according to rider alerts. Instead of the usual 10-minute intervals, passengers had to wait 30 minutes between trains from the University of Washington to Lynnwood stations.
A fire alarm also caused an evacuation at Capitol Hill Station during a fire across the street.
Sound Transit’s recent issues
Sound Transit has gotten hit with a plethora of problems lately. On Aug. 1, a power loss near Northgate Station caused trains to be closed in both directions for six hours. A power relay switch apparently wasn’t reset properly during work on the Lynnwood Link extension.
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On Sept. 17, riders were taken from a stuck train near the University of Washington (UW) Station and walked 300 feet in a tunnel. An electric arc flashed between a train and an overhead power wire. The following day, on Sept. 18, a railcar’s control system fault indicated a brake failure, leading the operator to stop the train near UW Station, resulting in two-and-a-half hours of using one track.
Last spring, power outages near Spring District Station blocked trains on the Eastside starter line for multiple hours, once on May 24 and again on June 18. Both outages were traced to circuitry settings.
Sound Transit CEO Goran Sparrman has hired an external team of engineers to investigate power supply systems.
Bill Kaczaraba is a content editor at MyNorthwest. You can read his stories here. Follow Bill on X, formerly known as Twitter, here and email him here.
