(The Center Square) – The Ballard section of Seattle is the big loser in a Sound Transit light rail system reboot that has left the community without funding for its planned train station.
Facing a $34.5 billion overall shortfall, the board of the transit system, after a six-hour marathon meeting on Thursday, voted to cut the majority of a light rail expansion link that would have connected the Chinatown/International District with Ballard
The line will now start in the Chinatown/International District and travel about three miles to the Seattle Center. That segment will cost more than $17 billion.
But that’s four miles short of Ballard in miles and $7 to $9 billion short in cash to finish the line.
Two other stops between Seattle Center and Ballard, Smith’s Cove and InterBay, also fell to the chopping block.
Seattle City Councilman Dan Strauss, who represents Ballard and also sits on the Sound Transit Board, said voters had been promised the full Ballard extension when they approved a more than $53 billion bond issue in 2016.
“Anything less than what voters approved is unacceptable,” he said.
Strauss cast one of two dissenting votes on the revised transit plan, with 16 board members voting in favor.
Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson, who is also on the transit board, voted in favor of the plan because it maintains planned rail links to West Seattle and preserves an infill station in South Seattle that had been slated for elimination.
In a statement after the meeting, she expressed concerns about Ballard.
“I’m frustrated and disappointed that we have not yet been able to find a way to deliver more for people in Ballard who have been paying into the program for years and not seen enough results,” she said.
Residents in areas that won’t be getting their transit lines anytime soon, such as Ballard, were visibly upset at Thursday’s meeting.
Dozens appeared, saying they agreed to higher automobile registration fees, property taxes, and sales taxes beginning in 2017 to pay for rail expansions that are nowhere in sight.
The Ballard line wasn’t the only one affected by the transit plan reboot.
One delayed line is a light rail line from South Kirkland to Issaquah. The Sound Transit budget allocates $8.4 billion for the line, but delays its completion from 2041 to 2050.
Rising land and construction costs have driven up light rail project costs. But critics say the transit project has also been mismanaged, with elaborate train stations that weren’t necessary, helping increase costs.
Another future line to Everett in Snohomish County was kept in the plan, but light rail is not expected to reach the urban area until 2041, several years behind schedule.
All was not lost for supporters of the Ballard link on Thursday.
The Sound Transit board did allocate $300 million for design work on the full line.
Strauss was also successful in adding an amendment to the Sound Transit plan requiring the transit agency to announce by Aug. 1 when service could begin on the full line.
But the reality is, there is still a $7 to $9 billion funding gap to build the line, so a date will mean little without the money.
Yet another amendment by Strauss passed by the board requires the transit agency to explore seeking new funding, including a possible new bond issue, if it can’t find another way to finance the line.
But board members questioned whether voters would be willing to pay for a new bond issue when they had been waiting for years for stations promised under the 2016 bond issue.
Sound Transit Board Chairman Dave Somers said he knows that many are disappointed about the Ballard line being only partially built.
“We are currently funded to build through Seattle Center, and I know that is not the vision, but we are fully committed to design the full project to Ballard and we will keep working to find the resources to build it,” he said.
