For all those crusading bus riders out there who wanted to save certain bus routes, including Magnolia’s No. 24, King County Metro wants you to know that the torches and the pitchforks can be put away.
Metro officials have heard your comments and complaints and have decided to leave the bus route No. 24 and many others alone…for now.
Larry Phillips, who heads the King County Council, said Metro has decided to make no changes to bus route No. 24, except that it will stop running after 9:30 p.m. once all the Metro changes are implemented on Sept. 29. The bus currently runs until about 1 a.m.
Phillips said that some time in the future, after Metro has implemented the other changes to other bus lines, it will come back to the Magnolia community and other interested parties along the No. 24 route and talk with them about reshaping the transit service to make it more efficient and still meet the needs of the community.
“Sometime in the future, Metro will come back and have a longer, extended conversation with the people along that route and ask them to help Metro shape a transit system that makes sense,” Phillips said.
The councilmember didn’t know when that conversation would take place, but it is expected to be next year at the earliest. He said the priority right now for Metro is to implement the changes it has outlined on other routes.
In recent months, activists had circulated petitions on Magnolia, demanding that Metro back off changes to bus route No. 24, in particular. Metro had planned to alter the route and limit service to West Viewmont Way West and 28th Avenue West. The petition drive had proved very popular, with one petition, alone, collecting more than 380 signatures.
Phillips said the changes proposed by Metro would make the bus service throughout the area more efficient.
Phillips and Seattle Department of Transit Supervisor David Hull met with the Queen Anne Community Council on April 4 to discuss the minor changes that are still scheduled for buses that service Magnolia and Queen Anne.
Hull stated that routes 1,2 and 13 through Queen Anne would not be changed. Route No. 3 will be phased out, with bus route No. 4 taking over nearly all of it’s stops.
The reason for these changes is Metro’s need to save money. Hull said Metro is facing a budget cut of 17 percent in the near future.
Metro planned to strategically approach current routes and find where services were being underutilized or adequate transit already exists. Aiming to do more with less, Metro has been attempting to find where productivity and efficiency can increase.
Originally, Metro proposed making 70 different changes to current Metro services that would be implemented in September. However, following a series of public meetings in November and February and comments from bus riders, the number of changes proposed by Metro was reduced to 50.
“We got about 1,000 comments,” Hull said. “We listened and we changed the proposal. Generally, people are liking the idea that we’re trying to make the system more efficient, just as long as we provide service to those who need it most and we do it transparently.”
According to Phillips, many of the initially proposed changes to transit in Queen Anne and Magnolia will likely revisited some time next year.
“We are still [working] under this plan requirement that underutilized routes will have to see some sort of change,” Phillips said. “That doesn’t mean elimination of service, [but] it could mean some other type of service or maybe another way in which we mitigate for change in service.”
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