The following April 11th Sound Transit System Expansion Committee agenda item caught my attention:
For Recommendation to the Board
Motion Mo M2024-19: Authorizing the chief executive officer to enter into an interlocal government agreement with the City of Bothell for transfer of development rights from Bus Base North, and to execute and record a transfer of development rights covenant for the Bus Base North property.
The reason being previous posts had questioned the Sound Transit System Expansion Committee’s authority to approve a Bus Base North (BBN).
The 2016 Prop 1 voters approved included a ST3 Map PDF specifically listing Bus Maintenance Facility as “Not Included.” Sound Transit plans to replace bus routes with light rail trains would seem to allow existing facilities to maintain the 48 buses planned for their Stride bus routes.
Yet the Sound Transit Board in the July 27th .2023 meeting approved Resolution No. R2023-17 to spend $499,500.000 on a Bus Base North. 17 with the following:
Adopts the Bus Base North Stride Bus Rapid Transit project baseline schedule and budget by (a) increasing the authorized project allocation to-date by $216,463,500 from $283,036,500 to $499,500,000.
Sound Transit had earlier decreed East King County would provide $215,391,000 of the $283,036,000, so it’s likely they’ll fund most of the increase. Snohomish funds paid $9,340,000 of the earlier number and presumable a similar percentage of the increase. Again, without questioning the need for the facility to maintain the buses.
Sound Transit needs for light rail vehicle maintenance led to the Board in 2014 approving a maintenance facility in the Bel-Red area’s Spring District. In 2017 they approved a design-build contract for the Operation & Maintenance Facility (OMF) East in Bellevue. An August 2020 OFM East “Facts Sheet” detailed it included “yard storage for up to 96 light rail vehicles, vehicle maintenance, parts storage and cleaning shop”. The 365-day operating facility would include administrative offices for approximately 250 full-time employees in support of East Link, Lynnwood Link, Downtown Redmond, and Federal Way Link Extensions.
One of the OMF East benefits was it had always included plans for Transit Oriented Development (TOD). A 2024 Sound Transit Spring District Station TOD included a picture of the 6.8-acre TOD site for a "Program of 500 homes and 400,000 SF for office." It included Sound Transit and the City of Bellevue each providing property at no cost (a collective $12 million value) to support the development of affordable housing on the site. Bridge Housing and Touchstone had been selected to develop the property with approximately 500 units of housing, over 400,000 square feet of office space, retail, resident amenities on the ground floor, and public park space.
As suggested by the April 11 agenda, Sound Transits approach to developing property not needed for BBN after construction was far different. The presentation described it as a 526,000 SF-site, with 130,000 SF needed for an Administration & Operations Building, surface parking lot for workers, underground parking for 120 buses, and Maintenance Building. The presentation detailed 171,000 SF was reserved for future development though it included the CEO’s declaration “it was surplus and does not have a transit use.”
The agenda item M2024-19 dealt with the remaining 225,000 SF. Apparently, to appease City of Bothell zoning concerns, Sound Transit agreed to a Transfer Development Rights (TDR) allowing Bothell to reap any benefits. That the agreement was approved by Bothell last year, well in advance of the April 11 request they recommend board approval.
The bottom line is the TDR result is Sound Transit loses all benefits from TOD from the $499.5 million they’ll spend on BBN. It continues the boondoggle of their funding a maintenance facility that was stipulated in 2016 ST3 PDF as “not included” and whose 48 Stride buses didn’t need the 120-bus capacity of BBN. It's time Sound Transit look more at existing facilities to maintain those buses.
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