PSRC Funding Application Competition Regional FTA Application Main Competition Status submitted Submitted: March 17th, 2017 11:48 AM Prepopulated with screening form? Yes Project Information 1. Project Title Purchase 11 New High Capacity Transit Buses 2. Transportation 2040 ID Exempt 3. Sponsoring Agency Sound Transit 4. Cosponsors N/A 5. Does the sponsoring agency have "Certification Acceptance" status from WSDOT? N/A 6. If not, which agency will serve as your CA sponsor? N/A 7. Is your agency a designated recipient for FTA funds? Yes 8. Designated recipient concurrence N/A Contact Information 1. Contact name Monica Overby 2. Contact phone 2066894979 3. Contact email [email protected] Project Description 1. Project Scope This project will purchase eleven High Capacity Transit (HCT) buses needed to provide 15,000 additional ST Express bus hours. The new service is estimated to increase ridership by a range of 1,400 to 2,800 riders per weekday. Sound Transit's ST Express Bus service provides fast, frequent, reliable service connecting major population and employment centers in the Central Puget Sound region. ST Express provides limited stops and serves twenty-five transit centers and over thirty park & rides linking the three-county region. The ST Express system is experiencing challenges meeting its service standards and performance due to buses being overcrowded, delaying schedule and service reliability. These buses will ultimately support the entire network of ST Express bus routes that serve 23 designated regional centers in Snohomish, Pierce and King Counties For this application, Sound Transit is focusing the eleven buses on routes experiencing the most severe overcrowding and schedule reliability issues. These routes include: 510/512 Everett-Seattle, 545 Seattle-Redmond, 550 Seattle-Bellevue, 577/578 Seattle-Federal Way-Auburn-Sumner- Puyallup, 590/594 Tacoma-Seattle. These routes directly serve a total of 13 centers along the I-5, SR-520, and I-90 corridors in Snohomish, Pierce and King Counties. • Regional Growth Centers: Everett, Lynnwood, Seattle Downtown, Seattle University Community, Redmond Downtown, Redmond Overlake, Bellevue Downtown, Federal Way, Puyallup Downtown, Auburn, Tacoma Downtown and Lakewood. • Manufacturing and Industrial Center: Sumner-Pacific These eleven HCT buses are needed to accommodate 15,000 additional annual platform hours for ST Express service to help address overcrowding on buses and improve schedule reliability and service quality. HCT buses have the ability to move larger volumes of people compared to single occupant vehicles (SOVs). Sound Transit estimates that approximately 357,000-714,000 vehicle trips and 6,602,960-13,205,920 vehicle miles traveled could be reduced annually as a result of this project. One HCT bus has seats for at least 56 passengers. Each new bus adds capacity to the regional transportation network without the addition of highway lanes or more SOV’s. The estimated number of passengers benefiting from the new buses and additional ST Express service hours is approximately 1,400-2,800 new riders per weekday. Summary of Benefits and Outcomes of this Project include: • Increased schedule reliability and on-time performance for ST Express buses serving and connecting 13 designated centers. • An estimated 1,400-2,800 new transit riders per weekday • Reduces an estimated 357,000-714,000 vehicle trips and 6-13 million vehicle miles traveled annually in already congested urban corridors. • Connects commuters, students, transit dependent populations to jobs, school, medical and social services. ST Express serves regional transit centers and park and rides, population and employment centers, schools/universities and major medical facilities. • Support for housing and economic development goals and policies in growth centers throughout the region (more details provided below in “benefit to centers” sections). Housing and development goals of regional designated centers served by ST Express encourage and support high capacity transit within these centers. encourage and support high capacity transit within these centers. • The 11 new buses will all have bicycle racks that hold 3 bicycles per bus • ST Express routes offer frequent, all day service. For example, ST Express 550 provides service every 5-10 minutes in the peak period and the span of service is 4:52 a.m.-12:12 a.m. The 11 HCT buses will be procured in late 2017 with delivery expected in 2018. 2. Project Justification, Need, or Purpose The new ST Express buses will be deployed on the region’s most congested corridors, serving the region’s densest downtowns and urban centers, adding critical capacity and reliability where it is most needed to support the region’s economy and preserve its quality of life. The purpose of this project is to buy eleven new buses needed to accommodate 15,000 additional annual platform hours for ST Express Bus service to address overcrowding on buses and improve service reliability and efficiency. The buses will also support ST Express ridership growth including the estimated 1,400-2,800 new riders per weekday anticipated from the additional hours. ST Express ridership for 2016 was over 18 million boardings and is estimated to reach 20 million annual passengers and average weekday boardings of 70,000 by 2022. Improve Service Reliability and Efficiency on the Region’s Congested Corridors As the Puget Sound Region continues to grow, congestion on major highways and arterials in the region is increasing and will get even worse without additional transit. Studies show that transit service along these region’s congested corridors (e.g. I-5) is the equivalent of adding additional lanes of traffic during peak commute periods. Transit ridership means fewer cars on the road, which helps alleviate traffic congestion by making the most efficient use of available highway capacity. This project is estimated to reduce 6,602,960-13,205,920 vehicle miles traveled annually. These congested corridors are served by ST Express (e.g. I-5 from Everett to Tacoma, I-90 from Seattle to Bellevue) and since 2015, Sound Transit has locally funded over 32,000 annual service hours throughout the ST Express system, providing new connections, capacity, meeting growing demand, and mitigating congestion. In September 2015, approximately 4,000 service hours were invested in the I-5 North corridor to improve on-time performance and schedule reliability of Routes 510, 511, 512, and 513. In 2016, Sound Transit invested approximately 4,000 service hours in the I-405 North Corridor, Routes 532 and 535, to improve on-time performance and schedule reliability along the corridor. Even with these investments, schedule reliability on a number of routes continues to not meet service quality standards as congestion along major highway corridors and at-capacity buses reduce on-time performance and schedule reliability. The purchase of the eleven HCT buses to support another 15,000 additional bus service hours provides an important investment in regional ST Express efficiency and reliability and responds to negative impacts to service, schedule and performance. These ST Express bus routes serve the I-5, I-90, and SR 520 corridors which experience congestion and capacity issues. This project directly supports routes (listed below) that are experiencing severe overcrowding and schedule reliability challenges. • Route 510-512 Everett - Seattle: a major regional route with bidirectional service that operates along the I-5 corridor and serves the Everett, Lynnwood, U-District and Seattle CBD centers. Combined, these two routes served over 2.6 million boardings in 2016 with 40-50 boardings per trip. • Route 545: Redmond-Seattle: this route operates along the SR 520 corridor serving Seattle Downtown, Redmond Overlake and Redmond Downtown centers. In 2015 this route was modified to help connect Capitol Hill (the most densely populated neighborhood in Seattle) with thousands of jobs at Microsoft. Between 2013 and mid-2016, average weekday boardings on the SR-520 corridor increased by 18 percent. During peak travel times, buses remain crowded with the average bus carrying 50 passengers. In 2016, there were 2.6 million boardings. • Route 550: Bellevue- Seattle: a major regional route serving the I-90 corridor and Seattle and Bellevue CBD centers. In 2015, total boardings were up 11 percent over total boardings in 2013 (or 14?). Weekday ridership grew by 13 percent. Riders per trip are very high on this corridor, averaging 76 per trip in the westbound peak direction and up to 81 per trip in the eastbound peak direction. Ridership continues to climb in the corridor. Route 550 now regularly averages over 10,500 boardings per day. • Route 577 | Federal Way – Seattle // Route 578 | Puyallup – Seattle: Puyallup > Sumner > Auburn > Federal Way > Seattle: These two routes are regional, serving the I-5 south corridor and designated centers of Federal Way, Puyallup Downtown, Sumner-Pacific and Seattle Downtown. In 2016, routes 577 and 578 had over one million boardings and experience consistent overcrowding. • Route 590 | Tacoma – Seattle: Downtown Tacoma > Tacoma Dome Station > Downtown Seattle // Route 594 | Lakewood – Seattle: Lakewood > Tacoma > Seattle These routes provide service on the I-5 corridor in the designated centers of Tacoma Downtown, Lakewood, and Seattle Downtown. They also serve the Tacoma Dome Station, a large multimodal transit center serving well over 3 million people a year with connections to regional and local bus, Sounder commuter rail, Link light rail and Amtrak passenger rail service. Combined, these two routes have over 5,000 average weekday boardings (2016).These are very popular routes offering fast, frequent service on I-5 between King and Pierce counties. The eleven HCT buses are needed to: Need #1: Accommodate expected population growth in the region. Forecasts show that the Region will have 5 million people and 3 million jobs by 2040. • Between 2000 and 2040, the region is forecast to grow by an additional 1.7 million people, increasing 52 percent to reach a population of 5 million.