March 18, 2016

On Saturday, it's all aboard U Link

Photos courtesy of Sound Transit [enlarge]

The University of Washington Station has a ramp that carries pedestrians and bicyclists over Montlake Boulevard.

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The new line adds 3.15 miles between Husky Stadium, Capitol Hill and the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel.

An eight-minute commute between Husky Stadium and downtown Seattle? Even when everything is gridlocked?

That dream will become a reality on Saturday when the $1.8 billion University Link light rail line opens.

Eight minutes? What about during a downpour or an ice storm or a hot Friday afternoon? No problem. Trains will zip through side-by-side tunnels that connect the new underground stations near the stadium and Capitol Hill, near Seattle Central College.

The 3.15-mile University Link line runs between the two stations and goes under nine lanes of Interstate 5 to connect to the existing light rail lines in the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel. A ride from the UW to Sea-Tac Airport is expected to take about 45 minutes.

An opening event today will have a bunch of high-ranking officials, including U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx and Federal Transit Administration Acting Administrator Therese McMillan.

The system opens to everyone else on Saturday.

The U.S. Department of Transportation provided $829.6 million in federal funding for the project.

Capitol Hill Station was built by Turner Construction and designed by Hewitt. Jacobs was the structural engineer.

UW Station was built by Hoffman Construction and designed by LMN Architects.

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Capitol Hill Station has a pedestrian link under Broadway.

Northlink Transit Partners, a joint venture led by Jacobs Associates, was in charge of final design for the tunnels and the cut-and-cover stations. Jacobs provided overall project management, design and geotechnical engineering.

Joint venture contractor Traylor-Frontier Kemper was in charge of tunneling between Capitol Hill and the UW. JCM U-Link Joint Venture did the tunnel from downtown to Capitol Hill.

Stacy and Witbeck installed the rails and related systems.

University Link is expected to add another 71,000 riders to the system by 2030.

In the fall, Sound Transit will open the 1.6-mile light rail extension from SeaTac/Airport Station to the new Angle Lake Station near South 200th Street in SeaTac.

The agency is adding another 4.3 miles of track from Husky Stadium to Northgate as part of the $1.9 billion Northgate Link project, which is scheduled to open in 2021.

By 2023, Sound Transit will operate nearly 50 miles of light rail between Lynnwood in the north; Bellevue and Redmond's Overlake area to the east; and the Kent/Des Moines area in the south.