Joint Seattle City Council Sustainability & Transportation Committee & Sound Transit 3/29/2019

Good morning, and welcome to this special meeting of the elected leaders group for the West Seattle and Ballard Link Extensions.

This group includes Sound Transit board members, members of the Seattle City Council, the Port of Seattle, and is a meeting of the Seattle City Council's Sustainability and Transportation Committee.

I also want to make sure that you realize there are interpreters available.

I've been looking forward to this meeting because we get to do a deep dive into two key areas along this project corridor, the communities that surround Chinatown International District Station and the Delridge Station.

Both of these communities were called out in the racial equity toolkit, and we, the elected leaders group members, felt it was necessary to spend this additional time understanding the alignment and station alternatives in these neighborhoods, particularly informed by community feedback.

I have the privilege of representing both of these communities on the King County Council.

The Chinatown International District is a unique cultural community, both in the city and in the larger region, and they have endured a disproportionate share of impacts from infrastructure projects over the last century.

And Delridge is truly a community of smaller neighborhoods, stretching from North Delridge, where we'll be discussing a location for a station, including Youngstown, North Delridge, High Point, Rocks Hill, South Delridge, Highland Park, and White Center, which will all be served by the station and corridor.

Community participation is crucial to the success of any project and critical and essential to this project I look forward to hearing from members of the public who are here today to offer their public their comments and testimony as well as from the Sound Transit staff who will summarize the feedback heard through the community meetings and work process that has been going on since the last elect leaders group meeting.

Engagement has been robust and there's a lot to do to be ready to move forward.

I want to thank everyone who's made comments thus far and remind everybody the scoping period is open until April 2nd.

Thank you for participating in this transformative project and before I turn it over to my co-chair Mike O'Brien with the Seattle City Council I'd like to also acknowledge that this is councilmember Rob Johnson's last meeting the elected leaders group Rob we wouldn't be as far in this work in sound transit in any sense without your involvement in your support and Both for your advocacy within transit and the ST3 in particular as a board member and now a member of this elected leaders group, but your advocacy and work as a public servant throughout the region as a Seattle City Council member, I've championed and I've appreciated.

I want to thank you very much for the leadership you've provided.

And with that, Mike.

Thank you, Joe.

I want to start by asking if our interpreter would like to make an announcement about what interpretation is available.

SPEAKER 1 IN MANDARIN CHINESE

Thank you both so much.

Joe, thank you for your introductions.

Colleagues, thank you all for being here.

Public, I want to just remind folks that today's meeting is this culmination of a number of conversations that have happened over the past 16 months, highlighting key opportunities and challenges that we face in this project's corridor.

The Racial Equity Toolkit helped highlight the station areas we will discuss today as key areas to dedicate enhanced engagement and analysis efforts.

We will hear today about community concerns and inputs to help us decide what to continue to look at as we move through this process.

Building light rail in our dense and dynamic city brings many exciting openings to address mobility change, but these opportunities are not without near and long-term impacts.

The elected leadership group has sought to determine how to maximize the promises that Light Rail brings to communities, mobility, housing, community and civic development, while also maintaining community character and the deep cultural historical character of the neighborhoods the train will serve.

I thank everyone for the engagement and analysis that has shaped this project to this point.

There's more work to do, but so many possibilities to explore to make this project one that will transform our city while maintaining the assets that we love about our communities.

I want to thank all community members who have spent time talking with us and Sound Transit by participating in that project thus far.

We're going to get into public comment in a moment.

Before we do that, I'm going to hand it over to Peter Rogoff to make some comments.

And we're going to go through three or four slides as a high-level overview as part of the introduction.

And then in about five minutes or so, we'll jump into public comment.

And I have about a dozen people that have signed up for public comment.

So sit tight if you're waiting for public comment.

And Peter, take it away.

Thank you, and thank you, Co-Chairs O'Brien and McDermott.

And really, thank you to all the members of the elected leadership group.

This has been an extraordinary commitment of time and effort around a very, very important project.

And I particularly want to thank, on behalf of the staff, the ELG for scheduling this meeting today as we're discussing two of the more vexing challenges in figuring out the right future for transit through the city of Seattle.

These two communities, the Chinatown International District and Delridge, obviously have a very rich history, a very rich culture that must be recognized, honored, and respected through this entire process.

At the same time, we have a requirement to be mindful of cost and schedule in moving the project forward and delivering it to the people so that all communities could actually enjoy light rail service.

But importantly, those two imperatives need not be in conflict.

But that's where this work comes in, is figuring out how to de-conflict any challenges between cost and schedule and what these communities really need to succeed through this process.

So I really appreciate you scheduling this meeting so we can do just that and gather all the facts here from the communities in their entirety.

And I will just say, I know I am among many on the Sound Transit staff that look forward to listening intently on what we're gonna hear today.

Not just obviously from staff, but most importantly for members of the community.

Thanks very much

Good morning, ELG members.

My name's Diane Adams.

Good to see you all again.

Thank you for coming in this morning.

Just for our benefit, I wanted to just review our agenda for today.

Our meeting structure is a little bit different, and then we can flow from there, just so we all have the same expectation.

The first thing is that we're going, we have until noon today, and a fair amount of content to get through, including feedback on the Chinatown International District Station planning process and Delridge Station as well.

So our structure this morning if you look at your agenda we'll get through our welcomes.

Cahill and Lita will provide just a few slides to set the context for where we are in the process and where we are with equity and inclusion outreach.

Then we'll move into public comment on the Chinatown International District station planning process.

Then we'll move into, at 9.50, move into the presentation material from Cahill, Lita, and Sloan.

Then we'll close out our discussion and presentation review around Chinatown International District.

Then we'll move to the Delridge Station process where we'll move into public comment, open with public comment, and then repeat the same kind of presentation feedback process there, and then hopefully adjourn by noon.

Does that make sense that that process?

Okay, and just a note for today.

There is a lot of content Sound Transit is not looking for Recommendations from you today.

This is kind of a special meeting to talk about the station planning process in these two neighborhoods And so while we want discussion we do have content to move through and so we'll want to make sure that we're able to share all of that with you Again, interpreters are available for the public comment period as needed, and I think that's, we're engaging that.

So with that, Cahill.

Just to remind you of where we are in the process, this is an overall look at our project development process.

In the green, you see the planning phase, which extends from 2017 through 2022. And as you can see, we're right at the start of the planning phase.

We've been going through the alternatives development work over the last year, the early scoping.

We're just currently in the scoping period.

And of course, we're moving towards board identification of a preferred alternative and other alternatives.

that would then be studied in the environmental review phase, which is coming up next, and which would extend through 2022. After that, we get into design from 2022 to 2026, and then we move into construction from 2025 to 2035, depending on the project.

The overall goal is to start service to West Seattle in 2030 and to Ballard in 2035. This is a look at our chart, which you've seen many times, explaining our community engagement and collaboration process over the last year.

It's basically broken down into three sections.

The first part of it, if you look at the top, is Level 1 Alternative Screening, which was in the first part of last year.

Then we moved into Level 2 Alternative Screening through the summer and into the fall.

And now we are in Level 3 Alternative Screening.

And as you can see along the left there, We've been doing outreach in various ways.

We've had updates to the community along the way through open houses, through neighborhood forums.

We've had a stakeholder advisory group which has met pretty much monthly through this process, elected leadership group of course, and of course we briefed the Sound Transit Board.

So we went through our level one alternative screening process, made our level one recommendations back in April of last year.

That was followed by going through the same process through the middle of last year and level two recommendations in September and October timeframe.

And now we're at that point over on the right of this chart where we're moving towards moving into making the next set of Alternatives Level 3 recommendations next month in April.

But today, as was described, is a special meeting to dig into some of the issues specific to the Chinatown ID and Delridge Station area.

And I'll hand it over to Lita.

So building upon the opening remarks and to provide additional context for this morning's discussion, I'd like to once again review an important aspect of our work at Sound Transit and the planning process for the West Seattle and Ballard Link extensions, our work on equity and inclusion.

As we've shared before, we're pleased to be building on our partnership with the City of Seattle during the alternatives development phase to apply the racial equity toolkit together with a cross-agency team to this project.

Representatives from the West Seattle Ballard Sound Transit team, both from external engagement as well as the technical team, have been meeting regularly with the city's team, including staff from the Office of Civil Rights, Office of Planning and Community Development, SDOT, as well as Department of Neighborhoods.

We've been engaging regularly and our structure has focused on data analysis as well as community engagement with the idea that we'd like to strive to provide information that data alone cannot provide.

So just to take you through the year during level one evaluation we did data analysis mapped the concentrations of communities of color along the project corridor.

You'll see from the map on the right this map is demonstrating those populations and it's taken from the American Community Survey.

You'll see that the Chinatown International District station area is the one stationary along the alignment with that level of intensity in terms of communities of color.

However we looked at the Delridge station as well and there are communities of color that are there's dense populations of communities of color further south.

The Delridge neighborhood and that would be served by the Delridge station through bus or bike and other sort of modes and connectors and that's informed our work over the year.

We also determined shared outcomes which I will share with you in a moment as well as updated our screening criteria.

So that was in our first phase of work.

These are the racial equity toolkit outcomes that we've been working towards.

We're looking at enhancing mobility and access for communities of color and low-income populations, creating opportunities for equitable development that benefit communities of color, avoiding disproportionate impacts on communities of color and low-income populations, and meaningfully involving communities of color and low-income populations in the project.

During Level 2, we shared this memo with the public, with the stakeholder advisory group, and the elected leadership group that captured both how we measured connections, potential impacts, and opportunities, as well as community feedback about those options, again, with the idea of trying to provide information that data alone cannot provide about these alternatives and how they might benefit or burden these communities.

And all of that work through Level 1 and Level 2 has really informed what we focused on in Level 3. In the Chinatown International District, we heard repeatedly themes about, for the Chinatown International District Station, about limiting harmful impacts, maximizing connections for all users, and how to support 100-year vision for the station.

And additionally, I'll add that the idea that the station is serving from Pioneer Square to the Chinatown International District and to Little Saigon, that the station is really an opportunity to potentially re-knit communities.

Delridge, we heard repeatedly about bus rail integration.

Again, that idea of serving those communities of color living further south, as well as equitable transit-oriented development.

And with that, I will leave it to public comment.

Thank you, Lita.

So folks, we are going to jump into public comments, specifically focused on the Chinatown International District right now.

If you have general comments, this would be an appropriate time to make it.

If you're here to comment on the Delridge alignment, we will come back to that when we're finished with the Chinatown International District presentation.

Folks, we'll have two minutes to comment.

I'll call names.

You can come up to the table as your name is called.

Alex Zimmerman, you're going to be first.

You'll be followed by Justin Clark, and then Micah Winkler-Chin.

Sieg Heil, my dirty Fuhrer.

A Nazi Gestapo pig.

My name Alex Zimmerman.

I'm sorry I call you pig, because right now everything that has happened here, and exactly in Seattle, in King Country, look to me like an animal farm.

You know what this mean?

Pig and chickens, it's exactly what's happened.

About what happened right now with sound transist, Chinatown.

or another Chinatown, or another Chinatown, or different town, you know what I mean, black town, brown town, white town.

It cost us a hundred and hundred billion dollars, this fancy scam.

who uses money, a corporation in council.

It's very simple.

How we can change this?

Can we change this?

Exactly we can, but not right now.

Why?

Because everybody who's sitting in this room right now are criminal or support criminal.

For example, I give you classic example.

City Council, Gonzalez, violate constitutional law five times.

And court recognizes.

Why she sit here and make decision with another couple criminal who violate constitutional law in Open Public Meeting Act?

And you all support these people.

This reflect your decision.

Is this exactly what is I want speak to you?

Are you listen to me?

No, I am nobody.

Another two million?

Another 700,000?

You listen to them?

No.

For this you all criminal right now.

So my proposition right now, I speak to everybody who listen to me.

First, before we start use our money for people, for government, for better life, we need clean this Dory chamber totally.

When we will doing this, maybe after this we can make a good decision.

Stand up America.

Stand up Seattle.

Thank you very much.

I'll try to keep the energy going here.

I'm Justin Clark.

I'm an engineer on the Seattle Design Commission.

Since 1999, the commission has served to advise the mayor and city council on the implications of ST projects on the public realm and neighborhoods.

In February, we held a joint commission with the Arts and Planning Commissions to discuss how CID investments could elevate the goals of equity, placemaking, and intermodal connections.

Here are some of our observations.

First, the construction and impacts of the 5th Avenue cut and cover alignment will cause significant long-term economic, social, and cultural impacts on the CID.

The 4th Avenue alignment substantially reduces these.

The technical and engineering benefits of the Fifth Avenue alignment are important, but the likely long-term displacement and gentrification of the CID is too great.

This is equity.

Expensive adjustments to the north and south ends of the representative alignment are being made to reduce conflicts with the port activities because the port can't move.

Similarly, neither can the culture and energy of the CID and Little Saigon be replicated or relocated.

We need to show that culture, community, and place are core to the identity of the city, just as we're showing industry is important.

As the city's partner, ST must study environment impacts of all options for the CID, including the 4th Avenue viaduct replacement and development of an intermodal hub.

Union Station is the ideal intermodal multicultural hub.

This use best meets ST's purpose and needs statements on equity and multimodal connectivity.

It's part of the city's responsibility to advance equity, and it also meets FDA's expectations about enhancing connectivity where light rail buses, streetcar, commuter rail, and Amtrak converge.

More broadly, to the Seattle ELG, Seattle must develop a vision for the CID station area that creates a unique entryway to the city.

With all due respect, ST should not set the vision based on their infrastructure needs.

The city needs to lead with ST to follow.

It's critical that the communities of the CID and Little Saigon are not just mere stakeholders with the vision dictated to them, but equal partners and leaders in casting and implementing the vision.

Further, ST and the city need to partner to hold robust public My last comment before I get kicked off.

Finally, we think that the city, the county, PDAs, and Amtrak need to create a partnership to leverage development opportunities that elevate culture, place, and community.

LA and DC did this with their Union Station, so did Denver.

We need to do it with our Union Station.

Thank you.

Thank you, Justin, and thanks to all the members of the Design Commission for your ongoing attention to this project.

Look forward to future comments, too.

Brian, can I ask for the next two speakers to come up?

You bet.

So Savita Reddy-Pathy and then Larry Yoke.

And following these speakers will be Kathleen Johnson and then Tim Lee.

Whenever you're ready.

Good morning.

Am I on?

Yes.

OK.

Good morning, elected leadership group.

I'm not?

Ah, the green light.

Good morning, elected leadership group.

We, all three of us, serve on the stakeholder advisory group and representing, or I think we're identified with the Chinatown International District.

When we started the process with the stakeholder advisory group, we understood that our role was to review information, come to consensus on key decisions, and work through project issues as a group.

But to be clear, the issues around alignment decisions are very complex and have lasting implications.

As a volunteer advisory group, the issues and choices put before us increasingly feel outside the scope of our advisory role.

We have not been elected by our respective communities to represent their interests on the SAG.

We do not feel empowered to speak for the communities we've been asked to by Sound Transit to represent.

We're we're just working folk and we don't have the time or resources or language ability I barely function in English as you can tell right now with all the community members and gather their feedback We can advise you on the issues to be studied and the outcomes we are advocating for in our communities But we ask you the elected leadership group members to take responsibility for consulting with the communities you represent and owning key decisions in the best interest of the people who elected you to represent them and be accountable for those decisions

Your button's on.

You can go, Savita.

We'll get the timing right for you.

Thank you.

Good morning.

My name is Savita Redipathi, and I'm on the Stakeholder Advisory Group and have been a trustee at the Wing Luke Museum since 2004. And I ride transit almost every day.

Sound Transit has asked the SAG to explore level three alternatives and recommend two preferred alternatives, one that's on budget and one that may require third party funding.

The information on benefits and impacts of each option are limited at this stage of design, so it's difficult to determine which is preferable.

Without clarity or consensus on priorities, it's also difficult for SAG members to compare benefits and trade-offs.

For example, an option of better access for transit users versus substantial construction impacts and displacing neighborhood businesses and residents.

The SAG has not received enough information about budget, project costs, and impacts to make this recommendation.

We believe that all concepts presented in the level three alternatives should be studied in the EIS.

This will also give Sound Transit more time to refine the concepts to include community feedback, meet the project purpose and need, and meet project budget requirements.

We ask for better understanding about what causes a project element to become a candidate for third party funding.

From what we can infer, is it simply that elements are over budget?

Because all level three designs appear to meet the project purpose and need.

If third party funding is required, we ask Sound Transit to design it further, study it in the EIS, and look at opportunities to reduce costs.

Then we will have more confidence in the numbers.

Thank you to the elected leadership group for consulting the communities you represent for these key alignment decisions.

Mr. Chairman, members of the group.

I think the challenge that we've faced on the stakeholders group, and I'm on the stakeholders group, I'm also a trustee of the wing, is that we've been asked to agree on a group of alternatives, alignments, when in fact what we have are a number of interests specific to each station.

And the consequence is that if we are, as a group, required to come up with an alignment, we run the risk of pitting one neighborhood against another.

The issues that are important to them having to be traded off by the issues of another neighborhood.

And I would argue that That's not really the role of the stakeholders group.

It's about giving you information about what the stations and the communities need.

And so I would ask that rather than focus on an alignment placement for you, focus on the needs of those communities and those stations, and then let the technical staff, the engineers at Sound Transit, come together with that alignment.

very competent people.

I've been very impressed with the work they've done in support of the stakeholders group.

I think they can make that happen.

My father ran a chop suey house for 40 years, and our menu had fixed combination plates, and we also had column A, column B, and column C.

Let me argue that this is an opportunity for us to make some choices between column A, column B, and column C.

If you get all three together, you get egg roll.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you all.

Applause is fine.

Applause is welcome.

Micah, Savita, and Larry, and all the others who are serving on the stakeholder advisory group, I want to thank you for your time and commitment.

And I really appreciate your comments today and helping us think about how we frame these decisions that are going to be coming before us in the next month or so.

So thanks a bunch.

Kathleen?

Good morning, and thank you very much for hosting this special CID focused ELG meeting.

I really appreciate the time that you're taking and the organization that went into bringing everybody to the table today.

I wanted to address the 4th Avenue alternative and specifically the impact of the cumulative construction potentially on the viaduct.

It's unclear what the city's plan is for the 4th Avenue viaduct and related structures that are in the area that might be impacted by the construction of the light rail line.

The infrastructure around this neighborhood is old and it will need to be replaced potentially within the horizon of the new train station here.

If so, sound transit in the city of Seattle could minimize the pain experienced by these two neighborhoods by completing the two major projects at once.

When Sound Transit compares construction impacts on the 4th Avenue and 5th Avenue alternatives with the 4th Avenue The 4th Avenue alternative looks like it will take much longer and have greater traffic and construction impacts But these comparisons don't consider the additional impact of the city coming back at some other point in the near horizon near window horizon of replacing the 4th Avenue viaduct and related structures We ask that Sound Transit compare the impacts of constructing a joint link extension on 4th Avenue with a 4th Avenue viaduct replacement project to the impacts of constructing the link extension followed by the replacement of the 4th Avenue viaduct or other infrastructure pieces in the area.

Even though the city has not developed a formal plan or timeline for replacing the 4th Avenue Viaduct and other structures in this area, Sound Transit should consider the construction impacts of this replacement in its cumulative effects analysis.

Whether the 4th Avenue Viaduct is rebuilt as part of this extension project or not, the city needs to provide Sound Transit with the information to consider the 4th Avenue Viaduct project as a reasonable and foreseeable project.

Finally, in these two historic districts, I would ask you to make your decisions with an equity lens and also a 100-year lens to build a system that maximizes its potential across the generations.

Thank you.

Thank you, Kathleen.

Tim?

Tim Lee is going to be followed by Liz Denning and then Kaya Wong.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.

Good morning, the leaderships and the city council and the mayor for hosting this opportunity for us to put input in this public comments.

And my name is Tim Lee and I'm a property owner and a business owner in Chinatown International District.

And our Chinatown community appreciates all this input and all the information that was provided for us last week, last two weeks.

And so our Chinatown community supports the 5th Avenue constructions and having the train cars stops below the 5th Avenue for the following reasons.

Number one is accessibility for the elderly, which is from the last time when there was slides that if the car is put on the 4th Avenue, it would take about a normal young man, like a healthy man, person to walk seven minutes to the car from the 5th Avenue to the 4th Avenue.

But Chinatown has 50% are elderly.

And when the elderly on walkers and cane walking seven minutes, that means 21 minutes or maybe more for them.

So it's a burden on the elderly.

So we hope that the stations and the cars be put under the 5th Avenue.

And the second reason is the efficiency in timing to complete the constructions.

And our community would like to enjoy the use of the public transits and the new car rail stations sooner compared to seven to 15 years.

And the thirdly is the budget feasibility of a city and also the sound transit.

We can use that extra money that was like billions of dollars into other projects.

And fourth, the owners, we have, I'm a business owner and I'm outreach to the business owners on the Fifth Avenue.

The four owners, they are all willing to move because the building's old and they are happy that they be relocated and be relocated back.

So relocation is not a problem for them and I can verify that.

And the fourth, so we hope that the, the stations or the cars be put under the Fifth Avenue.

Thank you very much.

And thank you so much for your comments.

Liz is next.

And if folks making comment want an interpreter, just let us know and we'll make sure we adjust the time to accommodate that.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak today.

I'm Liz Stenning the public realm director of the Lions for Pioneer Square.

The Lions is a nonprofit organization leading the revitalization of the Pioneer Square Historic District through advocacy programming marketing and community action.

We work to help preserve what makes Pioneer Square the most authentic engaging and dynamic neighborhood in Seattle.

So the CID station sits at the edge of Pioneer Square which serves all of our constituents daily.

This project matters deeply to Pioneer Square and we are dedicated to being fully engaged in the process through completion.

At this time we urge you to keep the 4th and 5th Avenue alternatives all on the table.

Pioneer Square needs time to be engaged in the process.

We are still as you know in the midst of more than a decade of public mega projects including the Alaskan way biotech replacement project the Alaskan way seawall replacement project the Washington State ferries Coleman dock expansion.

Expansion of the first hill streetcar and Center City construction and the replacement of the water main under First Avenue Which just happened this last year so by allowing time to fully study the alternatives You'll give us the opportunity to be engaged in the process so that at the end we can all have a project That engages everyone and we're all proud of thank you.

Yes Next is I'm sure it's Kaya or Karya.

I Caria.

And Caria, you'll be followed by Betty Lau and then Alvin Ong.

Hi, good morning everyone.

Thank you so much for your time and the opportunity to speak.

And my name is Caria Wong and I'm with Chinese Information and Service Center.

CISC has been serving the immigrant communities in the King County for the past 47 years.

As we are providing essential supporting service for immigrants to thrive, it's equally important for us to advocate for social, racial, economic, and environment equity.

I really appreciate the opportunity to share our comments regarding to the construction of the Chinatown International District Station.

For a lot of immigrants, because of language and cultural and various reason, immigrant families, especially for parents with children, who need to work multiple jobs to meet the end needs of the family, they won't be able to participate much.

However, historically, we know that immigrants of colors are often missed in the decision-making table, yet they are often Yet, they are often the last to be informed and the first to be impact.

Plus, this is really important for the community members in the CID area to be engaged and empowered throughout the process.

Material and information should be available in the language community members will be able to understand, even for the high level and technical information of the construction project.

And community members regarding of race, ages, and country of origins should be included, and their voices to be heard.

And give you an example, for a lot of people that we serve, it's not that they don't want to participate.

It's often because they don't understand, and they don't have the time, and there's not enough time for them to learn.

So it's really important for those people to be engaged.

Thank you so much for your time.

Hi, I'm Betty Lau, and I'm from the Zhonghua Benevolent Association, one of the lead organizations of the Chinese community.

First off, we're really happy to see the Chinatown ID station.

We have lobbied for about 14 years for that name to be corrected to match the Seattle City Council Ordinance 119297. where the official name is Chinatown International District, which includes the neighborhoods of Chinatown, Japantown, and Little Saigon.

Regarding the alternatives, many of us prefer the Fourth Avenue in contrast to my colleague, Tim.

We prefer the Fourth Avenue.

I'm one of those elderly people with mobility issues.

My parents had a laundry here in the 40s in Chinatown, well, on the edge.

And fourth, we would ask that you add to the criteria of the EIS study the community impacts.

This was asked by one of the other community organizations, and I haven't seen it happen yet.

I have been to every single one of the meetings, and I have learned so much.

I know it's a difficult decision, but I hope that criteria will be included for impacts on the community.

And with regard to the prior person, can I have some, about 30 seconds of your time, Alvin?

Thank you.

I would like to suggest that there be a meeting in Chinatown proper so that Things can be explained over time, as the previous speaker had said, to the non-English speakers.

It is really difficult to interpret all these new ideas, new vocabulary, and new concepts.

And it takes a while.

It took me a year.

And I was born and raised here.

It took me about a year to really grasp and understand what is happening on this project.

And I think when it's done, it's going to be super, but I hope it's according to what you said, to minimize the impacts on a non-English speaking community of color.

Thank you.

Thank you, Betty.

Do you want to say something?

I'm actually going to pass on my term, so.

Okay.

Thank you, Allison.

We have two more folks signed up to comment, Anna Zwartz and Anna Howe.

Should I go?

Yeah.

I'm with Rooted in Rights.

We're a program of disability rights Washington.

Our offices are right on 4th and Jackson.

And I just want to say that no matter what option you guys decide, ultimately I think it's important for us to think about the future and planning for the accessible future we want, and not just designing a station that meets the bare minimum requirements under the ADA for accessibility, but one that actually is a station and a street design that will work for people with disabilities, will work for the larger community, and will allow everyone to have the access to transportation that we need.

Thank you.

Thank you, Anna.

Anna Hao?

No, not here seeing Anna come forward.

All right, we'll go ahead and close public comment.

You can speak up.

My name is Nora Chan, and I'm from Chinatown, and you don't see me much, but I do work very hard, okay?

Thank you to the mayor, city government, and King County government.

for giving us this opportunity to voice our opinions.

I've been working very hard for the last two months because they don't know that I created many opportunity for the people to voice their opinion.

Fourth Avenue, Fifth Avenue.

We have over 20 ideas, and those ideas is from all these local people.

They don't speak any English, and yet they care, like putting a restroom in the station.

Do you ever think of that?

But they think of many different things that I did not even think of it.

So we are really happy about this opportunity to have the station close by to us, to Chinatown International District.

But I know that it will impact many bodies' life.

I went and talked to Fifth Avenue, you know, to all the business over there, and they saw me more than they see their husband or wife.

But anyway, I want to say that this is a great opportunity.

I was born and raised in Hong Kong, so I know that the transportation is how important that is to a city.

How come Hong Kong is such a little place and yet it is such a financial district for the world?

is very important for transportation.

And I'm the one that helped to get the free waterfront shuttle into Chinatown.

And every day, I go to the station and check.

And every day, the driver told me, Mr. Chen, we have more people coming to Chinatown.

And I'm really happy.

So I'm looking forward to this project because it probably is not for me.

I'm 72 years old, but I'm sure it will be for my children and grandchildren.

And I welcome this idea and thank you very much for all your hard work.

Thank you.

Thank you, Loi.

Is anyone else?

Is there anyone else who didn't sign up but would like to provide public comment on the Chinatown International District alignment?

All right, seeing none, we'll go ahead and close public comment and I'll invite the presenters forward.

And just reminding folks in the public, we'll have another opportunity for comment on the Delridge Station in about an hour.

Thank you.

So I'd like to just start with an overview of the engagement we've been doing in the Chinatown International District.

So we've learned as we've gone along there are many different ways that work better for some to engage.

And so we are looking at all the different ways to engage community members through briefings meetings events listening sessions in resident buildings door to door outreach with our community liaisons with businesses so in language community workshops open houses neighborhood forums and social service provider and community organization interviews.

Here's a snapshot of the engagement we've done for the Chinatown International District Station.

It's included 30 community briefings, 24 door-to-door conversations, nine tabling events engaging over 700 community members, so being at festivals or in community places, social service provider interviews, five of those, four listening sessions engaging more than 125 community members, and a number of four neighborhood forums, workshops, open houses.

So I just wanted to highlight, you know, we talk about the briefings and the community meetings and sort of what does that really mean.

And to give you more of a sense of what those 30 community briefings are, here's a snapshot of those.

In many cases, we are meeting with groups many times through the year, such as some of our commenters mentioned.

It helps to continue to come back to groups, whether it's the CID forum or the Capital Projects Coordination Workgroup, or with a group of community members that make up the South Downtown group, coming back and meeting with folks throughout the year has been very helpful to this process.

We've also done listening sessions in resident buildings.

We've offered this opportunity in a number of places, and we were able to have four of these in January, February, and March.

In March these presentations and conversations there in language.

Thanks to Camille liaison facilitator from Department of Neighborhoods as well as our own staff being able to do the conversation about the presentation as well as facilitated conversation in language.

We've also done social service provider interviews.

These interviews allow us to get a better understanding of both the communities that we are trying to reach out to and the better ways to potentially reach out to them and get their perspectives on potential challenges or opportunities associated with the alternatives that we're looking at.

And then we've also been, as we mentioned, at various tabling events.

So being where the community is at Dragon Fest, at Celebrate Little Saigon, in Pioneer Square actually tabling a Real Change vendor day, so being able to talk with vendors from Real Change, as well as recently Lunar New Year celebration and the Publix building, so just being there as residents come in to talk with them about the project.

And what we've heard throughout the last year consistently, and what has, as we mentioned before, shaped our scope for level three, is that folks are interested in improving connections between different modes, Sounder, Amtrak, light rail, and buses, and the streetcar, and others.

How do we support the community vision, contribute to that long-term vision, activating Union Station as a component of that?

And how do we minimize construction impacts on the Chinatown International District neighborhood?

All of that feedback also shaped how we conducted the community workshop on March 13th.

We hosted that here in Union Station, and we had over 130 attendees.

And I think in part because of community members, like those that spoke here today, getting the word out to their neighbors, to those that maybe don't speak English or get notifications in the usual ways.

We also did Blanket, the Pioneer Square, Chinatown International District, and Little Saigon with posters, flyers, and language, did door-to-door outreach.

We advertised the event at various other tabling events just to try to get the word out about the project as well as about the community workshop.

I'll briefly, sorry, I'm losing my voice.

Hopefully I'll make it through this.

I'll briefly review the alternatives in the Chinatown ID area.

This is information that you, some of it you've seen before and a lot of it we worked through at the workshop that we had a couple of weeks ago.

This is a look at the Chinatown ID station area.

You can see obviously the Chinatown International District on the right, Pioneer Square on the left.

And the station area is in the middle, it's that rectangular area which is really at the connection point between the neighborhoods.

As you know, in Level 3, we have three end-to-end alternatives.

And as you look at the second and third options there, you can see that we've got station options in the Chinatown AD area.

Fifth Avenue, both cut-and-cover and mined, so that's shallow and deep options.

And also on Fourth Avenue, again, shallow and mined, cut-and-cover and mined options.

This is a look at all of the options shown on one screen.

Basically there are five alternatives that we're looking at right now in Level 3. The first is in green.

It's the representative project.

Then the brown alternative shows the Fifth Avenue alternative, which again would be shallow or a deep station.

And then the blue is a Fourth Avenue station location, again looking at shallow or deep stations.

So five alternatives all together.

You've heard us reference the term cut and cover.

So just to very briefly explain what that means, essentially when you do a cut and cover station construction, you dig a trench initially.

You cover over that trench, which is the graphic in the middle.

You provide temporary decking.

And then when the temporary decking is in place, as shown on the right of the screen, you construct the station below that.

So a lot of the station construction is going on while the street is still operating.

With mine station construction, what you do is you develop an access shaft, which is what's shown in the top right of the screen.

And that's the way that you get equipment and materials down to the steps of the station.

And then you start to mine out the station from there, as shown by the graphics in the bottom right and towards the left.

So those are the two basic construction techniques that we've been looking at right now.

Cut and cover stations are generally shallow.

Mine stations are generally much deeper.

So just to explain the alternatives individually, first of all, the representative project, which was our starting point when we began this process last year, it would generally be a going along Fifth Avenue with a station immediately adjacent to the existing Chinatown ID station.

This is a graphic that explains some of the impact associated with this alternative.

So if you look at the top right, it shows the area along Fifth Avenue that would be disturbed during construction.

It's that orange band, which extends essentially from Seattle Boulevard up to Main Street.

This is where we'd be doing a cut and cover tunnel along this stretch of Fifth Avenue.

If you move towards the right, you can see that the overall construction duration will be about seven years, and about 1.5 years of that would require traffic detours.

Below that is a cross section giving you an idea of where the station is, the new station shown in green would be in relation to the existing station and Union Station and so on.

The second alternative, second or third alternative, will be on 5th Avenue, shown in brown here.

This would be a board tunnel that would go along 6th and then 5th Avenue through the Chinatown ID area.

The area of disruption is shown on the top left again of this graphic.

It would be a shorter area that would be disturbed.

As I mentioned, this would be a board tunnel, but the station itself would be cut in cover, and the area of disturbance would be about a block and a half or so south of Jackson Street.

Overall construction duration would be about six years, and the overall traffic detours would extend for about four months or so.

We also have a deep option on Fifth Avenue.

And with the deep option, we'd be able to have our access shaft potentially off street.

There would be some property effect associated with that.

And then the construction period would be about seven years.

But because the access shaft would be off street, you wouldn't necessarily have traffic detours with the deep station option.

Then we have the 4th Avenue options.

Again, we have shallow and deep options.

The area disturbance again is shown on the top left of this graphic.

It would extend again from Seattle Boulevard up to Main Street, this time along 4th Avenue.

And as was referred to in the public comment, this would require demolition and rebuild of the existing 4th Avenue viaduct before you would build the station.

The overall construction period would be about 10 years.

And with the shallow station option, you'd have detours of about 7 1⁄2 years.

And to explain that in more detail, we'd be shutting down about half of 4th Avenue at a time, and half of that traffic would be detoured onto adjacent streets for a period of about 7 1⁄2 years.

With the 4th Avenue deep station option, again, the area disturbance is shown in the top left, and then the construction duration would be about for nine years, with traffic detours, we estimate for about five years.

In this case, the detours would be more substantial because we'd be shutting down the street entirely while we'd be doing the deep station.

So that detour would be detouring all of the traffic on 4th Avenue.

A little bit about transfer times.

This is, again, looking at the Fifth Avenue options.

On the left is the shallow station option.

And the transfer time between the new Link Station and the existing Link Station would be about a minute or so, as represented by the blue number on the left side of the screen.

The transfer time between the new Link Station and Sounder would be about four minutes.

For the deep station option, the transfer time link-to-link would be about five minutes, the transfer time link-to-sounder would be about seven minutes.

For the fourth avenue station options, the link-to-link transfer time would be about four minutes for the shallow station option, and again, four minutes for the link-to-sounder transfer time.

For the deep station option on fourth avenue, the link-to-link transfer time would be about five minutes, and the link-to-sounder transfer time would be about seven minutes.

Very briefly, you've seen this.

Can I ask a quick question?

Sure.

On the shallow Fifth Avenue, the trains are stacked.

Is that, is the design, would it be a northbound and southbound would be on top of each other as opposed to side to side?

Yes.

Okay.

Yeah.

May I ask a follow-up to that, Mr. Chair?

Can you explain the stacking and why we aren't able to do sort of side-by-side mezzanine connections like one might assume we could do with a shallower station?

The reason it's stacked is so that we can fit it within the street right away without having property effects.

It allows us to narrow our area, our cross section of the Sturban, so it's beneficial from that perspective.

So we still have to work through the details of the mezzanine connections and so on with that area, but the intent is that you'd have a direct connection.

If I may permit, if you'll permit me a follow up, but we still stack it with a mezzanine on top.

And there's really not an option that we've analyzed because of engineering constraints to have a direct platform to platform connection for one of those tunnels and then a mezzanine connection to the bottom.

No, we're working through different ideas about how to make that happen right now.

Yeah.

Can you also explain, just so people understand, on the bore tunnel why it has to be so deep?

The reason that you have to have a very deep station is to get down to good soil conditions.

The soils in this area are not great.

It was previously tidal lands.

So getting down to, as shown on the right here, you have to get down to about 200 feet or so to build a station to get down to soil that you could actually mine in.

Just to explain some of the trade-offs, the key considerations with each of the alternatives, starting again with the representative project, which is the green box.

Obviously, with this alternative, you have a cut-and-cover tunnel as well as a cut-and-cover station, so it has greater construction effects to Chinatown ID along Fifth Avenue.

It also affects the washed-out ramps and foundations around I-90, and it has some effects to Ryerson bus space.

With the brown alternative, which is the board tunnel option, You only have cut and cover in the station area, so the construction effects are more limited.

The mined option would be less convenient in terms of access and transfers, and also would potentially take longer to construct.

It has effects to future central base expansion, and also the mined station option has some operational issues with train acceleration and track crossovers.

With the fourth avenue option in blue, this would require a rebuild of the existing viaduct, as we've explained before, so therefore it has complexity in terms of construction, traffic diversions, schedule delays, and potentially requires third-party funding.

The mined option on fourth would also have issues in terms of increased traffic effects, less convenient access and transfers, and impacts to wires and base.

Also with the deep mine station, it also doesn't allow for a pocket track, so it has operational issues.

This is a look at the key differentiators between the alternative.

Once again, these are color coded.

If you look at the first row there, ease of station access and transfers, obviously with the shallow station options, whether it's representative project or the fifth shallow or fourth shallow, these would be higher performing in terms of access.

In terms of construction effects, the representative project would have the most construction effects.

The fifth shallow option would have more construction effects as well, but not as significant along 5th Avenue.

The 5th Avenue deep option would have the least construction effects, as I mentioned, along 5th Avenue.

The fourth options, whether they're shallow or deep, would have more construction traffic effects, traffic detours, as I spoke about.

Property effects, obviously you'd have some property effects along 5th Avenue and Chinatown D, and it also has some effect to Ryerson Base.

With the brown options, you have property effects at the tunnel portal in Soto, as well as along 5th Avenue and CID, and it affects future central base expansion.

With the blue options, you have some property effects along 4th Avenue and some effect to Ryerson Base, particularly with the fourth deep option, which would require displacement of Ryerson Base.

In terms of construction schedule, The representative project and the fifth shallow option meet the ST3 schedule.

The fifth deep option would have potentially higher schedule risk.

And then the fourth options would obviously potentially delay the schedule due to the Viaduct rebuild.

And then you also have a comparative estimate.

The fifth shallow option would be less costly.

The options of Fourth Avenue would have, be potentially more costly overall.

Council Member Herbold.

Thank you, I'm just a little bit of definitional assistance here construction effects You're not just talking about the length of construction.

There's obviously something else in that Measurement because the Fifth Avenue shallow is a shorter construction Yeah, time period than the Fifth Avenue deep.

So we're looking at duration of construction.

We're also looking at We're looking at traffic diversions.

We're looking at potential property effects.

So it's combining a number of different measures into that one thing.

Thank you.

So we want to acknowledge of course that we are introducing a new station, new connections into existing communities and really take a moment to look at how that project intersects with the context.

There have been a number of planning efforts, of course, focused in the neighborhood here, Chinatown International District, and in Pioneer Square.

Most recently, the Jackson Hub planning effort, which is community-driven, looking specifically at the two-block area that we're looking at station sites.

This effort explored or actually put out a number of goals and priorities for guiding the vision of the Jackson Hub.

These are some of the key principles that came out of that effort.

Really enhancing the safety and comfort level of this block and the station area.

Creating an engaging and inviting public realm.

Really connecting the neighborhoods together, Pioneer Square and Chinatown ID. and really then ultimately embedding this place in these two communities with iconic architecture and public realm expressions.

So a lot of focus really on how this station, how this new investment could really transform this block and really create a compelling hub for these communities.

Of course there are a lot of projects underway in this area.

We will be introducing new light rail service in 2035 but between now and then there are a number of major projects.

Of course the waterfront, the Coleman Dock replacement to the west and Pioneer Square.

The center city connector streetcar project on ongoing work in 3rd Avenue All of these projects are essentially intersecting in this area and how we design this hub Is really going to influence how these different systems work together.

It's also important to note, of course that East Link One of the reasons why the buses have come out of the tunnel is to provide the opportunity to connect East Link into the Chinatown ID station So this is going to be an area undergoing a lot of change over the next few years And part of that change really is found in the intermodal connections that are happening here You have ferry service to the west you have sounder and Amtrak serving King Street station just to just to the west of us Across 4th Avenue.

You of course have new light rail that we're bringing in along with the existing light rail service from the Central Link and from East Link coming online in 2023. You have major bus corridors on 4th Avenue as well as on 5th Avenue.

And of course, the streetcar, which will be connected and extended to serve 1st Avenue and Pioneer Square.

So a lot happening in this area.

But it's also really important to note that this is a really important point of articulation between different communities.

Our ability to think about how we design the new station and kind of enhance public realm here bears directly on our ability to connect these communities together, which are incredibly culturally rich and diverse areas from Little Saigon to Chinatown proper to Pioneer Square.

And this diagram just kind of shows some of those key destinations and the connections that we want to Be mindful of and to foster in our work and in partnership with the city It's a quick question, yeah in public comment the gentleman from the Design Commission mentioned a couple other Transit hubs and I'm just curious From the agency's perspective.

Are there?

Examples, we're looking to that.

We're bringing in multimodal connections that things like the Jackson Hub concept would look to, that we could go online and look at pictures or if we happen to be in a city visit.

I mean, are there examples in the transportation or transit world that you say, yeah, these are a couple of the kind of great things that happened around the country that we should be thinking about at least?

one of the offside precedents for the kind of vision that Jackson hub presents is Denver's Union Station an example of kind of having an activated commercial area really thinking about Development that's kind of integrated into the transit function But then also kind of centering the station itself as kind of a public asset or park almost Plaza type expression So a few things to note about these two station locations.

On 4th Avenue, we're looking kind of at a high level at transit integration and non-motorized access issues.

And then also thinking about kind of the integration with land use and development.

And this kind of summarizes some key takeaways from kind of our early assessment of these two sites.

One with 4th Avenue.

Probably the most obvious opportunity here is to provide a much better and direct connection to King Street station.

And as we've kind of laid out at a high level the station we've seen an opportunity to potentially cite a station entry and integrate that into the Weller Street overpass.

So that would provide that kind of direct connection to the Amtrak and sounder sounder tracks.

The trade off though is a little bit of a longer transfer time between the light rail stations.

That you noted that Cahill noted earlier on this slide and a slightly longer walk to bus zones and the street car stop on Jackson Street.

But it's also really close to the 4th Avenue bus zones from a land use and development standpoint.

The positioning of the station is ideal to integrate transfer flows between the light rail lines.

In a way that can support the activation of Union Station that kind of goal of a of a of a repositioned Union Station and hub for this community.

But the trade off is potentially less potential for equitable agency T.O.D. and Plaza improvements associated with project delivery since we'll be really focused on the west side of Union Station and the viaduct as part of the project.

With 5th Avenue, it's kind of some of these talking points in reverse.

So you're a bit further from the 4th Avenue bus stops, but you're closer to bus stops on Jackson and on 5th.

It's a slightly longer walk to King Street Station.

You don't have that kind of direct opportunity to integrate with the Weller Street overpass or provide that connection over to King Street Station.

And but you have an opportunity to potentially have a station entry Cited on the east side of Fifth Avenue providing more of a direct connection and orientation to Chinatown From a land use and development standpoint We see an opportunity still to integrate the transfer flows in a way that can support activating Union Station it Would take a different character of course but there's still that potential there and also some higher potential for equitable T.O.D. and Plaza improvements associated with project delivery since we'd be working in Fifth Avenue and really needing to think about reconfiguring the connections between that Fifth Avenue station and the existing link light rail station.

I will turn on my mic and then I will talk about what we've heard.

So as we've done our engagement as I outlined before in level three, we have focused on those three key areas of community vision, connections, and the station and impact.

So I'm going to go through each of those what we've heard, both at the workshop as well as some common themes throughout.

So what we've said is, you know, as we plan for the light rail expansion, we want to better understand how community visions, priorities, and values relate to the new light rail station and connections that are coming through the neighborhood.

So I'll go ahead and go clockwise here and starting at the bottom left.

We heard that we want to maintain the connected, diverse, and historic place supported by an intergenerational, multilingual business and residential community.

Interest in Chinatown International District is the station name Improved connections along Jackson Street connecting neighborhoods from Little Saigon to the waterfront Activating streets and buildings around the new station including Union Station in a culturally and community-based manner providing more green and open spaces culturally reflective art public restrooms and local markets vendors and that the station could potentially bring more foot traffic to CID businesses and We then also have asked about how to maximize connections.

So asking community members how they get around now, where they'd like to go, what barriers they face in making those connections.

And here's a snapshot of what we've heard.

So community members are excited about new opportunities to get to more places faster and easier with the Sound Transit system expansion work.

They're concerned about limited parking Interested in convenient and reliable transfers between sounder Amtrak light rail buses streetcar that connections need to be improved across 4th Avenue and also across 5th Avenue as potential barriers and That multilingual signs announcements and improved wayfinding could address some barriers to using the link light rail system That we need good street lighting security and safe pedestrian experiences.

Safety is a common theme there Enjoy connections to family deaths and destinations in Beacon Hill UW the east side in the airport so places people go to on link now And finally, in describing the station alternatives and options, we've asked, first, do folks understand the options?

Share the information about that.

And then, how can these options best serve your community?

And what concerns do you have about potential impacts?

So we've heard mixed opinions on the station location Some prefer the 4th Avenue station locations to reconnect Pioneer Square and the CID neighborhoods King Street and Union stations and limit potential impacts in the CID neighborhood some prefer 5th Avenue station locations for easier access from residences and businesses in Chinatown International District and due to the shorter construction duration and There's been more interest in the shallow station options for accessibility in the sense of safety Protect local businesses during construction by maintaining operations provide fair compensation and continued operations in the CID after construction for those businesses Protect the Chinatown gate and then ongoing early in language notification about detours and construction impacts is very important

Thank you, Lita.

So we do have, Chairman O'Brien, about 15 minutes if we want to have some discussion among the elected leadership group members.

That's great.

I would love a little discussion.

If I can start with just asking a question, Lita, to you or any of the team up there.

In public comment, we heard from three of the stakeholder advisory group members.

And I really appreciate their points.

And if I understood them correctly, they were pretty clear that I heard two things, that as individuals, they didn't feel like any of them have the right or authority to speak on behalf of a diverse community.

So they wanted to bring opinions to the table, but didn't feel like they were in a position to be making decisions on behalf of a community.

That has a variety of interests some of which we heard in public comment elsewhere today and a second piece I heard was that that they Those individuals have a really good sense of some of the community needs But the engineering transportation needs and what can be done to meet those needs felt like it's a technical approach That that they they didn't have that expertise I did hear that they really appreciated some amazing work that's being done by Sound Transit, and it sounds like there is a high level of respect for folks in the agency.

They were continuing to refine options and convey that to them.

But I heard a request to shift the role as opposed to saying, you want us to bless one option and move forward, and we didn't feel like that.

Can you comment?

I imagine this is not the first time that's been spoken, and talk to us a little bit about whether I'm accurate or not in my characterization there, and then also what we're thinking about moving forward if there's an opportunity to kind of pivot a little bit.

Sure, so I'll just speak to the sort of the role of the Stakeholder Advisory Group members.

We have asked a lot of them and we've been incredibly appreciative of the amount of time they have spent with us over the year.

You know, in bringing on the Stakeholder Advisory Group as you appointed them, we worked on a charter with them about what their roles would be, understanding that it is a lot to ask any of the Stakeholder Advisory Group members to be the full voice and representative of their community.

They are not elected officials.

They are wonderful volunteers.

However, they all have very unique perspectives based on where they live, work, the communities in which they work with, and one of the benefits of having that stakeholder advisory group has been that we've had deeper engagement in communities through their leadership and their engagement, and their perspectives have helped shape how we've moved through the process as well, and they can bring that to bear as we move through the level one and two and so forth screening process.

So, with that, you know, and understanding that we have a very robust engagement process that's outside of the stakeholder advisory group, and the hope is that by bringing those perspectives in as much as we can, as it is our job as an agency to bring those perspectives in and help them make their recommendations, let us know what they feel like they can make recommendations on, and then also share that public feedback with you as the elected leadership group.

I think one of the issues that I'm struggling with, at least, is a timeline.

Because I would love to see you open this line to Ballard in the next six or seven years, as opposed to 15, 17 years.

And it feels like it's so rushed right now.

And so the elected leadership group and the stakeholder advisory group, I believe, are, in theory, coming to an end in the next few months.

And yet there's still a lot of decisions that are going to be made and a lot of Well, I assume there'll be a lot more opportunities for input And so I'm curious what thinking has been about as we get through the scoping process and the end of this process But there's still years of design work.

How?

Have we continue to move forward through that?

I can actually speak to that point, and I guess we anticipated that question to some extent.

But essentially, yes, we are getting a lot of feedback right now.

There have been the community workshops.

There has been a lot of scoping meetings and so on.

And just throughout the year, you've seen all the different ways that we get feedback.

Our next step really is just to share all of that feedback with the stakeholder advice group, obviously, and the elected leadership group next month, and then with the board in May.

And what we're trying to do, as you know, is not identify the project that's going to be built or select that project, but to identify those alternatives that we should continue to study moving forward in the draft EIS process.

That's the action that's before us.

So that should inform people's thinking as they approach their recommendations next month.

We will then be reporting back.

It doesn't end at that point.

That's really only the start of the environmental process.

All of this is, where we are right now would typically be the very start of a process.

Everything we've done over the last year and a half has really been preamble to get the thing going.

So we will be reporting back to the community as we go through the draft EIS process on what has come out of alternatives development, what we are continuing to study.

and what we learned through the RET process.

So that will be an ongoing conversation.

And we've learned a lot over the last year about how to better engage the community, as Lita described us.

We've learned a lot about how to be more effective in our engagement.

And so we'll continue to use those opportunities to engage the community.

As we get into the EIS, and this is reflecting on the third bullet here, we'll really be getting into conversations about some of the things that really matter to people.

What are the impacts?

We'll be examining those things in the EIS.

What are the cumulative impacts of other projects as well in this area?

And getting into, in more detail, the station itself, the station planning efforts.

So as Sloane has described, we've done some work on that over this last year, but we're going to get a lot more.

intensive about that over the next year as we go through the draft AIS process.

And then with the final bullet there, it's not just looking at the station itself and Sound Transit's infrastructure, but looking more broadly at the urban design concepts around the station area will be part of our effort as well.

So this is really only the beginning of a multi-year process as we go through the environmental process.

Mr. Chairman, could I just add something to that briefly?

Really for emphasis, Cahill is right in identifying as what the Board of Directors is anticipated to do in May with the roll-up of all of the good work that's been done.

by the stakeholder advisory group and the elected leadership group is to decide what to study.

It is not deciding the project to be built.

And to the comments made of an earlier witness, it is anticipated and it is kind of customary through that process that we might mix and match between various aspects as we get to know the details better of different alternatives to come up with the ideal project to be built to bring to the board, or what one witness talked about as having some from column A, some from column B, and some from column C.

That is not at all uncommon.

So there is still, as was pointed out, a lot of engagement to do.

But we're not, the board will not be picking the project to be built in May.

We anticipate them to pick a preferred alternative, but that is all studied in the context of a range of alternatives where a number of options are still on the table.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I appreciate the segue and opportunity to talk a little bit more about project delivery timelines.

And I think in my conversations with constituents, it seems to me that there's a difference of of opinion on and understanding on how the different alignments and station location choices that are being considered or are on the table might affect the project delivery timeline.

So I was hoping you would take a moment to share with us in the viewing public how these different choices do or don't impact the delivery timelines for the overall project.

Essentially right now with the representative project, if we're just speaking about the Chinatown ID area, and of course there are other aspects to this project and other segments that also have similar implications with some of the choice that are being looked at.

But with the representative project or the Fifth Avenue alternatives, the shallow Fifth Avenue alternative, we think that can be accomplished within the existing schedule.

If we're looking at a deeper station option on Fifth Avenue, we have some concerns with the schedule, but we need to look at that more to really flesh that out.

It's just a risk area right now.

We're not necessarily saying that it would take longer, but it is more work associated with that.

With the fourth Avenue alternatives, of course, we do need to demolish the viaduct and rebuild the viaduct So there would be we would expect additional schedule associated with those alternatives And I suppose I'm asking the question also because in one of the slides that is included in today's presentation or a series of the slides included in the presentation I think it begins around page 29 of the presentation.

There's a huge amount of variation in terms of the impact or the number of years estimated for construction versus detours.

And I guess I'm worried that in presenting the information in that manner, it seems to imply that that means we're gonna get stations faster than what we have understood to be true under even the overall schedule of delivery.

So for example, on the 5th Avenue South shallow station on page 29, the construction estimates are six years, detours are four months.

I think it would be easy for folks who aren't as entrenched in the technical matters here to believe that, oh, if I go with 5th Avenue South shallow station, that means I'm going to get a station in six years.

So so that's what I would like for you to talk a little bit more about the nuance related to These numbers these timelines that you're giving us as it relates to the various options I don't want the public to be under the assumption that we're revising timelines such that we should Be influenced to pursue one option over the other because we now somehow believe we're gonna get this in six years.

I

Thank you, I understand what you mean now.

Yes, no, this assumption is that we would open the Ballard Extension and the Chinatown at East Station as part of the Ballard Extension in 2035. There would be, so that's a long period of construction.

Not all of that time would be spent constructing in this area.

If you were to go with the Fifth Avenue shallow option that you noted, the period of construction in this area only would be approximately six years.

But that does not mean that the project as a whole would be completed in six years.

We would still be trying to reach the deadline of 2035. What I noted about with some of the other alternatives is she went with the Fourth Avenue alternatives You're talking about a longer construction duration in this area of nine to ten years But and there is potential risk to the overall schedule as well with that potentially extending beyond 2035 Thank you

Thank you.

I want to underscore the conversation we've had about Larry Yoke's analogy from the menu about columns A, B, and C.

And for as much as we will move the board at the end of May might move a very small number of alternatives forward.

I hope that, and I think we're hearing a need to be able to continue to have some design alternatives around that work.

that particularly Chinatown International District will need to be able to continue to work.

And so as we go forward, both in the elected leaders group and board level and continued conversation, I hope we can make sure we know what alternatives and pieces and design alternatives can mix and match one with another and make sure we know what continues to be an alternative and option for that mixing and matching and if there are scenarios that don't work.

I would also ask if we can explain mitigation and talk about what kind of opportunities we have for mitigation here in Chinatown International District and what challenges there are to providing that mitigation.

Yes, obviously as we go through the draft EIS process, we'll get a better understanding of what these alternatives actually are.

And we'll be able to study what the impacts of these alternatives.

We have developed some information over the last year as we described about potential construction durations, potential traffic detours and so on.

We'll get down to a lot more detail in the draft EIS where we have better definition of what we're studying.

Once we understand what those impacts are, we also, in the draft EIS, propose potential mitigation linked to those impacts.

So when we publish the draft EIS at the end of next year, in 2020, you will see both the impacts and potential mitigation associated with those impacts.

That information is presented in the draft EIS, it's made available for public review, and people can respond to that and make their comments both about the impacts and the mitigation at that time.

and that informs then the final EIS development.

Thank you.

Council Member Herbold.

Thank you.

Just drilling down a little bit on the next steps.

The pretty immediate next steps are the summary of the key themes from scoping and a level three RET memo to be available on April 15th.

I'm concerned that the SAG meeting where there's some expectations that there are level three recommendations based on this information is just two days later, and I'm wondering if there's a way that there could be more time between that information being available and the SAG meeting.

We can do our best obviously the scoping period extends until April 2nd.

We have will be getting a lot of comments So we have we're doing our very best to try and collate those comments and get them out there as quickly as possible So just as a follow-up our is you're thinking that the SAG meet the SAG meeting on April 17th

What are you expecting to come out of that from the stakeholder advisory group?

What we've articulated in prior meetings to the stakeholder advisory group is that we are asking them, they have the level three alternatives as they're defined right now, and we explained it to them several times.

But we've also explained to them that there are opportunities to mix and match between the alternatives that are on the table right now.

They don't have to accept any given alternative exactly as it's defined.

And that's been consistent with the process through level one and level two as well.

So we'll be expecting them to try and think about what are the alternatives that should be looked at forward, should continue to be looked at in the draft AIS.

And we've asked them to think of it in terms of two preferred alternatives.

an alternative that would move forward in the event that there is no additional third party funding.

So they can mix and match between the alternatives to try and identify what that alternative would be.

And we received direction from you, the elected leadership group, when we presented to you in early February.

to try and work to identify what that option would be, what would be the higher performing alternative that is still compatible with the overall scheduled budget and scope that was identified in SD3.

So that would be one task for the stakeholder advisory group to come forward with.

And then to also identify a second preferred alternative in the event that there were additional third party funding.

And those recommendations then would go forward to you along with all of the feedback that we received during the scoping period.

And are you anticipating that that SAG recommendation would be informed by the scoping report.

Absolutely, yes.

So you see my concern.

The scoping report itself isn't available until after the SAG meeting and there's a summary of the key themes just two days before that meeting.

We will try and get the essence of the scoping summary report in front of them.

It may not be completely finalized by that date.

It's what we have to do.

Question.

Mayor Durkan and then Council Member Harrell.

Thank you.

Thank you, Cahill, and thanks to everyone for all the work you've done here.

And I want to thank all the members of the public who came to provide testimony.

and their opinion, I think it's really important to have that engagement.

I know that Sound Transit, all of us feel a fierce sense of urgency.

We've missed transit for decades, we know we have to catch up, and even at the best schedules, when you hear 2035, it seems, can't we do it before then?

And I wanna thank Mr. Rogoff, we've had a lot of discussions, we're doing everything we can for the city of Seattle to work with Sound Transit, to have joint planning committees, So we speed things up.

But I really want to urge us, you know, I'm reminded of the phrase, you know, measure twice, cut once.

We have to not only get the best alternatives, we have to make sure the public feels included and they believe they're the best alternatives for each part of their communities.

And I think particularly when we're talking about Chinatown International District, That community, together with Pioneer Square, I think have suffered the brunt of so many transportation projects over the last many years.

And going forward, we'll continue to do that.

And Chinatown International District is one of our most culturally sensitive areas that has suffered from decades of government policies that were racist and inappropriate.

You talk about the Chinese Exclusion Acts, the Japanese internment, the immigration from Vietnam, all those things together.

And so I think we owe it to our community to make sure that we study what we need to study.

And we give ourselves the time to bring community along, to listen to them, because whether it's two alternatives or 10 alternatives between now and the environmental impact, I think is a distinction given what we need to accomplish over the next So I would urge us, you know, you will be hearing me at the board meeting that we should default to studying more.

You know, I'm reminded that when we were in Bellevue, we studied, you know, it was before I was on the board, but there were dozens of alternatives studied for various segments of Bellevue.

And you ended up synthesizing to get the best mold.

So whether you call them alternatives or design alternatives, I think we have to be very sensitive so the community understands exactly what the impacts are and we're thinking about how to get this segment right, because we will not get a second chance to do that.

And if we push forward too quickly on this phase, we will get resistance at all other phases, and I think that that could jeopardize the project more.

I'm reminded yesterday in Sound Transit, just two members of one of the North things wanted to know what the condemnation meant for their properties.

If you think about the number of condemnation acts we will have to do both in Chinatown International District and in Delridge, each one of those could slow things down if we don't get it right at the front end.

So that's just a comment, not a question.

Council President Harrell.

Thank you very much.

First of all, I want to thank Mr. Rogoff for the narrative, the framing of the challenge we have.

I thought that was very well done on what we're trying to do.

So thanks for sort of setting the stage, so to speak.

I had a few, just a few questions, and that is I'm a little confused on the mix and match approach, really what that means.

When I look at uh...

it seems like we have uh...

uh...

whether it's fourth or fifth or deep or shallow or mind or bored uh...

they all present uh...

some great things about them some great positive characteristics and of course the challenges and when we talk about the SAG looking at maybe a mixed or match approach at the end of the day you can't mix and match fourth and fifth and so what do we mean by that because like a Fourth-and-a-half Avenue or something that I don't know about.

So can you say a little bit about that's the first question Let me just get a few my thoughts out.

I just didn't fully understand it.

That's really my question The other piece is we continue down to councilmember Herbold's point looking at Continued community involvement.

I think you're hearing from the community of the community.

The alignment is obviously critical Do we understand that?

There are also these other factors, like we heard about restrooms.

What about the restrooms?

What about wayfinding?

What about cultural preservation?

What does it look and what does it feel like?

I really like the comment from the Design Commission that they're saying, from the City of Seattle side, lead with that vision and not lead with the infrastructure, right?

And so what does this look like?

And so I am assuming that The, I think it was the third bullet point in one of the slides, the continued engagement on some of the specific aesthetics and functionality of the stations, that's going to continue because we're sort of, I don't want to say stuck on the alignment, but we're right there trying to figure out the location first.

And so, can you tell me am I right on that, that those specific things that will come out in the community, we have more time to figure that out because none of the alternatives are going to exclude some of that.

good stuff we hope to have, to achieve.

And then the last question, I don't know how many questions are implicit in my comments, I never do.

to Councilman Herbold's point, the next stakeholder advisory group, I hear them.

I hear them that they don't feel equipped.

There's a lot of technical information and fiscal impacts.

They don't feel equipped.

I don't feel equipped sometimes to make these decisions.

So my fear, I suppose, is that even after that last meeting, they're not going to say, okay, it's going to be fifth shallow or fourth minor, whatever one of those are going to be.

And when we come out with our recommendations as elected leaders, I'm still a little unclear on how many, I mean, you know, we could punt, and we're not trying to punt, but really, what are you looking for?

One of the five, two of the five?

I'm just a little unclear on what, in a perfect world, what we are to decide.

Okay.

Six questions in one.

And Cahill, just paying attention to the time here.

Okay, I'll try and keep it brief.

Mix and match.

Maybe I'll hand it over to Sloan for the second question relating to ongoing station planning, urban design work.

But with relation to this mix and match, the way we've described it before, right now we're talking about the Chinatown ID segment of the project.

But there are other elements of this project, too.

There is the Duwamish section, West Seattle, and to the north, going through downtown, Interbay and Ballard.

There are alternatives there, too, different alternatives on the table.

Right now, we have strung together alternatives within each of those segments into end-to-end alternatives.

And that's for purpose of having a conversation and discussion.

But you could mix an alternative from one segment with a different alternative from another segment.

That's the conversation that can happen.

And overall, you may end up with a different end-to-end alternative than any of the alternatives that we currently have right now.

So that's the conversation that's been going on throughout the year.

With regard to the second questions, Nolan, do you want to talk to that?

Sure.

So as we move into the EIS phase, we're also going to be advancing our design efforts.

And so that'll include more work on station planning, thinking about urban design, some of those precise Issues that you highlighted council member Harrell.

So and that's going to be in partnership with the community and with the city as well.

We're working at a staff level with the city to think about a construct for how we engage in station planning in the next phase and beyond.

And that's in partnership, too, with the external engagement folks, so thinking about how the community is going to be able to weigh in all along the way.

Correct.

With regard to your third comment about the SAG and the number of alternatives that we're expecting to come out of this, we have, of course, throughout this year articulated the goal of identifying a preferred alternative.

but also recognizing that there may be other alternatives that still need to be studied through the draft AIS process.

So we hope to make some progress in narrowing down the number of alternatives, ultimately, that we're looking at in the draft AIS.

And that's essentially what we've been doing over all of this year.

We've had many, many alternatives.

We're now down to a subset.

Ideally, we'd get down to a smaller subset.

But that is really up to the SAG and you to decide what you're comfortable with in terms of narrowing it down.

Thank you.

Thank you everyone for the engagement on that.

I want to just make a couple points just to remind the public that the elected leadership group again is not the ultimate decision maker here.

That will be the board of directors.

Now half of the eight members elected officials of the leadership group are on the board.

or half of the eight that are here today.

And so there's obviously a lot of overlap.

And similarly, the stakeholder advisory group has been put together, not ultimately to make decisions, but to advise both us and the board.

I'm really interested in thinking between now and a month from now when we make our set of recommendations, to figure out how to incorporate some of the things we've heard from the stakeholder advisory group, both about, you know, perhaps specific alternatives, but also about process going forward and how they're going to be included.

And so I know that an ideal situation would be that The board gets clear consensus from the community, this is exactly the alignment and station location we want and that would be ideal.

We're not gonna be there, although I will say that it's amazing how much work has been accomplished in the past year in narrowing the choices down in a lot of locations.

As Mayor Durkan talked about the challenges and the opportunities in the Chinatown International District, we all recognize that this is a particularly unique piece of the alignments that are being done where we wanna spend a lot of extra time.

And so colleagues, I will be interested in entertaining your thoughts in the next month on how we make a set of recommendations that is both consistent with what we're being asked for by the board, but may also try to encompass and ask the board to, you know, broaden some of the ideas or entertain some other concepts from communities we move forward.

With that, one other quick question, and Sloan, you brought this up a little bit.

You said that through the EIS process, there'll be work to advance designs.

I take that to understand when we get to the end of this process and we make a recommendation and it goes into EIS.

the engineers and technical folks at Sound Transit don't stop their work for two years waiting for the EIS to finish?

Oh, absolutely not.

Yeah.

We're working very diligently through that whole process to advance the design.

So the question is, as you continue to make refinements and advance design, and we're in this EIS period, which has a very federally defined there will be a draft and then a comment period, and we'll respond to those comments.

That's going to be a long period of time where I imagine there's going to be some iteration going on in the shop.

I'm interested in exploring how community members can continue to interact with folks through that process that may not be part of the formal EIS, but recognizes the reality that we're doing this work concurrently.

Sure, absolutely.

So I think Lita mentioned that we're going to be coordinating very closely between the technical work that's happening as well as the external engagement.

We don't have an actual work plan formally designed yet, we're kind of in the process of doing so.

But we acknowledge that a critical aspect of this first phase has been the ability to bring technical information, make it public, foster the discussions, and so we will continue, that's an absolute commitment on our part, to continue that in the next phases and beyond.

What we are going to want to get into a little bit more in the next phase of design is thinking about the urban design framework or master planning framework in some of these station areas where the infrastructure investment is going to bring a substantial change.

And so a major component of that is visualizing it, exploring it further in kind of more collaborative charrette design environments.

As colleagues, as we get to a point of making a recommendation in the next month, I'd love to work with the agency and consider at least making some requests about additional feedback opportunities in that EAS.

You know, like there's a, in a lot of projects, there's a 10% design threshold or, and we may just ask for a commitment that when there will be other community input options, you are all the experts on this, so I'd love your feedback on what we could ask for that would be appropriate and I'll be working with community members on that too and see if colleagues are supportive of that.

And as a co-chair, I want to respond to some of the comments you just made, Council Member O'Brien, and particularly take care not to speak for the Sound Transit Board.

That would be terribly presumptuous of me.

But to speak for myself in saying that I do believe that we will find the board very receptive to the advice and the recommendations that this elected leaders group makes regarding an alternative, multiple alternatives, and design alternatives or multiple pieces.

I think the board will recognize the work that the community has put in.

We certainly realize the two pieces of the alignment that we're meeting about specifically today have specific issues and complications, which is why we're having this very conversation.

And I think the board will be ready to engage in a conversation and an understanding about why more than what we initially thought or might have said would be moving forward.

So colleagues, I suggest that we pivot from the Chinatown International District to Delridge if that's okay.

I don't see any opposition to that.

So I believe we're gonna start with public comment again for the Delridge station.

I have about a dozen folks signed up.

You'll each have two minutes.

Alex Zimmerman followed by Justin Clark and then Scott Caldwell.

And as folks are getting settled, I want to thank everyone who showed up for the Chinatown International District portion of today and for the continuing work you're all doing within the community.

So thank you for being here this morning.

Sieg Heil, my dear Führer, a Nazi Gestapo pig, a criminal, a killer.

My name is Alex Zimmerman and I'm against everything that is doing so in transit with your support.

And I'll explain to you why.

Look who is in this chamber.

Oh, everybody belong to one party system, what is I call a Nazi social democratic mafia.

It's exactly who you are.

No one, and I come to this room for many time and many year, no one who sit in this chamber have something against sound transit like I have and probably a million people what is in back.

It's very unique situation we have.

We have one party system.

It's a pure fascism.

It's not surprise me right now.

So from east coast to west coast, from the Atlantic to the stranger, you know what it mean?

For all 300 million American, right now, Seattle, 10 countries, the number one fascist city in America.

My point very simple.

How is this possible?

A Nazi social democratic mafia who talking about color, black, brown, poor, support, support, build a bridge for $4 billion.

What is drive by car, owner?

built a tunnel for $6 billion, but it's drive by car people.

And right now, we're talking about $100 billion Ponzi scam?

It don't have sense.

I spoke right now to this emerald degenerate idiot who supports this Ponzi scam for $100 billion.

We supposed to be have something in this chamber who have different opinion.

It's not supposed to be have everybody same opinion.

It's America.

Come on.

It's many people have different opinion.

So I speak right now to everybody who listen to me.

It's only one chance.

Clean this Dory chamber and bring people.

Thank you very much.

Justin.

You signed up second.

Sorry, twice.

I hope you're not, I don't know.

We will not judge you, Justin, based on who you follow.

That's great.

I was actually strategic about where I was placed here.

But just a couple of things here.

I think as Lita pointed out with her map, the diverse population of communities of color are south of where the station is going to be.

And so they're not directly being served by the station.

So I think from our perspective, seamless integration with the H line is a huge priority.

To make sure that these folks are served by this investment.

So the integration begins with the placement and orientation of the station But it continues through the design details and also robust agency coordination.

So that's something we really want to see Another aspect we want to see is leveraging strategic staging areas into affordable housing opportunities and I think the last thing you touched on this councilmember o'brien is When do we go back to the public?

And so we think that ST and the city need a partner to have robust public engagement once the 10% guideway and station designs have been developed.

If we wait till 30%, it's too late to really engage the public to have any real meaningful changes to the design.

We think it's a disservice to the community, especially culturally sensitive communities like Delridge and the CID.

So that's something that I applaud hearing from you and something we're really pushing for.

So thank you.

Thank you, Justin.

And I'd love to engage with you and design commission members along with Sound Transit to maybe craft some language and something that we could consider defining what that looks like in the coming year or two.

Free for lunch tomorrow?

Or we can start that now?

We'll talk.

Start now.

Scott and Scott's going to be followed by Amir's set it for and then Pearl Chan Good morning.

Thank you for having this meeting.

Thank you for listening to us My name is Scott Caldwell.

I am a resident of North Delridge.

I've lived there for 30 years.

I've watched that neighborhood Settle down get calmer get more vibrant, more diverse, and I'm proud to be a member of that community.

I appreciate especially what Mayor Durkin said a few minutes ago about measuring twice and cutting once.

And so I'm gonna offer you what might seem like a radical idea here this morning.

I have been impressed by your racial equity toolkit And I am looking specifically at one of the criteria, which says to avoid disproportionate impacts on communities such as Delridge.

When I look at the three alternatives for Delridge, including the station siting, I see what looks like disproportionate impact on that neighborhood.

It takes out One block of residential housing for sure dramatically impacts another block and has impacts on the green spaces that are a vibrant part of our community.

So here's my suggestion to you.

I strongly urge you to consider putting back on the table the Yancey Street, West Seattle tunnel option that was eliminated in Level 1. I know that was a long time ago, but I think that option would preserve the neighborhood, would dramatically diminish the amount of housing that's displaced, small businesses displaced would greatly diminish the impact on the green spaces in the neighborhood.

And while it has some issues that were raised in the level one evaluation, I'm about to finish, the mix and match method, I think they can pull elements from other alternatives to make that option worth considering for the EIS.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Scott.

Amir?

Hello.

My name is Amir Sadpur.

I'm a resident of West Seattle.

In January of this year, PST proposed an elevated line that displaces more than 100 families in my neighborhood.

I wanted to discuss a few of the major concerns.

This line would lead into demolition of about 100 to 150 houses based on our estimates.

That this in the midst of housing crisis doesn't make sense.

Most houses affected are currently single family housing that have a significant potential for growth.

The new proposal would lead into permanent loss of tax driving revenue for the city and loss of transit oriented affordable housing.

The new proposal is an attempt to make future extension of the light rail possible.

However it's evident that future extension would lead into decimation of hundreds if not thousands of additional houses in the West Seattle leaving a permanent score across the area.

Light rail is a generational decision.

We should not be tempted by quick and easy alternatives but instead build something we can proudly pass on to the next generation.

Thank you.

Pearl Chan here.

Pearl, you're going to be followed by Y2 and then Chris Contreras.

Hi, my name is Pearl Chan.

I am a very recent transplant from New York City.

And we just bought in the West Seattle area eight days after we moved in.

We got a flyer saying that we might be displaced, essentially.

The third proposal does run through our block.

I live on 25th Avenue.

And I guess the short time we've been in West Seattle, I feel like I'm kind of a purple unicorn.

We are fortunate enough to live in the area that we live in.

But as we've gotten to know West Seattle, when you're talking about equity, it really is south of where we are.

And in terms of accessibility, it just seems to make a lot more sense to have it on Delridge.

That's where all the transit is, except for the fact that We've only lived in our house for a month and then we might be displaced in a few years.

That's one of the biggest reasons we bought there.

And we weren't part of level one and level two because we weren't in Seattle yet.

But I just know that my husband and my daughter and I went to the phase three meeting and As I looked around the room, we were very much underrepresented.

I would say that my daughter who's half Chinese, there's only one and a half minorities in the room for what I saw.

And so I would say many of the community members that would be most affected by this, especially my immediate neighborhood, were not represented at that meeting.

And so I do wanna speak for my immediate neighborhood because even on our two, three block radius, I would say about a third to a half of us are people of color.

And I didn't see that represented in the phase 3 and I'm going to assume and maybe it's a you know ignorant assumption that they were not represented in phase 1 or phase 2 either so I do want to speak to that but Thank you so much Pearl thank you so much.

Welcome.

Welcome to Seattle.

Thanks for jumping in right away And we'd love to follow up just to make sure that we're we are connecting with folks in your neighborhood.

So We'll be in touch.

Thank you

Hi.

Good morning.

My name is way too late.

I currently moved in just a couple months before Pearl.

We were not preppy to what was going on.

I feel I'm just against the 25th Avenue station because it's going to displace a lot of us minorities.

And that's like I have to say thank you.

We thank you for coming here to share that, appreciate it.

Chris, Chris is gonna be followed by Dennis Nolan, and then Chris Coulter, and Deb Barker is the last one who signed up today.

Hi.

I'm a resident of Delridge as well.

I bought my house in 2011. When we decided to have kids, we didn't plan to have twins.

So we couldn't.

Council Member Johnson, do you want to speak to that?

I was big enough.

Yeah, and we can afford Seattle, so we had to move down to Tacoma We didn't really want to do that because grandparents live here in in Seattle, but we did anyway With the idea that we would keep our property here in Seattle and use it as an investment property so we can either put our cuts our kids to school or also, you know, I'll deal with our student loans and the cost of health care, so We just want to have the information of how we're going to be compensated for that if that is taken away from us, not just for what's there, but for the potential for us to build on it.

And we would just like to have some information on how that's going to be taken care of.

That's it.

Great, thank you.

And that's a concern we've heard from a number of folks.

This is a multi-year process, but we understand that the decisions we're even contemplating today have impacts on what you can do with your property or what you may want to do with your property.

And so it's something we're aware of, and we will do our best to get some clarity as soon as possible so that you can be planning accordingly.

Thank you.

Thanks for your participation.

I'll make sure we reach out.

Chris, I'll make sure that we reach out as well and have more conversation with you and connect you with the real estate office at Sound Transit too.

While it's very premature to do this, there's plenty of public information about how we compensate people and what goes into that calculation, so that should not be hard.

Dennis.

Good morning.

I'm here to speak on behalf of my Youngstown North outreach working class neighborhood.

Well, many or most of my neighbors are at work in two square blocks or 90 plus family homes.

Many residents are low income and people of color.

The mix of affordable homes with easy reach to the city core, superb transit service, increasing housing density is exactly what the leadership of our region professes we need more of.

It's a neighborhood that should be served by light rail, not destroyed by light rail.

Because residents and property owners were not notified in early 2018 by US Mail, as we should have been, Our input has not been part of the year-long ST weaning process.

We are in a drastic catch-up mode, supplying input and pushing back.

ST Level 3 boasts three alternatives, but in reality there are no alternatives.

All three decimate our Youngstown neighborhood.

We are requesting that other routings be included in the environmental impact study, specifically the Purple Pigeon Ridge Tunnel and the Andover-Yancy-Avalon route.

With less than 5% of the required engineering completed, these routes deserve further study.

In addition, the EIS should mandate an openness to new alternatives for studies such as use of open spaces.

Open channels to both the north and south of our neighborhood, if utilized, would minimize the impacts on residential properties.

On another note, I request part of your discussion today address the EIS process.

We, the public, don't know what's happening with our scoping submissions.

We want transparency.

You may receive more than 1,000 scoping comments.

We want to understand how these documents will be processed, who reviews and evaluates the material and makes decisions, what are the evaluation criteria, is adequate time being allotted, We urge you to allocate more time and move forward the designated dates for the SAG and EOG routing and station placement recommendations.

Review of EIS scoping submissions must be deliberative and thorough.

Thank you for listening.

Is there some way to submit my comments?

Yes, if you want to hand it to folks here on to your left.

Thanks, Dennis.

Chris?

Hey, everybody.

Hey, Chris.

I'm a Delridge resident with some of my other folks, and some of my folks are working right now, but I got out of work to come here.

We recognize that light rail's coming to the neighborhood, and we recognize there's gonna be winners and losers, and some of us are gonna be dispossessed of our houses, we get it.

And we recognize light rail's gonna change our neighborhood.

But as Sound Transit delivers light rail projects, we have observed it nip and tuck itself in the neighborhoods around the region.

But really, I have not observed it really pushed into a way where it's decimated an entire neighborhood.

And I think that's what I'll call the blue line alignment Delray station does.

There's 90 plus families there that that line is gonna displace.

And it's not 90 properties along a mile of track.

It's 90 families right in one place.

And what's sad is after that, I think Sound Transit wants to use the remaining land for transit-oriented development.

So I read that as condos and coffee shops for tech workers.

Well, Delridge doesn't need more coffee shops.

In fact, we still go over each other's houses to have coffee in my neighborhood.

I'm here to ask the elected leadership group to push the Sound Transit board to reconsider the Delridge the blue station And to actually look at some of the real other alternatives that seem to be called during level one or level two Such as the Purple Line station or the Yancey Street station We were like many of us.

We never heard about the level one and level two things because we didn't get notified While the people up the hill might get a tunnel and Beacon Hill got a tunnel and Bellevue gets a tunnel, I'd ask that we do, as Mayor Durkin said, measure twice, cut once.

Let's look at our options.

We got the planning and engineering talent to do that right behind me here with Sound Transit.

And I just ask you to think about our neighborhood carefully.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chris.

Deb.

Deb's the last person who signed up on my sheet.

If there are other folks that would like to provide comment, you can come on forward after Deb is finished.

Thank you very much.

My name is Deb Barker.

I am honored to be a West Seattle representative to the Stakeholder Advisory Group.

I have a few brief comments, and I'm going to ask.

I had my list of folks that my comments are directed to.

And so Councilmember Johnson and Councilmember Harrell have already left, if you could pass them on to them.

So Councilmember O'Brien and Mayor Durkin, my comments are mostly directed to you because we do have a lot of West Seattle residents up at the dais right now.

But this kind of goes to everybody.

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words.

I visited West Seattle.

Yeah, you still get to, yeah.

A picture is worth a thousand words and a one hour tour, actual visit with your eyeballs on West Seattle is especially the proposed light rail station areas and the alignments in the, within the area is well worth your time, and you owe it to yourself prior to your decision.

Actually, in West Seattle, it's an anomaly.

And I really need you to keep a hold of this fact.

Within the alignment, the West Seattle to ballot alignment, only in West Seattle are there proposed Impacts to actual residential areas single-family residential areas or multi-family residential just but all the other impacts within the alignment are going to be to commercial areas To existing industrial areas.

So West Seattle is an anomaly and you owe it to yourself.

Please do it and Port Commissioner Bowman did she went on a wasn't a three-hour tour But she went on a tour of the Delridge area and I think was very useful So, please I'm asking you to make a personal visit to the station areas and the rail alignment in lovely West Seattle Thank you for adding the Delridge neighborhood to this RET discussion today as well.

Thank you.

Thank you

Please introduce yourself.

Yes, of course.

Thank you for hearing us today.

My name is Ty Urelias.

I'm a West Seattle resident.

I hadn't planned on making a public statement, but based on some of what I've heard here today and at the last stakeholder advisory group, I've observed an opportunity, and I felt that it was my role here to at least speak it and share it with you all.

From what I have heard, both from Councilmember Harrell and also from the stakeholder advisory group and their public comments today, there seems to be an opportunity for outside technical expertise within these groups.

As currently set up, it appears that all technical analysis is being run through Sound Transit.

And not that that's necessarily a problem, but I think that if there's technical analysis through members of the elected leadership group, the stakeholder advisory group, and the board, those can also interface directly with the community.

So I just wanted to share that observation with you.

Thank you very much.

Great.

Thank you.

Does anyone else like to provide public comment?

Come on forward.

Good morning.

My name is John McAlpine.

I just thought I would build upon what Deb Barker was just stating.

I know we're here for the Dow Ridge Station, but we need to understand beyond the Dow Ridge Station, When level three design came along, what's called an elevated 41st Avenue came into the picture.

And not only, like was spoken earlier, where there'll be approximately 90 homes, families, you know, removed for the Dow Ridge Station, but there's, according to Sound Transit, they estimated 90 to 120 homes Destroyed removed for the elevated 41st Avenue station elevated for the 41st Avenue route when that comes through We need to understand that.

I don't know where that came from.

And of course it goes to a north-south facing station if that's chosen elevated and for phase 4 for st4 if that goes through in the future they plan on going elevated down 41st Avenue Southwest and And taken out, they said they would just buy the homes on each side.

So that's where you heard the other gentleman state that there'd be the removal of hundreds and hundreds of more homes heading south from there down 41st.

So I just want you to look at that.

I know I'm not here for that.

We're here for the Delridge.

But also, please pay attention to the fact that that elevated 41st that was introduced, it's not a good idea.

We just removed too many homes, which Mayor Durkan has said that it's just not the right way to go.

We're not looking to destroy homes.

If we're going to go into West Seattle, keep it a tunnel.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I see no one else.

We'll go ahead and close public comment and invite presenters forward for this next phase.

A couple of comments I'll just make in response to public comment.

One, thank you for the invitation to come out to West Seattle and Delridge.

I was out there a couple of months ago on my own biking around looking, but I have not done a formal tour with neighbors.

No, I know.

But I will work to see, and I certainly rely on my colleagues who live and represent that area to provide a lot of feedback on that too.

For just everyone who's sitting here except me.

I heard a number of comments about folks saying that they're able to take time off from work today to be here, but that there are a lot of folks in their community who can't be here today.

And we recognize that when we have meetings during the day, that's a reality.

That's why we try to provide multiple opportunities, including the workshops, to collect comments.

I'm sure that people understand it's not about, you know, the most people who show up today win the debate.

We are considering comment from all sorts.

And then I'll ask the presenters at some point during your presentation, we heard some questions about how the scoping comments will be used and transparency around that.

So if you have a chance to touch on that and how folks can see those and a little bit on timing, that would be really helpful too.

OK, I'll kick it off with an overview of the engagement we've done in the Delridge area in West Seattle.

So just as with the Chinatown International District Station, we have looked at multiple different ways of engaging in Delridge and West Seattle briefings, meetings, attending community briefings.

There may be 30, 40, 60 folks there, community meetings, events, community workshops.

door-to-door outreach open houses neighborhood forum social service provider and community organization interviews So in West Seattle, we've had 27 community briefings 20 door-to-door conversations seven social service provider interviews five neighborhood forums workshops open houses a number of tabling events engaging more than 1,200 community members and And over 20 property owner meetings as some mentioned there are a lot of property owners who've had questions and we've made ourselves available to them to have conversations with folks in the neighborhood.

So more specifically here's a snapshot of the West Seattle briefings that we've had over the last year.

I just know you know we've been out to Pigeon Point neighborhood council for example in terms of thinking about the Delridge community.

The Delridge Neighborhoods Development Association we've even been at ounces for a drink and link where we talked about the light rail alignments.

We have done a feet first walking tour where we looked at all the stations together with the feet first organization including the Delridge station and as well as a community briefing at the Youngstown Cultural Arts Center with community members from the neighborhood.

We've also done a number of social service provider interviews where we've met with actually social service providers right near the Delridge station and those that serve communities all in the West Seattle area, such as Southwest Youth and Family Services, Downtown Emergency Service Center, Cottage Grove Commons, Delridge Community Center, the White Center Community Development Association as well.

And we try to be where folks are.

So we were at Delridge Day in August, as well as at a partnership with S.Metro Rapid Ride H Open House, and at the Delridge Community Center, actually, as folks were there for the basketball games all around West Seattle and the Delridge neighborhood, being there to let them know about the project and opportunities to engage.

With that, I'll hand it off to Cahill.

I'll just briefly review the alternatives process that's been going on through the last year.

It started with early scoping and we went through a level one, level two process.

When we went to the early scoping period in February of last year, we had open houses, neighborhood forums, and what we were presenting at that time was the representative project, which is shown on your screen, generally an elevated structure with elevated stations at Delridge, Avalon, and Alaska Junction.

So that was our starting point just over a year ago.

Coming out of the early scoping period, we got a lot of additional ideas about alternatives we should continue to look at.

So these define what were our level one alternatives.

And you can see on the screen here, there were various options for crossing Duwamish on the north or south side of the existing West Seattle Bridge, as well as the alternative much further south, which is referred to as the Purple Alternative.

We also have various ways of going through the Delridge area with options along the West Seattle Bridge in dark blue, the Yancey alternative, which is shown in pink, several options that go along Genesee, and then, of course, the blue alternative that goes more through the West Seattle golf course, light blue alternative there.

We got a lot of public feedback.

All of our level one information was presented publicly again, and we got feedback in May of last year, and this is the same slide you would have seen in a previous ELG meeting, summarizing some of the major feedback that we got at that time.

So there were concerns about an isolated Delridge station with the dark blue alternative.

There was support for shifting Delridge station south.

There were mixed opinions about consolidating the Delridge and Avalon stations.

There were also mixed opinions about usage of open space.

There was support for the purple alternative and there was feedback to consider shifting the golf course alignment further north, that light blue alternative.

Coming out of the level one recommendation process from the ELG, the recommendations were to not carry forward the dark blue alternative, the West Seattle Bridge Fonte Roy alternative, to not carry forward the pink alternative, the Yancey Street, West Seattle Tunnel alternative, and then to modify the light blue alternative to have less of an effect on section 4F resource, the golf course.

So that then defined what we looked at in level two, and that's shown on this screen.

You can see that the alternatives are mostly concentrated along the Delridge Way and Genesee Street corridor.

We again did the level two analysis of those alternatives and this public feedback is the same slide you've seen before when we presented level two results.

There was support for a lower height guideway along Genesee.

There was general support at that time for the off street lower height Delridge station, the light blue alternative that had more development potential.

There was generally concern.

Which involves two tunnels.

The recommendations coming out of level two were to not carry forward the brown alternative, which went on Oregon Street and Alaska Junction in the Alaska Junction area, to not carry forward the orange alternative, which again was an Oregon Street alternative but elevated, to not carry forward the purple alternative, which is the Pigeon Ridge-West Seattle alternative, but to add a new elevated alternative in the Alaska Junction area oriented north-south, and to also move the Delridge Station further south.

So that has defined the alternatives that we are now looking at or have been looking at in level three.

And as you've seen before, we generally have three end-to-end alternatives.

And speaking more specifically about the West Seattle segment, we have the representative project, which of course we've had throughout the evaluation process.

We have a second alternative, which we call the yellow-brown alternative.

And this is different than the representative project in a couple of ways.

It moves the Delridge station further south than was identified in the ST3 plan, and also orients the Alaska Junction station to be in a north-south configuration, an elevated configuration.

So that's the second alternative.

The third alternative, shown in blue here, would have a north crossing of the Duwamish instead of a south crossing.

It also moves to Delridge Station further south, but also west, further into that residential community, the Youngstown area.

And then in the junction area, it assumes tunnel options with tunnel stations on either 41st, 42nd, or 44th.

Some of the key considerations with the alternatives in level three that are on the table right now.

The representative project, obviously there's been concern with the east-west orientation of that alternative.

and that it could complicate a future extension further south.

It also is a more constrained location for the station on Alaska Street.

It would result in a high guideway along Genesee Street.

It would have some park effects as it goes along Genesee to the West Seattle Golf Course.

And the location of Delray Station was noted to be problematic because of proximity to the freeway and New Corps.

With the orange alternative, it would result, and has been noted in public comment, with more displacements between Alaska Junction and Avalon Station, but it would have a similar number of displacements in Delridge to the other alternatives.

It would have a greater disruption to the neighborhood around Alaska Junction.

It would result in a high guideway along Genesee Street through the Delridge area, and would also affect park area along Delridge area, along the West Seattle Golf Course.

With the light blue alternative, there would be fewer displacements in the Alaska Junction area, but a similar number of displacements in the Delridge area.

It would have a lower height Delridge station.

The tunnel facilitates a lower guideway along Genesee Street, but obviously the tunnel could increase the schedule and require additional funding, and it would have effects to the golf course again.

Some of the key differentiators with the alternatives in this area, if you look across, again, these are color-coded with the station location.

If you're just looking at the Alaska Junction, there's differences in terms of proximity to California Avenue.

There's differences in residential effects, and this is broken out into the Avalon Junction area and also in the Delridge area.

Speaking just specifically to Delridge, the residential effects would be fairly similar across all of the alternatives.

In terms of property effects, again, just focusing on the Delridge area, you can see that there would be greater property effects with the blue alternative through that area, with the business property effects with the blue alternative through that area.

Guideway height with the red and the orange alternatives you would have a higher guideway going through the Delridge area with a blue alternative You would have a lower guideway height going through the Delridge area And then of course you can see the comparisons in terms of cost estimates gonna pause for one second councilmember herbal Do you want to ask a question?

I do two questions so the For the residential property effects, you are identifying that the Delridge households displaced are pretty much the same across all alternatives.

And the number that you're using is less than 40. The number that we heard from community members was more like 90 households.

So that's that's one question.

My other question is regarded regarding specifically the business displacements would like to just know a little bit more about why the business displacements the square footage are so much higher for the blue line.

Sure.

Yes, right now, and again, to point out, this is a very early stage of analysis, but as we look at the alternatives right now and based on how they're defined, we think the property displacements, the residential impacts are fairly similar across the alternatives.

We will learn more as we go through this process and flush this out, but at this point, based on our analysis, it looks fairly similar.

With regard to the blue alternative and the potential business displacements that's really associated with whether you've crossed the West Seattle the Duwamish area on either the north or the south side of the Existing West Seattle bridge.

So that's why you're seeing differences there and any thoughts as to the disparity between the 40 households in the 90 households in the community estimates I don't know I know what where our number came from.

I can't really say where the other number came from.

I

It'd be great if there's an opportunity, looking both at Sound Transit and community members, just to reconcile it and just for us to get clarity.

If there's a difference of opinion, that'd be great for us just to know.

And if there's just some information that hasn't been shared that could be clarified, that'd be great to know too.

Just to speak a little bit about the Duwamish waterway crossing, because it does have some implications for what goes on in Delridge as well.

With the representative project and with the orange alternative, they would both be on the south side of the existing West Seattle Bridge.

They would have effects on the Pigeon Point area and the steep slopes along that area, which is also a green belt, so that does enter into the equation.

Also, if you're on the north side, however, you're avoiding Pigeon Point and the steep slope issues and the green belt issues, but you're having a greater effect on port, port terminal facilities, freight, and so on.

Some of the key distinctions in that area, as I've touched on, you either affect or avoid Pigeon Point, steep slope, and the green belt.

Property effects are fairly similar in terms of the effects on Harbor Island and Solo, but you have greater effects in Delridge area as you make that turn onto Delridge Way.

Freight affects, obviously it affects more if you're on the north side of the Duwamish to the existing harbour port facilities.

And then you also have greater potential displacement of water-dependent businesses and you can see for yourself the cost differences in that area.

Another question on that side.

Thank you.

On slide 79 as it relates specifically to the construction along Spokane in a southern crossing.

Could you talk a little bit about how that might impact access to the peninsula.

This is a concern that the West Seattle Chamber has recently raised.

Certainly, whatever alignment we pick along as we cross Duwamish area, there's going to be construction effects, and we're going to have to assess what those are more specifically as we go through the draft EIS process.

At this point in time, we wouldn't be able to distinguish necessarily one as being better than the other based on the information we have at this point.

Okay, so to get a better sense of kind of the context, community planning and community context for the Delridge Station, this station is going to be a key intercept for the future RapidRide H planned line, which essentially converts the current Route 120 into RapidRide service.

It's also going to be an important intercept point for service to South Seattle College.

So this is really going to have a really deep travel shed into West Seattle, into the Delridge neighborhood, and specifically the communities of color that our RET analysis highlighted further down the corridor.

So it's really important that transit integration be a key design principle at this station.

When we zoom in on North Delridge itself a little bit more, Some of the prominent features that we note are the West Seattle golf course the Delridge Community Center and play field and then the Duwamish green belt.

So a phenomenal kind of set of different Public park and green space uses that really kind of form the heart of this neighborhood So a lot of our early outreach on the project We heard get the station a bit closer to those amenities onto the heart of that neighborhood So there is an existing body of planning work done by the city over the past several years, recently published actually in the fall for the North Delridge neighborhood on the North Delridge action plan.

And that planning process and document yielded a number of ideas about how to evolve the neighborhood.

It was also thinking or anticipating the potential arrival of light rail and kind of assuming the representative project location But this is where a lot of kind of the ideas that that we've heard in early outreach around Kind of reinforcing art and kind of really bringing art as an expression into the station design and planning as well as thinking about equitable transit oriented development how affordable housing and community amenities come from and When we think about the current zoning context and how the station's interacting with the community, about 66% of the zoned land use in the station area, the broader station area, is either single family or low rise.

So it's really important to note, as Deb Barker pointed out earlier, Very much a single-family residential kind of character in this neighborhood Another important feature is the street network when you look at the different station locations from the representative project in red To the blue as you move farther south you have more of a street network you have a larger walkshed and that's what those dashed lines are indicating is kind of the geometry of of that walk shed, which is a function of the street network of topography.

So as you generally move farther south, you serve more destinations.

The station becomes more accessible by foot.

So as we've looked at the three different locations and kind of developed the station concepts a bit further, this is kind of where we are in the current level of design thinking.

The representative project north of Andover Would have entries that could span both sides of Delridge way You'll see kind of generally in these graphics the green lines indicate Existing the solid green lines indicate existing non-motorized facilities like neighborhood greenways And dashed green lines indicate potential connections that could be made from those facilities directly into the station the blue Rectangles around the different station locations indicate where buses could stop so as we've thought about How these different station locations would interface with these different networks the connections that you could make?

And how that affects bus operations and circulation.

We're starting to get a little bit of a higher level picture of how these stations work.

But first, maybe to get a little bit more context for each of these station locations.

So the north of Andover location would essentially be right near the on-ramp to the West Seattle Bridge, which is a pretty dramatic transition from a neighborhood arterial to a freeway.

But it's also an important commercial node with the new core steel plant to the west and a couple of commercial establishments right at the corner of Andover and Delridge.

As we thought about this particular station location we see an opportunity to have again direct bus integration from both sides of Delridge but its location creates a more challenging pedestrian and bike environment due to the proximity of the West Seattle bridge.

And that kind of traffic pattern and utilization pattern really influences the ability of buses to easily serve this area as well from an operational perspective.

So it's a pretty challenged and constrained site.

From a land use perspective, given the adjacencies to new course steel, the steep slopes, and the transportation infrastructure of course nearby, relatively limited development potential with this particular station location.

And specifically more challenging to think about affordable housing integration into future kind of station siting and development due to those site conditions.

As we move south.

One second.

Yes.

You mentioned that there's there are good bike facilities here but it still proposes a challenge because of the proximity of the on ramps.

Can you can you elaborate that a little bit.

Sure.

So there's an existing greenway on 26th Avenue southwest.

It's just a little bit outside of that a little bit outside of this image.

And that green way kind of jogs over on Andover.

So it's an existing facility.

It's not fully separated or protected.

So that's something that could be explored later in design along with the city.

How could we potentially upgrade that facility to make it even safer for for cyclists.

Similarly there are neighborhood green ways a little bit up the hill from Andover.

So the issue there just is the the nature of the traffic the traffic volume coming out of new core steel The fact that on top of that you'll have a station sighted there with buses Stopping and integrating and people also picking up and dropping off.

So it's just going to be it would be a congested Condition and thus raise the the specter of conflicts, right?

Thank you

So as we move south, the orange station location would be between Andover and Dakota Streets on Delridge.

Currently, the alternative contemplates it would be sited directly in the right of way.

And at this point, you're a little bit south of that Andover node, you're a bit closer to The community amenities at the Delbridge Community Center and Youngstown Cultural Arts Center.

You're also next to an area that has currently commercial zoning including an office building recently redeveloped project at Youngstown flats as well as to the east some undeveloped hillside critical slope area.

And with that particular station location again the opportunity for direct bus access from both sides of the street is pretty notable with this with this location so buses could stop right essentially beneath the station people could circulate up.

It would be a higher station about 60 feet or so high so you you would have vertical circulation time that you would have to account for with that integration but.

still direct direct transit integration It's a bit closer to the neighborhood destinations to the south along Genesee Street and again kind of a potential for connections to that 26th Avenue Southwest neighborhood Greenway on Dakota Street and potentially even thinking about a Potential hill climb that could go up to Koda and the unimproved right-of-way there and serve the Pigeon Point neighborhood From a land use and development perspective there's some opportunity for smaller scale redevelopment given the given the likelihood that we would need to acquire some property for staging in that vicinity particularly in the commercially zoned area there between Andover and Dakota.

But there's still an effect from the guideway as it makes the turn to go up Genesee on the Youngstown neighborhood.

And as a result there are fewer opportunities just because you have columns and a guideway it's a different kind of footprint characteristic than a station.

So there's less potential to translate those effects into redevelopment opportunities in the neighborhood.

The third location, the station, the blue, north of Genesee, between Dakota and Genesee, sites a station, as we've heard from public testimony, in an existing single family neighborhood, residential neighborhood, very intimate scale.

So the introduction of a station here would be a transformative move for this neighborhood.

As we kind of assess what that means, I guess I'll start with this one from kind of a land use and development perspective that has significant effect on the existing residential neighborhood scale and fabric.

But with that comes an opportunity to kind of really re envision what a potential station transit oriented community.

would look like in this particular area and it's really the only opportunity that the only station that has an opportunity to think about development at a scale that you could that you could really introduce some of the community amenities like a grocery store that kind of required density in order to support those amenities.

So it's a choice obviously a major choice with this with all these station locations.

From a transit integration perspective there is a slightly longer connection to the station for bus transfers and less buses divert.

And we have explored with Metro that it would be possible to divert buses to kind of consolidate the zones in a way that kind of provide more of a direct access.

But assuming if that didn't happen and buses remained on Delridge there would be a slightly longer walk and a need to cross Delridge way to access the station.

So it's important to note that.

There's an opportunity to think about bringing the 26th Avenue Greenway more directly into the station really kind of create more of a public realm around the station.

And also important to note a potential opportunity to span Delridge with a pedestrian bridge and essentially go up and tie into a Dakota street hill climb as with the orange alternative.

Thank you, just if we could go back to the previous slide real quickly.

So under land use and development, the first bullet is largest effect to existing residential neighborhood scale and fabric.

So I'm having a hard time squaring that statement with the earlier statement that it would be approximately 40 residential households displaced across all three Delward station options.

Yeah, I think what that's speaking to is that whereas if you look at the other station options, they're really on Delridge Way, primarily.

The guideway itself, however, does go through the residential area, so there would be effects with the guideway that then you potentially have similar number of residential effects overall.

Not the same residences, but similar magnitude of residential effects.

But I think what this bullet is talking about in this case with this particular alternative station itself is within the residential community So it's going to have a more direct effect The station will have a more direct effect on that neighborhood as it exists right now to change that neighborhood from what it is right now

So when you're saying largest effect to existing residential neighborhood and fabric it is not focused on the question of displacement.

It's not strictly that it's also speaking to the character of that neighborhood.

Okay, so we did also have a community workshop in Delridge on March 12th, and we had 94 participants with us.

And from that workshop, as well as other engagement that we've had through level three, we've been asking about community neighborhood vision and values, what people love about their neighborhood today and why, and what they'd like to see in the future when the new light rail extension opens.

And here's a snapshot of what we've heard So folks really value the neighborhood parks green spaces the diverse topography birds views and Long Velo Creek They'd like to maintain a sense of community and diversity which speaks to age income and housing type improve integration of all modes so walking biking buses and light rail and Some support for more small businesses, restaurants, grocery store, family-friendly amenities.

Another thing people have shared is they really like how it's affordable and yet really close to downtown.

And that the future light rail station should fit within the current scale and character of the neighborhood.

So we then also asked about the level three alternatives and station locations.

So keeping in mind the vision and values that we just talked about, what community members like about these options and what they dislike and their concern.

So here's a snapshot of what we heard.

We heard considerable concern about neighborhood impacts and residential displacement.

Some interest in a station location close to the existing bike path near the West Seattle Bridge.

Concerns about height visual aesthetics and size of future station Concerns that the station the representative project station is far from the neighborhood center and more challenging to access a smaller walkshed and in a more congested area in terms of traffic Concern with visual effects along Pigeon Point and slope stability with the South crossing Some interest in blending that representative project station into the hillside Minimizing visual impact with potential pedestrian connections to Pigeon Point There's some preference for a station location south of Southwest Andover Street to avoid the traffic and congestion That's closer to the West Seattle Bridge An interest in, again, minimizing residential and business displacement and encouraging development that fits within the character of the community.

Finally we also have asked in terms of looking at the level three alternatives if there are refinements to the alternatives and station locations that would help those options better meet community vision and values.

And here's what we heard a snapshot.

So interest in using the street right of way along Andover Yancy Avalon to minimize displacement and avoid green space impacts.

Some interest in station location near the new core steel plant.

Some interest in north crossing to reduce potential effects on Pigeon Point.

Some interest in a station location farther east to minimize residential and displacement in Delridge, just in terms of that representative project.

interest in the purple alternative from level two to minimize residential displacements improve bus connectivity and serve the central part of the neighborhood and then some interest in pursuing an alternative through a portion of the golf course to minimize residential displacement again, I

Again, in terms of next steps, this is the same slide you've seen before.

This is where we are today in terms of the alternatives.

We will be relaying all of this feedback and speaking to the earlier comment about how the feedback will get captured.

We will be documenting all of the feedback that we receive during the scoping period into our scoping summary report and providing high level overview of that in our SAG meeting in April.

And then we will report after this process, after we go through the alternative development process and we actually identify what we're continuing to look at in the draft EIS, we'll still be continuing to engage the community moving forward just as we would be in the Chinatown ID area and everywhere along the alignment.

We'll be reporting back to the community on what alternatives are on the table and continuing the process of refining these alternatives as we go through the process.

As we get into the EIS, we're going to have a lot more information about impacts.

We've talked at a high level about what the potential residential effects in this area are, for example, or traffic effects or construction effects in general.

We'll have a lot more details as we go through the EIS process, and we'll continue to engage the community on that.

And as the station planning process, which will be going on in parallel with the EIS, just like in the Chinatown area, we'll also be planning to engage the community in those station area planning discussions and thinking more broadly about the design, the urban design around the station areas moving forward.

Thank you and I will lead off some public discussion.

I'll let our facilitator, Diane Adams, know that Council Member Herbold and I have conferred and we can each keep our questions to 20 minutes each.

Yes.

My first question would be really around the neighborhood that we're affecting here in North Delridge.

I've walked the neighborhood with constituents and sat down and talked with many others.

It is a fairly dense single family neighborhood couple townhouses but divided lots affecting a pretty vibrant dense neighborhood.

Do we as Sound Transit have experience in going through such a dense residential neighborhood with aerial track or with alignment in the past.

We certainly had residential effects with our projects in the past.

I'm trying to think.

I'd have to think a little bit more to think about specific examples of whether there's anything exactly parallel to this particular alternative.

I think it would be valuable to contemplate the density of this neighborhood and threading light rail that is very much desired here in North Delridge and the overall alignment into such a developed neighborhood to the degree we have done it before.

What have we learned that can inform our work here and to the degree that we haven't done it before, what do we need to be considering?

How can we best think that through?

We also heard some comment and some question in public testimony today about the purple line.

As we have those those questions in that conversation I'd like to know more about how confident we are in the financial numbers a lot of the concern that led to Not taking the purple line further was financial and yet We were very early in design and we see very big fluctuations in cost estimates now as we do a little bit more refinement in fact the north and south alignment over the Duwamish Waterway flipped by hundreds of millions of dollars in comparison to each other.

How confident are we and would more study of the Purple Line further inform solid estimates?

I think with the Purple Line, certainly cost was one factor, but there were actually, there was a lot more going on with that particular alternative that informed the analysis previously in Level 2. If you recall, there were a number of engineering constraints with that alternative, a lot of major issues along that particular alternative.

For example, in the Soto area, as we're going through South Soto, There were a number of high power transmission lines that would need to be relocated with that particular alternative.

We'd also have to cross the UP Argo Yard area, which would require a very long span.

It is the longest crossing, the widest crossing point in the Duwamish, so it would be a very extensive structure over the Duwamish.

It would go into a tunnel into Duwamish Greenbelt, so it would affect the middle of the Greenbelt, and it's an unstable slope area, which would be challenging.

And then, of course, it involves a tunnel, it involves two tunnels.

So none of those things are likely, I mean, they're not going to change.

Those are still factors that informed our cost estimates before.

At that time, our estimate was that that particular alternative would be about $1.2 billion more than the representative project.

Perhaps we could finesse that alternative or look at it in more detail, but we're likely to find that it's going to be all those issues that I described are still the same issues that we will encounter if we were to evaluate it further, so it's still likely to be a very costly alternative.

Those issues would still exist, of course, but our cost estimates might fluctuate like we saw them in alignments north or south of the West Little Bridge, I would imagine.

Yeah, I agree that the factors that we're dealing with here, like I said, it's an unstable slope.

It's an extra tunnel.

It's a wide crossing of the Duwamish.

All of those factors are still going to be very major cost drivers.

Those are the key cost drivers.

I'm going to conclude there and and reserve the right to chime in with more questions councilmember herbal yet just a follow-up on that I just want to highlight the fact that the purple line I think is the option that best address.

the concerns that we've heard, the issues highlighted in the what we have heard portion of this presentation.

I do understand that the cost constraints are a concern, as well as the engineering constraints.

I'm assuming that the cost Estimates include addressing those engineering constraints, and I also want to so this is more of a statement than anything I want to speak to the fact that whereas the purple line was judged Largely on cost because again from my understanding the cost of 1.2 billion more included addressing the engineering and construction constraints identified it was judged as as compared to other options and people saw 1.2 billion.

But I think one of the things that people did not fully consider is that 1.2 billion included the 700 million dollar tunnel for the junction.

And so In my thinking, it's a $500 million addition.

And I think it should be measured that way and weighed that way in consideration with the race and social justice equity issues that we've discussed here.

Councilmember Johnson.

Thank you.

As we sat here this morning and heard from many members in the neighborhood.

I was reminded a lot of the board discussions that we had run way back in 2004 with the Roosevelt neighborhood who started chatting with the Sound Transit Board a full 16 or 17 years before their light rail station was set to open about where potential station locations could be, what property impacts we're going to have, and really started getting proactive.

So kudos to you guys.

We're still a good 12 years away, so stick with us, but know that there's a good precedent here.

During that 16 plus years, the city's undergone a couple of planning processes in the Roosevelt neighborhood, adopted at least two different sets of land use changes and probably will have three by the time the station opens.

And at the same time, you know, we've really thought a lot about bus rail integration and that vision has changed a couple of times too.

So while I'm grateful, Sloan, that we've been spending time and energy thinking about what those things might look like, I also want to recognize that those concepts are likely to change and evolve over the next dozen years as we get closer and closer to a station location and closer to what we might understand Metro might want to offer in the corridor once light rail comes up.

I think that I'm using all of this as a platform to say there's a couple of things that I'm hopeful we will continue to take into account.

One, that what exists there today will fundamentally change once we actually do pick a station, that that's going to fundamentally change the economics of the neighborhood, and that for a lot of folks who are concerned about displacement, one of the best anti-displacement strategies we might have is the actual construction of new development in the neighborhood so that people who may be displaced can still have a place to stay.

And then secondly, I was a little surprised, Lita, that during the community conversations nothing was brought up about the five-year forced transfer at the Soto station.

I recognize that that is not unique to this just Delridge station itself, but I think it goes without saying that that is a pinch point in the system already and will be as we open up trains all the way to Federal Way and beyond.

We I think really need to continue to sharpen the pencil about the operating characteristics of that force transfer and I would hope Find other alternatives than what we have on the table right now So I wanted to offer those moments of history before I disappear from this group and knowing that a majority of the folks sitting around this table are West Seattle residents that I'm sure that the folks out in the audience felt well represented Councilmember O'Brien

Thank you.

A couple of questions.

First, Cale, can you walk through the mix and match potential of the station locations in the Delridge, in this neighborhood, and how those may impact north or south crossing of the shift canal, and do they have any impact on what happens in West Seattle Junction, or are they all fully interchangeable there?

We call it the Duwamish in West Seattle.

What happens in the Delridge area, it doesn't necessarily have a bearing on the Duwamish crossing.

You could be on the north or south side of the Duwamish, the existing West Seattle bridge, and accommodate any of the station options that we're talking about in the Delridge area.

Does that include the red line we can get there?

Yes.

The alignment essentially could be the same.

There will be differences in profile and things like that.

And similarly with the junction?

Yeah, the main differences would be profile, again.

If you're in a tunnel in the junction versus elevated in the junction, it will affect the profile in Delridge.

But the alignment could be a common.

It sounds like a lot of flexibility on the mix and match side.

Second question, Nucor Steel was mentioned a couple times.

Specifically, there was a comment about an interest in location being near the Nucor Steel plant.

What have we heard from Nucor Steel?

Were they saying they'd like it near them, or have they weighed in?

I have not heard from new core steel most recently.

We do have someone from new core on our stakeholder advisory group.

But I when we've met with them early on their concerns were largely around the traffic impacts potentially with a station that would be north of Andover and how much their truck traffic moves through there and that might be a challenge with folks trying to get to the station.

But beyond that I haven't heard anything else.

And then the last point I want to just lift up, Councilmember Johnson touched on this too, is the reality that if, at least Seattle's policies, this isn't really a sound transit thing so much, but we would do this in coordination.

We're gonna make an investment in high-capacity transit in this neighborhood.

We will almost certainly do significant up zones in that neighborhood, too and you know to the folks in that community that that are interested in what the alignment is and the the direct displacement impacts that I have that's obviously a very real concern on a variety of levels, but I want to You know think through how we as a city can also be engaged in that community at the same time about what are the type of zoning changes that that we would likely do.

Now obviously a zoning change is very different than someone condemning your property to use for a rail station, but our goal, at least my goal would be to significantly increase capacity there and now that we've recently passed the mandatory housing affordability, that would come with additional and likely significant requirement for affordable housing to be built in that neighborhood too as it redevelops.

It'd be good for us to think through how we at least talk about the type of zoning changes We talk you know we're talking about neighborhood commercial low-rise What are the heights so folks there can think about what that means as they're trying to figure out?

Property values property investments they might be considering and also what that time frame can be can I do an add-on to that?

So you're cheering now I think one thing that you get a real appreciation for when you walk 25th is that although it's been described as a single-family neighborhood, it has the type of infill that we always talk about in our planning discussions as wanting.

So it is a very dense neighborhood already as it is.

Yeah, I can see there's a multi-family there.

Cahill, as you went through each station location, you touched on one of the things you touched on was bus integration.

Can you speak a little bit more about how each one of the alternatives integrates with bus integration that's being so important in reaching people further south through the Delridge Valley?

I'll defer the question to Sloan.

Sloan.

Let me go back to because those connections are really imperative at this station.

Absolutely.

So when we look at the three alternatives you know probably from a from the standpoint of keeping buses on Delridge having direct integration from both directions of travel not needing to deviate buses.

The orange alternative performs really well from that regard.

The assumed kind of profile of that alignment is a bit higher, so you have more time essentially spent in vertical circulation, so going upstairs or elevators.

But from kind of a location and convenience for buses and bus riders, that's really strong.

The blue north of Genesee, again, unless you route buses off of Delridge onto Genesee, which Metro would consider that would require a crossing of Delridge way for northbound buses and transfers and a slightly longer walk.

Thank you.

I'd love to get a sense I don't know how far along we are on this but where ridership would be coming from to this station in particular.

I appreciate the walk shed and as we talked about obviously as the land use changes that will change.

The the ridership trip generation will come from residential but I assume a significant portion will be doing bus transfers from further south on Delridge.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

And so this this image actually shows you the slide 81 shows you the full extent of the corridor and the kind of red line that intercepts Delridge is the proposed rapid ride H routing.

Which goes all the way from Burien and is projected to go ultimately into into downtown via the E3 busway.

But we have also initiated conversations with Metro about possible shifts to that to that route once the station comes online.

Potentially even having that bus deviate and serve the Admiral and Alki neighborhoods.

But from the station south it's serving all of those communities White Center Delridge Highland Park even and down to be ran the I'm imagining that we're talking thousands of potential transfers a day.

And so as we think about now.

Balancing the needs of a variety of folks, I think this is a stationary that I imagine really important to get that bus transfer right, and a minute or two.

conversations so that I know we've come in the other order in the past and as we consider West Seattle and Chinatown International District that we not feel rushed, impressed in those conversations.

With that, Diane.

Thank you so much.

Any closing remarks, Cahill?

We talked about the next steps when we closed out Chinatown International District, but there's one last slide.

Just, I guess, a reminder that the next elected leadership group meeting is on April 26th here, and at that time we'll be looking for level three recommendations.

Any closing remarks, Chairman O'Brien?

I'd like to, as we started, I'd like to thank everybody for coming to offer their insights and comments today.

The issues facing, serving Pioneer Square, Chinatown International District, and Delridge have unique set of challenges and interests.

that necessitated and precipitated this conversation.

I want to thank you for coming to participate and provide this knowledge of your communities to us.

And I want to thank my fellow members of the elected leaders group for dedicating the time to have this conversation and look forward to the continued work we have in the next month before our next meeting where we'll be making

Receiving the recommendation from the stakeholder advisory group and making our recommendation to the Sound Transit Board One thing I don't recall if you mentioned Cahill how the agency plans to take the scoping comments I

As noted on this graphic, actually, we'll be summarizing the key themes.

Everything we've heard will be documented in the scoping summary report, which also will be presented to you before the next, before you need to make your recommendations and will be available publicly as well.

So is it safe to assume that all the comments will be available public in the summary document and people will be able to evaluate?

Yes.

If they feel you missed some points there and can speak to that.

The timeline is compressed, so I just want to acknowledge that.

There may be a short period of time.

So I'll echo my co-chairs thank you to everyone.

A couple things that I will be focusing on in the next month is continuing to engage with the stakeholder advisory group and think through what our recommendation may look like.

Obviously working with all of you between now and then and of course at the next meeting.

to think through, in addition to preferred alignment or alignments that we might be recommending, some process things that we might be requesting.

I'd love to work with the agency on thinking through that, how we continue to have community input as the designs continue to advance, kind of in parallel to the EIS.

And also what, if we want to think about formal structures for community feedback, similar to the ELG and the Stakeholder Advisory Group, which will Believe we're planned to sunset when this process ends, but is there something else that should carry on and what that might look like?

so it may be prescriptive or it may not be prescriptive, but we want to Acknowledge that as we move forward and then there's some work to be done Continuing with community members in the city of Seattle has a role to play along with the agency And so I want to make sure we foster those dialogues and make sure that we're providing the support to the neighborhoods that were here today To continue to work over the coming years to really refine this to get some options that can be really support the communities in the ways that we all share those values.

With that, if there's nothing else, we will adjourn this meeting.

Thank you all.