EVERETT — Snohomish County’s elected leaders are trying to hasten light rail’s arrival in Everett from the current quarter-century time line.
The County Council passed two resolutions Monday, promising full cooperation to process light-rail permits with counterparts in Lynnwood and Everett city government.
“It’s really time that we’re looking to save on all of this,” said Tom Rowe, special projects director in the county Executive’s Office. “Sound Transit has identified permitting as one of the main issues.”
The 25-year schedule for light rail reaching Everett caused widespread dismay when a draft plan the Sound Transit 3 ballot measure was released in March.
Agency staff heard similar sentiments throughout the region — from Seattle to Tacoma to Redmond — during a series of public outreach meetings in April.
“Our main takeaway from the public comment period is that people all over, including Snohomish County, are interested in completing projects more quickly,” Sound Transit spokesman Geoff Patrick said.
The $50 billion expansion plan for regional transit — known as ST3 for short — would result in higher sales tax and property tax as well as bigger car-tab fees. The measure is likely to reach voters in November.
The new planning agreement aims to convince Sound Transit that Snohomish County, Everett and Lynnwood are willing to do “everything possible under the law to speed the arrival of light rail to Everett,” County Executive Dave Somers said in a press release.
How much sooner remains to be seen. That should become clearer sometime after Thursday’s Sound Transit Board meeting.
This week’s board discussion is expected to focus on changes to the draft ST3 plan. Board members hope to pick a final list of projects on June 2 then return on June 23 to approve a package to send voters in the fall.
A major impetus for the permitting agreement is Sound Transit’s experience in Bellevue. While Link trains are due to start serving the Eastside city’s downtown in 2023 via a tunnel, planning for that work at times was adversarial, Patrick said.
“The process of getting to a final plan in Bellevue took about two years longer than expected,” he said. “That was based on a lot of back and forth about different alignment alternatives and mitigation issues before we got to an agreement.”
The three Sound Transit board members from Snohomish County have insisted on a route that serves Paine Field, rather than just paralleling the I-5 corridor. Sound Transit staff have said that sticking close to I-5 could speed up light-rail delivery to Everett by as much as a decade, but leaders here aren’t interested.
Light rail already is scheduled to reach the Lynnwood Transit Center by 2023 as a result of the Sound Transit 2 measure passed in 2008. The agency is working to buy nearby businesses.
“We should see dirt flying and construction within the next year and a half,” said Paul Krauss, Lynnwood’s community development director.
For the next phase of light-rail expansion through Lynnwood, city leaders agreed to settle for two new stations instead of three. They’re now supporting one station near 188th Street SW near the southwest corner of Alderwood mall. Another future station would serve the Ash Way Park and Ride, in Lynnwood’s future annexation area.
“The idea of that is that in helping to cut costs, that would help get the line to Everett and Paine Field sooner,” Krauss said.
The memorandum of understanding between Snohomish County, Everett and Lynnwood commits to have staff start processing permit applications the next working day after receipt. City and county departments are promising to assign the Sound Transit work the highest priority and to meet with the agency’s staff at the earliest-possible stages of the planning process to avoid holdups later on.
The agreements aren’t legally binding.
Council members passed the resolutions 4-0 on Monday with little fanfare.
The Lynnwood City Council was scheduled to vote on the agreement Monday and the Everett City Council on Wednesday.
“The intent is to show Sound Transit that we can work as a team up here in Snohomish County,” Everett planning director Allan Giffen said last week. “Really, this is just a commitment to work with them. There’s nothing legally binding that says we have to waive anything. In fact, the (memorandum) that we’re drafting will say we can’t waive anything that is otherwise required by law.”
Noah Haglund: 425-339-3465; nhaglund@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @NWhaglund.
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