EVERETT — If light rail ever reaches here, trains will travel through the bustling manufacturing area at Paine Field to downtown and possibly up to Everett Community College.

That’s the route the Sound Transit Board of Directors agreed Thursday to put in its long-range plan. Meeting in Seattle, the board acted at the request of three Snohomish County delegates.

“It stood out as an obvious choice,” said Everett City Council member Paul Roberts, who joined Snohomish County Executive John Lovick and Edmonds Mayor Dave Earling to advocate for the alignment.

Everett Mayor Ray Stephanson and Troy McClelland, president of Economic Alliance of Snohomish County, endorsed the route, as well, in a public hearing preceding adoption of the plan.

“This alignment will get as many single-occupancy vehicles off the road and the maximum amount of ridership to our largest job center,” Stephanson said Friday. “There’s a significant need there. This is a win-win for the region.”

Sound Transit is working to bring light rail to Lynnwood by 2023 and potentially into Everett the following decade. Until this week, its board had not sketched a path for trains to travel into Everett.

A 2013 analysis of potential alignments showed that routing trains away from I-5 and through the industrial corridor in southwest Everett would not be the cheapest way to reach Everett, but it could wind up carrying the most riders.

That study estimated a Lynnwood-to-downtown Everett line passing Paine Field would stretch for 15.7 miles and cost up to $3.4 billion to build. A more direct Lynnwood-to-downtown Everett connection along I-5 would cover 12.6 miles and cost up to $2.2 billion. For both routes, the cost rises to extend service to Everett Community College.

An estimated 5,000 to 7,000 more people will ride the longer route because it would serve the Boeing Co. and surrounding aerospace firms, where thousands of workers are employed.

It’s the state’s largest manufacturing area and is expected to have thousands of more workers in the future, Roberts said.

“Yes, this is a more expensive proposition,” he said. “This was the better route and it was pretty clear if you didn’t do it then you would need to come up with other ways to deal with the expected increase in traffic in this (manufacturing) area.”

There’s still a long way to go before the matter is settled.

An environmental study will be needed to nail down specifics of the route and identify where future stations might be.

More notably, there’s no money to pay for the extension north from Lynnwood or for other planned light-rail expansion to Tacoma and Redmond.

Sound Transit is asking the Legislature for the authority to put a measure on the ballot as soon as 2016 to raise the dollars needed for expansion — through a sales-tax increase, property tax assessment, a boost in car registration fees or some combination.

Board members hope such a measure — referred to as Sound Transit 3 or ST3 — could generate between $9 billion and $15 billion.

Also Thursday, the board approved a $1.2 billion budget for 2015 that includes $19.7 million to replace 22 ST Express buses. Five of those will be double-decker buses to be used on routes between Snohomish County and Seattle.

There also is $16.3 million to finish preliminary engineering and begin final design of Lynnwood Link, the project that will extend light rail service from Northgate Mall in Seattle to Lynnwood.

Jerry Cornfield: 360-352-8623; jcornfield@heraldnet.com.