The Sounder trains that have been rolling through Snohomish County this week have buzzed through Mukilteo without a hint of stopping.
That’s not how it was supposed to be.
When voters approved Sound Move in 1996, they said yes to a plan that would see three Snohomish County Sounder stations built, including one in Mukilteo.
Sound Transit and Burlington Northern are making major improvements to stations in Everett and Edmonds, but that hasn’t stopped them from being used since Sounder service began in Snohomish County Sunday.
Everett Station has been ready for Sounder for a year, and Edmonds can use Amtrak’s station until Sound Transit can build its own boarding platform.
That’s not the case in Mukilteo, where the exact location of Mukilteo Station cannot be selected until Burlington Northern realigns the tracks through the city as part of its plan to improve its routes in the county.
"Certainly there’s some disappointment in not even coming close to meeting the schedule," Mukilteo Mayor Don Doran said. "But to the extent that we do it right, then we won’t have to move it or do anything to it."
Doran said the city is looking forward to the train so residents can use it to commute to Seattle and so Whidbey Island commuters can hop on instead of driving through Mukilteo.
Waiting to build the station also gives those involved with the redevelopment of the Mukilteo waterfront more time to better link the station with a new ferry terminal and bus depot planned for Mukilteo.
The three pieces to Mukilteo’s new regional transportation hub will all tie into the Port of Everett’s plan to redevelop the 22-acre tank farm site in the city’s Old Town district, a prized swath of beachfront property that has been off-limits for more than 50 years.
Although it’s too early to know exactly what the port, city of Mukilteo and others will do with the waterfront property, early discussions have focused on turning the land into a trendy retail district with beachfront condos, shops, restaurants and walkways.
Doran said the city would like the retail and public access parts of the plan to blend in with a transportation hub.
To that end, the city has asked Sound Transit to build at least some of the 120 parking spaces planned for Mukilteo Station on a little-used road that’s away from the water, something that Sound Transit is studying.
"We have to wait until all of that work is done in Mukilteo, and then we can go in and do our work," said Paul Kaftanski, Sound Transit’s manager for Sounder’s north corridor.
The station Sound Transit eventually builds in Mukilteo will cost $18.2 million, up from an original estimate of $11.1 million. As with improvements planned for the Everett and Edmonds stations, the price tag increased substantially from what the agency first estimated in a recent review of all of Sounder’s costs.
Kaftanski said cost overruns are linked to not properly identifying expenses such as paying taxes on materials and not factoring in how much extra it would cost to make improvements to working tracks.
"We really have scrubbed the numbers and tried to identify every cost we could come up with," Kaftanski said of a budget review process announced in early December.
At Mukilteo Station, Sound Transit will build a loading platform on both sides of the tracks, a pedestrian bridge so riders can cross safely and the parking lot.
Improvements to Everett Station — a second parking lot and a pedestrian bridge — went from $24.6 million to $26.9 million.
In Edmonds, building two permanent platforms went from $9.6 million to $13.1 million.
Reporter Lukas Velush: 425-339-3449 or lvelush@heraldnet.com.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
