New 'bus only' lanes on 3rd Avenue in Seattle are expected to save bus commuters a lot of time, and bus drivers a lot of headaches.
"Over the weekend, Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) crews were busy marking twelve blocks of 3rd Avenue “bus only” and adding signs up and down the corridor alerting drivers not to enter between the hours of 6am and 7pm any day of the week," reports Ryan Packer.
The bus lane was originally scheduled for construction next month, but the project got moved up to take advantage of dry weather, according to Packer.
Packer describes the significance of the project is increased by the looming closure of the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel (DSTT) to buses. "In March of next year, every single bus that uses the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel (DSTT) to get through downtown will instead need to find a surface street. While 2nd Avenue and 4th Avenue have transit-only lanes as well, those streets are also limited in the number of routes that can be added. Nonetheless, without extra capacity on 3rd Avenue, that’s where they will likely end up, vying for space in lanes that also double as turn lanes for private vehicles."
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