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Light link rail seattle6/2/2023 Sound Transit CEO Peter Rogoff tried to assure the board. Northgate Link will open later this year, and revolutionize transit in North Seattle, even if King County Metro’s bus restructure fell victim to budget cuts. On a positive note, Sound Transit 2 remains on track with 62 miles of light rail expected to be open by 2024, with Lynnwood Link and Federal Way Link opening then and East Link a year earlier in 2023. The presentation didn’t detail Everett Link or Issaquah Link cost projections, but noted they had taken a hit as well. The culprit there is the agency’s determination that an extra three miles of elevated rather than at-grade rail will be needed due to concerns about drainage and disrupting indigenous burial sites as the route passes through the Puyallup Reservation. The Tacoma Dome Link Extension costs have climbed from $2.4 billion in 2015 to $3.3 billion as of the update yesterday. While the Ballard and West Seattle light rail extension numbers were the most dramatic, all Sound Transit 3 light rail lines are seeing cost escalations. In fact, property costs alone jumped $2.13 billion–a 263% increase. The agency revealed the bad news at the Sound Transit Board meeting yesterday and blamed skyrocketing costs for land acquisition, labor, and construction materials. The projected cost of the two lines jumped from $7.9 billion in 2019 to $12.1 billion–a jump exceeding 50%. Sound Transit is projecting an additional $4 billion in costs for light rail to Ballard and West Seattle. In 2024, Link will extend to Lynnwood on elevated guideway similar to the Northgate approach.
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