Washington

[compdude787]

I came across this picture on my Facebook feed showing an early design of the I-90/I-405 interchange. As you can see, this interchange design was horrible! It had left exits and entrances, as well as two loop ramps. I'm glad a stack interchange was built instead of whatever this was.



This photo was part of a post about the opening of the Hood Canal Bridge. Apparently, they had this interchange design on display there back in 1961.

[jakeroot]

I came across this picture on my Facebook feed showing an early design of the I-90/I-405 interchange. As you can see, this interchange design was horrible! It had left exits and entrances, as well as two loop ramps. I'm glad a stack interchange was built instead of whatever this was.



This photo was part of a post about the opening of the Hood Canal Bridge. Apparently, they had this interchange design on display there back in 1961.

Thanks for sharing. It's giving me serious 5/405 vibes (by vibes I mean PTSD).

I believe the present interchange was opened around 1970, before all the cross-lake delays, so the plan must have changed pretty quick. The diagram in that photo seems to suggest they were going to use more of the original roadways; the westbound carriageway and southbound carriageways both line up with old US-10 and the original north-south highway (respectively) pretty perfectly.

[jakeroot]

Other incentives that work well is with a more flexible vanpool.  Perhaps most of the days you can share a ride and meet up at a common location, but still have the flexibility of your own car for the days when you may have to leave early to do to a doctor appointment or handle other errands.

Not surprisingly, the Puget Sound region has one of the largest vanpool fleets in the country. About 2,389,000 unlinked passenger trips between the largest agencies in 2024, compared to 1,910,000 for Los Angeles and 1,220,900 for San Francisco. (Source)

Doesn't that speak to gaps in the overall public transportation system?

I know Microsoft has a robust vanpool system with some pretty serious incentives (a family relative takes advantage of it), so that's a unique factor as well. 

Depends on how generous you are with what counts towards public transit, but vanpools are considered public transit per the FTA. So I think it speaks more to Seattle's geography being beneficial to carpooling...and the weather being so poor half the year that anything is better than driving in rain and darkness.

[mrsman]

Other incentives that work well is with a more flexible vanpool.  Perhaps most of the days you can share a ride and meet up at a common location, but still have the flexibility of your own car for the days when you may have to leave early to do to a doctor appointment or handle other errands.

Not surprisingly, the Puget Sound region has one of the largest vanpool fleets in the country. About 2,389,000 unlinked passenger trips between the largest agencies in 2024, compared to 1,910,000 for Los Angeles and 1,220,900 for San Francisco. (Source)

Doesn't that speak to gaps in the overall public transportation system?

I know Microsoft has a robust vanpool system with some pretty serious incentives (a family relative takes advantage of it), so that's a unique factor as well. 

Depends on how generous you are with what counts towards public transit, but vanpools are considered public transit per the FTA. So I think it speaks more to Seattle's geography being beneficial to carpooling...and the weather being so poor half the year that anything is better than driving in rain and darkness.

Yes.  In many contexts vanpools are like public transit, with at least in some cases a door to door function.  The vehicle is generally owned by the company, not the individual passengers.  And the company will pay for gas and may even have reserved parking at the workplace.

The tech companies in Silicon Valley have company shuttles that are bus routes run by the companies.  Very specific routing that makes it easier for the employees to commute.

I think in any place without a comprehensive rail system, it would be very difficult and time consuming to rely on buses alone.  Bus routes simply make too many stops, and unless the company is located Downtown, there would not likely be enough bus routes to make it easy to commute to for a large segments of the population.

So the city's bus system probably cannot dedicate 10 express routes around town to Amazon's campus, but Amazon can use vanpools to do something equivalent with smaller vehicles.  And these van routes will have far fewer stops than public transit and will be targeted to the population.

[stevashe]

Other incentives that work well is with a more flexible vanpool.  Perhaps most of the days you can share a ride and meet up at a common location, but still have the flexibility of your own car for the days when you may have to leave early to do to a doctor appointment or handle other errands.

Not surprisingly, the Puget Sound region has one of the largest vanpool fleets in the country. About 2,389,000 unlinked passenger trips between the largest agencies in 2024, compared to 1,910,000 for Los Angeles and 1,220,900 for San Francisco. (Source)

Doesn't that speak to gaps in the overall public transportation system?

I know Microsoft has a robust vanpool system with some pretty serious incentives (a family relative takes advantage of it), so that's a unique factor as well. 

Depends on how generous you are with what counts towards public transit, but vanpools are considered public transit per the FTA. So I think it speaks more to Seattle's geography being beneficial to carpooling...and the weather being so poor half the year that anything is better than driving in rain and darkness.

Yes.  In many contexts vanpools are like public transit, with at least in some cases a door to door function.  The vehicle is generally owned by the company, not the individual passengers.  And the company will pay for gas and may even have reserved parking at the workplace.

The tech companies in Silicon Valley have company shuttles that are bus routes run by the companies.  Very specific routing that makes it easier for the employees to commute.

I think in any place without a comprehensive rail system, it would be very difficult and time consuming to rely on buses alone.  Bus routes simply make too many stops, and unless the company is located Downtown, there would not likely be enough bus routes to make it easy to commute to for a large segments of the population.

So the city's bus system probably cannot dedicate 10 express routes around town to Amazon's campus, but Amazon can use vanpools to do something equivalent with smaller vehicles.  And these van routes will have far fewer stops than public transit and will be targeted to the population.

Plus here in Seattle many vanpools use vehicles owned by the transit agency so they really are public transit.

[Bruce]

I think in any place without a comprehensive rail system, it would be very difficult and time consuming to rely on buses alone.  Bus routes simply make too many stops, and unless the company is located Downtown, there would not likely be enough bus routes to make it easy to commute to for a large segments of the population.

They don't have to be. Seattle developed a strong network of express buses that was expanded into the regional system we have today: generally one or two stops per city, then right back into the HOV lanes. The bus culture here is relatively strong for an American city because fast buses have been a thing here for more than 50 years at this point.

[jakeroot]

SR-9 to be reduced to one lane at SR-204 due to a high number of crashes in the roundabout (which are dropping, apparently...but not enough?)

It's amazing that we went from the initial plan of SR-9 grade separation down to a single southbound through lane. It's a shame they couldn't spring for a flyover, because now there's fewer southbound through lanes than 30 years ago.

https://wsdotblog.blogspot.com/2026/08/sr-9-sr-204-roundabout.html

[jakeroot]

I was alerted recently to the new Drivers Guide published by the WA DOL, which is given to most or all learner drivers:

https://dol.wa.gov/media/pdf/4745/driver-guidepdf/download?inline

Overall, it's quite good, and also very realistic. It doesn't seem to state anything ridiculous or completely contrary to law, like drivers guides sometimes like to do. I love that they mention the flashing green ball indications that you see in British Columbia, too. That's very clever. There's also a section on diverging diamonds, which I'm sure are not commonly mentioned in most drivers guides. They also clearly state that center turn lanes can be used for turning into the roadway (commonly misunderstood), and have a great section on handling blind intersections (inch out so other drivers can see and react to you, even if you can't see them, which is extremely good advice and exactly how it should be done). It also correctly states that you can speed up to the speed limit to enter a traffic light on yellow (implicitly anyways...it merely indicates you cannot exceed the speed limit in this situation).

There does seem to be at least a couple of errors or omissions, though (#2 is probably the most shocking error):

• In section 4.11 (Traffic Lights), flashing yellow arrows are fully omitted (this may be because the RCW still has no definition for a flashing yellow arrow).
• In section 4.11 (Traffic Lights), flashing yellow circles are stated as having the same meaning as "yield"; this is flagrantly false (they mean "pass with caution" per RCW 46.61.065).
• In Section 4.11 (Traffic Lights), while the section on solid red is correct about left and right turns on red, this information is omitted in the section on red arrows; this was probably for brevity, but many states do not allow turns on red arrows, and omitting that information in the section on red arrows may mislead drivers into assuming turns on red are only permitted on circular red.
• In Section 4.16 (Road Markings), the section on yellow lines erroneously shows all of the cars going in the same direction.
• In Section 4.16 (Road Markings), there is an example of a single yellow line, which are only used on the left edge of a one-direction carriageway, even though its shown here as being used on a bi-directional roadway.
• In Section 4.16 (Road Markings), contraflow roadways are shown with double dashed white, when they are actually marked with double dashed yellow.
• In Section 4.17 (Zones), the section on work zones shows a European warning sign for a man struggling with an umbrella next to the flagger.

There's probably more, but these stood out to me.

[Amaury]

Does anyone know why the viewpoint in both directions on I-90 by milepost 140 is a numbered exit (Exit 139)? Normally, the gore point sign would just say View Point with an arrow like other view points, such as I-82 by milepost 7. What's even more weird is the inconsistency, as the advance signs are still blue and the normal View Point 1 mile, NOT Exit 139 1 mile (in green(. Although the supplemental Wild Horses Monument Viewpoint Next Right sign is green, but still not consistent, as the main advance sign and the View Point Next Right sign are both blue.

[xonhulu]

Does anyone know why the viewpoint in both directions on I-90 by milepost 140 is a numbered exit (Exit 139)? Normally, the gore point sign would just say View Point with an arrow like other view points, such as I-82 by milepost 7. What's even more weird is the inconsistency, as the advance signs are still blue and the normal View Point 1 mile, NOT Exit 139 1 mile (in green(. Although the supplemental Wild Horses Monument Viewpoint Next Right sign is green, but still not consistent, as the main advance sign and the View Point Next Right sign are both blue.

Maybe because to get to both viewpoints, you need to drive on a 2-way road, as opposed to the one way roadways in rest areas?