T Line extension slated to be delayed 2 years. What about Tacoma light rail?
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- The Tacoma Dome Link Extension remains on track for completion in 2035, a proposal says.
- The T Line extension to Tacoma Community College is slated to be delayed two years.
- There’s no timeline for the Sounder extension to DuPont, which lacks significant funding.
A megaproject extending light rail to Tacoma will remain on schedule under Sound Transit’s proposal to address a $34 billion funding gap in ST3 — the voter-approved measure expanding the regional transit system.
The proposal keeps the Tacoma Dome Link Extension, estimated to cost $5 billion to $6 billion, on track for scheduled completion in 2035. Pierce County delegates on the Sound Transit board had vowed to not accept deferring the project for cost-savings — a prospect contemplated in a board exercise during a March retreat.
Board Chair Dave Somers, who presented the proposal during an executive committee meeting Thursday, called it a “balanced and affordable system” plan.
“There is no version of this plan that doesn’t involve tradeoffs,” Somers said, adding that nothing permanently defers or eliminates what voters approved in 2016’s Sound Transit 3 (ST3) ballot measure.
The T Line’s expansion to Tacoma Community College, another major ST3 project for the South Sound, will be delayed two years to 2043 under the proposal. The Sounder extension south from Lakewood, with new stations at Tillicum and DuPont, is partially funded for planning, but there’s no funding for its final design or construction, according to the plan. There was also no estimated timeline noted for its completion.
“As folks have said, of course, no one got everything, but no one got nothing,” Tacoma Council member Kristina Walker said during the meeting.
Walker, who sits on the Sound Transit Board, added that the proposal was a “great” starting point, but conversations would continue about increasing funding and ultimately delivering on all ST3 projects in the agency’s transportation district encompassing Pierce, King and Snohomish counties.
Pierce County Executive Ryan Mello, who is a vice chair on the board, agreed that each subarea within the agency’s district had made sacrifices.
“But we can still see in the future about what’s it going to take to bring projects that are still not fully funded, into the fully funded and implementation column,” Mello said. “And that’s where we got to begin to really focus our energy.”
Mello emphasized that the proposal put forward by Somers gets Sound Transit to 92% of the estimated boardings from ST3.
“That should be noted and that should be celebrated,” he said.
The Sound Transit Board is expected to vote on the proposal to amend the ST3 plan on May 28. If approved, it will be the second time the plan has been amended since its passage, according to the agency.
ST3 was approved as a 25-year plan and then realigned to 2046 by board action in 2021. The proposed update calls for extending the financial plan to 2052.
