- Seattle Municipal Archives
- Old timey streetcar line running from Streetcar Line, Yesler Way to Lake Washington.
The Seattle City Council’s transportation committee is finally poised to approve construction of the street car next Tuesday, February 28—a move that would put it before a full council vote the following Monday, March 5. If all goes according to plan (which it damn well should, as the city’s been planning this since Jesus was in nappies), construction on the new streetcar line will start in early April.
Wooot!
And here’s an interesting tidbit: Since Pacifica is assembling the cars locally, the contract they’ve pitched to the city includes an open-door policy that would allow other northwest cities interested in purchasing streetcars to attach themselves to Seattle’s contract with the company. If that happened, Seattle would contractually get a cut of their fees. In essence, streetcars are poised to become the ’80s Tupperware party of the transportation world.
Once construction is completed in early 2013 2014, the streetcar line will link First Hill to the region’s light rail system via connections on Capitol Hill and in the International District, with cars running every 10 to 15 minutes. Inekon-Pacifica will be manufacturing six streetcars for the line (for reference, that’s twice as many cars as currently run on the SLUT) in Seattle, at a total cost of $26.6 million.
