News & Notes: Transit-Oriented Lap Swimming in Bellingham
ALSO: Testing out the newly opened Lynnwood Link; new bike lockers near WTA’s Bellingham Station; and bus detours for WTA’s Routes 331 and 525.
Arne Hanna Aquatic Center, Lap Swimming, and the Importance of Transit-Oriented Indoor Recreation
The local pool that BhamByBus usually swims laps at is currently closed due to a two-week scheduled maintenance shutdown, meaning that the City of Bellingham’s heavily utilized Arne Hanna Aquatic Center is the only realistic nearby alternative. As someone who lives mostly car-free, BhamByBus is particularly attuned to nuances of transit-oriented lap-swimming and is fortunate to have a sponsored membership to Western Washington University’s Wade King Recreation Center, an important stop on the Whatcom Transit Authority’s Blue GO Line. Arne Hanna and the rest Bellingham’s Civic Athletic Complex are thankfully near multiple WTA bus routes, including those comprising the Plum GO Line (Routes 512, 525, 540, 533), plus Routes 190, 196, and 197, which also serve the adjacent shopping area near Lakeway Drive & Lincoln Street, including Whole Foods and Fred Meyer.
From Downtown Bellingham, the most direct transit option to Arne Hanna would seemingly be any of the Plum GO Line buses to Lakeway Drive & Lincoln Street. But Route 197 (Lincoln /WWU) – which runs hourly Mondays-Saturdays in a clockwise loop starting at Bellingham Station through the York neighborhood, Civic Stadium, the Lincoln Street corridor and the Blue GO Line corridor to Western Washington University – may be a more pleasant way to access Arne Hanna even if it has a more meandering route.
That’s because leaving Downtown Bellingham, Route 197’s clockwise loop avoids heavily trafficked Lakeway Drive near Interstate 5 and Fred Meyer, which is not a very pleasant roadway for pedestrians using WTA bus stops. While Route 197’s loop does travel westbound on Lakeway for a relatively short distance on its way toward Lincoln Street and WWU, its stop at Lakeway Drive & Orleans Street is on the same side of Lakeway as Arne Hanna, eliminating the need to cross the stroad and deal with motorists en route to and from Whole Foods, Fred Meyer, and Interstate 5.
The area around the Arne Hanna Aquatic Center and the Lincoln Street corridor have been envisioned for big changes in the years to come, including the possible construction of a new aquatic center next door to Arne Hanna on the site of Carl Crozier Elementary School at Lincoln Street & Potter Street.
The City of Bellingham certainly needs additional investments in indoor recreation, including an aquatic center with far more capacity than Arne Hanna, the only indoor public swimming pool in the city. Local swimmer and Bellingham Bay Swim Team coach Brad Jones wrote an October 2023 Cascadia Daily News guest commentary about the great need for more public facilities that support indoor recreation. The National Recreation and Park Association, Jones noted in his commentary, “states that public community pools should be able to accommodate 6% of the city’s population at any one time. Most cities achieve this with multiple pools. Arne Hanna Aquatic Center, our only public pool, accommodates less than 1% of Bellingham’s population.”
As BhamByBus can attest, Arne Hanna is a crowded, heavily used facility, and while it’s great for families, kids, and those seeking open swim and programmed activities like water aerobics, capacity for lap swimming can sometimes be limited and leaves some dedicated lap-swimmers yearning for better pool options in Bellingham.
Jones continued in the CDN: “Let’s balance our parks in Bellingham with modern, energy-efficient, public facilities like pools, ice rinks, senior centers, and community centers. Fixed-indoor recreation facilities integrate well with public transit systems, making them more accessible than trail systems.”
With WTA studying the possibility of connecting the Green and Blue GO Lines into a future improved crosstown rapid bus corridor connecting Cordata Station, Bellingham Station, and WWU, the Civic Athletic Complex could end up as the Lincoln Street terminus of a high-frequency bus route.
Transit-oriented recreational opportunities are important. Hopefully civic stakeholders in Bellingham, who regularly tout the long-standing civic investments in parks, green spaces, and outdoor recreation through the levy-supported Greenways Program, will also support future investments in more indoor public recreational facilities, including an improved, greatly expanded, and transit-accessible aquatic center at the Civic Athletic Complex.
Checking Out Sound Transit’s Newly Opened Lynnwood Link Extension
The big regional transit news of the past week has been Friday’s opening of Sound Transit’s Lynnwood Link Extension, which has brought the Link 1 Line northward into Snohomish County from the Northgate Station in Seattle with new stations in Shoreline, Mountlake Terrace, and Lynnwood that have fueled a boom of new transit-oriented housing. The Lynnwood City Center Station is now the new northern terminus of Sound Transit’s light-rail network, with service into Seattle and SeaTac International Airport, and the adjacent Lynnwood Transit Center is an important local and regional bus hub, including connections to Community Transit’s Swift Orange Line.
A Sound Transit Link 1 Line train pulls into the Mountlake Terrace Station. (Video by Michael Grass / BhamByBus)
BhamByBus has previously noted the indirect ways the Lynnwood Link extension (and express bus connections via Everett Station) can support car-free trips between Bellingham and Seattle, including alternative ways to reach certain destinations north of Downtown Seattle – like the University of Washington – without taking an Amtrak Cascades train or bus all the way to King Street Station and then backtracking north.
Although Amtrak Cascades trains and buses between Bellingham and Seattle don’t serve Lynnwood, they do stop at Everett Station, where you can connect with Sound Transit Express Route 512 buses – which offers frequent service via the Interstate 5 HOV lanes and an important connection with the Link 1 Line.
When BhamByBus periodically commutes from Bellingham to UW in Seattle, taking an Amtrak Cascades train or bus from the Fairhaven Transportation Center in Bellingham to Everett, transferring to the 512 bus and then the Link 1 Line, has sometimes saved 20 minutes compared to taking an Amtrak Cascades train or bus all the way into Downtown Seattle. It can be a handy way going south in mid-morning, when southbound congestion on I-5 isn’t typically bad.
The opening of Lynnwood Link now places Sound Transit’s light-rail terminus and the connection point for buses to Everett and other points further north, bypassing some of – but certainly not all of – one the most congested stretches of freeways in Washington.
Going northbound in the afternoon, when I-5 traffic congestion is often heavy heading toward and through Everett, presents some additional transit navigational variables to make the Link-512-Everett connection work. Although Lynnwood City Center Station and South Everett Park & Ride both have full HOV lane ramp connections to both northbound and southbound I-5, Ash Way Park & Ride only has partial HOV lane ramp connections, meaning that northbound Route 512 buses departing Ash Way Park & Ride have use local roadways involving numerous turns and traffic lights to re-enter I-5 in the general-purpose lanes. And that’s before buses have to cross multiple lanes of traffic to re-enter the left-side HOV lanes, which can sometimes move slowly.
So build in enough time to deal with any surprises from Route 512, which can be impacted by I-5 traffic, in order to make northbound connections at Everett Station, whether it’s the evening northbound Amtrak Cascades train or a Skagit Transit Intercounty Connector bus (the Route 90X bus to Mount Vernon, which has a timed transfer with Route 80X to Bellingham, co-operated with the Whatcom Transit Authority).
- Another incentive for Bellinghamsters to avoid driving into Seattle on I-5 and use transit connections instead in the years to come: The Washington State Department of Transportation will be ramping up Revive I-5 rehabilitation work between Downtown Seattle and Northgate, including deck repaving on the Lake Washington Ship Canal Bridge and Lakeview Viaduct in Eastlake, all of which will lead to shifting sections of temporary lane reductions over the next few years.
New Transit-Accessible Bike Lockers in Downtown Bellingham
As the Cascadia Daily News reports, the City of Bellingham has installed 14 new bike lockers in Downtown Bellingham including a cluster at Railroad Avenue & E. Champion Street, adjacent to the Whatcom Transit Authority’s Bellingham Station. The others are located at the Commercial Street Parking Garage. The lockers aren’t available to use just yet, but when they are, they’ll be accessible using the Movatic app, the CDN reports.
WTA Bus Detours for Route 331 and Route 525
According to Whatcom Transit Authority service bulletins:
- Route 331 | Due to ongoing construction work along Telegraph Road, Route 331 (Downtown to Cordata/WCC) buses to and from Cordata Station will be on detour through September 7.
- Route 525 | The Electric Avenue Bridge near Bloedel Donovan Park will be closed to all traffic September 9-20 for construction work. As a result, Route 525 (Downtown to Barkley) buses will detour and not serve stops along Electric Avenue and Alabama Street.