Sound Transit a little nervous about $1.2B light rail grant

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One worry is that Trump’s infrastructure plans could support private toll roads over mass transit.


LYNNWOOD — The timeline for getting light rail to Snohomish County slipped last year, and leaders at Sound Transit are scrambling to stop it from falling further behind schedule.

Working in their favor, transit engineers have made progress identifying huge potential savings along the future route from Northgate to Lynnwood. But rising land and labor costs cloud the picture. So does a fickle federal government.

A make-or-break decision looms next year. That’s when federal officials are to decide whether to award a nearly $1.2 billion grant for light rail to Lynnwood.

“That’s what is necessary for us to deliver the project in 2024,” Sound Transit CEO Peter Rogoff told the agency’s board of directors last week.

The board voted Thursday to submit a full grant funding agreement to the federal government. Sound Transit has been working through the application process since 2013. They hope to get word back next summer.

The money had seemed all but assured under President Barack Obama. Policy changes since the election of President Donald Trump threw it into doubt. Rogoff recently returned from his first meeting with the Federal Transit Administration’s acting director, trying to press the importance of the Lynnwood project.

“It was a very good and productive meeting,” he said.

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