Mountlake Terrace Transit Center is a

bus station A bus station or a bus interchange is a structure where city or intercity buses stop to pick up and drop off passengers. While the term bus depot can also be used to refer to a bus station, it generally refers to a bus garage. A bus station is l ...

and proposed light rail station in

Mountlake Terrace, Washington Mountlake Terrace is a suburban city in Snohomish County, Washington, United States. It lies on the southern border of the county, adjacent to Shoreline and Lynnwood, and is north of Seattle. The city had a population of 19,909 people counted ...

. In 2024, it will be served by an elevated light rail

station Station may refer to: Agriculture * Station (Australian agriculture), a large Australian landholding used for livestock production * Station (New Zealand agriculture), a large New Zealand farm used for grazing by sheep and cattle ** Cattle statio ...

Sound Transit Sound Transit (ST), officially the Central Puget Sound Regional Transit Authority, is a public transit agency serving the Seattle metropolitan area in the U.S. state of Washington. It operates the Link light rail system in Seattle and Tacoma, r ...

Lynnwood Link Extension The Lynnwood Link extension is a planned Link light rail extension traveling north from Northgate to Lynnwood in Snohomish County, Washington, United States. The light rail extension includes stations in Lynnwood, Mountlake Terrace, and Shoreli ...

, part of the

Link light rail Link light rail is a light rail rapid transit system serving the Seattle metropolitan area in the U.S. state of Washington. It is managed by Sound Transit in partnership with local transit providers, and consists of two non-connected lines: t ...

system.

Location

Mountlake Terrace Transit Center is located adjacent to

Interstate 5 Interstate 5 (I-5) is the main north–south Interstate Highway on the West Coast of the United States, running largely parallel to the Pacific coast of the contiguous U.S. from Mexico to Canada. It travels through the states of Califor ...

at 236th Street SW. It is west of Mountlake Terrace's

city center A city centre is the commercial, cultural and often the historical, political, and geographic heart of a city. The term "city centre" is primarily used in British English, and closely equivalent terms exist in other languages, such as "" in Fren ...

History

Community Transit Community Transit (CT) is the public transit authority of Snohomish County, Washington, United States, excluding the city of Everett, in the Seattle metropolitan area. It operates local bus, paratransit and vanpool service within Snohomish Cou ...

opened a 400-stall park and ride lot at Interstate 5 and 236th Street Southwest on April 12, 1983. It was initially served by Community Transit and

King County Metro King County Metro, officially the King County Metro Transit Department and often shortened to Metro, is the public transit authority of King County, Washington, which includes the city of Seattle. It is the eighth-largest transit bus agency in t ...

commuter service, until the latter dropped service to Snohomish County in June 1989. The new lot regularly reached capacity beginning in the 1990s and was supplemented with leased spaces at three nearby churches to provide overflow parking. City officials proposed a garage with integrated housing and retail, but later dropped them from plans. Construction began in late 2007 with the closure of the existing lower lot, which was replaced by spaces leased from local businesses. The parking garage at Mountlake Terrace Transit Center was dedicated on February 20, 2009, and opened three days later. The freeway flyer stop, located in the

median In statistics and probability theory, the median is the value separating the higher half from the lower half of a data sample, a population, or a probability distribution. For a data set, it may be thought of as "the middle" value. The basic fe ...

of Interstate 5, opened on March 20, 2011. It was immediately served by

Sound Transit Express Sound Transit Express (ST Express) is a network of regional express buses, operated by the multi-county transit agency, Sound Transit. The routes connect major regional hubs throughout 53 cities in three counties (King, Pierce, and Snohomish) in ...

and

commuter routes connecting

Snohomish County Snohomish County () is a county located in the U.S. state of Washington. With a population of 827,957 as of the 2020 census, it is the third-most populous county in Washington, after nearby King and Pierce counties, and the 75th-most populous ...

Downtown Seattle Downtown is the central business district of Seattle, Washington. It is fairly compact compared with other city centers on the U.S. West Coast due to its geographical situation, being hemmed in on the north and east by hills, on the west by ...

. The median flyer stop was first proposed in a 1996 report by Sound Transit and WSDOT. The garage was also planned as a precursor to a future light rail station, which was approved as part of

Sound Transit 2 Sound Transit (ST), officially the Central Puget Sound Regional Transit Authority, is a public transit agency serving the Seattle metropolitan area in the U.S. state of Washington. It operates the Link light rail system in Seattle and Tacoma, r ...

in 2008. Light rail construction at the transit center began in September 2019, with the closure of the surface parking lot for construction staging. The light rail platforms will be built to the east of the bus bays and are scheduled to open in 2024 as part of the

, carrying the 1 Line and 2 Line. The freeway station bays were closed for five months beginning in July 2020 for light rail construction, with commuter routes bypassing Mountlake Terrace replaced by a temporary fare-free shuttle route to downtown. The main bus loop at the transit center was closed in March 2021 and replaced with a temporary loop to the east of the future light rail station.

Transit-oriented development

The former site of the Evergreen Elementary School, just south of the station, will be redeveloped into a three-building complex with 600 apartments and retail spaces. The city government is also planning a "

town center A town centre is the commercial or geographical centre or core area of a town. Town centres are traditionally associated with shopping or retail. They are also the centre of communications with major public transport hubs such as train or bus st ...

" in the area east of the light rail station.

Layout and services

Services

References

External links

Lynnwood Link ExtensionMountlake Terrace Freeway Station
{{Sound Transit railway stations, Blue=y, Central=y, state=collapsed Future Link light rail stations Transportation buildings and structures in Snohomish County, Washington Railway stations scheduled to open in 2024 Bus stations in Washington (state) Sound Transit Express