SODO station is a light rail station located in

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...

. It is situated between the Beacon Hill and

Stadium A stadium ( : stadiums or stadia) is a place or venue for (mostly) outdoor sports, concerts, or other events and consists of a field or stage either partly or completely surrounded by a tiered structure designed to allow spectators to stand o ...

stations on the 1 Line, which runs from

Seattle–Tacoma International Airport Seattle–Tacoma International Airport , branded as SEA Airport and also referred to as Sea–Tac (), is the primary commercial airport serving the Seattle metropolitan area in the U.S. state of Washington. It is in the city of SeaTac, which ...

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 ...

and the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW, simply Washington, or informally U-Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1861, Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast; it was established in Seattle a ...

as 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. The station consists of two at-grade

side platform A side platform (also known as a marginal platform or a single-face platform) is a platform positioned to the side of one or more railway tracks or guideways at a railway station, tram stop, or transitway. A station having dual side platforms ...

s at the intersection of the

SODO Busway The SODO Busway, also referred to as the E-3 Busway, is a busway in the SoDo neighborhood of Seattle, Washington. It has four stops, including two that connect to Link light rail stations, and functions as an extension of the Downtown Seattl ...

and South Lander Street in the SoDo neighborhood of Seattle. SODO station was first proposed in the late 1980s but was ignored in subsequent light rail proposals until the addition of the Beacon Hill Tunnel to the Central Link route in 1998 (now part of the 1 Line). It was built between 2005 and 2006 by Kiewit Pacific and opened to Link service on July 18, 2009. Trains serve the station twenty hours a day on most days; the

headway Headway is the distance or duration between vehicles in a transit system measured in space or time. The ''minimum headway'' is the shortest such distance or time achievable by a system without a reduction in the speed of vehicles. The precise defi ...

between trains is six minutes during peak periods, with less frequent service at other times. SODO station is also served by several

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

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 ...

buses that stop on the SODO Busway adjacent to the platforms.

Location

SODO station is situated along the

in the SoDo neighborhood of

. The entrances to its two

s is located at the intersection of the SODO Busway and South Lander Street, adjacent to a

United States Postal Service The United States Postal Service (USPS), also known as the Post Office, U.S. Mail, or Postal Service, is an independent agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government responsible for providing postal service in the U ...

parking garage A multistorey car park (British and Singapore English) or parking garage (American English), also called a multistory, parking building, parking structure, parkade (mainly Canadian), parking ramp, parking deck or indoor parking, is a build ...

. The area surrounding the station consists of a mixture of

industrial Industrial may refer to: Industry * Industrial archaeology, the study of the history of the industry * Industrial engineering, engineering dealing with the optimization of complex industrial processes or systems * Industrial city, a city dominate ...

and low-density commercial areas without residences, employing over 12,000 workers. Major employers in the area include

Starbucks Starbucks Corporation is an American multinational chain of coffeehouses and roastery reserves headquartered in Seattle, Washington. It is the world's largest coffeehouse chain. As of November 2021, the company had 33,833 stores in 80 c ...

, who has their headquarters at the

Starbucks Center The Starbucks Center (formerly the SODO Center) is the world headquarters of the List of coffeehouse chains, coffeehouse chain Starbucks. It is located in the SoDo, Seattle, SoDo neighborhood of Seattle, Washington; the area is part of the cit ...

five blocks west of the station, and

Seattle Public Schools Seattle Public Schools is the largest Public school (government funded), public school district in the state of Washington (state), Washington. The school district serves almost all of Seattle. Additionally it includes sections of Boulevard Park, ...

at the John Stanford Center. The light rail line is paralleled to the east by a

mixed-use Mixed-use is a kind of urban development, urban design, urban planning and/or a zoning type that blends multiple uses, such as residential, commercial, cultural, institutional, or entertainment, into one space, where those functions are to some ...

bicycle trail A trail, also known as a path or track, is an unpaved lane or small road usually passing through a natural area. In the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland, a path or footpath is the preferred term for a pedestrian or hiking trail. T ...

called the SODO Trail, which connects SODO station to Stadium station at South Royal Brougham Way. The

Seattle Department of Transportation The Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) is a municipal government agency in Seattle, Washington that is responsible for the maintenance of the city's transportation systems, including roads, bridges, and public transportation. The agency ...

plans to extend the trail to Spokane Street, connecting it to a bike trail on the

Spokane Street Viaduct The Spokane Street Viaduct is a freeway connecting the West Seattle Bridge to Interstate 5. It runs above South Spokane Street in the SoDo neighborhood of Seattle and is generally four to six lanes wide. The viaduct was one of Seattle's first fre ...

, serving

West Seattle West Seattle is a conglomeration of neighborhoods in Seattle, Washington, United States. It comprises two of the thirteen districts, Delridge and Southwest, and encompasses all of Seattle west of the Duwamish River. It was incorporated as an i ...

; a connector trail on Forest Street to a segregated cycletrack on Airport Way is also being considered.

History

The earliest proposal for a light rail station at South Lander Street in SODO came from the

Puget Sound Council of Governments The Puget Sound Regional Council (PSRC) is a metropolitan planning organization that develops policies and makes decisions about transportation planning, economic development, and growth management throughout the four-county Seattle metropolitan a ...

in 1986, as part of a north–south line from

Lynnwood Lynnwood is a city in Snohomish County, Washington, United States. The city is part of the Seattle metropolitan area and is located north of Seattle and south of Everett, near the junction of Interstate 5 and Interstate 405. It is the four ...

Federal Way Federal Way is a city in King County, Washington, United States. One of the most recently incorporated cities in the county, its population was 101,030 at the 2020 census. Federal Way is the tenth-largest city in Washington and the fifth-larges ...

, following the

Duwamish River