Bellevue College will spend up to $200,000 in design improvements to keep King County Metro’s Route 271 running through its campus.
Route 271 is among a number of bus routes Metro will revise to cut transit hours due to a long-standing revenue shortfall, but Bellevue College is now taking steps to stay on its path through the city.
“Metro proposed some infrastructure changes, mainly, and what we did was we took those proposed infrastructure changes and took them to our capital projects team,” said Patrick Green, sustainability coordinator at Bellevue College.
The college community was joined by the city in opposing the reroute earlier this year, which would have skirted the campus with a stop on 148th Avenue Southeast. Students told Metro high traffic, distance and poor pedestrian access made it an unsafe alternative.
Green said Route 271 is still planned to stop traveling to Issaquah, but credits King County Councilmember Jane Hague for getting Metro to the bargaining table with the college on how to keep it running down Kelsey Creek Road.
“She and her team were pretty important on representing the issue to council and to Metro, and were pretty critical to bringing people together to handle this issue,” he said.
Metro proposed traffic calming and pedestrian channeling improvements along the road, which is heavily used by motorists, Green said. The college has agreed to spend up to $200,000 for design improvements and is now reviewing project quotes and design alternatives. Those designs will be shared with Metro as the collaboration continues, Green said.
“The college kind of had to find it to make it happen,” he said of the funding.
Those improvements will include separating bus and motorist traffic on Kelsey Creek Road and speed humps – extended speed bumps – as well as beautifying the road to direct students and staff to designated crosswalks. Green said there has been an issue of people parking in a bus stall along the road, waiting to pick up someone from campus. Cars also continue to turn left from the parking garage, which has been causing issues for northbound busses, Green said.
“We have agreed to implement the changes before the end of this academic year,” he said.
