Back to square one: Sound Transit reconsiders 5th Ave station in CID despite community opposition

By Carolyn Bick
NORTHWEST ASIAN WEEKLY

Graphic: Han Bui

By Carolyn Bick
NORTHWEST ASIAN WEEKLY

Despite taking it off the table in 2022, following an outpouring of united community opposition to creating a new Sound Transit station on 5th Avenue in the Chinatown-International District (CID), the board of Sound Transit has announced that it is once again considering the option.

The construction of a new Sound Transit station in the CID is an ongoing, years-long saga, which the Northwest Asian Weekly extensively covered in this September article.

At a meeting on Nov. 14, Sound Transit presented its own study that bolstered its case against building a station on 4th Avenue. The Sound Transit-conducted study supports exploring other options, including the supposedly laid-to-rest 5th Avenue option, and continued study of a “North and South of CID” option. Sound Transit’s board had already been leaning in favor of the latter, which has supporters and detractors in the CID community.

At its Nov. 21 board meeting, several commenters spoke against the board’s decision to consider a 5th Avenue station, saying that the construction of this station would be disruptive and force several businesses to close. This would increase displacement from the area, further harming the CID, they said. 

Kyle Jacobson is both a resident of Little Saigon and sits on the board of Seattle’s International Special Review District (ISRD). The ISRD is one of Seattle’s eight historic districts, and encompasses “a collection of early 20th-century commercial and hotel buildings that serves as the center of Seattle’s diverse Asian American community.” Jacobson wrote to the Sound Transit Board prior to the meeting, opposing a 5th Avenue option and in support of a 4th Avenue option.

“The 5th Ave diagonal plan as currently proposed will be far too destructive and disruptive. But Dearborn station is too far from other modes, the current CID station, and existing housing and businesses,” Jacobson wrote. “It represents a compromise to connectivity that the region’s transit backbone will be stuck with for decades.”

“Meanwhile,” Jacobson’s written comment continued, “we are told that the 4th Ave shallow station would be too costly, too time consuming, and too challenging to build. Maybe so, but I am reminded that Rome has managed to build subway infrastructure at and under the Colosseum.”

Betty Lau, who co-founded Transit Equity for All (TEA), a group that supports a 4th Avenue option, spoke as a representative of Seniors in Action Foundation. She listed a number of reasons why a 5th Avenue option would hurt community elders, particularly the more than 1,200 living in the 13 low-income buildings across Chinatown and Japantown.

In addition to increased dangers they would have to face, around construction (things like haul trucks, ditches, and wooden planks over torn-up sidewalks and roads), Lau also cited longterm street closures that could block emergency vehicles from responding to elders in crisis, and the lack of overall planning around supporting elders with various health problems, including dementia and Alzheimer’s, and vision and hearing loss.

The board also heard from other public commenters opposing 5th Avenue, including Connie So, president of the OCA Asian Pacific Advocates of Greater Seattle; Brien Chow of the Chong Wa Benevolent Association of Washington State (and co-founder of TEA); Historic South Downtown Executive Director Kathleen Barry Johnson; Amy Chen Lozano, also of OCA Asian Pacific Advocates of Greater Seattle; and Paul Wu, one of the architects who designed the entrance to Chinatown, and who serves as vice president of the Historic Chinatown Gate Foundation.

Stephen Fesler, of The Urbanist, wrote in support of 5th Avenue, but the Northwest Asian Weekly did not have immediate access to his comments.

The board did not discuss the project.