The in basket: Linda Verbon, visiting her Bremerton family from Las Vegas, worries that if the grimmest predictions about backups on I-5 from the freeway work in downtown Seattle the next 2 1/2 weeks come true, that she might have trouble getting to Sea-Tac Airport next week. She asks how a person can make sure to make their flight during the road work.
The in basket: Linda Verbon, visiting her Bremerton family from Las
Vegas, worries that if the grimmest predictions about backups on
I-5 from the freeway work in downtown Seattle the next 2 1/2 weeks
come true, that she might have trouble getting to Sea-Tac Airport
to fly home next week. She asks how a person can make sure to make
their flight during the road work.
The out basket: Leave for the airport earlier than usual is the
predictable advice both from the airport and Kitsap Airporter,
which says it won’t make any adjustments in its schedules unless
the work proves to be an actual problem for it.
If the backups from the road work don’t extend to Tacoma, as some
pessimists have suggested might happen, there might be no problems
at all for the Airporter or anyone else driving to the airport.
One major source of delay on those trips was eliminated with the
opening of the new Tacoma Narrows Bridge.
For those who don’t want to take a chance going north to the
airport, there are several options for going south from downtown
Seattle or Fauntleroy, where the state ferries land.
They are all rounded up on an online Web site provide by the
airport, which is
www.portseattle.org/seatac/ground/groundrates.shtml.
The options include taxis, limousines, Metro public transit, Gray
Line Airport Express, Seattle Airline Airporter and Shuttle
Express, which have rates ranging from $1.25 for an off-peak-hour
ride to the airport on Metro to up to maybe $50 for a taxi or limo
ride, the price of which depends on how long the trip takes.
Metro bus service is available on Second Avenue, two blocks uphill
from the downtown ferry terminal
The City of Seattle suspended its $28 flat rate for taxi rides from
downtown to the airport during the highway project. Denise Movius
of the city says taxi fares during the work could range from $35 to
$50 if the highway repair creates congestion going south.
Taxi-sharing can let you split whatever the fare is with other
passengers, which would require some effort to find others going to
the airport at the ferry terminals.
Seattle-Tacoma International Taxi Association taxis, which have an
exclusive deal to take riders FROM the airport, will have people at
the taxi lines at Sea-Tac calling out destinations to facilitate
ride sharing. That’s information a Kitsaper may want if they have
someone flying into Seattle and don’t want to chance a drive to the
airport to pick them up..
Sheila Stickel of STITA says the normal $32-$35 one-way fare from
the airport to downtown could go up to $45 or $50 if congestion
prolongs the ride. It too can be divided among all the
passengers.
Fares from downtown to the airport on the various shuttles range
from $12.75 to $26.
