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Image of a person placing a bicycle on the bike rack of a King County Metro RapidRide bus

Convenient. Frequent. Efficient. Simple. Direct. Regionally Connected. These are the goals for transit in Bellevue as established by the

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Bellevue Transit Master Plan (70 MB file) adopted by the City Council in 2014. Each of these goals reflects some aspect of the Transit Master Plan’s “Abundant Access” vision statement, which aims to “support planned growth and development with a bold transit vision that provides efficient, useful, attractive service for most people, to most destinations, most of the time, serving maximum ridership.”

About the plan

The Transit Master Plan summarizes all aspects of the two-year planning process, It's divided into four sections, plus appendices:

  • Background: Summarizes community outreach efforts and analyses of existing fixed-route bus network performance, market conditions, and projected travel demand.
  • Policy Element: Serves as the guiding framework for the planning process and identifies the strategies that should be pursued to realize the service and capital visions.
  • Service Element: Presents route-level recommendations that are responsive to different financial scenarios (reduced, stable, and growing resources) and to different time horizons (2015, 2022, and 2030).
  • Capital Element: Details how the City can positively affect transit within Bellevue in order to maintain transit-supportive land use policies, improve pedestrian and bicycle facilities, bus stops, and park-and-rides, and implement transit speed and reliability infrastructure.

Background

The role of transit in Bellevue is evolving, and the Transit Master Plan (70 MB file), is part of that process. It's an update of the city’s 2003 Transit Plan, and builds on the success of that plan by considering how to address Bellevue’s transit needs through 2030.

Although the city does not operate its own transit service, the Transit Master Plan provides the city with a means to influence decisions made by regional transit authorities. It also provides a basis on which to begin advancing proposed capital projects for further study, design and prioritization, and position them to compete for grant funding.

The plan establishes scalable short- and long-term strategies, and identifies projects that will foster a high-quality transit system to meet Bellevue’s needs through 2030.

More information

  • Transit Partnerships page has information about collaborative efforts to develop, implement, and evaluate public transit services since adoption of the Transit Master Plan.
  • Document Library page has information related to all subjects addressed in the Transit Master Plan.
  • Public Involvement page. Presentations, minutes and other materials associated with public hearings about the Transit Master Plan from 2012 to 2014.