Ride a bus, and you’ll soon notice that transfers are unnecessarily difficult, the seats uncomfortable, the buses themselves seem to amplify every bump in the road, etc. That’s because transit systems are designed and managed by people who don’t usually take the bus, and don’t particularly care about people who do.
“Metro gets you there,” is the local transit agency’s motto, and it’s accurate. Yeah, Metro Transit will get you there, if you’re patient, but it’ll be slow, bumpy, and frustrating.
For example, most bus stops don’t have benches. If you’re waiting for a bus, you stand.
Around Seattle, perhaps 10% of bus stops have benches, but the bench always faces the sidewalk and the street, at a right angle, 90°. Have a seat, and to see if a bus is coming, you must crane your neck to the left, toward oncoming traffic. If you’re waiting for more than a few minutes, and especially if you’re old like me, it soon hurts your neck.
But behold, a miracle: At 61st Place & Strander Boulevard in Tukwila, there’s a bus stop with a bench facing oncoming traffic. If you sit on the bench, you’re looking down Strander Blvd, and you’ll be able to see any bus approaching, without craning your neck.
Of course, that bus stop is normal in every other way — garbage everywhere inside the shelter, an overflowing trash can that’s apparently never to be emptied, and “Caution: wet paint” signs from 2024 on the shelter’s interior walls, etc.
But there’s a bench, by golly, and the bench faces traffic. Pretty sure I’ve never seen that before, but I’ve only been riding buses since the 1960s.
♦ ♦ ♦
The RapidRide #H bus passes through a Burien neighborhood filled with busy Mom & Pop businesses, but it doesn’t stop there, just rolls through. There’s a stop on 150th Street, but after that the bus goes three blocks west and turns onto the main arterial, Ambaum Blvd, then continues north for two long and busy blocks before the next stop, in front of Walgreens at 148th & Ambaum. That’s five bustling business-blocks, with no stops.
This has sometimes annoyed me, because I have occasional destinations in that neighborhood, so I always need to walk a few blocks, and I’m a guy who’d rather walk fewer blocks.
There are a thousand ways the bus system could be and should be better, though, so I’d never complained about it. Riding the bus, you expect such hassles.
Well, a week or so ago I was riding that very route through that very neighborhood, when a passenger spoke up from his manual wheelchair, as we approached Ambaum. “Hey driver, could you please let me off at Ambaum & 150th? That’s where I’m going, and it’s a lot of extra rolling to get back from Walgreens.”
The driver said, “Sorry, we can only stop at bus stops.”
“Aw, man,” said the guy in the wheelchair.
I was in a pissy mood already, and this pissed me worse. I remembered an article I’d read somewhere, saying that Metro drivers are allowed to pick up or drop off passengers anywhere the driver deems safe, not only at marked bus stops. And there was nothing unsafe about stopping at Ambaum & 150th. The pavement is flat, there’s plenty of sidewalk space, etc.
“I’m pretty sure you’re allowed to let passengers off anywhere that’s safe,” I said, loud and perhaps a little cranky.
“Only at bus stops!” the driver said again, much louder, so like a good American I shut the hell up. The guy in the wheelchair said nothing more. At Walgreens, the driver lowered the ramp and let him off, and he started rolling himself two blocks the way we’d just come, down Ambaum Blvd.
When I’d finished my errands, I came home, searched the net, and found the article I’d read three years ago. It’s from Next City, a national news site, but it mentions my own King County Metro, and says Metro has allowed such “request stops” — picking up and dropping off away from bus stops — since 1983.
And although King County Metro and other agencies market its request stop policy – King County Metro doing so on its website and transit schedules – … request stop policies at King County and elsewhere has been limited by inconsistent marketing efforts, inadequate training for drivers and confusion over specific procedures.
Maybe it’s been further limited by people not complaining, so I complained on Metro Transit’s website, and waited for a reply.
They answered four days later, with a rather perfunctory form letter that said “request stops” can only be made if the driver believes the stop would be safe.
What it didn’t say, because it goes without saying, is that transit systems are designed and managed by people who rarely take the bus, and don’t particularly give a damn about people who do.
4/14/2026
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