Sound Transit CEO: Seattle-to-Eastside light rail line 'makes this place a better place to live'
Sound Transit CEO Dow Constantine calls it “the most complex project” the agency has ever done.
On March 28, Sound Transit will open a 7.4-mile segment along Interstate 90, connecting riders from Seattle’s Chinatown International District station to South Bellevue. It is the world’s first light rail on a floating bridge and a connection 60 years in the making.
The cross-lake service, which includes new stations at Mercer Island and Judkins Park, was initially scheduled to open in 2020 but encountered construction delays for much of the past six years. It's the final piece of the transit expansion project approved by voters in 2008 under the Sound Transit 2 ballot measure.
Constantine traces the project’s origins even further back to 1966, when lawyer and civic activist Jim Ellis led a group proposing a mass transit system. Local leaders proposed a rail system with a line running across the lake between Seattle and Bellevue as part of a sweeping package of infrastructure reforms for the Puget Sound region.
https://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/news/2026/03/12/sound-transit-dow-constantine-light-rail-bridge.html