This marks the beginning of a project to recreate Sound Transit’s “Central Link” light rail line in the form of an OpenBVE route. Seattle’s first light rail line between downtown and the airport opened on July 18, 2009 with an extension to the University of Washington currently under construction and slated to open in 2016. In November 2008, voters approved a mass transit expansion plan which included 36 miles (58 km) of new light rail to be brought into service over a period of 15 years.

The Route

See the route map from Sound Transit.

The 18.7 mile (30.1 km) long Link light rail line begins underground in the University District and travels south towards Capitol Hill and on to downtown Seattle where it uses the existing Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel jointly with buses. Leaving the tunnel the line enters south of downtown (SODO), the line runs at-grade by Seattle’s two major sports stadiums and through the industrial district. Then it turns east on to an elevated viaduct, passing the Operations and Maintenance Facility, leading into a tunnel under Beacon Hill and out the other side in a short elevated segment in the Mount Baker neighborhood. Then it transitions to an at-grade segment in the median of Martin Luther King Jr Way South (MLK) through the Rainier Valley in south Seattle. It returns to an elevated guideway right before MLK Way meets Interstate 5 (I-5) and turns west onto Boeing Access Road across I-5, then turns south along E Marginal Way, entering the city of Tukwila via Interurban Ave S, then it runs on the west side of I-5 in a retained fill at-grade section until it approaches State Route 518 (SR 518). From there it becomes an elevated structure that turns and follows SR 518 and then to the median of the Airport Expressway at-grade and ends at an elevated station located just next to the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport parking garage.

Building the route in BVE

The route will be built in short segments beginning with the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel segment followed by the SODO segment, Beacon Hill tunnel, Rainier Valley, Tukwila, Airport, and finally the Capitol Hill-University segment.

At first, only the skeleton will be built with only the track alignments and no scenery or objects. I’m going to use placeholder graphics from other routes until I can take photos of real objects and track and recreate them for BVE.

Materials needed

• Trackwork, station platforms, guideway structure plans for Link Light Rail
  • University Link
  • Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel
  • E-3 Busway to O&M
  • O&M to Beacon Hill Tunnel
  • Beacon Hill Tunnel
  • Mount Baker station
  • Martin Luther King Jr Way (Mount Baker to Rainier Beach)
  • Boeing Access Road to Tukwila Intl Blvd
  • Airport Link
• Photos and dimensions for textures and objects representing:
  • stations
    • platform objects
  • tunnel walls
  • OCS
  • signals
  • different types of track and ballast
• Signal plan
• Operations info (schedules, procedures, etc.)
• Sounds
  • Announcements
  • Ambient
  • Train sound effects (for LRV)

The trains

To recreate the Kinkisharyo-Mitsui designed and built LRVs at least functionally and not visually. I need several technical information such as:

• acceleration characteristics
• brake performance
• jerk value
• brake type and pressure
• car mass and dimensions

Timeline

I have no set deadline for finishing this route as I’m doing this on my very free time. I am learning as I go. If you are interested in helping out please contact me. Hopefully I can complete Link from Northgate to SeaTac/Airport before Sound Transit does! ;)