The star marks the approximate spot along 10th Ave E where North Broadway Capitol Hill light rail station was envisioned.

The light rail line envisioned in 1999 was planned to head directly north from Capitol Hill Station. A North Broadway station was eliminated from further study by two votes on the Sound Transit board.

By Ryan Packer

In less than five weeks, Sound Transit will open three new light rail stations in North Seattle. Northgate, Roosevelt and U District stations will bring those neighborhoods exponentially closer to Capitol Hill for transit riders, with travel times of around eleven minutes between Capitol Hill Station and Northgate Station. But the opening of these new stations offers an opportunity to look at Sound Transit’s original plan for light rail to the University District— and the plan for a second station in Capitol Hill that never came to pass.

In 1999 the Sound Transit board selected a route for the initial segment that went all the way to the heart of the University District. Rather than veer off toward Montlake, the planned tunnel was envisioned as running directly north from Broadway and John, after a circuitous detour to First Hill that would later prove too ambitious. The route made a stop at NE Pacific Street on the other side of the ship canal before the main U District Station at N 45th Street, on the east side of 15th Ave NE where the Burke Museum of Natural History stands now. Continuing on to Roosevelt and Northgate was only added as a contingency if Federal funds became available.

Even that route would prove too ambitious, with any route under Capitol Hill proving too costly to be included in the original line, a fact that foreshadows the current realignment discussion currently surrounding planned extensions of the light rail network to West Seattle and Ballard.

But in the lead up to approving that route, the board considered but ultimately voted down an amendment that would have added another Capitol Hill station on Broadway, at Roy Street. But for two votes, Broadway might have gotten two light rail stations. Maybe.

The 1998 Capitol Hill neighborhood plan, which included plans for neighborhood-wide improvements like what would become Cal Anderson Park, had ambitious plans for the area around the North Broadway Capitol Hill light rail station. Plans for the “North Anchor District” around Roy Street focused heavily on the redevelopment of the “Keystone Site”, the vacant former gas station that would eventually become 700 Broadway E, home to Kinko’s and Rapport. It’s safe to say that what ended up happening on this parcel fell short of plans, even if you put the subject of the building’s architecture to the side.

In addition to accommodating an entrance to the Capitol Hill light rail station, the neighborhood plan envisioned the Keystone site as being home to the next iteration of Capitol Hill’s public library, then called the Henry Library. “The relocation will enable the Henry Library to expand its facilities, programs, and hours. If the Henry Library does relocate, the existing Henry Library site may become available for affordable housing, a community center, or educational uses,” the plan read. Instead the library was rebuilt on the site where it stood in 2003.

If that wasn’t enough, the plan also called for creating some sort of public open space on the Broadway & Roy Street side of the building facing the treasured Loveless Building, perhaps in place of the current slip lane between the two streets. A counterpart to the Barbara Bailey Way plaza, perhaps. Another piece of the neighborhood plan that went nowhere.

Some public open space was envisioned around the corner from the Roy Street and 10th Ave E light rail station entrance.

Was the North Broadway stop a huge missed opportunity? The minutes from that 1999 Sound Transit board meeting note Seattle electeds like City Councilmember Richard McIver and future Mayor Greg Nickels were worried taking a north Capitol Hill station off the table would be squandering an opportunity. “Mr. Mel ver expressed that to ignore this would be a mistake which could not be corrected later,” the meeting minutes note. “Mr. Nickels stated that the Board has to have the flexibility to build a system that is expandable and this may include shelling in stations in North Capitol Hill.” Shelling the station would have allowed Sound Transit to come back and build the station itself later. “[Nickels] said this may be appropriate to allow the billion-dollar investment in a tunnel to be used to its full extent in the future.” The votes against studying the Roy Street station all came from electeds who represented areas outside Seattle.

Now a future tunnel station deep under Volunteer Park seems fun to think about but almost certainly politically (if not technically) impossible. Capitol Hill’s future transit improvements will most likely come in the form of buses, or maybe a streetcar. But the path not taken for Broadway and Roy to become a twin transit hub to Broadway and John is useful in thinking about how that part of the neighborhood has evolved. No one in 1999 could have envisioned the Harvard Exit turning into a Mexican consulate, though that may have boosted ridership projections. The 1998 neighborhood plan shows just how fruitless it can be to shape a neighborhood from a piece of paper.

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