The long-awaited light rail connection across the I-90 floating bridge is poised to hit one of its last milestones within the next month, a move that will set the stage for Sound Transit to finally announce a grand opening date. After starting pre-revenue service in December, work is proceeding smoothly and the 7.4-mile connection between South Bellevue and International District Chinatown stations is set to enter simulated service within 30 days, Sound Transit CEO Dow Constantine confirmed Thursday.
The imminent start of simulated service, in which operators run trains in the same cadence as they will when they’re carrying passengers, signals that Sound Transit could be on track to open the line significantly earlier than the May 31 deadline that had been widely communicated.
Inaugurating revenue service on the 7.4-mile gap will allow 2 Line trains to run all the way from Redmond to Lynnwood, passing through the cores of Bellevue and Seattle on the way.
Last year, the agency started simulated service on the three-station Federal Way Link Extension in late October, and opened the line on December 6. That matches timelines on other projects of around six weeks of simulated service, such as the Lynnwood and Downtown Redmond Extension projects. While simulated service might be given extra time due to the unique infrastructure present on the I-90 bridge, the calendar is still looking good.
With simulated service on the 2 Line comes a major benefit to riders: the ability to board trains between International District and Lynnwood, a move that will double frequency on the north half of Sound Transit’s flight rail system. This should significantly relieve overcrowding that riders have grown accustomed to, especially before and after major events. Though riders on simulated service 2 Line trains won’t be able to reach Judkins Park or the Eastside, it is a foretaste of the transit feast to come.
“This is service as it will look when we are welcoming paying customers on to the system,” Constantine said. “And so you’ll see four-minute headways at peak travel times throughout that period. And then after we run that simulated service and we’re satisfied that we have everything ready to go, we will be able to announce an opening date for service across the lake, and that will be an exciting moment as well, tripling the length the 2 Line from 10 miles to more than 30 miles.”
On December 18, Constantine and other high-level Sound Transit officials including board vice chair Claudia Balducci were treated to a preview ride across Lake Washington to experience the new segment during pre-revenue service. Also in attendance was Washington State Department of Transportation Secretary Julie Meredith — whose agency oversees the operations of the I-90 bridge itself — and Sound Transit Deputy CEO for Megaproject Delivery Terri Mestas.
“I can report that it is very smooth. It’s a very smooth ride. Everything seems to be going well. We are now in training of operators, moving towards the eventual announcement of an opening date, and everything seems to be going in the right direction. It’s super exciting,” Balducci said.
Opening the 2 Line by April (or even maybe March?) would not only clear the bar that the agency set for itself, but would also provide another way to mitigate the impacts of months of lane closures on I-5, as part of the Revive I-5 construction project. From next week until June 5, Interstate 5 across the Ship Canal Bridge will be reduced by two lanes, likely shunting traffic onto alternate routes and slowing surface bus routes. While work will pause during the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup games in June, it will restart in mid-July and extend through the end of 2026.
“The final piece of the 2 Line will represent the completion of really a generational investment, years of bold action and vision for members of this committee and the full Sound Transit Board, and we are working hard to nail down a specific spring opening date,” Constantine said. “And every day that goes by, we have greater certainty, we reduce risks, we move farther toward being able to announce that date, and I’m increasingly confident that we’re going to be able to do that, perhaps before the May 31 date that we’ve previously announced.”
The opening of the 2 Line has been delayed repeatedly. In the planning phase, Sound Transit faced local siting battles in Mercer Island and Bellevue, setting the project back. In the construction phase, the agency ran into issues with defects and quality control on the I-90 segment tracks, where operating on a floating bridge added an extra engineering challenge. Ultimately, the contractor was forced to rebuild the tracks in the segment, pushing the opening back from 2023 to 2026.
Sound Transit opened the rest of East Link as a “starter line” minus the cross-lake crossing in 2024, and extended the truncated 2 Line to Downtown Redmond in 2025. That terminus in Downtown Redmond, built into the city’s urban fabric like few other stations on the Eastside, has become its most popular.
After opening the entire 2 Line, Sound Transit ribbon cuttings will become much more infrequent. Later this year, 1 Line trains will begin stopping at the Pinehurst infill station, just north of N 130th Street in Seattle. And Sound Transit will cut the ribbon with the City of Shoreline on a new pedestrian bridge across I-5 at Shoreline South/148th Street station that will greatly increase multimodal access in the area.
Beyond that, Sound Transit won’t open another major project until 2028, when the agency cuts the ribbon on two new Stride bus rapid transit (BRT) lines: the S1 between Bellevue and Burien, and the S3 between Shoreline and Bothell. The S2 line, between Lynnwood and Bellevue, is set to open in 2029. Sound Transit won’t cut the ribbon on a new rail project until the Graham Street and Boeing Access Road infill stations in 2031, West Seattle Link in 2032, and Tacoma Dome Link Extension in 2035 — if those projects are able to stay on track as the agency recalibrates its financial plan.
With the start of simulated 2 Line service, the finish line is coming clearly into view on what will be one of the most anticipated transit openings in Puget Sound history — an opening that is long overdue.
Ryan Packer has been writing for The Urbanist since 2015, and currently reports full-time as Contributing Editor. Their beats are transportation, land use, public space, traffic safety, and obscure community meetings. Packer has also reported for other regional outlets including BikePortland, Seattle Met, and PubliCola. They live in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle.