Seattle’s Metro Transit is changing a number of routes in South Seattle. They’re proposing to close the #39.

Here’s my letter to Metro:

To: metro-feedback-se@kingcounty.gov

Subject: Please keep the #39 open

I live two blocks from the busstop at 15th and S. Nevada, served by routes #39, #60, and #36. Metro is proposing to close the one really useful route, the #39 which takes me to work in Pioneer Square. The #60 gets me to 12th and S. Jackson, nearly a mile from work. The #36 only runs down 15th in the evenings; otherwise it runs through Jefferson Park, half a mile away.

The new #50 route will be a poor re­place­ment, getting me only as far as the busway at Lander Street, about halfway to Pioneer Square. Transfers are inevitably tedious and it’s all too easy to miss your connection, especially coming home in the evening.

The Beacon Hill Light Rail station is a mile away from me. It’s unlikely that I will use it much, even though I work next to the Pioneer Square station.

Closing the #39 leaves me and my wife with poor transit options. But’s it’s not just me.

There are a lot of people on Beacon Hill who ride the #39, many of them low-income or immigrants. Every stop north of me on 15th and Columbian has plenty of riders. The VA Hospital is just to the south of me and the #39 stops at the front door. I see veterans on the #39 every morning; I don’t know how the more disabled ones will manage.

I urge you to keep the #39 running. If you don’t, please route the #36 along Columbian Way all the time, so that there’s a direct bus between downtown and Beacon Hill.

We’ll be attending the open house: