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FAQs for Transit Consolidation

Aug 16
9 min read

Updated: Aug 24

Over the last 133 years, transit service has changed several times, from horse-drawn carriages to electric streetcars operated by multiple companies, to a privately run bus company, to Everett Transit. 


The City of Everett and Community Transit are now pursuing consolidation of their transit operations to create a unified, expanded countywide transit system. This would be one more major event in Everett's transit history.


The following FAQs are based on materials shared by the City of Everett and Community Transit. Any information on this FAQ page should be considered unofficial.

How good could the service be?

According to the 2021 Rethink Transit Study, consolidation results in an increase in the number of bus stops in Everett with at least 15-minute frequency at mid-day in 2036 from 219 with the current sales tax revenue to 590 with consolidation.


As transit policy expert Jarrett Walker says, “Frequency is Freedom.” Walker explains, “High frequency means transit is coming soon, which means that it approximates the feeling of liberty you have with your private vehicle – that you can go anytime.”


The number one reason someone chooses one mode over another is how fast it takes to get from A to B. For transit, the biggest time issue is wait time. Many of Everett’s routes are currently on 40-minute headways. That means, if someone were to randomly walk out their front door and go to the bus stop, on average, they’d wait there for 20 minutes.


Study after study shows that when headways reach 15 minutes, ridership booms. It’s no surprise that Everett’s top two lines for ridership, the 7 and Swift Blue, run at 10- to 15-minute headways.


When more routes are running at 10-to-15 minute headways, transit agencies can also straighten out circuitous routes, and utilize a grid of transit routes. End-to-end the routes are shorter and faster, and people can easily transfer to get to where they want to go.


A grid of frequent service is what metropolitan cities like Everett need. It makes it possible for people to leave their cars at home — and thus enables our city’s developers to build more housing, office space, and commercial retail rather than spending lots of space and money on parking garages. For Everett’s growth plans, we need transit that is fast, frequent, and abundant.


For more information about how transit frequency and route design affect ridership, read this blog post by Jarrett Walker, author of Human Transit, Basics: The Transit Ridership Recipe.


Improved local transit services will help Everett fully realize its potential as a metropolitan city.  Everett is projected to grow to 179,000 residents and 167,000 jobs by 2044. 


With abundant, frequent, and fast transit, more of these new people will be able to take transit rather than drive a car. The natural space efficiency of transit means the city will be able to accommodate more people traveling on the public right-of-way.


In addition, developers will be able to focus more on building housing and commercial space rather than building parking for cars. This means more units and square-footage for what we need, built more cost-effectively and space-efficiently.


Finally, when light rail arrives to Everett, the city will need excellent local transit service to connect people to the train.  Better local transit service will allow people to leave their car at home and ride the bus to rail.  This will reduce the need to build expensive parking garages near transit, and we can instead prioritize the land near light rail for housing and jobs—further increasing ridership.


More transit means more housing, more jobs, more mobility, greater affordability, and ultimately more reductions in greenhouse gas emissions impacting climate change.

A jump from a 0.6% sales tax to a 1.2% sales tax feels big, as does giving up the city control of the transit service. So, some have asked why not keep Everett Transit as-is and instead increase the sales tax to its maximum allowed of 0.9%.


The simple answer is that there's a big difference in outcomes between increasing the sales tax to 0.9% and consolidation, according to the 2021 Rethink Transit Study. It's an exponential difference.


With the increase in the sales tax from 0.6% to 0.9%, 111 more bus stops get 15-minute frequencies at midday. But from the 0.9% tax to consolidation, an additional 260 bus stops get 15-minute frequencies — for a total increase of 371. This is not a straight line improvement.



Job access is also exponential. Increasing the sales tax from 0.6% to 0.9% brings 4,800 jobs within a 30-minute ride; but increasing the sales tax from 0.9% to full consolidation adds another 17,700 jobs within a 30-minute ride.



These numbers show that a half-step increase in the sales tax brings only marginal improvement to the transit system, but the full consolidation brings tremendous improvement.

While Rethink Transit and the More Transit Together studies promise big improvements, Community Transit still needs to undergo its planning exercises prior to implementing service.


With the new funding, the agency could purchase new buses, build a new operations and maintenance facility, upgrade the bus stops, expand its Zip Shuttle service, build its capital funds reserve, or compensate the City of Everett for the acquisition of Everett Transit. There's validity in all these actions, but come at a cost of investing more in service hours and frequency.


The City of Everett's and Community Transit's outline for a future interlocal agreement commits to:

  • adding Zip Shuttle service by March 2028,

  • increasing fixed route service hours between 2028 and 2030, and

  • opening the Swift Gold Line to from Everett Station to Smokey Point in 2031.

Altogether, Community Transit says it'll increase total service hours by 50% in Everett between 2028 and 2031.


To get there, Community Transit expects to have two phases:

Today, Everett Transit provides door-to-door service for eligible disabled residents across the entire city regardless of where they live, as well as people age 65+. 

 

Community Transit, on the other hand, provides the minimum level of ADA paratransit service that is required by federal law—which is providing door-to-door service to eligible people to and from locations within three-quarters of a mile of all-day fixed route service, and no service based on age alone (49 CFR 37.131(a)(1)).


For its part, Community Transit has committed to continue providing its DART service to any Everett resident who already has successfully gone through the eligibility screening.  Eligibility for new paratransit applicants, including those in the City of Everett, will be subject to Community Transit’s standards. This means that people age 65+ will not automatically be eligible.


In addition, trips outside of the DART service area would not be eligible, so some folks have wondered whether Community Transit's use of the federal 0.75-mile standard would result in geographic gaps of paratransit service in the City of Everett.


There likely are limited areas of the City of Everett where this could be an issue, such as the Boulevard Bluffs neighborhood and the far eastern portion of the Silver Lake neighborhood.


The good news is that most of these gaps either must be served by Community Transit or the agency can choose to serve, provided the agency applies a consistent standard in determining eligibility. Under 49 CFR 37.131(a)(ii), public transit agencies must fill in small areas that are not within 0.75-miles of the fixed routes but are otherwise within the "core service area" of the transit agency. In addition, transit agencies may provide ADA paratransit services up to 1.5 miles from any fixed route (.131(a)(iii)).


Between the federal requirement to fill small areas and the allowance to provide services up to 1.5 miles from fixed routes, Community Transit can continue to provide service to the entirety of Everett, consistent with the approach Community Transit has taken in other areas of its district.

Consolidation may bring other solutions for people with disabilities and older age.


Community Transit's Zip Shuttle is a microtransit service in Lynnwood, Lake Stevens, Arlington, and Darrington, and the agency is committing to adding Zip service to Everett by March 2028.


Zip Shuttle could be even better than current paratransit service.

  • Whereas a paratransit rider must schedule a trip at least 24 hours in advance, the average wait time for a Zip rider from a request to pick-up is 15 minutes. 

  • The vehicles are smaller vans and sedans that are easier to get in & out of. The vans are outfitted with a wheelchair lift. 

  • For riders who have a Regional Reduced Fare Permit or an ORCA LIFT card, the Zip trips would be less expensive than Everett Transit's $2 paratransit trips and Community Transit's $2.50 DART trips.


Another solution could be the Transportation Assistance Program (TAP). TAP, operated by Homage Senior Services, already provides door-to-door service outside of the two agencies' service areas to people with disabilities. In addition, TAP serves any low-income adults age 60+. Given this, TAP could serve residents who are no longer served by Community Transit's DART. However, TAP has limited financial resources and is designed to serve mostly the rural areas, not urban areas. It would likely need additional funding support to adequately support Everett riders.

As the operator of its own transit service, the City of Everett has complete control to hold its agency accountable. If Everett Transit consolidates with Community Transit, this control goes away.


The two clearest paths for accountability moving forward will be through holding a seat on the 9-member (potentially 11-member) Community Transit Board of Directors, and regular plans and reports, such as the annually updated 6-year transit development plan.


Although not legally required, Community Transit does often present updates to city councils, and it's expected that Community Transit staff would do the same for the Everett City Council.


In Everett, Everett Transit provides monthly updates to the Transportation Advisory Committee, a citizen advisory group appointed by the mayor and council. With consolidation, Community Transit could potentially participate in these monthly meetings.

If the City of Everett is added to the Community Transit geography, the city would represent 14 percent of the overall population within the agency’s boundaries. With an agency board size of nine members, Everett’s population size should entitle the city to one board member (1/9th = 11%).


Either the mayor or a city councilmember would take this position. The Community Transit Board includes alternates, so it's possible that the city could also have an alternate position to its official board position.


The Community Transit Board will make the decision on how to restructure itself in order to assure proportional representation among its membership. It must take this action within 90 days of the official consolidation date of the agencies.

  1. Geographic Proportionality


Today, the agency board is split between Large, Medium, and Small city representatives and two county representatives. Although this structure achieves proportionate representation, it's potentially not proportionate to the county's geographies nor representative of the opportunities & challenges of those geographies.


For example, Mountlake Terrace and Mukilteo, which are both classified as Medium cities, have more in common with their neighbors Lynnwood and Edmonds (Large cities), than they do with Arlington (a fellow Medium city). And Marysville (a Large city), has more in common with Arlington than Lynnwood and Edmonds.


The current approach creates a risk that 100% of the board members could be from outside of Southeast County or 100% could be within Southeast County — neither of which meets basic principles of democratic representation.


Instead of grouping cities by their size, the cities should be grouped by their proximity to each other. If there are nine districts, each district should have approximately 85,000 people.


City and county councilmembers could still be the designated individuals to serve on the board (as required by state law), and appointments could be made nearly the same way as done today.


  1. Transit Rider Representation


Often transit boards are composed of individuals who rarely take the bus. This means that some boards fail to center the needs of the people who actually ride the bus.


That’s why the state legislature, passed HB 1418 in 2025 allowing PTBA Boards to expand to eleven voting members with two appointees who represent transit riders.


The legislation was approved on a bipartisan basis, including all Democratic legislators from Snohomish County, as well as Senators Goehner, Muzzall, and Wagoner, and Representatives Eslick and Low.


Under HB 1418, public transportation benefit area agencies such as Community Transit can expand their boards to eleven positions by adding one representative who is transit-reliant and one representative from an organization that serves transit-reliant communities.


These positions would be appointed by the other board members, so there is little risk for disruptive wild-card individuals joining the board.


Adding these community member positions would help ensure that the governing body includes people who are deeply committed to transit as a service and not just serving on the board due to a general personal interest in civic involvement.

Letter to Mayor Cassie Franklin, which includes 11 recommendations (July 15, 2026)

Op-Ed published by the Everett Herald (Aug. 4, 2026)


 
 
 

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