Sound Transit weighs possible savings on Everett Link extension

EVERETT — Sound Transit could make early design changes along the Everett Link light rail extension to help save money as the regional transit agency faces rising construction costs.

The potential cost savings come at a tumultuous time for Sound Transit as the agency attempts to navigate a 20 to 25 percent increase in the planned costs of its light rail extensions and ongoing operations. Those increases were due to inflation, tariffs, labor shortages, supply chain disruptions and added right-of-way costs, the agency said in an Aug. 28 presentation.

The cost of the Everett Link extension has grown between $200 million and $1.1 billion, according to Sound Transit estimates, due mostly to increases in construction costs, officials said. The initial Sound Transit 3 finance plan anticipated the project to cost a total of $6.6 billion. It could now cost between $6.8 billion and $7.7 billion.

Sound Transit’s newly presented money-saving methods, however, would be able to bring Everett Link’s costs down to meet the initial estimates presented in the Sound Transit 3 financial plan, the agency said. The transit agency plans to adjust designs to many of the six new stations the regional transit agency hopes to add in Snohomish County through the 16-mile light rail extension. (A seventh provisional station is planned to be built at a future date.)

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