Constantine Defends Bus Electrification Focus as King County Metro Service Lags
Facing looming budget issues and increasing threats from the second Trump administration, King County Executive Dow Constantine is defending his administration’s focus on transitioning Washington’s largest transit agency to a zero-emission vehicle fleet. In an exclusive interview with The Urbanist, Constantine cited a likely need for King County Metro to tap into new revenue to sustain itself into the future. But he doubled down on the need for the agency to push forward on fleet electrification, despite the strain on service plans and finances.
Between 2025 and 2029, King County Metro is poised to spend over $1 billion on projects intended to allow the agency to transition to a fully zero-emission fleet by 2035, a goal the King County Council adopted in 2020. With those expensive electrification projects eating up a significant portion of Metro’s fiscal reserves — and potentially sending the agency into fiscal crisis — many transit advocates see Metro’s leaders putting those zero-emission goals ahead of its service expansion goals, which are also ambitious.
“I don’t think there is a prioritization of electrification or zero emissions over expanding service,” Constantine told The Urbanist. “When we were coming out of Covid, and we had all these Covid service restrictions, I was presented with a choice: we could add service to respond to the need as it was, at present, or we could add service to try to provide the frequencies people would need to induce them back onto transit, and I chose that route, which meant spending more money earlier in order that we might build ridership. And that has been a successful strategy. Our ridership has increased faster than just about anybody in the country.”
King County’s greenhouse gas emissions are also rising, which was what spurred the focus on electrification in the first place. Last year, a progress report on King County’s climate action plan recognized a need for “serious course correction” when it comes to the transportation sector, and cited increased investments in transit service as a major strategy that the county needs to find ways to deploy. Meanwhile, only around 2% of transportation emissions in King County come from public transit, and expanded service could entice more people out of cars — which are the region’s top source of emissions.
https://www.theurbanist.org/2025/03/05/constantine-defends-metro-bus-electrification-focus/