The Rail Ahead - Light rail could make it to Issaquah in 30 years

As the light-rail train swiftly speeds to a hum, Fred Butler steadies himself with a hanging strap. He leans over with a generous smile to interview a man headed to the airport.

As the train halts at the Mount Baker stop, Butler hops off, scans his transit card and moseys over to the ticket officers for another chat.

Butler is convinced such a train could roll into Issaquah in 30 years, but his focus is greater than just the city.

“It’s planning for the future,” he said. “It’s a recognition that the population in the region is going to double in the next 20 or 30 years, and we need to prepare.”

Butler is a vice chair at Sound Transit and also a member of the Issaquah City Council.

While cities with developed urban cores, like Redmond and Kirkland, are vying for the next expansion, Issaquah, too, has managed to throw its hat into the debate.

The city’s strongest case is its plan for downtown, which hasn’t even been completed. The plan would create the density a major train system demands.

However, the attention of Sound Transit took more than a promise to grow. It took Butler.

“He’s always motivated, and he knows how to motivate people,” said Rosemarie Butler, his wife.

By calling attention to Issaquah’s potential, he convinced Sound Transit to agree to a multimillion dollar light rail study for the city in 2005.

The study is scheduled to finish in 2017, and its results would drive Sound Transit’s decision on what to include in a third expansion.

The rail ahead

Depending almost solely on sidewalks and public transit to account for future traffic, the Central Issaquah Plan is symbiotic with mass transit, such as light rail.

If the plan fails to create an urban center, light rail won’t come to Issaquah, said Mayor Ava Frisinger said. “I don’t think there would be a financial justification for it.”

On the other side, if the city’s plan is completed without mass transit like light

rail, traffic could choke the city.

While Sound Transit focuses on serving areas with dense populations, it’s not just about the needs now. It’s about preparing for future needs, Butler said.

The organization has a chance to plan for a train system before a city builds its urban core.

“The growth is coming,” he said. “What do we want the growth to look like?”

In contrast to Bellevue’s drawn-out drama over light rail, Issaquah planners are already doing everything they can do to keep the city open to Sound Transit’s plans.

At one point, the city left out details about where light rail could go in a 30-year plan to avoid “short sighting” any of the organizations plans.

People began to notice the lack of detail.

In August, city planners presented a vague map showing where a train could enter and leave the city. It included hot spots for potential stops.

Apprehension about planning too much, too soon turned out to be wrong.

“Sound transit thinks it’s a great thing that we’re at the table so early working with Issaquah,” said Bruce Gray, a Sound Transit spokesperson. “Light rail is a good fit for Issaquah.”

The city doesn’t just have to convince Sound Transit. It also has to convince the greater Seattle area to pay for it.

Butler is counting on Bellevue’s train to fix that.

Public support soared, when people began seeing trains run through Tukwila, Butler said.

“They realized light rail was real and coming,” he said. “They will begin to ask the question in earnest, ‘How do we get the light rail east to Issaquah?’”

An expansion to Issaquah, which would stretch about eight miles from the South Bellevue Park & Ride, would be packaged with expansions in Redmond and up to Kirkland.

Laying the tracks

While Butler, 71, doesn’t expect to see the day a train once again makes its way to Issaquah, his political story is so interwoven with early discussions it’s hard to overlook his contribution.

A retired colonel from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and once the chief engineer of Seattle City Light, Butler doesn’t care much for sitting still.

When a rezoning issue threatened to change his neighborhood, he took the opportunity to join two of Issaquah’s commissions.

After three years studying city government, he tried his hand at the City Council. Twelve years later, he’s now an incumbent running unopposed in November.

The first year he sat on council, 2000, he said they needed to figure out a way to get light rail earlier.

“There needed to be a recognition that our future would be dependent on light rail,” he said.

He was met with skepticism. However, his role on the Eastside began to evolve, and it became clear he’d be a regional player.

“I couldn’t have told you what he’d do,” Frisinger said. “I would have told you he would have been a person of substance and well respected by people.”

Transportation came naturally to the civil engineer.

At one point, Butler was in charge of 15 ports and harbors in Southern California. During his 27 years in the military he participated in 13 major military construction projects. He lead a project to construct an airfield in Bahrain in the Middle East.

As a councilmember, he began showing an interest in regional transportation groups, and by 2004 he was the chair of the Eastside Transportation Partnership.

Butler’s work caught the attention of Ron Sims, then the King County Executive.

In a bit of an upset, Sims gave an open seat to Butler, an Issaquah man, when Bellevue and Redmond were the regional transportation players.

He joined the board just in time to help fashion its Sound Transit 2 plan, which included a budget for the Issaquah study.

In addition to chairing the organization’s capital committee and his work with Issaquah, Butler participates on three other boards.

“He’s just not a guy to sit home and do nothing,” his wife said. Then, when asked what motivates him, she laughed and said, “When you find out, let me know.”

At a Seattle train stop, Butler moves slowly along the moving train and takes a seat across from a young woman. It’s been a long morning, but he can’t help but get more input.

“How are you doing today?” he begins.

She smiles and responds.

“I’m doing great,” he continues. “And you know what? It’s just going to get better.”