Watch the 2 Line ribbon cutting speaking program and read comments from regional leaders on light rail’s Eastside debut

This morn­ing, Sound Tran­sit inau­gu­rat­ed rev­enue ser­vice on the 2 Line, serv­ing neigh­bor­hoods in Red­mond and Belle­vue, Wash­ing­ton. It’s a huge moment for the East­side, where the North­west Pro­gres­sive Insti­tute has been based since its incep­tion. If you did­n’t get to join us for the open­ing fes­tiv­i­ties, you can watch a replay of the speak­ing pro­gram below and see what the NPI cam­eras saw by click­ing play below.

And here’s what elect­ed, busi­ness, and labor lead­ers had to say to mark the open­ing of the 2 Line in a press release dis­trib­uted by Sound Tran­sit’s com­mu­ni­ca­tions team: 

“This is a his­toric occa­sion for our region and the hun­dreds of thou­sands of peo­ple on the East­side who will be able to use Link light rail to quick­ly and safe­ly get to school, work, games, con­certs, and more, with­out the has­sles of traf­fic and park­ing,” said King Coun­ty Exec­u­tive and Sound Tran­sit Board Chair Dow Con­stan­tine. “We are well on our way to a more con­nect­ed Puget Sound region with the 1 Line exten­sion to Lyn­nwood open­ing in August, and the 2 Line fur­ther expand­ing next year.”

“This light rail line is going to change lives,” said King Coun­ty Coun­cilmem­ber and Sound Tran­sit Sys­tem Expan­sion Com­mit­tee Chair Clau­dia Bal­duc­ci. “It will con­nect peo­ple to edu­ca­tion, jobs, recre­ation, and each oth­er, help­ing expand access to oppor­tu­ni­ty across our region. For me, this is the cul­mi­na­tion of years and years of work by many peo­ple and a real­iza­tion of the promise we made to vot­ers in 2008. For the East­side, it’s the begin­ning of an incred­i­ble trans­for­ma­tion that will ben­e­fit the com­mu­ni­ty for decades to come.”

“Pub­lic tran­sit is a top pri­or­i­ty for peo­ple across Wash­ing­ton state, so it’s a top pri­or­i­ty for me —and I’m proud to have fought for, and won, cru­cial invest­ments in our state’s pub­lic tran­sit sys­tem,” said Sen­a­tor Pat­ty Mur­ray. “I have a long his­to­ry with this project and remem­ber some pret­ty tough times a cou­ple decades ago fight­ing along­side Joni Earl to ensure there was a future for Sound Tran­sit — that future is here now, and it is so bright. I am so excit­ed to be able to tell every­one we will no longer have to wait years for light rail to come to Belle­vue — instead it will be here every ten min­utes! Deliv­er­ing the fed­er­al dol­lars to sup­port Puget Sound’s incred­i­ble expan­sion of pub­lic tran­sit has not been easy, but as long as I serve as the top Demo­c­rat on the Sen­ate Appro­pri­a­tions Com­mit­tee — it’s going to be a pri­or­i­ty for the fed­er­al government.”

“The Muck­leshoot Tribe is pleased to be a part of this impor­tant event cel­e­brat­ing the open­ing of the East Link exten­sion, con­nect­ing South Belle­vue and the Red­mond Tech­nol­o­gy Cen­ter. We appre­ci­ate our strong rela­tion­ship with Sound Tran­sit as they work to bring light rail to com­mu­ni­ties through­out our usu­al and accus­tomed land,” said Muck­leshoot Trib­al Coun­cil Chair­per­son Jason Elkins.

“Sound Transit’s lat­est expan­sion unlocks the poten­tial for greater eco­nom­ic growth in this region and it cre­ates more oppor­tu­ni­ties for Wash­ing­to­ni­ans to con­nect and explore the cities and towns around Lake Wash­ing­ton,” said Wash­ing­ton Gov­er­nor Jay Inslee.

“As the Seat­tle area con­tin­ues to grow, we know that thou­sands of peo­ple depend on tran­sit to move them around this grow­ing and thriv­ing com­mu­ni­ty,” said FTA Region­al Admin­is­tra­tor Susan Fletch­er. “The open­ing of the East­side ini­tial seg­ment of the Link 2 Line light rail sys­tem will have a sig­nif­i­cant impact on the entire region, and it will make a real­ly big dif­fer­ence for res­i­dents trav­el­ing to des­ti­na­tions on the Eastside.”

“Ever since the East­side com­mu­ni­ty vot­ed for Sound Tran­sit, I’ve dreamed of a day when I can hop on a train in Red­mond and quick­ly get to Belle­vue. Now, that day is here,” said Red­mond May­or and Sound Tran­sit Board­mem­ber Angela Bir­ney. “This is a his­toric moment that’s been years in the mak­ing, and I am excit­ed for peo­ple across the East­side and beyond to ride the rails.”

“Today’s cel­e­bra­tion reminds us that progress is not a soli­tary endeav­or, but rather the col­lec­tive effort of vision­ar­ies, engi­neers, and skilled work­ers com­ing togeth­er to cre­ate a more acces­si­ble and sus­tain­able future for every­one,” said Brad Smith, vice chair and pres­i­dent of Microsoft. “This is a fan­tas­tic step in con­nect­ing peo­ple and com­mu­ni­ties across the Puget Sound region.”

“Our down­town Belle­vue cam­pus was designed around the con­nec­tiv­i­ty that mass tran­sit pro­vides, both for the com­mu­ni­ty and the busi­ness­es that are grow­ing here,” said David Zapol­sky, senior vice pres­i­dent of glob­al pub­lic pol­i­cy and gen­er­al coun­sel at Ama­zon. “Not only will this invest­ment pro­vide eas­i­er access to down­town Belle­vue for our 12,000 Ama­zon employ­ees in the city, but as we con­tin­ue to invest in afford­able hous­ing with access to near­by pub­lic tran­sit through the Ama­zon Hous­ing Equi­ty Fund, the 2 Line will also begin to open up new oppor­tu­ni­ties for the broad­er community.”

“We are about to board light rail on the East­side for the first time thanks to the years of col­lab­o­ra­tion and hard work that our com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers, project part­ners, Sound Tran­sit staff, and con­trac­tors have ded­i­cat­ed to make this moment pos­si­ble,” said Sound Tran­sit Inter­im CEO Goran Spar­rman. “Con­grat­u­la­tions and thanks to the many hun­dreds of peo­ple who have played such an impor­tant role in bring­ing the vision of a more con­nect­ed East­side to life.”

“When the train doors open on Sat­ur­day, any­one who lives, works or plays in Belle­vue will have far more sus­tain­able and acces­si­ble options to move through­out the city and the entire East­side,” said Belle­vue May­or Lynne Robinson. 

“We look for­ward to cel­e­brat­ing this mile­stone with the com­mu­ni­ty as we show­case Belle­vue and all its ameni­ties along the 2 Line.”

“Thank you to Sound Tran­sit and its lead­ers and staff for cre­at­ing eco­nom­ic oppor­tu­ni­ty for gen­er­a­tions of work­ing peo­ple. These invest­ments here on the East­side have cre­at­ed thou­sands of good, fam­i­ly-wage jobs for skilled crafts­peo­ple. Sound Tran­sit has pro­vid­ed path­ways out of pover­ty for women, peo­ple of col­or, vet­er­ans and oth­ers who are dis­ad­van­taged into con­struc­tion careers,” said Mon­ty Ander­son, exec­u­tive sec­re­tary, Seat­tle Build­ing & Con­struc­tion Trades Council.

“Through strong train­ing pro­grams and appren­tice­ships, we have worked togeth­er to build the next gen­er­a­tion of con­struc­tion work­ers, many from local com­mu­ni­ties here on the East­side. Get­ting to this sig­nif­i­cant step on this huge region­al sys­tem took vision, per­sis­tence, and bold lead­er­ship — and it will build bet­ter lives.”