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Getting around in Seattle
spinal77
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
Hi everyone! I've been a long time reader of Penny Arcade but I finally decided to join the forums since this is the first year I'm heading to PAX in Seattle. I've decided to stay over until the Thursday after PAX and I had some questions. For reference I'm staying in the Seattle Downtown Sheraton that everyone recommends. I went ahead and got my reservations because I didn't want to not be able to get a room where I wanted to stay (they have a good AAA discount).
I've traveled to a decent amount of large cities across the country and world (London, Tokyo, LA, San Francisco) and the one thing in common that they all have is really superb public transportation that can pretty much get you from any point A to any point B in their relative cities.
This will be my first time in Seattle; I've done some research and it appears they have a bus system instead of the usual big city subway stuff. Is the bus system reliable? Can I reliably get from point A to point B using it without looking like an idiot? I am not averse to bus systems; I actually found the San Francisco system to be excellent when I went there on vacation a few years back. Is the Seattle system like the San Francisco system? Also, does anyone know if they offer a pass that will get you on the bus lines free without having to deal with fares (I had one of these for SF as well, bought it before the trip all you had to do was activate it and flash it at the drivers and was good for like 5 days, and good for admission to some museums as well).
Places of interest for me include the Asian Art Museum, The Experience Music/Sci Fi Hall of Fame, the Museum of Flight, and anything like that really.
Any help at all would be greatly appreciated by this newbie! 8-)
I've traveled to a decent amount of large cities across the country and world (London, Tokyo, LA, San Francisco) and the one thing in common that they all have is really superb public transportation that can pretty much get you from any point A to any point B in their relative cities.
This will be my first time in Seattle; I've done some research and it appears they have a bus system instead of the usual big city subway stuff. Is the bus system reliable? Can I reliably get from point A to point B using it without looking like an idiot? I am not averse to bus systems; I actually found the San Francisco system to be excellent when I went there on vacation a few years back. Is the Seattle system like the San Francisco system? Also, does anyone know if they offer a pass that will get you on the bus lines free without having to deal with fares (I had one of these for SF as well, bought it before the trip all you had to do was activate it and flash it at the drivers and was good for like 5 days, and good for admission to some museums as well).
Places of interest for me include the Asian Art Museum, The Experience Music/Sci Fi Hall of Fame, the Museum of Flight, and anything like that really.
Any help at all would be greatly appreciated by this newbie! 8-)
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Last year was my first and my friends and I got around perfectly on foot. Walked everywhere and it wasn't a big deal. Granted I am used to walking really, really, really long distances. But with walking and cabs to just help out a little bit you should be okay.
Granted I don't know where those locations you specifically mention are though, you might need to cab that.
Well, I plan on going pretty far afield, and would rather use public transport if possible. If its not workable, I'll probably just end up renting a car. I just wanted to avoid that if possible.
Well, its a good thing the AAA rates allow you to cancel with no charge then right?
BTW any advice on getting around, since I'm assuming you're familiar with the area as a Mod?
IF you mean, Norfolk, VA then I would be hard pressed to call that a bus system. Public transport sucks in Tidewater
Ahh, sorry for assuming.
anyways, free buses to/from everywhere you'd want to go + some walking
First, in an obvious attempt at plugging Pre-PAX activities and Seattle exploration, I invite you to visit our thread on the Magical Mystery Tour!
As for transportation... yeah, yeah... we don't have a fancy subway system (*sniffle*), but the bus system is quite reliable, depending on where you're going.
Check out the Seattle Metro website for some general information and for specific bus numbers and schedules to get an idea of where they go and how long it takes.
Also, an AWESOME resource that was just created by a UW engineering student is "One Bus Away", a site that gives you--via SMS, website, phone browser, etc-- real-time bus locations and approximate distance away from a particular stop. (for more info about this, check this out: http://www.physorg.com/news153509804.html )
There are other more ... eclectic ways to get to some places around Seattle, for instance the Seattle Monorail , the Waterfront Streetcar, and the SLUT (yeah, we're a classy city...).
All in all, there are some pretty good options!
Thank you for the welcome and the info Metaverse! Unfortunately my plane is coming in about 3PM Thursday so I can't hop on the tour thing, but my friends and I may be interested in the dinner when more info comes out about that.
And that info is really helpful! I really appreciate it.
For some reason the primary page on the Metro Transit site is missing for it (probably related to their domain transition), but there should be Visitor Passes available. I believe they're only good for a day each.
Thank you, I'll look into that!
Disclaimer - Not actually typical of Seattle buses. They are awesome though. But considering most of the stuff you'd want to see is within walking distance of the WSCTC, I barely used them. It is a nice walk around Downtown too.
My main question -- if I end up near an airport hotel, will it be difficult to get to the con center and back? If cabs are needed, especially after dark or on weekends, then that could be an expensive tradeoff.
Entirely true. Unless you're on the CCST, are local to the area, or are staying quite far from the convention center, a car is not needed. Pike's Place Market is 6 blocks from the convention center and the bus system seemed to run quickly and often.
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You can find more info on Seattle (and all of King County) busses here: http://transit.metrokc.gov/
They have things like trip planners, time tables & route maps.
Basically though, if you're wanting to stick to the city, you'll find that the larger bus stops (like in the bus tunnel, or on 3rd) have maps that show you were the different routes go and at normal hours within the city the busses are quite numerous.
Is that the bus that went underground or no? (Took some bus from the airport to PAX. Wasn't bad)
<Moe_Fwacky> nice girls
<Moe_Fwacky> lesbians
<Moe_Fwacky> robbed drugstores together
Why is it really complicated?
Also, Museum of Flight is free on the first Thursday of the month, 5-9 PM. (and the 174 runs until 4 AM)
Just to clarify, you can hopon any bus running *IN* downtown for free. If you get on the bus and you are not downtown, it will cost you money.
By PAX, Seattle's light rail system will be in operation, running from Tukwila to downtown. So if you want to take that, you just need to take a bus to Tukwila (there's gonna be shuttle busses running the route every 10/15 minutes until December when the light rail reaches the airport).
The bus system is pretty darn good service, as long as you stay in the central Seattle area. If you ever want to go somewhere on the East Side, though, it's only reliable to major locations - downtown Bellevue, Redmond Town Center. Which really, for the average PAX goer the only place on the east side I could see wanting to go to that would be a real hassle would be the Pancake House.
We have a Fatburger here in San Antonio, and it went under for sucking ass so I will ask you this,
Fatburger, Dick's, or Chili's? (Since I figure we both have eaten at these three.)
If you say Fatburger maybe I need to give it another try, as the franchise might have just been bad.
Chili's is great, but most of them are closed now. I'm not sure if there's any still open around here...
Are we talking about the same Chili's?! They're the most generic, bland hamburgers I've ever had. Frozen patties on stale buns. Blegh.
As far as chains go, Red Robin probably has the best burgers.
But for the best of the best, it's always impossible to beat the local fare.
You best not be setting foot back in these parts.
Seconded. The only fast burger better than Dick's is In-n-Out. People actually like the frozen shit that all the major chains serve?
But really, if you want the best burger around, it's at Maggie Bluffs.
Also, the Fatburger in Federal Way is good, but my wife likes it more than I do.
Man, this tangent topic has convinced me to eat some Dick's after work tonight/tomorrow-morning-at-an-ungodly-hour-right-before-they-close. I will dedicate it to all the haters.
LOL Nice!
Def local burgers win over any chain but really the only way to get Moe to do a fair comparison of what he thinks about Fatburger is to use places we might have all eaten at.
Man i've never even HEARD of any of these chains before heh...All we have out here are like McD's, Burger King, Hardee's (Carl's Jr.), and Wendys(my place of choice). If you wanted to sample one quick place for fast food, thats easy to get to, which is it, Dicks or Fatburger?