Bellevue Transit Center lost more than half its Route 550 riders in five months after the Link 2 Line began crossing Lake Washington.
Boardings on Route 550 at the transit center fell 57% compared with the same period a year earlier, according to a ridership analysis first reported by Seattle Transit Blog on Oct. 26. Overall Route 550 ridership dropped 52% year over year. The analysis, by Michael Smith, compared average weekday boardings from March through August 2025 with the same months in 2026.
The shift began March 28, when Sound Transit opened the Crosslake Connection, linking Seattle and the Eastside by rail. By August, the 11 Link stations on the Eastside and Mercer Island averaged 12,500 boardings each weekday, the analysis found.
The 2 Line's pull reached beyond I-90. Seattle-bound boardings on Route 271 at Bellevue Transit Center dropped 47%, even though Route 271 reaches the University District in 24 minutes versus 37 on Link.
Smith suggested the drop came from riders who previously transferred to another bus in the U District and now have a faster end-to-end trip on Link.
One spot bucked the trend. Boardings at South Bellevue station for Bellevue-bound Route 550 trips doubled to about 50 per day, as passengers transferred from the 2 Line to reach stops along Bellevue Way.
The five-month overlap period ended in August when several bus routes were cut. Seattle Transit Blog said it plans to publish data from those route changes in spring 2027. The full route-by-route breakdown is available in the original analysis.
