America’s Sorriest Bus Stop: Seattle vs. Chapel Hill

From our field of 16 sorry bus stops, we’re almost down to the Final Four.

Just five contenders remain: Seattle, Chapel Hill, and Englewood have all secured spots in the semifinals. We’re still waiting on the results of the Omaha vs. Munhall match (you can weigh in until tomorrow).

Now soak up the ghastliness of these two bus stops in Seattle and Chapel Hill, North Carolina, facing off for a chance at everlasting shame in Streetsblog’s 2017 sorriest bus stop championship.

Seattle

This stop, nominated by Alexander Lew, beat San Diego and Fremont, California, in previous rounds of competition. Its impressive run rests on its position between a highway and a set of active freight train tracks.

The industrial area served by the stop is not far from downtown, and there’s a small community college right across the street.

Agencies responsible: Washington DOT, King County Metro.

Chapel Hill

Kira Glynn nominated this stop, which beat stops in San Juan and Tampa to advance to this stage, and she’s in it to win it. She’s sent us half a dozen photos and a video to document.

Students and staff at UNC Chapel Hill use this bus stop a lot, but there’s no safe way to cross the divided highway.

In this clip you can see a man disembark, cross half the highway, then walk between lanes of noisy traffic on the median to get where he’s going. Not good.

Responsible agencies: NC DOT, Chapel Hill Transit.

Which bus stop is the sorriest?

Seattle (60%, 509 Votes)
Chapel Hill (40%, 337 Votes)

Total Voters: 846

Joseph pattern

An odd “tournament”. Do you want to know what’s worse than either of these? Having no transit, which would be the case in most of America.
Harry Balsagna

what are you talking about? every mid-sized city and greater has transit in this country
bagh53

Just because your suburb in the hills doesn’t have a tram doesn’t mean there isn’t any transit. bub.
Kenny Brooks

I’m really surprised the Chapel Hill stop is losing now. I use this stop, and three big factors missing from the description definitely make it worst than what I’ve seen of the Seattle stop.

First is there is NO possible way to get to a crosswalk/traffic light. In Seattle, it looks like this block has them on both sides. Second, the Chapel Hill one puts you at the mercy of a curve and a back exit for one of the complexes making it hard to see traffic from one direction. Third is the intersection that occurs right before the stop with the main exits of the apartment complexes and the U-Turn lanes. The drivers using those are often focused on the highway traffic like the pedestrians, and have occasionally (luckily without incident as far as I know) pulled out and had to slam on because they weren’t paying attention to people crossing.