Light-rail can turn into money train
Homes near light-rail lines tend to increase in value
By Margaret Jackson
The Denver Post
Article Last Updated: 10/29/2008 11:25:37 PM MDT

Margarete Humphrey knows her bungalow near the Louisiana Station light-rail stop is in a hot neighborhood. But she was surprised to learn the value of her home has increased over the past two years as much of the metro Denver housing market has declined.

Homes near light-rail stations along the southeast line, which opened in November 2006, have increased by an average of nearly 4 percent over the past two years, according to an analysis by Your Castle Real Estate. But the rest of the Denver market declined an average of 7.5 percent.

“I know that it’s always been a good neighborhood, but I didn’t think it was like that,” said Humphrey, who doesn’t drive and frequently uses public transportation.

The closer a home is to the station, the more its value increases, according to the Your Castle analysis. Homes less than a half-mile from a station increased an average of 17.6 percent, while those 1 1/2 to 2 miles away increased just 0.1 percent on average. The data varied widely among stations, however.

Under its FasTracks program, the Regional Transportation District plans to create six new commuter-rail and light-rail corridors and extend three existing corridors by 2017, potentially creating other pockets where values are driven by proximity to rail.

In other markets with rail lines, single-family home values have increased anywhere from 2 percent in San Diego to 32 percent in St. Louis, according to data gathered by the Regional Transit District.

By the 1980’s, the short-sightedness of their enthusiasm was becoming apparent : car culture, they discovered to their dismay, was destroying their urban heritage and their way of life. And the solution was equally obvious : restore the trolley lines. Today, Swiss cities from which trolley lines had been banished are once again served by them.

May Seattleites prove similarly insightful and Seattle equally fortunate. Although urbanism in the US differs notably from that of old Europe, humans are humans just about everwhere, and walkable communities are consistently the healthiest. The staid, comfortable, weatherproof trolleycar is a community friend whose worth is best appreciated not in dollars per passenger mile but in civilization units that increase per service distance, frequency and hours operational.

This thought so-characterizes my own transit values. In 1996, I saw Sound Transit 1 as a “seed” even as the anti-transit mob showered us with arguments like, “It won’t solve congestion, costs too much, and doesn’t go anywhere that matters.” At the time, I lived in West Seattle and wouldn’t have been served by any of the ST improvements even ten years later!

But I voted for it anyways, because I believed if we sprinkled transportation choices around the region, including some clean, modern, sparkly rail lines and stations, we’d create the base of a better, more modern city. A place with smart growth, a magnet for smart businesses, and a city with cool “looks.”

Now we live in Burien and see the end of the line coming to within two miles of our home (not out my door but perfectly good enough) and I feel like my faith in the idea is being rewarded. My wife has been phone banking for Mass Transit Now all month and we are pretty passionate about passing ST2. Thanks for joining the Seattle Transit Blog mantle, Dan, and carrying the issue in your own way!

David