Kent TOD

Downtown Kent

King County and the City of Kent are working together to improve transit service and create opportunities at various sites for economic redevelopment in the downtown area. The sites affected are the James Street Park-and-Ride at Lincoln Avenue and W James Street, the new Rail and Bus Transit Garage, the 17-acre Kent Station private development, and the City’s municipal lot at 4th Avenue N and W Smith Street.

James Street Park-and-Ride

The 10-acre James Street Park-and-Ride has been subdivided into two lots, an eight-acre lot to the south and a two-acre lot with 100 parking stalls. Most bus routes have been rerouted to the Sounder Garage approximately half a mile to the east. A five-story park-and-ride garage now serves both bus and rail commuters at the Sounder Station near 1st Avenue S and W Smith Street. The James Street Park-and-Ride is effectively closed as a transit center and remains only as an overflow commuter parking lot. The county will retain the two-acre lot for park-and-ride purposes until it is certain that capacity at the Kent Sounder Garage is adequate for bus park-and-ride users and that these spaces can be surplussed.

Rail and Transit Garage

The five-story, 871-stall Sound Transit Sounder Garage is now open for use by both bus and commuter rail customers. Improvements to streets next to the garage, which will allow Metro Transit buses to access loading platforms at the garage, have been completed. Metro Transit has redirected its service from the James Street lot four blocks away to the garage, thus allowing park-and-ride users to park in the garage and board bus routes that formerly stopped at the James Street lot.

Kent Station private development

Kent Municipal Parking Lot

Just across W Smith Street to the south of the Kent Station redevelopment lies the four-acre Kent Municipal Parking Lot. The city is actively interested in redevelopment of this surface lot as a link from the historic downtown area that lies to the south to the newly developing Kent Station to the north. In addition to preserving adequate parking for continuing uses, opportunities exist for mixed-use redevelopment of housing, retail, and office space to serve the area’s needs, including those of the adjacent Regional Justice Center.