SEATTLE — Seattle transportation agencies will pay $6.5 million to settle a lawsuit over a light rail crash that killed a Rainier Valley couple on their way to a Mariners game.
Their families alleged that Sound Transit’s trackway is hazardous in that area, where trains run along the street, and lacked sufficient pedestrian safety features such as crossing arms. The agencies argued that the area was well-marked and the couple proceeded against a don’t-walk signal.
Emoke Rock, 76, and Steven Wayne, 66, were walking toward Columbia City Station on July 2, 2021. A northbound train pulled up at the station platform on Martin Luther King Jr. Way South. The couple walked east on South Alaska Street across MLK Way, toward the northbound platform on the far side of the median. As they stepped onto the median trackway, they didn’t notice a second train on their left, heading south. Crash investigators reported the train operator didn’t have time to stop.
Rock was a former real estate broker and schoolteacher, while Wayne was a real estate broker. Both were baseball fans and Rock was wearing a blue jersey when the crash happened.
Attorneys for their families and for the transportation agencies signed a notice of settlement filed Tuesday in King County Superior Court, that all claims have been resolved, in advance of a scheduled Jan. 29 trial date.
Sound Transit, King County Metro Transit, the Seattle Department of Transportation, and the train operator were named defendants in the civil case.
James S. Rogers, lead attorney for the families of Rock and Wayne, said the agencies will collectively pay $6.5 million, a figure confirmed by a Sound Transit spokesperson. The agencies did not say Thursday how responsibility for the payment would be divided among the agencies.
Rogers said the agencies were aware of trains hitting pedestrians and near hits, but failed to add sufficient protections. There should have been swing gates that people operate by hand, and automatic gates that descend to block the walkways when trains approach, he said in an interview Wednesday.
“We believe it could have been prevented, and we hope changes are made,” Rogers said.
Sound Transit spokesperson John Gallagher said “there is no admission of liability” in making the settlement, which does not contain any orders or pledges about future safety measures.
Sound Transit’s light rail tracks are mostly underground or elevated, but there are three surface stations in Rainier Valley and two in the Sodo area. Metro operates the trains, while the Seattle transportation department operates traffic and pedestrian signals.
Since Rock and Wayne were killed, the Rainier Valley stations were equipped in 2022 with flashing electronic signs that warn “ANOTHER TRAIN COMING.” Louder train horns and station warning bells were provided, along with railroad-crossing pavement markings for drivers. Previously, Sound Transit added swing gates at South Holgate Street, known for frequent near hits and collisions, so that people using sidewalks must push a gate to go east-west across the railway, and presumably, as they do, they are looking for trains.
The Columbia City Station crash is the city’s only double-fatal light rail collision, though a similar incident in 2013 killed a man walking toward Rainier Beach Station.
Rogers said that to his knowledge, it’s also the first fatal incident involving a Sound Transit train that resulted in a court case and settlement payout. Sound Transit did not confirm Thursday whether there were others.
Seattle DOT argued in a court filing, early in the case, that Rock and Wayne “attempted a late crossing in front of Light Rail Vehicle, Train No. 9, without due regard for their safety, contrary to active no-walk and train-warning signals.”
To that argument, Rogers said Wednesday that walking on red signals is a result of flawed design, and known to the agencies. Among other problems, he said, the Alaska-MLK intersection has a long cycle between walk signals, and can even skip a phase, so crossing on red is commonplace in the neighborhood, and happened moments before Rock and Wayne reached MLK Way that night.
Among other factors, Metro’s safety team said in the accident report that the light rail system was “designed at grade with public crossings and did not account for rapid growth of the MLK Corridor.”
In two weeks, a Sound Transit committee is scheduled to hear a safety update that will include conditions in Rainier Valley, said Gallagher. The timing is not related to the lawsuit.
Pedestrians were hit 37 times from 2009 to mid-2022, along the corridor between Northgate and Angle Lake stations, according to crash reports. Most occurred at surface intersections.
Sound Transit’s safety team last year reported that light rail trains collided with 11 pedestrians and 30 motor vehicles in three years from 2020 to 2022.
