There are more than 30 stations on the Sound Transit Link light rail map.
And not too long ago, the names of three of those stops included the word “university.”
For our series What’s In a Name, KNKX looked into the logistics behind keeping hundreds of printed maps and signs up-to-date — and what happens when you need to rename a station.
Ryan Avery teaches about public transit infrastructure at the University of Washington. He doesn’t work for Sound Transit but is a daily light rail rider.
“They would have that announcement at University Street Station saying, ‘If you are going to the University of Washington, do not get off. Please continue to the University of Washington Station or the U District Station,’” he said. “They were trying to help people get to the right place.”
The situation was even more confusing because the University Street Station was in downtown Seattle at Benaroya Hall, miles away from UW.
After years of discussion, Sound Transit finally renamed the stop Symphony Station in September 2024.
That seemingly small change meant the agency had to take on a much bigger task: updating signage across the entire light rail system.
‘Coming Soon’
Lately, changes have been a constant for Sound Transit.
The agency is in the midst of expanding the light rail system. If all goes to plan, it will eventually span around 116 miles. The newest stations, which will extend into Federal Way, will come online in December. (The agency recently revealed a budget shortfall of up to $30 billion for planned projects.)
As stations are added, familiar names such as Westlake and Beacon Hill are joined by the likes of Lynnwood City Center and Marymoor Village.
Joseph O’Connor is the agency’s signage maintenance manager. His job is to make sure language and names are consistent across the network.
Changing a station name — from University Street to Symphony, for instance — adds to his team’s already considerable workload.
They identify every sign in and around the station that bears the old name and update the wording and the graphics. An outside vendor prints the signs, and then Sound Transit schedules crews to install them.
Because transit stations are interconnected, every new station name means changing hundreds of maps on the walls and in train cars throughout the system, too.
This process can feel like a never-ending task, said Angela Hiatt, who is in charge of signage and wayfinding for Sound Transit.
The vinyl signs Sound Transit uses are typically changed out every six months to a year.
She said some maps even have “coming soon” stickers covering up the names of stations that aren’t open yet.
Then there’s the upkeep. Signs have to be replaced periodically because of wear and tear or vandalism.
And while it’s rare, some signs have to be swapped out because they contain a mistake.
“One that is still kind of plaguing me a little is 'capitol,'” O’Connor, the maintenance manager, said.
Some signs spell Capitol Hill with an “a-l” at the end, rather than the correct “o-l.”
“There are still one or two outliers that are on my list to update,” O’Connor said. “Our passengers are really good about letting us know when there is a mistake out there.”
It’s those daily riders — the ones who notice the little things while waiting for trains — who O’Connor depends on to tell him whether the signage is working.
“When we don’t get complaints about certain things, that’s when I know that I’m on top of things,” he said.
Light rail geography
Sound Transit’s formula for choosing station names is fairly simple. The agency’s board members start with a city name. If that’s too broad, they then narrow it down to a neighborhood, then nearby landmarks. The last option is a street name.
Once the board narrows down a list of names, it asks for public input — something Avery, the UW transportation expert, approves of.
“The majority of your riders are local riders, so you definitely want to make sure it’s easy for locals to ride,” he said.
Avery said new stations can also illuminate areas of the city with which even longtime Seattleites might not be familiar.
For him, that was the Angle Lake Station, which is just south of Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.
"I actually didn't know where that was until it was a light rail station,” he said. “So it's weird that you can also learn geography from the light rail system.”
Sound Transit aims to add two more light rail stations in the spring of 2026 as the crosslake connection comes to fruition. Long term plans include stations in Tacoma, West Seattle and Ballard.
Avery said these changes are part of the growth of a transit network: “It's a reciprocal process of people acclimating themselves to the system, as well as sometimes the system acclimating itself to the surroundings."
