Line 2 (Sound Transit)

The East Link Extension, also known as Line 2, is a future light rail line serving the Eastside region of the Seattle metropolitan area in the U.S. state of Washington. It will be part of Sound Transit's Link light rail system, running from west to east and serving 10 stations in Downtown Seattle, Mercer Island, Bellevue, and Redmond. Line 2 is scheduled to open in 2023 and will continue into the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel and share stations with Line 1. A extension to Downtown Redmond with two additional stations is scheduled to open in 2024.
The East Link project was approved by voters in the 2008 Sound Transit 2 ballot measure, with construction costs projected at $3.7 billion. The line will use the Homer M. Hadley Memorial Bridge, one of the Interstate 90 floating bridges, which was constructed in 1989 with the intent to convert its reversible express lanes to light rail. Early transit plans from the 1960s proposed an Eastside rail system, but preliminary planning on the system did not begin until Sound Transit's formation in the early 1990s. The proposed alignment of the East Link project was debated by the Bellevue city council in the early 2010s, with members split on two different routes south of downtown Bellevue; city funding for the downtown segment's tunnel was also debated and ultimately included in the final agreement. The alignment was finalized in 2013, after more than two years of debate, and delayed the beginning of construction to 2016 and the completion of the project from 2021 to 2023. The line will be the world's first railway constructed on a floating bridge and is expected to carry 50,000 daily riders by 2030.
History.
Background and early proposals.
The Eastside suburbs underwent rapid development into bedroom communities after the 1940 opening of the first Lake Washington floating bridge, which replaced a cross-lake ferry system as the main connection to Seattle. While private bus operators ran routes over the Lake Washington Floating Bridge from Seattle to Eastside towns, the municipal Seattle Transit System opted not to extend its routes. The 1963 opening of the Evergreen Point Floating Bridge fueled further growth, leading to traffic congestion on both bridges during peak periods. By 1965, more than 150,000 people lived on the Eastside; the King County government predicted in 1965 that up to 550,000 people would live in Eastside cities by 1990.
In the 1960s, the construction of a rapid transit system for the Seattle metropolitan area was explored by municipal and regional governments. The initial system, serving the city of Seattle, would be extended east to Bellevue via Mercer Island and an additional floating bridge in a later phase, to be built by 1990. The state government amended its plans for a parallel floating bridge to Mercer Island to include exclusive right of way for rapid transit. The Eastside section of the rapid transit system was expanded to include branches to Eastgate and the Bel-Red area, with provisions to extend the system to Redmond. Intermediate stations would be located at Rainier Avenue in Seattle, on Mercer Island, and in Downtown Bellevue. The proposal, funded with federal grants, was put to a public vote as part of the Forward Thrust referendums in 1968 and 1970, requiring a 60 percent majority in order to use increased property taxes. During both referendums, voters were unable to meet the required majority to approve the rapid transit plan; the first earned a simple majority, while the second failed due to local economic conditions.
Metro Transit was created by a 1972 referendum to operate a countywide bus system and resumed planning work for a Seattle–Eastside transit system to be built using the new Interstate 90 floating bridge. A transit element for the new floating bridge was requested by the Puget Sound Council of Governments and a group of municipal leaders from Seattle and the Eastside, seeking to avoid additional traffic. A memorandum of agreement signed by the Washington State Highway Commission, Metro Transit, and local governments in late 1976 designated the center two lanes of the eight-lane bridge for use by transit and Mercer Island residents, with possible conversion to a fixed-guideway system in the future. The Puget Sound Council of Governments (PSCOG), a regional planning organization, determined in a 1981 study that light rail would be a feasible way to relieve traffic on the Interstate 90 corridor and recommended that Metro include it in their long-term plan. A joint study by Metro and the PSCOG in 1986 explored several alternative routes for an Eastside light rail system, recommending a route across the Interstate 90 bridge and branching from Downtown Bellevue to Kirkland and Bothell, via the Eastside railway, and Downtown Redmond, via State Route 520. While the light rail plan was left unfunded, provisions were made to accommodate a future Eastside light rail connection in the Downtown Seattle bus tunnel that opened in 1990.
In 1990, the state legislature called for the creation of a regional transit authority to fund the construction of a light rail system serving the Seattle metropolitan area. A work group, known as the Joint Regional Policy Committee, drafted a transit plan in March 1993 that conceived of a rapid rail system with a line between Seattle, Bellevue, and Redmond served by through-trains from Snohomish County. The plan recommended a hybrid rail and bus system, with rail serving as the primary form of high-capacity transit on the Interstate 90 corridor. Later that year, the Central Puget Sound Regional Transit Authority, later renamed Sound Transit, was established and began planning a package of transit projects for a public referendum. The committee's plan was downsized to of light rail, including a line from Seattle to Bellevue and Overlake, and submitted to voters on March 14, 1995. The $6.7 billion transit package was rejected by voters, in part due to an opposition campaign funded by Bellevue developer Kemper Freeman. A smaller, $3.9 billion system was proposed the following year, with a light rail line serving Seattle and Seattle–Tacoma International Airport instead of a system spanning the entire metropolitan area; express buses from Seattle to the Eastside would be funded by the package in place of light rail service. The removal of the Eastside light rail line was opposed by politicians and business groups in the area, with prominent developers funding an opposition campaign. The package was approved by the Puget Sound region's voters on November 5, 1996, earning a majority of votes in Eastside cities. Express buses between Seattle and the Eastside, funded by Sound Transit, began operating in 1999.
Planning and ballot measures.
In the late 1990s, Sound Transit and the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) co-led a study into congestion-relief measures on the State Route 520 corridor, including the use of light rail on either of the floating bridges. The final Trans-Lake Washington Study, published in 2002, recommended further development of a high-capacity fixed transit system on Interstate 90 to supplement a new floating bridge carrying State Route 520. While the Trans-Lake Washington Study was underway, Sound Transit formed a steering committee in 1998 to assess configuration options for Interstate 90 and its existing reversible express lane. The committee recommended the addition of high-occupancy vehicle lanes (HOV lanes) to both directions of Interstate 90 by narrowing the existing lanes, leaving the reversible lanes ready for future transit use. The lane conversion, coupled with additional HOV ramps on Mercer Island, was approved by Sound Transit, WSDOT, and the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) in 2004. An amendment to the 1976 memorandum signed by Metro and municipal governments to build the Interstate 90 bridge was drafted and signed, authorizing the conversion of the reversible lanes for high-capacity transit.
Sound Transit added the Eastside high-capacity transit project to its preliminary long-range plan in 2004, exploring several conceptual corridors and modes that branched out from a main line on Interstate 90. The Bellevue–Overlake corridor was chosen as the preferred routing of the Eastside line, which would be either light rail trains or a bus rapid transit system that could be converted to rail, in July 2005. Light rail was chosen as the preferred mode by Sound Transit in July 2006, after receiving endorsements from the city councils of Bellevue, Kirkland, and Redmond. The $3.9 billion light rail project, named "East Link", would be part of the next regional transit ballot measure and run from Seattle to Bellevue, the Microsoft campus, and downtown Redmond. A segment of East Link was included as part of of light rail in the $47 billion Roads and Transit package, which combined Sound Transit projects with highway expansion. Under the plan, light rail service from Seattle to the Overlake Hospital Medical Center east of downtown Bellevue would begin in 2021, followed by an extension to the Microsoft campus in Overlake by 2027; the segment between Overlake and downtown Redmond would be prioritized for future extension using additional funding, with engineering and property acquisition work covered by the Roads and Transit package. The package attracted opposition from environmentalists, developer Kemper Freeman, and Eastside elected officials, and failed to pass in the November 2007 election.
Sound Transit continued to hold public hearings and open houses on the design of East Link after the rejection of the Roads and Transit package as part of the environmental review process. A smaller, transit-only package named "Sound Transit 2" with of light rail was passed by voters in November 2008, including funds for East Link. The $18 billion plan projected that light rail trains would reach Bellevue in 2020 and Overlake Transit Center in 2021, and also included preliminary engineering for an eventual extension to downtown Redmond.
Floating bridge engineering and litigation.
In 2005, WSDOT conducted a live load test on the Interstate 90 floating bridge using 65 trucks carrying concrete weights to simulate the weight of light rail trains and test its performance. Using the results, which matched those from an earlier computer simulation, WSDOT concluded that the bridge could carry the weight of light rail trains after minor changes to sections of the transition spans were made during construction. Sound Transit later determined in an engineering study that rail joints could be designed to accommodate the multi-directional movement of the floating bridge, with special design considerations and speed restrictions. In 2008, the state legislature's Joint Transportation Committee commissioned an independent review of potential issues that would arise with light rail operations on the floating bridge. The panel identified 23 issues, including stray currents from the electrical system that could cause corrosion, the weight of the tracks and catenary on top of the deck, the design of the expansion joints, and a needed seismic upgrade for the bridge. The panel recommended several mitigation measures for the identified issues, which were accepted for consideration by Sound Transit, and gave the preliminary go-ahead on the project.
Sound Transit authorized a $53 million budget for preliminary engineering work on the floating bridge segment in 2011, contracting out to a team led by Parsons Brinckerhoff and Balfour Beatty. Preliminary design on the track bridge system to be used over the bridge's expansion joints was completed in early 2012, following the development of computer models and prototypes tested at the University of Washington. A replica of the bridge's light rail tracks, complete with an electrified overhead line, was built for field testing at the Transportation Technology Center in Pueblo, Colorado, using two light rail vehicles from Central Link. The track bridge system was designed to accommodate the bridge's six ranges of motion, changes in lake level, and allow for trains to operate at the full speed of . The track bridges consist of curved steel platforms placed under the tracks, connected to the railroad ties by pivoting bearings that move independently of the tracks, allowing them to remain parallel; the pivoting bearings would also stabilize the railroad ties during an earthquake, moving slightly apart to accommodate the seismic waves. Under the steel platforms, a series of flexible bearings would allow for the tracks to rise and fall by up to while following the motion of the bridge deck. Trains would be halted from the bridge in the event of a major windstorm, with gusts of from the north or from the south. The design of the system, which would make East Link the first railway over a floating bridge ever constructed, was recognized by "Popular Science" magazine in their 2017 "Best of What's New" awards. The design of the seismic system and steel frames to be installed inside the floating pontoons added $225 million in construction costs, increasing the construction budget by 46 percent, and was paid for using contingency funds.
The use of the floating bridge for light rail service remained controversial after the passage of Sound Transit 2 in 2008. Bellevue developer Kemper Freeman filed a lawsuit against the state government in 2009, arguing that the 18th amendment of the state constitution prohibited the use of the gas tax-funded bridge for non-road uses. The case was argued before the state supreme court, who ruled in April 2011 that the case should be heard in a lower court first. Days later, Freeman re-filed the lawsuit in the Kittitas County Superior Court, naming Governor Christine Gregoire and Secretary of Transportation Paula Hammond as defendants. A judge in the Kittitas court issued a summary judgement in favor of Sound Transit and WSDOT, effectively halting the lawsuit. A third lawsuit was filed by Freeman in the state supreme court, where a 7–2 decision in September 2013 deemed that the conversion of the express lanes for light rail was not unconstitutional.
Route refinement in Bellevue.
The Sound Transit 2 package did not include a specific route for East Link in Bellevue and Redmond, due to the time needed to evaluate alignment options. The Sound Transit Board divided the line into five segments and identified 19 total potential alignments, including tunnel routes in downtown Bellevue favored by the city's government, that were studied in the project's draft environmental impact statement in 2008. In southern Bellevue (named Segment B), the alternatives considered included an at-grade line along Bellevue Way, an at-grade or elevated alignment on 112th Avenue Southeast, and a route following Interstate 405 on the east side of Mercer Slough Nature Park. In downtown Bellevue (Segment C), three alternatives called for tunnels, while two were elevated guideways along 110th or 112th avenues, and a sixth alignment consisted of an at-grade line split between 108th and 110th avenues. In the Bel-Red area (Segment D), the alignments traveled east above or along new streets proposed by the city, transitioning into an at-grade and retained cut alignment along State Route 520 to Overlake Transit Center. The Overlake to Redmond segment (Segment E), studied by the project but not funded for construction, diverged at West Lake Sammamish Parkway, generally serving stations at the Redmond Town Center mall and on the east side of Marymoor Park.
The Bellevue City Council endorsed the 112th Avenue alignment, along with a tunnel in downtown Bellevue under 106th Avenue, in February 2009. Microsoft voiced its opposition to the tunnel alignment, which the company believed would jeopardize funding for the segment of the line serving its corporate headquarters in Overlake; the tunnel was estimated to add $600 million in costs to the project's budget. On May 14, 2009, Sound Transit Board chose the two-street surface alignment on 108th and 110th avenues as its preferred alternative, but indicated that it would prefer a tunnel under 108th Avenue if $500 million in additional funding could be found. In September, the Bellevue City Council requested further review of the options in downtown Bellevue, and together with Sound Transit proposed a short tunnel under 110th Avenue with one station that would be cheaper to construct and avoid disruptions to the existing Bellevue Transit Center and the 12th Street corridor. The composition of the Bellevue City Council was changed later in the year, with candidates backed by light rail opponent Kemper Freeman winning a majority in the November election. New councilmember Kevin Wallace proposed the "Vision Line", an elevated alignment that followed Interstate 405 and the Eastside Rail Corridor, with its downtown station connected by skybridges and moving walkways.
Bellevue continued to consider four new downtown alignments, as well as options in the South Bellevue area. The city council considered routing trains through the Mercer Slough and on the Eastside Rail Corridor until the National Park Service spoke out against the plan. In March 2010, the city council unanimously endorsed the 110th Avenue tunnel alternative, which would cost an additional $285 million, and drafted a cost savings plan that would levy a local tax to pay for the tunnel. A new alignment in the South Bellevue area using the east sides of Bellevue Way and 112th Avenue, along with the city covering the cost of street reconstruction and utility relocation, was also proposed in order to save $75 million in costs. The Sound Transit Board made the revised tunnel and South Bellevue alignment its new preferred route in April and requested further study into the impacts of rail construction in the Surrey Downs area. Sound Transit also approved the exploration of alternative designs for the Overlake Hospital station, the alignment through the Bel-Red area, and the Overlake Village station in Redmond. An additional downtown option, using a shorter tunnel beginning at Northeast 2nd Street and an at-grade crossing of Main Street, was also proposed by Sound Transit to help reduce costs amid an expected shortfall in revenue.
In July, the Bellevue City Council voted 4–3 to reject Sound Transit's six proposed South Bellevue options, in favor of its preferred alternative ("B7") using the Eastside Rail Corridor. The Sound Transit Board voted to continue studying the 112th Avenue alignment and identified the corridor as its preferred route ("B2M"), drawing criticism from Bellevue mayor Don Davidson, who spoke before the board. The city council responded by approving $670,000 in funds towards study into the B7 alternative to provide an even comparison to Sound Transit's proposed 112th Avenue alignment. The three councilmembers who voted against the study called it a hypocritical move, in the face of financial conservation during the Great Recession, and feared that it would extend the planning period by several years. Sound Transit released its supplemental draft environmental impact statement in November, finding that the B7 alternative would be costlier to construct and require more wetland mitigation and displace more businesses. A public hearing on the document later that month in Bellevue was filled by supporters of the B7 alternative, who outnumbered those arguing in favor of B2M. The delays in deciding the Bellevue route moved the projected opening date for East Link from 2021 to 2022 for an at-grade alignment and 2023 for a tunneled line. A group of fourteen business executives representing Boeing, Microsoft, T-Mobile USA, and Symetra, among others, sent a letter to the Bellevue city council in May requesting it to cooperate with Sound Transit and expedite the planning process.
The divided opinions of the Bellevue city council, led by B7 supporter Kevin Wallace and B2M supporter Claudia Balducci (also a Sound Transit Boardmember) resulted in heated debates, one of which devolved into a shouting match, and accusations of conflicting interests in decisions related to the light rail project. In April 2011, the city council hired an independent investigator to probe for possible conflicts of interest related to the East Link decision. Balducci, through her involvement on the Sound Transit Board, and councilmember Grant Degginger, whose law firm represented Sound Transit in disputes over other projects, were investigated and cleared of any wrongdoing under state laws. Wallace himself became the subject of a separate investigation by the City Attorney's Office after court documents revealed that his real estate company had negotiated with a freight railroad looking to use the Eastside Rail Corridor; he was later cleared by the independent investigator, having not sought to profit from city council activities. The City of Bellevue adopted an ethics code in 2013 that banned specific conflicts of interest as a result of the investigation. In the November 2011 city council election, Freeman and other anti-light rail developers funded challengers to Balducci and Chelminiak (themselves funded by Spring District developer Wright Runstad), as well as opposition messages and advertisements. Balducci and Chelminiak were re-elected and joined by newly elected councilmember John Stokes, replacing Degginger, in continuing the 4–3 makeup of the council.
The preliminary Bellevue city council report was released in May 2011, finding that the B7 alternative would be feasible, but cost up to $140 million more than Sound Transit's B2M alternative. The study received a mixed reaction from the council and members of the public, and the final version was cut after the cost of the study increased to $730,000. After the release of the study, high-level talks with Sound Transit were initiated by a delegation of Bellevue officials, including city manager Steve Sarkozy and councilmembers Degginger and Wallace. The negotiations moved into public sessions in mid-July, focusing on design modifications to Sound Transit's B2M alternative on 112th Avenue that would lessen impacts on nearby homeowners. A final environmental impact statement was published on July 15, which excluded a modified version of the B7 alternative, and the Sound Transit Board selected a modified version of its 112th Avenue route and the 110th Avenue tunnel as its preferred route on July 28. The new version included an HOV lane on Bellevue Way, grade separation on 112th Avenue, the replacement of a station at Southeast 8th Street with one at Main Street, and a noise wall and landscape buffer next to the tracks. The Bellevue city council approved a preliminary agreement in August in support of the 112th Avenue alignment, and continued its negotiations with Sound Transit ahead of a memorandum of agreement due later in the year. Further modifications in September eliminated a retained-cut trench favored by the city council and moved the planned crossover from the east side of 112th Avenue to the west side from Southeast 6th Street to Southeast 15th Street. The deadline for the memorandum was originally set for October, but it was extended into November while awaiting additional public comments solicited by the city council. The city council also asked for a grade-separated overpass for light rail trains crossing 112th Avenue at Southeast 15th Street. An umbrella memorandum of understanding between Sound Transit and the City of Bellevue was approved unanimously by the city council on November 15, placing East Link on 112th Avenue and funding the downtown tunnel with a $100 million contribution from the city. After the signing of an agreement with WSDOT to use the Interstate 90 floating bridge, Sound Transit received a Record of Decision for the East Link project issued by the Federal Transit Administration (FTA), formally ending the environmental review process.
Sound Transit initiated design work on East Link in early 2012, commissioning a cost-savings analysis for the Bellevue segments to find elements where project costs could be reduced. The analysis was released for public comment in April, proposing $60 million in savings by moving the downtown station out of the 110th Avenue tunnel, removing trenches from the 112th Avenue section, and moving the historic Frederick W. Winters House out of the planned guideway. Bellevue proposed an additional design change for the 112th Avenue corridor, moving the planned elevated flyover for trains into a trench under the raised road, after Surrey Downs residents complained of the potential visual and noise impacts. A shortlist of design modifications was approved for further study by the Sound Transit Board in late June, with an endorsement from the city council. After the publication of the final cost-savings analysis in September, the Sound Transit Board and Bellevue city council voted to endorse the proposed design modifications to the downtown station, 112th Avenue crossing, and Winters House trench. The design modifications to Bellevue Way and 112th Avenue were opposed by residents of the Enatai and Surrey Downs neighborhoods, who claimed that the changes would restrict road access and lower property values and quality of life. After threatening to block property acquisition and delay the project further, a group representing Surrey Downs residents agreed to changes in the city code that were approved by the city council in February 2013, giving homeowners a larger setback from the tracks and more time to negotiate property sales to Sound Transit. The city council also approved a streamlined permitting process that would expedite planning within Bellevue. The Surrey Downs group had previously sued Sound Transit over impacts to the Mercer Slough and the Winters House, but the lawsuit was rejected by the U.S. District Court in March 2013.
A supplemental environmental impact statement was released in late March, incorporating the Bellevue design modifications and requesting further design of pedestrian bridges over State Route 520 near Overlake Village station in Redmond. The Bellevue city council unanimously approved a final alignment for East Link on April 22, 2013, including up to $53 million in cost savings identified in the 2012 analysis. Days later, Sound Transit approved the same final alignment and design modifications. Public open houses on final design and property acquisitions began in May, and an amended transitway agreement was signed by the City of Bellevue in June. In July 2014, Sound Transit selected a former rail yard located west of the Spring District and its station as the site of the project's satellite operations and maintenance facility. The proposed site initially came as a surprise to the City of Bellevue, who had hoped to use it for transit-oriented development, and also attracted an offer from the Mars Hill Church to share the site, which was later rejected. After negotiations with the city, the design of the facility was amended to add of commercial and residential development on part of the shrunken yard, and asked Sound Transit to improve nearby pedestrian and bicycle connections.
In 2015, Sound Transit adopted a $3.7 billion budget for the East Link project, funded primarily by tax revenue and bond proceeds from the Sound Transit 2 package. The FTA agreed to contribute a $1.33 billion loan for the project, as well as $88.7 million in grants. The City of Bellevue also contributed $100 million towards the construction of the downtown tunnel after signing an updated memorandum of understanding in 2015.
Construction.
Sound Transit broke ground on the project's downtown Bellevue tunnel on April 22, 2016, beginning its construction with the demolition of homes in the Surrey Downs area. The tunnel was excavated using sequential mining, as opposed to tunnel boring machines used for Sound Transit's other light rail projects. To prepare for East Link construction on the express lanes of the Interstate 90 floating bridge, which began in June 2017, WSDOT added HOV lanes to the outer lanes of the freeway between Rainier Avenue in Seattle and Bellevue Way. The $283 million project was completed in stages from 2008 to 2012, reducing lane and shoulder widths on the floating bridge to accommodate the new lanes. The bridge's express lanes were closed to traffic on June 5, 2017, and will be rebuilt for light rail trains. Construction was scheduled to move from the pontoons to the bridge deck in 2019.
Demolition work in the South Bellevue, Bel-Red, and Overlake segments of the line also began in early 2017, including the closure of the South Bellevue Park and Ride, which was replaced with several temporary parking lots around the Eastside. By the end of the year, site grading and preparation was underway in Mercer Island and along State Route 520 in Overlake. The first segment of elevated guideway was erected at the future Bellevue Downtown station in December 2017 and in Bel-Red in March 2018. Work on the line's crossing over Interstate 405 in Bellevue began in early 2018, with a falsework constructed under the arches for the bridge. During installation of girders near Overlake Village in late May, a construction worker was killed after falling from a column near State Route 520 and 148th Avenue. Excavation of the Bellevue tunnel was completed in July 2018, approximately five months ahead of schedule, and substantial finishing work on the structure was declared complete in August 2020. Construction on the entire project reached the halfway milestone in April 2019, including of elevated guideway and of tracks.
Construction of the line's operations and maintenance facility in the Spring District began in April 2018 and is scheduled to be completed in 2020. It will include space for 96 light rail vehicles and integrate housing and office space. The Rainier Freeway Station was closed in September 2018 and work on the Judkins Park station began shortly thereafter with the demolition of a freeway overpass. By mid-November, installation of rails and ties began on Mercer Island had begun and work on the elevated guideway near South Bellevue had transitioned towards girder installation using a traveling form system. Construction was originally scheduled to conclude across all segments in 2020, but was delayed by a work stop during the COVID-19 pandemic. Light rail service is anticipated to begin in June 2023.
Downtown Redmond Extension.
The Overlake to downtown Redmond segment of East Link was granted engineering and design funding in Sound Transit 2, passed by voters in 2008, leaving a future ballot measure to fund construction. During a funding shortfall in 2010, Sound Transit suspended engineering work on the downtown Redmond segment, which was later restored in 2016. The Sound Transit Board studied several alternative alignments in the downtown Redmond area and selected a route through Marymoor Park and on a disused railroad, terminating at the Redmond Town Center mall. The project was included in the Sound Transit 3 ballot measure, passed by voters in 2016, and preliminary design work began the following year. The project began construction in 2019 and is expected open in 2024. Sound Transit filed a lawsuit against Microsoft in March 2020 for access to land in the future right of way on State Route 520, after a dispute over payment for the property and easement.
Route.
East Link diverges from the Central Link corridor at International District/Chinatown station, located near the end of the Downtown Seattle Transit Tunnel. The tracks ascend on an existing ramp, used by buses leaving the tunnel, and turn east to follow Interstate 90 over Interstate 5. The line will use the freeway's former express lanes, which weave under the westbound lanes and onto the roadway's median as I-90 passes around the north side of Beacon Hill. East Link then stops at Judkins Park station near the freeway's interchange with Rainier Avenue before entering the Mount Baker Tunnel. The tracks travel onto the Homer M. Hadley Memorial Bridge, a floating bridge that will be renovated to accommodate light rail, towards Mercer Island. On the island, East Link travels under Aubrey Davis Park and stops at a station at the center of the city's central business district. After traversing the East Channel Bridge, the light rail tracks leave I-90 and cross over to the east side of Bellevue Way, traveling north on an elevated guideway through South Bellevue station. The tracks descend into a trench running along the west edge of Mercer Slough Nature Park, with lids near the historic Frederick W. Winters House and other intersections. East Link then turns northeastward to follow 112th Avenue Southeast, crossing under the street to its west side near Surrey Downs Park, and stops at East Main station before turning sharply westward into a tunnel. The tunnel travels under 110th Avenue Northeast in Downtown Bellevue and makes a sharp turn to the east at Bellevue Downtown station, adjacent to Bellevue Transit Center at the eastern edge of Downtown Bellevue.
The tracks continue onto an elevated viaduct that travels over Interstate 405 and turn north over the Eastside Rail Corridor. Trains reach Wilburton station, on the north side of Northeast 8th Street, and follow the Eastside Rail Corridor while descending to ground level near Lake Bellevue. At Northeast 12th Street, the tracks turn east, while the Eastside Rail Corridor continues north along another set of tracks leading to Link's East operations and maintenance facility. Trains continue into a trench with a station at 120th Avenue, in the center of the Spring District development. The tracks cross over Kelsey Creek and return to street level at Bel-Red/130th station, traveling northeast in the median of Northeast Spring Boulevard and 136th Place Northeast. After crossing Northeast 20th Street, trains ascend onto an elevated guideway that follows the south side of State Route 520, crossing over the 148th Avenue Northeast interchange and stopping at Overlake Village station. East Link descends to ground level and turns north along the freeway and approaches its initial terminus at Redmond Technology station, located at Northeast 40th Street on the Microsoft Redmond campus. The Downtown Redmond Extension will continue along State Route 520 towards downtown Redmond, stopping at a station northeast of Marymoor Park. The extension then turns west, crossing under the freeway, and terminates at Downtown Redmond station near the intersection of Cleveland Street and 166th Avenue Northeast.
Service plans.
Under the operating plan described in the 2011 final environmental impact statement, three-car East Link trains will initially have a headway of eight minutes during rush hours, twelve minutes during the day on weekdays and weekends, and fifteen minutes during early morning and late evening service. Sound Transit plans to operate East Link as part of "Line 2", which continues north along Line 1 to Lynnwood Transit Center. Line 2 is proposed to be extended to the Mariner area of Everett by 2036, while Line 3 trains would continue on to Downtown Everett. East Link trains are anticipated to carry 50,000 daily passengers by 2030, and take 20 minutes to travel from International District/Chinatown station to Downtown Bellevue, and 10 minutes from Downtown Bellevue to Redmond Technology station. Sound Transit's current bus service on the west half of the corridor, Sound Transit Express Route 550, carries over 10,000 daily passengers and takes 35 minutes to travel from Seattle to Bellevue. King County Metro's RapidRide B Line operates on the east half of the corridor, traveling between Bellevue and Overlake at a frequency of 10 to 15 minutes.
Sound Transit plans to expand light rail service to Kirkland and Issaquah in 2041, as part of the Sound Transit 3 program. The project's preliminary design includes tracks shared with East Link through Downtown Bellevue, between East Main and Wilburton stations.


Thomas Higinbotham

Thomas Higinbotham (1819 – 5 September 1880), was an Irish-born civil engineer and civil servant, particularly associated with the development of railway projects in England and Australia.
Education and training.
Higinbotham was born in Dublin, the third son of Henry Higinbotham, merchant, and his wife Sarah, née Wilson, and was educated in Dublin at Castle Dawson School near Blackrock and at the Royal Dublin Society House.
Higinbotham moved to London in about 1839, initially working for a firm that promoted railway companies, and often appeared before parliamentary committees on railways, then as an engineer on British railways, where he gained high repute in his profession. In about 1838–9 he moved to London and entered the office of Sir William Cubitt, who was mentor to several Victorian railway engineers. Subsequently, Higinbotham was appointed as assistant engineer of the South Eastern Railway on the Ashford and Canterbury branch. Afterwards, Cubitt, who was advising engineer to the Great Northern Railway, had him appointed as resident engineer on the Huntingdon section of that railway. Higinbotham was elected a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers on 7 February 1854.
Migration to Australia.
In 1857, Higinbotham moved to Melbourne, Australia, and lived with his eldest brother George's household in Melbourne. He never married.
Shortly after his arrival in Victoria, Higinbotham was appointed Chief Engineer of Roads and Bridges in the colony. In 1860 he was appointed engineer-in-chief of the Victorian Railways, replacing the first engineer George Christian Darbyshire. Higinbotham supervised the surveying and construction of all new Victorian lines (his first projects were lines to Ballarat and Echuca via Bendigo) and championed various rail improvements, including city station locations, construction of Melbourne's Outer Circle Railway, adaptations to permit unbroken rail traffic between Sydney and Melbourne, and, importantly, uniform adherence to a standard gauge of five feet 3 inches across all Victoria railways.
Along with other senior public servants, he was removed from office in January 1878 by the Berry government, and was replaced by Robert Watson. Over the next two years, Higinbotham was invited by the South Australian, Tasmanian and New Zealand governments to report on their railway systems.
Final year.
In March 1880 the Service government reappointed him engineer-in-chief of the Victorian Railways, but the ministry soon fell and Higinbotham was unhappy under its successor. He had decided to resign but died in his sleep on 5 September, to be replaced as engineer-in-chief by William Elsdon.
His long-standing and status in the Railways Department was rewarded on his retirement by a sumptuous banquet and presentation.
Bibliography.
Contemporary Images -


Osma Gallinger Tod

Lucy Osma Palmer Gallinger Tod (January 18, 1895 – January 10, 1983) was an American artist, writer, and arts educator, specializing in weaving, basketry, and other craft techniques.
Early life.
Lucy Osma Palmer was born in Newark, New Jersey, the daughter of William E. Palmer and Alice Cornelia Hoyt Palmer. Her father was a clergyman. She studied piano and graduated from Wellesley College.
Career.
During World War II, Gallinger and her second husband ran a weaving studio and loom factory in Guernsey, Pennsylvania, near Gettysburg. One of their products was a loom for bed use, intended to be used by convalescent soldiers as occupational therapy. They also launched a home-weaving program in Michigan. She was head of the National Conference of American Handweavers for twenty years. In the 1960s and 1970s she taught at her weaving studio in Coral Gables, Florida. The Coral Gables Library and the Weavers Guild of South Florida held a retrospective show of Tod's work in 1981.
Books by Tod included "Basket Pioneering" (1933, with Daniel Carter Beard), "Earth Basketry" (1933), "Embroidery in Wools" (1933), "The Game of Weaving" (1938, with Constance Darrow and Dorothy McCloud), "Joys of Handweaving" (1944), "Rug Weaving for Everyone" (1952), "Designing and Making Handwoven Rugs" (1957), "Bobbin Lace: Step-by-Step" (1969), "Household Baskets" (1970), "Basketry: A Popular Handbook", "Wool Stitchery", "Manual of Helpful Hints for Handweavers" (1974), and "Weaving with Reeds and Fibers" (1975, with Oscar H. Benson). She also edited a magazine about weaving, "Shuttle Service", wrote hundreds of articles for magazines, and ran a correspondence course on weaving. "It's like math," she explained of weaving's comforts. "Right is right and wrong is wrong. If you make a mistake, take it out, don't cover it up."
Artist Dorothy Gill Barnes described Osma Gallinger Tod as a helpful influence.
Personal life.
Osma Palmer married three times; her first husband was fellow artist Frank Byron Couch. They married in 1924, and had a daughter, Josephine (later writer and preservationist Josephine Del Deo, 1925–2016); he died in 1928. Her second husband was loombuilder Milo Oliver Gallinger; he died in 1956. Her third husband was engineer James Tod; they married in 1960, and he died in 1969. "Each time I was widowed it was my art that saved me", she recalled in 1981. "When you are passionately in love and that love is lost, you have to do something to close the gap." Osma Gallinger Tod died in 1983, in Centerville, Massachusetts, aged 87 years. Her papers are held in the Archives of American Art.


Sangok station

Sangok station () is an under-construction railway station on Seoul Subway Line 7.


Montclair Transcenter

Montclair Transcenter is an intermodal transit center located at 5091 Richton Street in Montclair, California. It is located between Central and Monte Vista Avenues on Richton Street just north of the Montclair Plaza shopping center.
The TransCenter is owned by the City of Montclair. Omnitrans, Foothill Transit, and the Riverside Transit Agency all provide bus service, with Foothill and RTA providing express service and Foothill and Omnitrans providing local service. It is also a station on the Metrolink San Bernardino Line.
The station serves as the dividing line between Foothill's service area and Omnitrans' service area. Omnitrans buses run to the east, while Foothill buses run to the west. Both agencies accept each other's passes for one transfer outbound from the station.
Services.
Both bus and rail service are available 7 days a week.
Metro Rail.
The Los Angeles Metro Rail Foothill Extension may terminate near this station as part of Phase 2B, which is planned to open in 2028 pending additional funding. By the time this extension opens, all Gold Line stations north of Little Tokyo (including this station) will become part of the A Line.


George Baden Crawley

George Baden Crawley (1833–1879) was a successful railway contractor responsible for the construction of railways in Belgium, Spain, Mexico, Georgia, Romania and Hungary.
Early life.
Crawley was born on the 4th September 1833 in Upper Gower Street, London to George Abraham and Caroline Crawley. He was educated at Harrow School where he excelled in sports, particularly cricket, making the winning hit in the match with Eton College at Lord's in 1851, and becoming an excellent tennis player in later life, playing against Charles Gilbert Heathcote at Brighton the year before his death. He initially followed his father's career, training as a solicitor, but found the profession too sedentary for his adventurous spirit and switched to a career in civil engineering.
Career.
He established the contracting company "George B. Crawley and Company" which won contracts to construct two railway lines in Belgium, two in Spain and a railway of nearly 300 miles from Tiflis to Poti in Georgia. In the 1860s the British-owned railway company, "Imperial Mexican Railway" (later known as the "Mexican Railway") took over the main contract for the construction of a railway line from Mexico City to Veracruz from the French Government and Crawley's company was sub-contracted to build the line. His last work was a railway from Ploesti in Romania to Cronstadt in Hungary.
Family.
In 1863 he married Eliza Inez Hulbert (6 Jan 1841 - 29 July 1913) at East Farleigh, Kent, the daughter of Henry Hulbert. The couple had at least seven children: George Abraham Crawley (1864-1926), Henry Ernest Crawley (1865-1931), Eustace Crawley (1868-1914), John Kenneth Crawley (1873-1943), Arthur Stafford Crawley (1876-1948), Caroline Inez Crawley (married 1893, died 1920), and Georgina Beatrice Crawley (died 1968).
A biography of Eliza's eldest son, George Abraham, paints a picture of Mrs Crawley as "a perfect hostess, kindly and warm-hearted, and her children and their friends were always welcome. Her energy and "joie de vivre" enabled her, even in old age, to throw herself with enthusiasm into the interests of the young. She was an excellent musician with a charming voice, which her children and grandchildren have inherited, and she inspired and led the music that was always a feature of her entertaining at shooting parties, cricket matches, and family gatherings". After the death of George Baden Crawley she remarried Rear-Admiral George Elliot Pringle, who also predeceased her. She died in 1913 at Ayot St Lawrence, Hertfordshire leaving an estate valued at £76,528 gross.
Death.
On the 25th September 1879, while disembarking from the steam ship "City of Alexandria" at Veracruz, Crawley was struck on the head by a heavy object that fell from a ship and died within three hours.
His body was returned to England and was buried on the west side of Highgate Cemetery.


Tilman Riemenschneider

Tilman Riemenschneider (c. 1460 – 7 July 1531) was a German sculptor and woodcarver active in Würzburg from 1483. He was one of the most prolific and versatile sculptors of the transition period between late Gothic and Renaissance, a master in stone and limewood.
Biography.
Tilman Riemenschneider was born around the year 1460 at Heiligenstadt im Eichsfeld in present-day Thuringia.
When Riemenschneider was about five years old, his father was involved in a violent political conflict, the , so the family had to leave Heiligenstadt and all their possessions. They resettled in Osterode, where his father became Master of the Mint (a good position at that time) and where Riemenschneider spent his childhood years.
Riemenschneider likely came to Würzburg for the first time at the age of 18 in 1478/79. His uncle served as notary and financial advisor to the bishop there, but he did not stay for long. Around 1473, Riemenschneider learned the trade of sculpting and woodcarving, likely in Swabia or the Upper Rhine — possibly in Strasbourg and/or Ulm. At that time, the statutes of the guild of sculptors required that an apprentice travel to many different workshops to gain experience. Very little is known about this period of his life, but he likely came in contact with the work of Martin Schongauer, whose copper engravings served him later as examples.
In 1483, he settled in Würzburg. On 7 December 1483, he joined the Saint Luke's Guild of painters, sculptors, and glass workers as a painter's assistant. On 28 February 1485, he married Anna Schmidt (born Uchenhofer), a widow of a master goldsmith with three sons. This marriage not only brought him property, but it also meant that he could end his apprenticeship and become a master craftsman.
Also in 1485, Riemenschneider became a citizen of Würzburg, which made it possible to attain the status of master craftsman, and opened a workshop in Franziskanergasse, in the home of his wife.
His earliest confirmed work is the gravestone of Eberhard von Grumbach in the "Pfarrkirche" at Rimpar. This may be the type of work he started out with before obtaining large church commissions. He started to receive numerous orders from the town councils of Würzburg and neighboring towns. The earliest large work attributed to him is the "Franziskusaltar" in the "St Jakobskirche" in Rothenburg ob der Tauber, which is described in the church guide book as 'about 1490', but its style compared to other works of that date is rather primitive, suggesting it may be an earlier work, sometimes dated from 1485. In 1490, the town council of Münnerstadt ordered an altarpiece for the altar of "St Maria Magdalena", the parish church, which included a carving of Mary Magdalene with six angels. It was set up in 1492. In 1491, the town council of Würzburg ordered two life-sized stone figures of "Adam" and "Eve" for the south portal of the council's church, the "Marienkapelle" (erected in 1493).
In 1494, Riemenschneider's first wife died, leaving him with three stepsons and a daughter. In keeping with the times and his status, he remarried in 1497, Anna Rappolt. She bore him two daughters and three sons, all of whom seem to have inherited their father's artistic talent. In 1495, he created the statue of Mary with child ("Pfarrkirche St Bernard" in Würzburg).
More high-profile work followed: In 1496 Riemenschneider received the order to carve the tomb of Prince-Bishop Rudolf von Scherenberg at Würzburg Cathedral. It was delivered in 1499, the same year in which an order arrived for the Imperial tomb at Bamberg Cathedral (delivered 1513).
By 1500, he had developed an outstanding reputation as an artist and had become a wealthy Würzburg citizen. Not only did he own a number of houses, but he also was a landowner with his own vineyards. His flourishing workshop provided work for as many as 40 apprentices doing woodcarving, sculpting, and painting.
In November 1504, Riemenschneider became a member of the "Unterrat" (councilman) of the town of Würzburg, an office he held until 1525. This office not only brought him social status, but it also helped him obtain many large and profitable orders.
In 1508, Riemenschneider married Margaretha Wurzbach. From 1509 until 1522 he was a member of the "Oberrat" four times. He married again, in 1520, a woman of whom only the first name, Margarethe, is known. In 1520/1, Riemenschneider was a mayor of Würzburg (in the Middle Ages there were always two people who held this position at the same time).
His increasing engagement in local politics at a time of heavy order volume meant that his apprentices took a more prominent role in the creation of the workshop's output. Art historians have been able to identify specific figures as the work of individual workers.
During the German Peasants' War, Riemenschneider was one of the town council members who refused to obey an order by Konrad von Thüngen, the Prince-Bishop of Würzburg to fight the revolting peasants. On 4 June 1525, the peasant's army was destroyed, with 8,000 killed, just outside Würzburg by the troops of Georg, Steward of Waldburg-Zeil, and the bishop. After the town surrendered, the full town council, including Riemenschneider, was incarcerated and tortured in Marienberg Fortress. The claim that both of his hands were broken during the torture, which ended his artistic career, is today considered to be a legend without base in fact. It probably only originated in the 19th century after his "rediscovery". Together with the rest of the council, Tilman was set free after two months, with loss of most of his property. The only order he is known to have received after this was work in 1527 for a Benedictine nunnery at Kitzingen. Until his death on 7 July 1531 at Würzburg, he led a retired life with his fourth wife. His son Jörg from his second marriage continued the workshop after his death.
Due to his loss of status, Riemenschneider was soon forgotten as an artist, other than for the two gravestones of Bishops Rudolf von Scherenberg and Lorenz von Bibra side by side at the Würzburg Cathedral. Only when his gravestone was discovered in 1822 between Würzburg Cathedral and Neumünster was his outstanding position in Gothic sculpture recognized by a wider audience. Unlike Albrecht Dürer or Veit Stoss, Riemenschneider acquired true fame only posthumously.
Art.
The sculptures and woodcarvings of Tilman Riemenschneider are in the late Gothic style, although his later work show mannerist characteristics. Notably the tomb for Lorenz von Bibra (see below) is considered as one of the pieces marking the transition from Gothic to Renaissance art. His work is characterized by the expressiveness of the figurines' faces (often shown with an inward look, as in the 'self-portrait') and by their detailed and richly folded clothing. The emphasis on expression of inner emotions sets Riemenschneider's work apart from that of his immediate predecessors.
Riemenschneider's early success as a sculptor was due to the plasticity of his works, with great care being taken of modeling the folds of garments. This way of sculpting the garments as well as the typical oval faces and almond-shaped eyes were modelled on art from the Upper Rhine region of the 1470s, implying that Riemenschneider may have learned his trade either there or at Ulm. Later works lost some of the volume of the early sculptures, allowing a more efficient production.
Riemenschneider is seen today as one of the first sculptors of the 15th century who did not have all his figures painted. Prior to the 1490s, almost every sculpture had been painted in several layers by a different artist, who often attracted more admiration than the sculptor. The reasons for shifting to a new type of art, where the wood was visible, are still debated by art historians.
Riemenschneider worked in both wood and stone. It is assumed he learned stone carving first and only later turned to wood carving. Some wooden figures, though unmistakably his own work, show some signs of less-than-perfect choice of wood or handling.
Souren Melikian places Riemenschneider's best work, such as the "Virgin listening to the Annunciation", in the same league as the oil paintings of Albrecht Dürer. Art historian Kenneth Clark views the Riemenschneider figures as showing the serious personal piety in Germany in the late fifteenth century and as harbingers of the coming Reformation. Among his successors and/or pupils were and Philipp Koch.
Major works.
The largest collection of his work, 81 pieces, can be found in the "Mainfränkisches Museum" in the Fortress Marienberg in Würzburg.
In literature.
The character Goldmund in the 1930 book "Narcissus and Goldmund" by Hermann Hesse serves as an apprentice with a master sculptor who is socially prominent in the town where he worked and whose character appears to be loosely based on that of Riemenschneider. He serves both as an artistic inspiration for Goldmund and as a foil for the less restrained temperament of Goldmund.
Hesse describes Riemenschneider's statue of Mary with child which resides in the "Pfarrkirche St Bernard" in Würzburg as:
"Dreamily she gazes out from her glass case, far away from our world... in her gracefulness and distinction she is refined to a degree of perfection far above that of mankind today."
The plot of Elizabeth Peters's first Vicky Bliss mystery novel, "Borrower of the Night" (1973) centers around the search for a missing Riemenschneider sculpture. Most of the action takes place in Rothenburg ob der Tauber.


Wuding Road station

Wuding Road () is a station under construction on the future Line 14 of the Shanghai Metro. Located at the intersection of Wuding Road and South Wuning Road in the city's Jing'an District, the station is scheduled to open with the rest of Line 14 in 2020.


Arnold Dolmetsch

Eugène Arnold Dolmetsch (24 February 1858 – 28 February 1940), was a French-born musician and instrument maker who spent much of his working life in England and established an instrument-making workshop in Haslemere, Surrey. He was a leading figure in the 20th-century revival of interest in early music.
Early life.
The Dolmetsch family was originally of Bohemian origin, but (Eugène) Arnold Dolmetsch, the son of Rudolph Arnold Dolmetsch and his wife Marie Zélie (née Guillouard) was born at Le Mans, France, where the family had established a piano-making business. It was in the family's workshops that Dolmetsch acquired the skills of instrument-making that would later be put to use in his early music workshops.
He studied music at the Brussels Conservatoire and learnt the violin with Henri Vieuxtemps. In 1883 he travelled to London to attend the Royal College of Music, where he studied under Henry Holmes and Frederick Bridge, and was awarded a Bachelor of Music degree in 1889.
The early music revival.
Dolmetsch was employed for a short time as a music teacher at Dulwich College, but his interest in early instruments was awakened by seeing the collections of historic instruments in the British Museum. After constructing his first reproduction of a lute in 1893, he began building keyboard instruments. William Morris encouraged him to build his first harpsichord. He left England to build clavichords and harpsichords for Chickering of Boston (1905–1911), then for Gaveau of Paris (1911–1914).
During Dolmetsch's time at Chickering, he resided in a house in Cambridge, Massachusetts, partially of his own design, with the aid of architects Luquer and Godfrey. It was through Dolmetsch's work in Cambridge that a wealthy benefactress, Miss Belle Skinner, was able to restore a number of rare instruments, including a spinet owned by Marie Antoinette, which today comprise the founding collection of Yale's Collection of Musical Instruments.
He went on to establish an instrument-making workshop in Haslemere, Surrey, and proceeded to build copies of almost every kind of instrument dating from the 15th to 18th centuries, including viols, lutes, recorders and a range of keyboard instruments. His 1915 book "The Interpretation of the Music of the XVIIth and XVIIIth Centuries" was a milestone in the development of 'authentic performances' of early music.
In 1925 he founded an annual chamber music festival, the International Dolmetsch Early Music Festival, which is held every July at Haslemere in the Haslemere Hall.
Dolmetsch was active in the cultural life of London, and his friends and admirers included William Morris, Selwyn Image, Roger Fry, Gabriele D'Annunzio, George Bernard Shaw, Marco Pallis, Ezra Pound, George Moore, whose novel "Evelyn Innes" celebrates Dolmetsch's life and work, and W. B. Yeats.
He was responsible for rediscovering the school of English composers for viol consort (including John Jenkins and William Lawes), leading to Sir Henry Hadow's tribute that Dolmetsch had "opened the door to a forgotten treasure-house of beauty". He was also largely responsible for the revival of the recorder, both as a serious concert instrument, and as an instrument which made early music accessible to amateur performers. He went on to promote the recorder as an instrument for teaching music in schools.
In 1937 he received a British Civil list pension and in 1938 he was created a chevalier of the Légion d'honneur by the French government.
Dolmetsch family.
Arnold Dolmetsch was married three times. On 28 May 1878 he married Marie Morel of Namur, Belgium (a widow, ten years his senior) but was divorced in 1898. His second wife, to whom he was married on 11 September 1899, in Zürich, was Elodie Désirée, the divorced wife of his brother. This marriage ended in divorce in 1903. Thirdly, he was married on 23 September 1903 to Mabel Johnston, one of his pupils.
Dolmetsch encouraged the members of his family to learn the skills of instrument-making and musicianship and the family frequently appeared together in concerts, playing instruments constructed in the Dolmetsch workshops. Following the death of Arnold Dolmetsch at Haslemere in 1940, his family continued to promote the building and playing of early instruments.


M7 mine

The M7 is a small, metal-cased United States anti-tank blast mine that was used during the Second World War. It was based on the British Hawkins grenade. Approximately 2.5 million were produced before production ceased, and although it has long since been withdrawn from U.S. service, it can be found in Angola, Burma, Cambodia, Chad, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Korea, Lebanon, Myanmar, Somalia, Thailand, and Zambia.
Description.
The mine has a thin olive green painted steel case, with a large hinged pressure plate. This plate transfers force onto the mine's fuze. The fuze is triggered by relatively low pressures, making the mine effective against trucks and cars. Additionally, the fuze may be sensitive enough to make it effective as an anti-personnel mine. The mine was normally deployed inside a cloth bag or sack to prevent rocks getting trapped under the hinged lid of the mine. The mine only has a small main charge, so was typically deployed in lines or rows of up to five mines to be effective against tanks.
Several variants of the mine were produced, and two chemical (the M600 and M601) and one mechanical fuzes (the M603) were developed for the mine. A secondary fuze well may be fitted to the mine for anti-handling devices. The most common type of booby trap detonator is the M1 pull which is installed in the end fuse well. This can be attached to a trip wire or a small stake underground for anti-removal detonation. Command detonations can be achieved by screwing in an electric cap adapter and firing it with a demolition firing machine. It can even be detonated by installing a standard firing coupler with a fuse cap and safety fuse.


David E. Pergrin

Colonel David E. Pergrin (26 July 1917 – 7 April 2012) was commanding officer of the 291st Engineer Combat Battalion of the United States Army during World War II. Before the war he earned an engineering degree at Pennsylvania State University, graduating in 1940. While at Penn State he participated in the ROTC program. In addition, Pergrin played on the university's football team, was elected to the Tau Beta Pi and Chi Epsilon engineering honor societies, and was senior class president. Before graduation he was voted Outstanding Non-Fraternity senior. In his role as senior class president, he presented the university with the Class of 1940 gift – the Nittany Lion Shrine, a 14-ton limestone monument symbolizing the Penn State tradition. However, the monument was not officially dedicated until 1942.
Military service.
Pergrin was called to active duty in April 1941, with the rank of 2nd Lieutenant. After helping train numerous engineering platoons and companies, he was transferred to the new 291st Engineer Combat Battalion in April, 1943 to assist in its training. In August, he was given command of the battalion when it completed its states-side training. During training in the United States and Britain, then Major, later Lt. Colonel, Pergrin emphasized individual leadership which he credited as the main reason for the unit's success in completing its missions, especially while under enemy fire.
Battle of the Bulge.
The battalion served in France, Belgium and Germany. It was particularly effective as the engineer unit that primarily caused the delay of the advance elements of the Sixth Panzer Army, especially the Kampfgruppe under command of Joachim Peiper, during the Battle of the Bulge. Individual squads and platoons blew bridges, planted mines, and defended roadblocks in the face of oncoming tank columns, causing further confusion in German plans. Upon seeing another bridge blown up just as his tanks reached it, Peiper is said to have uttered the words, "Diese verdammten Pioniere!, Diese verdammten Pioniere!" ("Those damned engineers! Those damned engineers!"). Kampfgruppe Peiper was eventually contained and the Waffen-SS tankers had to abandon their vehicles.
Elements of the 291st were the first American soldiers to contact and rescue wounded survivors of the Malmedy massacre, and it was Pergrin who initially reported the massacre to higher headquarters. Later, toward the end of the Battle of the Bulge, the 291st was assigned responsibility to uncover the bodies of soldiers massacred at Malmedy for Graves Registration Service troops and documenting officers.
Battle of Remagen.
Due to its stellar reputation for working under enemy fire, the battalion was selected to build a treadway bridge down the Rhine river from the Ludendorff Bridge captured during the Battle of Remagen. The 291st began constructing the treadway bridge at 8:30 AM on 9 March about down river. The crews and the treadway bridge were struck by artillery and tank rounds and suffered several direct hits, slowing work on the bridge. They completed the first tactical bridge across the river in 32 hours at 5:10 PM on 10 March. At it was the longest tactical bridge ever built under fire. A German forward artillery observer with a radio was captured in Remagen, and artillery fire gradually let up.
Recognition.
The 291st was the most decorated combat engineering unit of World War II. The unit built more than 70 bridges—19 while under enemy fire—, cleared land mines, and demolished bridges during the Battle of the Bulge. It received the Presidential Unit Citation and other awards for its performance during the Battle of the Bulge.
Pergrin was recognized with the Purple Heart, Silver Star, Bronze Star, Presidential Unit Citation, Croix de guerre from France and Belgium, and the silver order of the De Fleurry Medal. In 1998, he was awarded the Freedom Foundation's George Washington Medal of Honor.
Post war.
In 1988, Pergin received Penn State University's Outstanding Engineer Award.
He also took up woodcarving as a hobby and published three tutorials about wood carving animals.


Allan Dibblee

J.T. Allan Dibblee (October 20, 1856 – January 31, 1915) was a hardware merchant and political figure in New Brunswick, Canada. He represented Carleton County in the Legislative Assembly of New Brunswick from 1892 to 1899 as a Liberal-Conservative member.
He was born in Woodstock, New Brunswick and educated in Carleton County. Dibblee married Maria Ellegood. He served on the town council and was mayor of Woodstock in 1890 and 1891.


Five Dock railway station

Five Dock railway station is a proposed station on the Sydney Metro West that will serve the Sydney suburb of Five Dock. It is scheduled to open with the rest of the line by 2030.


Sirisena Cooray

Bulathsinghalage Sirisena Cooray, JP is a Sri Lankan politician. He was the Mayor of Colombo from 1979 to 1989 and was elected from Colombo to Parliament in the 9th parliamentary election in 1989 and was appointed Minister of Housing and Construction in the Premadasa cabinet. He had served as General Secretary of the United National Party during the tenure of party leader Ranasinghe Premadasa He submitted nominations for the Colombo Municipal Council elections in 2006 as the Mayor, however his party nominations list was rejected by the election commission on a technicality. The independent party backed by Sirisena won the election and Uvais Mohamed Imitiyas became Mayor.
His brother Nandasena Cooray was a onetime Deputy Mayor of Colombo and was married to the sister of the former JVP leader Somawansa Amarasinghe.


Pomona (North) station

Pomona–North station ( ), formerly Pomona (North), is a railroad station located in Pomona, California. It is located just west of Garey Avenue and south of Bonita Avenue, and has 225 free parking spaces, which are accessible from either Santa Fe Street or Fulton Road.
The north Pomona station serves the San Bernardino Line. The Downtown Pomona station, located a few miles south and also near Garey, is an Amtrak station that also serves Metrolink trains on the Riverside Line.
By 2025, the Metro A Line is planned to also serve this station when the line is extended east from APU/Citrus College station.
The Pomona–North station is owned by the City of Pomona. A freight line (ex-ATSF Pasadena Subdivision) runs along the north side of the station. The old Santa Fe station lies to the east of the station, on the northwest corner of Santa Fe and Garey Avenue. Foothill Transit provides connecting service on Garey Avenue, with stops at Garey and Bonita Avenue for Lines 291 and 492, and stops at Garey Avenue and Arrow Highway for Lines 197 and 291, both approximately a half mile from the station. Both bus and rail service are available 7 days a week.
This site was the home to the Los Angeles and San Gabriel Valley Railroad station opened in 1887. In 1887 there was debate as to call the station the: North Pomona Station or Palomares Station or Palermo Station.
Metrolink's operations center is located near the station.


Mist, Oregon

Mist is an unincorporated community in Columbia County, Oregon, United States. Formerly called Riverside, the place was renamed in 1888 for the atmospheric conditions of the Nehalem Valley. The first land claims in the area had been made circa 1870. The original Riverside post office was closed in 1975.
Background.
On July 6, 2001, the Mist store, which was built in 1874, caught fire and was destroyed. Until then, it was the oldest continuously operating business in Oregon, offering food and hardware and displaying historic newspaper clippings and antique logging equipment on the walls.
Mist is a crossroads community where Oregon Route 47 turns north to Clatskanie, and a pioneer trail (Burn Road) crossed the Nehalem River and went south to Vernonia. It is the eastern terminus of Oregon Route 202. The Nehalem River valley widens between Mist and Jewell and was favored by the Native American tribes of the area for hunting; it was later favored by early European American settlers for agriculture. Although the area is now sparsely settled, it is notable for having the largest operating sawmill in Columbia County and also geological conditions lending themselves to natural gas storage. Mist contains one of the very few, and therefore very valuable, natural gas storage areas in the Pacific Northwest. It operates unobtrusively on a hill near Mist. It is controlled by NW Natural (formerly Northwest Natural Gas) and is connected by several pipelines, including a and a pipeline along the Nehalem Highway.
Earlier in the 20th century, Mist had a logging camp next to a railroad used by the Kerry Timber and Logging Company. The remains of the camp were discovered in 2008 and 2009. Though still important in terms of logging, the population today is sparse, and there is no longer a railroad.


Xiepu Road station

Xiepu Road () is a station under construction on the future Line 14 of the Shanghai Metro. Located at the intersection of Xiepu Road and Pudong Avenue in Pudong, the station is scheduled to open with the rest of Line 14 in 2020. The station is located on the south side of the Yangpu Bridge.


Felicity Brown (milliner)

Felicity (Flic) Brown is an Australian milliner. She was born in Mudgee, and now lives in Broome, Western Australia.
She has shown her hats at New York Fashion Week.
Brown is the subject of a documentary, "Madhattan - Aussie Outback to New York Runway" shown on Lifestyle, that has won a number of awards, including the Special Jury Award for Bridging Cultures at the Arizona International Film Festival, and the World Cinema Documentary Feature award at the Amsterdam Film Festival.
Her story has also been part of a "Landline" program.


Serangoon North MRT station

Serangoon North MRT station is a future underground Mass Rapid Transit station on the Cross Island line located on the boundary of Serangoon and Hougang planning areas, Singapore. It will be located underneath Ang Mo Kio Avenue 3, at the junctions of Serangoon North Avenue 1 and Serangoon North Avenue 3.
The station is in the vicinity of residential developments near Serangoon North, and community amenities such as The Serangoon Community Club, Hwi Yoh Community Centre, Rosyth School, Serangoon Garden Secondary School, Bowen Secondary School and various other places of worship such as Masjid Al-Istiqamah.
History.
On 25 January 2019, LTA announced that Serangoon North station would be part of the proposed Cross Island line (CRL). The station will be constructed as part of Phase 1, consisting of 12 stations between Aviation Park and Bright Hill, and is expected to be completed in 2030.

Initially expected to open in 2029, the restrictions on the construction due to the COVID-19 pandemic has led to delays in the CRL line completion, and the date was pushed to 2030.


William C. Street

William Camp Street (August 7, 1816 – April 7, 1893) was a member of the Connecticut Senate representing the 12th District from 1867 to 1869 and a member of the Connecticut House of Representatives representing Norwalk from 1863 to 1865. He served as Warden of the Borough of Norwalk, Connecticut in 1860.
He was the son of William Jarvis Street and Sarah Camp. His father had owned a hardware business in Norwalk, and also served as Warden of the Borough of Norwalk. For some time, he was a business partner with William H. Smith, who also served as warden of Norwalk.
In 1849, he was one of the original incorporators of the Norwalk Savings Society.
In 1860, he was Warden of the Borough of Norwalk.
On October 26, 1876, he was elected to the board of directors of the Norwalk and Danbury Railroad.
In 1878, he was on the board of directors of the Norwalk Fire Insurance Company.


Parramatta metro station

Parramatta metro station is a proposed station on the Sydney Metro West that will serve the Parramatta central business district. It is to be built within the block bounded by George, Macquarie, Church and Smith streets, to the north of the existing Parramatta railway station. An entrance is proposed to be built on Horwood Place, with other potential entrances still to be determined (as of March 2020). The metro station is anticipated to increase capacity at Parramatta railway station by relieving demand in peak times. It is scheduled to open with the rest of the line by 2030.


Axel Sveinsson

Axel Sveinsson (3 April 1896 - 12 August 1957) was a civil engineer, having received his engineering degree in Copenhagen in 1927.
He is noted for having designed several lighthouses in Iceland; these include the lighthouses at Hólmsbergsviti, Garðskagi, Þrídrangaviti and Knarrarós. A postage stamp depicting the Vattarnes lighthouse at Reyðarfjörður, which was designed by Axel, was issued in 2013.


Railway coupling conversion

From time to time, a railway decides that it needs to upgrade its coupling system from one that is proving unsatisfactory, to another that meets future requirements. This can be done gradually, which can create many problems with transitional incompatibilities, or overnight, which requires much planning.
By region.
Europe.
The European network has traditionally been formed of many independent national railway networks with buffer and chain used near universally to allow the interchange of rolling stock. The European Union Technical Specifications for Interoperability (TSIs) for high-speed passenger rolling stock mandate the use of Scharfenberg Type 10-compatible couplings. The Type 10 includes "horns" to aid coupling on curves and include a function to provide standardised automatic air-brake connections; the coupling horn is often visible poking out at the front of the nose of high-speed trains.
For European freight, the TSIs mandate buffer and chain couplings at specified heights. The European system links to the former Soviet Russian-gauge network, where SA3 automatic couplers are used. Some research has been undertaken to choose an automatic freight coupler compatible with the Soviet one, but owing to widescale replacement cost, no action has been taken to implement the conversion, except for some trial installations. In many heavy-haul applications, such as for coal and iron ore, either US AAR-type couplers or Soviet SA-3 couplers are used. Conversion is made harder to justify because the existing buffer and chain coupling is almost universal.
Meanwhile, drawgear of new rolling stock is being built at a height suitable for conversion. The proposed European C-AKv freight coupler is compatible with the SA3 coupler but adds integrated air and electrical connections. This standard would need to be revised to allow for the unforeseen development of electronically controlled pneumatic brakes.
In Germany all freight wagon have been built with a UIC automatic coupler option since 1976. This mounting option can be used to deploy the C-Akv coupler when a conversion is implemented. A further advantage in such a scenario is, that the C-Akv coupler can also function like the hook and air connectors for a hook-and-chain coupler, ad long as the vehicle with the C-Akv coupler still has buffers.
Soviet Union and successor states.
Russian Empire and later Soviet Union used buffer and chain couplings, albeit with possibly wider centres for the buffers, until conversion to automatic SA3 couplers. The SA3 coupler was invented in 1932, based on a British invention from 1916. Some wagons were equipped with SA-3 couplers in the 1930s (they could be coupled with chain coupling), but all cars received automatic couplers in 1957.
United States.
Once Congress passed the Safety Appliance Act in 1893, mandating conversion from the link and pin coupler to the Janney coupler, railroads in the United States had only a few years to implement the change. The railroads in North America, except for mass transit, form one unitary system, and uniformity of couplers is important for smooth interchange of rolling stock.
Latin America.
Railways in Central and South America are fragmented by gauge, geography, and financial and technical heritage. While some systems have adopted the American Janney coupler, others retain the British buffer and hook (buffer and chain) coupler (see above).
Japan.
Japan converted its British-derived buffer and chain couplings to the American Janney coupling over a period of a few days in the early 1920s, after considerable preparation. Today, most (if not all) EMUs including high-speed Shinkansen trains, and some DMUs use the Shibata type coupling system, while locomotive-hauled trains use the Janney coupling and Tightlock coupling system.
Philippines.
The Manila Tranvía system first adopted the use of British buffers and chain couplers with the acquisition of the Manila Railway Manila class in 1885. After American rolling stock became more common under the Manila Railroad during the late 1920s, Janney couplers were adopted as the standard, and were first adopted on the locally-assembled RMC class railcars of 1928. World War II-era and post-war locomotives such as the Manila Railroad 800 class of 1944 only use Janney couplers. Today's Philippine National Railways, which succeeded the Manila Railroad also, also uses Janney couplers for all of its rolling stock.
Starting in the 1990s, both Scharfenberg and Shibata couplers are being adopted on electrified rapid transit lines in Metro Manila. The first use of the Scharfenberg coupler was for the Manila MRT Line 3 in 1999. Meanwhile, the first use of the Shibata coupler was for the LRT Line 2. In the future, Shibata couplers are also expected for use on the MRT Line 7, the Metro Manila Subway, and the North–South Commuter Railway (NSCR). The NSCR is so far the only PNR line that will use Shibata couplers, with the future South Long Haul project continuing to use Janney couplers for its rolling stock.
Australia.
Australia, with its breaks of gauge, has always had different couplers on different systems, and has generally adopted gradual conversion. Conversion to the Janney coupling is now virtually complete. Commonwealth Railways started with Janney couplings on its Trans-Australian line, and some railways, like the former Victorian Railways and the Queensland Railways, used dual couplers. Older couplers remain on Heritage railways.
Middle East.
While the Middle East is mostly standard gauge, three different couplings appear to be in use (not counting Scharfenberg couplings on EMU trains). These are buffer-and-chain, American, and Russian types.
Africa.
South of the Sahara, Janney (AAR) and chopper couplings (not necessarily of compatible types) appear to account for most couplings. The preferred and proposed UAR standard is the American Janney (AAR) coupling.


Sigmund Riefler

Sigmund Riefler (9 August 1847 – 21 October 1912) was a German physicist, inventor and precision clockmaker.
Life.
Sigmund Riefler was born on 9 August 1847 to Magdalena and Clemens Riefler. He studied mathematics, geodesy and mechanical engineering at the Technical University of Munich, and then physics and astronomy at the University of Munich. From 1870 he worked as an engineer in the Royal Prussian Land Survey, surveying land in Schleswig.
In 1876 after the death of his father, he took over the firm of Clemens Riefler with his two brothers, Adolf and Theodor. Sigmund worked mainly on new developments in the area of drawing instruments and precision clocks, while his brothers handled the technical, sales and management of the company.
In 1878 he settled in Munich, to be in contact with the local scientific community. He invented the Riefler escapement which was patented in 1889. He died in Munich on 21 October 1912 at the age of 65.
In popular culture.
Monroe mentions Sigmund Riefler in the "One Night Stand" episode in Season 3 of "Grimm".


2nd Combat Engineer Battalion

2nd Combat Engineer Battalion is a combat engineer battalion of the United States Marine Corps . They are based out of Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, North Carolina and fall under the command of the 2nd Marine Division and the II Marine Expeditionary Force.
Mission.
Enhance the mobility, counter mobility, and survivability of the Marine Division through combat and limited general engineering support. The Combat Engineer Battalion performs the following tasks:
Current units.
 -Route Clearance Platoon 1 (RCP1)
 -Route Clearance Platoon 2 (RCP2)
 -Route Clearance Platoon 3 (RCP3) *embedded into Operation Detachment Alpha 3121
 -Assault Breacher Vehicle Platoon (ABV)
 -Headquarters and Support Platoon (HQ)
History.
The 2nd Combat Engineer Battalion was activated on 1 November 1940 in order to support the 2nd Marine Brigade. With existing Company A and the activation of the Headquarters and Service Company, Companies B and C were organized 6 December 1940 in San Diego, California. On 1 April 1941, the battalion was assigned to Division Special Troops of the 2nd Marine Division. On 4 November 1941, 2nd Engineer Battalion was relocated to Marine Barracks, Navy Yard, Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Upon Arrival, Headquarters and Service Company and Company A were assigned to Construct Camp Caitlin, Oahu.
The 2nd Engineer Battalion was relocated on 13 May 1942 to Camp Elliot, San Diego. From here, engineers from Company A embarked for Guadalcanal, and participated in the landing on that island. On 8 September 1942 2nd Engineer Battalion was redesignated as "1st Battalion, 18th Marines". During World War II, the engineers of 18th Marines participated in Campaigns on Guadalcanal, Tarawa, Saipan, Tinian, and Okinawa. 18th Marines was redesignated 16 August 1944 as the 2nd Engineer Battalion. On 23 September 1945, 2nd Engineer Battalion was redeployed to Nagasaki, Japan to begin its duty with the Occupational Force.
The 2d Engineer Battalion relocated to Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune, during July 1946. A major redesignation took place on 17 May 1958 with 2nd Engineer Battalion becoming the 2nd Pioneer Battalion, 2nd Marine Division. Engineers with Battalion Landing Team's 1/8, 3/6, and 2/2 landed in Lebanon during the summer of 1958. The 2nd Pioneer Battalion maintained a combat-ready posture during the October/November Cuban Missile Crisis while on maneuvers in the Caribbean. Another change of designation took place on 1 April 1976 when the 2nd Pioneer Battalion returned to its former designation as the 2nd Engineer Battalion. During the spring of 1965, Marines from 2nd Engineer Battalion landed in the Dominican Republic on a peace keeping mission. Also, training exercises in numerous European and South American countries were supported by Marines from 2nd Engineer Battalion, who participated in civic action projects. On 15 April 1976 the 2nd Engineer Battalion was designated as 2nd Combat Engineer Battalion.
In the 1970s and early 1980s the battalion furnished Combat Engineer Support to the Battalion Landing Teams (BLT) in the Mediterranean, the Caribbean, 29 Palms, Norway, and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. From August 1982 to February 1984 Marines from 2nd Combat Engineer Battalion were part of the multinational peacekeeping force in Beirut, Lebanon. Late in October 1983, Combat Engineers landed and occupied the island of Grenada with the 22nd Marine Amphibious Unit. The battalion continued to provide Combat Engineer Platoons to the BLT's of the 22nd and 26th Marine Expeditionary Units and support elements of the division throughout the world. During April 1990, elements of the Battalion supported division units attached to Marine Forces Panama and participated in Operation Just Cause. In August 1990, Company D, while deployed aboard the off the coast of West Africa participated in Operation Sharp Edge assisting in the evacuation of civilians from Liberia. During Operation Desert Storm the Battalion deployed in support of the 4th MEB and the 2nd Marine Division leading the division through the myriad of obstacle belts into Kuwait. Recently engineers have participated in military operations in Bosnia, Haiti, and Cuba, and most recently, participating in Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom.


Italian cruiser Cesare Rossarol

Cesare Rossarol was a scout cruiser built in Sestri Ponente, Genoa, in 1913 and launched by S.A.I. Gio. Ansaldo & C. in Liguria, Italy, in 1914. Like her sister ships, "Alessandro Poerio" and "Guglielmo Pepe", she was named after a famous Neapolitan light cavalryman who helped defend Venice from attacks by the Austro-Hungarian Army during the revolutions in 1848.
Service.
"Cesare Rossarol" was an Italian light scout cruiser (Italian:"esploratore leggero") measuring long and wide. She was equipped with Yarrow type 3 three-drum water tube boilers with water pipes, two groups of steam turbines Belluzzo of , two 3-blade propellers, a fuel capacity of 325 tons, giving her a range for 2,400 miles at 13 knots. She could launch torpedoes while maintaining a constant speed of over 30 knots. With a displacement of 891 tons or 1,270 tons when full, she was fitted with six 102/35 mm, four tls. trainings 45 mm and two 40/39 machine-guns with a mine positioning system, making her the equivalent of the Austro-Hungarian -class light cruisers.
She began service in November 1915, patrolling the lower part of the Adriatic, and later joining her sister ships to form the Second Group of the Fourth Division. Together they patrolled the upper Adriatic until June 1917 when she was ordered to be transferred to Brindisi and incorporated into the Fourth Group of the Fourth Division. She took part in several battle operations, laying mine fields, fighting small ships and aircraft, scouting and escorting battleships.
Sinking.
During the Adriatic Campaign of World War I, soldiers of the Austro-Hungarian Empire set up extensive minefields along the waters of the Istrian Peninsula, in Croatia. Following the Armistice of 4 November 1918, no real attempt to communicate the position or extent of the many minefields was made and, as a result of this lack of action on the part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire's naval command, a number of ships were sunk after the war after hitting wartime mines. "Cesare Rossarol" was sunk by a mine less than one week after the ceasefire declared by Germany on Armistice Day.
At the end of the war "Cesare Rossarol" was off the coast of Austria-Hungary, outside the empire's main naval harbour and arsenal at Pola. She had been assigned to serve as an anti-submarine patrol ship after giving support to the landing and occupation of the city when Lieutenant Ludovico De Filippi, captain of "Cesare Rossarol", received orders to escort a Serbian officer to Fiume whose orders were to convince the Serb-Croatian irregular troops not to oppose to the Italian occupation of the city. Just before noon, she moved down from Pola to Cape Kamenjak and then on towards Fiume Harbour only to hit a mine early on Saturday afternoon 16 November 1918.
The force of the explosion almost instantly tore the ship in two parts. The bow quickly sank vertically, while the severely damaged 30-meter high stern drifted for another hundred meters before sinking. Eighteen other ships arrived at the site, but most of the crew were trapped inside the hull and went down with the ship.
The sinking of "Cesare Rossarol" two nautical miles off the coast of Lisignano left ninety-three petty officers and marines dead, including seven officers and the captain and was one of the largest losses of life for the Italian navy during the war.


Frelon (material)

Frelon is a polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) based material with other proprietary fillers to increase bearing characteristics, such as low wear, low friction, and high strength. It is chemically inert and self lubricating. It qualifies as a class III plain bearing. The load capacity of a frelon-lined bearing is typically four to eight times that of a comparable ball bearing; for instance, a Frelon-lined bearing can support the same load as a ball bearing.
Characteristics.
Frelon creates a self-lubricating bearing surface by transferring some of the soft PTFE to the shafting during the running in process. It is almost universally chemically inert; the only materials that attack it are molten sodium and fluorine at elevated temperatures.
It has a plain bearing pressure rating (P) of ; dry velocity rating (V) of 140 surface feet per minute (sfm) (0.71 m/s); and a PV rating of 10,000 psi sfm (0.35 MPa m/s).
Additional lubrication can reduce friction and wear by 50%.