As many have suspected after years of studying why it’s so hard to get King County Metro Route 8 buses—aka “The L8″—to reach any destination on schedule, scientists have finally confirmed that the First Law of Motion does not apply to them.
“All other physical objects in the universe seem to have at least some ability to stay in motion after being put into motion—not so with Route 8,” said transit scientist Zak Newton. “Now, we still don’t know why, but we’re studying if it’s tied to the same phenomenon that suddenly sucks any Metro bus route into the void.”
King County Metro says it’s working on solutions that can fight the laws of science so the bus route that nonetheless remains popular can some day successfully move from Seattle Center, through South Lake Union and onto Mount Baker.
“To our credit, we’re doing everything we can to improve service and fight the hex on the route’s inertia and are currently studying adding either NOS or monster truck wheels to get it through traffic faster,” said Sarah Heigl. “We’re proud to say that we’ve been able to move a Route 8 bus that’s been stuck in South Lake Union since 2023 a whole 15 inches this year alone.”
In the meantime for the sake of transparency to transit riders, King County Metro says it will be officially renaming Route 8 to Route ∞.
