At large in my own city

From time to time something new in Seattle is so different or so longed-for that it brings on a classic "Wait, where AM I?" moment.

Almost eleven years ago, we got a beautiful new concert hall, in the middle of downtown. Not only does it offer two fabulous performance facilities (large and small halls) but the three-story atrium-lobby is one of the most spectacular venues in the city. On a summer or winter night, its curved glass facade facing the lingering twilight or glittering city lights, it is a wonderful place to be.

And almost every one of my friends had exactly the same reaction to the hall on their first visit - "Is this really Seattle?"

Today I had another of those moments, when I rode the new Link Light Rail. In town, the sleek train cars run in the bus tunnel that has been part of life for 20+ years (if you subtract the two when it was closed because engineers discovered it would not, after all, support train tracks without major refurbishing. Oops.)

That's all in the past. On July 18 the trains started running, and finally, 42 years after a former mayor urged the city to develop a light rail system, we have it. There is only one line so far, and it won't reach the airport until December of this year, but it's a major step forward.

So today I checked it out, riding from Westlake Station to Tukwila. For much of the route, the train tracks follow a couple of major streets, but one section of the route is a tunnel, that emerges into an underground station that's all curved steel walls and sculptural glass panels.

That's when I had the "Where am I?" moment. I've been in other stations like the one at Beacon Hill - in Copenhagen, Vienna and Berlin. Here is an architecturally breathtaking place, half an hour from home.

There's nothing quite like playing tourist in your very own city.