Participants in the 2014 Seattle Dyke March
Drag Queen Story Time at PrideFest Family Day
A performer at the Capitol Hill Pride Festival on Broadway
Someday — maybe soon — we won’t be able to close down the street for a festival. But we’re fairly certain the Seattle Dyke March will parade down Broadway forever.
The Seattle Pride Saturday night tradition continued this weekend as the 2014 edition of the city’s LGTBQ celebration continued with a full day of activities and night of parties on Capitol Hill before Sunday’s downtown parade.
Nice shoes
The Capitol Hill Pride Festival — now in its sixth year — again had Broadway restaurants, bars, and merchants spilling into the street with Pride patios and special food and drink offerings. Despite the occasional sprinkle, attendance was again strong for the day of drag entertainment, pet fashion contests, singing, and dancing organized by Broadway merchants. Hopefully attendees got their fill. With the plan to extend the Broadway Streetcar targeting a 2017 start of service, construction of the line and changes in Seattle Department of Transportation policy could mean the end of closing off the street.
Meanwhile, PrideFest celebrated Family Day in Cal Anderson and filled 11th Ave near the park with food trucks in a new expansion of the Pride Saturday event. Kids enjoyed Drag Queen Story Time while in the background, the annual Prom Dress Rugby game played out on Bobby Morris Field.
More pictures of Pride Saturday on Capitol Hill, below.
What changes are planned by SDOT as far as street closures? I noticed busses yesterday along 12th, which I assume was because Broadway was closed.
I can understand that the north extension of the streetcar would preclude closing Broadway during construction, but afterwards it shouldn’t be a problem.
Once the street car is extended north to Roy (or beyond), a street closure on broadway north of john would mean no street cars running on broadway since you can’t re-route the street car as you can buses (the 49, 60, 9x all run on the section of broadway that was closed on saturday). Instead, the street car would terminate at denny and reverse course and head south again. The street would also be narrower since there will be a bikeway, and the turn lane will be lost. It remains to be seen how the bikeway will be separated from the sidewalk and the parking or traffic lanes, I don’t think the latest designs shown by SDOT are conclusive on that. But the bikeway and whatever separates it from the sidewalk and street could also pose a challenge for a festival closure of the street.
Thanks for your comment, Gregory….but I don’t see any major problem with closing down the streetcar north of John, and the bikeway, for just one day.
If street closure is banned, the businesses along that stretch of Broadway will not be pleased, because the Capitol Hill Pride Festival is primarily a way for them to bring in boatloads of cash on that day.
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