The neighborhood turned E Columbia into a giant hopscotch route in 2020
SDOT says these purple-dashed CD’s Stay Healthy Streets are “under review”
Created during the pandemic to give more people safer options for walking, running, and biking but implemented with movable barriers and frequently ignored signs, the city’s “Stay Healthy Streets” routes across the Central District are either under review or already marked to revert to simpler “neighborhood greenway” setups, the Seattle Department of Transportation has announced.
In its update on the program laying out plans for the existing routes in the city and a few new additions being planned, SDOT says some Central District streets in the program including the key route on 22nd Ave connecting to neighborhood greenways on Capitol Hill and giving bikers and walkers an alternative to the 23rd Ave traffic artery are set to have the Stay Health barriers and signage removed.
Other streets in the CD, SDOT says, including stretches of E Columbia and 25th Ave are now “under review.”
“Over the next few weeks, we plan to visit all existing Healthy Street locations to check on the condition of signs and repair or replace them as needed,” the SDOT update reads. “We’ll also remove signs on Healthy Streets that will become neighborhood greenways like they were before the pandemic.”
The full map of planned changes to the program and areas like the CD that are being reviewed
Where planned, SDOT says it will also “begin installing the updated signs for permanent Healthy Streets locations” — that’s not currently part of the plan anywhere along the Central Area routes.
That’s a change in message from what CHS heard in spring of 2020 as the new streets were added to the program in the Central District with plans for making the routes permanently changed to reduce motor vehicle traffic:
Seattle’s Stay Healthy Streets designations mean routes closed to “through motor vehicle traffic “in order to give people more space while social distancing.” The hope is to create more space for distancing, exercise, and recreation. Officials also hope the routes can help connect people to services and businesses without the need for cars or public transit. The streets remain open to “local traffic” and deliveries and the rules are in effect 24×7.
But the execution was half-hearted at best with easily moved barriers and flimsy signage regularly knocked over or smashed by a passing car.
SDOT says while many people provided positive feedback about the Stay Healthy Streets providing more safety, creating “a more enjoyable neighborhood,” and providing “more open space,” many complained of “difficulty getting around,” the “ineffective signs,” “safety-related issues” related to confusion and vehicles passing through the streets, and “feeling excluded.”
With a step back to greenway status, the CD routes would still be marked with signs and managed to encourage safer walking and biking as they connect with similar routes across Capitol Hill where SDOT opted not to trial the Stay Healthy Streets concept in the neighborhood’s more expensive areas of predominantly single family-style housing.
SDOT has not said what its timeline is for any removals from the Stay Healthy Streets program.
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So important to have safe walking routes in the neighborhoods. Wish the City Transportation Dept would commit the resources needed to make this program a success, rather than doing a limited job and declaring it a failure.
I couldn’t agree more! This was an incredible opportunity to easily build a network throughout the city for non-motorized transportation use that is safe and accessible to users of all ages and abilities, as well as have areas for pop-up activities and pocket parks.
In the CD at least, all of the barricaded streets have sidewalks on both sides of the street. These are safe walking routes since before the pandemic, so keeping them closed beyond the initial COVID panic was inane. I agree the city should invest in sidewalks for the many streets that lack them.
Agree completely! I have always thought that the “Healthy Streets” was a ridiculous and unnecessary program, as we already have safe and permanent places for people to walk and run. They are called “sidewalks.”
Sidewalks are often not well maintained nor wide enough for users like children on bicycles, or people using mobility scooters and electric wheelchairs. Also, bikes aren’t supposed to be on sidewalks, so you’re still ignoring my plea for these to be used as an incredibly low-cost way to build out that network. Please try thinking about people with experiences other than your own 🙏
The answer is investment in sidewalk maintenance and repair. And an actual greenways program. This was a half assed joke from the beginning with almost no investment or network design.
Sidewalk maintenance is the responsibility of the adjacent property owners, am I correct in assuming you all are advocating for more enforcement? I report sidewalk issues weekly on find it fix it and am often given the response that a notice is given to the property owner and nothing ever happens 🤷🏻♂️
Also, you all must not know or interact with people in wheelchairs or pushing carts, because helping people with our sidewalk ramps and getting through narrow areas with obstructions is something that I do or see on a weekly basis and have heard regularly in discussions with people in wheelchairs. It really isn’t that hard to design with some dignity for all users in mind, rather than designing everything for cars and treating everything else like an afterthought.
Point taken. But, the answer is better sidewalk maintenance, and not closing streets.
They’re called “sidewalks.”
There seems to be a problem where more affluent areas get precedence for their streets to shut off traffic. Alki Point has this issue currently and it was just made permenant. We need these in non-affluent areas too.
Columbia Street through the CD and Madrona is affluent by any measure. Any decent house there goes for a $Million on up.
The program was a decent start and showed us how friendly and enjoyable a traffic-safe neighborhood can be. All ‘Stay Healthy Streets’ should be completely pedestrianized, with vehicle traffic allowed only for residents (in their blocks), deliveries, emergency services, infrastructure projects, and construction. And many more Seattle streets should be blocked off to random car traffic and give walkers and bicyclists priority. In these pandemic years, I’ve never seen enforcement of any kind, and drivers in the CD largely disregarded the signage and just went however they needed to. That would need to be handled differently. After the first eight months or so of the Stay Healthy Streets program, pedestrians figured out this wasn’t really keeping them safe from anything except it gave them a way to avoid aggressive non-maskers, so they mostly returned to the sidewalks and have been there since. Many European cities have solved this nicely.
Hallelujah. The barricades should have come down as soon as the initial terror of COVID gave way to better understanding that the risk of catching it from a chance sidewalk passing outdoors is virtually nil. The barricades themselves are an even greater hazard as we are forced to veer around them into potential head-on traffic.
The only time I got it, it was from a man talking to me for about 10 seconds (my baby’s stroller had rolled off our front area into the sidewalk and we both went to grab it at the same time, had a brief exchange like “Oh, I’m sorry, thanks!” “No problem, doing my part!”) and then he stepped back and said, “Actually, I’m feeling a bit under the weather.” This was January last year during peak Omicron and my family had completely locked down again because I and one of my sons have a heart condition that put us at greater risk and he wasn’t vaccinated yet. Not a single other interaction with anyone up close and didn’t step inside anywhere for months.
My neighborhood has sidewalks so I am confused about the supposed need to shut down streets.
Can’t stand these signs. Missed a few doctor’s appointments because cab drivers mistakenly thought the roads were closed. Get more traffic cops to enforce existing laws; take away these signs.
The current signs are effective in quieting traffic. No cars are speeding through those streets. I call it a success, no need to outlaw cars.
Not on my street… the sign is simply ignored at one end and was so often vandalized, run over and stolen at the other end that is hasn’t been there for probably a year now. Little of the traffic that uses my street are actually people who live here and we’re well up to pre-pandemic levels and speeds (so zooming as fast as they can). Zero people use the street to walk in, because they aren’t in the mood to be run over.
I live next to one, use it daily, and I like it a lot. It’s safer for me to ride my bike and for my kid to ride a scooter, in a street that actively discourages cars and trucks and causes (most) drivers to be more careful.
city streets are for anyone to use – should i be prepared to show my papers to prove i live the neighborhood?
No, just if you choose to use this street you may be sharing it with little kids on bikes and scooters and should drive as such… these are meant to be residential roads, not through streets that are sped through because your GPS tells you to.
Not once in the two years of this program have I actually seen anyone use the streets as you describe. It’s time for the unsightly and often confusing and frustrating signs to come down.
I see them used almost daily as described, it would be great to have some actual data or feedback from communities, rather than anecdotal evidence. I think GPS routing traffic through neighborhood streets is more confusing, unsightly, and much more dangerous than providing neighborhood thoroughfares meant for moving people.
These are all on existing neighborhood greenways. If you are driving more than one block on them in the first place you are doing it wrong, and the signs are just reminding you of that. The number of kids I’ve seen biking to school on them well makes up for the occasional annoyance of having to drive an extra block to get to my house.
Close them streets!!
Good riddance to this silly project. “Closing” streets that have cars parked on both sides, where people live – of course the signs are ignored. My personal favorite are the “closed” streets leading to the back parking lot at Garfield. Sheer genius closing streets accessing a parking lot.