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Here are the top stories from this week in CHS history:
2018
With a snip of a ribbon, two years of construction starts on Capitol Hill Station development
CHS History | Rainbow crosswalks born, Q debuts, Cafe Solstice arrives
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Author Archives: CHS
CHS Pics | This week in Capitol Hill pictures
Capitol Hill and the nearby lends itself to great imagery. Social media is filled with images of the places and streets around us. We share some of the best here. To be included and help us find your stuff, use the #capitolhillseattle tag on Instagram or ping @capitolhillseattle or @jseattle via Twitter.
We still also have lots of love for the CHS Flickr Pool and its more than 36,000 photographs — most of Capitol Hill images, many glorious, some technically amazing. The pool is a mix of contributions from Capitol Hill shutterbugs. With changes at Flickr, its days of an amazing, free for most repository of great photography have shifted but we’re still watching.
Continue reading
Sponsored | Comcast partners with GSBA to memorialize 50th anniversary of Stonewall
Sponsored by Comcast and GSBA
It’s Pride Season and as a proud member of the Capitol Hill community, Comcast is partnering with GSBA – Washington State’s LGBTQ and Allied Chamber of Commerce – to recognize the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots and its significance in leading to the gay liberation movement and the modern fight for LGBTQ rights. Throughout this month and beyond, Comcast cable TV stations in Washington are broadcasting this video featuring GSBA President & CEO Louise Chernin. Continue reading
Seattle’s increasingly modest plans for new bike projects remain mostly modest despite community feedback — UPDATE
Sadly, the bravest father in Seattle (Image: SDOT)
The result of those spring café-style conversations on Seattle’s increasingly modest plans for new bike projects?
The Seattle Times reports “tweaks” after “backlash from cyclists” but says “construction will remain limited.”
Following outrage from cyclists, the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) will make some small changes to its near-term plan for building bike lanes and slow streets known as greenways. But those hoping to see a dramatic increase in construction of safe biking infrastructure are likely to be disappointed. In the latest version of its six-year bike work plan released Thursday, city officials added back several bike lanes and greenways they previously cut. But nearly all of the projects being resurrected are identified for early planning work, indicating their construction is still unfunded and could be years away.
The full report from the Times is here.
SDOT’s take on those “tweaks” is here: Continue reading
City Council takes a deeper look at Seattle hate crimes — 6 lessons
“Hate crimes are most frequently directed towards a victim’s race or ethnicity (54%) and sexual orientation (32%)”
The Seattle City Council’s Civil Rights, Utilities, Economic Development, and Arts Committee took a deeper look at the city’s continued rise in reported hate crime earlier this week and the findings show the challenge in stamping out the problem — areas in the city where the incidents occur are some of the busiest, densest, and most racially and culturally diverse. Continue reading
City Council notes: Showbox ‘saved’ some more, Battle of Fort Lawton ends
(Image: Seattle.gov)
It was a busy, pre-summer rush Monday for the Seattle City Council with a flurry of votes on some of the city’s important open issues.
- The Showbox: Proponents for preserving the 1st Ave building lined up for redevelopment scored another small victory Monday as the council voted 8-1 on an a six-month extension of the temporary expansion of the Pike Place Historic District. Last week, the building also made it through the first round of the city’s landmarks designation process. Unlike many of the council’s few 8-1 votes, the lone holdout was not District 3’s Kshama Sawant who has been a champion of the preservation effort even thought it is stymying potential redevelopment. Instead, interim council member Abel Pacheco was the lone voice on the council saying the need for housing — or, at least, Mandatory Housing Affordability in-lieu payments — outweighed the venue’s value.
- Fort Lawton: A housing battle that has simmered for 13 years reached a new milestone as the council unanimously approved a plan to create hundreds of units of affordable housing on the site of the former army base in northwest Seattle.
- Capitol Hill Design Guidelines and rent bidding ban: Also, as expected, the council approved updated design guidelines for Capitol Hill and extended the city’s temporary ban on rent bidding platforms.
CHS Pics | Partly cloudy with Thunderpussy — but no rain — at the 2019 Volunteer Park Pride Festival
With fairy wings, rainbow swimsuits, hip-hop funk, blues, and rock and roll, the Volunteer Park Pride Festival brought Seattle’s celebration of LGBTQ+ to Capitol Hill Saturday as part of a busy month of events in the neighborhood culminating with a weekend of parties around Pike/Pine and Broadway before the city’s annual parade on June 30th.
“The event being in the backyard of where I grew up is such a huge thing for me. I’m so proud to be on stage singing my heart out for the Seattle queer community,” J GRGRY, one of the musical artists who performed at Saturday’s festival told CHS. Continue reading
CHS Pics | Rainbows restored in Pike/Pine
Fears that redevelopment construction also ripped away a recent but highly visible symbol of the gayborhood were painted over this week as crews restored the Capitol Hill rainbow crosswalks along 11th Ave just in time for Pride.
When the construction crews dig in on any Capitol Hill project, Seattle Department of Transportation requirements mandate the right of way and its resources be restored. It’s no different for the city’s “Community Crosswalks” program. Continue reading
With a vision for affordability beyond the neighborhood, Capitol Hill Housing won’t just be Capitol Hill Housing much longer
Developed in conjunction with Africatown, The Black Community Impact Alliance, and Byrd Barr Place, Capitol Hill Housing’s Liberty Bank Building opened in MarchBy Tim Kukes for CHS
Capitol Hill Housing held its annual meeting Tuesday at the 12th Avenue Arts building, one of several projects across Seattle created by the nonprofit developer of affordable housing. Members of the organization gave status reports on the successes of the past year and discussed some of the challenges they were facing. But, CEO Chris Persons did what in journalism is called “burying the lede”.
“We’re coming up with a new name,” Persons said, late in the meeting. “Think about our name, Capitol Hill Housing, neither of those really represent what we do as an organization, so it is time after 40 years to select a different name.”
What was discussed prior to the announcement Tuesday morning illustrates the need for a new name and rebranding of the organization. As the leadership spoke it became clear that the message was that CHH was more than in the business for providing affordable housing and its scope was beyond Capitol Hill.
As Persons put it, “Building beyond buildings.” Continue reading
23rd Ave Vision Zero work not complete but street getting back to *new* normal in the Central District
(Image: SDOT)
After more than a year of construction as part of the overhaul of 23rd Ave from Montlake to the Central District, the southern end of the route is back open to vehicular traffic and the long project is moving into its final phases.
The Seattle Department of Transportation announced that 23rd Ave south of Jackson has been re-opened to two-way motor vehicle traffic though construction is still being wrapped up.
The so-called Phase 2 of the 23rd Ave Vision Zero plan began last spring to continue the effort of slimming down the corridor and adding sidewalk improvements including new paving, crosswalks, and upgraded pedestrian crossing signals, new landscaping and trees, and transit improvements including real-time arrival information and bus pullouts between Jackson and S Hill. Continue reading
