Tag Archives: bikes

Wanna ride bikes? The I-5 Colonnade Park is getting two new pump tracks this spring

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This pump track in Port Angeles is an example of the setup’s appeal for riders small and large (Image: City of Port Angeles)

The Colonnade (Image: Evergreen Mountain Bike Alliance)

Construction has started on a bicycle pump track project including a new paved track for young riders in a $314,000 overhaul of the city’s I-5 Colonnade mountain bike skills park below the busy freeway on the slope between Capitol Hill and Eastlake.

Seattle Parks and Recreation and the Evergreen Mountain Bike AllianceΒ announced the project is moving forward with construction slated to be completed before summer.

“One beginner-friendly, aMTB-friendly paved pump track; and one larger, steeper paved pump track are expected to be completed by the end of May,” the Alliance says.

The Alliance has been working to improve the bike recreation area challenged by homeless camping, litter, and the area’s steep slopes. It designed and built the Colonnade as “the first urban MTB skills park to open in the United States” when the space debuted in 2005. The Alliance began seeking funding for the new tracks in 2018. The group has been holding work sessions to help prepare the area for the new effort. Continue reading →

Don’t let new 520 bike/walk bridge get lost in the Montlake Lid’s sea of cars — Opening celebration Saturday

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The bridge crosses 520 just east of the new lid (Image: Washington State Department of Transportation)

Saturday, the Washington State Department of Transportation is inviting you to “walk/roll” across the ready-to-open bike and pedestrian bridge crossing the newly expanded SR-520 just east of the pretty much completed Montlake lid.

It’s understandable if you weren’t aware of a ready-to-open bike and pedestrian bridge crossing the newly expanded 520 just east of the pretty much completed Montlake lid. The $455.3 million Montlake Project to expand the freeway and lid it is a pretty car-forward project as it finally reaches completion after years of construction. The snarl of criss-crossing traffic lanes interconnecting with 24th Ave on the lid is bigger and busier than ever.

The pedestrian/bicyclist bridge just east of the new lid will provide some counterbalance to that motor vehicle snarl. It provides a north-south connection across the freeway for walkers and rollers only and connects to the SR 520 Trail, Bill Dawson Trail, or along Lake Washington Boulevard via the Montlake Lid. Continue reading →

CHS Pics | Dead Baby Down-Capitol Hill: Annual Seattle bike race zooms down 15th Ave E

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There is still a Critical Mass in Seattle but the long fight for cyclist rights in the city feels sometimes like more of a planning session than a direct action. The city has settled on a formula for adding its version of protected bike lanes to areas like Pike and Pine, the Fremont Bridge Bicycle Counter ticks its data into the City of Seattle Open Data portal, and we move on.

But the critical — and more profane — energy lives on. Saturday, bicyclists of all types gathered outside the temporary home of the Punk Rock Flea Market on Capitol Hill’s 15th Ave E for the start of the annual Dead Baby Downhill race.

Continue reading →

Seattle City Council holds first of two public hearings on $1.45B transportation levy proposal

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A Seattle City Council committee will host the first of two planned public hearings Tuesday on the proposed $1.45 billion transportation levy being readied for November’s ballot.

The Select Committee on the 2024 Transportation Levy’s hearing will focus on providing time for the public to speak in person and remotely on the proposed property tax. If approved by voters in the fall, the funding and spending plan will replace the $930 million levy approved in 2015.

The city says that under the current expiring levy, the cost to a typical homeowner is around $24 per month. The new eight-year levy proposal would increase the monthly cost by 70% to $41 per month. Continue reading →

Bike Everywhere Day on Capitol Hill includes calls for city to act ASAP to address safety issues with new Pike/Pine traffic flows

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CHS has been working on a larger story we hope to publish soon about the problems and what the city is going to do about them — but here’s a quick Bike Everywhere Day boost to the calls for city leaders and the Seattle Department of Transportation to act immediately to address the half-baked safety measures around the partially completed changes making Pike and Pine into one-way streets between Capitol Hill and downtown and the new bike lanes installed as part of the project.

CHS reported here on the construction challenges for the area from the project underway between I-5 and Bellevue Ave wrapping up 18 months of scheduled work changing the streets to one-way vehicular traffic and installing new bike lane protections.

Those challenges have now transitioned into day to day use challenges as the new traffic flow has opened and bicyclists are funneled into the designs despite missing signs and construction equipment blocking lanes. Continue reading →

‘The basics of a 21st-century transportation system’ — Seattle boosts transit levy proposal to $1.45B with $100M more for sidewalks, bikes, and transit

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Harrell digs in (Image: SDOT)

Mayor Bruce Harrell’s office has finalized his proposal for the city’s next transportation levy planned to go before Seattle voters in November — now with an even bigger price tag: $1.45 billion.

The Seattle Times is calling the eight-year proposal Seattle’s “biggest-ever property tax proposal.”

Transit, biking, and pedestrian advocates are calling it an improved proposal after a month of criticism over the plan’s focus on repairs, replacements, and realignments over new street and transit projects.

The mayor said Friday at a press conference unveiling the new proposal that feedback shaped a $100 million addition to the plan.

β€œOver the last month, we’ve received feedback from thousands of Seattle residents who want a transportation system that is safe, connected, and well maintained – this proposal will help get us there,”  Harrell said in a statement.

Transit advocacy leaders have been measured in their enthusiasm for the proposal, praising the administration for listening to constituents but framing the plan’s spending on elements like safety, transit, and non-motor vehicle travel as barely adequate.

“We thank the transit riders and the community of advocates who spoke up to ensure this levy ushers in the transportation future we need,” Kirk Hovenkotter, executive director, of the Transportation Choices Coalition, said in a statement from the mayor’s office that called the proposal’s investments “the basics of a 21st-century transportation system.”

“We thank Mayor Harrell for his leadership on the levy and for being responsive to community feedback.”

The updated levy proposal will add a more than $20 million to boost sidewalk work including adding 250 blocks of new sidewalks in the first four years.

The administration also responded to advocates, boosting funding earmarks for improving transit corridors by 20% to around $145 million in spending in the plan to improve safety and connectivity with light rail stations and on key routes like the 3, 4, and 31.

Bicycle spending in the proposal was also boosted around 20% with about $114 million in planned safety spending, and expansion of the city’s bike networks. Continue reading →

Seattle has a new 20-year transportation plan — Now, about that $1.35B levy…

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(Image: @seattledot) “Nearly one hundred years ago, on April 21, 1924, the first traffic light in Seattle was installed at 4th and Jackson…”

The Seattle City Council Tuesday approved a new 20-year transportation plan for transit, street, sidewalk, and bridge projects across Seattle that will serve as the framework for the planned $1.35 billion transportation levy renewal vote this fall.

While still massive in scale and the result of a two-year process of outreach, bureaucracy, and budgeting, Mayor Bruce Harrell and council leadership are emphasizing the plan’s focus on day to day issues like potholes, sidewalks, and costly infrastructure repairs over the ambitious new initiatives and projects it might eventually spawn.

β€œIt’s time for us to prioritize the bold basics of local government. From filling potholes to expanding access to public transit, this 20-year vision for the future of Seattle’s roads does just that,” District 3 Councilmember Joy Hollingsworth, vice chair of the council’s Transportation Committee, said in a statement. “Local government can’t solve every problem on its own, but when we put our mind to it, we can build world-class transportation infrastructure.”

The Harrell administration plan was little changed by the council and some of the few additions underlined what is being positioned as a more neighborhood-focused approach. Continue reading →

Hollingsworth amendment for Seattle Transportation Plan focuses on Lake Washington Blvd safety

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(Image: City of Seattle)

A Seattle City Council committee Tuesday morning will take up a handful of amendments including a proposal from District 3 representative Joy Hollingsworth as it finalizes the city’s new long-term transportation plan.

CHS reported here on the proposed 20-year transportation plan for transit, street, sidewalk, and bridge projects across Seattle that will serve as the framework for the city’s planned transportation levy renewal.

Tuesday, the committee could move the plan forward to a full council vote after debate on a roster of amendments including downtown representative Bob Kettle’s push to remove funding from the so-called “Pike Place Event Street project” and amendments that seek to help better address the estimated 27% of Seattle streets that do not currently have sidewalks. Continue reading →

Capitol Hill Station opened in 2016 — It will finally have safe bike parking eight years later

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Capitol Hill Station began living up to its promise of changing the way we commute and move through the city when it served its first light rail passengers in March 2016.

Construction of the mixed-use developments above the busy subway station was completed in the summer of 2021.

Bike lockers to help serve the thousands who move through the station each day? April 2024 — probably.

Sound Transit is telling folks who care — like CHS tipster @CheeToS_ — that the long-promised bank of on-demand bike lockers finally installed above the station and giving riders a new, more secure option for leaving their rides behind on Broadway should open for service beginning next week.

“As it turns out, there were a number of challenges with the project,” a Sound Transit spokesperson tells CHS. Continue reading →

There still isn’t a crosswalk at Harvard and E Olive Way

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A photo Matt Baume sent to city officials showing yet another crash at Harvard and Olive

Even with a new representative on the city council more dedicated to public safety, transparency, and access, “One Seattle” slogans from City Hall, and leaders paying lip service to the importance of pedestrian and bike rider safety as they shape the city’s next billion dollar transportation levy, it still takes a hell of a lot of work and a few squeaky wheels for the Seattle Department of Transportation to add a needed crosswalk at a dangerous intersection on Capitol Hill.

Matt Baume, a neighborhood writer, has been documenting the crashes at E Olive Way and Harvard Ave E for about ten years, all the while trying to get safety improvements put in place. With new leadership in the district, Baume wrote to D3 Councilmember Joy Hollingsworth in January to share his concerns after yet another crash, this time involving three cars and several passengers including a family with a small child. Continue reading →