Tag Archives: bikes

School’s out for summer — How did student-friendly project to create Capitol Hill’s newest neighborhood greenway work out?

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The green bike box at 15th Ave E (Image: CHS)

By Ryan Packer

In the middle of 2020, when the Seattle Department of Transportation was still figuring out how to roll out pandemic-focused programs like the local-access-only Stay Healthy Streets, it was also installing a long-anticipated new neighborhood greenway to a street in Capitol Hill. The connection is a part of a Safe Routes to School project providing safer routes to Lowell Elementary and Meany Middle School. We covered the project at CHS as it was happening, but after an unconventional school year at Seattle Public Schools ended a few weeks ago, we decided to check back in on how the project has worked out.

The greenway connected to the one already in place along 21st Ave E and filled in a route envisioned on Seattle’s 2013 Bicycle Master Plan running east to west in Capitol Hill along E Republican Street. But to serve Lowell Elementary, the route takes a detour at 13th Ave E and connects with the back end of the school along E Roy Street. Users wanting to connect to Broadway can use one of Capitol Hill’s only pedestrian streets- but not during the start or end of school days during the school year.

The crossing improvements at E Roy Street and 12th Ave E, as well as at E Republican and 19th Ave E, featuring marked crosswalks on both sides of the street and flashing crossing beacons to alert drivers to stop for walking or rolling traffic, are probably the most notable changes that have come with the greenway. But E Harrison Street also received crossing improvements as part of the project, in recognition of the fact that there isn’t one singular route that neighborhood residents take to travel between Meany and Lowell. Continue reading →

4th of July launch for expanded Lake Washington Blvd opening for pedestrians, bikers, and more

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(Image: SDOT)

The 4th of July weekend brings the first days in a summer of dedicating three miles of Lake Washington Blvd to walking, running, and rolling.

Starting Friday three miles of Lake Washington Blvd from Mt Baker Park to Seward Park will close to motor vehicle traffic on weekends and holidays through at least September in an effort to create another wide open option for people to get outside safely.

“As a city, we’re taking what we experienced during COVID-19, considering how to meet our environmental goals, and striving for safer places to walk and bike. What I’ve witnessed on Lake Washington Boulevard is that when such spaces are opened to people of all ages and abilities, they truly transform into a spaces for people,” Councilmember Tammy Morales said in a statement on the new program. “Children, families, and elders fill these spaces as they go for strolls, picnic on the grass, or go swimming in the lake. These spaces are truly valued and they are something that all communities in Seattle should be able to access.” Continue reading →

Signal changes at Broadway and John should make everyone’s trips easier

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A person crossing the street in the north-south crosswalk at Broadway and John

(Image: Ryan Packer/CHS)

By Ryan Packer

One of Capitol Hill’s busiest intersections should get easier to navigate this year, whether you’re in a car, on foot, or in a wheelchair. Broadway E and E John is slated to get a brand new set of traffic signals as part of the Seattle Department of Transportation’s Neighborhood Street Fund grant program. With the signal upgrades will come separate turn signals; drivers heading east on John Street or west on Olive Way will be asked to wait to turn left until pedestrian traffic clears the intersection.

Brie Gyncild of Central Seattle Greenways called the grant application a “last resort” in an SDOT blog post about the project. The city looked at including the signal upgrade with a previous Neighborhood Street Fund grant that made spot improvements to John and Thomas Street across all of Capitol Hill, but couldn’t make it happen due to high cost.

“The Neighborhood Street Fund was a last resort, because we have been trying to get these improvements made for a while,” Gyncild said. “This intersection has seen injuries and close calls. We all recognized the need for change here, but it’s expensive because signals are expensive and there are a lot of things that needed to change alongside the new signal, such as ADA upgrades to curb ramps.” Continue reading →

New E Union bike lanes connect Capitol Hill to the Central District

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New bike lanes have finally been added to E Union, making this route connecting Capitol Hill and the Central District a little safer for everybody using the street.

Crews finished installing the new markings, parking areas, and lanes this week after years of planning and back and forth with the community. Continue reading →

SDOT: E Union will finally get its protected bike lanes this month

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(Image: 2020 Cycle)

The Central District’s 2020 Cycle is surely geared up for the occasion. Construction is set to begin for the remarkably speedy installation of new protected bike lanes running by the shop serving E Union between Capitol Hill and MLK.

Here is the latest from the Seattle Department of Transportation on the project:

We’re scheduled to construct the E Union St Protected Bike Lane on the weekend of April 24 – 25*! Our crews will begin site preparation work as soon as April 19. We will be installing a protected bike lane on both sides of E Union St between 14th Ave and 26th Ave and an uphill protected bike lane with downhill sharrow (permanent marking on the road to indicate shared lane between vehicles and bicycles) between 26th Ave and MLK Jr Way.

SDOT has distributed a construction notification, embedded below, in the area around the route. Continue reading →

Catching up on a lost 2020, E Union protected bike lanes should be in place by summer

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(Image: CHS)

Seattle needs to push in 2021 to catch up on its plans to create new, safer routes for bicyclists including its plans for new protected bike lanes on E Union connecting Capitol Hill and the Central District.

A representative for the Seattle Department of Transportation tells CHS that there is no official schedule yet for the project but construction will start before summer.

“We anticipate construction may happen as soon as late March or at late as May,” the department rep said. “We will be sure to inform neighbors at least two weeks ahead of time to coordinate any construction-related impacts.” Continue reading →

With bigger Pike/Pine street changes ahead, construction on Melrose Ave pedestrian and biking overhaul slated to begin this summer

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The Melrose palm is staying

Changes are coming soon to Capitol Hill to improve walkability and the biking — and we’re not talking about melting snow and ice.

The community vision for a safer, more vibrant for Melrose Ave — the change coming soonest — has been a decade in the making. Recognizing safety concerns, community members started doing outreach to neighbors to gather ideas for what a better Melrose would look like, eventually developing the Melrose Promenade project at the base of Capitol Hill.

Meanwhile, a plan for the total re-orientations of Pike and Pine into one-way streets is also underway with a longer wait for the start of that construction.

The changes to Melrose, currently expected to begin construction in June, include a redesigned intersection at E Olive Way with a new signalized crosswalk on the west end of Melrose as the Seattle Department of Transportation reconfigures the I-5 on-ramp, SDOT community outreach lead Sara Colling said.

There were 141 reported collisions on Melrose between Roy and University from 2013 to 2018, with almost all of the serious injuries being suffered by people walking or biking on the short stretch between Denny and Pike Pine.

New protected bike lanes between Denny and Pike Pine will attempt to improve safety on Melrose. They will be one-way lanes on each side of the street protected with plastic posts and pavement markings. Continue reading →

Why Capitol Hill’s Millionaire’s Row isn’t a Stay Healthy Block anymore

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A Capitol Hill avenue that became a popular addition to the city’s experimentation with community-created walking and riding streets as part of its efforts to address social distancing needs during the COVID-19 crisis has been removed from the program and looks unlikely to return.

The situation on 14th Ave E is an example of the limits of Seattle City Hall’s urbanist-leaning efforts and, the resident who originally applied for the permit says, a prime example of kowtowing to complaints from homeowners and drivers.

“If SDOT continues to insist on these restrictions (and others) then it seems clear to me that they have no intention of allowing the program to continue in a dense urban neighborhood, no
matter how successful the program was,” applicant and area resident Christopher Hoffman tells CHS.

According to Hoffman, his original approval of the program’s implementation on 11 blocks of 14th Ave E, the city’s legendary Millionaire’s Row extending south out of Volunteer Park, came with the basic requirements allowing the use of signs and small barriers to “temporarily close a street to create more outdoor recreation space for people to enjoy while following social distancing guidelines” while allowing “local access, deliveries, waste pickup and emergency vehicles.” Continue reading →

City beefs up Stay Health Streets signage

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The city’s Stay Healthy Streets program to restrict motor vehicle traffic on select streets to create more open space during the pandemic is adding sturdier signs to help better protect people from drivers as they walk, bike, and roll.

The new signs aren’t exactly barriers but officials hope they will be less susceptible to breakage and loss as bad weather and bad drivers have taken a toll on the city’s collection of a-frame style signs deployed early in the pilot project. Continue reading →

With Lowell to Meany route mostly in place on Capitol Hill, city to hold ‘drop-in’ on Safe Routes to School program

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The City of Seattle will hold an online “drop-in” session Tuesday to provide updates on the Safe Routes to School program, an effort to increase “safe walking and biking to school” along select routes across the city.

A $2.2 million project to complete a Safe Routes corridor between Capitol Hill’s Lowell Elementary and Meany Middle School mostly wrapped up this summer even as the district’s campuses remain closed to COVID-19 restrictions. Continue reading →