(Image: Terra Exhibit)
You don’t have to believe in anything to be in awe. And you might not think a giant globe hanging in a church would leave you in deep contemplation. But the Terra Exhibit currently installed through November 23rd at Capitol Hill’s St. Mark’s Cathedral is inspiring.
The 24-foot museum-grade Earth globe suspended from the central beam in the cathedral nave can have an other-worldly effect: Continue reading
The City of Seattle has started the search for an occupant for the Bullitt House, the 1955-built, H-shaped, A-frame home on its way to becoming a protected landmark at the center of the North Capitol Hill property donated to become a new 1.6-acre city park on Harvard Ave E.
The Seattle Parks and Recreation Department has posted a call for “letters of interest” for an organization or business to enter into a 10-year contract to occupy the house “and operate the facility, including a significance presence in the evenings.” Continue reading
Puget Sound Business Journal: The wealthiest ZIP codes in the Puget Sound region
Two ZIP codes covering Northern Capitol Hill neighborhoods — not Medina, nor Mercer Island — now rank as the wealthiest areas on the Puget Sound. Soaring housing values, booming incomes for some, and economic changes are factors.
So are methodologies. Continue reading
If the Capitol Hill neighbors around 18th Ave E north of E Galer act like they own the road it might be because they do.
“Thank you for reaching out to us about the private segment of 18th Ave E near Interlaken,” a Seattle Department of Transportation representative began their kind of complicated response to a recent CHS inquiry about some recent work and new signs around the street. “Because the street in question is private property, it is not part of the city’s right-of-way, and we do not have jurisdiction over its maintenance or management. The property owner is responsible for maintaining the street, sidewalks, signage, and any other features.”
It turns out, Seattle has some relatively long stretches of street that through quirks of real estate, history, and mysteries, are private property. Continue reading
A woman was pepper sprayed and held down while thieves ransacked a $6 million Capitol Hill mansion in a home invasion robbery early Saturday morning, according to police and East Precinct radio updates.
Police say two suspects described only as black males entered the residence and confronted the victim just after midnight. The suspects pepper sprayed the woman and held her down while they ripped off “thousands of dollars of items” from the home.
UPDATE: The property is owned by a corporation registered to the management company that represents Macklemore though it does not appear that the celebrity was home at the time of the robbery attempt. The Seattle rapper has just returned to the States after performing in Ireland, according to social media updates.
SPD says the victim, who works at the home as the children’s nanny, was able to free herself, escape the house, and call police to the northwest Capitol Hill area home where three children were still asleep inside. Police say the suspects fled with the loot shortly after the woman’s escape. Continue reading
An Operation Nightwatch volunteer (Image: Operation Nightwatch)
Capitol Hill’s St. Mark’s will add a new women’s emergency shelter facility from Operation Nightwatch as it moves forward with a plan for new affordable housing to be developed on its North Capitol Hill campus.
Plans filed with the city describe construction of a “limited use emergency shelter with 20 beds and limited hours of operation” in the 1950s-era addition to the 10th Ave E property’s landmarks-protected St. Nicholas building.
CHS reported here earlier this year on a planned development and adaptive reuse project envisioned to create more than 100 affordable homes in a transformation of the nearly 100-year-old building.
In the meantime, the new shelter from Operation Nightwatch will call the St. Nicholas addition home. Continue reading
(Image: Seattle Public Schools)
Capitol Hill’s Stevens Elementary might have the opportunity to change its name, afterall.
The North Capitol Hill campus is off the list — for now — as Seattle Public Schools has changed its plans from cuts that would have sliced more than 20 campuses to a cutback that will shut down five following public outcry over the district’s efforts to overcome a looming budget deficit.
Superintendent Brent Jones announced the new, less aggressive plan for cutbacks Tuesday, saying his office heard complaints about the initial planned closure of up to 21 elementary school campuses “loud and clear.”
“We know we need the support of our students, families, and staff to uplift a large-scale change such as this,” Jones said in the announcement. “My hope is that we can work together to re-establish a level of trust that allows us to move forward in a way that honors our school communities.” Continue reading
Capitol Hill has a lot going for it over the mansions of Medina.
In a June interview with Time Magazine about the philanthropist’s life after divorcing the world’s fifth-richest person, Melinda French Gates sounds quite a bit like the rest of us when it comes to describing what she loves about her new life in the city:
“I live in a neighborhood. Now I can walk to little stores. I can walk to the drugstore, I can walk to a restaurant,” she says. “I absolutely love it.”
Where is this lovely slice of city living? Capitol Hill. Business Insider reports that French Gates purchased “a cottage in the North Broadway neighborhood of Seattle weeks before the former couple filed for divorce in 2021” for $1.2 million. Continue reading
(Image: CHS)
Day-long power outages from June-uary winds and rain that hit over 7,000 Seattle City Light customers in northern Capitol Hill earlier this month didn’t have enough of an impact for the city to consider installing underground power lines. The location of Capitol Hill power outages follows a pattern: in areas where multifamily housing development is less prevalent, power lines sit above ground and are left vulnerable to high winds and storms.
“The recent, sustained high wind event caused many outages throughout our service area including Capitol Hill,” Jenn Strang, media relations manager of SCL, told CHS.
Power outages are frequently caused by fallen trees, wind and ice. Strang said some instances are easier to fix than others, like the outage at 15th St and E Olive St.
“In the case of Monday’s outage at 15th Street East and East Olive, multiple wire spans and crossarms needed to be replaced and repaired which required different crews to complete the tasks,” Strang said.
Installing power lines underground to lessen the risk of outages in the area isn’t an option without larger scale housing development.
For one, it’s expensive — and the city wants developers to pay for it.
Nicholas Rich, client executive at IMEG—a national engineering and design consulting company— said many owners of newly built apartments want City Light to bury overhead power lines underground.
“If you put those underground you really improve the reliability in that respect locally,” Rich told CHS. “Usually a new developer won’t want to do that because City Light is perfectly happy keeping those overhead lines just the way they are.” Continue reading
A rendering showing the planned massing of the new structure (Image: Atelierjones)
The Seattle Landmarks Preservation Board will be briefed this week on the planned redevelopment and adaptive reuse project envisioned to create more than 100 affordable homes on the St. Mark’s Cathedral campus on northern Capitol Hill.
The project would transform the landmarks-protected St. Nicholas building that has stood on the property for 98 years. CHS reported here on the project taking shape with designs calling for 109 affordable apartment units in a development that would create a new twin to the historic building.
Designated as a protected landmark in 1982, the St. Nicholas structure’s protections include the “entire exterior of the 1926 building” and “the entire site” but the restrictions do not extend to the structure’s interior. Continue reading
