Coming home Wednesday night from covering a meeting of the North Capitol Hill Neighborhood Association, we found 10th Ave East a changed place. No, the Roanoke Tavern is still there. And Easy Joe’s is not open. Yet. Look. A clear roadway. It appears the 10th Ave E ‘summer’ paving project is complete. We’ll check in with SDOT to see if there’s any more work to be done but it looked to be clear sailing. Which should make this guy pretty happy:
Get up some speed and the air rushing into your face makes your eyes water, and there are the Olympics to the left, Cascades to the right, and just as you hit top speed there is Pagliacci and the smell of fresh-baked pizza.
I notice that now the entire east side of 10th, from E Boston to the I5 overpass, is “no parking 4-6 PM”. I don’t believe this was true prior to the construction, except perhaps for the area north of E Lynn St. It is not at all clear, at least for me, what the intent of this restriction is, because 1) the area adjacent to the curb is for parking only, and it’s not wide enough to be used as a second through lane during rush hour, and 2) there is no designated bike lane northbound.
Perhaps this is meant to serve as an “unofficial” bike lane, but if so I think it’s unsafe, because motorists will inevitably move over into it, and since it’s not a bike lane they will be less cautious about doing so. My prediction: injured cyclists.
I would like to hear an explanation from SDOT about the reason for this restriction. I live elsewhere on Capitol Hill, so it doesn’t affect me directly, but if I did live there I would not be happy about the unavailability of parking as I returned home from work.
I think the intent is just to aid rush hour traffic. Even if the space is not big enough for a second through-lane, restricting parking between 4-6pm keeps traffic flowing since the rush hour flow doesn’t have to stop for people parallel parking.