Monthly Archives: February 2017

Neighborhood by neighborhood, Seattle working out HALA and Mandatory Housing Affordability changes

Posted on by
Miller Park from above (Image: CHS)
The crowd at a recent Miller Park neighborhood meeting to discuss the HALA proposals (Image courtesy Andrew Taylor)

Some Miller Park residents are not happy with the proposed zoning changes for their neighborhood in the city’s Housing Affordability and Livability Agenda.

Those residents will get an opportunity to voice their thoughts in small group discussions following a presentation on HALA, Urban Villages, and the Mandatory Housing Affordability proposal at a Community Design Workshop at 6 PM on Tuesday at the Miller Community Center.

Spencer Williams, a legislative assistant to City Council member Rob Johnson, said the input collected from community members at the workshop as well as from open houses the city has hosted and online and elsewhere will be analyzed by the Office of Planning and Community Development.

http://www.capitolhillseattle.com/event/madison-miller-urban-village-community-design-workshop/?instance_id=7437097

“The meeting is happening many months prior to there being a final proposal before the council,” Williams told CHS. “We are really trying to stay engaged early.” Continue reading →

Post mid-winter break snow open thread — UPDATE: #THUNDERSNOW

Posted on by
(Image: @Dannicus523)
(Image: @pavelosc)

Forecasters were convinced any accumulations would be minor but snow was falling and sticking Monday morning across Capitol Hill and parts of Seattle. There were no immediate reports of bus changes or school closures.

The National Weather Service says the snow should change to rain later this morning but we should be ready for pockets of snowfall over the coming night and morning:

Snow levels will remain rather low (below 500 feet across
most areas from Seattle northward Monday morning and again late  tonight and Tuesday morning – and around 1000 feet during the  afternoon and evening hours). But to complicate things, heavier  showers will locally lower the snow level and showers may contain  small hail, if not snow. Snow in the lowlands, if it occurs, is  not expected to accumulate as near-surface temperatures during  the precipitation remains above freezing. But, heavier showers can have a way of giving a local accumulation that is impossible to pinpoint beyond an hour or two.

There has been no update yet from Seattle Public Schools. Parents are probably keeping a close watch for any delays or closures as kids are slated to return to school after the district’s mid-winter break.

UPDATE 3:50 PM: #THUNDERSNOW. One of those unpredictable pockets produced a few bolts of lightning, hail, and fluffy snowflakes in miserable, cold, wet mix that is expected to continue through the already mangled evening commute. Meanwhile, we’re getting reports of vehicles stuck on some of Capitol Hill’s slopes including Pine at 14th, and Madison at 19th.

Visitors say goodbye, for now, to Capitol Hill’s Seattle Asian Art Museum

Posted on by

IMG_3634

As Capitol Hill’s Seattle Asian Art Museum welcomes hundreds of visitors this weekend for a last round of free tours before closing its doors to make ready for a multiyear construction project, none will know exactly when the park’s cultural center will reopen and what shape a planned overhaul and expansion to the 84-year-old building will take.

http://www.capitolhillseattle.com/event/seattle-asian-art-museum-closing-weekend-open-house/?instance_id=7438098

As visitors get a last chance to enjoy Tabaimo: Utsutsushi Utsushi, or Terratopia: The Chinese Landscape in Painting and Film, and Ai Weiwei: Colored Vases, officials have yet to work out a perspective that moves the project forward. Continue reading →

CHS History | Capitol Hill quake readiness, Marion Apartments demolition, R Place fights red tape

Posted on by

Screen-Shot-2015-11-06-at-4.10.39-PMHere are the top stories from this week in CHS history:

2016

 

15 years after Nisqually, some things you should know about an earthquake on Capitol Hill

City Council may decide killing Pronto is best way to save bike sharing in Seattle — UPDATE: Pronto not dead yet


Continue reading →

Last chance to submit your $90K District 3 parks & streets idea

Posted on by
Screen Shot 2017-02-25 at 10.07.40 AM

D3, bringing up the rear

Seattle has turned to its citizens to decide how $2,000,000 in street and parks projects should be divvied up around the city — and District 3, your district, has been relatively quiet.

You have another day to change that. Your deadline is Sunday, February 26th.

Of the more than 600 ideas submitted this month for sidewalk repairs, new crossings, speed humps, curb bulbs, park benches and tables, traffic circles, and sidewalk designs in the Your Voice, Your Choice Parks & Streets process, District 3 representing Capitol Hill, First Hill, Montlake, Madison Valley and Madison Park, part of Eastlake, and the Central District was bringing up the rear with around 8.3% of the submissions as of Saturday morning. You can see the latest overall tallies here. Continue reading →

Pikes/Pines | The how, when, and why of the Hill’s birdsong

Posted on by
brendan_mcgarry_160528_00137

Male and female Marsh Wrens look alike, but when I find one singing along Portage Bay, it’s undoubtedly a male.

Despite knowing it happens annually, I’m always surprised when I hear birds begin to sing every year. I spend most of my days outside and I wake up early, so I notice subtle changes in the seasons acutely, and my ears are always pricked for avian voices. That’s how I detect many of the birds I watch. As a result, I noted that within the last week, more birds have been singing than a week earlier.

As days lengthen in the temperate world most organisms have physiological reactions, and birds are no different. One result is that male birds’ testes swell, and increased testosterone expands song volume and frequency. Many resident birds sing year round; I hear Song Sparrows and Pacific Wrens regularly throughout winter. But, when the daylength broadens, birds ramp up the energy they put into singing. The other morning in the vicinity of 17th and Roy I counted six species singing, not an impressive number. However, four out of the six I hadn’t heard since last summer.

Why do birds sing? Overall it’s a pretty simple answer. Birds generally sing either to impress the opposite sex or defend a territory. In the vast majority of cases, if you hear birdsong the vocalist is going to be a male bird.    Continue reading →

CHS Pics | This week in Capitol Hill pictures

Posted on by

Feb 2017 Seattle with Leica M6 MS-Optics Apoqualia-G 28mm and Mamiya 7ii

The CHS Flickr Pool contains more than 34,000 photographs — most of Capitol Hill images, many glorious, some technically amazing. The pool is a mix of contributions from Capitol Hill — and nearby — shutterbugs. Interested in being part of it? If we like your photo and it helps us tell the story, we may feature it on CHS so please include your name and/or a link to your website so we can properly credit you. Interested in working as a paid CHS contributor for scheduled assignments? Drop us a line. Continue reading →

Ready for Capitol Hill debut, more Paseos to come

Posted on by
(Image: @krummc)
(Image: Paseo)

In September, CHS broke the news that Paseo was coming to Capitol Hill. Friday night, you can try their new steak sandwich if you can stand what will likely be a hungry mob at 10th and Pike.

The Caribbean roast sandwich joint is planning a “soft opening” this weekend with 3 PM openings of its latest location in the space adjacent temporarily shuttered Neumos and the under-transformation Moe Bar.

And, apparently, like many new things on Capitol Hill these days, the new Paseo won’t be the last.  Continue reading →

CHS Pics | Capitol Hill Community Council benefit for Islamic Center of the Eastside

Posted on by
(Images: CHS)
CHCC’s Zachary DeWolf, right

The Capitol Hill Community Council raised some cash and connected communities Thursday night at a fundraiser for a Bellevue mosque damaged by fire.

“That mosque has been a nucleus,” Imam Arshad Anwar of the Islamic Center of the Eastside told the crowd gathered at the council’s social even Thursday night at The Summit space on E Pike.

With food on hand from Melrose’s Syrian-flavored Mamnoon, the council added donations raised by the community to what has been an outpouring of support to the mosque after man suffering from mental illness set fire to the building in January.

“What has been priceless is the support of community and show of support that people have come forward and shown us,” Anwar said. “It’s not only neighbors of the mosque who have come forward with flowers, kind words, cards and support, it’s been throughout Seattle, throughout Washington. Some of the donations we have received have been from across America.”

“I would say it would be a silver lining to the cloud but the lining has overtaken the cloud, here.”

You can learn more about the center and how to help at eastsidemosque.com. More information on the Capitol Hill Community Council can be found at capitolhillcommunitycouncil.org.

 

Sun Liquor moving distillery off Capitol Hill

Posted on by

Capitol Hill’s craft distillery industry is being downed by half and one of the neighborhood’s longest running purveyors of craft cocktails is contemplating more changes on E Pike.

CHS has learned that Sun Liquor Distillery, one of two craft-level spirit makers operating in Pike/Pine’s light-manufacturing zone left behind by the neighborhood’s auto row legacy, is moving operations to a nondescript warehouse on the backstreets behind University Village.

“We need two times as much space and the loading on E Pike is just too dangerous,” Sun’s founder Michael Klebeck tells CHS. Klebeck said his company is also considering working with a new owner to take over the Sun Liquor lounge across the street from the bottling facility on E Pike. Continue reading →