A scene from 2015 when SDOT tested closing E Pike to traffic on weekend nights
The Capitol Hill Superblock is not dead. But the long, winding legislative road ahead might end up far from Capitol Hill.
Seattle City Councilmember Teresa Mosqueda is the council’s budget chair so she has her hands full right now wrangling changes to the city’s 2023 spending plan. We’ll have more soon on the budget amendments that made the cut.
But as the prime champion of the superblock pedestrianization concept to transform the core of Pike/Pine to make it friendly to people on foot and bicycles, Mosqueda’s attention was pulled away from the 2023 budget debate last week as Capitol Hill business owners had the mayor’s ear and others around the superblock plan backpedaled on the initiative over concerns about street access and parking in the area.
Mosqueda tells CHS the superblock is not dead but its path forward after a community tour she helped lead with new Seattle Department of Transportation director Greg Spotts is a legislative process that could end up far from Pike/Pine.
“We had great discussions about the benefits of orienting our streets towards people walking, rolling, and biking, and opportunities for supporting and lifting up local small businesses, improving safety and accessibility for workers making their way to and from their jobs, and creating space for community cohesion, mobility, and enjoyment on our city streets—and all the ways that Café Streets have helped to prove this concept over the last couple of years,” Mosqueda said in a statement sent to CHS.
According to the councilmember, the superblock concept is still moving forward but slowly, through proviso restrictions on “Mobility Operations Budget” spending calling on SDOT to “identify and prioritize opportunities to promote pedestrian uses through woonerfs, shared spaces, traffic calming, super-blocks and other design treatments.”
Mosqueda said she would also be “amplifying this work through the budget” in the council’s 2023 spending package and “continuing the conversation with community members about how to make this long-awaited vision a reality.”
Mosqueda’s office says the hope is for a superblock framework that could be applied not just on Capitol Hill but across the city — though the Pike/Pine opportunity could remain a focus for possible implementation.
Mosqueda also hopes that the experiences of the pandemic when many restaurants and bars were able to stabilize their business prospects thanks to street cafes and outdoor seating will help change the mood about pedestrianization in the Pike/Pine core.
So far, that doesn’t seem to be the case. People familiar with the situation said the mayor’s office is fielding a new spike in complaints from Pike/Pine businesses concerned about street access and parking with the revived efforts around a neighborhood superblock. CHS has reached out to some of the businesses reportedly involved but none have agreed to speak on the record about the issue.
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Before they get so involved with banning gas leaf blowers and super block ambitions maybe they can …address all of the other glaring issues first? Violence, crime, mental health, housing and houseless issues. Etc etc.
Exactly! And let’s prove we can effectively manage the current open spaces we have (Parks) before taking on more public spaces.
You realize this is all of our space and therefore all of our responsibility. We don’t live in some resort town where your room is your only responsibility. Take some ownership over your community please 🙏
Careful there Matt, I’m no troll. I’m out there at every neighborhood clean-up and adopted Nagle with the commitment to clean it up throughout the year. These are all community-led projects and it’s not enough. Public spaces need public management along with private stewardship.
Thanks for your commitment! I’m leading my own cleanups, and trying to facilitate more in the neighborhood, let me know if you want to coordinate in the future 😀
I’m not understanding the concept of public lands needing private stewardship, any chance you could elaborate?
I do think that the city, county, and state needs more funding and in-kind donations from large corporations that utilize our public resources and natural areas to grow without any earnest consideration for the impact their growth has caused. It’s the major downfall of capitalism… that there is no built-in check to the idea that there can be constant growth. It’s an incredibly foolish assumption that could only be overlooked if those who designed it were the ones that benefited from it!
Agreed.
Can’t we do all of it? Gas leaf blowers are an issue. It can all be done at once. Dang.
This is 100% Seattle.
Instead of doing something tangible, instead go make a progressive report about how we might do it in the future. (which, of course, we won’t).
We’re like the opposite of tactical urbanism.
I really wish you would tell us which businesses oppose the superblock so I could know who to boycott. What incredibly shortsighted people. And I say this as a fellow Capitol Hill business owner!
It would be great if pike place market were one of the places considered for this (excluding, of course, vendors and delivery drivers). As someone who walks through it on my daily commute to work, both cars and pedestrians seem to have an unpleasant time with the current setup.