Tag Archives: first hill

13 things CHS heard at the Capitol Hill Community Council/First Hill Improvement Association Mayoral Debate: Broadway Crisis Care Center, Pike/Pine gun violence, and electric scooters

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It has been a long 2025 election season but Tuesday night’s Capitol Hill Community Council/First Hill Improvement Association Mayoral Debate brought new energy and new opportunities for the candidates to distinguish themselves in important issues including the Broadway Crisis Care Center, neighborhood homelessness, Pike/Pine and Garfield gun violence, affordability, and, yes, electric scooters.

“They do drive me crazy,” Mayor Bruce Harrell admitted before delving into a deeper answers on issues around the surprisingly important component of Seattle’s transit system. More on that, below.

The incumbent and challenger Katie Wilson sparred on the night in front of a group of around 150 inside Harvard Ave’s First Baptist over themes of experience and change in a back and forth on questions from moderators Chris Paulus of the Capitol Hill Community Council and Ellen Greene of the First Hill Improvement Association, and support from the Urban Community Councils of Seattle group that has grown as an umbrella organization connecting some of the city’s core neighborhoods.

CHS also advised and helped the groups form the night’s topics.

The candidates were provided with a roster of possible questions prior to the debate to allow them to prepare in a standard the Urban Community Councils group established in a series of political debates it helped organize this year. The candidates were given two minutes to answer plus an opportunity for follow-up time.

Harrell, an incumbent centrist coming out of a summer primary that saw a strong showing from a slate of Seattle progressives, spent those minutes focused on his leadership against the Trump administration and his many years at City Hall and in the city.

In her time, Wilson made the case that 14 years “working in and around City Hall pushing ‘visionary legislation'” made her the right candidate to lead the city forward.

The differences between the two on issues specific to First Hill and Capitol Hill were illuminating.

CRISIS CARE CENTER
The county’s nearby planned $56 million Broadway Crisis Care Center was one flashpoint.

Harrell told the crowd his plan for city support for the center will hold county officials accountable and that a Seattle Police Department-led “Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design” process will make the area safer around the center planned to open in 2027. Continue reading →

Happy birthday, RapidRide G

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(Image: King County Metro)

By Matt Dowell

Happy first birthday to Madison’s RapidRide G, a.k.a. the G bus, the G line, or just The G.

While the one-year anniversary or the line’s start was overshadowed by the city’s whipsawing on its transit planning around a single-block near the G, the reshaping of the Madison corridor deserves a look back and a look forward as the line begins its second year of service between the waterfront, First Hill, Capitol Hill, and Madison Valley.

“In the last year, Metro provided more than 49,000 service hours on the RapidRide G Line, helping spur tremendous growth in ridership,” a Metro blog post celebrating the bus rapid transit line’s first year reads.

Metro says the G Line is now “the 12th busiest route in our system,” averaging around 6,300 riders every weekday — about half the totals projected as the line was first being designed before the pandemic reset traffic and transportation habits across the city.

Metro says that early surveys indicate riders enjoy the G more than regular Metro routes and that it’s boosted bus usage across the Madison Avenue region: “Three routes, the 10, 11 and 12 — those most closely aligned with the G Line corridor — when combined with the new G Line, have seen weekday ridership grow by over 80 percent!”

Transit riders are enjoying the fruits of a project that, by the time buses started running, was three years of construction plus nine years of planning in the making. The line cost $134 million including $60 million in federal funding and was Metro and SDOT’s most ambitious bus rapid transit project to date. It required an overhaul of Madison Avenue traffic patterns and the addition of dedicated bus lanes along most of the 2.5 mile route in order for buses to arrive every six minutes, as promised.

The duration and impact of the construction along the diagonal arterial brought some infamy to RapidRide G long before it turned one, made worse by a number of visible snafus: streets paved, torn up, repaved; orange metal plates at some stations that linger to this day (SDOT says they’ll be removed soon).

Lewis

Jordan Lewis, a Capitol Hill resident hoping to cash in on the buzz and the frustration, dressed up as an under construction RapidRide G line station for Halloween last year.

“The long, protracted construction process was the only thing that people along Madison talked about,” said Lewis. “It was such a topical thing.”

Lewis now rides the G downtown to work each day and considers the project worthwhile. But not everyone in the neighborhood does. After traffic alterations on Madison that streamline bus flow, many drivers find themselves in a Derek Zoolander-like predicament: they can’t turn left.

Some Capitol Hill businesses feel this has cut them off from their customers, hurting revenue. Continue reading →

Victim with service dog targeted in 11th and Fir street robbery

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Police are investigating an overnight gunpoint street robbery that targeted a victim walking with her service dog near 11th and Fir early Tuesday.

The Seattle Police Department reports the victim was walking with her dog just before 2 AM when the suspect rushed from behind and pulled the victim to the ground by the neck. “The suspect put a gun to her head and told her she could keep the dog but to empty her pockets,” SPD reports. “The victim complied with the demands and removed the contents from her pockets.” Continue reading →

‘Khampaeng’s Medical Journey’ — Community raising funds to support Taurus Ox owner

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(Image: Taurus Ox)

Friends and fans are rallying to support restaurateur Khampaeng “KP” Panyathong, owner of Capitol Hill’s Taurus Ox.

The restaurant announced Panyathong was scheduled to undergo a craniotomy Thursday to address a tumor discovered on his brain. Continue reading →

Police investigate after man shot in reported domestic violence dispute in First Hill parking lot

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Police were investigating after an apparent domestic violence-related shooting in a First Hill parking lot late Monday night.

Seattle Police reported the shooting just after 11:20 PM in a parking lot near Broadway and Jefferson where a man was reported down and the shooting suspect remained at the scene. Continue reading →

Seattle leaders debate groceries as new building owner says emptied Broadway Whole Foods has lease through 2038

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Plywood at 1001 Broadway (Image: CHS)

Plywood coverings for the windows and the district’s city council member suddenly going off on grocery store closures does not mean the Broadway Whole Foods is being readied for a new supermarket.

What it does mean is there is new ownership for the 17-story luxury apartment building above the empty 40,000-square-foot grocery space on the edge of First Hill and Capitol Hill and new plans being put in place for what could be a long-term vacancy for space.

According to the new owners, Whole Foods still has 13 more years on its Broadway lease. And, they say, the Amazon-owned grocery giant could someday reopen there. Continue reading →

Woof! Celebrate the neighborhood fur babies at First Hill Fidos

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A tradition that began ten years ago to celebrate the neighborhood fur babies returns this week. First Hill Fidos is Wednesday night:

Join us from 6-8pm at First Hill Park (1201 University) for a doggone good time!

🐾 SWAG BAGS! For participating pooches! (space is limited)

🐾 FUN PRIZES! For Cutest Pup, Best Trick, Best Dressed, and Best in Show!

CHS was there in 2015 as the First Hill Improvement Association gathering brought together good dogs from across the area for a night of fun — and prizes.

The event returns this year and is also a celebration of First Hill Park which reopened in 2021 after a $1 million overhaul.

 

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On a weekend to ponder covering I-5, a call to support Seattle’s original ‘lid,’ Freeway Park

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The roar of I-5 was a little more subdued this weekend with northbound lanes through the city shut for Washington State Department of Transportation maintenance.

The community group advocating for permanently quieting the freeway — and adding a cap covered with parkland, housing, and development — gathered nearby to illustrate the opportunity.

The Lid I-5 group is also asking the public to support needed work in the original I-5 lid between First Hill, Capitol Hill, and downtown — Freeway Park.

Saturday, the group gathered off Boren in Pillars Park above I-5 to mark the weekend’s northbound closure and spread the word about progress being made in plans likely to stretch out for decades to cover the freeway through Seattle. Continue reading →

Mayor’s conditions for $56M Broadway Crisis Care Center plan include Seattle Police safety sign-off, citizen advisory committee

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The building from above from a recent real estate listing (Image: CBRE)

Screenshot

As the King County Council prepares to vote on a $56 million plan to create a new Crisis Care Center at Broadway and Union, Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell has conditionally endorsed the proposal and says the city is ready to “partner” on the new facility.

“Seattle, along with other cities in the County, is facing an unprecedented behavioral health crisis. Too many residents are struggling with behavioral issues without adequate support,” the mayor’s letter in support the plan for the facility reads. “When the Seattle clinic opens it will provide same-day access to care for a person in crisis, which will help reduce the crisis we see on our streets every day.”

In the letter, Harrell says the county and a yet to be announced operator of the center must partner with the Seattle Police Department to assess the former Polyclinic building and its surroundings for safety, execute a “safe operations plan for the building and the surrounding exterior spaces, including public sidewalks and other publicly accessible spaces,” and enter into a Good Neighbor Agreement with the city that “obligates the provider to meet certain safety and disorder standards to be negotiated with the provider.”

The Seattle City Hall letter of support is a key milestone in the so far limited public process around the proposal. Continue reading →

Spruce Street School will bring its kindergarten and elementary kids to First Hill in $22M project on Madison

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Spruce Street has been educating Seattle city kids for decades (Image: Spruce Street School)

The school’s future Madison home (Image: Spruce Street School)

By Matt Dowell

The private Spruce Street School is building its future on First Hill in the midst of the neighborhood’s mix of hospitals, medical facilities, and high-rise apartment towers.

The $35,000-a-year school of about 110 K-5th graders purchased the building in 2019 for $15.15 million as part of a long term plan to make it their “forever home.” This summer, the school applied for a construction permit to begin a $7 million renovation of the Madison at Summit building, though they don’t plan to relocate from their current address at 914 Virginia Street on the edges of South Lake Union and downtown until 2028.

School officials declined to comment on the project.

“By 2035, Spruce Street School will be the highest quality, most financially accessible K–5 independent school of its kind in the Seattle area – able to admit children who would thrive in our educational program and community, regardless of their families’ ability to pay,” the school says of its future. “In addition, we will continue to be distinguished for our unique program and excellent teachers.”

The urban campus will include the 20,000-square-foot classroom building plus the building’s roof which is planned to be developed as an outdoor play area and a massive underground parking lot.

The permit states that work will occur on all three levels of the property, which is currently home to Salal Credit Union and ATI Physical Therapy, plus another school, Seattle Academy. Continue reading →