Tag Archives: streets

City says it had to clean up less trash in 2024 thanks to volunteers and enforcement

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Seattle Public Utilities is out with its 2024 “Clean City” report as it says citizens are volunteering more effort than ever to community clean-ups while its totals for debris collected from the public right of way actually dropped during the year.

“I’m proud we’re doing this work. Keeping Seattle neighborhoods cleaner helps residents thrive,” SPU General Manager and CEO Andrew Lee said in the announcement. “We welcome more residents and community organizations to join us in supporting Seattle’s diverse communities.”

SPU says its crews removed 1,765,421 pounds of debris from 1,550 blocks across the city’s right-of-way in 2024, down 7% from 2023 despite continued increased use of the Find It, Fix It “Service Request Mobile App.”

SPU credits “community engagement and education, enforcement efforts, and collaboration with other City of Seattle departments” for the reduction.

The Find It, Fix It app is focused on issues around cleanliness and rubbish but stats from the show that a bulk of the system’s calls are related to homelessness even though the app’s categories don’t show choices like “encampment” or “tents.” Instead, the calls are frequently reported under general inquiries, or “illegal dumping,” the most frequently used category in Find It, Fix It complaints. Continue reading →

New signs in Pike/Pine — Seattle launches Music Venue Zones for ‘musician parking and loading’

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Last year, the city launched a plan to create new Music Venue Zone parking spots to help bands dealing with load in and load out and help foster the city’s neighborhood live music scenes. Now the program is launching and City Hall is looking for Capitol Hill venues to join the program and add the signs and street markings to Pike/Pine’s maze of parking restrictions.

Qualifying music venues can apply for one annual Music Venue Zone permit each, creating up to three designated spaces at the curb, which SDOT will install. Music Venue Zones allow parking and loading 24 hours a day, 7 days a week with a valid permit displayed.
To qualify for the permit, music venues must:

  • Have a valid City of Seattle business license
  • Host live music events at least two different days each week
  • Charge a fee for entry for live music events

If your venue qualifies, you can now apply here for a Music Venue Zone permit.

CHS reported here on the legislative efforts to create the program last fall.

The new permits will cost venues $250 a year and the legislation has established rules limiting where they can be deployed. Each permit allows up to three Music Venue Zone
spaces per venue. Restrictions on parking and loading will be 24 hours a day, 7-days
a week. Vehicles in zones without the valid permit displayed will be subject to citation and impound, the city says. Continue reading →

Seattle Department of Transportation $1.55B levy plan includes Broadway safety improvements, E Union ‘Revival,’ and transit safety

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The Seattle City Council’s transportation committee Tuesday will hear a report on the city’s plan for delivering projects under the $1.55 billion levy approved by voters in November.

CHS reported here on the record-sized levy and its focus on streets, transit, sidewalk, and bike lanes for the next eight years.

The Seattle Department of Transportation has released its plan for how it will spend $177 million of the levy funds in 2025. The plan comes as Mayor Bruce Harrell seeks a new leader for the department after the departure of Greg Spotts earlier this month.

A roster of Capitol Hill and Central District-area projects are included in the 2025 plan but don’t mistake it for a list of projects that will be completed this year.

“The Levy Delivery Plan shares projects starting planning, design, construction, or maintenance in 2025,” SDOT says about the process. “Because some projects take 3+ years from inception through construction, work in 2025 lays the foundation for next 8 years.”

There are lots of items in the plan to look forward to.

Some $16 million in safety spending will include “HIGH-COLLISION SAFETY PROJECTS” at Broadway and Pike, Broadway and Union, and Harvard and Pike among dozens of other locations across the city, according to the plan. Continue reading →

Nice: Seattle boosts typical parking ticket to $69 starting January 1

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Screenshot

Seattle is jacking up its fine for parking tickets in 2025 for the first time in 14 years.

Currently, most parking fines range from $29 to $53, depending on the type of violation, the city says. The new fines will range from $43 to $78.

The most common fines of $47 will soon cost you $69.

CHS reported here on City Hall’s latest adjustments to on-street parking rates across Capitol Hill where the most coveted nighttime spots have now reached $6.50 an hour.

On-street parking also continues to shrink across the city as new programs and protected parking zones have been created to better utilize the public space. Continue reading →

Seattle needs a new transportation leader

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Spotts and the mayor hop off the bus at the RapidRide G ribbon cutting ceremony earlier this year

The final acts of Greg Spotts leading the Seattle Department of Transportation have had some mixed results. The $1.45 billion transportation levy he helped shepherd cruised to victory with voters in November. The $144 million RapidRide G his department was in charge of building for King County Metro launched with construction mistakes, inadequate bus shelters, and traffic signal hiccups.

Spotts announced this week he is stepping down from the post, citing a desire to work closer to family.

CHS reported here in 2023 as the former chief sustainability officer at the Los Angeles Bureau of Street Services and “15-minute city advocate” made the move from Southern California to the Pacific Northwest with a “Vision Zero” agenda and a philosophy around “self-enforcing” roads.

Under Mayor Bruce Harrell’s administration, Spotts barely got started in what will ultimately be a short tenure in the role. The $1.45 billion transportation levy will be one measure of his work. The city’s continued challenges around traffic safety will be another. Continue reading →

Sunday: Seattle Marathon 2024 winds way through Interlaken Park

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The pedestrian and bicycling-only curves of E Interlaken Blvd will be filled with thousands of runners, rollers, joggers, and don’t give up you can do it walkers as the Seattle Marathon passes across the north slope of Capitol Hill Sunday morning.

The Seattle Department of Transportation says there will be trail and street closures across the route including SR-99, the Burke-Gilman, and I-5 Express lanes. Streets should reopen by 2:30 PM. Be prepared for delays along 24th Ave E where the route crosses the artery.

The full marathon’s official start time is 7 AM. Many participants won’t arrive in Interlaken until noon.

Around 15,000 participants are expected across the day’s events including the half and full marathon. In 2023, there were more than 1.700 runners and walkers who finished. Times ranged up to 18 minutes per mile for the slowest having the most fun-est runners.

In 2019, marathon organizers re-routed the course away from Interlaken as part of moves needed to avoid light rail construction on the I-90 bridge and flatten the course. After the pandemic forced the cancellation of the 2020 race, organizers finally restored the Interlaken portion of the run for the race’s 2022 edition.

Crowds gather on the northern fringes of Capitol Hill to mark mile 22.5 of the race with an annual final boost of cheering and enthusiasm.

More information on the race is at seattlemarathon.org.

 

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Pedestrian hit by driver on Broadway suffers serious injuries — UPDATE

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A pedestrian struck by a driver Thursday night on Broadway was taken to the hospital in serious condition.

Seattle Fire says it responded to the collision at Broadway and Harrison just before 6 PM. According to SFD and emergency radio updates, the man was struck by a driver in a black Honda Fit in a “high impact” collision that left the victim down and unresponsive in the northbound lane.

The patient was treated at the scene and transported to Harborview in serious condition, SFD reports.

Police at the scene reported taking one person into custody but we don’t have additional information on the arrest at this time.

Broadway was closed to traffic during the response.

UPDATE: Records indicate SPD was investigating the incident as a DUI crash.

 

HELP KEEP CHS PAYWALL-FREE
Subscribe to CHS to help us hire writers and photographers to cover the neighborhood. CHS is a pay what you can community news site with no required sign-in or paywall. To stay that way, we need you.

Become a subscriber to help us cover the neighborhood for as little as $5 a month. 

 

Good vibrations? WSDOT says construction underway for seven-year 520 Portage Bay Bridge and Roanoke Lid project

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Design concept for a new bridge over Portage Bay

Just as the Montlake Lid project is laying down its final layers of landscaping bark, the Washington Department of Transportation says construction began this week for SR-520’s Roanoke Lid and Portage Bay Bridge project:

Beginning the week of Nov. 4, crews will start piledriving in Portage Bay to build the temporary work trestle and future westbound Portage Bay bridge. A work trestle is essentially a temporary platform that crews need to build so they can construct the permanent bridge. This will be the first of six piledriving “seasons” allowed on this project. Each season lasts from September through April. This first season – from November 2024 through April 2025 – will be the most significant season of impact piledriving work. The following seasons will have less piledriving – and some seasons may not drive piles at all.

The bridge work is a long process. The state says crews will use two methods to install or “drive” the piles. The first method uses a vibratory hammer to “vibrate” the piles into the bottom of the bay. The second method uses an impact hammer to strike the piles like a hammer into the base of the bay: Continue reading →

City says annual repainting of Capitol Hill Black Lives Matter street mural to take place this month — if weather cooperates

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(Image: CHS)

The City of Seattle and the group of artists that shepherd the creation are hoping for a run of dry October weather for the annual repainting of the Capitol Hill Black Lives Matter street mural.

The Seattle Department of Transportation says the collaboration with the Vivid Matter Collective to care for the mural remains intact along with help from the Seattle Office of Arts & Culture to gather every year to clean up and repaint portions of the street-tall E Pine mural.

SDOT crews were spotted at work on the the clean-up around the mural in September but a planned repainting event never took place due to rain, the collective said.

The city says the repainting “to restore the mural’s colors and vibrancy” requires good weather and is hoped to take place the weekend of October 19th or October 26th depending on the forecast. Current forecasts call for stretches of drizzle that could further delay the effort.

Vivid Matter Collective has yet to announce a new date for its 2024 effort

The Vivid Matter Collective shepherds the long-term responsibility of maintaining the Black Lives Matter mural created by artists and activists in 2020 in the first days of the protests in Seattle. Continue reading →

City’s latest rate adjustments show nightlife crowds apparently willing to pay anything to park in Pike/Pine

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If you were to treat the Seattle Department of Transportation’s seasonal adjustments of its on-street parking rates like the stock market, you should be buying shares in the afternoon and evening sector on 12th Ave, go long all around the clock on 15th Ave E, hold a few shares of Broadway north of John, and be ready to jump off the momentum that keeps Pike/Pine nighttime rates soaring to match the highest total in the city.

Meanwhile, you can short Broadway between Pine and Capitol Hill Station in the afternoons and evenings — for now.

The city is out with the new payment schedule for Capitol Hill’s five main on-street parking zones as makes its “regular seasonal adjustments” to rates across the city. The new rates take effect starting today. More than half of the rates are staying the same. but the city is ticking up rates by $0.50 an hour for about 1 in 4 of its street parking spots. About 14% are getting a $0.50 discount in the latest update, the city says.

Here is how that shakes out this fall on Capitol Hill: Continue reading →