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  • Who’s the best District 5 candidate for biking and safe streets?

    By

    Tom Fucoloro

    | Posted

    District: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7

    Seattle City Council Districts map.As noted in our previous posts, Seattle Bike Blog is not doing official endorsements this primary. Instead, I’ll be going district-by-district, posting videos from the MASS Coalition’s transportation forums along with a roundup of transportation-related endorsements and other notable news items and thoughts.

    Couldn’t at least one of those great District 4 candidates have lived just a few blocks further north?

    The District 5 race leaves a lot to be desired. Incumbent Debora Juarez has not drawn a high quality challenger, it seems. Juarez gave good, though not inspiring, answers to Lester Black at the Stranger (be sure to check out the spreadsheet of responses), which is more than I can say about the other candidates who bothered to respond.

    Juarez has somehow managed to publicly stay out of the 35th Ave NE bike lanes fight, though her lack of support for the project, which crossed into her district, is itself saying something. The mayor’s last-minute decision to cut those bike lanes has proven to be a huge mistake, and her lack of advocacy for SDOT’s designed and contracted plan has resulted in a more dangerous street in her district and a gap in her district’s bike network. Folks who live in D5 and ride a bike could really have used her help standing up for them.

    The Urbanist notes in their non-endorsement that “In her questionnaire, Juarez refused to side with safety advocates pleading with the city council to save lives on NE 35th Avenue. She insisted the concerns of business owners and landowners must be given extra weight no matter how late in the process or badly needed the safety upgrades are.”

    But she says the city should be building more bike lanes and providing more funding for bike improvements. She has helped work on home zones and says she supports safer streets and Vision Zero. That’s all great to hear. 35th, though, was a solid test of her true commitment to safe streets, and she failed it.

    I just wish there were a challenger in this race who could press her on these issues. But there doesn’t seem to be.

    Here’s a look at some endorsements: (more…)

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  • Who’s the best District 4 candidate for biking and safe streets?

    By

    Tom Fucoloro

    | Posted

    District: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7

    Seattle City Council Districts map.As noted in our previous posts, Seattle Bike Blog is not doing official endorsements this primary. Instead, I’ll be going district-by-district, posting videos from the MASS Coalition’s transportation forums along with a roundup of transportation-related endorsements and other notable news items and thoughts.

    District 4 is a great example of the downside of changing to district-based elections. There are so many good candidates in this one race, yet the city can only elect one of them. Meanwhile, there are districts with few good options. It just seems like such a waste.

    For example, Cathy Tuttle is running for District 4. Cathy Tuttle! The founder and longtime Executive Director of Seattle Neighborhood Greenways. Just check out all these stories we’ve written about her and her work. And those are just the ones where I remembered to tag her name. Not only did she found and build a new safe streets non-profit organization, she was able to get it established enough that it could continue to thrive even after she stepped away. That is very rare. Only a tiny percentage of grassroots non-profit orgs ever survive their founder, and it takes great leadership to achieve this. Honestly, I’m not sure a Council seat is any harder than what she’s already done. And we know she’d be great for safe streets issues.

    But she’s gotta somehow beat a dynamic cast of other candidates, many of whom have great things to say about biking and safe streets issues.

    Shaun Scott, who racked up the most endorsements from transportation orgs (he’s the only D4 candidate who got the nod from every org we’ve been tracking below), has great things to say about transportation issues. And he is consistent in connecting it to issues of housing affordability and climate justice.

    Emily Myers has also talked about the need to complete the Bike Master Plan and to “stop centering cars in our decision making process about how we improve transportation in the city,” as she said during the MASS forum (video and transcript below). Her answers to Lester Black at the Stranger were also particularly strong (be sure to check out the spreadsheet of responses).

    And we haven’t even talked about Joshua Newman yet. Newman is a longtime neighborhood organizer who, instead of fighting new bike projects, says he wants to see neighborhoods with safer streets, more bike lanes and better transit.

    Here’s a look at some endorsements:

    (more…)

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  • Who’s the best District 3 candidate for biking and safe streets?

    By

    Tom Fucoloro

    | Posted

    District: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7

    Seattle City Council Districts map.As noted in our previous posts, Seattle Bike Blog is not doing official endorsements this primary. Instead, I’ll be going district-by-district, posting videos from the MASS Coalition’s transportation forums along with a roundup of transportation-related endorsements and other notable news items and thoughts.

    District 3 incumbent Kshama Sawant would be the senior member of the City Council if she wins reelection, but she has drawn her toughest slate of challengers yet.

    Sawant has been a member of the Transportation and Sustainability Committee since 2016, when Mike O’Brien became chair after Tom Rasmussen declined to seek reelection. During that time, she has been unwavering in her support of walking, biking and transit efforts in her role on the committee and in full Council votes.

    Transportation is not her top issue, and it’s not the focus of Socialist Alternative rallies and posters. But she gets it, and she often highlights equity and the needs of working people during committee discussions.

    So if transportation is the issue you’re focusing on for this race, then I don’t see much of an opening to unseat Sawant.

    Here’s a look at some endorsements:

    (more…)

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  • Who’s the best District 2 candidate for biking and safe streets?

    By

    Tom Fucoloro

    | Posted

    District: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7

    Seattle City Council Districts map.As I wrote in our District 1 post, Seattle Bike Blog is not doing official endorsements for the primary. Instead, I’ll be going district-by-district, posting videos from the MASS Coalition’s transportation forums along with a roundup of transportation-related endorsements and other notable news items and thoughts. I also want to hear who you are supporting and why in the comments below.

    With Bruce Harrell choosing not to run again, District 2 is our first of many open races this year. And, as a result, there are a lot of candidates, and endorsements are a bit more spread out. But as you’ll see, a couple names rise to the top.

    (more…)

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  • Who’s the best District 1 candidate for biking and safe streets?

    By

    Tom Fucoloro

    | Posted

    District: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7

    Seattle City Council Districts map.
    To verify your Council District, use this city web tool.

    I apologize to readers waiting for Seattle Bike Blog’s City Council endorsements, but I just plain did not have enough time this year to do Council primary endorsements justice. I had written earlier this year that I planned on creating an endorsements board, but it turns out organizing such a board also takes a lot of time that I didn’t have. Between watching the kiddo during the week and working on a top secret project I can’t yet talk about, it became clear that any endorsement effort would have been lacking. So I decided against doing them.

    But that doesn’t mean there won’t be Council primary coverage! This week, I’ll go district-by-district, posting videos from the MASS Coalition’s transportation forums along with a roundup of transportation-related endorsements and other notable news items and thoughts. Sometimes one or two candidates will obviously stand out, and I’ll note that. This post is an example.

    District 1 – Herbold goes unchallenged (basically)

    The MASS coalition did not host a forum for this race, which also seems to be among the least competitive of the races this year.

    Incumbent Lisa Herbold received endorsements from the Transit Riders Union and the Stranger. The Urbanist, Seattle Transit Blog and Seattle Subway (PDF) did not endorse anyone in this race.  (more…)

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  • King County will celebrate the Eastside’s ‘Traily McTrailface’ July 20

    By

    Tom Fucoloro

    | Posted

    Yeah, no. The Eastside Rail Corridor Trail will not be named Traily McTrailface. Sorry.

    I’m pretty sure I know the name, but I’ll go ahead and let King County announce it in style 10 a.m. July 20 at Redmond Central Connector Park (hmm, this trail isn’t the only thing that could use a better name).

    We reported a while back on the contending names for the under-construction trail, which is planned to connect from Renton to Redmond. None of the names were notably amazing or seemed to find a strong following of supporters. I’ve been referring to it as “The Eastside Trail” for years now since it’s official name “The Eastside Rail Corridor Trail” is a real mouthful. Of course, there are several trails on the Eastside, so my name wasn’t all that great, either. In Kirkland, it is known as the Cross-Kirkland Corridor Trail, a name that will remain in use for the Kirkland-owned section.

    Maybe if King County succeeds in fully funding and completing the trail according to its ambitious schedule, someday we’ll name it the DowWay or the Baldutrail. Honestly, if the county completes a fully-separated rail trail from Renton to Redmond, they can call it whatever they want. It will be amazing.

    It’s worth noting that passing the King County Parks ballot initiative this August would go a long way to helping to build this thing. So we should really do that.

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