Seattle Bike Blog

WA transportation ‘compromise’ spends billions on highways, ransoms transit but keeps most bike/walk funding

By

Tom Fucoloro

| Posted

June 30, 2015
UPDATE 12:10p 7/1: Publicola reports that the revenue portion of the transportation package is headed to Governor Inslee. That includes ST3 authorization and an 11.9 cent gas tax. However, other bills that make up the transportation package, including appropriations for the projects below and bonding for mega projects, are still in limbo.

After not moving an inch for months, the Washington State legislature is moving at lightning speed this week to pass a so-called “compromise” transportation funding package that preserves much of the bike/walk safety and access funding in the version of the package we saw earlier from the House.

But the package also spends many billions on new and expanded highways, includes protections against clean air standards and provides authority for a Sound Transit 3 vote (but at a cost).

The new package of bills has already passed mostly out of the Senate and is expected to hit the House floor today. Stay tuned for updates.

Seattle Transit Blog wrote a scathing post today lambasting the package for holding transit “ransom.” The proposed law only gives Sound Transit the authority to put a $15 billion ST3 measure up for a local vote in 2016 on the condition that, if it passes, the agency gives about $0.5 billion back to the state’s general fund. So billions go directly to highways, but transit gets taxed if local voters pass it. That’s all backwards.

On the other hand, Transportation Choices Coalition and Futurewise are pushing for passage of the bill even with all these problems. There’s also talk of putting the package up for a statewide referendum, which I can’t imagine would pass (and would having it on the ballot impact the outcome of the Move Seattle vote? Hard to say.).

Efforts to preserve the bike/walk safety and access funds proposed by the Democrat-controlled House in April were pretty successful. The compromise package passed by the Republican-controlled Senate includes:
- Bike/Ped Grant Program ($75M), same as House version
- Bike/Ped Projects ($89M), effectively down $1M from House version since the Northgate bike/walk bridge was moved to the transit projects list
- Safe Routes to Schools Grant Program ($56M), same as House version
Thanks to Senator Andy Billig (D-Spokane), the compromise deal also includes a commitment that WSDOT direct $86 million in Federal funds it receives in the next 16 years to Safe Routes to School. This smart use of Federal funding was not in the House version.

If you include this commitment for Federal funds, the total funding for bike/walk projects is about $320 million over 16 years, up from $236 million in the House version.

However, the Complete Streets Grant Program would get $106 million in the compromise package, down $54 million from House version. So that’s a significant safe streets hit between the versions.

Blake Trask, state policy director at Washington Bikes, praised Senators for preserving and even growing bike/walk funding. (more…)
tags: 2015 legislature, blake trask, curtis king, transportation choices coalition, washington bikes

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DUI suspect kills person biking in Ravenna – UPDATE: RIP Andres Hulslander

By

Tom Fucoloro

| Posted

June 29, 2015

Image of NE 65th ST/15th Ave NE intersection from Google Street View.

A person suspected of driving under the influence struck and killed a 45-year-old who was biking in Ravenna late Saturday, according to Seattle Police.

UPDATE: The man killed has been identified as Andres Hulslander, according to the King County Medical Examiner. The Seattle Times reports that he lived in Seattle since the early 90s and moved to Lake Forest Park earlier this year. We will update when we learn more about him.

Our deepest condolences to his friends and family.

The 29-year-old behind the wheel of a red 2002 Subaru Impreza was arrested and booked into King County jail on investigation of DUI. More charges could be added pending a Seattle Police traffic collision investigation.

UPDATE: The Seattle Times reports that Lucas McQuinn is now facing a vehicular homicide charge and is being held in lieu of $100,000 bond.

The collision occurred at NE 65th Street and 15th Ave NE around 11 p.m. Saturday night.

A police spokesperson did not yet have details about how the collision occurred. Major traffic collision investigations can take weeks or months to complete. UPDATE: Police say in a Blotter post that both were headed eastbound on NE 65th St when the suspect struck the man biking from behind.

Our deepest condolences to the family and friends of the person killed.

UPDATE: A Seattle Fire Department spokesperson said when crews showed up to the scene, they found the man (who they estimated was about 25) has “suffered heavy trauma.” His bike was found 50–75 feet from his body. They conducted CPR and rushed him to the hospital.

Remember, thank a first responder. They work some horrible scenes and see things we all would like to pretend never happened.

I also confirmed with SDOT that, from I can tell from my reporting and from what the city has tracked, this is the first death of a person on a bike in Seattle in 2015. It’s also the first death since Sher Kung died on 2nd Ave in August.

Before Kung, it had been 15 months since a person biking died on a Seattle street.

UPDATE x2: “ghostbikeguy” posted these photos in the comments with the note: “Ghost bike is up. Please stop making me do this, Seattle.”

UPDATE x3: More info from the SPD Blotter:

A 45-year-old cyclist was killed in the Roosevelt neighborhood Saturday night after he was struck by a suspected intoxicated driver. Police arrested the 29-year-old driver at the scene.

SPD Traffic Collision investigators believe the driver of a red Subaru was headed eastbound on NE 65th Street around 11 PM Saturday night when he struck the cyclist from behind near 15th Avenue NE.

Numerous witnesses called 911, a medics transported the 45-year-old bicyclist to Harborview Medical Center, where he later died from his injuries.

Officers examined the 29-year-old suspect at the scene, and determined he appeared to be intoxicated. Police booked him into the King County Jail for Investigation of Vehicular Homicide.

Traffic Collision detectives are investigating the incident.

tags: 15th Ave NE, deaths, ne 65th, ravenna, spd

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Summer Parkways 2015 headed to the Central District and Ballard

By

Tom Fucoloro

| Posted

June 26, 2015
Remember that boost in the city budget to expand Summer Streets? Well, it’s summer, and it’s happening.

There will be two multi-mile open streets events in the city this September:
- 11–3 September 12 in the Central District
- 11–3 September 19 in Ballard
There was talk of a downtown route instead of Ballard, but that concept has been shelved for this year.

To solidify the change in the style of the event, Summer Streets is now Summer Parkways. Instead of just an awesome, couple-block stretch of people-filled streets for a couple hours, Summer Parkways will feature an afternoon with miles of car-free neighborhood streets opened to walking and biking and yard sales and community parties and basically whatever people and organizations in the area want to make happen.

The new style is modeled after Portland’s fantastically successful Sunday Parkways. Seattle Neighborhood Greenways invited city staff and Sally Bagshaw on a trip to see that even with their own eyes last year. Below is the video they made to give you an idea of (hopefully) what we can expect. We’ve posted it before, but it’s worth rewatching. And captions have been translated into a ton of languages, so send it around to everyone: (more…)
tags: summer parkways

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Council keeps full-strength Move Seattle levy, adds extra safety emphasis

By

Tom Fucoloro

| Posted

June 25, 2015

Council added Accessible Mount Baker, I-5 crossing improvements between Wallingford and the U District, and (maybe) short-term Ballard Bridge improvements to this map.

The Seattle City Council is only one step away from sending a nine-year, $930 million property tax levy for transportation to voters in November.

Mayor Ed Murray’s Move Seattle levy made it through the Council’s special committee shaping the measure mostly unscathed. All Councilmembers are part of that committee, so it’s very likely that their amended version of the ballot measure will pass it’s scheduled June 29 Council vote. From there, the city will send it to King County for inclusion on the ballot.

After much debate in recent weeks, attempts by Councilmembers Nick Licata and Kshama Sawant to replace part of the property tax with an employee hours tax, commercial parking tax and developer impact fees did not pass. So the full levy will be paid by property taxes, both residential and commercial.

The failed amendments were intended to make the levy more progressive, moving some of the burden from lower-income populations. However, there is some disagreement about how much more progressive those other options would really be, as Erica Barnett argued in a Seattle Transit Blog post.

The big question still floating out there (and worthy of much more investigation than I can fit here) is how such a property tax increase will affect the rental market. Since most low-income people are renters and affordable housing is one of the biggest challenges in the city, this is important to answer when debating the November vote. While common sense might say that any property owner will pass their cost increases to renters, rentals exist in a market where — in theory — demand shapes prices rather than landlords.

The average home will see a tax increase of about $12 per month if Move Seattle passes. When you include the city’s existing transportation budget and the grant leveraging forecast, the total Seattle transportation investment level in the next nine years could actually be closer to $1.8 billion. That’s definitely worth $12 per month, whether it gets passed down to renters or not.

Council changes to the levy

The Council did make some changes to the mayor’s levy. If you want to dig through the language yourself, there are links to each amendment in this PDF. Here are the ones that passed (PDFs): 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 (as amended), 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 15 (as amended), 17 and 19.

Here are some highlights: (more…)

tags: city council, move seattle, move seattle levy

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20/20 Cycle owner plans Central District electric cargo bike shop: Electric Lady

By

Tom Fucoloro

| Posted

June 24, 2015

Alex Kostelnik built 20/20 Cycle out of little more than a couple maxed out credit cards and a serous desire to create a bike shop in the Central District focused on getting any old bike rolling again.

Perhaps more than any other shop I’ve been to, 20/20 staff always default to fixing what’s on a bike rather than jumping straight to replacing parts. It’s a shop that genuinely believes in helping people save money and get every inch of life out of their bike (from a 2012 interview: “We cater to moms with duct-taped Burley trailers with their kids inside on their way to Montessori school. People who ride in the rain, in the snow…”). It’s the only bike shop where I sometimes have to insist they take my money.

Since Velo moved from Capitol Hill to Belltown/Denny Triangle a few years ago, demand at 20/20 has boomed. Now, with a child in his family and 20/20 bursting at the seams, Kostelnik is planning another shop two blocks down the street with a very different focus: Electric cargo bikes.

“Think of it like a department store,” Kostelnik told Capitol Hill Seattle. “Only you go down the street to get to another department.”

The Electric Lady is scheduled to open in the under-construction building at 23rd and Union this December, CHS reports. The new shop will sell new bikes (they’ll be a Bianchi dealer) and 20/20’s shop bike, the Sealth. But the maturing market of Seattle-ready, kid-hauling cargo bikes will take center stage.

With the booming popularity of G&O Family Cyclery in Greenwood (a Seattle Bike Blog advertiser), which specializes in family cargo bikes, the Electric Lady is set to be part of a revolution in urban cycling in the city where bikes are replacing more and more tasks usually taken by car or truck. (more…)

tags: 20/20 cycle, alex kostelnik, cargo bikes, electric lady, family biking

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FamilyRide: 20 families bike together to go camping on Bainbridge

By

Madi Carlson

| Posted

June 23, 2015

EDITOR’S NOTE: Madi Carlson is Seattle Bike Blog’s Family Bike Expert and author of FamilyRide.us. Keep an eye out for her book, “Urban Cycling: How to get to work, save money, and use your bike for city living” available from Mountaineers Books in November.

We took part in a huge, fun bike event this past weekend. No, not the annual Solstice Cyclists Painted Bike Ride (AKA the Fremont Solstice Naked Bike Ride), the other thing: Swift Campout. Masterminded by local pannier maker and Seattle Bike Blog sponsor Swift Industries, anyone and everyone all around the world was invited to create a bike overnight trip and invite friends.

I organized a trip for biking families to Fay Bainbridge Park, where we family bikers have previously held our annual late summer group bike camping trips. It’s also the closest place I know for people traveling with enormous bikes that can’t go on the bus or train but are welcome on the ferry. Five miles from Fremont to the Seattle Ferry Terminal, then seven miles from the Bainbridge Ferry Terminal to Fay Bainbridge Park, and you’re in paradise — driftwood-strewn beach, campsite playground, amazing view and the impression of being far from the city (even though you’re not).

(more…)

tags: bainbridge island, familybike seattle, familyride, fay bainbridge park, madeleine carlson, swift campout

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