Seattle Bike Blog

Neighbors, city and state launch traffic safety project on Lake City Way

By

Tom Fucoloro

| Posted

March 28, 2014

Looking north of Lake City Way at NE 104th Way. Image from Google Street View

The State of Washington, the City of Seattle and Lake City neighbors will launch a coordinated traffic safety project on Lake City Way this afternoon.

Two community walks will start at 3:30 p.m. and converge at the Chase Plaza at NE 125th Street for a 4 p.m. launch event. See image above for map and details on the walks.

Lake City Way is the primary commercial street for the neighborhood, but it is also among the least walkable and most dangerous streets in Seattle. It also happens to be a state highway (522).

“For some people it’s just a state highway, but for people who live here, Lake City Way is like Main Street,” said Janine Blaeloch of Lake City Greenways, which has been very active in urging action to make the street safer. “We need to be able to share it.”

There are about 143 collisions on Lake City Way every year just on the section between NE 78th Street and the Seattle city limits at NE 145th Street, according to a five-year study. A stunning 88 people are injured in traffic collisions every year. Four people every year are killed or seriously injured. (more…)

tags: janine blaeloch, lake city, lake city greenways, sdot, vision zero, wsdot

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Mayor Murray outlines search for next SDOT Director

By

Tom Fucoloro

| Posted

March 27, 2014

Click to take the survey

When outgoing Mayor Mike McGinn left office at the end of 2013, incoming Mayor Ed Murray sent SDOT Director Peter Hahn with him. Since then, Goran Sparrman has been acting as Interim Director with the Murray administration promising a nationwide search.

Well, the search is officially on, and the Mayor’s Office needs your input about what qualities are vital for Seattle’s next transportation leader.

One easy way to submit input is to complete this online survey. It’s open-ended and takes only five or ten minutes to complete.

Aside from the obvious qualities like ability to effectively manage a large budget and staff, we are eager to see Seattle continue to innovate and lead the nation in prioritizing people using all modes of transportation. The next SDOT Director should be brave, willing to learn from examples of complete streets successes around the nation and globe and modify them to fit the needs of Seattle.

The Director should also be eager to maintain Seattle’s role as a major player in developing the nationally-used NACTO guides. The benefits of sharing safe, efficient street design knowledge and expertise across North America are immense for all cities involved. In fact, NACTO might be a good place to look for someone ready to take on the SDOT Director job.

Streets make up 27 percent of all land in Seattle, and the next Director must view streets at places, not merely pipes for cars. The next Director must be able to build popular trust in SDOT and have the courage to do the right thing even if there is some inevitable public backlash to change.

But the most important quality the next SDOT leader must have is complete dedication to the city’s stated top transportation priority: Safety. The city must make big changes to our transportation network if we are going to achieve our goal of zero annual traffic deaths by the year 2030. As the city continues to delay in putting its full force behind this goal, we are simply passing the buck to the families and friends of our neighbors who will face the devastation of losing someone in an entirely preventable traffic collision on our unnecessarily dangerous streets.

More details on the search, from the Mayor’s Office: (more…)

tags: ed murray, nacto, sdot, sdot director search 2014

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The 39th Ave NE greenway could soon reach NE 90th Street

By

Tom Fucoloro

| Posted

March 27, 2014

By most measures, the 39th Ave NE project was the city’s first truly successful experiment with neighborhood greenways. Funded by Seattle Children’s and developed through the hard work of NE Seattle Greenways, the project was the first to include stop signs for cross streets and included a fantastic new connection to the Burke-Gilman Trail.

The route is not perfect, but it’s pretty close. It has also helped to highlight the need for speed humps to slow cars and better arterial crossings at future neighborhood greenways.

The route is well used by people of all ages and abilities, and the city is already planning a short extension of the route north to NE 90th Street near Our Lady of the Lake School. From there, the route will turn and head west, including an improved crossing of the busy and poorly-designed 35th Ave NE.

If all goes according to schedule, construction could begin this fall.

You can learn more about the plans and give your feedback at an open house tonight (Thursday), 6:30–8 p.m. at Thornton Creek School Cafeteria. The presentation starts at 7.

More details from SDOT:

In 2013, SDOT and Seattle Children’s Hospital completed a neighborhood greenway along 39th Avenue NE between the Burke-Gilman Trail and NE 80th Street. If you have not used it, we encourage you to check it out.

This year we’re looking at extending a north-south route in the area of 38th and 39th avenues NE from NE 80th to 89th, or 90th streets and over to 32nd Avenue NE. We want to hear from the people who live, work, shop and play along these streets. We’ll be holding two public meetings. The first meeting shares traffic data and helps SDOT staff understand where people want to walk and bike and barriers to doing so. At the second meeting we share the results of technical analysis and public comment and the most promising route with recommended safety improvements.

tags: 39th Ave NE, meetings, ne seattle greenways, sdot, wedgwood

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Thieves hit Fremont’s Cascade Bicycle Studio, again

By

Tom Fucoloro

| Posted

March 26, 2014

For the second time this month, Fremont’s Cascade Bicycle Studio was broken into Tuesday. Unfortunately, this time they were hit hard.

In all, 32 bikes were stolen, including customer bikes. That’s quite an operation. Let’s hope law enforcement puts all their weight into catching them.

Here’s the announcement from CBS:

As some of you may have heard, we were broken into on early morning Tuesday, March 25th. This was actually the second time we had been hit in the last month. Unfortunately, we were hit very hard, and cleaned out of 32 bikes, which also included some customer bikes. Thanks to those customers and friends who actually noticed the broken window, and called 911.

Unfortunately, the loss was very heavy this time. We are nearly cleaned out of all bikes, so we have very little bike inventory to sell right now.

The list of lost bikes is long, but it includes the following bikes below. If you see any of these bikes, please let us or the police know. (more…)

tags: bike thefts, cascade bicycle studio, fremont

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On year anniversary of devastating DUI, community rallies in call for ‘vision zero’

By

Tom Fucoloro

| Posted

March 26, 2014

Right before the Schultes crossed the street one year ago, they stopped to pet this goat.

Dan Schulte told a crowd of residents gathered in memory of his parents and in a call for safer streets that being a public figure feels “strange” to him. In fact, he wasn’t even sure he wanted to be at the planned memorial walk and rally.

“But when I think of my parents, I could not possibly be anywhere else,” he said in a powerful and emotional speech on the lawn of Eckstein Middle School. He hopes his family’s story can give a boost to efforts to prevent impaired driving.

The walk and rally was held exactly one year after a drunk driver struck and killed Dan’s parents, Dennis and Judy, and seriously injured his wife Karina and 10-day-old son Elias. The man behind the wheel, Mark Mullan, pleaded guilty and is in prison.

“Karina is incredibly brave and courageous,” he said. “Elias has had to go through more in his first year than many have to go through in a lifetime.”

Dan Schulte speaks at the rally

(more…)

tags: dan schulte, darrin grondel, david frockt, judy and dennis schulte, mothers against drunk driving, vision zero

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Bike Works will host 2015 Youth Bike Summit + Notes from the auction

By

Tom Fucoloro

| Posted

March 26, 2014

Bike Works youth tell the auction crowd how Bike Works has impacted their lives. Photo by Ken Yasuhara

From its humble beginnings in a yellow house on Ferdinand Street in Columbia City, Bike Works continues to grow at an amazing pace. Their expanded reach is easy to see as both their programs and their annual auctions outgrow their former spaces.

Their auction, held Sunday, outgrew its previous venue and expanded into the Seattle Design Center in Georgetown. Always a good time, I volunteered for the third year in a row. I definitely recommend either attending or volunteering next year if you have never done so before.

The hottest item of the evening was, of course, the Rodriguez bike decked out in a Seahawks theme that Mayor Ed Murray put on the line against Denver Mayor Michael Hancock in a Super Bowl bet. It sold for $5,100.

In all, the auction raised $157,000 on Sunday alone.

They money raised at the auction will continue to fuel the organization’s steady growth. In the past few years, Bike Works has expanded into a larger warehouse and classroom space near the iconic yellow house where it started (the yellow house is now mostly used by the shop, which also helps raise money for Bike Works programs). With the space expansion, Bike Works has doubled its youth programs, Salls told the auction crowd.

At the same time, their influence on the neighborhood and the national bike scene grows, too. With their participation in Rainier Valley Greenways, Bike Works is helping residents organize and establish a clear voice in the call for safer streets in a neighborhood with some of the city’s most dangerous roads. After all, if Bike Works participants are going to put in the work to empower themselves through bicycling, the least the city can do is make sure the streets are safe for them to do so. (more…)

tags: auction, bike works, deb salls, jobs, rainier valley greenways, youth bike summit 2015

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