Beacon Hill commuters participating in Bike to Work Day should bike by the corner of Beacon and Columbian between 6-9 a.m. this morning, where Bike Works will be hosting a Bike to Work Day commute station with free souvenirs, snacks, and bicycle advice.
Depending on your commute, you might pass other stations on your way to work, too. See the list of commute stations here.
You can help improve things for pedestrians on Beacon Hill by taking part in a Beacon Hill Walking Audit on Saturday, February 25, from 1-2:30 p.m. All are invited to join the Beacon Hill Merchants Association and Feet First in a conversation and walk through the North Beacon Hill commercial district to discuss improvements in connectivity and the overall pedestrian experience.
The walk will begin at the corner of Beacon Avenue South and South Spokane Street, near the fire station at the north end of Jefferson Park. It will begin with a short presentation by Feet First. Bring a poncho or umbrella if the weather calls for it—the walk will go on regardless of weather. Feet First will provide cameras and clipboards for notetaking.
The walking route will go north from Spokane Street to Beacon Hill Station, and the walk will take about 90 minutes.
For more information about the Walking Audit, contact Gia Clark of Feet First (gia@feetfirst.org or 206-652-2310 ext. 3), or Angela of the Beacon Hill Merchants Association (info@beaconhillmerchants.com or 206-459-1430).
One street on Beacon Hill will be a bit less bumpy after this weekend. The Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) will resurface South Myrtle Street from 35th Avenue South to just west of 32nd Avenue Sout this weekend, February 18 and 19, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day. According to info from SDOT, “The pavement on this stretch of Myrtle Street is in poor condition. Resurfacing will improve roadway life, ride quality, and above all, safety for all roadway users—transit, general vehicular traffic, and bicyclists. This work is part of SDOT’s annual arterial street paving program.”
The full width of the street is to be repaved, with one lane left open in each direction for street traffic. There will be a police officer on site to assist navigation through the construction area. Pedestrian paths will remain open.
If the forecast calls for rain, the project may be rescheduled.
View S. Myrtle Street resurfacing, 2/18-2/19 in a larger map
At a January 10 meeting of Seattle Greenway Organizers at the Beacon Hill Library, Seattle City Councilmember Sally Bagshaw enthusiastically announced a set of pilot Neighborhood Greenways being planned by the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) that are designed to make streets safer and more pleasant for people who live, walk, bike, and drive in Seattle’s neighborhoods.
The Neighborhood Greenways under review total 11 miles: seven miles in Ballard, Beacon Hill, Greenwood, North Delridge, Wallingford, and the University District and an additional four miles in Laurelhurst (funded by Seattle Children’s Hospital). These projects are intended to form the backbone of a new network of Greenways that effectively connect people to the places they want to go by giving them a choice to travel on quieter, safer streets around the city.
Councilmember Bagshaw, chairing the newly formed Seattle City Council’s Parks and Neighborhoods Committee, is excited to include Neighborhood Greenways on her agenda.  “Greenways connect parks and schools, community centers and neighborhood business districts. Neighborhood Greenways help with transportation, and they help with getting people where they want to go within their own communities.†(Watch a YouTube video of Councilmember Bagshaw’s announcement here.) Councilmember Bagshaw and Councilmember Tom Rasmussen, who chairs the Seattle Transportation Committee, have taken great leadership initiative on Greenways.
In case you missed previous posts here and here: Neighborhood Greenways are slow-speed, low-traffic residential streets made even more pleasant for the people who live, walk, and bike on them. By adding new park-like amenities and limiting cut-through traffic, Greenways are naturally attractive both for families, and for anyone seeking a safer, more connected community experience. By placing Greenways a block or two away from major arterials, Neighborhood Greenways create a great option for people who prefer to walk or bike away from congested streets. While many new dedicated walking and bicycling trails are beyond the reach of our City’s budget, 10 miles of Greenways can be built for the cost of a single mile of new trail, offering the potential to bring a high-quality network to all Seattle neighborhoods at a comparatively low cost. Neighborhood access by emergency service vehicles and freight delivery vehicles—and parking—is preserved along Greenways.
If you would like to get involved with Greenway planning on Beacon Hill during these exciting times please visit the Beacon BIKES webpage and come to our February meeting!
The tour leaves from the junction of the Jose Rizal bridge and the Mountains-To-Sound trail at 5:30 p.m. and will arrive at the library just before the 6 p.m. meeting.
A Seattle city-wide neighborhood greenway organizers event will be held on Beacon Hill at the Beacon Hill Library next Tuesday, January 10, from 6-7:45 p.m. Beacon Hill currently has a new greenway in progress along 17th/18th Avenues South, between Jefferson Park and the Mountains-to-Sound Trail. For more information on what neighborhood greenways are all about, see this video about Portland’s greenways project.
Here’s the announcement for next Tuesday’s meeting:
Seattle’s Neighborhood Greenways movement is attracting many newcomers to bike advocacy who are eager to transform Seattle into a city where everyone can bike and walk safely. Come join us to learn about the history of bike advocacy in Seattle, and how our growing Neighborhood Greenways movement can complement the hard work that’s already been done to make Seattle one of the nation’s most respected cities for bicycling and walking.
We are privileged to welcome Blake Trask as our featured speaker for this meetup. Blake is the chair of the Seattle Bike Advisory Board (SBAB) and is the Statewide Policy Director of the Bicycle Alliance of Washington (BAW). He’ll be providing us with the context for Seattle’s current (2007) Bicycle Master Plan: who was involved in it? What was the vision? What were the biggest challenges? And how can Neighborhood Greenways be incorporated into the 2012 update to the Bicycle Master Plan?
Blake brings a wealth of knowledge and many years of experience in improving bike safety “from the inside”. By learning from Blake where we’ve already been as an advocacy movement, we will be even better equipped as Neighborhood Greenways organizers to “work within the system” to make bicycling and walking safe and attractive for all Seattle.
We will also be discussing the upcoming neighborhood project fund grants (deadline Feb 1). This is a great and easy way to get some Greenways built in your neighborhood NEXT YEAR!
Please attend this meeting if you can.
There will be two additional southbound trips from Westlake Station, at 12:58 a.m. and 1:13 a.m. The last northbound trip isn’t so late—it leaves Sea-Tac Station at 12:20 a.m.
On Sunday, New Year’s Day, and also on Monday, January 2, Link will run on a Sunday schedule, which means that the first northbound train won’t reach Beacon Hill Station until 6:43 a.m., and trains will run only every 10 minutes during most of the day. Service will return to normal on Tuesday, January 3.
Those driving through Sodo, take note: Sixth Avenue South and East Marginal Way South will both be closed overnight tonight and some nights next week at South Spokane Street, so that workers can complete construction in the area for the Spokane Street Viaduct widening project.
Sixth Avenue South will be closed at South Spokane Street tonight, Thursday, December 8, and also on Monday and Tuesday, December 12 and 13. Closures will begin at 9 p.m., except on December 12, when work will begin at 11 p.m. The street will reopen at 5 a.m. each morning.
Northbound drivers on Sixth Avenue South will have access to I-5 on-ramps at Sixth and Spokane during the closures.
Northbound East Marginal Way at South Spokane Street will be closed tonight, December 8, from 9 p.m. until 5 a.m. tomorrow morning. The street will be closed to both northbound and southbound traffic next Monday-Thursday, December 12-15 from 11 p.m. until 5 a.m. each following morning.
On Tuesday, December 13, the southbound to westbound turn to the West Seattle Swing Bridge will also be closed from 9 p.m. until 5 a.m. the following morning. Drivers will be directed to a detour via the First Avenue South Bridge.
Further information on the viaduct widening project, which is scheduled to complete in Spring 2012, can be found at the project website.
View Street closures, 12/8-12/15 in a larger map
The Airport Way South Viaduct in neighboring Georgetown, just north of South Lucile Street, will be closed to all traffic beginning on November 28 for up to 14 months while the bridge is rehabilitated by the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT).
Vehicles and pedestrians will be detoured to Fourth Avenue South via South Lucile and South Industrial Way, and bicycles will be detoured all the way west to First Avenue South via South Lander Street. (Which seems like a heck of a long detour.) Denver Avenue South and South Dawson Street between Lucile and Fourth will be used as a northbound truck detour route. See a map of the detour routes here.
Crews will work from 6 a.m to 5 p.m. weekdays, as well as on some nights and weekends. Expect traffic delays in the area.
The rehabilitation project includes seismic retrofitting of the 83-year-old bridge just west of Beacon Hill and I-5. The viaduct bears 13,000 vehicles daily.
What are Neighborhood Greenways, you may ask?
Neighborhood Greenways are quiet residential streets that are optimized for pedestrian and bicycle travel. The idea is to have routes that connect our neighborhood to itself along streets that are safe for those 8 to 80 years old. The bike lanes on the arterials are only going to be used by a small minority of the neighborhood; Neighborhood Greenways, on the other hand, can be conformably used by anyone!
What does a Neighborhood Greenway look like?
The best introduction to Neighborhood Greenways is this video from Portland. Basically, a residential street that connects neighborhood destinations is outfitted with wayfinding signs, paint markings on the street (like the “sharrows” on 15th), some traffic calming (speed bumps, traffic circles), improved crossing treatments at intersections with arterials, and maybe some trees to spruce the place up.  The result is a street that gives that small town feel in the middle of the big city. Traffic is calmed where people want it calmed (in front of their homes!), bikers are off the arterials where conflicts with traffic are good for no one, use of the public space provides more eyes on the street and thus reduces the likelihood of crime, and you can bike to the park or to school with your kid without worrying for their lives.
The Beacon Hill Family Bicycle and Pedestrian Circulation Plan is basically a big network of Neighborhood Greenways on Beacon Hill.  The first Greenway route (18th Ave South/17th/Lafayette) is currently being implemented.  The wayfinding signs are up (you may have seen them around the library), the paint will be going in within a month, and as of yesterday SDOT planted about 70 trees along the route. I snapped some photos this morning of our new friends on the hill. Its not a Greenway without the Green, so we are excited that the city agreed to help us out with the trees!  Neighbors along the route with a spot for a potential tree in their planting strip were offered a choice of a couple different species of trees or no tree at all.  SDOT planted and will water the trees for 3 years until they are established.  SDOT will also prune for the life of the trees.  The trees planted were paperbark maples, Persian ironwood, “Royal Raindrops” crabapples, “Native Flame” American hornbeam, and “Emerald Sunshine” elm.
If you get the chance, take a stroll down 18th and see how our first Greenway is coming together!
Next Beacon B.I.K.E.S. meeting is Wednesday November 16th, 6-8pm at the library. Â All are welcome!