Transportation Committee 4/2/2024

Let's call the roll.

Council Member Kettle.

Here.

Council Member Strauss.

Present.

Council Member Wu.

Present.

Vice Chair Hollingsworth.

Present.

Chair Saka.

Here.

Chair, there are five members present.

All right.

And today we have two noncommittee council members also joining our committee this morning.

And I'd like to extend a very special welcome to council members Moore and Morales.

Thank you for joining us today.

Colleagues, if there are no objections, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing no objection, the agenda is adopted.

So first off, welcome.

members and guests to this year's fifth Transportation Committee.

We have a public hearing on the third item of the agenda regarding the petition to vacate an alley.

So there will be an initial public comment period and then the public hearing on the specific petition itself, the third item on the agenda, will be towards the end of the meeting.

So make sure you are signed up in the right spot to make your comments.

All right, we will now open the hybrid public comment period.

Public comments should relate to items on today's agenda or within the broader purview of this committee.

Clerk, how many speakers are signed up today?

Chair Saka, we have 20 in-person speakers and six remote speakers.

All right.

Each speaker will have approximately 60 seconds or one minute.

We will start with the in-person speakers first.

Clerk, can you please read the public comment instructions?

The public comment period will be moderated in the following manner.

The public comment period is up to 20 minutes.

Speakers will be called in order in the order in which they are registered.

Speakers will hear a chime when 10 seconds are left of their time.

Speakers' mics will be muted if they do not end their comments within the allotted time to allow us to call on the next speaker.

The public comment period is now open and we will begin with the first speaker on the list.

Mary Baccarella.

Go ahead, go to start, thank you, sorry.

Good morning, council members.

I'm Mary Baccarella.

I'm the executive director of the Pike Place Market PDA.

And I'm here today to ask that you remove project 65, Pike Place Event Street from the Seattle Transportation Plan.

Pike Place Market isn't a park.

It's a working market that facilitates a wide variety of merchant-customer interactions.

Pike Place Street is the operational spine of the market, the essential artery for the market's functionality for deliveries, emergency, and customer access.

It's not like any other street in Seattle.

the city to allow the PDA to handle the management of the street.

The fate of over 500 of our businesses, small shops, restaurants, craftspeople, farmers, buskers, 480 residents, and five social services vital to the city remain in the hands of those who understand that best, the PDA and the market community.

Over 50 years ago, the citizens of Seattle created this PDA that I work to operate the market, so please let us do all that.

For all these reasons I just touched on, I ask you to remove Project 65, Pike Place-Event Street, from the Seattle Transportation Plan.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Jim Margard.

Good morning.

On August 10th, the Seattle Times editorial board published, here's a bit of advice for Mayor Harrell and the Seattle City Council.

If you pour money into plans to build a new streetcar down First Avenue, scrap any notion of asking voters to renew a transportation levy in 2024. Concluding, if they do, voters should consider it reason enough to reject any new property taxes to pay for, quote, vital transportation projects next year.

Since then, project costs have escalated by another $160 million.

Virtually all merchants, eateries, hotels, cultural venues, and property owners along the route oppose the project stating that it would do major damage to their businesses, in some cases irreparably, and severely inhibit the downtown recovery.

Further, a thorough environmental impact study and traffic simulation impact assessment have never been made.

As a signatory to the First Avenue Transit Alliance representing those above, please amend the SDP to exclude the connector project from the SDP.

Thank you.

Mike Stewart.

Good morning, Chair Salka and members of the Transportation Committee.

Mike Stewart, Ballard Alliance Executive Director, representing hundreds of businesses and thousands of residents in the community of Ballard.

Today, I'm here to urge this committee and the Seattle City Council to take an active role in helping the communities of Ballard, Fremont, and Westlake work with SDOT on a compromise solution for the proposed Route 40 changes.

We all support a vast majority of the project proposals, including the pedestrian improvements and the transit signal priority usage.

However, the proposed 24-7 bus-only lanes present unique challenges for our neighborhood business districts, and we've grown frustrated by the lack of progress from SDOT to work in earnest and hear our communities and work together for a solution.

With the transportation levy renewal right around the corner, now is the time for a robust engagement from SDOT that demonstrates they're committed to working with us, that they're committed to working on the significant impacts that the proposal presents for businesses, residents, and the freight community.

Thank you.

Elizabeth Wilder.

Hi, I am Elizabeth Wilder, and I represent 57 families in my neighborhood who signed this petition, which simply asks SDOT to meet with us in person to address wrong-way traffic.

We live at the second busiest intersection in the city, over 68,000 cars per year, according to SDOT, 2,400 pedestrians, the third highest bike usage, and six people were in a serious or fatal pedestrian collision on these two blocks in 2020, according to SDOT.

We have been trying for at least seven years to get a meeting, and they won't meet with us.

They send us do not reply emails that tell us that we live in the best of all possible worlds.

This place is very poorly signposted.

People are frustrated.

They are trying to get to 520. There is no sign.

We don't understand why we can't have a high-vis, red, you know...

at our street like they have here in Green Lake, which is a much less busy location.

Again, six people dead, second highest traffic in the city.

Thank you.

And I'm happy to give you maps and I'm happy to give you copies of the petition.

I'll be dropping them off with Council Member Hollingsworth, whose staff Alex has so kindly worked with me on this.

Thank you very much, ma'am.

Mike Strickland.

Good morning, all.

I am a canal station condominium HOA president, and the proposed SDOT Route 40 design right now totally eliminates our loading zone, and 169 residents and three businesses will have no way to safely offload and load, along with FedEx, Uber, everybody else that comes with all these delivery packages.

Amazon's probably our biggest one.

We really need to have that reconsidered and because we have no other options, access to our elevator to use, to get to the residents.

And I appreciate your support in looking into more in depth by the design team.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Howard Anderson.

Good morning.

The Seattle Transit Coalition Alliance is opposed to the streetcar, obviously.

The reason being is that we have the most viable street at First Avenue, the most active street in town.

and it connects five of the neighborhoods on the two-mile corridor, and it's the gateway to the Pike Place Market.

If the streetcar were to go in, four blocks would be ended, starting at Cherry to Jackson would be closed, and First Avenue becomes a dead end.

We're proposing a street, a transit plan for that street, First Avenue.

It requires bringing back the buses that were removed to Third Avenue and reestablishing as a real connector on First Avenue, serving local.

The other reason for rejecting this, 440 million reasons to reject this, and you know where that number comes from.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Tom Malone.

Good morning, everyone.

Thank you for giving us this opportunity to address some issues in regard to Route 40. I want to first of all endorse the comments of my colleague, Mike Stewart.

I think he did a great job of giving a general outline.

What I'm here to say specifically is that there are several arteries throughout the city of Seattle that are really important to us that are part of this route.

Route 40 is important.

It goes all the way from Northgate to South Seattle, but it cuts through several streets.

One of them is Market Street.

Market Street is not just a street for us.

It's the east-west artery.

For all of Ballard, I'm an emeritus member of the National Nordic Museum, and we're really dependent upon that street.

So we're only asking for the SDOT to take our ideas into consideration so we can make this a better plan than it is right now.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Devin McComb.

Good morning, Chair Saka and council members.

My name is Devin McComb.

I have the honor of serving as the chair of the governing council of the Pike Place Market PDA.

And I'm here today to ask you to please let's keep the market, meaning we don't want you to take away the responsibility that the PDA and the MHC and the market community has for governance.

And we want to maintain our control and management of Pike Street.

It's not an event street.

It's not a cafe street.

It's a market street.

It has been since the market was founded in that street in 1907. And what we would ask you to do is allow us, through our master plan process, which we just completed and adopted last Thursday, to develop a plan for the management and the operation of the street that serves the market community and is informed by the market community.

The city created...

to govern the market, and we're asking that you let us do that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Eric Peel?

Good morning.

Good morning.

My name is Eric Peel.

I work for the National Nordic Museum.

I'm here to talk about a couple issues about the Transportation Master Plan, but also about the Route 40. I think there's been an absence of meaningful community engagement around the Transportation Master Plan, and that's really evidenced by the SDOT's engagement with the Route 40. It's been largely driven by special interest and by box checking.

There's a group of more than 50 community leaders and organizations from the North End who have reached out to SDOT a couple times to talk about issues with the Route 40, but those have largely gone unanswered.

I'd encourage you to take more time WITH REVIEWING THE MASTER PLAN, TRANSFORMATION MASTER PLAN TO ENSURE THAT THERE IS MEANINGFUL ENGAGEMENT, AND THAT IS NOT A TOP-DOWN APPROACH, BUT A MEANINGFUL TWO-WAY DIALOGUE WITH COMMUNITY, AND THAT YOU WOULD ALSO ENCOURAGE SDOT TO REVIEW THE ROUTE 40 PLAN WITH THE COMMUNITY.

THANK YOU.

THANK YOU.

PAUL OSNER.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak today.

My name is Paul Osher.

I own Rachel's Bagels on Leary Avenue, and I'm here to share my concerns about SDOT's proposed Route 40 lane through Ballard.

The addition of a 24-7 northbound bus lane on Leary Avenue will have a substantial access and impact on my business and everybody who works there.

Leary Avenue is a highly trafficked entry into downtown Ballard, and over the past 10 years, we've worked really hard to increase the foot traffic there as well.

SDOT's proposed plan for a dedicated bus lane on Leary will choke that off by rerouting traffic and displacing much of the much, much needed parking on the north side of the street.

What is so striking for everyone affected by the plan is how it feels excessive, like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut.

To put a 24-7 bus lane where traffic patterns just simply aren't slowing down buses for more than an hour or two a day is just a lot.

All other times, the neighborhood just needs more easy access and parking to keep the neighborhood vibrant.

Please, please, please listen to the people that are on the ground every day.

We really want a vibrant neighborhood as well.

Thank you.

Heather Peel.

Heather Peel, Friends of the Market.

Pike Place is not an event street by any stretch of the word.

It is the lifeline street in the Market Historical District that serves as the only loading dock for the most historic part of the market, as it has since 1907. Pike Place Market is a working market, and it's also a community, including low-income residents, a senior center, a food bank, a childcare, and a medical clinic.

It's not a place to hang out.

For these reasons, the hands-on operator at the market, the PDA, needs to manage the street.

The market had to be saved from the city's plans, and it does now, too.

I support Amendment 3. Thank you, Councilmember Kettle.

Please keep Pike Place out of the transportation plan and the levy, and entrust the PDA to manage the street.

Which brings me to, please also bring an amendment to delete the streetcar from the plan and connect the neighborhoods along First Avenue by bus instead.

The streetcar would choke the market's operations because it would severely limit access to Pike Place and loading unloading for the market.

Thank you.

Christy McDonald.

Good morning, and thanks for the opportunity to address the Ballard's concerns, Ballard Business' concerns about the Route 40 revision.

The stated goals, according to SDOT, are to reduce transit time, increase reliability, all this is for the bus, calm traffic, and safety.

These are not the issues that have bubbled up from the business community in Ballard.

I don't quite know how this solution to a problem that hasn't been identified with the community's involvement has arrived.

But for those of us who have businesses on Market Street and elsewhere in Ballard, getting deliveries matter, getting customers to and from our businesses matter enormously.

And the most frequent thing that we hear still is parking.

I want to say that I appreciate the city's approach to parking, jiggering the parking and having it turn over.

There is a parking available for folks most of the time, but this just doesn't feel like it's been a conversation.

It feels like it's something.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Christy Kisby.

Good morning.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak with all of you.

My name is Christy Kisbee.

My husband and I own a business, have owned a business on Market Street for 23 years.

And we're here to voice our concerns about the impacts that the proposed Route 40 bus-only lanes through Ballard will have on our community.

We are by no means anti-public transit, but the proposed 24-7 bus-only lanes east and west along Market Street, an already really busy corridor, will eliminate two travel lanes.

In addition, it will remove the already scarce parking spaces and loading zones on our street, both of which really are crucial to businesses like ours.

We have customers who come to Annie's from all over the city, actually all over the area, and they come to us expecting to be able to load and unload projects for framing.

We have a frame shop.

So we kindly ask that...

Thank you.

Good morning and thank you for this opportunity.

My name is Suza Pell.

I own Pellington Properties on Westlake Avenue North and have seven small business tenants there.

I want to make three points.

One is that we need to allow freight delivery whenever the tenants need it.

While SDOT has proposed a special freight and bus lane, it's really just trying to ameliorate the problem of a bus-only lane.

That's the worst part of this plan.

The second is around congestion.

The only time we have congestion on West Lake Avenue North is when the Fremont Bridge goes up, and that's congestion going north.

And with a bus-only lane, that congestion is gonna be worse.

And the third is what my colleague Mike Stewart said, we would like you to help us to work with us to make this plan work for everybody.

And thank you very much.

Thank you.

Eva Otto.

Good morning, my name is Eva Otto and I am a small business owner in Fremont and I'm here to talk about Route 40. I'm also a member of the Fremont Neighborhood Council and we've met with Route 40 and SDOT and we've talked to them and it didn't feel like they were listening.

We have probably over 100 businesses along 36 in Fremont that will be impacted by Route 40. They're super small.

They're all one story businesses, mom and pop shops that all depend on parking to be able to get a quick run in, pick up that set of flowers or whether it's, pick something up for your pet.

And so I just wanted to say that I totally support Route 40 and would love to see it come through our community, but just not take away all the parking for all the small businesses in the country.

So please help us find a compromise and communicate with SDOT that we would like to work with them.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Margie Freeman.

Good morning, Margie Freeman here.

I appreciate the time.

A couple bullet points about Route 40. Parking, express buses, math, freight lanes.

70 minutes is what it takes from going to South Seattle up to Northgate.

We're going to save five minutes for these dedicated lanes.

It doesn't work.

The impact.

of the travel time for the general transportation lanes is huge.

There will be backups, there will be frustration, and there will be accidents.

The other thing I wanted to say was the freight lanes that they have considered for sharing the bus lane is a good idea.

Let's put that in the bucket of things to use.

However, they're only going to do it for a year, so who is going to be providing what happens after that.

So freight is really important to the city of Seattle and to our small businesses.

Parking is too.

We wish SDOT would work with us.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Janice Stamm.

Good morning, and thank you for allowing us to speak to you this morning.

I'm here to talk about Leary Avenue and the bus-only route.

I live on Leary Avenue in the senior community at Ballard Landmark, and across the street from us is going to be a northbound bus-only lane, which means there will be no parking on the eastern side of Leary.

That means that delivery trucks, moving trucks, and other vehicles will not be able to stop or park on the east side.

Can you imagine a moving truck with having to move furniture across Lurie to the Canal Station, for example?

There is much congestion on the road on Leary Avenue right now, and this will only add to that.

We hope that you will reconsider and work with us and help us work with SDOT.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Neil Edwards.

Good morning.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak.

I'm Neil Edwards.

I'm the director at Ballard Landmark.

We're a retirement assisted living community where Janice lives.

I'm here to share my opposition to SDOT's proposal to add the bus-only lanes, obviously specifically through Ballard and on Leary Avenue.

A couple of reasons.

It's not clear how the project is going to interact or interface with another potential future project, that being the missing link Uh bike trail.

So Combination of those two things are a big concern for us and a number of others here today.

One thing that is clear just to highlight what Janice said is that the elimination of parking on the northeast side of of our street, Larry, will force everything in front of our community.

And that poses a very serious safety risk for residents such as Janice and about 160 other senior citizens that live with that.

So we would ask that the council engage this on behalf of all of us and work with that stuff.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Eugene Wasserman.

Hi, I'm Eugene Wasserman.

I'm president of the North Seattle Industrial Association.

We're the industrial maritime part of this coalition.

Only in Ballen-Fremont did you have industrial coming alongside retail businesses and stuff.

We tried to work with SDOT for three years on this project.

We hired our own transportation consultant to work with SDOT.

SDOT has refused to work with us.

They promised us information that we'd like to see, how they base their decisions.

They actually refused to give it to us.

They promised it, and then they never delivered it.

They also lied to us about how they talked to all these businesses that they told us they talked to.

when they put this project together.

It turns out they talked to no one.

So this is not how, as a new council, and I was one of the leaders in the district council elections, kind of behavior.

And the only way we get anything done on freight, which you all have nicely supported, is we go to Council Member Strauss or we go to the mayor's office.

But we don't get that help from S.

I'm happy you're all here to remind me how important freight is in this practice.

Thank you.

Pete Hanning.

Good morning, Council.

My name is Pete Hanning.

I'm the executive director of the Fremont Chamber of Commerce.

We are here today not to voice opposition to the Route 40 project, but to ensure that this project, as voted on by the people, makes the best use of the allocated funds for the betterment of all the stakeholders who live along this vital corridor.

This network of roads goes through critical industrial and maritime zone lands, three vibrant and distinct business districts compromising hundreds of small businesses and tens of thousands of residents and is a designated freight corridor.

By implementing bus-only lanes 24-7, SDOT expects significant improvements in travel time.

We have advocated for bus-only lanes Monday through Friday at peak times only to minimize the impact.

If implemented, as approved.

However, the anticipated negative outcomes such as rate, vehicular capacity, constriction of loading zones and loss of short-term parking and severe backups and congestion will occur.

Our large coalition kindly asks that this committee request SDOT to reengage with our coalition to ensure the best outcomes possible.

Thank you for hearing our concerns.

Thank you.

Clara Cantor.

Sorry, that was me.

This one?

Go ahead.

Hello, is that better?

Okay.

Hi, my name is Clara Cantor and I'm a community organizer with Seattle Neighborhood Greenways.

I'm here to support the amendments uplifting the dramatic need to fund sidewalks in our city.

Seattle is missing 829 miles of sidewalks and building them at the rate of 1.7 miles per year is laughably inadequate and puts us on a timeline of 500 years before people with disabilities can access most of our city.

I'm also here to ask you to oppose Council Member Kettle's amendment, explicitly excluding Pike Place Market from the possibility of future improvements to the street in front of the market.

Making Pike Place more pedestrian friendly is supported by over 80% of voters in Seattle and a majority of market vendors.

Even the Pike Place PDA's long-term plan points towards a different way to manage the street in front of the market.

There are many ways to continue to allow deliveries and freight access while we also make the streets safer and more joyful, better access to the market for everybody.

But this amendment would prohibit us from even having those conversations.

I'm also strongly in support of the Route 40 moving forward.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, we're going to move on to remote speakers.

The first one we have is Scott Bajoukian.

Scott, you need to press star six.

Thank you, Chair and Council Members.

My name is Scott Bajoukian and I live in District 2. I'm representing a coalition of advocates asking for a stronger incorporation of our highway mitigation work into the Seattle Transportation Plan.

We include Lit I-5, the U District Partnership, Connect South Park, and the Rural Reimagine Coalition.

We would like to see these projects acknowledged in the draft plan and to see better implementation of Council Resolution 32100 from last year.

Our projects are real, and they are making good progress towards implementation.

We have invested many years of volunteer hours, built tremendous public buy-in across all council districts, and we have secured millions of dollars in funding for transportation planning.

We offer a citywide vision for a safer and well-maintained roadway network, creating better places for people and bringing together everyone as one Seattle.

We have submitted a comment letter with details on our two main recommendations.

First is to add our projects to the large capital projects list under the implementation strategy.

And second, to integrate more highway mitigation work directly into key moves chapter three.

Thanks for your attention to the transportation issues in our city and our coalition looks forward to working with you on this.

Okay, next up we have Megan Cruz.

Megan, you need to press star six, please.

All right.

Megan, we're going to move on to the next person.

We'll get you on the flip side.

I've been doing.

Can you hear me?

Okay.

We can hear you.

I did it like three times.

Sorry.

Third time's the charm.

Can you hear me now?

We hear you now.

Okay.

Super.

Okay.

I'm Megan Cruz speaking on the Seattle Transportation Plan.

This is the blueprint to ensure Seattle's right-of-ways work with buildings to absorb 120,000 new residents over the next 20 years.

However, it doesn't have a plan for freight.

The average US household receives 162 packages a year, and this is consistent with the package counts for downtown residential towers.

E-commerce deliveries are growing by double digits annually, and the new comp plan calls for bigger, denser urban neighborhoods.

When the trucks and vans supplying these new homes and businesses can't find parking, we know the problem spills into the street, causing a chain reaction with congestion, pollution, and pedestrian safety.

The STP even states that without freight parking requirements, there may not be enough loading docks built in new developments, making them even more dependent on the curb.

To avoid the problems we've seen downtown, the STP needs an urban freight policy backed by SDCI's residential loading recommendations.

I hope this committee can help initiate this effort.

Thanks for your consideration.

Thank you.

Next up is Maggie Haynes.

Maggie, please pass star six.

Maggie, are you there?

Hello, this is Maggie Haynes.

I'm a member of the Friends of the Market, and I speak to support Robert Bob Kettle's Amendment 3 to the resolution.

We support excluding the Pike Place Event Street, number one, because it's not an event street.

It's a place where local producers sometimes sell, where cars and pedestrians move very well.

Sometimes I call it a slow dance, but there is already priority given to pedestrians.

It's necessary to remove both the words event street and removing Pike Place from the future levy.

Thank you.

Thank you.

John Turnbull.

Go for it, John.

John, you're unmuted.

I am?

Yes.

Go ahead, John.

John, would you like to start your testimony, please?

John, we'll come back to you.

All right.

Next is Colleen McAleer.

Colleen, please press star six.

Good morning, council members.

This is Colleen McAleer, Lowellhurst Community Club in Northeast Seattle.

The process behind the transportation plan resolution has noble intentions, but it's very scant data that's offered to provide information enough for a rigor analysis to make changes in policies and plan for the future.

Data is missing about the effectiveness of the projects we implemented in the last 10 years move Seattle funding.

Data about the city's work patterns changing to Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and major highways and congestion and peak times and its mitigation is missing.

Data about how well the infrastructure performed with the growth of the urban centers and urban villages and bottlenecks they've created.

Data is missing about trip generation and travel times with increased freight movement and more deliveries.

and road conditions and sidewalk conditions and the missing 800 miles.

Data is missing about bridge replacements and and data is missing about the crime and safety issues reported to transit users as well as the traffic delays created from road diets and the effect on small businesses which you've heard today.

So we ask that you get more data and answers from SDOT.

They have a very narrow scope which they have put this plan together and use what we've learned to make it a better plan for the future for mobility and safety for all the people at the city.

Thank you.

Thank you.

David Haynes.

Hi, David Haynes.

SDOT can't and won't even fix all the potholes on the Route 40 between Ballard and South Lake Union.

It breaks apart the bus and it injures your spine.

Plus, they refuse to coordinate with King County Metro and the Seattle Police to deal with all these evil, self-destructive, low-level drug pushers and junkie meth heads who have still continuously taken over the bus stops that made life a living hell, justifying not even taking the public transportation ever again, buying a car or relying on your bike.

So, you know, maybe keep SDOT a little more honest before they start tearing up more roads.

And quite frankly, I think we still need to stop driving through Pike Place Market because it's a living hell.

It's like a modern third world infrastructure and you need to take that connector and put it on the waterfront so it's more enjoyable and it would be a lot cheaper.

Thank you.

All right.

Next up, we have Nivi Achanta.

Hello, can people hear me?

Hello, just confirming that you can hear me.

Hi, I'm Nivea Tanta.

I am part of the Fremont Neighborhood Council, Chamber of Commerce.

It's been great seeing people here on the phone.

I think it's kind of mean to call people names, but the reason I'm here is to support Route 40. I take the bus.

I do have a car, but when congestion goes up, I am more likely to ride the bus.

I think that Route 40 needs to be improved.

And I think small businesses are awesome, love them.

And I, as a Fremont resident, only get to small businesses on the bus or on my bicycle.

So I am strongly in favor of better bus-only lanes.

And I don't want the concern of deliveries to be mixed up with parking spaces.

I think those are two different things.

So as someone that uses transit way more than parking spaces, I wanted to just say that I am highly in support of better bus infrastructure, and I also love the emphasis on SDOT working with communities better.

Thank you.

Next up, Carter Portwood.

Carter, please press star six.

Hello.

Can you hear me?

Yep.

All right.

Hi, I'm Carter Portwood.

I live a few blocks from Leary in District 6 and I regularly take Route 40 as well as drive, walk and bike along the corridor.

I'm personally very excited for the pedestrian and pedestrian improvements in the bus and freight lanes that will improve the bus reliability and speed.

I use Route 40 to patronize businesses in Ballard and Fremont.

And I suspect that many others do.

SDOT has done extensive community outreach on Route 40, and community feedback has been very positive in support of the project, in spite of what a small contingent of business owners may say.

These bus and freight lanes would improve transit for over 7,000 riders a day.

Removing them in favor of a few parking spaces would have been an incredibly short-sighted move that set odds with Ballard's increasing density and Seattle's Vision Zero.

Thank you for your time.

Yonatan Gonzalez.

Oh can you hear me.

Yep.

Cool.

Hi my name is Jonathan Gonzalez.

I'm calling in to support the Route 40 improvement.

I live in Ballard in the Brewery District and Route 40 is how I get around and into Fremont and into downtown.

My husband takes it to go in to and from work sometimes.

And he has mentioned several times how it's standing room only and very busy during peak hours.

I just really want to thank SDOT for listening to the community and putting these improvements in.

And I'm excited to see how the freight and bus only lanes will work because I believe that getting both buses and freight around the city is important.

And it seems like SDOT is making a plan for that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Kevin Trout.

Hello.

Testing, testing.

Am I coming through?

You sure are.

Excellent.

Hi there.

My name is Kevin Trout.

I live in Ballard.

I work in Fremont.

I'm here calling in support of the Route 40 project and really just upping our transportation game in general.

As anyone that has walked around or been around, you know, just been in the city for a while, I've seen we're expanding tremendously.

Lots of places are going from single family housing into multifamily units.

And that kind of density is really lovely.

It creates a really vibrant city and a lot of opportunity for people.

And it also means that we're in a spot where we can't feasibly have everyone have a call.

And what that means is we really need to be prioritizing How we're letting people get around the city, right?

The freedom to choose how to get around.

And when we think about how we can incentivize that because people respond to incentives, it is going through things like freight and bus only lanes.

So I'm here calling in support.

I think they're a really lovely idea.

And truthfully, we are not.

Okay, John Turnbull, can you try again to press star six?

Okay, let's try this.

Yeah, we hear you.

Does that work?

Yes.

Yes, sir.

Oh, great.

I'm John Turnbull.

I'm speaking with 40 years experience of managing and operating Pike Place Market and adjacent areas of First Avenue.

I'd like to point out that in the transportation plan, there's a section called curbside management, which stresses critical access needs.

You've heard a lot about that in Ballard.

That also applies to the whole length of First Avenue where there's small businesses, hotels, low-income housing, other destinations, as well as the market.

It's the only place along the curbside where you can take deliveries, emergency responders, first responders, drop-offs, pickups, and it's essential to making these functional streets and sidewalk areas.

The transportation plan forgets all that when they get to transit because they talk about eliminating all the curbside parking, moving all the deliveries into Pike Place.

It's totally inconsistent.

The market needs to be managed better and first

Okay.

There are some people who are signed up to speak for the public hearing for clerk file 314-512.

Elizabeth Wilder, Jim Margard, Megan Teuch, Brian Reagan, and Mike Peck.

I just want to make sure they're here to speak to that matter and not to...

Okay.

So we'll...

We'll wait till the public hearing for that clerk file for you to speak.

And that is item three on the agenda.

No.

Okay.

We already heard from Jim and we already heard from Elizabeth, I think.

Elizabeth Wilder.

Okay.

Megan Teutsch.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak today.

My name is Megan Twitch, and I'm here representing the Ballard Landmark, along with other Neil and Janice, a vibrant, independent and assisted living community of 170 residents in the heart of Ballard, located at 4533 Leary Avenue and Ballard Avenue.

I'm here to voice my opposition about SDOT's proposed Route 40 bus-only lane through West Locks, Fremont, and Ballard.

And contrary to some other callers, I have yet to meet any small business owners that are in support of this.

The addition of a 24-7 northbound only bus only lane on Leary Avenue Northwest between 20th Avenue Northwest and Northwest Market Street will have a substantial access impact on small businesses as well as residential retirement communities along the corridor.

Leary Avenue Northwest is a highly trafficked throughput and connector for residents, workers, and visitors to Ballard.

Additionally, our elderly residents' medical needs mean that the fire department and EMS are full to Ballard landmark an average of three to five times weekly and need to park in the middle of Leary Avenue to access our facility.

However, due to the terrible congestion on Market Street, Seattle Fire Station 18 and EMS services must drive down the middle lane of Leary Avenue, essentially using it as a fire lane to not only access Butler Landmark, but also Swedish Hospital and other businesses and homes in Dallas.

Thank you, ma'am.

Your time is up.

Brian Reagan.

Thank you for taking the time to listen to us on this project.

I'm a pedestrian in some of the neighborhoods served by Route 40. We need to maintain our public transit fleet and keep routes that are efficient and serve both the high demand areas as well as those less accessible.

However, the plan to turn Route 40 into a bus freeway is both a waste of money and extremely invasive to the neighborhoods with little to show for it.

Walking on our sidewalks next to parking lanes feels much safer to me than next to transit-only lanes like you have on Third Avenue downtown.

The idea that we can or should become a car-free city has no merit.

The proposed bus only lanes would squeeze all the cars and trucks into traffic jams spewing more carbon dioxide into the air than they do now.

Bicyclists would have to fend for themselves.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Mike Peck.

Hello, I'm Mike Peck.

I own a couple of buildings down in Fremont.

Been there, a resident and a business person for 40 years.

I'm representing small businesses in our building that's going to be impacted directly by a bus curb, a bus bulb that's going to be stopping traffic in the middle of a five-way intersection.

These businesses are four woman-owned businesses that have been established there as long as 35 years.

This bus configuration with the bus bulb is going to drop the front door of the bus right into the lingerie store that happens to be adjacent to it.

There's also another business next door that's utilizing some of the sidewalk as some of their eating area for the public, and it's being impacted by this as well.

And that is move the bus stop a half a block north to the Lennon statue and we all be happy.

Thank you.

Thank you.

That's it.

All right.

Well, thank you.

There are no additional registered speakers and we'll now proceed to our items of business.

We will now move on to our first item of business.

Will the clerk please read item one into the record.

Agenda item one, resolution 32132, a resolution providing an honorary designation of 8th Avenue between Seneca Street and Spring Street as Weir Harmon Way.

All right, thank you.

Will our presenter please join us at the table?

Let's get there and share your presentation.

Once ready, please introduce yourselves and begin your presentation.

Good morning.

I'm Calvin Chow with council central staff.

Item one is resolution 32132. It would establish an honorary name designation for 8th Avenue between Seneca and Spring as a Weir Harmon Way is offered by council member Morales.

And I would offer the council member to speak to her resolution.

Yes.

Thank you, Calvin.

Council member Morales, do you have anything else to add?

Well, I'll just make a few comments.

Thanks so much, Cal, for working with me on this.

And thank you, Chair, for allowing me to come.

Where Harmon, for those who don't know, was the executive director of Town Hall Seattle for 17 years.

And he really turned it into a focal point for civic life, for arts and culture, political discussion, music.

In 2015, Seattle Metropolitan Magazine named him one of 15 people who should really run Seattle.

And I think it was because of his focus on community and making sure that we all remember to stay engaged with one another.

He was a musician, a scholar, a huge Mariners fan.

and a loving husband and father.

Our kids went to school together, elementary school together, and to many Mariners games together.

So I'm really honored to be able to sponsor this resolution on his behalf and on behalf of his family and the entire Town Hall Seattle community.

So thank you very much.

Awesome.

Thank you, Council Member Morales.

Do any of my fellow committee members have any questions, comments, or Council Member Moore as well?

All right.

Well, thank you, Council Member Morales, for your leadership on bringing this to life and working closely with community to honor Weir Harmon in this way.

This is terrific.

I move that the committee recommend adoption of Resolution 32132. Is there a second?

Second.

It has been moved and seconded to adopt the resolution.

Are there any further comments?

All right, will the clerk please call the roll on the adoption of resolution 32132.

Council Member Kettle.

Aye.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Council Member Wu.

Yes.

Vice Chair Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Chair Saka.

Aye.

Chair, there are five votes in favor.

All right, the motion carries and the committee recommendation that council adopt resolution 32132 will be sent to the April 9th, 2024 city council meeting.

Now, and thank you council member Morales again for your leadership on this.

We will now move on to our second item of business.

Will the clerk please read item two into the record?

Agenda Item 2, Resolution 32131, a resolution approving the Seattle Transportation Plan and superseding the Transit, Bicycle, Freight, and Pedestrian Master Plans.

Thank you.

We will now proceed with a discussion of the amendments, the proposed amendments that have been submitted.

Will our central staff member please join us at the table?

Already there?

Hi, Kelvin.

And so...

Now, colleagues, what we're going to do here is we're just going to go around Robin, share our thoughts on each of the amendments.

I'm going to give each member an opportunity to speak on your own amendment and entertain any questions after that from any of our colleagues here, and we'll start with Vice Chair Hollingsworth and go with the other members that had amendments and then we'll allow our colleague Council Member Moore as well to speak on her amendment.

Go ahead, Madam Vice Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Chair Saka, I really appreciate your help and also your leadership on this.

I know it's a big undertaking for our Seattle Transportation Plan and then also the move levy.

You have a lot on your plate, so thank you, sir.

I also want to thank Calvin as well for helping.

I know I was kind of last minute on some stuff, so thank you for putting in the work and helping us So the amendments that I'm proposing that I'm going to be submitting to Chair Saka after this meeting are based on what I've heard from some constituents in District 3. It's not a comprehensive list, but it's a few projects that are emphasizing some of the of the impact of the district and the surrounding communities.

The first one that we've heard loud and clear, the late eight, Metro eight is one of the eighth busiest weekday routes in the whole system while having the fourth worst on-time performance.

I know that we are not, METRO BUT WE DO DEAL WITH THE INFRASTRUCTURE THAT HELPS METRO PROVIDE SOME OF THE SERVICES I KNOW THAT RIDERS ARE COLLECTIVELY LOSING THOUSANDS OF HOURS EVERY DAY LIKE WAITING FOR THE BUS FOR THE EIGHT IT'S ALSO A LINE THAT I USE AS WELL GOING HOME SO THAT'S PROJECT 35 OF THE LARGE CAPITAL PROJECT LIST THAT YOU KNOW WE WOULD LOVE TO SEE IN THE LEVY I'M ALSO ASKING ESSAT TO IMPROVE THE SAFETY ON LAKE WASHINGTON BOULEVARD CORRIDOR THERE HAVE BEEN TWO There have been two roads, MLK and 23rd, that we have improved the safety on those.

That has pushed people to use the Lake Washington corridor as they're traveling north and south, or from the Central District on to south Seattle.

And so we're asking ESSAT to look at some of those to ensure that We have safety on that.

It's 25 miles per hour, but we've seen top speeds of 70 miles an hour.

And there's a lot of residents along that road that would like safety efforts to be improved as that.

The third thing I'm asking is for SDOT to understand their role in public safety in our community.

We've had significant issues with gun violence last year at some of the different high schools.

We just had a drive-by shooting at Garfield High School.

One of the biggest things that we heard from parents and from kids is that traffic calming around schools is super helpful, and it helps create safe measures, whether it's crosswalks, whether it's...

you know, different types of ways to create traffic calming around schools, which is huge.

If we can make it harder for drive-by neighborhoods, harder to drive into neighborhoods to commit different crimes and then speed away, I think we can prevent some of the tragedies that are going on in our city as well.

Also, we've heard from a ton of people, the city is super dark, and so creating safety-related items and pedestrian lighting improvements across the city I think is gonna be extremely helpful as well.

So lighting increases both safety and pedestrian safety.

It helps prevent crime and eases the strain on our Seattle Police Department as well and helps with their efforts to prevent crime and activation in those areas as well.

And then also last but not least, we also have sidewalks.

I know there's some amendments here on sidewalks, so supporting that as well, as we know how extremely important they are to our walkability in our city.

So those are some of the few amendments that I'll be passing on to you Chair Saka, and I will pass the mic to whoever's next about theirs.

Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Vice Chair.

I'm actually going to go to my left and acknowledge our colleague, Councilmember Strauss.

Councilmember Strauss, do you want to go ahead and speak on your proposed amendment?

Yes.

Thank you, Chair.

And again, my apologies for needing to bring an amendment.

I had somebody really smart tell me that this was supposed to be about good vibes, everyone getting something, and we're not doing prioritization.

We're not talking about implementation.

And I understand the connection between this plan and the comprehensive plan.

I think there was an oversight here last year.

We changed zoning in this area from being industrial to a new type of industrial.

Essentially, adding greater protections for the industrial zone in and around 14th Avenue.

14th Avenue is the local access street as compared to 15th Avenue, which is the arterial for freight.

Looks like SDOT left freight off of the map here for 14th, so I'm asking to put it on.

There's also a greater, larger community conversation about how do we create a stronger bicycle and pedestrian network in this area.

We have a crosswalk on 15th at 53rd.

We're getting one at 51st.

We're adding in right now the Greenway on 6th.

And so what essentially you have, if you could look at a map and you drew a box, 6th on the east, 17th on the west, 51st on the north, or 53rd on the north and 51st on the south.

Within this zone around 14th, adding pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure along 9th and 11th connects the public space at Leary Triangle to Gilman Park, which is another open and public space.

So that is my amendment, Chair.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Strauss.

Let's see here.

Councilmember Kettle.

Thank you, Chair Saka.

Thank you very much.

And thank you for my fellow Councilmembers and Chair for your amendments as well.

I'm supportive.

I really appreciate Councilmember Hollingsworth highlighting the public safety piece because public safety is a policy element and it's so important for the Seattle Transportation Plan in addition to the Comprehensive Plan.

And a big piece of that, which goes to Councilmember Strauss's amendment, is freight.

I often talk about loading docks, but another good word is freight, because we should solve tomorrow's problems today, and addressing freight is so key.

NOT JUST FOR DOWNTOWN, BELLTOWN, DISTRICT 7, BUT CLEARLY ALSO FOR BALLARD AND OTHER DISTRICT 6 AND OTHER PARTS OF THE CITY.

I'M ALSO, HAVEN'T HEARD YET, BUT I'M ALSO SUPPORTIVE OF MY COLLEAGUE TO MY LEFT, COUNCILMEMBER MOORE, AND HER FOCUS ON SIDEWALKS.

BUT MY AMENDMENT TODAY IS RELATED TO PIKE PLACE MARKET.

THE AMENDMENT IS TO REMOVE THE VENT STREET NUMBER 65 FROM THE PLAN.

And I should state first that I am supportive of increasing the opportunities to expand the use of our city streets.

And we should look to how to pedestrianize segments and create community.

It's very important.

And I should say, not forget sidewalks.

I know that's very important for members here in the chamber.

But I'm also supportive of a proposal to do the same of a street in Queen Anne that would basically along McClure Middle School and Queen Anne Community Center and the Queen Anne Pool created basically a campus environment.

So I'm definitely in support of, you know, opportunities to expand, you know, our city streets and pedestrianize them.

But I also understand that good governance requires us to look at each project and proposal and check in with the neighborhoods, check in with the stakeholders, and make sure that we make an objective decision based on unique circumstances and not decide with more of a cookie-cutter approach.

And to this point, I would note that Pike Place Market, and specifically Pike Place, is unique.

It's been ongoing, it's been operating since 1907, in an area where the city falls to the sea.

This is not William Penn's Philadelphia, where you have nice squares going everywhere in a nice flat manner.

You know, the right is on the cusp of falling into the sea, and we have to remember our geography and our topography.

There is no streets on the other side.

There's no First Avenue further west or Second Avenue further west.

Basically, we have Elliott Bay.

There are no service alleys like we see all throughout the city.

There are no loading docks on Pike Place or for Pike Place Market.

Pike Place itself is the logistics node for nearly 500 small businesses.

The street is key for business operations each day, receiving deliveries, but also taking out the garbage, recycling, and compost.

There's so many different pieces, but most importantly, it's served their customers because it is a business.

Pike Place Market, resides on both sides of Pike Place.

It is a farmer's market.

You have many vendors from farms across the region.

You have craft vendors selling an incredible array of products.

We have stores with doors, you know, some known for selling coffee, but a whole range of goods.

And then we have the roll-ups that are essentially a grocery store and so important to the neighborhood, but also to the city, especially during the pandemic.

And some would say, oh, it's okay.

The businesses will be okay.

We can subsidize them.

That's what I've been told.

And no, as we know from today's paper stories, we have a major deficit.

We have major issues.

We cannot be subsidizing businesses in a system that is already working.

And to the point about the pandemic, when our city was down, Pike Place Market, under the PDA, the commission plus the foundation and friends of the market stood up.

The market organization has done great service to our city for over 50 years, but as I said before, adversity reveals, and the pandemic was an adversity, and it revealed what a gem Pike Place Market is to our city and what a service it provided to our city.

One thing I note oftentimes is that Fisherman's Terminal, if I have visitors, you know, I take them down to Fisherman's Terminal, to Chinook's, and say, hey, this is a fishing fleet.

This is real.

You know, these businesses, fishing vessels go up to Alaska, North Pacific, wherever it may be.

This is real.

This is not San Francisco Fisherman's Wharf where we have a rented fishing vessel.

It is real.

And that same concept applies to Pike Place Market.

It's not some Disney project.

It's not Hollywood.

It's real.

It's the market.

It's a business.

And that's really what we need to think about as we move forward.

And speaking of move forward, Again, back to good governance.

Good governance requires engagement with all stakeholders and importantly, listens to all stakeholders.

You know, the old council presented a solution that didn't really have any collaboration.

Clearly, as you saw from the testimony, there's not a collaboration related to the event street.

YOU KNOW, EVENT NUMBER 65. BUT WE ARE A NEW COUNCIL, AND WE ARE A NEW TRANSPORTATION COMMITTEE.

SO WE SHOULD REMOVE PIKE PLACE EVENT STREET NUMBER 65 FROM THE STP, AND I PROPOSE, AND I WILL TAKE THIS ON, THAT WE LOOK AT PIKE PLACE AGAIN WITH FRESH EYES, ENGAGING AND LISTENING TO ALL STAKEHOLDERS, TO INCLUDE SDOT, PIKE PLACE MARKET, ALL THE VARIOUS ELEMENTS, NEIGHBORHOOD GROUPS, DISTRICT 7 NEIGHBORHOOD COUNCIL, Citywide groups to include Seattle Greenways.

I invite Gordon and Claire and everybody else to join in this new look at Pike Place Market, but also the DSA and the Chamber.

So that's my proposal, is to remove number 65 from the Seattle Transportation Plan, and that I will assist and work with all the stakeholders to include Seattle Greenways.

to look at the market again with Pike Place Market so we can look at all the issues and get a solution that works for everybody.

So that's my amendment.

Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak to it.

All right.

Thank you, Council Member Kettle.

Moving on now to Council Member Wu.

You didn't have a proposed amendment, but I know you've been hard at work behind the scenes, me and you, you know, making sure that your feedback was reflected in the amendment that I, the original amendment I put forward, but do you have any comments or questions on any of the amendments from any of our colleagues?

I have some really quick comments.

I want to thank all the council members for bringing forth these amendments.

They're very important.

And as a citywide, I lean on you to bring forth what's important in your districts.

And so, yes, I support public safety, these sidewalks, making sure that we preserve or bring back our industrial maritime zones and looking at what's working, what's not working, and being able to pivot if something is not working.

And so thank you.

And I support these amendments and I've, um, hope that, you know, when we look at the implementation that we really incorporate, incorporate our priorities.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Council member rule.

All right.

Council member Moore, please go ahead and speak on your amendment.

Great.

Well, good morning and thank you very much, Chair Saka, for this opportunity to present and be invited to the committee.

And also thank you to Calvin for your help with drafting this amendment.

I know there's a fair amount of back and forth, so I appreciated the assistance.

So, just to begin, as we know, the Seattle Transportation Plan will be the foundational document for transportation planning in Seattle for at least a decade.

It does combine and replaces previously separate plans such as the Pedestrian Master Plan.

There are over 11,000 missing sidewalks in Seattle.

In District 5 especially, there's a deficit of sidewalks.

A map provided by SDOT shows 36% of the missing sidewalks are in District 5, of the North End, 85th to 145th, and from the Sound to Lake Washington.

So it's quite a large geographic district.

This issue dates back to the 1954 annexation.

in which time the city was, that area was promised sidewalk.

So it's worth noting that the first Seattle transportation plan to be proposed since the, this is the first transportation plan to be proposed since the arrival of the district council system being adopted by voters in 2013. Hence, I think, the sort of hyper-local focus that we are getting reflected in many of the amendments here, which is, I think, certainly appropriate.

So, for new sidewalks, we definitely need to clearly delineate performance measures and establish baseline and also clearly articulated goals.

The 2017 Pedestrian Master Plan included such performance measures, goals, and a clear baseline for new sidewalks and so we need that in our plan as well.

So that's why I'm bringing forth this amendment today.

So it's a little bit technical but I'll just talk about the first part of the amendment adds a recital to the resolution and it quotes directly from the pedestrian element of the draft transportation plan, which says, quote, ìA quality pedestrian network is at the core of an equitable and accessible transportation system, and sidewalks are the building blocks of an effective pedestrian network.î So my amendment would incorporate that as a whereas.

Additionally, it adds to the resolution three sections, which would amend the plan itself.

The first is to add a new performance measure in the pedestrian element with the desired outcome of growing the pedestrian network through additional sidewalks and alternative sidewalks, as we saw the other day on our tour.

A performance measure for the percentage of areas that have sidewalks in tiers one through five, a baseline of missing sidewalks beginning in this year, and a goal to complete the pedestrian network in tiers one through three by 2044. Secondly, to set a clear baseline, it adds a citywide map that shows the missing sidewalks, and this is the map that you, Chair Osaka, requested.

It clearly shows where sidewalks are missing as well as the number of missing sidewalks by tier, and I do thank you very much for making that request from SDOT.

And then it also includes the amendment to the key move action, which is a pedestrian element of the plan, to construct new sidewalks or alternative sidewalks on all blocks that do not currently have sidewalks.

So this is all, I'm just reiterating the language of the amendment.

I did also want to note that I shared this amendment with SDOT, and they are supportive.

They felt it would be helpful over the next 20 years to have council put down a marker both for the upcoming levy renewal deliberations and also for future funding decisions beyond that.

And it would be helpful to have council make such a strong statement when it comes to how we approach grant and other leveraging opportunities going forward.

So I want to thank SDOT for their collaboration on this and also to thank you for the opportunity to present that amendment and present it to colleagues.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Moore.

Yeah, so sidewalks are clearly very, very, very, adding new sidewalks specifically are clearly very, very important to me personally as chair of the Transportation Committee.

I view it as one of our key urgent, responsibilities to address.

There's been a lot of elected political leaders in the past who've made some progress.

And sadly, 400, potentially 500 years, we've heard the current clip of construction is totally unacceptable.

I'm here to do better.

I think this council is here from all these conversations that I've heard at the dais and behind the scenes 101, you know, here to do better in that regard.

So Council Member Moore, just want to thank you for your leadership on that.

I added some sidewalk portions to my proposed amendment.

And this is how we build on each other's work.

So I appreciate you and your amendment.

And I didn't think there was anyone more passionate about adding new sidewalks than me.

But if there was, it's probably you and or Councilmember Morales.

In my view, that's a clear race to the top, by the way.

But for those watching and listening to, you know, the perceptions of new sidewalks amongst our colleagues here, it's...

I think there's a bright future ahead in Seattle for adding new sidewalks and sidewalk alternatives, which is really important.

So I'll just kind of briefly talk about Like my proposed amendment, very high level.

It just includes and calls out those specific things that I mentioned at our very last Transportation Committee meeting.

And specifically it calls out the importance of adding new sidewalks and sidewalk alternatives.

It sets forth the council's high level expectations for a future levy renewal proposal that again, very high level prioritizes bridge maintenance, modernization, and preservation efforts, the core kind of nitty-gritty things.

We'd love to make bridges and roads glamorous again, if you will.

And so it does that.

Safety and...

well, calls out safe and mobile experience for all, including a once-in-a-generation investment in new sidewalks, calls out the need and the imperative, rather, for climate action and livability, including through electric vehicle charging infrastructure, adding new EV charging infrastructure throughout the city, and amongst other things.

It also...

specifically, you know, mentions that the various modal advisory boards are to continue because this plan obviously subsumes the various, you know, like pedestrian master plan, freight master plan, bicycle master plan, et cetera, into this one document and more, a more expansive scope and breadth in this document.

But so the amendment that I put forth clarifies that those are intended to continue and remain ongoing, the work of those various boards.

And it also describes council's expectations for the STP implementation plan and reporting, clarifying the importance of tracking progress and monitoring our progress for our asset management planning efforts all up, including calling out specifically the bridge asset management plan.

And then, of course, adding the policy benchmarking component, which, you know, I think memorializes what many of our departments do anyway.

But, you know, I think in my mind, this is intended to make us to enable us to be a little more intentional about that important aspect of our policy planning and design efforts, understanding what's going on in other jurisdictions and how that may or may not impact what we're doing.

And then finally, and I do want to give credit where credit is due, our colleague Councilmember Morales made a few proposed changes to my original amendment, and a few of them were more sort of minor, technical, in nature and one of them I'll call out is definitely more substantive and I think it's a terrific idea.

And I do wanna give appropriate attribution and credit where credit is due and that is she added the idea of basically highlighting the importance of for the new levy renewal, highlighting projects that prioritize progress towards our vision zero goals, really, really urgent and important.

I think it's a terrific idea.

That was something that I was personally going to add anyway, or thinking about adding anyway after I created the original amendment.

But we do need to make more urgent progress on Vision Zero.

And I'm glad that the consolidated amendment does exactly, calls all that.

important priority as well.

Um, and then finally, Councilmember Moore, I'll say, you know, I appreciate how your amendment calls out some specific benchmarks and and goals and metrics related to new sidewalks.

And as as folks may recall, I called that out again during our last Transportation Committee that that was a disappointment that I hadn't seen in the document.

It is it didn't treat the It didn't have as robust performance metrics for sidewalks, new sidewalks specifically as some of the other modal elements.

And so thank you again for, this is the race to the top.

All right, well, colleagues.

Oh, of course, one of the, all these amendments are important, but more specifically, I guess procedural, slightly less substantive is the amendment number five or six.

Was it the errata?

How do you pronounce it?

It's the errata.

Errata?

It's identified small technical changes that the department identified for your consideration.

Yeah, and those were surfaced to me, and I authorized those to be included in a standalone amendment last Friday.

And so, yeah, that's, you know, this is part of the sausage baking that goes on with legislation, and I'm learning errata.

But yeah, those are kind of minor technical department, generally department proposed tweaks to make things more in line, like to change wording, phrasing, nomenclature, to make things more in line with, for example, the one Seattle comprehensive plan and amongst other things.

So those are the amendments.

Colleagues, are there any other comments, questions, feedback?

Go ahead, Council Member Kettle.

Chair Saka, thank you for the opportunity.

I just wanted to make two points.

One is to, you know, the point regarding sidewalks and what Council Member Moore said about, you know, the district and representing the district interests.

And on that point, I'm in District 7 relative to 1, 2, and 5, or 5, 1, and 2. You know, we don't have the same sidewalk requirement.

We do have some, but I have to say that, you know, from an equity perspective, the prioritization for sidewalks definitely needs to be with Districts 5, 1, and 2. I say that as the District 7 rep. Yes, there's some areas in North Queen Anne, parts of Magnolia, that need some sidewalks.

But, you know, looking big picture, we need to think about the equity pieces to this, the social economic impacts of this, and the public safety pieces as well.

So, you know, even though we're district, I think we also recognize the need for these sidewalks.

And, you know, on this point, one thing about going through this process from a District 7 perspective, changing topics to bridges, I really appreciate the focus on bridges, the asset management plan, all these different pieces to bridges, because in reality, in a lot of ways, District 7 is Peninsula.

We have our six bridges, plus or minus, that go over Interbay.

We have the Ballard, the Fremont, and the...

the Aurora Bridges.

We have a couple other on North Queen Anne, too, over Wolf Creek Ravine.

We have the I-5 Bridges.

If you think about it, I mean, they're dividing.

Between our water boundaries and I-5 and 15th and the rail yard, we're essentially a peninsula.

And we really rely on these bridges to get to west, north, and east.

And so thank you for keeping this focus on bridges.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Councilmember Kettle.

All right, any other final comments, questions on that topic?

All right, we will now move on to our third item of business.

Will the clerk please read item three into the record?

Agenda item three, clerk file 314512, petition of Denny and Eastlake Limited Partnership and Denny and Stewart Limited Partnership for the vacation of the alley lying within block 24, Pontius, fourth addition to the city of Seattle, extending from the north margin of Denny Way and the easterly margin of Stewart Street.

All right.

Thank you, Clerk.

As presiding officer, I am now opening the public hearing on Clerk File 314512. Clerk, how many speakers are signed up for this public hearing?

Council Member Saka, we have no speakers signed up for this public hearing.

No speakers noted.

All right.

Clerk, I will now hand this over to you.

Well, pardon me.

No.

All right.

Being that there is not a member of the public present for this public hearing on clerk file 314512, this public hearing is now closed.

Let's see.

Okay.

Will our presenters please join us at the table and share your presentation?

Once ready, please introduce yourselves and begin your presentation.

You already joined us, welcome.

Good morning, Lishwitz and Council Central staff.

Jackson Cook, S.S. Street Use.

Michael Jenkins, Seattle Design Commission.

Beverly Barnett, Seattle Department of Transportation.

Mark Brands, landscape architect with Site Workshop.

And council members, today you'll be considering a petition for an alley vacation in the Denny Triangle, South Lake Union neighborhood.

You'll receive a presentation on the proposal from Mark Brands.

SDOT and the Seattle Design Commission have reviewed the petition and are recommending conditional approval.

Attached to my memo for this item are the conditions that the SDOT director has recommended.

And yeah, we're available for questions after the presentation.

All right, thank you.

Yeah, senior recommendations, appreciate those.

All right, colleagues, this vote, we'll, what?

We have a presentation.

Yeah, so we've got a presentation for you.

Okay.

So it's about 10 minutes long.

All right, go ahead.

But I'm gonna go through the project, and a little bit of background, knowing this is maybe your first vacation, just carry you through a little bit of the process.

So I'm gonna share it on screen.

Or do I, how do I, sorry.

Well, I've never seen Mark in person either.

share.

It seems ungrounded.

Well, thank you for your patience this morning.

There always is an unexpected glitch.

So while they're figuring that out, I will say we recognize that there's a time constraint today, so we're sorry for the delay.

But we thought the best way to understand the project is to do the visuals.

And so Mark's presentation shows the site of the project, the larger context of the neighborhood, and no vacation alternatives.

And those I think are so much more powerful than all of us kind of talking through.

And I think as Mark goes through the presentation, you can see the way the street vacation policies are ordered and the elements that we look at and how we arrive at the conclusion to recommend the vacation.

And then we're all here to answer questions, because I'm sure this presentation is going to get fixed really quick.

And so we can talk about the design commission process.

Jackson worked on all the street environment, which creates a very cool pedestrian environment.

And Lish and I can always talk about the vacation process for as much time as you have.

We can talk about that.

So looks like maybe we're ready.

So thank you for your patience.

Are we?

while we're waiting for the, I was just asking Beverly while we're waiting, maybe what we can do is just give you a very quick primer about the two important elements of any vacation that we evaluate, the design commission evaluates and SDOT embeds in their recommendation, which is public trust and public benefit.

Public Trust looks at when you remove the alley or the street, how do the remaining functions surrounding the site work?

And in this particular case, the removal of the alley, this particular alley was really not connected to the larger street grid in any meaningful way.

By removing the alley and moving access to the site for both vehicles and trucks, from potentially going out onto Stewart onto East Lake was a much better move for traffic safety, because what I think we all agree is moving traffic in and out of Stewart Street near Denny and the off-ramp from I-5 is very problematic.

So by moving it to East Lake and getting it away from high-traffic areas was really an important move for this project.

It also allowed the project to free up creating one building with significant series of open spaces that would not have been available absent that vacation.

More importantly, with the public benefit package that you'll see really looked at elevating public safety by vacating the alley and having this applicant develop a series of public benefit strategies to enhance the remaining right of way.

They were able to create substantial improvements at two of the most problematic intersections in downtown Seattle, the Stuart Denny Minor Intersection and the Stuart East Lake Intersection.

It has a much more expansive pedestrian environment with improved and enhanced sidewalks that really elevate the pedestrian experience and take away and hopefully remove significantly potential automobile and pedestrian conflicts.

You'll also see a significant investment for protected bike lanes along East Lake.

If the vacation didn't go through, those investments wouldn't have been able to be realized.

When the Seattle Design Commission was looking at the proposal, it became very clear that the applicant's lens that they were creating for public benefit elevated the notion of public safety for pedestrians and for automobiles, and hopefully you'll be able to see that.

Clerk, I have shared my screen.

Yay!

Councilmember Strauss, Member of IT?

Councilmember Strauss to the rescue.

Let's roll with that.

Magic button.

Okay, thank you.

Sorry about that.

Apologies.

So thank you, Michael and Beverly, for giving us a background.

I will roll through these slides efficiently.

I can find my mouse here.

Just tell me when you need next slide.

Are you controlling?

I am controlling your screen.

Thank you.

Council Member Strauss.

Next slide, please.

The site is located at a real gateway to our city.

Not only as you enter off of I-5 from the north, but also from Capitol Hill.

The site is bounded by arterials of Stewart, Eastlake, and Denny.

Next slide, please.

The site has a collection of buildings.

Framed in the red box or perimeter is the collection of parcels.

The alley really serves only these parcels that the developer has pulled together for this project.

There is one outlying parcel that is not part of the project, the very tip to the north.

Next slide, please.

This slide does a good job of showing you the amount of drive cuts noted in red.

So as we talk about pedestrian safety in Vision Zero, this is a really important part of the conversation.

Really appreciate that conversation about sidewalks.

This project is very much about improving our public realm and pedestrian safety.

Next slide.

We had a robust community outreach process from start to finish, and that included and highlighted in here are several important neighborhood groups that really became our partners throughout this process, which is really important as we talk about public benefits.

Youth Care, Emanuel Lutheran Church, and the Cascade Neighborhood Council.

Next slide.

When we go through a petition, the city to vacate a right-of-way is very important first step that we go through public trust analysis.

And I've pulled out one slide here.

We call our nine block analysis, essentially an urban design analysis looking beyond our border.

to look at things that relate to light air views, open space circulation, pedestrian activity.

In this case, open space is important in this neighborhood.

The linear corridors of Thomas Street at the top of the page, I'll go through a bike connection that we're making that connects to the King County bike lanes to the north, but also to the bicycle master plan, which notes the connection via Howell into the city center.

Next slide, please.

As part of the public trust, we then compare vacation, no vacation.

So this slide illustrates the no vacation scheme on the left of page where we maintain the alley.

We get two parcels of development and on the right is the vacation scheme.

We're actually able to consolidate, get a more efficient floor plate and really work on that urban design, the mass of the building in respect to the public realm.

Next slide, please.

And this shows it in three dimensions, and it shows the alley on the left that's maintained.

You get a small parcel of open space facing what we call Lower Denny, below Denny Way, the bridge.

And then the generous open space and the deep setback that we get on the no vacation scheme to the right.

Next slide, please.

This is a really good analysis of transportation that relates to safety.

When we maintain the alley, we need to use it.

We are required to use it for loading and access.

It also exits out onto an arterial in a very awkward fashion of Stuart, which is a one-way into the city to the west.

and then they have to enter from the Lower Denny, creating that awkward turn off of Stewart onto Lower Denny.

So there's all kinds of conflicts with pedestrians.

On the right is a consolidation, and this is the big one.

I pointed out all those drive cuts.

The initial slide, we're able to consolidate into a single drive cut and really clean up our city sidewalks and increase the safety.

Next slide, please.

And this is the pedestrian counts.

So on the left is the No Vacation Scheme where we get no improvements.

We continue to have conflicts at two key intersections at Denny and Stewart and also Denny, excuse me, Stewart and Eastlake.

Again, as we clean it up, we create these pedestrian refuges on either triangle, and I'll show you those in a moment when we get to the public benefits.

And the next slide is public, is open space.

It kind of speaks to itself.

When we do this deep setback, we are able to offer publicly accessible private space as well as the contribution to the right-of-way.

In a moment, you see the big green swath south of the Novocation Scheme.

Well, that's turning that street into a pedestrian street and taking cars off it for the most part.

So next slide is our proposal, and I won't go through this in detail.

I'm going to point out three things that are going on here.

The deep setback that I mentioned several times, again, creates light, air, and views into the city, especially as you approach down Stewart Street as an entrance.

The transition, the pedestrianization of Lower Denny into a people space rather than using it for cars and vehicles, and then East Lake, a wide right of way.

It's 80 feet wide, and the transition from that and from a main arterial into also a shared space with bikes and peds.

Next slide.

Okay, these are our benefits.

So I'll end on a collection.

We have seven benefits.

The top portion is really focused in on pedestrian safety, the crossings, the sidewalk space, East Lake Avenue, and the bike connection.

And then we make a contribution to the wayfinding package.

And then the bottom tier is really focused on the Lower Denny and the pedestrianization of it.

Next slide.

So the first crossing is at Denny and Stuart.

It is a rather dangerous location for a crossing, a very popular one at that, where you have conflicts with vehicles turning onto Lower Denny, a really small pedestrian refuge area that does not serve pedestrians well.

And then on the right is the cleanup of that.

We're able to relocate the entrance into a pedestrian street of Lower Denny and then create proper refuge space and also amenities to go along with that.

Then before and after photo.

The next slide, please, is before.

And so that's looking to the east.

The Denny bridge deck is on the right, Stewart Street to the left, and then east.

Here's the improvement.

So we're able to close that street to normal traffic.

We're able to create a generous pedestrian space, a safe crossing, and all the amenities that go along with that.

Same thing for the crossing to the north.

Again, unused right-of-way.

It was closed years ago.

Used to be a two-way in either direction.

Now it's one way going north.

It's left over right-of-way, almost half of it.

So it's a very generous area to work on a new crossing.

Before and after photos.

before looking north and then cleaned up, and we were able to actually relocate a crosswalk as well, make it perpendicular, which is what we're accustomed to as a pedestrian, and really clean that busy intersection up.

Thank you.

Okay, the next benefit is East Lake.

It's again significant opportunity here to clean up a right-of-way, an 80-foot right-of-way that is really only partially utilized by two traffic lanes going north.

So we're able to take that and turn it into a bike connection and really feed into the King County bike lanes that are being built to the north on East Lake that feed into Thomas Street that get you all the way over to Elliott Bay.

And then eventually on the south, which is the right of the screen, into Howell, the network that is being developed by the city.

And then after, next shot, please, image.

This is looking north on East Lake Avenue.

The project is on the left, East Lake Avenue on the right.

You can see the off-street bike paths, generous sidewalk, and a double lay of conifer trees, which does not happen very often in our city.

Next is a contribution to wayfinding.

This is a program that is ongoing and currently under implementation with SDOT Urban Design.

And so this is a contribution to that program.

No longer developers actually implement this, they make contributions to the program and SDOT actually manages it.

Then end on Lord Denny.

And this is a very exciting one.

We're able to change this, really transform it, as Michael mentioned before, into a pedestrian street.

So we've closed it off the advice and guidance of SDOT with bollards, so it is accessible via emergency vehicles and maintenance vehicles for both building and the bridge deck, but otherwise for pedestrians.

What we're doing to serve that, next slide please, is amenitizing it.

So beyond the bollards, the red dots on either end, we have benches, we have pedestrian scale lighting, and we have amenities.

We have power, water, we have a storage room that all serve community events.

And I'll touch on that in a moment.

We also have bike fix-it station here.

So something along our bike path that has utility.

First shot is before.

Next slide, please.

And this is looking east up into Capitol Hill.

Danny Way on the right.

You can see the surface car park.

And it's kind of an alley, essentially, is what Lower Danny Yaks has.

Next slide is a transformation.

Closing it down and creating it, pedestrianizing, getting very generous landscape opportunities that also serve as stormwater sinks.

Next slide, please.

This is the amenity zone where we have power, water, a bike fixing station.

Notice that we've got glazed conditions, we've got retail, and it's much active use facing that as well to help increase the safety, sense of security.

Next slide is looking west, the other direction.

And then the next slide shows a transformation again, and you can see the bike lane and foreground there.

And then I'll end on the last one, which is a mural.

It's a public artwork.

We shout out to Urban Artworks, who led us through this process, a great organization, and basically signed up our community members of the folks I mentioned in the beginning, Youth Care, Cascade Neighborhood Council, Emanuel Lutheran Church, the design team, member of design commission to select an artist.

We're very happy to share with you the next slide.

Councilmember Strauss, you'll recognize that image on the lower right.

Mallard, we have engaged, selected Jen Vickers as our artist.

We're very excited to get her going.

Concept, initial concept, I should say, is up on the top of the screen there.

And then the last slides, I won't get into it all, but these become part of the ordinance.

And if you go to the next slides, please.

They really do itemize in detail the improvements we're making.

And then on the right of the screen is an estimated cost to the developer, in addition to the market value that they pay for the alley itself.

So these are contributions that are not required by mitigation that the developer is making.

And that is the end of the show, and I'll take any comments.

Thank you.

Sorry about the debacle there at the beginning.

Thank you, Councilmember Strauss.

You're the best.

Thanks, Mark.

Thank you.

And thank you, Councilmember Strauss, chair of our budget committee, finance committee, one of the most senior members of our council, and amongst other things, and expert.

Slide clicker.

I'll share the words that Deborah Juarez used to share with me, which is she would say to me, I'm not smarter than you.

I've just been here longer.

There it is.

There it is.

So thank you all.

Colleagues, any comments, questions for our representatives here on this matter?

I have a question.

Since we've been talking about loading a bunch this meeting, so I saw that loading dock was there and that's where garbage pickup is as well.

So would the garbage trucks be entering in through that loading dock and being able to back out or would they have to stop on the streets?

You're right.

The first statement, everything goes inside the building.

So trash, recycle, loading, parking, everything on one consolidated drive cut off the street.

And that includes the commercial spaces, they're loading.

Correct, everything.

Moving in out.

Next question is, I'm just really curious.

It looks like, I love the improvements made, but wondering at the loss of parking spaces, do you know how many?

On street parking, I should have mentioned that Council Member Wu, You could go to the, keep scrolling down, if you will, to the site plan.

We have preserved parking along East Lake.

That is the one place where you can load, park, short-term parking.

We are eliminating, I'm gonna hazard a guess, at maybe seven or eight stalls along Lower Denny.

You cannot park.

On Stewart, there was back-in angled parking along, so we are replacing that with parallel parking, so we are losing spaces there as well.

I will also say that there's an expansive drive cut at the end as well, so it's...

I would say it's not really regulated parking so much up there, it's just this leftover unused right-of-way that we're eliminating, turning into pedestrian space.

And all the bicycle improvements, is that part of a larger plan for that area?

It certainly does.

It feeds into what is being constructed right now north of John and Stewart, that access onto the freeway.

King County is building bike lanes that feed into the neighborhoods to the northeast lake, but also to Thomas Street, which is really important as that network continues to develop.

And as the city develops the network into the city via Howell, as you turn the corner and into the city, that'll be a valuable connection as well.

So this is a key link.

Thank you.

All right.

Thank you.

Council Member Kittle.

Thank you, Chair Saka.

And thank you, Council Member Strauss.

Can you scroll up all the way to the beginning?

We had those photos.

But you to work today.

Thank you.

Stop, stop, stop.

Second right there.

Before talking about it, I just had to stop on this photo.

Thank you so much because it highlights the point that I just made earlier about D7 being Peninsula.

As you could say, we have a water boundary to our west.

We have a watery boundary to our north.

And right there, we have another boundary that we need bridging over, and it's called I-5.

And that just shows the point so well.

So thank you for including that photo.

In fact, I need to get a copy of it since it's so good.

I also want to thank...

The provisions, the points of the plan related to traffic and pedestrian safety, I think that's very important.

You know, we have to be mindful of these things.

And so thank you for being, you know, to incorporate those elements in there.

That's very important.

You know, bleeding public safety committee into transportation committee.

Thank you for that.

And also for the canopy piece, you know, as I've stated before, evergreens, but me in a happy place.

So I really appreciate the conifer.

trees, particularly on East Lake.

And that's an important piece too, because we need to increase our tree canopy.

And I like the fact that you're really pushing that side of the plan as well.

So thank you.

And as your District 7 representative, I do support, along with central staff's recommendations, the plan overall.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Kettle.

And thank you, Council Member Kettle, for...

I'm glad I can always count on Councilmember Kettle to find the nexus between public safety and anything.

But as chair of our public safety committee, I would expect nothing less.

And I wholeheartedly agree.

Everything we do doesn't exist in a silo.

It doesn't exist in a vacuum.

There's dependencies and connections between every single thing that we do.

We need to understand that.

But I appreciate you for helping us be calling it out and helping us be more intentional about it.

Council Member Strauss.

Thank you, Chair.

I'll just end with an appreciation.

I love street vacations.

I love term permits.

This is where I really enjoy all of my work.

Also, colleagues, I've worked with Mark Brands on a number of different projects from Thomas Street to street vacations to Ballard Avenue.

Mark, I think this might be the best...

plan I've seen come out of your shop so far.

So really, thank you.

Kudos.

Continue breaking the mold.

And Council Member Saka, I don't know, we switched offices.

So in the, how do you call it, in the closet, there's a whiteboard that said, transparency creates robust conversations.

And that was actually a quote from Mark.

So just bringing it all full circle.

Love it.

Hey, it's still there, by the way.

I don't use that whiteboard much, but I support the principle, so that's why it's still there.

In any event.

All right, cool.

Well, thank you, colleagues.

Thank you, everyone, for this insightful presentation.

This is really the last mile here, sort of where we're at in the stage.

Colleagues, we're now gonna, this vote will proceed in two parts.

First, we will vote to add SDOT's recommended conditions Then if there are no objections, we will vote on granting the clerk file as conditioned.

As a reminder, colleagues, this matter, as you know, has been before previous councils multiple times since early last year.

And so this is really the final stages of approving this specific alley vacation.

We're the last mile, not even the last mile, the last hundred yards of a marathon.

really.

And so, you know, as Councilmember Strauss aptly noted, this is the sort of nuts and bolts and spinach of the work that we do and these alley and street and, you know, permits, vacations.

And so in any event, this is really, really important work.

Some of these things are a little more glamorous or sexy like the Seattle transportation plan, levy renewal, but this right here, this third item on the agenda is again, kind of the nuts and bolts, the bread and butter of what we do, because all those other things don't always come before us, but this type of stuff generally does.

In any event, any final questions, comments from any of our members here?

No.

Okay, well, I move that the committee amend clerk file 314512 to add SDOT's recommended conditions as shown in attachment one to council central staff's memo.

Is there a second?

Second.

All right, it's been moved and seconded to add the conditions to the clerk file 314512. Will the clerk please call the roll on amending the clerk file?

Council Member Kettle.

Aye.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Council Member Wu.

Yes.

Vice Chair Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Chair Saka.

Aye.

Chair, there are five votes in favor.

All right.

Now, if there are no objections, the council rules will be suspended to allow the committee to vote on the clerk file on the same day a public hearing was held.

Hearing no objection, the council rule is suspended and the committee will proceed with voting on the clerk file.

I move the committee recommend city council or I move, excuse me, I move this committee recommend city council grant as conditioned clerk file 314512. Is there a second?

Second.

It's been moved and seconded to grant as conditioned clerk file 314512. Will the clerk please call the roll on the granting of the clerk file?

Council member Kettle.

Aye.

Council member Strauss.

Yes.

Council member Wu.

Yes.

Vice chair Hollingsworth.

Yes.

Chair Saka.

Aye.

Chair, there are five votes in favor.

All right.

The motion carries and the committee recommended recommendation that council grant as condition clerk file 314512 will be sent to the April 9th, 2024 city council meeting.

All right.

Well, Thank you, everyone.

Great meeting today.

They're all great.

Because we have a great vice chair.

But we have reached the end of today's meeting agenda.

Is there any further business to come before the committee before we adjourn?

No.

Hearing no further business to come before the committee, we are adjourned.

It is 1124 a.m.