Transportation Committee 2/20/2024

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Good morning.

The February 20th, 2024 meeting of the Transportation Committee will come to order.

It is 9.32 a.m.

I'm Rob Saka, Chair of the Transportation Committee.

Will the Committee Clerk please 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, if there are no objections, the agenda will be adopted.

Hearing no objections, the agenda is adopted.

Colleagues, at this time, we will open the hybrid public comment period.

Public comment should relate to items on today's agenda or within the purview of the Transportation Committee.

Clerk, how many speakers are signed up today?

We have two remote speakers and no in-person speakers.

All right.

We will start with the remote speakers first, if no in-person.

Today, each speaker will have approximately two minutes.

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

Clerk, please read the instructions.

I will call on each speaker by name and in the order which they registered on the council's website or on the sign-up sheet available here in council chambers.

I will alternate between sets of five, well, there aren't that many in-person and remote commenters until the public comment period is concluded.

If you've not yet registered to speak but would like to, you can sign up before the end of the public comment period by going to the council's website or by signing up in the sign-up sheet near the public comment microphone.

The public comment link is also listed on today's agenda.

Once I call a remote speaker's name, staff will unmute the appropriate microphone and an automatic prompt of you have been unmuted will be the speaker's cue that it is their turn to speak.

And then the speaker must press star six to begin speaking.

Please begin speaking by stating your name and the item you are addressing.

As a reminder, public comment should relate to an item on today's agenda or within the purview of the Transportation Committee.

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

Once you hear the chime, we will ask that you begin to wrap up your public comment.

If speakers do not end their comments at the end of the allotted time provided, the speaker's microphone will be muted to allow us to call on the next speaker.

Once you've completed your public comment, we ask that you please disconnect from the line.

And if you plan to continue following this meeting, please do so via Seattle Channel or the listening options listed on today's agenda.

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

Please remember to press star six after you hear the prompt of you have been unmuted.

Okay.

John Grant is our first speaker.

Good morning, Chair Saka and committee members.

My name is John Grant, and I'm the Chief Strategy Officer for the Low Income Housing Institute, or Lehigh.

I'm speaking today in favor of the resolution for an honorary street sign for former Senator George Fleming.

In May of 2022, Lehigh opened George Fleming Place, named in honor of the former state senator and Washington Husky football star.

George Fleming was Washington's first African-American state senator.

He was elected in 1971 and represented the 37th District of Southeast Seattle and the Rainier Valley.

Lehigh is specifically honoring George Fleming for being the prime sponsor in the Senate for creating the State Housing Trust Fund in 1986, now a nationally recognized housing program.

George also established the Washington State Housing Finance Commission back in 1983, and also established the Office of Minority and Women's Business Enterprise.

For all these reasons, we encourage you to vote yes on this resolution and celebrate this civil rights icon.

Thank you.

Next, we will have David Haynes.

All right.

Thank you.

My name is David Haynes.

You have to make public safety number one priority in order for people to come back to using public transportation.

And you really need to consider, I think if the move levy had money to, um, help the Metro police work with the city police to trespass all the junkie thieves and like question all the low level drug pushers, then maybe there'd be an improvement in the transportation.

And perhaps some pothole focus with the bus drivers reporting all the potholes that they drive over that damage the buses could be included in that.

And we need noise abatement at transit-oriented housing so that people don't have to listen to the beeps and the horn honkings and the grumbling of the engines and the air pressure release valves that are extremely loud and really like set people off and you need to consider having green light priority when you come up to like a Fremont bridge or you're going through like intersections.

Um, you need like the train, that ridiculous trolley train, it sits at the stoplight with the bus coming out of South Lake union.

And if you're on your bike and you just run the red light or you catch the light just in time, you can beat the train all the way to Westlake from South Lake union.

And it's a telltale sign that we have a bad idea for transportation that seems to impose a whole bunch of noise pollution that's completely unnecessary throughout the residential and commercial areas.

And hopefully you'll realize that it's not safe to go into the West Lake Tunnel or anywhere between 3rd and 4th Avenue, between Pine and Pike.

Because the police chief is manipulating the crime fighting data and the crime hotspots to make it seem like he's having progress.

And it's unsafe to take public transportation.

And we need laws before the levees even voted or considered.

Councilmember, our next speaker is Margaret, who's with us here.

Margaret Peel, Friends of the Market president.

And I have packets for the council members that are on the committee.

Sorry, I did not bring a sixth one, but I'd be happy to furnish it later.

This addresses the levy and the phrase is multimodal transportation in there.

Dear council members, please do not support funding the First Avenue streetcar through the transportation levy or any other funding mechanism.

I feel it's necessary to make this request because the project has not been officially ended by the mayor and so it seems to be moving forward.

Operation of a streetcar line on First Avenue would significantly interfere with Pike Place Market's operation because it would eliminate left turns into the market and load and load space along First Avenue.

I have attached some plans that I annotated to explain the issues.

Pike Place Market is a tremendous economic driver for downtown, and it led the way in recovery during the pandemic.

It is a resilient community that includes not only businesses and residents, mostly low income, but also a senior center, food bank, daycare, medical clinic, and offices.

Pike Place functions as the only loading dock at the market, in addition to being its front door.

For these reasons, the market depends on full access from First Avenue at all times.

Most of all, Pike Place Market is a very special cultural place in the history of our city.

Saved by a voter's initiative that created a historic district to protect the market, therefore, we should think very carefully about impacts from outside to this special place, such as from city planning, including transportation.

Let's bring some of the already funded buses on Third Avenue back to First Avenue to connect the neighborhoods at either end of it.

It is reversible and lower impact transportation and some routes to First Avenue might also help alleviate the effects of too many buses on Third Avenue.

Please ask the mayor to work with King County Metro to move this plan forward.

Thank you.

That concludes public comment.

All right.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

the conclusion of the public comment period, I want to first off recognize my esteemed colleague, Tammy, Council Member Tammy Morales.

Thank you so much for being here.

Council Member Morales has, I invited her to speak on behalf of the first item on the agenda today.

And I will recognize her momentarily after we get a briefing from our staff on the item, but welcome council member Morales.

And thank you so much for being here.

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

Will the clerk please read into or read item one into the record.

Resolution number 32126, a resolution providing an honorary designation of 43 Avenue South between South Othello Street and South Webster Street as Senator George Fleming Way.

All right.

Council of Central Staff, will you please introduce yourself and provide an overview of the resolution?

Good morning, council members.

I'm Calvin Chow with council central staff.

The resolution before you is a honorary designation of a street 43rd Avenue South, which is immediately adjacent to the Othello playground.

It would give an honorary designation of the street to Senator George Fleming Way.

The cost of establishing signs and installing them is approximately $2,000 and would be covered by a third party.

And I will let council member Morales speak to the merits of the legislation that she is bringing forward.

All right, Councilmember Morales.

Thank you, Chair Saka.

Thanks very much, Calvin.

As we just heard, this resolution would designate a block between Othello and Webster as Senator George Fleming Way.

George Fleming was Washington's first African-American senator.

He was elected in 1971 and represented the 37th District, which includes South Seattle and parts of the city.

for 22 years.

He was the prime sponsor, as has been noted, in the Senate for creating the Washington State Housing Trust Fund in 1986. And that fund has become a nationally recognized program and a way for folks across the state and as others have modeled it across the country to actually finance affordable housing projects in different communities.

He also established the Office of Minority and Women Business Enterprise.

In 2022, when Lehigh opened the George Fleming Place at Othello and 43rd, Senator Fleming was there and stated that he was honored and wished to thank Lehigh for naming their new apartment building after me.

Setting up the State Housing Trust Fund was a top priority and achievement for me.

I'm pleased to know that George Fleming Place will continue to serve the 37th District and the community in perpetuity.

Affordable housing is closest to my heart.

There is no nobler work and there is no clearer sign that a society is working than when our neighbors have a place to call home.

Long before the current housing and homelessness crisis, Senator Fleming recognized the importance that affordable housing plays in the everyday well-being of people in our communities.

I'm proud to bring this resolution forward to acknowledge and honor the work of Senator Fleming and the long-lasting impact that he'll have, especially on the people of South Seattle.

Thank you for inviting me, Chair.

Thank you, Council Member Morales, and thank you, Cal, as well for that.

So I never had the pleasure of meeting the late Senator Fleming before he passed, but I do know that he was the champion of champions.

I know.

You know, I make no apologies about the fact, and I'm proud of the fact that, and I've made clear in the past that, you know, I happen to be a council member who is black.

And as a result, I believe firmly that I'm standing on the shoulders of giants.

That includes people like Sam Smith, Mayor Bruce Harrell, Norm Rice, and yes, Senator Fleming.

So it is with great honor and privilege that this resolution comes through the committee that I have the pleasure of chairing.

So Councilmember Morales, thank you for your leadership in helping bring this to life.

I communicated with with the late Senator's daughter, Yemi, Yemi Fleming Jackson, who is a friend, a dear friend, and also a professional mentor.

She's a lawyer as well.

And let her know about this today, and she was very excited.

So, I'm honored again to be able to SHEPHERD THIS THROUGH AT LEAST THIS COMMITTEE HERE.

NOW, THAT SAID, I MOVE THAT THE COMMITTEE RECOMMEND ADOPTION OF RESOLUTION 3216. IS THERE A SECOND?

SECOND.

SECOND.

THANK YOU, VICE CHAIR HOLLINGSWORTH.

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 adoption of resolution 32126.

Vice Chair Hollingsworth.

Aye.

Council Member Kettle.

Aye.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Council Member Wu.

Yes.

Chair Saka.

Aye.

All right, the motion carries.

And the committee recommendation that council adopt Resolution 32126 will be sent to the February 27th, 2024 city council meeting.

Thank you, council member Morales.

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

Will the clerk please read item two into the record.

We're going to hear the levy to move Seattle briefing.

All right, thank you.

Will our presenters please join us at the table, which you already have done, thank you.

And once ready, please introduce yourselves and begin your presentation.

Good morning, I'm Greg Spotts, SDOT Director.

Before I begin this item, I'd like to pay tribute to SDOT Director of Regional and Interagency Programs, Jonathan Laser, who passed away this weekend after a long illness.

John has been a beloved figure at SDOT, most recently leading our interaction with Washington State Department of Transportation, neighboring cities, and other governmental agencies on some of the region's largest and most complex construction projects.

Just after I joined the agency in the fall of 2022, John was the lead writer and editor of our top to bottom review of Vision Zero, bringing keen insight to this essential project.

In addition to his many accomplishments, John will be remembered for his brilliant mind, his kind and thoughtful manner, and his generous mentorship.

Thank you for the opportunity to present item two.

I'll briefly introduce the topic and then pass it to my team members who will give the presentation.

The levy to move Seattle is maintaining and modernizing our street network.

The levy has made it safer to walk our kids to school, has improved the speed and reliability of transit, has made it more attractive and convenient to get around on bikes, e-bikes, and scooters, and has filled potholes, paved streets, planted trees, and constructed new sidewalks.

Along the way, the levee has aligned major street projects with opportunities to update our water and sewer infrastructure.

In the process of improving our streets, the levy has also catalyzed steady improvement within SDOT itself.

Across the first eight years of the levy, SDOT has strengthened our ability to attract and manage grants, expanded our capacity to deliver projects large and small, and enriched our collaboration with communities and neighborhoods.

During my 18 months as SDOT Director, I've been orienting the agency towards two primary goals, strengthening our safety programs and finishing strong on the levy to move Seattle.

With a relentless focus on delivery, in 2023, we completed design on dozens of levy funded projects, which you will see going into construction throughout 2024. All three of my deputy directors have been leading the way on levy projects and programs.

For today's presentation, I'm pleased to feature senior deputy director, Francisca Steffen, who oversees both our design and capital projects divisions.

Take it away, Francisca.

Good morning, Chair Saka, Vice Chair Hollingsworth, council members.

Thank you for your time today.

I really appreciate you having an interest in this levy and taking the time with us this morning to find out more.

I'll start with just a quick overview.

We wanna give you some background information, get you up to date on where we stand with achievements on the program.

Serena Lehman, the Program Portfolio Manager, will give you some information on current status as we finish strong, and financial information.

We'll also get you up to date on the Levy Oversight Committee.

So starting with a little bit of the background.

So the MOVE Seattle Levy is the 18th year of transportation levies for the City of Seattle.

We've been really fortunate that the voters have been generous and have first started with the 2006 Bridging the Gap levy, which was about $365 million.

It was the first steady, consistent, focused source of funds for maintenance.

It was a...

It set up to address a serious maintenance backlog in our paving.

It was dedicating 67% of its funding towards paving alone and maintenance alone.

It was very maintenance focused.

It was coming at a time when the city and the state was struggling to figure out how to fund those types of improvements.

In 2015, the voters again went back to the ballot box and approved a tripling of the levy size to $930 million.

It was an interesting moment.

It was a moment where Seattle was growing incredibly rapidly, and we continue to grow.

But when you think about it, we've added 100,000 new Seattle residents since we passed the Move Seattle levy.

It's pretty incredible.

So top of voters' mind at that time was congestion.

So it had a slightly different focus.

It continued to focus on safety.

It continued to focus on maintenance.

But it introduced a new focus on moving people more efficiently and effectively and lower emissions through the city, which we called congestion management.

So it was an interesting response to a very distinct challenge of that time.

And this levy, it's currently in effect.

It expires December 31st of this year.

It funds about 30% of SDOT's budget.

And so we are working right now on developing a renewal levy and looking forward to talking with you more about it this spring.

Next.

So a little bit, I think you may have seen this at the SDOT 101 presentation we gave, but just a reminder, you know, as a consistent source of funding for SDOT, the Move Seattle levy is our single largest consistent source of funds.

We do benefit from many other funds in the city, but they are more fluctuating and subject to different changes in the market.

Next.

So diving in.

Approved by 58% of voters in 2015. We talked a little bit about the timing, but it has an enabling legislation that outlines 30 very specific programs and very specific deliverables.

And we'll talk quite a bit about that today so you're familiar with how it was structured and what those were.

And it's overseen by an oversight committee that is appointed in part by council and in part by the mayor.

They meet monthly to review key deliverables, reports, and to discuss and provide guidance for the overall levy.

I will say this levy is important.

It's a $930 million levy, but in reality, it has leveraged significant grant funds, significant partner funds, and we have taken a whole of SDOT approach to implementing this levy.

It is, I would argue, the organizing principle of much of SDOT's work right now.

We are fully 110% committed to implementing this levy, so in addition to that $930 million, it's easily double that in the amount of resources that have gone towards making sure we're meeting the spirit and intent of what the voters approved.

Next.

So as I mentioned, there's three major groupings, safe routes, maintenance and repair, and congestion relief.

Within that are very specific programs, and each has specific deliverables.

They can get as specific as, you know, One of the metrics is an improvement, a safe routes to school improvement at every school in the city of Seattle, which we will meet and exceed in the term of this levy.

Others are a little bit more broad, just making sure we're staying on top of sidewalk repairs, but we do report.

We actually track every single repair made and report numerically on how many are done.

You'll see in some of the categories, there are very specific projects that have been completed.

We'll show some photos of those in a minute.

It's a mix of operations, distinct capital, repair, and services.

A key piece of this levy as well, as we were working to figure out how to move people more efficiently throughout the city, was a huge surge in the network of bicycle facilities that we have in the city.

We have this levy to thank for many of the protected bikeways that keep people safe as they move throughout the city, many new sidewalks, and many key pieces of the infrastructure that move Seattle.

Next.

So nine years is a long time and things happen.

And we want to just acknowledge that, especially as we're thinking about projecting into the future, that when we adopted the ordinance, we could not have seen COVID-19 coming.

We could not have seen the West Seattle Bridge crisis that happened.

And we also got direction in 2018 to reassess the work plan.

The good news of all of this is we pivoted every time, but then in 2021, we stopped and said, wait a second.

The voters in 2015 asked us to do something very, very specific, and they still think that.

And so what we did in 2021 is we said, what can we do to pivot to make sure we hit as many of the targets of the original legislation as humanly possible?

Where we had increased targets, we tried to stick with those increases.

And there's some areas where we said, we're never going to stop doing safety projects.

Even if we hit the minimum, that's not enough.

So we're going to keep going.

But in 2021, we doubled down and recommitted.

And Serena is going to talk more about that.

But I think that's an important thing to remember.

Through all the bumps in the road, we've come back to the original foundation of what people thought they were getting so that they're going to be getting what they thought.

Next.

So the Levee Oversight Committee.

This is a key role for us.

They are the recipient of our quarterly reports, our annual reports, and the place that we go when there might be adjustments needed.

For example, if we have the neighborhood street fund is a good example.

That is one of the programs that we do where we put out a call and an open call for neighborhoods to submit projects they'd like to do.

And then those are vetted by staff, and ultimately the selection of the 25 was up to the Levy Oversight Committee.

We also bring to them areas where there might have been a pivot.

Serena will talk a little bit about our pivot in the Bridge Seismic Program.

We bring those types of policy and specific project pivots to them, and we're really grateful for their volunteer work and labor because it's a lot to monitor and it's a lot of information.

In fact, we have our 2023 report about ready to hit the streets, a little bit of volume, although I know you would probably weigh more than that, but it's a lot for a volunteer board.

Next.

So this is just, you know, this takes some time to get through.

I'm not going to walk through each piece of it, but it gives you a sense of, you know, we try to sort of give summary over, in addition to our 100-page annual report, we try to give a summary overview of work that's been completed so people can see both the breadth and the number of what we do.

Key...

Examples in here would be the spot improvements, new painted crosswalks and blocks of new sidewalks, but we'll talk about those in a minute as well.

So, but just an idea of kind of how we try and make it accessible to someone who's got 30 seconds to spend on the levy, as well as in depth for those that are volunteering to help us do oversight.

Next.

So what have we done?

A key piece of what was also happening in 2015 is Metro had decided that they wanted to create a really strong backbone of rapid rides in the city of Seattle.

That was a key partnership and a really important foundation of the move Seattle levy.

So that's how we get projects like the Delridge rapid ride, how you see the construction on Madison of the rapid ride G and how we're about to celebrate the opening or the start of construction for rapid ride J.

In addition, there are a number of more surgical insertions that we have worked out with Metro that are not branded as rapid ride, they're not the red buses and that bus furniture, but they are, I like to call them a string of pearls of transit improvements In areas where there's congestion and the buses can't reliably get through, we are doing corridors to say, okay, we're going to create dedicated red lanes in spots where there's current congestion so the bus can get through.

And if people are taking the most space efficient and most energy efficient mode of travel, they'll get through quick.

So that includes Route 44, 48, 40, and many other transit routes.

So these are key pieces that...

Pieces of our city landscape that this levy has funded.

Next.

Moving goods reliably, this is really important.

The Lander Street Bridge was a marquee project of this levy.

The levy didn't pay for it all.

In fact, it paid for a small portion of it, but an important portion, right?

Someone has to start the seed funding, and the levy was an important part of having match funds for the federal government.

and indicating a seriousness around moving this project forward.

We also do a very consistent freight spot improvement program.

So that's taking places where it's a railroad crossing that's got some safety concerns and other places where trucks maybe need turning radii adjustments.

This is a key part of the levy as well.

Where we do paving, paving was a huge part of this levy, upwards of $200 million.

We have really focused on arterials that serve our freight network and arterials that serve our transit network.

An important part of thinking about paving is that we're doing it in places that are moving the most people on the busiest streets.

Next.

Safe and sustainable transportation options.

As I mentioned, this was a huge surge in our bike network.

It was a huge surge in our new sidewalk network, 25 blocks of new sidewalks a year, leading to 225 over the life of the levy.

Did I say 225 a year?

25 a year, excuse me, 25 blocks a year.

And then we also were doing safety corridors, as I mentioned earlier.

Next.

Connecting people and places.

This is really important.

This was the John Lewis Memorial Bridge on the bottom left-hand corner, a key piece of infrastructure connecting across I-5.

We created a Safe Routes to School program that has been a huge asset to the community.

And then we have our impressive public staircase network.

And we've either reconstructed or significantly repaired 45 of our public staircases throughout the move Seattle levy.

Next.

And last but not least, investing in our assets.

We know that bridges are a key part of how we keep our city connected.

They keep over our waterways, over our ravines, all of those places are key connections.

This program, the Move Seattle Levy, put together a bridge seismic retrofit program.

It had a bridge spot repair program to remove our backlog in bridge spot repairs, and also a number of other strengthening efforts on our bridges.

It was a key step toward being more proactive in our bridge asset management.

And I'll just leave, obviously can't read, take some time to read that.

But I think the important thing is knowing that the people of Seattle have really appreciated this effort in myriad ways that it has changed the way that they live, the way they move and where they can get on a regular basis in the city.

So with that, I wanna pass it off to my colleague, Serena.

Thank you so much.

So now we're in year nine of the Levy to Move Seattle.

And so I'm gonna touch on where we are with our 30 programs that Francisca has walked us through.

So despite all the challenges that we have faced in the city over the last eight years, including COVID-19 and the West Seattle bridge closure, we believe we're on track to meet 27 of our 30 program commitments as outlined in the 2015 levy ordinance.

So the green boxes are where we're meeting or exceeding those 2015 goals.

And then I'll walk through on the next slide, the three programs where we will not be meeting our targets.

All right, so the first one I'm gonna touch on is our bicycle safety program.

In the original levy ordinance, we committed to building 50 miles of protected bike lanes and 60 miles of neighborhood greenways.

We are on track to currently build between 90 and 107 miles of that 110. The next program that I'll touch on is multimodal improvements, and this is a very large program.

This encompasses a commitment to build seven transit plus multimodal corridors, and then do several individual for individual projects, which I'll touch on in a minute.

So we are on track to complete seven, or be in construction on seven transit plus multimodal corridors by the end of 2024. And that includes projects that you've probably seen in your neighborhood, including the Delrid Rapid Ride Project, Madison Rapid Ride G, which is in construction right here downtown.

Roosevelt Rapid Ride J will be starting construction early this year, and then routes 7, 40, 44, and 48. We've completed a connection on Northeast 45th, and then we're currently doing an Aurora planning study.

And then the two places where we are not going to be meeting our commitments are that we've been delayed on the Berkelman Trail project due to ongoing litigation.

And then last but not least is there was a Fauntleroy Boulevard Southwest project, and we paused this in 2018 due to Sound Transit 3 planning.

They were currently looking at where they wanted to site their different light rail stations, and so we didn't wanna go and invest, we wanted to be thoughtful about how we were using taxpayer dollars, and we didn't wanna go and invest a bunch of taxpayer dollars when it would potentially be torn up.

And then the last one that we will not be meeting our commitments is on the Graham Street light rail connection.

Sound Transit is planning on doing, eventually planning on doing an infill station on Graham Street through Southeast Seattle.

However, that work is not going to be complete until 2031. And in conversations with Sound Transit, we acknowledge that the work that would, SDOT would be contributing to wouldn't start till after the life of our current levy.

So we paused that work.

And then one that we have not highlighted here is our bridge seismic program, which Francisca alluded to earlier.

For those who have been tracking, this has gone through a journey.

And when we originally passed the levy, SDOT published some materials committing to a series of 16 bridges.

And then as we held ourselves to very high standards, we realized a few of those bridges would pretty much eat up the entire budget of, of the Bridge Seismic Program and more.

And so we paused the program.

However, as Francisca alluded to back in 2021, we were looking at what can we do to get as close as we possibly can to meeting our commitments to the voters.

So we worked with our very talented Bridge Seismic team to identify additional bridges that we could then do some seismic retrofits on by the end of the year that fit within the budget that we had.

And so we're able to identify four key pedestrian bridges that we'll be moving forward with and we'll be starting construction on this year.

Next slide.

All right.

So now I'm going to talk about how we've been spending on the levy to move Seattle over the last nine years.

So this graph shows how we've spent each year.

The blue is kind of other funds that we've used.

This includes grants, local funds, and the green is our levy dollars.

This is a pretty normal spending curve for a levy this large.

As we mentioned beginning, the levy move Seattle pretty much tripled the levy budget when it passed from bridging the gap into our current levy.

And so during those first few years, we were doing planning and design ramping up.

And now you can see we've been maintaining a pretty high spending rate over the last five years.

And we're looking to spend likely even more going into 2024. thinking about those big projects that are out in construction that we see all over the city.

So today we've spent 720 levy dollars and we anticipate spending, we've programmed out the rest of the levy dollars to be spent in 2024 and then beyond.

So we're very excited that that money is, we've pinned it to all of our projects.

Next slide.

And so on this slide, this shows this kind of side-by-side comparison of where we thought we would be when we originally scoped the levy to where we are now in terms of local dollars and partnership and grant funds.

So back in 2015, we thought the whole package to deliver on what we had committed to voters would be 1.8 billion.

And this included pretty ambitious grant goals of 400 million grants, and then 160 million in partnership funds.

And those partnership funds we expected to be mostly from King County Metro, as we were looking at expanding the rapid ride network, You know, zoom forward to now we are have completed eight years and the whole package looks closer to $2 billion with, you know, the levy dollars stay the same at 932. We met our grant goal of 401 million.

And then our partnership funding ended up being lower than expected as King County did not end up end up scaling back on their rapid ride deployment plans.

So I'll hand it back to Franziska.

Thank you.

Great.

Thank you.

I think it's important to note the sustained delivery that SDOT has been able to hold for the last four years on over $200 million a year in projects that are a mix of crew and contractor delivered.

As Serena mentioned, we have fully programmed all of the Move Seattle budget towards projects within the portfolio and have a ton of projects coming forward this year.

Some really big highlights include this sort of start on the Bridge Seismic Retrofit projects, 10 of those neighborhood street fund community requested projects will be starting construction and 20 plus miles of neighborhood greenways.

This is going to be a really exciting summer to be out and about in your neighborhood, walking and biking, and it will be a really great way to connect our different neighborhoods.

So we are excited about doing these projects.

We're excited to engage you in the next phases and to celebrate all the work that has been done.

This is really one of the things that has shaped the face of this city and the way that we get around and the places we can get to and how we can get there.

Right, very exciting.

And the last slide is just where you can see more.

We are committed to transparency and accountability.

In addition to having annual and quarterly reports, we have a levy performance dashboard available online.

We also have a capital project dashboard online.

So those are the ones that go to contractors that are the larger projects.

Those are available anytime and you can filter information and zoom in to different projects and programs.

So please feel free at your leisure.

Thank you very much.

We're here for questions.

All right.

Well, thank you, Director Spatz and your executive leadership team for sharing your insights on the current move Seattle levy with us.

You know, I was struck by a couple things.

One is those force majeure events, the bridge closure, the West Seattle bridge closure, and a global pandemic, which obviously weren't at all anticipated or contemplated during the pandemic.

You know, once the original levy was passed.

But seeing on the slide, you know, it sounds like we've, despite that, those challenges, we've substantially performed.

Always opportunity for continued growth and, you know, improvement.

But kudos to the team at SDOT for...

working hard to live up to those commitments.

And I'm looking forward to working alongside you all to make sure we do even better on a going forward basis.

So, but one thing, another thing that sort of struck me with that personally is that, well, the West Seattle Bridge, the closure there.

And as I understand it, that wasn't something that was related to necessarily a state of poor quality of the bridge.

That was a design flaw that caused that.

And here we are in a position where there are a lot of, we're all familiar with the 21 audit and the current high-level state of the bridges across the city.

Colleagues, I'll be, we'll have a separate presentation you know, topical briefing and discussion on the state of our bridges in the coming weeks and months ahead.

And just as an aside, I've also invited some members of the Levy Oversight Committee to come and share their perspective next month.

But regardless, I think there's a huge opportunity on a going forward basis to make sure that bridge maintenance and modernization efforts are better funded, not only in this upcoming move levy or renewal, but also just on an annual going forward basis as well.

One of my goals, in addition to being the king of potholes, if you will, and being pothole royalty alongside my colleagues here, is to make sure that no other community in seattle experiences what we experience in west seattle with the two and a half year closure of a critical ingress egress route um so in any event there i think there is a huge opportunity to to do better and that is one prime example of what by administration fix the first approach looks like uh so But I would just be curious to hear from all your perspectives, how did those two force majeure events, the pandemic and the West Seattle Bridge closure, how did that impact?

We saw it on some slides, but would be curious to learn more about how that impacted our performance with this move levy.

I can take that, although I wasn't here then.

You know, Finding a way to diagnose whether the West Seattle Bridge could be repaired or not and then repairing it, that became the number one priority of the agency for a couple years.

And it was the number one priority of elected officials up and down the chain in this region.

And a lot of federal funds were brought in and state funds.

And it was really a heroic effort.

It was simultaneously a...

a very difficult period for West Seattle residents and a really amazing all-hands-on-deck effort to get that bridge back up and running.

And then there was also a concrete strike, which hasn't been mentioned previously.

So there was a change of focus during a period of time.

But, you know, I happened to turn up...

right before the bridge was reopened.

And during my confirmation hearing, I committed to this committee regarding the bridges that I would ensure SDOT had the people, systems and technology to bring a contemporary asset management approach to the bridge network.

And that's what we're doing.

And we have delivered on all of the bridge audit recommendations.

We've gone beyond that.

I've appointed the first chief infrastructure engineer as a deputy director, Elizabeth Sheldon, so that I have a civil engineer on the executive team, and she's overseeing our bridges and roadway structures group.

So we are continuously improving our ability to be good stewards of that asset class.

And there's a variety of different reports we're going to be publishing about that and bringing through this committee.

And the next levy offers a unique opportunity to make investments in that area.

Thank you.

I'm Calvin Chow with Central Staff, and I'd just like to add a couple comments to your question.

From my perspective, a lot of the impact of those events was really financial.

The pandemic really took a hit on transportation revenues and sort of forced a lot of rethinking about how Estop was going to deliver on its promises.

And the West Seattle Bridge actually required us to use a fair amount of our debt capacity.

So that is, you know, future that we issued bonds to be able to pay for that.

So that limits our ability to use other debt because we are servicing that debt now.

I think both those efforts required a lot of internal work to figure out how to deliver on the promises that were already made with sort of restricted funding.

And that's the main impact on all of this.

Thank you.

Looks like Every last one of my colleagues has a question.

I'll go in the order that they appear here, starting first with Council Member Strauss.

Thank you, Chair Saka.

I'm going to not speak a whole lot.

Departure, I know, because I know that we all have something to do.

Everyone's got coughs all of a sudden.

I have an air purifier if you need it.

I'm going to take a moment here.

I just learned here on the dais about John Lazor passing away.

Colleagues, I don't know if you all had interaction with John.

He was one of the few.

in our city government that...

I mean, there are a lot of these folks that are still alive, and I don't want to have to talk about them, and it always hits hardest when somebody of his stature passes.

The last person of this category was Angela Steele in our public space sector of Department of Transportation.

The reason that John's passing hits me quite hard is because...

we wouldn't have the waterfront, we wouldn't have the tunnel, we wouldn't have so many aspects of our city infrastructure in place without him because he was both firm and kind.

He was able to tell you no and not be a jerk and still have that relation.

If you think, and the example I'll give you, if you remember all of the litigation around Bertha not working and whose fault was it?

Was it the insurance?

Was it washed out?

Was it the tunnel maker?

That was John representing the city in those meetings.

He was incredible.

I still disagree the Battery Street Tunnel shouldn't have been filled, but I'll leave that for another day.

But when we had Marshall Foster here last week talking about the Seattle Center and the waterfront, it was Marshall and John working on these projects.

And so he's somebody that I looked up to personally for both how to live life and also for how to show up in your professional environment.

So my thoughts, feelings, and condolences to the family.

I will just say with the Burke-Gilman Trail, I noticed it was incomplete on your project, has been my whole life, don't need to go into it here, but I will also say despite litigation, you have been able to push that project forward.

Even though the section on Market Street is not complete, it does not have its final markings and it doesn't have its final treatments, et cetera, because of this ongoing litigation, that section from 24th to the locks has made a huge difference.

And so we're only going on 30 years on this project.

Well, it's a couple more.

Actually, I mean, I would like it done today, but that's another statement.

Talking about bridges, I believe the thank you or the question slide at the end was my favorite picture.

As much as I would love the Ballard Bridge to stay in its current form, I know that we need to have it replaced.

I'm hoping that that can...

This is my plug for the next levy.

But also to say, colleagues, we have so much bridge infrastructure and so much sidewalk infrastructure that is left undone.

We could have a levy on each of those individually.

Just...

I mean, when I ran for office the first time, if we had stayed on schedule to complete our sidewalks, it would have taken 350 years to complete.

And so that's where my question is, how are the alternatives to sidewalks coming along?

Working with SPU, using asphalt treatment, I know you've done a couple statements of legislative intent.

I know there's a couple out there right now that are in my district that we're looking at.

How are things going with sidewalk alternatives?

Yeah, I mean, there's been, I think, a wonderful growth and ability to work through some of the contextual challenges that happen with alternative sidewalks.

They definitely, you know, they vary each time based on width and what drainage currently exists and the conditions.

So I would say we are in a good place with having demonstrated many different varieties and many different ways to deliver them.

We still, I think, you know, in...

There's discussion still underway around how we can continue to do it and loop in some additional drainage work there.

So I would say continues to improve and continues to move forward with it being very site-specific in how we approach each one.

Thank you.

All right.

Well, thank you, Council Member Strauss.

Sidewalks are really, really important to me as well.

And trust we will have a separate topical briefing focused on sidewalks.

I will now recognize Vice Chair Hollingsworth.

Thank you, Chair Saka.

Director Swartz, I was waiting for you to say fast and flavorful for some values, but I know that's That's very catchy.

One of the questions I had was, I know that we've seen a really big increase in the micro transit options like the scooters and we've gotten a ton of emails to talk about like safety pieces of scooters and are they on the sidewalk?

Are they in the bike lanes or in the road?

Could you talk a little bit more about, you know, like what we're doing with the scooter safety piece?

Is that going to be, you know, in the move levy?

What is SDOT kind of doing right now?

So the good news is that, you know, as we have more protected bike lanes in particularly downtown areas, there's less scooter riding going on in the sidewalks along those corridors where there is a safer place to ride.

But our scooter program is vendors who have taken out a permit to operate here.

And so we have to work collaboratively with them.

And that industry is changing very fast.

We're probably going to have fewer vendors functioning on the street this year than previous because of changes in that industry.

So we're working closely with the vendors on improving technology, improving a kind of geofencing so that you could keep the scooter where it needs to be, and also improving those vendors' ability to come and clean up or pick up scooters that are in the wrong place.

I did a...

a walk with a representative from our visually impaired communities and she showed me how jarring it can be when you're trying to navigate our streets with a visual impairment and all of a sudden there's a scooter where you weren't expecting it to be.

So this is something we're working very hard on and it is evolving as the industry keeps changing.

Awesome, thank you.

And then, my second question was side roads.

I know we pay a lot of attention to the corridors and the main pieces, but I also know our side roads are, you know, continuing to decrease as well, like just like the way they look, potholes, you know, some side streets obviously are like old cobblestone roads and so forth.

Is there like...

money in the budget, is there like an emphasis on, hey, there are some side roads that we are going to start, you know, taking care of or prioritizing?

Just because I know a lot of times, for example, like 23rd Avenue that has, we've done a lot of street calming, but that has also pushed people into the side roads and it's created, you know, a lot of heavy traffic, trafficked areas, you know, in those ways.

So just wondering if there's gonna be emphasis on side roads, repairing some of the, you know, main ones.

You know, this current levee, although it concentrated the large paving on our biggest arterials, it also had other categories for smaller paving projects, for projects where you're fixing the roadway but less than the full block.

And actually, we have pulled out several paving crews that we have to do smaller projects with our own SDOT staff.

And I think an important...

point of discussion when there's a levy proposal will be the balance of investing in the roadway condition of our arterials versus the side roads.

Awesome.

Thank you.

And I'm assuming it's going to be fast and flavorful for those side roads.

Okay.

Awesome.

Thank you.

There's a nice plug from Vice Chair Hollingsworth for our focus on our non arterial streets.

So super cool.

All right, let's see Council Member Kittle.

Thank you, Chair Saka.

Thank you, Director Spatz, for coming today.

And I wanted to say also thank you for how you started off.

I think it's important to recognize the work of your colleague that was lost, Mr. Fleming, and I think it's really important to highlight that, get it in the record, have the opportunity for Council Member Strauss to also speak to it.

I did not know him, but I think it's really important to have this opportunity in an official record way to get that in.

And not knowing him, I do know the Vision Zero program, as you mentioned, and would like to thank him and his family and his legacy on that, because it's really important.

That's something that we worked in the Queen Anne, not just in the Queen Anne, but the surrounding areas as well, quite often.

And that's a very important piece, particularly, too, because it's the kind of overlap as well in terms of the Public Safety Committee and the Transportation Committee.

And by the way, I'd like to add that pedestrian safety is very important to me, and playing off comments last week, I just wanted to say thank you, Councilmember Hollingsworth, talking about scooters, because the scooter issue is what I was referring to the last meeting, when you had your mobility bullet on your slide.

And that is a big issue for the residents downtown and Belltown, even with the bike lanes, which I 110% support, like on 2nd Avenue.

particularly with the lighting and everything, it's so important to have those very well-done bike lanes because they do provide that separation for the different parts of the traveling public.

And I also support those new ones too, like coming off the waterfront up onto Elliott into Belltown.

So I definitely support those bike lanes.

Separately, when I was talking pedestrian safety last week, I was making note of a very different bike lane up on West Lake.

But that is very different from the other bike lanes that we've been building through the levee and the like.

And so I just wanted to highlight that.

And off the Vision Zero point, thank you very much.

And you had some slides last week that had pictures around Coe Elementary and the like.

The Safe Schools project is so important.

One thing I've learned from being on the campaign trail and now as a council member, and I will work with my my colleague from District 6, is that Magnolia, oftentimes, Magnolia's kind of the forgotten piece of this.

It's out of the way, it's to the side, if you will, but the pedestrian safety pieces there in terms of crosswalks, all the calming pieces that we see in places like Queen Anne and other parts of District 7 don't necessarily get seen in Magnolia, so I will work with my colleague COUNCILMEMBER STRAUSS, AND TO ENSURE THAT THOSE REQUIREMENTS ARE ALSO HIGHLIGHTED AND ADDRESSED.

SO IT'S VERY IMPORTANT.

ALSO IN TERMS OF PEDESTRIAN SAFETY, AND I'M NOT SURE IF THIS WILL PLAY, YOU HAVE THE AURORA PIECE.

SADLY, A LADY WAS KILLED NOT LONG AGO BECAUSE SHE TRIED TO CROSS AURORA BECAUSE SHE THOUGHT IT WAS TOO DANGEROUS TO GO UNDER THE DEXTER UNDERPASS.

AT LEAST THAT'S THE UNDERSTANDING.

AND SO THESE ARE THE THINGS WHERE, AGAIN, WHERE WE HAVE the transportation community, the public safety.

There's definitely a lot of non-transport issues with that Dexter underpass area of Aurora, but it plays in together, and this is where we need to ensure that we have good answers for places like that Dexter underpass at Aurora.

Also, thank you for the pieces on the bridges.

As we know, in District 7 between Magnolia and Queen Anne, and also East Lake.

Many number of bridges, so thank you for the work that's ongoing right now with the Wolf Creek Ravine, the McGraw.

Very important to have that done.

A lot of people don't even realize that it's a bridge.

They just go over it, not even thinking about it.

But that kind of background maintenance work is really what not just the committee, but this new council is all about.

It's about getting to the nuts and bolts and just taking care of the foundational pieces.

So thank you for that.

Now, one question, or I guess it's not so much a question, the Route 40, I can't speak to the District 6 or other district aspects of it, but Westlake doesn't really need a bus lane dedicated, at least from the Fremont Bridge.

I can imagine if you got like a block or two from Mercer, but for that entire distance, I don't think it's quite needed in terms of my personal experience, but also in terms of working and talking with constituents.

And so I'd just like you to think about you know, not just giving a blanket kind of approach and really look at the different segments of the Route 40 plan because that would be problematic in a lot of areas for the Westlake specific.

Again, Westlake seems to be coming up on transportation issues, but, you know, it could have major impacts on, you know, the residents that now live in the area, but also the businesses.

Really interested in the freight piece related to the port.

And I was curious, this is a question now, it's like, do we have a specific port program that brings in all the various pieces of these transportation questions, the freight, mobility, and the like?

Does it all come together in one package, one program, as relates to the port?

We collaborate very closely with the port and sometimes we identify co-investment opportunities and we're about to break ground on the East Marginal Way project, which is a really exciting paving project that will also create a fully separated bikeway there so that trucking and bikes can be prioritized and separated.

And the port has some money in that project.

We continue to collaborate to look at large opportunities where we can co-invest in smaller things, whereas that can just program and make the spot repairs that the freight community tells us are needed.

I also wanted to thank you for what you said about John Lazor.

You know, when I got here, I knew that I was important to immediately do kind of a performance audit of Vision Zero, but I also knew I had to tread carefully being brand new in the job.

And everyone told me the only person who can lead this review is John Lazor.

The only person who has the credibility and trust across this entire 1100 person organization.

to interrogate the question of what could we do better in a way that would bring forward staff collaboration and participation rather than make people feel under attack or on the defense.

The only person who could do that with integrity was John.

There was no one else.

There was no second choice offered.

And he even outdid those expectations.

And it's incredible to think of a person who's regarded that way in such a large and complex place like Gaston.

That's, again, a great recognition of his work.

Of course, that's a good question, is who's the next John?

Are you developing the next Johns out there and the like?

That's a very important part of my job, is to do just that.

Thank you.

All right, Councilmember Wu.

Did not know John, but he sounds like an amazing person.

I'm very sorry for our collective loss.

So thank you for this presentation.

Thank you for all the work that you do.

I have a question.

For the Move Seattle levy, how closely do you work with the mayor's office?

What goes into the, I guess, how do you pick which projects that the Move Seattle levy will focus on?

You know, a very interesting design question for the next levy is the balance between specificity and flexibility.

So the way this particular levy was designed in 2015, high degree of specificity, 30 different categories of projects.

It promised 16 bridge seismic projects, even though a bridge seismic project can cost $800,000 or $30 million, depending on what bridge and what kind of seismic issues are there with the bridge.

And so for this particular levee, because of its specificity, a whole lot of it was wired right into the original ordinance.

And we've been taking direction and briefing and seeking consultation with the mayor's office throughout the way.

But I think a very interesting question for the elected officials as we tee up the next levy isn't just the size of it and what the main themes of it will be, but how to balance enough specificity so the voters have confidence they know what they're getting.

with perhaps maybe a little more flexibility to respond to individual communities and the concerns that emerge during the course of the levy.

In some ways, my tenure here so far has been building a set of projects that two directors ago picked in 2014. And that's what I need to do right now is finish strong on that collection of projects.

But I think it could be intriguing to offer future directors a little bit more flexibility to respond to evolving community needs with these funds in some way.

Councilmember, if I might also add, the levy legislation itself put restrictions on what the money could be spent for.

That's really the ultimate legal commitment.

The mayor will propose a budget every year with what projects actually get funded that's based on what the department thinks they can deliver, and then that comes to council for approval.

Largely, the spending restrictions on what we promised voters that the levy could spend on really set what the CIP budget was for the last nine years.

and that will be the discussion before you when we think about renewal.

All right.

Let's see here.

Councilmember Kettle, do you have another question or is that a hold over hand?

Lack of a lowered hand.

Oh, goodness.

Well, thank you, Director Spatz.

SDOT team here, really appreciate it.

And I also echo the sentiment of my colleagues in expressing our sadness for the passing of John Lazor, long-time SDOT employee.

And as chair of this committee, on behalf of this committee, I offer...

my sincere condolences and thoughts to the family of john laser and everyone at s thought whom he's touched and the broader community it's clear his impact is profound so thank you again for uh for sharing a little bit about the legacy and life of of john we will uh We will now move on.

Actually, first off, while I'm here, I'm hearing some of my team is pinging me about some scheduling snafus, potentially.

We've had on the calendar for a long time, and while I got to Director Spatz and Bill, we've had on the calendar for about three weeks now some pothole I was gonna visit Some of the frontline crews tomorrow morning at 8 a.m.

doing some pothole work.

So it sounds like we're working.

I would appreciate your commitment to make sure that still happens.

Can't keep kicking this down the road.

So thank you.

All right.

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

Will the clerk please read item three into the record?

Petition of the ULLC for the vacation of a portion of the alley lying within block two, Wegener's addition to the city of Seattle, being the block bounded by North 87th Street, First Avenue Northwest, Palatine Avenue North, and North 85th Street at 8623 Palatine Avenue North.

All right, welcome.

Already had a seat, so please settle yourselves in and begin your presentation.

Introduce yourselves, of course.

Liz Switson, Council Central staff.

Beverly Barnett, Seattle Department of Transportation.

We're just getting ourselves hooked up here.

Thank you.

Kevin Clary, I'm with Bayless Architects.

I'm Michael Jenkins.

I'm the director of the Seattle Design Commission.

So this morning, you're going to hear about a petition to vacate an alley in the Greenwood neighborhood.

Approval of the petition would transfer ownership of the alley and facilitate the development of a 70-unit multifamily project.

This is an early briefing, which is intended to provide you both an overview of the project, which will come back to you at a later time for your approval, and also provide an opportunity for you to highlight any issues that you'd like to raise at this time to be considered during the departmental review of the petition.

And with that, I'll hand it over to Beverly to talk a little bit more about the vacation process.

Good morning.

Thank you for having us back.

We had the opportunity to be at the first committee, and here we are.

I don't think we'll be on every committee, but we will come as often as invited.

So we wanted to start with this slide after Lisha's introduction.

So we did that in our 101 presentation, and I guess it went away.

But as Lish indicated, this is provided for in the street vacation policies that when we have a new vacation petition, we'll bring it in early in the processing.

So we do not have an SDOT recommendation.

We're not scheduled for a public hearing.

It hasn't been through all of the processing, such as the design commission review that Michael will talk about.

So it really just creates an opportunity for you to see a project early, and you can provide us some guidance if there's things that you really want us to focus on through the review.

If you think the normal review is fine, you can always share ideas with us later that you heard from a community member or something you thought of.

So we are at the first green box, which is, Petition Submittal, Introduction to City Council, and Early Committee Briefing.

So we're just kicking that off today with the overview of the project and we're here receptive to any ideas of things that you want us to consider and review.

Then we're going to have Michael Jenkins go over the design commission, which is a really significant part of the review, looking at some of the key issues.

And then Kevin Cleary from Bayless Architects will run through the PowerPoint, which shows where the project is, what they want to vacate, and why, to give you some overview and context.

And then we'll see if you have questions or guidance for us.

But, yeah, there isn't a vote today, so this is just the fun part of talking about these interesting issues.

So, Michael, you want to go next?

Just briefly, there's a lot of information in the PowerPoint that you see about the scope of the vacation and some of the early issues that the Design Commission addressed.

I think maybe there are a lot of new faces here who may not know exactly what the Seattle Design Commission's role is.

So just very briefly, the Design Commission advises the mayor, the council, and city departments on the design and environmental implications of city capital projects, as well as projects that seek long-term or permanent use of a right-of-way like this project.

The Design Commission is comprised of 10 architecture, design, and planning professionals are appointed by the mayor and confirmed by the council.

Back in 2018, the then council did a significant update to the council vacation policies.

And really, as in terms of the role of the commission, really further defined and provide guidance to you about what it is that you want the commission to look at relative to these issues.

And you can see in the diagram above, pre-submittal is a very important part of the work that we do.

The pre-submittal work is prior to the submittal of the petition.

We try to provide some initial direction to the applicant about key issues that may be of interest to the commission about when you remove that alley, what the remaining role and function of the right-of-way looks like.

and any potential public benefits that might be appropriate to offset the loss of that street or alley or public place.

We did that work in May of 2023, and we provided that direction that you'll see in just a moment with the presentation, and I'll speak more to that in a moment.

Okay, so I guess we're ready for the presentation.

Bill will run the PowerPoint for us.

He always helps us through everything.

So, Kevin.

Thank you.

Good morning.

I'm Kevin Clary, Bayless Architects.

I'm speaking on behalf of the ownership, the Greenwood Shopping Center.

This will be our second project in this neighborhood.

The project site, as you see on the slide here, this is a view looking from the north, looking south, sorry, southwest.

It's one block west from Greenwood Ave at the corner of Palatine and 87th.

Next slide, please.

So the project that we envision is a 70, what I'll call larger-sized, more marketable unit mix.

We've been working after the completion of the first project to find homes that fit the size of the neighborhood based on what was leased successfully in the previous project, which was across the street.

We're targeting almost a one-to-one parking ratio at 68 residents, bike storage.

We're looking at enhanced sidewalk improvements, some off-site sidewalk improvements, thematic signage, street furniture, as well as some asphalt resurfacing on 87th as well as Palatine.

We are hoping to get construction going in the fall of 2024 this year.

We feel allocation will provide better security as well as let this project respond to the surrounding context better.

Next slide, please.

So where we're at, we're pretty much right square in the middle of the orange dot that says site on it.

Right square in the middle of the neighborhood, we have Fred Meyer just directly to the west of us.

We are on the edge of the Greenwood-Finney Ridge residential urban village.

As mentioned, the big fat purple line going up and down, that's Greenwood Ave, which is a principal arterial.

And then we have 87th, which of course connects across and is a...

residential street.

Next slide, please.

So this kind of gives a context again.

They're just large-scale zoom out.

First slide on the left is the existing alley looking northeast.

There we've highlighted in the alley where it would be.

It actually currently doesn't exist.

It hasn't existed for some time except for some dots on a piece of paper.

The next picture on the right just shows its alignment with where is the residential zone across the street, where it would align.

Next slide, please.

So the first question that gets posed to us is what would we do if we did not vacate the alley?

There used to be an alley going more south of this alley.

It was previously vacated when the project there was developed.

I want to say around early 2000s.

So what we would do if we didn't is we would probably build a smaller project of likely smaller unit sizes.

I've put the unit mix that we probably would achieve over on the right.

The alley, of course, would be retained.

And then what I'll call a little sliver of land that remains, we would probably look to do, again, a sort of project that we haven't quite vetted with ownership there.

So it would be kind of a bifurcated building is what it would be.

You can see 87th where it sits just to the north and Palatine to the right.

Next slide, please.

So the rationale of our alley vacation is it basically at this point is a remnant of the previous full alley.

It's a remnant function that really serves no existing purpose.

I'll get into that more.

It bifurcates the site, as I mentioned.

It does not hold any current utility functions in the alley that most alleys do have.

Being that there's no developed projects on that site at this point, it doesn't serve for access as well.

One major benefit that we see is, of course, if we're able to do this, being on the edge of the urban village we're going to be able to create a more marketable larger scale unit mix i'll touch on that more construction one building is way more financially feasible than two buildings you save on circulation costs a number of elevators number of stairs overall just number of in order to create you know more efficient development It allows more flexibility in design by removing the alley, and lastly, we see that dead-end alley as a bit of a security concern for the family that owns this project and maintains this project and the surrounding projects.

Next slide, please.

We did do community outreach as part of our early design guidance.

This is kind of a quick summary of Some of the outreach that we did, what we heard was people really want parking.

They really want the sidewalk connections improved, pedestrian realm improvements, open space, street safety, authentic architecture.

And so that kind of informed our design and how we looked at it moving forward.

One of the goals that we heard from when we did the previous project across the street was the one-to-one parking ratio, which kind of developed design.

We definitely wanted to look at these sidewalk connections and find ways to do what we do with our open space areas.

Next slide, please.

This is what we would propose then.

What we're proposing is a mixed-use building.

It's about 70 units.

It's got a larger unit mix, less studios, more larger one-bedroom, one-bedroom dens, more two bedrooms.

We obviously use the whole site.

We take our access off of 87th in approximately the same location that the previous alley served.

That was intentional because we felt like that would provide a network of how the street grid previously functioned and could maintain that.

In the corner where you see item two, this is kind of why we call it the U.

There was across the street on Palatine where we developed the Morrow project, there was a U tree that was saved.

It was moved to this site.

That creates what we call the corner pin and the rationale for the U corner.

It's a nice way to create this sort of large shared public corner open space.

We see that as the anchor for the sidewalk improvements.

Other improvements that we're looking at besides the larger enhanced street would be item three, improving the traffic circle there.

It's settled substantially.

It could use some greenery improvement.

We see improving the sidewalk connection for the entire block going past with item seven, connecting it.

There's currently no sidewalk in that area and some better security fencing around a green detention pond area that's been preserved.

Next slide, please.

proposed public benefits.

I touched on briefly already the enlarged sidewalk going and connecting the streetscape experience on the north edge of the urban village border at 87th.

That would include thematic lighting, building elements, decorative fencing, improvements, informational signage.

We've had some early conversations with SDC that's talked about opportunities that we could do to kind of enhance that.

Again, that U corner public space that I talked about, we see that as a great opportunity for a pause point, a public landscape plaza, open to all, highlighting the mature U tree, offering a place for people to pause along their way.

And roundabout improvements, item three there, the asphalt, it's a bit of a roller coaster ride as you go through it.

So, you know, we see that as a great way to clean up our front door.

Again, highlight the strength of that U Plaza, makes the road safer for bikes, cars, et cetera.

Next slide, please.

So we looked quickly, and we'll look at this more with SDC, how the public and street impact would be used if this alley was vacated.

So this is a very colorful chart, but it shows sort of all of the public trust functions that we're gonna dive into with SDC, where the bicycles would circulate, where the water, the sewer, the utilities essentially would serve this building, how autos and pedestrians move.

Again, none of those functions currently are in this currently non-existent alley, but are currently taken in that alley, so we don't see an impact to that grid.

Next slide, please.

Quick, as we'll do this more, but it was a Seattle subcommittee design feedback.

This is kind of their main bullet points from an early meeting we had with them.

Emphasis on public benefit, importance of community engagement, environmental and sustainability focus, and that's where we touch on some of the signage.

along the walkways, things that kind of can enhance that public realm movement, sidewalk improvements, and their general perspective was they did not see the vacation alley as a major issue.

Next slide, please.

Thank you for your time.

This is kind of how we as Bayless architects envision the possibility of this space.

This is looking at the U corner.

Thank you.

I wanted to take a moment and just build on the role of the Seattle Design Commission.

I gave you a very high-level overview.

In May of 2023, we held what's called a subcommittee.

It's not a quorum of the commission, but we really try to bring in commissioners that have a significant role in street and alley vacations, our urban designer, our landscape architect, and our architect.

This is very typical of the kind of direction that we provide.

It's before the petition has been submitted.

So it's really at a high level.

What are the sort of high level moves that the commission has flagged for them that they need to think about as they advance not only the commitments to the public realm, but how it informs the work that they do with Seattle Department of Construction and Inspection on the design review program on the actual building.

So those six bullet points that you see really are trying to highlight for them if you remove that alley from service, what happens to the remaining functions of the right-of-way?

numerous times that this alley really hasn't been developed to the level that we would like to see in other alleys.

But it still provides an important function for access and circulation.

How are they offsetting the impacts of moving those functions out to the right of way where people will see them and potentially the negative consequences of that on movement through the public realm?

We'll be holding our first full meeting with them in a month.

where we look more closely at the implications of the loss of the right of way and how they intend to offset those losses through a public benefit package that you've seen a little bit about, not only in the presentation, but how the public has indicated how they want to have the remaining public spaces enhanced for movement, for rest and other functions of the right of way that are important to that community.

Thank you.

All right, well, thank you all for this very insightful overview and presentation here.

And colleagues, I remind, this is the intro, you know, this is part of a continuing ongoing conversation and briefings we'll have on this particular and more similar matters on a going forward basis.

I have a question about how do we, A blurb in this memo dated, it's linked in the agenda, but it's dated February 14th, 2023. Maybe that was 24, but it's from Lish.

It should be 24. All good.

But on the second page there, On that second full paragraph, it says in the 2024 budget, the council added a proviso of $150,000 of the SDOT budget for sidewalks to fund the construction of a sidewalk on the south side of North 87th Street between First Avenue Northwest and Palantine Avenue North, abutting the used property.

Was that proviso at the time the budget was adopted, was this specific project and this petition contemplated at the time?

Chair?

Mayor?

Please, go ahead.

Thank you.

This was a budget proviso that I brought.

This is something that I've been working with the U, their property owners, which is a family, and the architects for quite some time.

I'm happy to give you a more in-depth understanding, but the thought here is, and if we could go to slide...

I'm sorry, I was going to address some of this.

So here we go.

Colleagues, as you may know, this project used to be centrally located in District 6 until I had some of my district taken from me.

I will tell you that that was not appreciated to lose Crown Hill and Greenwood because its direct connection to the rest of the district is pretty incredible.

If you could go to slide...

Page three, according to your notes on this.

Colleagues, as you can see here, my district now has the boundary on 87th.

Actually, if you want to go up to that first slide, the very first slide.

So this 87th Street is now the district boundary.

Council Member Moore's staff has been in the chambers during this discussion.

And what I can tell you is that we've been working pretty intensely here.

If you could move back to that page three.

So what we have here is on that site between the Fred Meyer building and the eastern edge of the orange bubble called the site, that is the only block that does not have sidewalks between, I think it might even be Aurora and Third Avenue, right?

And so what we have here is it's a missing link if you will, of how do people navigate that area?

So on the north side of 87th, it's hard to tell, is it public, is it private?

It's a little bit of a dirt track on the side of the road.

And then on the south side, if you could go back actually to that first slide, you'll see that there are curbs here.

You can actually see the ADA improvements that are up to specs since the ADA curb ramp consent decree that the city has been under.

So you can see that they've already got the drainage.

This is an opportunity that literally the SDOT crew could come in and pour in asphalt.

It would be one of the cheapest alternatives because you're not doing drainage, you don't have to do the ADA.

And at the same time, I've made agreements with the property owners that if the city was to spend money in the interim, that we would need to recoup those costs.

because you may also know that there's a permitting audit that was done last year because they're talking about putting in permits or pulling permits in fall of this year.

But if for some reason, one thing doesn't go correctly with this alley vacation and they don't have that submitted to us by mid...

This is where I'm also giving...

the team our calendar roadmap that we can't miss.

Because if the team was to not transmit this alley vacation by the middle or early August, that means we probably wouldn't have time in your committee in September before we get into the budget session, which then takes us to the earliest time of pulling permits in December, right?

much less all of the other issues going on with the permit.

And so when we look, and then there's gonna be construction.

And so when you look at this proviso of what, you know, I've seen the upper costing of 175,000, but my best guess is you could get it done for 30. Just because of all of the different sidewalk alternative work that I've done, I have these back of the envelope figures.

That 30,000 or 40,000 or maybe 175, if you put in every bell and whistle you got, would be present throughout construction.

And so when I go back to page three, if you will, We're talking multiple years of impact of not being able to get from third all the way.

Sandell Park is a block north of here.

There's a Greenwood Park, another two blocks to the east of this map.

That's where that budget proviso comes from.

And I wouldn't have put it in there if, I hadn't had these conversations to say, if we spend city dollars here, I am going to request it to be recouped within the public benefits aspect of this plan and project.

That's probably longer than you expected.

All good.

No, yeah, very helpful.

Thank you, Councilmember Strauss.

I guess from my perspective, yeah, I think it would be a fair sort of ask item as part of this in exchange for this to make sure that, you know, the development takes care of the the sidewalk infrastructure, adding that along that missing link, if you will, along North 87th Street, but also, you know, exploring, making sure that the sidewalks in the adjacent areas surrounding the properties, where appropriate, are also in good overall, you know, state of repairs and, you know, modernization, if you will.

The only other thing I'll, or comments, guidance, as these discussions evolve that I have from my perspective, in addition to highlighting the importance of sidewalks, is the affordable housing component.

So as I understand it, this property is in a neighborhood commercial.

So, and I'm reading verbatim now on page one of the memo and that one, let's see, fifth full paragraph.

It says the property is in a neighborhood commercial 2-75 zone with an M2 mandatory housing affordability designation, which, you know, under the sub-bullet there, that specific designation combined with the designation of the Greenwood-Finney Ridge Urban Village as a medium area under MHA and requires a a specific payment or 10% of the units in that project to be affordable.

So I think we need to do the best job possible to make sure that at the end of the day, when the smoke clears in this project, after shovels are on the ground and this great project is fully brought to life, that No one pays a fee.

We actually live up to the 10% intended commitment of affordable housing.

So those would be my only comments.

I acknowledge and recognize Council Member Wu.

I have a question regarding who owns the alley?

It's currently city-owned.

Well, streets are an odd ownership, but basically the city owns it and we're being requested to sell it to the U property.

Can you talk a little bit more about that process and how does that work and what does it look like and where does that money go?

Yeah, the money will go into the general fund, Beverly?

Yeah, it's split under state law where one half of the money goes for transportation and open space purposes, and one half of the money goes into the general fund to be dispersed through the normal budget process.

And so the process, any property owner has the right to petition the city for a vacation of the right-of-way that's next to their property.

Generally, we only approve petitions when property owners on both sides of the property are seeking it and where there's a project that would use the property.

We have a set of criteria in our street vacation policies about when we would consider giving up the right-of-way, and we want to make sure that we're protecting the public's interest in having the street or alley.

So if the alley is going to be used for access, we don't want to give it up because that's an important role.

The alleys provide some light and air to the adjacent properties.

They can also be used for utility lines.

We look at what the next steps are for the city departments to review.

all of those different functions of the alley and see if it's appropriate to vacate it and transfer the ownership to the U property.

They will come back to the council with a recommendation, hopefully in August or September.

And then this committee will decide whether or not they feel it's appropriate and whether or not what is being given up and giving up ownership of the driveway is being offset by the public benefits that are proposed as part of the project.

Is that alley currently being rented out or just used?

It's just sitting there, and in this case, undeveloped.

Walking by, you wouldn't necessarily even know that the alley exists there, but it exists legally.

Great, thank you.

And my second question is, Parking.

You mentioned that there may be parking.

I thank you for the alternatives.

It looks like a very amazing project, but want to learn more about community concerns regarding parking.

Certainly.

Community outreach for this project, as well as the Morrow project, which is across the street from Palatine, parking has come up in this neighborhood as a concern over basically providing enough.

I know in this zone, the parking requirement is very limited.

I don't think we have to provide parking.

However, we're working with our leasing team.

That was probably one of the main drawbacks when we leased up the project across the street was providing enough parking.

We had people that didn't feel they wanted to either leave their car in the street or wanted to look elsewhere in order to have it.

When we started looking at this project, from the ownership side, they looked at saying, I want to provide enough parking to attract tenants to the size homes we're looking at.

On the community feedback side, the conversation was generally make sure you have parking so they don't park in front of my place and take my my spot basically so that kind of developed our goal of trying to then come up with the design that still allowed for you know neighborhood friendly functions facing the street to the greatest extent we can but providing essentially as close to a one-to-one parking ratio as one-to-one, meaning one parking stall per unit inside the structured parking.

So we're a couple stalls under that goal, but we're really close to that goal.

Thank you.

All right.

Thank you.

And Council Member Kettle.

Thank you, Chair Saka.

Before I start, I would like to note that Council Member Strauss may have lost some of his District 6, but that was more than offset that he gained from District 7, just to put that point out there really quickly.

Alley Vacation, first, thank you for the briefing.

I appreciate it.

I understand.

I've seen similar things in District 7 and some of my volunteer work.

The alley questions are very important.

One thing that I learned, so this is actually more for the commission side versus the project in itself, is that as it relates to alley vacation policy, this is a big issue in districts.

DISTRICT SEVEN, PARTICULARLY DOWNTOWN AND BELLTOWN, AND IT BECOMES A QUESTION OF LOGISTICS.

AND I DIDN'T SEE LOGISTICS IN YOUR SLIDE, BUT FOR THE CENTRAL STAFF, FOR THE MAYOR'S SIDE, THAT IS LIKE THE NUMBER ONE THING WITH ME IS THAT WE HAVE TO MAKE SURE THAT THE LOGISTICS OF WHATEVER PROJECT IS ADDRESSED, WHETHER IT'S A RESIDENTIAL LIKE THIS ONE OR MAYBE MORE COMMERCIAL, BECAUSE I'VE BEEN ALL OVER DISTRICT SEVEN, PARTICULARLY DOWNTOWN BELLTOWN.

AND WHAT ENDS UP HAPPENING IS IF WE DON'T ADDRESS THIS FROM A planning and zoning and the like, is that we push logistics on the street, which then creates other problems.

So we have to address logistics as part of the planning process, but also any question related to alley vacation, the first question's gonna be from me is, What's the logistics?

So if this project wants to do that, you can do that as well in terms of addressing logistics, because this is so important.

Residential, commercial, and I always say it comes down to two words, loading docks.

I've seen some bad loading docks throughout District 7. This goes to our architect friend here.

You make sure loading docks are well designed, both for commercial and residential.

And so I just wanted to highlight that piece.

Again, logistics, logistics, logistics.

One last point, too, is I really appreciate the design review slide here, because that's really important, too.

I do believe in design review.

I know some others don't.

I recognize that oftentimes we need guardrails between the community and the developers and other players are in play because we can't have things slow down.

But I really appreciate the input that's coming from the community through design review and has shown up in this briefing.

So I appreciate that point.

So Mr. Chair, I just want to get those two points out really quick.

And that's it for me.

All right.

Thank you, Council Member Kettle.

Emphasize from my perspective that I'm curious, glad to hear some of the initial feedback reflected in this presentation from the community, but as this process evolves, you know, also curious to hear if there are any more, what kind of more refined contours of that community feedback and outreach look like in specific asks from the community's perspective.

So let's see, council, go ahead.

Oh yeah, sorry, chair.

I gave you what I was gonna tell you about just that sidewalk alternative and, but I did have some more to say and Council Member Kettle's point is right.

I'm very excited to get Magnolia back in my district.

Just pissed as all can be about losing Crown Hill.

I may have gone to preschool in Magnolia, but if you could go to slide three, I bought my toys, childhood toys at Top 10 Toys, which now Snapdoodle as represented on the map.

It's good to be local.

I want to go, if you could, to slide four to help answer Councilmember Wu's question of what is the alley like?

When we are in the built environment, it's hard to tell where is public and private.

And so the private alley is working as a...

as a public space right now, even though it's private.

So folks are moving back and forth.

I walked across it when I went to the Taproot Theater last week myself.

And so that is good.

I will say that when I'm hearing from The neighbors, you were right about the parking.

Parking is already really tough in the neighborhood, and I know that y'all are working to, I believe the minimum is zero, if not nearly there, and to provide one-for-one is above and beyond.

Also, colleagues demonstrates that the private market can provide when they choose to.

The sidewalk connections, and if you look just across Palantine on that southwest corner, there's about a 15-foot section of sidewalk that needs to be remediated.

It seems as if it was private development, private development house, and in front of that house, there's not a sidewalk that is connected just to that one little corner.

And overall, you know, meshing that neighborhood commercial, like Chair Saka said, to the neighborhood residential zone.

I think those, you know, meeting places, these are all great.

But if you could go to the last slide and then I'll be done, Chair, because I know we have time here.

You know...

I say this with love, like great drawing.

And if we can get this, you'll surprise me.

And it's nothing about your building.

It's because colleagues, the Greenwood blog, the Greenwood bog, I'll save it for another day to brief you on.

But if you can get that traffic circle onto the same level as the sidewalk, That will be a feat in history because colleagues right now that roundabouts, it's about 12 to 18, possibly more inches above where the sidewalk is because the Greenwood bog.

Thank you, colleagues.

I look forward to working with you more.

All right.

Thank you, Council Member Strauss.

Colleagues, any other questions, comments, feedback?

All right.

Well, thank you again for this very helpful overview.

Look forward to working alongside you all as we proceed here and make sure we get hopefully shovels and ground by the end of this year, early next.

We have reached the end of today's meeting agenda.

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

Hearing no further business to come before the committee, we are adjourned at 11.16 a.m.