Tag Transportation

Help Prioritize Neighborhood Street Fund Projects

Community members have submitted over 300 projects for the Neighborhood Street Fund and now it is time for community prioritization of the initiatives. Every vote has a huge impact at this stage of the process.

Please consider supporting some of the proposed Licton Springs projects:

• Improvements to help make Licton Springs more connected to Green Lake at N 85TH, including improving the Wallingford Ave N crosswalk (#2019-114) and the Ashworth Ave N intersection (#2019-25). These projects are listed as part of District 6 but would benefit both District 5 and District 6.
• Improvements to Aurora Ave N including adding lighting (#2019-116), additional art installations (#2019-75) and crosswalk safety improvements (#2019-18).
• A proposal to make Stone Ave N (#2019-14) a designated North / South Greenway providing safe pedestrian and bicycling access to schools, parks, and amenities.

You can find a map of all the submitted projects here.

Upcoming Community Meetings:

• District 6 - Crown Hill Center, Tuesday, January 29, 7pm to 8:30pm
• District 5 - Broadview Branch Seattle Public Library, Thursday, January 31, 6pm to 7:30pm
• District 5 - Lake City Community Center, Tuesday, February 5th, 6:30pm to 8pm
• District 6 - Phinney Center Community Hall, Wednesday, February 13th, 6pm to 7:30pm

To provide feedback, rank projects proposed in your district online here, or at a Community Prioritization Meeting in your district. The meetings will begin with a presentation of all the projects proposed in the hosting district. Then, you will receive a score card, where you can rank your top projects and submit to SDOT staff. Top-ranked projects will proceed to the voting phase in spring 2019.

Submit Ideas for Your Voice, Your Choice 2019:

After voting on Neighborhood Street Fund Projects: help decide how to spend $2,000,000 of the City's budget on small-scale physical improvement projects to Seattle's parks & streets through Your Voice, Your Choice!

Each project must: Benefit the public Cost $90,000 or less * Be a physical project that is located within Seattle's parks or streets

Ideas may be submitted online or in-person at any Seattle Public Library branch or various public outreach events. Submit your ideas by February 22nd!

Please contact Amy Nguyen at [email protected] or 206.222.2044 with any questions.

Well ahead of the light rail opening, many changes are coming to Northgate Transit Center, some over the next few weeks, and others early next year.

Back in September, we saw our first positive change as the 41 bus received more frequent service. However, as Seattle prepares for the period of maximum constraint early next year, you can expect even more changes to come to our transit station.

The first major change coming is the opening of the new parking garage to the north of the station, coinciding with the close of the 2 west side lots:

The new parking garage will contain 450 parking spots, more than making up for the closed lots, but some of the new spots will be reserved for paying customers. More information about the parking changes can be found on Sound Transit's overview. These changes will take effect Monday, November 19th.

Then, come March of next year, big changes are planned for our fastest connection to Bellevue - the 555. The route will be updated to bypass Montlake and operate only between Northgate and Bellevue, no longer serving Eastgate or Issaquah. This should result in much quicker and dependable transit times for those commuting between Licton Springs and Downtown Bellevue.

Finally, with land usage signs now visible around the North Seattle College's Campus, construction on the pedestrian bridge from Licton Springs to the transit center has passed its biggest hurdles and is set to begin construction next year.

Here's to hoping all the transit changes lead to a quicker more dependable commute!

Earlier this month, residents of North Seattle gathered to share information, resources, and get connected at U District's Let's Go Transit Talk. The U District, Roosevelt, and Northgate Link light rail stations will arrive in 2021 which means these neighborhoods, as well as Licton Springs, will be better connected to each other and Downtown Seattle.

Panelists included:

• Amy Gore, Seattle City Councilmember Rob Johnson's Office District 4
• Inga Manskopf, Ravenna Bryant Community Association
• Laura Loe, Share the Cities
• Mark Crawford, U District Partnership
• Joe Gruber, University District Food Bank
• Jeffrey Young, North Seattle College
• Scott Cooper, Roosevelt Neighborhood Association
• Bill Bryant, King County Metro Transit
• Ellen Blair, Sound Transit
• Ann Sutphin, Seattle Department of Transportation

Of particular interest to those in the Licton Springs area, we heard from Jeffrey Young about the upcoming pedestrian bridge connecting Licton Springs to Northgate's light rail station with plans to focus on preserving the wetlands while achieving safety in the design:

Additionally, Jeffrey mentioned upcoming plans (in the next two years) for additional student housing at North Seattle College including a 300-bed residence hall:

You can find the full recording of the session here: http://www.seattlechannel.org/misc-video?videoid=x98788

As well as more information about U District, Let's Go Transit Talks here:

https://udistrictgo.org/transit-talk-were-in-it-together/

Starting this September the frequency of the E Line, in addition to many other regional bus lines, will be increased. This change is happening thanks to a partnership between Amazon, the City of Seattle, and King County Metro. This will be a particularly welcome addition over the next few years as the recent closure of the Convention Place Station reroutes our other popular bus line into downtown: the 41 - leading to possible delays until the light rail construction is complete.

This change will positively affect many as the E Line is Metro’s highest-ridership route with more than 17,000 weekday riders.

For many years Northgate enjoyed the convenience of having both of the big name wine and beer outlets right next to each other. Being able to easily walk between BevMo! and Total Wine in the same trip was a magical thing for anyone who anxiously awaited limited availability beer, wine, or spirit releases. Of course, one-day several months ago, this duo came to an end, leaving only Total Wine - which sits at the bottom of an apartment complex, left in-tact.

A friend of the blog recently reached out to us, with an unsurprising explanation for that closure: BevMo!, which was nestled into an old-fashioned shopping strip, needed to close to make way for the expansion of Downtown Northgate. In the place of the old shopping plaza, plans are in place to build a 235 unit apartment building with retail at the bottom, continuing the trend happening around the old plaza:

If you would like to give your input into the design of this new apartment building, there is an upcoming opportunity to contribute to the early design guidance August 6, 2018 6:30 pm

Meanwhile, the redevelopment of the mall into the focal point of this new downtown area continues being planned, with the first two opportunities for community input coming tentatively next month:

• August 13, 2018 6:30 pm
• August 27, 2018 6:30 pm

The transit-oriented development, temporarily paused, has come back in full swing with a new RFP based on free land from King County and an upzone to allow up to 24 story buildings promised by the end of this month.

And finally, concerns over future of the Northgate Pedestrian bridge which will connect Licton Springs directly to both the developing Light Rail and Downtown Northgate, have been alleviated after the Seattle Colleges Board of Trustees conditionally agreed to give an easement to the new bridge. The latest plans for which, will have the new bridge/path only a ~5-10 minute walk away from Oak Tree Plaza.

No matter how you feel about the developments overall, hopefully, this all will lead to a North Seattle that feels more connected both to Downtown Seattle and to the neighborhoods contained within.