Although some of the attendants of last night’s community transit meeting might not have gotten the answers they sought regarding the lack of bus service on 15th Avenue Northeast, they still left with a little more knowledge about upcoming plans for the Maple Leaf corridor.
The meeting was scheduled to help address concerns brought up at the Maple Leaf Community Council’s April meeting, including how the rerouting of buses from 15th Avenue to Roosevelt Way Northwest during construction on the 15th Avenue bridge is affecting the neighborhood.
“I think that the decision to move the buses has undermined public safety,” said Maple Leaf resident Marjorie Rhodes, who has a blog about bus service in Maple Leaf. “I don’t think it was completely necessary to remove the buses from 15th.”
But Project Manager Kit Loo, with the Seattle Department of Transportation, said the city considered keeping one lane of the bridge open when possible during the majority of the project, but chose to instead close the bridge entirely to speed up the process.
“One of the things that we didn’t want to happen is that (allowing traffic on the bridge) would have a detrimental impact to some of the repairs,” Loo said, noting that the heavier weight of Metro buses could have been even more harmful than typical vehicle traffic.
Rhodes also asked why the buses couldn’t use another road to get from Roosevelt to 15th Avenue, suggesting Northeast 103rd Street as a through street.
But that, too, had been considered and thrown out.
Liz Gotterer, transit planner for Seattle Metro, said one of the articulated coaches with the accordion-type midsections gave 103rd a try, but bottomed out against the street. Not to mention that getting onto Roosevelt or 15th Avenue during rush hour would have been a nightmare.
Transportation Planner Dan Wells added that Metro also would have needed the city to close parking on both sides of 103rd, and he noted that the structure of the street simply wasn’t made for such heavy vehicles.
“We just didn’t think it was a safe operation,” he said, adding that in all, Metro tried 27 different intersections before deciding that bus service on 15th simply had to move for the time being.
“We were looking at basically everything between Ravenna and 85th,” Gotterer said. “This is probably the most complicated bridge construction project I’ve worked on in terms of what’s feasible.”
But that still doesn’t make the trek up and down Maple Leaf’s east-west hills – which often lack both adequate lighting and sidewalks – any easier. Rhodes pointed out that without buses on 15th, there are scores of elderly and disabled community members who “can’t get to the bus if their life depended on it.”
However, neither Metro nor the Transportation Department had an answer that would remedy that problem, although Metro acknowledged it should have started the conversation earlier with the community about temporarily stopping the bus routes.
“I’m sorry we didn’t come talk to you more about what we were doing,” Gotterer said. “I haven’t had this kind of response in the past (to a route change).”
Loo, with the Department of Transportation, offered additional concessions, pointing out that completion of the bridge project is on schedule, with an end date estimated for late March or early April 2011.
“We’re trying to push them as hard as possible to try to get the bridge open as soon as possible,” he said.
In addition, Wells noted that the city is in the midst of adding wheelchair-accessible landing pads at the Maple Leaf bus stops on Roosevelt Way, as well as benches and even shelters at those with heavier usage. And even though there will be fewer stops when buses return to 15th Avenue next year, Wells said Metro hopes to make the most of them.
“It’s our hope that … every southbound bus stop between 120th and 80th will have a shelter and a landing pad,” Wells said, adding that the future stops on 15th Avenue will be located at 80th, 82nd, 88th, 95th, 100th, 103rd, Northgate Way, 115th and 120th.
And before you feel like Maple Leaf is getting the short end of the stick with the reduction in bus stops, Wells also said that Metro is decreasing the number of stops systemwide to save money and gas.
Maple Leaf resident Donna Hartmann-Miller urged city officials at the meeting to consider being on hand to answer questions and hear out concerns from residents attending this year’s Maple Leaf Summer Social, which begins at 7 p.m. July 28 at Maple Leaf Park.
What do you think about changes to the bus routes because of the 15th Avenue bridge closure?
As someone that lives off of Roosevelt I am thrilled with the re-route of the 73. It is nice to have an additional bus that runs more than just during banker’s hours. Unfortunately the riders on 15th and below are now feeling the same pain those of us living off of Roosevelt have felt for years. Lucky for those living on 15th and below they only have to endure it for a year.
As for the improvements Metro is making on 15th, why aren’t they working with the city to install sidewalks on the remainder of 15th before they sink a bunch of money into the stops? Would wheelchair accessible landing pads be necessary if there are properly installed sidewalks? Shelters are nice but sidewalks are the necessity here as 15th is a high traffic area even without the bus running.
Pedestrian safety is the crux of this issue. I’ve been advocating for a pedestrian articulated light at Roosevelt and 100th for years.
Please leave feedback here: http://walkbikeride.seattle.gov/ballot/ to give the McGinn administration the idea that we need sidewalks and a safe way to cross Roosevelt.
A pedestrian light would be a great investment in the walkability of our neighborhood for generations to come.
Honestly, I don’t know what the fuss is about. If you live between 15th and Roosevelt, catching a bus on Roosevelt is just as easy as catching one on 15th. If you live downhill from 15th it’s more of a shlep to Roosevelt, but it’s only three or four more blocks-and if you can walk uphill to 15th in the first place, you surely can walk another three blocks and lose some weight while the bridge is under construction.
For the elderly and people with disabilities, it does pose more of a challenge-but in large part because the city doesn’t have sidewalks installed fully in Maple Leaf, not strictly because of lack of bus service. There is special van service, however, so I wonder it there’s simply a lack of information about how to use available transportation services.
There is a fairly serious issue with Roosevelt, however, in terms of making safe vehicle turns and crossing safely as a pedestrian. Visibility was already notoriously low when turning from side streets onto Roosevelt (in either direction) because of parked cars, and now with the increased volume and speed it can be downright scary to use Roosevelt at all.
The lack of stoplights and the lack of garishly marked crosswalks are also a huge problem for pedestrians; during the school year there are tons of kids who could be walking to Olympic View and Perkins and St. Catherine’s who simply can’t because Roosevelt is not safe.
I don’t bike in this neighborhood because of the uphill ride home, but I’m sure bikers will concur that Roosevelt is a biker’s nightmare as well. (15th is probably a lot nicer now, though.)