Meeting Minutes for Quarterly Joint Meeting

[Brock Howell]

Meeting Minutes of 

Quarterly Joint Meeting

of Ballard, Green Lake, Greenwood-Phinney, Lake City, Licton-Haller, Maple Leaf, NE Seattle, Pinehurst, and University District Greenways Groups.

Sunday, February 12, 2017, 7:00-9:00 p.m.
Cafe Racer
(location changed from Fix Coffeehouse last minute due to hours of operation. Cafe Racer had a singles mixer happening, so the space was packed and a little more interesting)

Started at 7:10

Joint Overviews

• Welcome & Introductions:
• Attendees: Brock Howell (Maple Leaf), James Dailey (Ballard/Licton-Haller), Glenn Pittenger (Roosevelt/Maple Leaf), Cathy Tuttle (SNG Exec. Director & Wallingford), Elizabeth Umbanhower (Green Lake), Janine Blaeloch (Lake City), Lee Bruch (Licton-Haller), Max Taran (N. Roosevelt & E. Green Lake), Dai Toyama (Pinehurst), Reema Rafii (Lake City), Roy Yap (Lake City), Katie Lewis (U District), Andres Salomon (Ravenna / NE Seattle), Maria Brumm (Maple Leaf), Peter Meilstrup (Maple Leaf), Justin Martin (Greenwood-Phinney).
• Overview of SNG 2016 Priorities — Cathy Tuttle
• Vision Zero Funding — seeking to increasing 2018 funding for street safety improvements.
• Tactical Urbanism — supporting specific 1-day pilot projects by community members to show effectiveness of street redesign projects to improve safety & public space.
• Multimodal Corridors — advocating for transit and safety corridor projects to better include biking & walking improvements and to happen more quickly.
• Updates on SDOT Projects
• #Fix65th. — Andres Salomon
  SDOT is holding an open house on February 28, 6-7:30pm at Roosevelt High School to discuss near-term improvements to be made in Fall of 2017 and additional long-term improvements.
• Banner Way. — Brock Howell
  Later this spring, SDOT will rechannelize 75th Street & Banner Way from 15th Avenue NE to 5th Avenue NE.
• Northgate Bridge.
  We didn't discuss on Sunday, but SDOT and Sound Transit continue to work on a new design for the pedestrian bridge in anticipation of the Northgate light rail station opening in 2021.
• Northgate Street Concept Plan. — Brock Howell
  SDOT will soon be creating a "Street Concept Plan" for streets in the Northgate neighborhood. These streets will be redesigned/redone as part of funding from Sound Transit and previously designated by SDOT.  SDOT is seeking to have a meeting with the Maple Leaf Greenways group over the next two weeks, so we will send out a notice soon as it's scheduled.
• Bikeways to 130th Street Light Rail Station. — Janine Blaeloch & Lee Bruch
  After successful advocacy by neighborhood activists, the station was funded as part of the ST3 ballot measure this past fall.  The station is currently scheduled to be opened in the 2030s, but folks are hoping it'll be built as part of the 2023 Lynnwood Extension opening.  In that vein, Lake City Greenways, Pinehurst Greenways, and Licton-Haller Greenways activists are working to identify a "coast-to-coast" greenway route.
• Bikeways to 145th Street Light Rail Station. — Janine Blaeloch & Lee Bruch
  Last year, the City of Shoreline completed a 145th Street Multimodal Corridor Study to improve the street and improve access to the future light rail station.  That study currently identifies 143rd Street as the primary east-west bikeway (as a greenway).  Licton-Haller, Greenwood-Phinney, Pinehurst, and Lake City Greenways activists are working on making sure this route makes sense and the routes are funded & built in a timely manner.  The 145th Street Multimodal Corridor Project should be undergoing a 1-2 year environmental review right now.
• North Seattle Greenway. — Justin Martin
  SDOT recently held three open houses for a neighborhood greenway to be constructed on 92nd & 100th Street from X Park to North Seattle College later this year.  There's still some discussion by bike advocates as to whether 90th or 92nd make more sense for part of the route. An online survey for the project will remain open until February 26.
• Fremont Avenue Transit/Pedestrian Safety Project. — Brock Howell
  SDOT is improving the pedestrian experience on the sidewalk for people waiting for the bus at N 34th Street and Fremont Ave N by expanding the sidewalk by 5-feet.  Unfortunately, this leaves zero space for people biking, despite Fremont Avenue being identified as a high priority for a protected bike lane by the 2014 Bike Master Plan.  So, SDOT continues to have conversations with bike, ped, and transit advocates.
• Pedestrian Master Plan 2017 Update — Cathy Tuttle
  SDOT will be releasing an update to the PMP later this year.  It'll have to be adopted by city council, so there's still time to weigh-in before final adoption.
• Aurora Avenue & Lake City Way Repaving — Lee Bruch
  WSDOT will be repaving Aurora in 2018, and will repave Lake City Way soon too.  These are opportunities to leverage the Move Seattle Levy's safety corridor investment commitments to Aurora & Lake City Way (but requires the funding to be moved up in time), and for WSDOT to implement its "Complete Streets" policy.
• Bike/Ped Access to U District Light Rail Station. — Katie Lewis
  The U District Light Rail Station will open in 2021. Katie Lewis of University Greenways is working to get key stakeholders to meet in order to assure there's a clear, funded plan for bike/ped access to the station. Some of these issues were addressed in the U District Urban Design Framework (PDF), completed in 2013.  To see more details about Katie's upcoming work on this issue, see below.
• Your Voice, Your Choice Funding
  The Department of Neighborhoods and SDOT are seeking community suggestions to be funded by the Your Voice, Your Choice program. Projects must be $90,000 or less, and there's $285,000 available per city council district.  There will be district-based prioritization committees to prioritize the projects for each district prior to SDOT's final decision-making. All projects submissions are due by February 26.  Lake City Greenways is holding a project planning party at the Lake City Library on Saturday, February 18, 12:30-2pm.
• Upcoming Events For Your Groups to Plan For:
• Cascade's Bike Month is May
  Organize a bike activity or host a bike-to-work-day "celebration station" during Bike Month.
  
• Tactical Urbanism in June
  Cathy Tuttle is working with SDOT to host a second, more expanded "Park(ing) Day" in June. Details TBA.
• FREE BIKE is July 1-10
  Brock Howell and Tom Fucoloro are organizing the second annual "FREE BIKE" — Seattle's crowdsourced, DIY bike festival that celebrates bike culture.
• Park(ing) Day is September 15
  Park(ing) Day is an international holiday to celebrate reclaiming vehicular parking stalls as tiny public parks.  In years past we've expanded the activities to include tactical urbanism projects focused on street safety engineering.

Project Breakouts

• Bikeways to 130th & 145th Street Light Rail Stations — Janine Blaeloch
• Lee Bruch will set up a meeting with Shoreline officials that will encourage greater city & agency coordination.
• Dai Toyama will talk with PTSA regarding a needed traffic signal along the proposed eastern "zig-zag" route to the 135th Street Station.
• Vision Zero — Brock Howell
  
• Expand & Enforce School Zones
• Maria Brumm will create preliminary identified routes to schools & playgrounds in Maple Leaf neighborhood.
• Elizabeth Umbanhower will explore using this mapping exercise as part of her summer UW studio class that she teaches.
• James Dailey will organize parents for crosswalk actions near Eagle Staff schools prior to their fall 2017 opening to emphasize the need for better/more safe crossings of major arterial streets for kids.
• Arterial Safety
• Glenn Pittenger and Brock Howell will continue to push SDOT & WSDOT on improvements to Banner Way and to raise the profile of needed agency coordination to improve the bike/ped safety of the 80th Street Bridge & I-5 Ramps.
• Bikeways & Walkways to University District Light Rail Station — Katie Lewis
• The group mostly discussed ongoing access issues to the future U District Light Rail Station, and the work that Katie Lewis is doing on behalf of University Greenways to improve access.
• Katie Lewis is organizing a stakeholder meeting with Councilmember Rob Johnson, Sound Transit, King County Metro, SDOT, and UW to discuss needed bike/ped improvements (Sound Transit isn't yet committed to coming to the table).

Neighborhood Group Breakouts

• We did not have time to break-out by neighborhood group. :(

Ended on-time at 9:00 p.m.  

Some folks lingered on afterwards until about 9:25 p.m. to continue conversations.

——————————————

Thank you to everyone who came.  Look for our second quarterly meeting to be held in Mid-May on a Sunday.

Best,

Brock Howell

206-856-4788