SDOT releases first annual spending plan for the Keep Seattle Moving levy

Map of the 2025 levy-funded projects from SDOT's 2025 Annual Delivery Plan (PDF) for the transportation levy.

As one of the final acts for outgoing SDOT Director Greg Spotts, the department released its first annual workplan laying out the first year of projects that Seattle voters funded by approving a $1.55 billion transportation levy in November.

We are aware there was a perception in 2016 that SDOT did not get off to a strong start on the levy," said Spotts in remarks to a small group of reporters on a virtual call Friday (yes, SDOT's 2016 start was real bad). He said the department did not want to make the same mistake again. The department has been on a hiring spree to try to get the staff in place that they need to take on the increased scope of annual work, and they are proposing a nearly-full-speed $176.8M start in year one that utilizes about 1/9 of the 8-year levy's funding. This includes $16.1M for the Vision Zero, school and neighborhood safety" category, $28.9M for pedestrian safety," and $16.3M for bicycle safety." By comparison, SDOT didn't even release its first work plan for the 2015 levy until mid-April, and it included significant cuts from what had been promised to voters.

Many projects are already underway, including holdovers that were initially funded under the now-expired 2015 levy. Likewise, staff said that they expect the same thing to happen at the end of this levy. Because projects can't go from zero to in-construction in the month between election certification and the start of a new year, there's always going to be some overlap.

The new format for the annual work plans is also more streamlined, designed to keep the narrative short and the details about the places and actions long," said Spotts, who described it as a new level of transparency and specificity about what we have planned." Specific projects are listed by name and shown as a dot on the map, and appropriations by category are listed in a simple table. Projects listed in two categories signify that funding is being shared by those categories. For example, the S Henderson Street Safety Corridor project will get funding from the Vision Zero, safe routes to school, and protected bike lanes budget lines and so is listed three times.

The document only includes work that is funded by the levy, so it is not inclusive of all the department's work. It's also the only annual plan in the eight-year levy that will be created without feedback from the not-yet-formed levy oversight committee, which will be tasked in part with scrutinizing the department's claims about being transparent.

SDOT staff did get feedback from a different group before publishing the 2025 plan: City Councilmembers. Though they have yet to present to the Transportation Committee (scheduled for February 18), some SDOT staff did meet with some City Councilmembers while creating the plan. The scale and nature of the Council-instigated changes were not immediately clear. But the department needs Council action to enact their 2025 plan, which assumes they will lift the budget proviso they imposed on about half of the 2025 funds. Having the plan in hand and ready to present two weeks from now shows that SDOT is eager to get the Council on board and get that proviso out of the way as soon as possible so that their fast start is not delayed.

The document notes that project details and timelines are expected to change as planning and contracting progresses, as is the nature of public works projects. Project ideas that make sense on paper might change after assessing physical conditions (like worse-than-expected pavement, etc.), encountering slower-than-expect approvals from other agencies (*cough*WSDOT*cough*), and unanticipated community responses (could be good, such as community efforts to make a project better, or bad, such as neighbors organizing to stop it). The department is also prepared to rework schedules to help align their work with other public work in the area, such as utility projects. So if they plan a bike lane but learn of a future planned sewer project in the same location, they'll probably bump that project back to align with the sewer project. Likewise, if they learn of an upcoming sewer project that happens to align with a bike lane project that is not yet on the schedule, that project might get bumped up. The goal is to avoid tearing up the same street twice, saving money and reducing headaches for project neighbors.

Not all categories are off to an identical start. With public works investments, the bigger a project, the longer it takes to spin up. So for example, they are beginning work on the bridges and structures category, but the initial stages are all about assessments and engineering rather than doing actual work. The freight category is similar. So those categories will likely see larger shares of the annual funding pie in future years. Many bike lane upgrades and ADA ramps and crosswalks and things like that can come together much more quickly, so the 2025 plan is full of them (PDF).

In general, the project phases go planning, design, then construction. The distinction between planning and design is sometimes fuzzy, but planning is supposed to be more about assessing the goals and high-level options for a project while design is more about creating a detailed and construction-ready plot. But sometimes a little design work is needed to inform the planning work, so it's not always a perfect step 1, step 2, step 3 process. If an individual or community group wants to influence a project, you have a better chance of doing so in the planning phase than the design phase. So don't snooze on anything listed under start planning."

The bicycle safety category for 2025 includes funding for general bike lane maintenance, such as sweeping and replacing downed posts. It also includes ongoing design work on Councilmember Dan Strauss's Leary/Market concept for the Burke-Gilman Trail Missing Link. SDOT plans to start construction on the following neighborhood greenways:

• 12th Ave NE - Roosevelt Connection
• Alki Point - Phase 2
• Central Area Healthy Street - Columbia Street
• Georgetown Loop Healthy Street & Neighborhood Greenway
• Othello Healthy Street

The department will begin construction on these protected bike lanes (in addition to finishing all the projects that started last year, like 15th Ave S/Beacon Ave S, Georgetown-to-downtown, Georgetown-to-South Park, 11th Ave NE, etc):

• N 130 St (Stone to 1st Ave N)
• S Henderson St

They will start designing these protected bike lanes for construction:

• 8th Ave (Westlake to Bell St) PBL
• Beacon Ave S Middle Segment
• Beacon Ave S Southern (S Myrtle St to 39th Ave S)
• Highland Park Way SW (W Marginal Way SW to SW Holden St)

They will start planning these protected bike lanes:

• 4th Ave PBL between Dilling and Main St
• 12th Ave/12th Ave S between Madison St and Jose Rizal
• 14th Ave S between S Director St to South Park Bridge at Dallas
• 520 Bridge Connections - 10th Ave E between E Miller St and Broadway
• 520 Bridge Connections - Roanoke between I-5 and Eastlake
• Georgetown Connections Study/Albro to Cleveland HS
• NE 47th St Bike/Ped Bridge Study
• Rapid Ride R Bicycle Facility Alternatives Analysis (Rainier Ave S between MLK Jr. Way S and S Jackson St)

They will start work on upgrading these bike lanes:

• 5th and Main to Jackson
• Banner Way between NE 77th St and NE Banner Place
• Gilman Ave W/20th Ave W
• NE Campus Parkway
• Ravenna between E Green Lake Way N and 15th Ave NE
• SW Admiral Way between SW Spokane St and SW Olga St
• SW Andover St between Delridge Way SW and SW Avalon Way
• Yesler Way - Boren to 14th

They will start bike lane upgrade design work here:

• 9th Ave Between Bell St and Westlake Ave
• Union Street between 14th Ave S and MLK Way Jr S
• Wilson Ave S between S Dawson St and S Morgon St
• Western Ave between Virginia St and Union St

They will make various spot improvements" to bike routes:

• Initial NE 130th Street Protected Bike Lane phase
• Microprojects including Except Bikes" signage retrofits, under Ballard Bridge pathway repair, Queen Anne Ave PBL, and more
• Trail pavement repairs and vegetation mitigation
• Yesler Way PBL gap between Western and Occidental

They will design these spot improvements:

• 1st Ave N Trail connection to N 130th Street
• Chief Sealth Trail - S Juneau St Gap
• Melrose Connector Trail and Burke Gilman Drainage Improvements

And finally, they will begin planning these spot improvements:

• 14th Ave S Trail gap between S Director St and S Dallas Ave
• Chief Sealth Trail gap between S Myrtle St and S Webster Street