Seattle Bike Blog

A couple blocks of the S Dearborn Street bike lane now has a knee-high concrete curb separating it from the four lanes of general purpose traffic between Rainier Ave S and 10th Ave S. The Toronto" barriers are shorter than highway-style Jersey barriers but significantly taller than a standard curb. They are fabricated in advance [...]

The person who struck and killed Steve Hulsman December 21 was driving with a suspended license and without a court-mandated ignition interlock device, according to the police report. Seattle Bike Blog is not naming the suspect because the 53-year-old has not been charged at this time. Hulsman, 66, was a husband, father and grandfather who [...]

Rob Saka has an enormous task ahead of him in his first year as a City Councilmember. In addition to the usual challenges, like hiring a legislative team and getting everyone up to speed on how work gets done inside City Hall, he will also chair the Transportation Committee during what will likely be the [...]

In a devastating and unexpected announcement Friday, G&O Family Cyclery sent a message to customers that the shop is permanently closing. They will be totally closed until January 17, then they will reopen to sell off remaining stock. They are also working to complete existing orders, but are no longer taking service appointments. This news [...]

Neighborhood greenways have a hit and miss history in Seattle. Sometimes they create fantastic all ages and abilities walking and biking connections, and sometimes they are so heavily compromised that they do very little. So as Seattle prepares to create a new transportation plan and craft a new transportation funding measure, we should probably get [...]

Seattle has a very new City Council, and the changes aren't even complete yet. Five coucilmembers are new, and a sixth interim councilmember will be appointed soon. For a nine-person governing body, that's a lot of turnover all at once. Washington Bikes asked all the candidates for their stances on various bike issues, and none [...]

Travel patterns are still out of whack, but the number of bike trips across the Fremont Bridge in 2023 were up more than 13% over 2022, which was itself up more than 11% over 2021. Altogether, the number of people biking across the Ship Canal has almost returned to pre-pandemic levels, with 902,926 counted in [...]

Steven Hulsman was biking a hilly route he has ridden countless times when someone driving collided with him and killed him Thursday evening. He was 66. Our condolences to his friends and family. Hulsman was a husband, father and grandfather. He loved riding hills like this one, friends say, and he was scheduled to lead [...]

Didn't order your copy of Biking Uphill in the Rain soon enough to arrive by Christmas? No problem! You can order one from our online shop and select Local pickup in U District/Wallingford" option during checkout. You can pick it up from my front porch any time. Also, local pickup is free. Each copy sold [...]

The design for the Alaskan Way bike lane has reached the 90% milestone, and the latest version is wider and better protected. As before, the bike lane is still on the waterfront side of the street to connect the Elliott Bay Trail in Myrtle Edwards Park to the in-construction bikeway that is part of the [...]

SDOT should no longer be able to make a significant road repair project without ensuring that at least one side of the street has a sidewalk and completing any necessary repairs. The City Council approved a new ordinancelast week that will make sure SDOT no longer makes large street investments that ignore the adjacent sidewalks. [...]

The Freight Advisory Board fought hard against SDOT's plan to connect the Duwamish Trail to the Alki Trail and Spokane Street Swing Bridge, a connection sorely needed since many sections of the trail opened in the early 1990s. But after Mayor Jenny Durkan delayed the project, safe streets advocates kept pushing. Mayor Bruce Harrell and [...]

I am writing this post from a subway train in New York City. Did you know it is possible to have more than one subway line? Wild! And when they connect to each other, you can take trains to a lot more places. Seattle should really give this a try. I'm here for fun and [...]

Here's some great local bike shop news: Mello Fellos (formerly known as Mobile Bike Repair) is opening a location in the Belltown/Denny Triangle space formerly home to Velo. Mello Fellos/MBR has been operating out of a much smaller space near 9th and Stewart since 2012 while also hosting mobile repair services for bike commuters at [...]

UPDATE: WSDOT announced this morning that the trail work has been cancelled. So the bridge trail will be open this weekend, though sections may be skinnier than usual. The 520 Bridge Trail will be closed again this weekend, and this time stretches of Montlake Blvd. and Lake Washington Blvd. will be closed as well along [...]

UPDATE: The trail reopened Wednesday. The atmospheric river inundating Seattle has triggered a small landslide along a slide-prone section of the Burke-Gilman Trail in Lake City between Lakeside Place NE and NE 112th Street. Seattle Parks says they hope to clear the trail by 4:30 p.m. The (hopefully) good news is that this section of [...]

The 520 Bridge is completely closed this weekend, and this time the closure includes the trail. Crews will close the bridge starting at 11 p.m. tonight (Dec. 1) and will reopen it 5 a.m. Monday (Dec. 4). The map shows that the trail will be open on the Eastside up to 92nd Ave NE. The [...]

The design for the Georgetown to Downtown Safety Project, which will build a long-awaited and sorely needed bike connection, is nearing completion. The biggest changes are that the route will now access the SoDo Trail via S Lander Street rather than S Forest Street, which the SoDo Business Improvement Area requested. They have also revealed [...]

The day before Thanksgiving, SDOT released a first look at their design concept for a Ballard Missing Link bike route alternative following 17th Ave NW, Leary Way and Market Street. The plan includes a 10-foot-wide multi-use trail" on one side of the street as well as significant traffic calming and safety upgrades to Leary Way [...]

For a budget cycle with tough revenue projections, the City Council still added some excellent street safety projects and mostly protected safety efforts from cuts. The Council passed the 2024-25 budget Tuesday after weeks of hearings and debates. Highlights include $1.4 million to transform the Mt. Baker station area into a safer and comfortable place [...]

I am still riding high on the happy and caring vibes from Seattle's 14th Annual Cranksgiving. 168 people biked all over our beautiful city Saturday to buy items the U District, Rainier Valley and Byrd Barr Place Food Banks requested. Pannier by backpack by trailer load, the riders all pitched in to deliver an all-time [...]

If you see a yellow silhouette attached to a pole or sign around town, it's there because a person was killed in a traffic collision near that spot in the nearly nine years since Seattle first approved it's Vision Zero goal in 2015. The sheer number of these yellow memorials, numbering over 200, provides a [...]

Cascade Bicycle Club is hosting a screening of The Street Project 6 p.m. Tuesday (Nov. 14) at their office in Magnuson Park. The 50-minute documentary is an inspiring story about the global, citizen-led fight to make our streets safer," according to the trailer: There will be a Q&A with Cascade advocacy staff after the film.

I'm on my way to Vancouver, WA, with a Brompton full of books. A bike to Link to Amtrak adventure is a lovely way to start a day. I'm giving a book presentation and selling copies at the Vancouver Bicycle Club meeting, 5pm at the Aero Room this evening (Nov. 8). It's amazing how much [...]

Good bike lights are empowering, pun intended. But really, with the end of daylight savings plummeting evening commutes and dinnertime grocery runs into darkness, many readers may be spending a lot of time biking around town at night for the first time. But with a good set of lights, a little darkness does not need [...]

The new Marion Street Pedestrian Bridge to the revamped Seattle Ferry Terminal is set to open this week, and crews removed the temporary walkway over the weekend. But thanks to a creative exchange the Puget Sound to Pacific Collaborative facilitated between the City of Seattle and Clallam County, that temporary walkway will not go to [...]

Volunteers for the Pedaling Relief Project have hauled 1.2 million pounds of food by bike since 2020, all to support local food bank operations. That's equivalent to about 1 million meals. It helps us and the other food bank partners achieve their mission at a time when volunteerism is not keeping pace with the growth [...]

What I started Seattle Bike Blog in 2010, I chose an icon that seemed to best represent the experience of biking in Seattle at the time: The sharrow. Officially called a shared lane marking," SDOT had painted dozens of miles of sharrows in mixed traffic lanes across the city, including on many busy streets. The [...]

Sniff. Can you smell that? There's a crisp coldness in the air, and is that a hint of cranberry sauce? That can mean only one thing: It's almost time for Cranksgiving. For the 14th year, Seattle Bike Blog is presenting a joyful day of bike adventures and good will to celebrate winter riding and support [...]

Seattle has completed the design for the RapidRide J project, which includes complete and protected bike lanes on Eastlake Ave. The design even includes protected bike lanes on the block immediately south of the University Bridge, which was lacking protection in an earlier design. Thanks to many years of persistent advocacy, the project is poised [...]

Within hours after the City Council approved a deal with the railroad now formerly known as the Ballard Terminal Railroad Tuesday, SDOT crews had already marked out the area under the Ballard Bridge where they plan to pave over both the railroad tracks and gravel pits in order to create a safe bicycle pathway. Work [...]

Confusion over the rights to a mostly unused and perhaps even forgotten rail line has delayed work on a major designed and funded remake of East Marginal Way between downtown and the West Seattle bridges. As we reported in April, the contract for construction has been awarded with work scheduled to begin right about now. [...]

Your ballot for the November 7 general election should be in your mailbox or in the mail. If you have not yet registered, don't worry. Eligible voters have until October 30 to register or update your address online. After that date, voters will need to register in person at a voting center. With all Seattle [...]

The Seattle Transportation Plan will guide the next 20 years of local investments in our streets, so it's very important that we get this right. Most immediately, the plan will form the basis for the transportation funding measure that Seattle will need to send to voters in 2024 to replace the expiring Move Seattle Levy. [...]

In a surprise development in the long, injurious and frustrating history of the Ballard Missing Link of the Burke-Gilman Trail, Councilmember Dan Strauss announced Tuesday an agreement with the Ballard Terminal Railroad Company that should set the city up to pave over the rarely used tracks near and under the Ballard Bridge. This is a [...]

Here's some great news for people who walk or bike to and from West Seattle: SDOT has completed work on the Spokane Street Swing Bridge in just half the time they originally estimated. The bridge is now operational, and the vital trail it carries is open. The bridge was closed October 7 to install a [...]

I'm presenting about Seattle bike history at REI's Seattle flagship store 6 p.m. Thursday (October 12). Sign up via their event page. You'll have a chance to buy a copy of my book Biking Uphill in the Rain: The Story of Seattle from behind the Handlebars or get your copy signed. My presentation includes a [...]

Seattle needs to make it easier, not harder, for the Department of Transportation to improve safety on our streets. To that end, the City Council should not pass Resolution 32097, which is scheduled for a vote Tuesday. The resolution, which was passed unanimously out of the Land Use Committee rather than the Transportation Committee, contains [...]