Move Seattle swindles its first neighborhood

You shouldn’t be surprised that the Seattle Department of Transportation is spending $3 million on a problem street without actually fixing the problem people care about. Turns out, Move Seattle wasn’t exactly what we were told.

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Remember how Seattle voters approved a $930 million levy in November? Well, the folks living on a 24-block stretch of road along Greenwood Avenue North do — and they are a little upset. They think it is a very difficult and dangerous place to navigate as a pedestrian. Part of the issue is they don’t have sidewalks for a stretch of that road.

Move Seattle moves past sidewalks

The good news is that the City of Seattle has determined they will work on this particular stretch of road. Remember, we now have nearly $1 billion coming from Move Seattle that the city has to work with for these type of issues.

Neighbors are disappointed that, for some reason, SDOT is choosing not to fund sidewalks on this road, which seems to be one of the main concerns of the people who live there and work nearby. Darby Watson, director of project development for the Seattle Department of Transportation, told KOMO that she knows there’s a lot of need but that sidewalks are expensive so, instead, they are making repairs to the busy thoroughfare by replacing some curb ramps and installing wheel stops.

What? Too expensive? You have $930 million. We just passed that. The problem is that a levy coordinating committee, which isn’t really accountable to you, decided not to fund the sidewalks. But it gets worse, if you go to the Move Seattle proposal, on page 55, you’ll find that the city specifically pitched the Greenwood Complete Street project. And, literally, here is the first talking point about why it’s important to complete the whole street: “Upgrades existing sidewalks, and adds new sidewalks to fill numerous gaps in pedestrian connectivity.”

Right next to that bullet point there, they have a photo of a mom and her kid, not walking on a sidewalk but on a dirt piece of property next to the street. Of course, they picked this image because the implication is that if you vote for the project, they will give you sidewalks. But, once it actually passed, the $500,000 per city block that is needed for that project is too expensive.

You know how much I hate to brag (wink) but this is an unfortunate I-told-you-so moment. In October, I warned voters that Move Seattle is nothing but a money-grab, and that not a single project had guaranteed funding; that none of the city’s silly proposals needed to be honored.

The sad truth is that the city can use these propaganda pieces because it knows you don’t actually read the bills that you pass.

Shame on the City of Seattle and shame on SDOT for putting out proposals they knew they wouldn’t actually be able to pass through the committee that decides how the money will get spent. But they keep doing it – over and over again — because they know you let them get away with it.

I’m almost always mad at SDOT but I’m angrier at the people who voted “yes” on Move Seattle. Then again, let’s not act like we’re surprised. How can you be upset at something you knew was going to happen? So we move on.

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