West Seattle Bike Connections

Here are counts of actual bike trips at key locations in Seattle where SDOT has permanent full time bike counters.  Fremont Bridge, Spokane Street Bridge, and Second Avenue protected bike lanes near University Street.  Contrary to recent news reports, you can see that the numbers have been fairly even over the last few years at the bridges, and went way up on Second Avenue after the second phase was completed.

The SDOT bike counters count real people actually using bikes, for all kinds of purposes. The Second Avenue data is interesting.  It shows what happened very quickly when the City actually made a big change on just one downtown street to prioritize safety, and permitted dockless bike share, too.

The erroneous news stories reporting that bike riding went down by some big percentage in 2017 in Seattle were based on a small sample of people answering a US Census American Community Survey question on what their single primary mode of commuting was. They did not actually count any bike riders on the streets. They just sampled a few people, and their question missed all those who use a bike for just part of their commute, or part of the time.

 

The numbers are from SDOT. We added up the monthly data for each year. The graphs are ours, as are any errors.

We adjusted 2018 data for the Spokane Street Bridge to account for 6 days lost in June to emergency bridge closure, 3.5 days in November due to copper cable theft, and 9 days in December due to another copper cable theft. Adjustment was made by interpolation from nearest weekday and weekend days to those events. Counts even without those 18.5 days were higher than 2017 by 3.5%. This counter is still out. A temporary hose counter in place.  Of course, due to the federal government shutdown, the US Census Bureau is not working either.

You are invited to our first meeting for 2019. Tuesday, January 8

6:30 pm to 8:00 pm

Neighborhood House in High Point. Use north entry.

6400 SW Sylvan Way

Come join in planning for new year! We’ll discuss projects, activities, rides, and ways to make our streets safe and comfortable for everyone.

Bike parking.  Metro routes 21, 21X and 128.

The Alaska Way Viaduct is coming down! Traffic is entering the period of maximum gridlock. How will we get out of West Seattle to go downtown?   Ride our bikes!

This ride is a chance to try out bike commute routes in a friendly group, on a Saturday morning with more daylight and less traffic than on weekdays.

Meet in front of Starbucks in the West Seattle Junction on California SW at SW Alaska. Arrive by 9:15 for check in, safety briefing. Rolling at 9:30 am.

For more information and (free) pre-registration, see https://cascade.org/node/46115

If you’ve never tried it, we encourage you to ride in the wet months. We hardly ever have ice or snow, and it doesn’t rain hard here all that often. This November, it didn’t even rain at all on a lot of days. You don’t need a shower at work if you get one on the way.  We’ve got some tips for riding in the rain on our Resources page to get you started.

West Seattle Bike Connections competed in Washington Bike’s Ride in Rain Challenge. Our Peninsula Puddle Pedalers team came in 7th of 400 teams in Washington!

We were right behind the Ice Cold Quad Squad from UW, and ahead of the NOAA AFSC Marine Mammal Laboratory Tour de Flipper team.

In the Club/Organization category, counting all 13 WSBC members who signed up, we were 5th for number of commute rides, and 10th for commute miles, coming in ahead of some big agencies and clubs.

Kathy Dunn was our team Captain, riding every day.  John Graham logged 1,208 miles in November on 59 rides! You can sign up to join them and Bill, David, Don, Paul, Tan, Jodi, Al, Tamara, Valerie, Bryan and Joe, if you’d like to log rides through the winter and join the next challenge in May for Bike Month.

 

On December 1, Bike Works hosted a Major Taylor Tribute Ride, and screened a new short film honoring the first African-American world cycling champion. That was in 1899, when bike racing was  a really big deal. This was a fun, social ride around south Seattle at quite a bit slower pace than the Black Cyclone’s.

Organizers included Seattle African-American bike community leaders pictured here: Rich Brown, Jay O’Connor and Phyllis Porter. They are leaders in Bike Works, Rainier Riders, Rainier Valley Greenways, Black Girls Do Bike-Seattle, Cascade Bicycle Club, Cascade’s Major Taylor Project, and Seattle Bicycle Advisory Board. Other leaders included Ed Ewing and Dr. Rayburn Lewis, two of the founders of the Major Taylor Project in Seattle. Don and Rachel (a Major Taylor Club volunteer) rode, representing West Seattle Bike Connections.

At the Duwamish Longhouse on Saturday, people were crossing West Marginal Way SW to go to the Halloween party hosted by the Duwamish Tribe.  Nick was acting as a crossing guard. Pretty scary. The traffic, not Nick.

People are crossing 5 lanes with a 40 mph posted speed limit on a major truck route, to get to the Longhouse from Herring House Park’s parking and the Duwamish Trail. There is just a rough dirt path on the west side of the road. We are working with the Duwamish Tribe and Duwamish Valley Safe Streets to apply to SDOT’s Neighborhood Street Fund for a sidewalk and signalized crosswalk to keep people safe and make it ADA accessible.

“The Duwamish Longhouse is the cultural center for indigenous People in the Coast-Salish region – a home to our spiritual practices and lifeways, as well as ceremonies and community gatherings. We invite you in with open and raised arms. Come and learn about our culture and living history.”

The Duwamish Tribe has been offering hospitality to all comers, ever since the days of their Chief Seattle and long before. We are asking the city that the American colonizers named after the Duwamish chief to reciprocate. To honor the ongoing life and contribution of the Duwamish people, upon whose lands and waters we live.

The Duwamish Tribe welcomes everyone. Even space aliens.

Herring House Park on left. Duwamish Longhouse beyond, across West Marginal Way SW.

Please join us in voting for this project when the time comes!

 

Alaskan Way lanes have changed to a “long-term temporary configuration”.

Jasmine Beverly at Alaskan Way Viaduct Replacement Program says,

We posted a bike-specific map on our website for showing route options coming to and from the Elliott Bay Trail. These routes will not change during the SR 99 closure. There are more bike options northbound than southbound, as there is now a local-access lane northbound under the viaduct that people can ride heading north. The main southbound options between Yesler Way and South King Street are the sidewalk on the edge of the water, or riding in the general traffic lanes.

The new Alaskan Way alignment that we instituted earlier this month is a long-term temporary configuration that allows Alaskan Way to remain open while we remove the viaduct nearby. There will not be any bike lane as part of this temporary configuration. After we remove the viaduct, the City of Seattle will rebuild the waterfront with a new Alaskan Way that includes a protected bike lane.

Join our Peninsula Pedal Pushers team for the WA Bikes “Ride in the Rain Challenge”!

Our team did great last year at motivating each other to keep riding into fall and winter. Just sign up and ride at least 10 days in November, logging your trips at LoveToRide.net. New riders encouraged!

If this team fills up, we can recruit another team captain and start another team.

We didn’t pay the fat fee to be listed as an “organization”, so just look for team name Peninsula Pedal Pushers.