Solarbird 
Been a while since I've looked at the new bike/ped bridge over SR-520, and the plantings have _really_ grown in. <3
Tom Fucolorohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbasAdObT0I
I was out of town when WSDOT cut the ribbon on the walk/bike bridge over SR 520 in Montlake earlier this month. Luckily, Best Side Cycling was there to capture it all.
It’s always cool to see how many people show up even when it is pouring rain. But it stopped long enough to get some cool drone shots.
The new trail bridge connects to a new bike route nexus where the 520 Bridge Trail and the Bill Dawson Trail to Montlake Playfield meet up with the Shelby/Hamlin connection to the Montlake Bridge. The parts that are connected work great, and the new bridge makes navigating the area much easier for many trips after years of ever-changing construction detours.
Enjoy the Bill Dawson Trail connection while you can, however, because it is due to close in the spring as crews begin work on the next major phase of the 520 project across Portage Bay.
However, there are two major complaints I have been seeing consistently:
No more Bill Dawson Trail on the west side of Montlake Boulevard
For NOAA workers and anyone else with easy access to the west sidewalk of Montlake Boulevard, the removal of the old connection to the Bill Dawson Trail forces them to now cross the widened boulevard only to then pass under the Boulevard again using the new trail tunnel. The east-side access point is a huge upgrade for most users, but it is a clear downgrade for some. I was a bit surprised myself that there was no connection from the west side of the street. The boulevard is not only very wide, but there are also several missing crosswalks that leave a gap from Hamlin Street to Lake Washington Boulevard where people cannot cross.
The south terminus is not good enough
The new bridge is glorious for crossing the freeway, but it doesn’t actually connect to the Arboretum. Instead, it ends at a flashing beacon crosswalk across Lake Washington Boulevard at E Roanoke Street. From there, people on bikes can catch the popular Lake Washington Loop bike route at 25th Ave E and then lake the old stone bridge at E Lynn Street to get to the Arboretum Trail (the west sidewalk on Lake Washington Boulevard also connects to paths leading to the stone bridge). This is fine though out-of-the-way route for those who know it, but there are going to be a lot of people who assume they will be able to take the new trail directly to the Arboretum since it gets so close. It is disappointing that with as long as this freeway project has taken, there is still very little movement on the project to develop the old construction staging site into a park as is the plan. The 22-acre North Entrance Project remains unfunded, so it’s going to be a long time before it is constructed. A trail was shown in the environmental review documents for the Montlake part of the SR 520 Bridge project, so this is a known issue.
Perhaps the city/state can at least build out a temporary trail in the meantime since planning for the full site has not even begun, and that process will likely take some time since there will be a lot of public interest in what will feel like an expansion (or reclaiming) of the beloved Arboretum. The park is not something that should be rushed because quality is more important than speed, but the trail connection is needed now.
#SEAbikes #Seattle
Best Side Cycling filmed the rainy Montlake bike/walk bridge opening + Temporary Arboretum connection needed – Seattle Bike Blog
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbasAdObT0I I was out of town when WSDOT cut the ribbon on the walk/bike bridge over SR 520 in Montlake earlier this month. Luckily, Best Side Cycling was there to capture it all. It's always cool to see how many people show up even when it is pouring rain. But it stopped long enough to…
Bike/walk bridge over SR 520 in Montlake will open Dec 14
The very long-awaited biking and walking bridge over SR 520 in Montlake will finally open with a community celebration 11 a.m. December 14.
For the better part of a decade, folks trying to bike through Montlake have been dealing with a variety of different detours, and they’ve been stuck mixing with people on the sidewalk of Montlake Boulevard for years as crews work on a new biking and walking bridge to the east of the boulevard. The new bridge largely replaces the role of the old 24th Ave E bridge, though with much more style. Rather than leaving people to wind their way through alleys to reach the Lake Washington Loop bike route, the new trail will connect to a crosswalk at E Roanoke Street. It will also feed into the still largely unplanned future park at the north end of the Arboretum, located where construction staging equipment has been. I am not yet certain exactly how the south terminus of the new trail will work or how well it will connect to the Arboretum Trail, and none of the documents available online seem to show those details. I will update when I learn more.
People heading from the north will follow the same route as usual along the east sidewalk of the Montlake Bridge, then turning on Hamlin toward the 520 Trail. At the end of the block, there will be a new trail nexus with options to go across Lake Washington, across SR 520 toward the Arboretum, or back under Montlake Blvd and under SR 520 toward Montlake Playfield.
Final design for the Montlake area, from the project’s State Environmental Protection Act documents.The new tunnel and trail connection (AKA the Bill Dawson Trail) to Montlake Playfield is already open, and I ran into a very confused guy there the other day who thought he could go that way to get to the 520 Trail. That will be possible soon. But for now the most important thing to note is that you access all of these trail connections from the east sidewalk of the Montlake Bridge. The old trail connection on the west side of the street is gone and is not coming back.
New bike tunnel just dropped. Passing under Montlake Boulevard toward Montlake Playfield.There will still be some work left to finish for the project after the grand opening, but it should be reliably operational. It has seemed at times that this project would never end, and maybe it still feels that way. But this is a huge step for folks sick of navigating detours through this area. In fact, this is the first post I’ve had about the Montlake area in a long time that isn’t about a new detour or weekend trail closure. Progress!
#SEAbikes #Seattle
Bike/walk bridge over SR 520 in Montlake will open Dec 14 – Seattle Bike Blog
The very long-awaited biking and walking bridge over SR 520 in Montlake will finally open with a community celebration 11 a.m. December 14. For the better part of a decade, folks trying to bike through Montlake have been dealing with a variety of different detours, and they've been stuck mixing with people on the sidewalk…
You did it! WSDOT will not cut the Harvard Connection path to planned Roanoke Lid
Concept diagram from a 2020 report to the Seattle Design Commission.The efforts by advocates at Central Seattle Greenways as well as readers like you have paid off. WSDOT announced that they are no longer planning to cut the Harvard Connection path to the planned Roanoke Lid as part of the SR-520 Portage Bay Bridge and Roanoke Lid Project.
“Following conversations with legislators, our contractor, project partners and community advocates, we have decided to maintain the Harvard Connection,” wrote WSDOT Program Administrator Omar Jepperson. “It is clear the community feels strongly about keeping this bicycle and pedestrian connection. We look forward to delivering these multimodal improvements to the city and region.”
We wrote about the community effort to save the trail connection Wednesday while also arguing that the path would recreate one of Seattle’s very first bicycle paths from the 1890s. There’s some really interesting potential for public art or historical markers of some kind to connect people with the history of white colonial settlement and development of this place, which began with a bike path that grew into a freeway.
There are still budget gaps to figure out before this final segment of the 520 freeway megaproject project begins its long construction phase. But the cutting the trail connection would barely scratch the surface of the project budget, which includes a full replacement of the entire Portage Bay Bridge between Montlake and I-5. Community advocates previously fought to keep a biking and walking trail on the new bridge, which will shorten several major regional bike routes between the city center and UW, the Burke-Gilman Trail, and Eastside communities along the 520 Trail.
Below is the full text of the letter from WSDOT:
Hello,
Thank you for contacting us about maintaining the Harvard Shared-Use Path (Harvard Connection) on the SR 520 Portage Bay Bridge and Roanoke Lid Project. We appreciate your advocacy and patience while we conducted additional analysis.
As we’ve shared before, this project faced an approximate $700 million budget gap. The Legislature directed us to move forward with awarding the Portage Bay project but to “seek consequential cost reduction opportunities through value engineering and prioritizing functionality and usability of the Portage Bay Bridge and Roanoke Lid.” Removing the proposed Harvard Connection was one of several cost reduction opportunities we analyzed to meet this legislative requirement.
We identified the Harvard Connection as a potential cost reduction measure because there are alternative walking/biking connections in the area that provide a similar function. We saw this as an opportunity to align resources with the city of Seattle to improve the alternative connections, reduce maintenance costs and concerns, and preserve approximately 50 mature trees.
However, following conversations with legislators, our contractor, project partners and community advocates, we have decided to maintain the Harvard Connection. It is clear the community feels strongly about keeping this bicycle and pedestrian connection. We look forward to delivering these multimodal improvements to the city and region.
Thank you again for your feedback.
Share
#SEAbikes #Seattle
Not only would the Harvard Ave path connect the Roanoke Lid and 520 Trail along a safer and less steep route, it would also restore a small piece of Seattle’s first ever bike paths.
You can support a Central Seattle Greenways effort to protect the proposed path from budget cuts on the freeway megaproject.
The 1895 Lake Union Bike Path cannot be accurately restored because, well, it’s now the path of I-5 between downtown and SR-520. But photos from the turn of the 20th century show the crossroads where the Lake Union path connected to the 1896 Lake Washington Bike Path that lead folks east through the forest now known as Interlaken Park. That old crossroads would most likely be located somewhere within the I-5/520 interchange on land that was excavated for freeway construction, and the Lake Washington path hugged the hillside as it curved to the east. The closest existing land to this historic path would be the proposed Harvard Connection path that has been planned as part of the Roanoke Lid of the SR-520 replacement project.
Base map with grades from Central Seattle Greenways, historic photo and approximate location added by Seattle Bike Blog. The exact spot where the photo was taken has since been excavated for freeway construction.Like the old path, the Harvard Connection would hug the hillside to follow the least-steep route as it turns east toward the lid and Interlaken Blvd. The only surviving engineering plot of the old Lake Washington path (that I was able to find, anyway) ends on top of the proposed Roanoke Lid on the northeast corner of what is now 10th Ave E and E Roanoke Street, and the early design for the lid already includes a path that follows a similar path. The proposed Harvard Connection would meet up nicely with the historic route, creating opportunities for heritage markers or public art connecting the past to the present. With the freeway interchange roaring in the background, it could be an opportunity for folks to reflect on the marks we leave on this land, how an innocent-looking bike path through the forest was a harbinger of white colonial land theft and settlement that in just a few short decades grew into a freeway.
Here’s the text of the action alert you can sign from Central Seattle Greenways:
The Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) is planning to delete a key bike and pedestrian connection from the future Roanoke Lid over SR 520 between Capitol Hill and Eastlake. Tell WSDOT that removing this community-supported connection to the SR 520 Trail is unacceptable.
The Harvard Connection, the dashed yellow path pictured in the image above, would offer a vital lower-incline and safer connection towards Capitol Hill for users of all ages and abilities via a tunnel under 10th Ave E and a gently sloping path from the Roanoke Lid up to E Miller St.
Cutting the Harvard Connection would only save about 1% ($10-15 million) of the car-centric megaproject’s $1.4 billion budget. WSDOT has justified their shortsighted decision by asserting that the path wouldn’t provide a meaningful connection. This is not accurate: it would provide a valuable alternative for southbound trips from the Roanoke Lid with gentler (6%) grades and lower traffic stress than navigating the busy intersection of 10th Ave E and E Roanoke St and the block south of it, which has a 10% slope.
With the future Roanoke Lid likely to become a community destination for events and other activities, the Harvard Connection would offer accessibility not only for bicyclists but also pedestrians using wheelchairs and other mobility devices. Removing it would leave parkgoers without an alternative to the prohibitively steep slopes on 10th Ave E, Federal Ave E, and 11th Ave E
TELL STATE AND CITY TRANSPORTATION OFFICIALS AND ELECTED LEADERS: Please restore the Harvard Connection and keep your promise to people bicycling, rolling, and walking on the future Roanoke Lid over SR 520.
Share
#SEAbikes #Seattle
Trail connection to planned Roanoke Lid would restore a historic Seattle bike path + Tell WSDOT not to cut it
Not only would the Harvard Ave path connect the Roanoke Lid and 520 Trail along a safer and less steep route, it would also restore a small piece of Seattle’s first ever bike paths. You can s…
I found where the weird cast-on-site concrete rectangles went!
They went here!
I guess those are access hatches of some kind? I'm pretty sure all that gets landscaped in the plans.
I really didn't expect them to be forming concrete slabs on site, but here they are doing that - I really would've expected them to do that offsite and bring them in, designed in advance to size, but no. I wonder why?
Alert 7/26-29: 520 Bridge trail closed late Friday until early Monday
Map of the closure from the 520 Construction Corner website.The trail across the 520 Bridge will be closed from 11 p.m. Friday through 5 a.m. Monday along with all the traffic lanes and ramps. The Montlake Bridge and Montlake Boulevard will remain open for regular travel.
Kind of a bummer for the bridge to close for a summer weekend with such a spectacular forecast. But the project is getting closer to completion, though it sure feels like it will never end. The website still lists a 2024 completion date for the whole Montlake project. The unique walking and biking bridge over SR-520 that will connect from the bridge trail on the north side to the Arboretum could open in September, though no official date has been released yet.
More details on the closure from WSDOT:
SR 520 and the SR 520 Trail will be closed in both directions between I-5 and the Eastside from 11 p.m. on Friday, July 26 to 5 a.m. on Monday, July 29. To accommodate those leaving the Seafair Torchlight Parade, from 4:30 to 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, July 28, crews will open the northbound I-5 ramp to eastbound SR 520, one eastbound SR 520 lane from I-5 to the Eastside and the SR 520 eastbound off-ramp to Montlake Boulevard. Those attending the parade from the Eastside should find alternate routes and expect delays.
Share
#SEAbikes #Seattle
Alert 5/31-6/3: Bill Dawson Trail closed, but 520 Bridge Trail open
Image from WSDOT.It’s yet another weekend of major closures in the Montlake/SR 520 area. The Bill Dawson Trail between Montlake Blvd and Montlake Playfield will be closed late Friday evening (May 31) through early Monday morning (June 3) along with Lake Washington Boulevard between 520 and the Arboretum. However, walking and biking access will be open along Montlake Boulevard even while the street is closed to general traffic. The 520 Bridge Trail will also remain open even as nearby freeway ramps are closed.
So in a way, it’s shaping up to be a decent weekend to bike through Montlake. But Boyer Ave E will likely be extra busy again, so be ready for that.
The Bill Dawson Trail is closed “so crews can remove temporary electrical poles and begin grading the area for landscaping,” according to WSDOT.
If you ever lose track of what is closed in Montlake at any time, check the 520 Construction Corner website.
Share
#SEAbikes #Seattle