Seattle's Maple Leaf District no longer has any bus service between 80th and 110th North-South; and between Roosevelt Way (10th Ave) and Lake City Way (approx 21th Ave) East-West. This leaves a couple square miles in NE Seattle with no bus service. Our bus service was discontinued in order to do repair work on the Thornton Creek Bridge (15th Ave); however, it was not necessary for our government to leave folks here stranded. Nor does the #73 bus return to 15th Ave (its usual route) at any point between Thornton Creek Bridge and the University District.
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This cancellation is supposed to be for a year once this repair work gets under way. The repair work isn't even scheduled to begin until March, but all bus service here has already been stopped since February 5th. All vehicles except buses are still using 15th Ave.
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This decision was made sans input from folks in Maple Leaf who depend on this bus service, even though Jon Layzer with Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) has informed me (Feb 18th) that a meeting(s) was held here providing us with opportunities for public input. He said that we were notified of this meeting(s), but none of my neighbors nor I received notification. Furthermore, I was unable to pin him down as to when and where this alleged meeting was held. The city had two years in which to prepare for necessary bus rerouting, but did so without input from the people who live in the east half of the Maple Leaf District, those of us affected by the removal of buses from our neighborhoods.
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Also, Kit Loo, project manager (SDOT) for this bridge repair, had this to say in an email to me dated February 18th: "As for your question regarding the [bus] 77, we are not familiar with Metro bus operations and not in a position to comment on what was observed." This is shameful.
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Our government says it has no problem with elderly folks, small children and handicapped people walking uphill to Roosevelt Way (the highest place in Seattle, second only to Hi-Point in West Seattle). And we must circumvent the reservoir, ravines, and other dead-end streets. And our government expects us to do this in heavy rain, icy conditions, and darkness. There are a number of elderly and handicapped people on my street, who are unable now to get to a bus.
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All this is not to even mention the time factor. I used to live at the bottom of Queen Anne Hill and know what it was to walk from bottom to top. In Maple Leaf it takes no less time, and is no less distance, to walk from 20th Ave uphill to 10th Ave than what it used to take me to walk from Valley Street to the counter balance atop Q.A. Hill; and Maple Leaf has a higher elevation than Q.A. Hill. Many streets in Maple Leaf have no sidewalks; and all east-west streets in Maple Leaf are poorly lit residential streets.
Contact me if you have questions:
24 hour voice mail 206.222.8940
And be sure and contact Jon Layzer. I know he'll want to hear from you
Jonathon Layzer 206-684-5300 or 684-8084 jonathan.layzer@seattle.gov
Kit Loo, Project Manager 684-3669 kit.loo@seattle.gov
LeAnne Nelson, Project Communications 684-3897 leanne.nelson@seattle.gov
