On Monday, the Move All Seattle Sustainably (MASS) Coalition published an open letter calling on Mayor Wilson to advance high-impact transportation, accessibility, livability, and climate priorities. Seattle Transit Blog is a proud member of the MASS Coalition, and we endorse this letter. It reads:
Dear Mayor Wilson,
We, the MASS (Move All Seattle Sustainably) Coalition, write to request your administration take action on a set of high-impact, near-term actions that respond to public priorities and accelerate visible results for city residents, while preserving capacity for longer-term reforms.
Your recent electoral victory creates a historic mandate and an opportunity to translate progressive campaign commitments into real results for Seattle. Your leadership—built through years of grassroots organizing and coalition‐building, and long record as a transit advocate provide the momentum and responsibility to act swiftly on the transit and sustainability priorities you have espoused. Indeed, you co-founded the MASS Coalition in 2018 to connect Seattle’s diverse and vibrant neighborhoods, minimize reliance on private vehicles, achieve Vision Zero, make Seattle carbon-neutral, create walkable communities, and ensure equitable access to transportation for all people. As such, our coalition has a duty to call on you to pursue tangible progress on expanded service, equity‐centered planning, and durable funding strategies during your first year in office, when visible well‐executed actions will reinforce the core values of your platform and build political capital for deeper reforms.
Below are the priorities that all the member organizations have agreed will advance the MASS coalition’s goals that you championed as its leader. The coalition members pooled our ideas and balanced our diverse organizational priorities with the coalition’s collective goals. By agreeing to a clear set of shared criteria—urgency, equity impact, and feasibility, we preserved each member organization’s mission integrity while prioritizing projects that will deliver citywide benefits. We believe these actions will improve Seattle in multiple, mutually reinforcing ways; and they would also be significant achievements for your transit agenda.
The MASS coalition continues to stand with you in your new role, and we stand ready to collaborate with your administration to pursue these actions. We are committed to organizing volunteers, providing technical assistance, and coordinating outreach and engagement, to shorten timelines and increase public ownership of results. Together, with your leadership and shared accountability, we can deliver bold, equitable transit and accessibility improvements in 2026—proving that when city government works alongside the community, Seattle can achieve something truly great.
1. Mobility
Your transit platform envisions a Seattle where every person, regardless of where they are in the city, can safely, reliably and efficiently get to where they need to go without a car. This requires an efficient, connected transportation system. To start the pursuit of this vision, we ask that your administration pursue the following priorities.
● Reduce Traffic Deaths and Serious Injuries
Significantly advance progress towards Vision Zero, the goal of having zero traffic deaths or serious injuries by 2030, by advancing full redesigns of our most dangerous streets to slow speeds and prioritize safety for everyone, including Rainier Ave S, Aurora Ave N, and Dr Martin Luther King Jr Ave S. If done correctly, these large projects will save lives, create stronger communities, and make our streets more accessible. Additionally, because big redesigns take time and money, we also need more immediate spot improvements, traffic signal policy that prioritizes pedestrian safety and convenience at all intersections, intersection daylighting, protection for pedestrian spaces, and neighborhood traffic calming to help keep people safe now. The city can also launch a safer fleet initiative for city vehicles, including adoption of intelligent speed assistance. Safe speeds will both increase safety and reduce fuel use in support of climate goals.
● Fully fund the Seattle Frequent Transit Network
Ensure sufficient funding to achieve the 2024 goals of the Seattle Frequent Transit Network, including significantly stronger targets for high-frequency and off-peak service. We seek a goal that 70% of households will be within a 10-minute walk to a bus that comes every 10 minutes all day, every day, and runs all night.
● Complete a Connected City-Wide Bike network
Complete an assessment of the bike network and identify points of friction where spot improvements and small projects will make an outsized difference. The Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) should rapidly implement fixes such as improving critical gaps, pinch points, and connections to our bridges. Some example gaps include, but should not be limited to: 1) downtown to the SODO Trail, 2) through downtown Georgetown, 3) from Georgetown to Beacon Hill, and 4) from South Park to the Green River Trail.
● Develop a vision/strategy/plan for the streetcar system in conjunction with the light rail vision in the Seattle Transportation Plan (STP)
Develop a strategic plan for the streetcar system moving forward that works in tandem with the vision for light rail from the STP. The plan should establish a framework for a comprehensive, long-term vision for the Seattle streetcar. The city must also appoint a dedicated person responsible for the development and implementation of the plan within SDOT.
● Identify and develop high-impact bus lane corridors
You have started pursuing improvements with your executive order regarding Denny Way. Explore additional quick and impactful bus lane projects. Some potential projects include, but should not be limited to, adding additional bus lanes on Aurora and Rainier, extending the 3rd Avenue transitway to Denny, and making Virginia Street a transitway.
● Adopt minimum performance standards for bus corridors
SDOT should implement minimum speed and reliability standards to incorporate better accountability and greater impact, along with remediation processes for routes that fail to meet those standards. These will contribute to achieving your goal of making transit “irresistibly good” in Seattle. Importantly, these targets should not only be applied to the entirety of a route but also to sub-corridors and times of day, since aggregated data can hide issues in a route. For example, Route 8 currently has an overall on-time performance of over 80% that masks the severe delays along Denny Way during rush hours and special events.
● Streamline trolleybus infrastructure and support
Seattle’s network of trolley wire is currently built and maintained by a small, specialist team within King County Metro. This team is severely under-resourced and the complexity of working across SDOT and Seattle Public Utilities right-of-way has created delays and blocked projects. Earmark a small amount of STM funding for wire maintenance and construction, in a way that Metro can use it to increase relevant headcount. Work with Metro to find ways for the system to further leverage the batteries the trolleybuses already have to give more neighborhoods the benefit of zero-emissions transit.
● Convene a long-term task force to develop a sustainable funding strategy for getting new sidewalks built
The current levy has sidewalk funding front-loaded, meaning that there will be a cliff in funding for new sidewalks in 2028. Building sidewalks in our city is necessary to ensure accessibility, and we need a sustainable funding source to make that possible. The levy proposed a Transportation Funding Task Force to solve this problem, but it has yet to be convened. This taskforce must be convened in 2026 and be given support and tools to build a successful strategy for sustainable, long- term funding for new sidewalks.
2. Accessibility
Accessibility is a critical priority for the MASS Coalition, and we ask your administration to prioritize the following actions. We also have deep concerns about Automatic License Plate Readers (ALPRs) and Closed Circuit Television (CCTV) camera surveillance limiting civil rights and accessibility on our public streets. Please look for a topic-specific letter from this group soon.
● Create a sustainable sidewalk maintenance and repair process
Seattle is not currently fixing our problematic and inaccessible sidewalks at scale. Create a program to track, fix, and prioritize sidewalk repairs as part of a sustainable system with clear policies and plans for how to maintain, repair, or replace existing, crumbling sidewalks. This system must be adequately and permanently funded
● Accelerate investment in a parking corral system
The micromobility parking corral initiative seeks to increase street parking for bike and scooter shares to support the high number of riders and keep them off the sidewalks, a high priority for the disability community. To maintain accessibility of sidewalks, accelerate investments in an in-street parking corral system. Parking corral systems designate zones located on the street that are reserved for micromobility parking. Once enough parking corrals exist in heavy-use areas, micromobility companies can require that bikes/scooters be parked in those corrals or face penalties.
● Develop a Disability Plan for special events such as the FIFA World Cup
Seattle must develop a plan for special events that considers disability. Sound Transit set a new record with 225,000 boardings on Seattle Seahawks parade day—but for the disability community, the day was a nightmare. Curb cuts and elevators were blocked, and Access Transit vans couldn’t navigate through crowds to load or unload passengers. There was no advance planning or coordination with the Office of Emergency Management to address day-of challenges. The Human Services Department previously had a Vulnerable Populations Planning Coordinator embedded within the Emergency Management team, but that position was eliminated in April 2022. Seattle urgently needs this coordinator back as an active part of the Emergency Operations Center. Restore this role within OEM and develop a planning template for major Seattle events—including the Pride Parade, Torchlight, Seafair, the FIFA World Cup, and more. It’s time to be a world-class city for the disability community too.
● Rectify Sound Transit name discrepancy for Chinatown International District
Direct Sound Transit to correct the name and signage of the International District/Chinatown station to match the 1998 City Ordinance 119297 name, “Chinatown International District.” This naming discrepancy is confusing and inequitable. The incorrect name causes confusion for neurodivergent and sight-impaired riders who rely on apps for navigation. Additionally, the error is disrespectful to the Chinatown community that has been renamed and relocated, without consent, many times throughout Seattle’s history.
3. Livability
Transportation is completely intertwined with our housing options, health outcomes, and local economies. Therefore, we must be intentional and proactive to create a transportation system that promotes livability in every community. Livability means reimagining streets as a place for people, community, and commerce as they once were. Together with sidewalks and curb space, streets can be vibrant, public spaces that encourage community gathering and meet people’s needs. This includes amenities like free public bathrooms, benches, and trees. Our streets can support local business and encourage local entrepreneurship, sidewalk vending, and street food. To create these spaces, we need to ensure they meet people’s basic needs and reflect communities’ priorities.
● Develop pedestrian streets in every neighborhood
Pedestrian streets increase foot traffic and spending at local businesses, while creating a cleaner and safer environment. Seattle needs more permanent pedestrian spaces. Identify and develop a pedestrian street in the heart of every neighborhood, along with a process whereby community members are empowered to create temporary or permanent school streets, market streets, festival streets, healthy streets, and garden streets.
● Ensure accessible, equitable low-pollution neighborhoods
Seattle must prioritize climate justice pathways for all communities to pursue low pollution neighborhoods. In dense, urban neighborhoods well-served by transit, the city should implement significant traffic diversion and build infrastructure to encourage transportation mode shift and ensure that targeted climate and safety goals are met. In communities that are more car-dependent due to less transit service, there must also be community projects for slower speeds, safer neighborhoods, and better air quality, but the goals for these projects must be community-driven, with reflective outreach, planning, and co-design. In residential areas without sidewalks, there should be significant traffic diversion and other traffic calming to ensure safety for pedestrians. Second, the city must develop and publish a plan for achieving the low pollution targets that were specified in the Climate Change Response Framework.
● Expedite implementation of the Comprehensive Plan
Seattle must expedite implementation of the Comprehensive Plan because the most effective transportation plan is one rooted in smart land use: concentrating growth in expanded neighborhood centers, increasing housing density near frequent transit, and designing 15 minute neighborhoods that put daily needs within a short walk or bike ride. Accelerating these land use changes will reduce vehicle miles traveled, boost transit ridership, lower greenhouse gas emissions, and expand access to jobs and services—especially for communities historically underserved by transit.
4. Climate
● Be accountable to stated climate goals
Because transportation emissions are the number one source of climate-impacting pollution in Seattle, the only way for Seattle to begin to meet its lofty climate goals is through solid transportation and housing policy that gets more people out of our cars and allows more of us to live closer to jobs. The transportation and livability policies above are key. An efficient, connected transportation system that works great for people who can’t drive or can’t afford to drive, where transit, bike, and walking are the most attractive choices for all of us, coupled with comprehensive plan changes that promote a job and housing-rich urban environment, is the only way to meet those climate goals.
And as such, emissions are a critical metric for evaluating transportation policies. Your administration must require that all SDOT projects, and climate-pollution-impacting projects in all city departments, report on how they help to achieve stated city climate and mode-shift goals. Seattle is well behind on its 2030 climate goal to reach 24% of all trips being by transit and 7% by bike. This will make it very hard to cut nearly in half the share of trips taken by cars powered by fossil fuels, as is the City’s 2030 target.
● Expand tree canopy in public right-of-way
Dense, climate-friendly, urban neighborhoods don’t have to be heat islands. 58% of Seattle residents live in heat islands where temperatures feel 8° warmer than surrounding areas. The urban heat island effect—how heat radiates off surfaces like buildings, pavement, roadways, rooftops, etc.—in our increasingly hot, dry summers can be extreme and dangerous. Extreme heat kills more people every day than any other weather event has a direct correlation with health outcomes, increasing risk of cardiovascular disease, respiratory illness and heat stroke. These high heat and negative health effects are prevalent in lower income neighborhoods and communities of color that are already dealing with the highest burden of air pollution, traffic, and limited mobility. Trees are important to keeping our city cool and healthy. Their shade directly cools surfaces and they also move water called evaporative cooling. Additional measures such as green roofs, pavement materials that remain cooler, and urban agriculture can reduce urban heat island effect. The Seattle Transportation Plan‘s target outcome of increasing tree canopy to 30% by 2044 despite a 2007 pledge by Seattle to increase its tree canopy to 30% by 2037, and a loss of 255 acres of trees between 2016 and 2021. Every year gets hotter and the more we delay our climate goals, the more unlivable and dangerous our city becomes.
In Solidarity,
Transit Riders Union, Seattle Streets Alliance, Cascade Bicycle Club, Seattle Subway, Transit Equity for All, Transportation Choices Coalition, The Urbanist, Nondrivers Alliance, 350 Seattle, Fix the L8, Sierra Club Washington, Seattle Transit Blog, America Walks
“Chinatown International District” is a ridiculously verbose name for a transit station. When was the last time you heard someone say those three words when referring to that neighborhood in everyday conversation? It’s either Chinatown or International District. Pick a lane. Or just go with the more neutral “King Street Station.”
I assume this term was in response to some people (presumably Chinese?) wanting to call it Chinatown, and others (presumably Japanese or Vietnamese?) wanting to call it International District. So we split the baby.
The Link station name does make sense, in a way, if you realize that Japantown still sort of exists. It’s the area north of Jackson. If you can read Chinese or Japanese, you can see that the street signs north of Jackson are in still in Japanese, while south of Jackson, they are in Chinese. And while there are some Japanese businesses and residents south of Jackson, there is still a greater preponderance of them north of it.
So you could think of the “International District” as encompassing not only Chinatown (south of Jackson, west of I5) but also Japantown (north of Jackson, west of I5) and Little Saigon (east of I5). And so the Link station is in the International District, but specifically in the Chinatown portion of it.
It’s all a little silly to be arguing about this stuff these days. The center of both the Chinese and Japanese diasporas is on the Eastside now.
King Street should be the name. Although given there’s only one station with the Chinatown name, the confusion of CID or IDC is grossly exaggerated. University Street was actually confusing for tourists.
I don’t think anyone is confused by the CID-or-IDC name. It’s just inconsistent and long. Nobody uses it.
Have you considered telling her this at the Crosslake Connection opening?
Will the mayor have her own tent at one of the station? Where can I find her?
Idk where she would be probably on the first train.
I’m really hoping to be on the first train but I doubt I’ll be able due to crowding unless I camp out overnight. I will be disappointed if the mayor gets a reserved seat on the first train through sheer nepotism.
There won’t be time at the event when she’s busy greeting other people if she’s there. You’re more likely to be able to press the MASS agenda with her or her first-level staff at City Hall or the numerous other events she’s involved with that don’t have tens of thousands of people coming.
1. I find it strange that MASS is writing open letters to the mayor. I would expect them to have a direct channel for communication with her office. Maybe my expectation isn’t realistic, I’m not an expert on municipal politics. Still doesn’t seem right to me.
2. The streetcar point is awfully vague. I guess the CCC is really dead if even the advocacy groups aren’t pushing for it specifically. I would like to be hopeful that the mayor could find a way to get it built anyway (for cheaper than current estimate) if she really wanted to, but hope is fading.
Publication of an Open Letter doesn’t mean MASS doesn’t have a direct contact with the Mayor’s Office. Instead, it’s how groups like MASS let the public know that they’re directly lobbying the government to achieve stated priorities.
The alternative would be to have this sort of communication happen out of public view, which folks often refer to as the “smoky backroom” lobbying.
The reason we published this was to inform readers of an organized articulated agenda we support, not because we thought it was the only way Wilson would see it. It’s like all open letters in this regard. When cities give feedback on a Link alignment, they do it as an open letter to ST, which we sometimes link to or quote from. This letter articulates many ideas we’ve also had, perhaps better than we’ve been able to.
Makes sense, thanks for clarifying Mike & Nathan
The cheaper option already exists: buses. That’s why it is dead.
The streetcar item is the one thing in the letter I have some disagreement with. “Develop a streetcar plan” could be interpreted as “expand the streetcar network”. It should really be “rightsize the streetcar network”.
1. Kill the Culture Connector and stop wasting time on it.
2. Delete the SLU streetcar. Instead extend the H to Fred Hutch following the C route.
3. The First Hill streetcar can either stay or go since it has higher ridership. Don’t let the streetcar get in the way of bus lanes on Jackson Street.
4. Don’t add a dedicated streetcar person to the payroll. You don’t need it just for this.
Light rail is better transit because it’s faster due to exclusive/grade-separated lanes and high capacity. Buses are good because they’re inexpensive. Streetcars as defined in Seattle are the worst of both worlds: more expensive than a bus, not faster than a bus, slower than a bus, and no more capacity than a bus.
I wish that Vision Zero efforts began to study the causes of fatalities and serious accidents better. The biggest factors seem to be bad lighting (significantly higher serious accident rates thanks to the new LED street lighting creating blind spots) and drunk driving (which could be helped by more frequent evening transit service to get drinkers out of cars). The problem is generally not fast street design anymore.
Well, the city has no jurisdiction over over vehicle headlight regulations and drunk driving is already illegal, so what would the city be able to do if those were found to be primary causes? The City can make it so comfortable driving speeds are less than currently encouraged, and can reallocate street space for safer modes.
The City has jurisdiction over LED street lighting and can direct Metro to subsidize evening transit service better. Many routes drop to every 30 minutes as early as 7 pm.
There’s things that Seattle City can do.
The city has made good progress, but fast street design is still a real issue in some places. 35th Ave. in west Seattle is one example. Lake City Way is another.
Is drunk driving increasing? There’s certainly more transit use from bars as service has gotten better in some places, and that would lead to driving going down. The actual level is probably flat or slightly decreasing, since for the vast majority of bargoers there’s still no feasible transit option.
The idea that people who choose to drink and drive care about transit if it ran more frequently is dubious. Vision Zero doesn’t work because there’s no consequences and relying on people’s judgement is foolish. Sure you get arrested if caught DUI, but then you’re let go and you’re back driving within hours because laws are a suggestion in Seattle and traffic violations are laughably enforced.
That’s overgeneralizing. A significant number of people who drink and drive aren’t cowboys who think they’re superior and laugh at enforcement. They want a feasible non-driving alternative that doesn’t cost as much as a taxi. They may not intend to be drunk but slightly misjudge their limit.
And Vision Zero doesn’t depend on people’s judgment: it’s about infrastructure changes that make it easier to be safe by default. If an airline pilot presses the wrong button, you can spend all your energy blaming the pilot, or you can look at whether the button panel is confusing or inconvenient, and fix it so that more pilots will do the right thing instinctively by default.
While increasing bicycle mode share from 3 to 7 percent ( more than doubling) between 2019 and 2030 as a stated goal, merely completing an ambitious bike network is probably not going to get Seattle anywhere close to that goal.
I can’t say what else needs to be added, but much of the network now exists so I don’t see how achieving “completion” will magically double bicycle use.
Eastlake, alone, should help a lot. That’s a huge bike route.
There’s still not much network in the sense of continuous protected bike lanes or off-street corridors connecting a lot of villages to each other and allowing you to go north-south throughout the city and through downtown without ever leaving a protected bike lane or trail. It’s having that kind of network that allows bike modeshare to dramatically increase so that grandmothers feel comfortable biking everywhere.
Flatter terrain and better weather would help.
TL;DR: “focus” on these 17 things
Good luck with that!
It’s better than nothing. While it’s 17 steps, they all boil down to fewer categories. E.g., if you prioritize improving sidewalks in all ways, that’s 3 steps you’re addressing simultaneously with one effort. If you include bike access and accessibility, which are sidewalk-adjacent issues since bike corrals are at sidewalks and wheelchairs roll on sidewalks, that’s 7 steps. If you include all non-car mobility (=ways to get around without driving), that’s 12. (I’m not counting climate, naming, and tree canopy in that. These are good goals but they don’t in themselves make it easier/faster to get from A to B.)
It’s an “everything but the kitchen sink” letter. Since most positions stated here are already well understood in City Hall, I don’t see it moving the needle much if at all.
Seattle advocates have an affinity for these kinds of catchall, multi-group letters. The problem with the approach is that it is so general that it’s hard to tell what’s most important to each of these advocacy groups individually. So it is likely not as impactful as each group highlighting specific actions.
It almost cones across to me as each organization more needing to show that recent advocacy is being done — in the easiest or laziest way possible (which is signing on to a general letter).
“Since most positions stated here are already well understood in City Hall, I don’t see it moving the needle much if at all.”
The next step is moving from goals to actions. That’s where letters like this can help, if it’s part of increasing public demand for this. We’ve elected a major who’s predisposed toward improving these, and now this letter is showing widespread public support for it. There needs to be more public advocacy than just this, but this is a significant step. To my knowledge STB has never had such a letter or such a large group jointly making such a large common demand.
“The problem with the approach is that it is so general that it’s hard to tell what’s most important to each of these advocacy groups individually. So it is likely not as impactful as each group highlighting specific actions.”
Why does it matter? The groups’ names tell you what’s most important to them. Specific actions can come later once the mayor shows a commitment to doing something substantial in one or more of these areas. Improving “high-impact bus lane corridors” and “city-wide bike network” raises the issue of which streets to do and what to do on them. SDOT has already done extensive work on this with the Frequent Transit Network and citywide bike network and the precedents of previous upgrades, so we can just say “Do this” or “Add a certain street” or such — but those specifics can be advocated for later.
“Chinatown International District” is a ridiculously verbose name for a transit station. When was the last time you heard someone say those three words when referring to that neighborhood in everyday conversation? It’s either Chinatown or International District. Pick a lane. Or just go with the more neutral “King Street Station.”
The suggested name is the name of the neighborhood, and is a long-standing sensitive and political issue in the area. Sound Transit’s offices are also in C/ID, and they’ve been botching station placement for years. It’s the least they can do.
And in terms of number of syllables, Tukwila International Boulevard (11) has more than Chinatown/International District (10). Both Shoreline full names have 10 syllables as well, and University of Washington is 9.
I personally think the station names should reflect the neighborhood or area of the region they are in, not the name of that place in 1995.
We’ve now got two stations with “International” in the name. Both names are too long. And the Seattle Center Station would be near the International Fountain.
I realize that other Asian communities were also segregated to the ID in the past. However, the ethnicities represented there are no longer forcibly segregated, and the communities stretch out to many other parts in the city and region. So I think there could be merit to just name it after the major historic landmark (“Chinatown Gate”) right across from the station rather than a broad “District”.
The area around Graham Street is very ethnically diverse too, and maybe more “International” that CID is at this point. I’d actually like some stations to have names based on the art installations there generally — but the installations would need more landmark prominence than ST currently awards.
It’s however a political minefield to change station names. So in my mind it doesn’t belong in a letter like this one at all. Station renaming needs its own stand-alone effort and discussion. It’s not something that the Cascade Bicycle Club or other modal advocacy groups should be weighing in on, especially if it doesn’t shorten the station name. The recommendations should come from the communities with more of a vested interest in the name. Once a community consensus is achieved, advocacy groups could then sign on the that recommendation as a stand-alone letter of support.
And to be clear I actually do like the suggested name change. I just think it doesn’t belong in a letter like this.
The specific context of ST planning in and around C/ID (re: botching it), and the long and contentious process to land on “Chinatown/International District” as the official neighborhood name are relevant in advocating for the name change. Part of accessibility is consistent wayfinding, and having two similar but conflicting names is bad.
And I don’t think it’s “too long”. Most major urban rail systems have at least some stations as long as Chinatown/International District.
The community consensus is the existing neighborhood name. Other names will be controversial and contentious.
I’ve heard some people strong opinions from people in the neighborhood. They think the “International District” term is BS. There is a “Chinatown”. There is a “Little Saigon”. But there is no “International District”. The person saying this has lived in the area a long time and is a Chinese American. Those of Japanese ancestry might feel different. I think the “International District” idea was an attempt at political correctness. In the 70s it was common for people to say racist things about Chinatown (look up the lyrics to “Kung Fu Fighting”). Now it just seems silly.
I agree. They could have avoided the whole mess by just calling it King Street Station. Oops.
The name was Chinatown until the 1980s. Then there was a wave of political correctness and “International District” was created to not leave out the other traditional ethnicities in the area. Even though the other ethnicities said they were fine with Chinatown according to my friend. International District was always a misnomer because it’s all Asian, not the whole world. But that was elite-favored name when DSTT was built in the 1980s.
Ever since then there’s been a movement to rename it back to Chinatown. The city eventually responded by renaming the neighborhood “Chinatown-International District”, and Sound Transit responded by renaming the Link station to “International District-Chinatown”.
I’d heard about Japantown but never knew where exactly it was. Recently I found out it’s on the north side of Jackson Street.
I think the station name should be shortened to either International District or Chinatown. “CID” might be a third possibility.
How good do you think Seattle’s current Frequent Transit Network and Transit Master Plan are? What’s the closest bike network plan the city has? How much can we just tell the city “Do this”, vs how much of it is missing too much or is too flawed that we’d have to get it changed before it’s implemented?
That’s quite the utopia list. Good luck to Wilson trying to find a way to pay for all that when the city is on its way to financial insolvency.
The only thing missing is how will utopia be paid for. As usual it will be paid for by the lower and middle class by property tax increases.
The first sentence of the second paragraph is some Trumpian-level hyperbole… Wilson’s election did not create a “historic mandate.” She received 50.20% of the vote.
Here are the mayoral election winners since 2001:
2025 Wilson 50.20
2021 Harrell 58.56
2017 Durkan 56.25
2013 Murray 51.55
2009 McGinn 51.14
2005 Nickels 64.15
2001 Nickels 50.15
If Wilson has a “historic mandate”, what on earth did Bruce Harrell have? A super-duper mandate? what about Nickels?
This is overall really great, and I’d like to add a couple suggestions:
It seems like it would be much more effective to focus on the top few obtainable objectives, I think people reading this will be confused about what the priorities are, everything seems diluted and maybe not that important due to the volume.
I think both public safety and the perception of public safety are essential to successful urbanism and especially transit. As such I think we need as much surveillance as possible from cameras, license plate readers, automated traffic enforcement, anything and everything, and a lot of it.
I think allowing and incentivizing Waymo or other AVs to proliferate is essential to vision zero and public safety, and I hope speeding this up is a high priority.
Lastly I think comp plan- increasing/speeding up densification is probably *the* most important element to improving transit for what it does for demand/funding.