Last week, Seattle’s Department of Planning and Development published legislation that would allow property owners throughout the light rail corridor to temporarily allow all-day parking within a quarter-mile of a station. Each lot could have up to 40 spaces.
The city had initially imposed four-hour parking limits near Link stations, to encourage mixed-use development, while discouraging cars and commuter crowds in the neighborhoods, but many Rainier Valley property owners – like Othello Partners CEO Steve Rauf – pushed back in the hopes of being able to generate some revenue with all-day commuter parking.
Many New Holly neighbors oppose the idea of allowing more parking, but others say that light rail will ultimately fail without parking available to commuters who don’t live within walking-distance of a station.
According to the City, the following is a summary of the proposal:
- The legislation would allow light rail parking as an interim use on existing lots in station areas in Southeast Seattle (North Beacon Hill, Mt. Baker, Columbia City, Othello and Rainier Beach Station Areas) where principal use (commuter) parking is not currently allowed.
- Owners would be able to make parking available to rail commuters, employees and patrons of nearby businesses.
- Light rail commuter and business support parking would further be allowed on lots owned by institutions within walking distance of these light rail stations.
- The proposal would not allow principal structures to be demolished in order to establish a parking use.
- The proposal would limit the number of non-accessory parking spaces that may be established on a lot to 40.
- The interim use parking allowance would be permitted for a maximum term of three years, and the ability to apply for a permit would expire at the end of 2012.
What do you think? Will you ride Light Rail more often now that parking is available at stations along the Rainier Valley corridor?
The Citadel lot – owned by Othello Partners – sits just steps away from the Othello light rail station. When the economy tanked, formerly interested developers fled, and as many as 60 Rainier Valley lots now sit empty as owners and developers wait for the recession to really end. Photo/do communications
Related:
- Letter to the Editor: City’s New Proposed Parking Legislation Goes Too Far (6/21/10)
- Tired of Vacant Lots in Seattle? So’s the City; Can You Say “Light Rail Parking”? (6/11/10)
- Lack of Parking Causing Problems for MLK Business Owners (4/30/10)
- Mayor Suspends Enforcement on Parking Restrictions Around Light Rail Stations (1/12/10)
- Danny Westneat: City Won’t Let You Park to Ride (1/9/10)
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{ 20 comments }
I would be more likely to use light rail if parking is readily available near the station. For example, if I need to go downtown to the dentist, for example, I can park for a few hours. Or if the rains are pouring down, I can get to light rail without a drenching. This is especially important since the shuttles to light rail are a joke. The shuttles are too infrequent to be of much use. In my opinion, parking near light rail is a good thing…
Agreed – not having parking is one of the biggest boneheaded mistakes of those that designed the light rail system. (…Besides choosing light rail technology over something else that wouldn’t require expensive tunnel boring.)
I will indeed use light rail a whole lot more now that I know there might actually be a place to put my car near the nearest station, which is still about a mile and a half away from my house (and I live in Jackson Place!)
My fear is that somehow these lots will become permanent.
“Light rail commuter and business support parking would further be allowed on lots owned by institutions within walking distance of these light rail stations.”
According to the City isn’t everything within walking distance?
I’d trake the train at LEAST twice a week… but without parking this is sort of useless. I’m not taking a bus to take the train. I’ll just drive.
Shuttles, shuttles, shuttles! We do need some parking, but having frequent and reliable shuttles would do a lot to encourage light rail usage.
I wouldn’t park my car down in that particular area (Othello) for fear of getting broke into, or even worse, having my car stolen.
It’d be interesting what the impact would be if our crime rates and perceived safety were on par with an area like Ballard or South Lake Union.
I went to the ballgame Friday night with my mother. We parked at the lot at the Mount Baker station and took link light rail to Safeco. Had this option not been available, we would have driven to Sodo. There’s no bloody way I was going to ride the light rail and then transfer to the #7 after dark when traveling with somebody not as mobile than I – not in this lifetime or any other. I put the safety of me and mine first. Pick your poison: Either I drive the short distance to the park-and-ride and take the choo-choo, or I drive to Safeco and burn up more than an hour’s worth of gasoline while I sit in bumper-to-bumper traffic with the others who travel longer distances and emit more pollutants than I.
If light rail completely solves a person’s transporation needs, they will sell their car and just use light rail. But as it is, there are a lot of cars parked on side streets, at least by the closest station near me. An intermediate mode of transporation is required by many to get to the station, hence, adding parking makes a lot of sense. I’m not sold on the idea of shuttles. They may work for some, but they add in yet another time slot that makes one’s commute to wherever they are going that much more of a headache.
I’d wait to see what happens to everyone else parking near the station before trying it. My biggest concerns would be: car theft, break ins and muggings. The light rail stations on the south end do little to address these problems already.
If these businesses could provide some sort of security, be it just a guard sitting on a chair in the corner of the lot, then I’d probably jump at the chance to stop paying downtown parking prices.
These parking lots will very likely attract crime. The people running the lots will probably not anticipate that and will not have anti-crime methods and systems setup in advance.
The lots would likely become permanent, though this would be based on job creation numbers in the Seattle area, which drives our local economy.
Local community organizations should jump on this opportunity now and begin working with security companies to supply equipment and training so that this can translate into jobs for people in our community. Let the locals police themselves!
I agree with the previous posters who said that the omission of parking around stations (with the assumption that everyone would magically go car-free) was naive.
The lots around stations are good for several reasons:
- Mobility impaired can now use the rail more easily
- Less congestion on the freeways, arterials, and downtown streets
- Increased activity around stations (which, I’m hoping, will result in *less* crime.) More people = more eyes and ears.
I have no problem with the lots becoming permanent. They should have been part of the plan from the beginning.
There is a little bit of parking available at Othello now and we’ve used it without fear. Use your head folks, don’t leave valuables in your car in plain sight!
I think we need parking. It’s a wonderful dream, to have people all over the city walking a mile or more to and from the light rail stops and taking light rail, but it’s NOT going to happen. Better to let them park close in and use the light rail. This will encourage doing business near the stop too.
Maybe it will attract some actual retail (I’m not talking Ross) to the area, that would be nice not having to go to Renton to buy everything.
I know it’s not going to happen overnight but without parking it might not happen at all.
We just returned from 2 weeks in Germany, where even the mid-size cities we visited had extensive public transit systems, reasonably priced, and integrated closely with each other, in terms of both station/stop locations and schedules. It’s the tenuous integration between light-rail and bus systems in Seattle that prevents me from using either on a regular basis.
Parking is a useful interim solution — it might help if the City Masters started thinking of RV parking for light rail as downtown parking, displaced into the RV.
But the real change that has to happen to make light rail attractive to me — living as I do a bit over a mile distant from either of the two closest stations — is a frequent, cheap and fast shuttle from my immediate neighborhood to at least one of those stations. By frequent, I mean no longer than a 5-8 minute wait between coaches. By cheap, I mean some amount significantly less the cost of a full-fare bus ride to downtown. Metro doesn’t have to use articulated behemoths to run these shuttles — smaller, but more frequent vans could do the job.
If I never had to carry anything, and if it never rained in Seattle, I’d gladly walk the mile or so to one of the stations once in a while. But if my intent is to go downtown to shop, or take heavy luggage to the airport — the light rail system is useless to me, even though the tracks are two blocks away from my home.
@16 I agree completely that the city needs to start running a shuttle service. Have a few collection points around each station. I shuttle per station. Doesn’t sound too difficult.
We tax payers are now paying 9 dollars for every dollar spend on light rail tickets. It is the most heavily subsidized form of transportation. You might improve this with some light rail parking lots, with security. You can charge for parking. If I could leave my car in a lot when I fly I would do it. If I could leave my car when I went down town I would leave it. As it now is, parking at the airport is well over $15 a day, for secure parking.
Only someone with there head in the sand would think that light rail would work with no parking. Before I hike two miles through the rain to a station, I simply would drive.
In addition there are no restrooms at the stations. Hop on the train and hope the store downtown will let you use thier’s. If you have children or elderly put them in dipers. McDonalds downtown will not let you use theirs restroom unless you purchase something. I offered to just pay a dollar and was told no purchase no potty. I did not want any food and if I stood in the long line for food I would probably christen their floor.
We are now seeing the 6 “P” of planning, prior proper planning prevents poor performance.
SE Observer -
I agree. Proper planning requires an analysis of the data available, in order to make objective, intelligent decisions. Much of the time, I see major decisions in South Seattle come about through majority consensus opinion, which has little to do with objective data analysis. What if the consensus is wrong — who would know? In fact, I don’t think anyone would really care. That is, until it affects them personally.
FWIW, I submitted the idea to have local shuttles run to/from the Link stations to the Ideas for Seattle site a while back. Cast your votes here.
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