We are authoring this petition to you in order to request immediate attention to the need for traffic calming on 28th Avenue East north of East Madison Street, a residential street in the Arboretum/Madison Valley area of Seattle. This street is home to racially, ethnically and multi-generationally diverse middle class families with young children that would like to keep this a safe and peaceful neighborhood road.
As Seattle continues to grow, we are deeply impacted by strains on the existing arterials of East Madison, 23rd Avenue and Lake Washington Boulevard resulting in excessive traffic well beyond what these streets were intended to accommodate. We are concerned, not only with the amount of traffic, but more so by the recklessness and speed of the drivers who are trying to bypass the designated arterials particularly in view of the two childcare businesses and various SPS bus stops between E Roy and E Madison Streets where children are often present.
Recent incidents include an inattentive south-bound driver hurtling out of his lane into a north-bound car whose driver then had to swerve onto the sidewalk, destroying a resident’s 8x8 foot planter box and lower staircase railing. As this was during the morning rush hour, it was fortunate that no pedestrians were nearby. There have been many near misses for pedestrians and bikes versus speeding cars, and it has even become very stressful for residents just to pull out of their driveways.
Originally SDOT proposed parking on both sides of 28th Ave E as a preventative measure against this sort of behavior. However, due to the narrowness of the street and the subsequent damage to vehicles, this has just caused people to violate parking strip and sidewalk regulations as they try to park their cars without being hit by passing traffic. Without any ticketing enforcement by SPD, this practice has only increased, causing the roadside infrastructure to fall into disrepair and the traffic situation to revert to a dangerous stretch of road.
85% traffic exceeds previous 25 mph speed limit and volumes, (b) streets that are curbless, and (c) being a pedestrian traffic generator (links to studies included below).
This situation is dangerous and unacceptable to the residents of the neighborhood. Given that 28th Ave E north of E Madison clearly qualifies for calming measures, we desperately request your assistance in prioritizing this with SDOT as a fully funded, priority project. We are happy to host you all at a neighborhood meeting to better convey the situation to you and rally support for this initiative.
We look forward to your counsel.
Sincerely,
The Undersigned.
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attached: relevant Lake Washington Loop Neighborhood Greenway website data and maps
Proposed greenway: http://www.seattle.gov/transportation/lakewashingtonloopgreenway.htm
Traffic speed survey: http://www.seattle.gov/transportation/docs/Speed_lkWaLoop.pdf
Traffic volume survey: http://www.seattle.gov/transportation/docs/TrafficVolumes_lkWaLoop.pdf
