Roosevelt BRT Road Diet Analysis

by Andres Salomon, NE Seattle Greenways November 26, 2015 NOTE: Seattle DOT Is gathering public input for the Roosevelt to Downtown High Capacity Corridor (Bus Rapid Transit BRT) Project. Be sure to let them know that you want safety improvements for people walking and biking to be the primary focus for this project. Put your Public comment here, or attend a public meeting. Public SDOT meetings
Wednesday, December 9 6 – 8 PM TOPS School, Cafeteria 2500 Franklin Avenue E Seattle, WA Thursday, December 10 6 – 8 PM UW Tower, Cafeteria North 4333 Brooklyn Avenue NE Seattle WA
Same content at both SDOT meetings. A brief presentation starts at 6:15.   Within 1/2 mile of the #RooseveltBRT corridor, 30% of surveyed households don't own a car. Compare this to 8% non-car ownership for the rest of Seattle.   Car-free household density map Where are all of those zero-car households? Here's a density map. Darker areas have > 10 car-free households per acre. Pedestrian collisions High numbers of pedestrian & bike collisions within a 5-year period along the #RooseveltBRT corridor. Safety should be the #1 priority on #RooseveltBRT! bicycle collisions 657 total collisions between 2010 and 2015. Nearly 1/3rd (184) of those involved a person walking or biking.                                                     Population density map More than 13% of Seattle's population lives within 1/2 mile of the future #RooseveltBRT corridor. Due to density, this is a critically important corridor!   Worst sidewalks map The worst sidewalks along #RooseveltBRT corridor are in South Lake Union, Eastlake, Roosevelt, & north U-District neighborhoods.   traffic volume Vehicle counts for the corridor are pretty low. Remember, road rechannelizations are recommended for streets where vehicle volumes are under 20-25k per day.   roadway Much of #RooseveltBRT corridor has 4 lanes (two in each direction, including the Roosevelt/11th couplet), which can easily become 3 or 2 lanes w/out delaying drivers.   Level of Service Meanwhile, @seattledot has devoted a whole section in the #RooseveltBRT study to corridor Level Of Service (LOS) and vehicle speeds. LOS is how traffic engineers measure congestion for cars. There's a completely separate section analyzing average speed for existing bus service, so the LOS section is entirely focused on car/truck movement. Worrying about congestion and speeds for cars should be our absolute lowest priority in trying to move people safely through this corridor.