Seattle

Sept 17, 2022

I just spent a month in Seattle, and I have to say, Seattle has a lot going for it. I wasn't so sure I would like it, and there are definitely some rough spots and growing pains for the city, but I like what I saw.

First and arguably most important, Seattle is actually building housing. They expect another 800,000 people by 2040. I've seen 5 story condos next to single family homes, something people in the Bay Area would wince at. In every part of the city, they seem to be building housing, and even in smaller neighboorhoods.

Another suprising aspect of the city is how compact it is. It takes 15 minutes (by car) to get from Ballard to the U District, and the same from Fremont to downtown. If the city can manage to build decent bike infrastructure, the time on electric bikes would be comparable, since most of the driving consists of low speed roads with lights. I saw a ton of electric bikes, as well as Bakfiets(dutch cargo bike), holding kids and groceries. The culture is already there, people are just strugggling against cars to make it happen.

I was impressed with the light rail system, which was easy to use, clean, and had a frequency of 10 minutes between trains. It connected the popular destinations in the downtown to the airport and stadiums. It has yet to connect to other parts of the city, but that is coming soon with 37 stations planned to be added by 2036 with the "Sound Transit 3" project.

The greenery in the city is serious, even at the end of summer when I visited. So many tree-lined streets, and amazing parks (Green lake, Discovery Bay, Washinton Park Arboretum, Gas Works).

People actually use the lakes here, by paddle boarding, kayaking, and swimming. My favorite thing to do was run around Green Lake at twilight.

It doesn't need mentioning; great coffeeshops, books stores, and record stores.

It's not all sunshine and roses. The downtown needs a lot of work; it doesn't seem to have fully recovered from the pandemic. Charming neighboorhoods around Occidental Square were eerily empty. Pike Place gets all the tourists and attention, but the city needs to care better for the rest of downtown.

The city needs to remove many of its downtown parking complexes and public storage facilites. If they are serious about density, these have no place in the downtown.

I don't think downtown will ever truly thrive until they remove the freeway (Interstate 5) going right through the middle of city! It creates a dead zone of activity and pollution. I hope this will eventually be removed.

The waterfront needs attention, and while having the highway removed is great, there is still ridiculous public storage along Alaskan Way.

All that being said, there is so much potential for the downtown, and the foundation is there.

With the great weather (Seattle is sunny for ~5 months of the year, but they don't want people to know), water, tech, universities, and neighborhoods, I see Seattle becoming a truly great city to live in the coming decades.