The Fremont Bridge isn’t just busy — it is without doubt one of the busiest drawbridges in North America. The Seattle Division of Transportation’s plan to create a bus-only lane via Fremont and alongside Westlake will enhance congestion and site visitors, severely impacting residents, native companies and everybody passing via, with out considerably bettering bus journey occasions.
For greater than a century, the Fremont Bridge has served as each a literal and symbolic gateway between neighborhoods. Opened in 1917, the bridge connects Queen Anne and Downtown Seattle to Fremont, Wallingford, Ballard and the communities to the north. This bright-blue-and-orange double-leaf drawbridge features as a significant artery not just for commuters on land but additionally for marine site visitors passing beneath its low-slung deck. From trolleys and horse-drawn carriages to at this time’s fixed move of automobiles, buses, bicycles and pedestrians, the bridge stays a civic hub, linking commerce, tradition and group.
But, regardless of its appeal and performance, the Fremont Bridge stays one in every of Seattle’s nice paradoxes. Sitting solely 30 toes above water, it opens about 40 occasions every day to let tugboats, fishing vessels and leisure boats go via the Ship Canal’s waters. This lifting and ready has made it an emblem of each affection and frustration, uniting and delaying us on the identical time, and serving as a metaphor for our ever-expanding metropolis and the rising pains that include it.
On high of the busy maritime site visitors beneath and vehicular site visitors above, the bridge serves as a significant artery for Seattle’s vibrant biking group. Each ends of the bridge have intersections which can be among the many busiest for bikes on the whole West Coast. On any day, hundreds of cyclists go via these crossings. It’s also the busiest pedestrian crossing of all of the bridges throughout the water from Montlake to Ballard, establishing the Fremont Bridge as a regional hub for all modes of transportation.
Including one other layer of complexity is the core difficulty of lane capability. The Fremont Bridge is one in every of Seattle’s most extreme site visitors bottlenecks. With solely two lanes in every course and three main arterials from the south — Westlake and Dexter avenues and Nickerson Road — and 4 main arterials to the north — North thirty fourth and thirty fifth streets, Fremont Avenue North and Leary Manner that land instantly at its base — there isn’t any bodily house for enlargement. Not like the neighboring College and Ballard bridges, the bridge’s quick decking offers solely restricted loading capability. Each time the Fremont Bridge opens, all site visitors stops.
This isn’t an anti-bus op-ed. Our group helps and welcomes most elements of the Route 40 Transit-Plus Multimodal Corridor project. Upgrades to curb ramps and pedestrian crossings will enhance security and accessibility. The addition of a safer bike connection heading north on Fremont is a constructive and wanted step for safer journey. We would like a robust and wholesome bus community to be a key a part of our transportation choices. Nonetheless, the proposal to create a full-time bus-only lane within the Fremont core will trigger important impacts that we imagine haven’t been totally addressed. Slicing the capability for common site visitors will inevitably enhance congestion and hinder freight, emergency response and native car motion. Neighborhoods from Ballard to South Lake Union depend upon this route, and the ensuing gridlock will create ripple results all through the whole hall. Elevated congestion and restricted entry can even hurt our small enterprise group by discouraging prospects, delaying important deliveries and threatening livelihoods, particularly in an space already going through ongoing building challenges and lowered parking choices. A transit plan that ignores Fremont’s realities is a plan destined to stall.
Fremont just isn’t opposed to vary. Our group has lengthy championed modern and inclusive infrastructure options. However on this case, we urge metropolis leaders to rethink the proposed bus-only lane and as an alternative pursue methods that adapt to Fremont’s distinctive belongings and limitations, somewhat than imposing a one-size-fits-all method. In spite of everything, nobody needs the Heart of the Universe to break down below its personal gravity.
