The City of Seattle is once again seeking local input for the future of transportation and urban design in our neighborhood.
Locals are invited to give feedback at an Open House event this Thursday, May 7, at Leif Erikson Lodge in the Large Hall from 6 p.m. – 8 p.m.(2245 NW 57th St).
Thursday’s event is the next planned open house to be held since the public meeting held in November and the first open house that was held last May which drew a large turnout of locals.
The City is hosting this week’s open house to once again gain local feedback on the important issues of development, transport and urban growth/design in our neighborhood.
According to the Goldberg, at last year’s meeting the community expressed their love for Ballard’s historic qualities and its tradition of industry. However, locals also expressed their concerns about the high number of recent high-density projects being built in the area, the concern of affordability of housing and also the lack of transportation improvements.
After last year’s meeting, The City collaborated with Ballard Partnership to define responses to the community input on the character of growth in Ballard’s core business areas. According to Goldberg, at the November public meeting ” we received strong support for preliminary recommendations to shape new development, streetscapes and open space in downtown Ballard.”
The City has been coordinating with Sound Transit, SDOT, the DPD and Ballard Partnership for Smart Growth to come up with recommendations for shaping the growth in the Ballard Business District and to explore the many transportation issues.
The collaboration between these agencies in combination with local feedback will develop into an Urban Design Framework (UDF) and a multimodal transportation plan called Move Ballard that, according to the DPD’s Senior Planner David Goldberg, “will articulate a shared vision to guide future development and transportation investment while ensuring Ballard’s people and places thrive.”
Through Move Ballard, the city aims to engage community members to recommend innovative solutions for enhancing the transportation environment for all, regardless of how they travel to and through the area.
Attendees at Thursday’s event will be asked to:
- Make comments on the draft recommendations to better guide development
- Identify and prioritize near-term improvements for all forms of transportation in the Ballard Hub Urban Village
- Evaluate and prioritize potential future high capacity transit (e.g. light rail, streetcar) station locations while preserving and supporting industrial and commercial employment in Ballard.
If you are unable to make the event you can submit your feedback online by completely a quick survey.
Readers can review the background information about all public meetings and plans online.
