Thanks to everyone who's recently signed our petition. Please keep sharing! We are meeting with SDOT this week. We will share a copy of the petition and comments with them. Your voices will be heard!

We are especially concerned about the safety issues raised by these plans. The above photo shows how the street will be reconfigured:

• Parking on the beach side of the street will be removed, so that ten feet of "walking, biking and rolling" space can be created.
• The middle lane will be used by cars, going both directions.
• Parking will be on the east side of the street only, including 3 ADA spaces. 
• Last week, SDOT announced that the "rolling lane" will be separated from the traffic lane by concrete wheel stops, instead of the posts that had been previously announced.

Here are just a few of the questions this raises:

1. How will emergency vehicles get through?
2. How easy will it be for cars to jump the wheel stops, and how will pedestrians, joggers, strollers and bikers be protected from them? What data makes SDOT think they are safer than the posts? How visible will the wheel stops be in the rain, and at night? 
3. What plan does SDOT have to manage traffic at the entrances to Alki Point, where two-way traffic will be coming and going through an opening big enough for only one car? 

It's easy to imagine the chaos that will result from these changes, especially on a sunny summer day, or when there is a special event at Alki. It's harder to imagine why SDOT thinks this is safer than the way the street works now. What problem was this project actually trying to solve? 

At this point we have a lot more questions than answers. We are looking forward to this meeting and grateful to Councilmember Saka's office for setting it up. We'll let you know what we learn, and what our next steps might be.

Thanks again for your support, and stay tuned!