Seattle pedestrians and bikers are fed up with it too. Over 70 Seattle sidewalks are closed due to private construction. A recently completed audit on sidewalk closures and pedestrian access concluded that the city wasn't doing enough to help pedestrians navigate the ever-changing sidewalk closures. In hopes of changing that, the audit proposes that construction projects be coordinated to avoid conflicting closures and that the city begin enforcing rules about pedestrian violations of sidewalk closures.......

"Ghost Pedestrians" courtesy of the Seattle Municipal Archives If recently released rankings of big cities in America are to believed, yes. Seattle is the #1 Big City in the U.S. for Pedestrian Safety. And to that we say--remind us never to walk anywhere else in America, ever again. In the lifetime we've called Seattle home, Seattle has never seemed less friendly or safe for pedestrians. Every time we step into the street, be it in......

Slow! by smohundro, another fun image found in our wonderful Seattlest Flickr Pool.......

While there is plenty of good beer in Seattle to keep us busy, it is always nice to head out of town to visit some of the brewpubs spread around the Pacific Northwest. We try and do a trip as often as we can, which usually turns out to be one trip every three months or so. Port Townsend is situated in a beautiful spot out on the Olympic peninsula and is about a 2-hour......

Franklin vs. Garfield is one of the Seattle sports events that you just shouldn't miss. Here's what we wrote about it for The Stranger in September:True local hoops fans don't miss this game between two perennial inner-city basketball powerhouses, even at the cost of connubial tranquility. The 2005 game at Garfield fell on Valentine's Day, but happily married Husky basketball coach Lorenzo Romar was there anyway. A win in this game means neighborhood bragging rights......

Remember SimCity? Seattlest had some incredible towns built in that game, with commercial and residential districts packed full of shiny, tall towers and trains and street traffic all flowing as effortlessly as rivers. Scroll way over to the left to the edge of the city grid; now that is a healthy industrial district, perfectly bisected by a pollution-eating green belt. The landmarks sprouted everywhere and the money and accolades poured in. Of course, it took......

On Friday while walking to work downtown, we saw a motorcycle cop at an intersection on southbound 3rd Ave waiting to turn. He had to wait for the northbound bus to pass, which was running a yellow light. He waited and the bus was still rolling by when the light turned red. The cop was in a hurry since he was turning on a red light, which is probably illegal (who knows?), and so he......

"You're lucky to have Bumbershoot," remarked comedian Michael Ian Black the other night. "There are a lot of music festivals, but this is an arts and music festival. You get both." He paused. "You get both." Everybody laughed. Why? That is one thing we did not learn at Bumbershoot. We did learn that while, really, all carnivals are human-powered, some are more human-powered than others. Cyclecide's assortment of pedal-powered rides had lines all day, and......

According to the guy who holds the "smile" sign at the entrance to the pedestrian walkway to the ferries, this truck started rolling backwards down the hill until the driver swerved into the brick stairway next to the Federal Building. Scary; because there are a lot of pedestrians around there and also because it's a big truck crashing into a place that's guarded 24/7 by cops who use those mirror thingys to look under......

The supreme granddaddy of Seattle blogging and king shit of the international bicyclist rebellion Rob Zverina has yet another straight from the gut, well written and beautifully illustrated post up on his blog that's worth checking out. After viewing the aftermath of another car on bicyclist collision up in Fremont, Zverina rants: It made me incredibly mad. The equivocator said he knew what it was like because he too was a cyclist. When Sarah......

Some signs went up at the future site of the Colman Center earlier this week. Where there is currently a parking lot surrounded by Western Ave, the alleyway entrance to the Owl and Thistle, the pedestrian walkway to the ferry terminal and an on ramp to the Viaduct there will soon (2009) stand a 12-story office tower that's making the case that there is a market for "green" office space in Seattle. What's particularly......

There was a lot of talk on the blogs last week about newly-released census data that highlighted the 23% of Washington residents that get to work by means other than riding in a car alone. Seattle is in the top ten US cities in walking to work, taking the bus to work and biking to work (although not in carpooling) all of which are impressive and encouraging. There is an element of spin to all......

Apparently its that time of year again, since at least one Seattlest contributor witnessed a few crow attacks on civilians in the past week, including an attack on his own feeble, defenseless person by a pair of crows on the north side of Freeway Park earlier this week. They swooped down from behind at his head, squawking, and followed him halfway through the park. Upon exiting the south side on Seneca he observed a different......

Our quest to make it from Renton to Ballard for happy hour was nearly dashed yesterday because some drunken idiot craving attention almost jumped off the Aurora Bridge. It was 4:45 and traffic on 99 North had been light, so things were looking good. As we drove onto the bridge in the right lane, we imagined the earthy, hop-heavy smell of Hale’s lobby. We’d be there by five—one full hour to drink cheap! On the......

Monday PREQUEL TO MCARTNEY'S WINGS: Richie Unterberger, the author of several books on the history of rock, shows some film footage and plays some music recordings of unreleased Beatles material. He´s promoting his latest book, The Unreleased Beatles -- Music and Film. We had no idea they were in jail! (Ha! Because of the "unreleased" -- see how...oh...sure, we can move on.) 7pm // Seattle Central Public Library Microsoft Auditorium // FREE GARDENING AT......

You're at an intersection staring down traffic, trying to get someone to stop so you can get across. Suburu Honda, Honda, Suburu, that new Mustang, Prius, then someone with those damn studs on their tires that scrape the asphalt so loudly you can hear the road repair coin getting sucked out of DOT's wallet: Krkrkrkrkrkrkrkrkrkr. Of course this is the guy that stops. Mountain man, down at sea level to pick up a few tanks......

On Saturday, they will rock you. In advance of their first show ever in a bonafide rock club, Seattlest asked Buttrock Suites co-founder, producer, choreographer, dancer, and lead head-banger Diana Cardiff how exactly they combine Poison and Bon Jovi with grand jetées and pointed toes. However they damn well please, it turns out. What was the inspiration for Buttrock Suites? My inspiration for buttrock was from riding around in my car and rockin' out to......

After some letter-writing and phone calls to the mayor and city council members, vanishing Wallingford crossing flags have been resurrected. During their first appearance, our toddler found them magical. She had recently learned the power of the word “No,” so we anxiously latched onto and encouraged her enthusiam. We said hello and goodbye to the flags as we drove by. At bath time, we sang a song about the flags to the tune of “We......

--After one city council member's aide was killed by a car while crossing the street, and another's stepson was seriously hurt in a similar accident, you'd better believe the council's ready to take the most decisive action they can. That's right--city charter be damned--they're going to "approve a resolution creating a pedestrian master plan and a city-appointed advisory group to develop it." Ugh. --Today at 10am, on KUOW, former TV commentator Walt Crowley says his......

This was not a very happy week for the -ist network as one of our own, Phillyist co-editor Star C. Foster, passed away early in the week. Her wit, intelligence, and good nature shone through the site, making Phillyist an immensely fun read. She was loved by many and will be missed by all. Phillyist paid tribute to her this week with a heartfelt letter to her and an obituary. And now, the awkward......

On the sixth of October we were walking down 40th Ave N in Wallingford from the bus to our house. We remember the evening clearly because... Because the way our camera stores photographs on our laptop tells us that we took this picture on the 6th. Those are crossing flags and they're at the intersection of 40th and Bagley, right by Irwins cafe. Great idea, we thought. A lot of people cross here --either getting......

Those new signs sure don't seem to be doing the trick. Tatsuo Nakata, chief of staff for council member David Della, was killed by a West Seattle motorist while walking in a marked crosswalk. He sustained major head injuries as a result of being run down, and died in the hospital Tuesday afternoon. This morning, an 11-year-old boy was hit in a crosswalk on his way to West Seattle's Madison Middle School. "It appears......

Following the advice of one of Seattlest’s faithful readers (and proving we value the comments!), we continued the craze of eating on the Eastside, where we think the best Chinese restaurants are located (our favorite is Szechuan Chef, followed by Yea’s Wok). This time our destination was Café Ori, a Hong Kong-style eatery with a side order of Taiwan-style drinks. As at Szechuan Chef, the crowd was mostly Chinese. So was the service. Seconds after......

Halloween is Tuesday, which means this weekend is really the time for all of the –ists to celebrate. And whether they’re designing super-spooky costumes or talking about the super-spooky upcoming elections, we’d say that they’re doing a fine job of it. Austinist knows that few things in life are scarier than zombies, people with way too much money, and politicians who try too hard to be funny. Slightly less scary, depending on whom you......

Every time someone comes to visit Seattlest from our pre-Emerald City life there's a moment when the two of us arrive at a crosswalk and Seattlest pulls up in strict abeyance of law and social conditioning and our friend charges through the light, only to recognize sometime halfway down the next block that we're still waiting for the white walking guy signal. When we catch up we explain the situation: Pedestrians obey the traffic......

Call us crazy. Crazy about chicken—especially the organs. We frequently find ourselves at the north end of Pike Place Market, anxious for a stroll through the stands of fruits and vegetables. Oh, check out those perfect plums. The intriguing heirloom tomatoes. Berries, berries, and more berries. Everything looks so gorgeous, so delicious, so fresh… And then comes that smell, the one that overrides everything else in our hearts, minds and stomachs. The smell of FRIED.......

-The claims of "white washing Islamists" continue in some paper called the Washington Times today in an article that revolves around the sanity of Naveed Haq. This is also a local meme. -Bullshit. Everyone knows that you have to whale on the pedestrian knob at least a dozen times in order for it to register your presence. That's Seattle 101. Bonus points if you pound on it with no cars in sight. -Someone's taking some......

Maybe it started when we found out the Urban Hike domain is actually owned by a Pittsburgh group. Pittsburgh, we thought. Huh. In a burst of civic rivalry, we decided to go hiking around Seattle. (Also, blogging makes you fat.) For the first time out, we decided to walk around Lake Union, because it's much, much smaller than Lake Washington. We prepared for the hike by knowing, roughly, where Lake Union is and walking......

Mayor Greg Nickels delivered a State of the City speech on Monday that hit on a bunch of Seattlest's favorite talking points, but failed to mention the growing divide between the mayor's office and the parks department and various neighborhood groups in the city. That's gotta be a tough one to swallow for neighborhoods whose primary complaint seems to be the lack of acknowledgement of their complaints. Nickels spent some time discussing the walkability of......

Ron Sims graces the editorial pages of the Seattle Times today to dangle the carrot of a "re-imagined Seattle Center" in front of us. The Center sucks, he says, and it does. We can do better, he says, and we can. Some things like the Needle and the fountain should stay, but the Center House and the Fun Forest are crap he tells us in colorful metaphor: "Too much of Seattle Center remains like a......