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FRONT PAGE FODDER / NEIGHBORHOOD NEWS January 2007
The Olympic Sculpture Park is, after the usual construction delays, finally set to open on Saturday, Jan. 20, with an opening gala at 11 a.m. and festivities continuing through the weekend. Planned events include live music and dance performances, family programming, art activities, park tours and artist demonstrations. More info: Seattleartmuseum.org.
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Belltown could sure use it, but Fremont's got it first. "Last Call," a venture of Harborview Medical Center and Seattle-King County Public Health, established a taxi stand outside the Fremont PCC Natural Market (North 34th and Evanston) in late November. Bar crawlers can go there after 11:30 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays and find a commercial ride home, avoiding the physical and legal risks of drunk driving. Organizers say they may expand into Belltown if the Fremont experiment proves successful.---
Elsewhere in nightlife, Mayor Greg Nickels finally issued his proposed rules for clubs and bars in late November. Among its provisions, according to Nickels's office: - Clubs that serve alcohol after 10 p.m. and have high occupancy levels are affected. (This excludes many restaurant and restaurant-with-lounge operations.) - Clubs must adhere to their occupancy limits.
- Clubs must limit amplified noise levels.
- Clubs are responsible for litter within 50 feet around the club after closing.
- Nightlife premises must return complaint calls within 24 hours.
- Penalties range from fines to suspensions, depending on the gravity of the offense.
- A seven-member "Nightlife Premises Advisory Board" will be appointed to work with clubs, neighbors and the city on club issues.The City Council now gets to thrash out the proposal's details.
It may make its say on the matter as early as this month. Already, hospitality-industry advocates have asked the council to smooth out some of the proposal's sharper enforcement aspects.
Gov. Christine Gregoire finally decided in mid-December what she's going to do about the Alaskan Way Viaduct-let somebody else decide. Namely, the Seattle voters (even though it's a state highway, part of a regional transportation grid). Perhaps as early as mid-2007, we'll get to choose whether we want a fancy new viaduct (costly), or a mile-long tunnel (even costlier). Maybe, just maybe, there might also be an option to junk the whole thing and beef up public transportation instead. But we'll have to fight for that option; Gregoire's current plan ignores it.---
Community activists in downtown Tacoma and Bellevue have occasionally talked about wishing to make those places more like Belltown. Now, residents and merchants in Capitol Hill's Pike/Pine Corridor are complaining their neighborhood might become too much like Belltown.
At a November public hearing, Pike/Pine denizens spoke out against a property owner's plan to raze a whole block of Pine Street storefronts (including such popular destinations as Kincora's and the Cha Cha Lounge) for a six-story mixed use development with street-level retail. Speakers at the hearing claimed the project could destroy the area's lively retail and nightclub scenes.
The proponents and opponents of this "Belltown east" could learn from the real Belltown how we've developed condos, funky stores, AND cool eating/drinking joints in the same place.
A member of FreeRepublic.com, a Web discussion board for avid right-wingers (its participants are sometimes known as "Freepers"), recently posted (without permission, but we'll slide on that) Mollie Bradley-Martin's essay from the November issue, "To Impeach or Not to Impeach?" Along with the usual anti-liberal insults and catcalls in the comments forum, someone using the name "My2Cents" commented: "What is the Belltown Messenger?' A high school newspaper?" To which one "Dane" replied: "My conjecture it is the alternative, counterculture' newspaper in Seattle (one of those free newspapers one finds in American big cities, where their advertising revenue comes from phone sex ads)."
A statue above Mama's Mexican Kitchen. - Photo by Louie RaffloerFor the record, the Messenger is a neighborhood monthly, and our publisher proudly refrains from accepting phone sex ads.
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A BELLTOWN MANIFESTO43. A diverse society allows a girl to be good at sports.
A truly diverse society allows a boy to be bad at sports
© 2007 Belltown Messenger
