Aurora Avenue is a mess. Avoid it at all costs. It's packed and frustrating and just plain irritating. That's all I hear lately. But is it? Sort of.
One thing to remember is, we asked for it. When we voted to incorporate the City of Shoreline in 1994 -- by a three-to-one margin -- the Aurora Corridor Project was one of the big promises. We had one of the ugliest and most dangerous arterials in the state as our main street. The City of Shoreline's website on the Aurora Corridor Project notes that from 1992 to 1996 there were 42 car-pedestrian accidents on the Shoreline stretch, and 38 percent of those resulted in fatality or permanent disability. The statewide average is 12 to 15 percent. More than half the collisions in Shoreline happened on Aurora. There were almost no sidewalks, driveways were essentially unmarked, and property owners regularly used everything right down to the right-of-way, so walking was an invitation to mayhem. It clearly needed fixing.
In 1998, Shoreline convened a Citizens' Advisory Task Force which came up with "The 32 Points," a set of recommendations for the future of SR 99. The City Council accepted and adopted the Points as the official guidelines for the design of the Aurora Corridor Project. Fourteen of the Points dealt directly with the pedestrian experience.
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In 2002 the city adopted the design concept and construction started in 2005. The first segment, North 145th Street to North 165th Street, was finished in 2007. The next segment, North 165th Street to North 185th Street, is under construction now and is expected to be done summer 2011. The part up to North 192nd Street will be done by winter 2012, and the last piece, to North 205th Street, is already contracted to start in 2012.
It isn't free. According to the City of Shoreline's website the first segment cost $39,885,391. That's a lot of mochas. It goes for Design and Environment, Right-of-Way acquisition, Engineering, Construction, Interurban Trail Bridges Construction, Seattle City Light Undergrounding, Telecommunications work, Seattle Public Utilities work, 1% for the Arts, and a fund for potential claims. But that said, it involves no tax hike. The money has come from or is coming from the federal government, Washington state, King County, and from funds already set aside by City of Shoreline. In fact, only 11 percent came from the city budget. The rest was from all other sources, said the project's program manager. In other words, our tax dollars are coming back to serve us.
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McKinley wrote me that the first phase funding, including design, construction and right-of-way acquisition lays out thusly:
City Roads Capital Funding - $3.1 million
State - $13.8 million
Federal - $ 10.4 million
King County - $500,000
Total: $27.8 million
The second phase looks like this:
City Roads Capital Funding - $3.1 million
State - $20.3 million
Federal - $15.5 million
King County - $600,000
Total: $39.5 million
The next section, from North 185th Street to North 192nd Street, is expected to cost about $15 million. The last phase, from North 192nd Street to North 205th Street, is budgeted at $45.9 million, but will likely cost less. The middle mile and the last section have much higher right-of-way acquisition costs than the other two sections, but that's OK.
The big thing to remember is the intended result: a much better, safer, more attractive, more business-friendly road precisely because it will be a more pedestrian and transit-friendly road. People, including the more than 7,000 daily transit riders Aurora serves, will have a good incentive to get out of the car and really use their city.
Businesses are being assisted through the construction time by Shoreline, and once it's done they are expected to thrive with the increased walk-by traffic.
Still in the short-term, there are challenges. Janet Mulvanny, a sales representative at on Aurora, told me the Aurora Avenue construction's impact on business "isn't good", but went on to say that "the first section is much nicer- those wide sidewalks- and it looks so good, too. They left us 'business access' drives, but you can't really see where they are. One guy drove around the block three times trying to find a way in here. It's worst when they block both drives. I think we're going to put 'Chuck Olson' signs out by the DOT ones so people can find us."
She was smiling through her description, though, and concluded "It'll be great when it's all finished. I think it'll really improve things."
Our downtown will grow denser and richer. North 165th Street to North 205th Street are designed to make full use of natural treatment systems for rain runoff, including bioswales, raingardens, ecology embankments, root boxes and filterra systems to extract toxins from storm flow by natural means. Both the process and the results will be a strong example to surrounding cities for how to do this.
How do I know? I saw Shoreline's funding request paperwork to King County for the northernmost segment. WSDOT figures show the first, finished section of 99 has had a 61 percent reduction in accidents! When it's done we will finally have a main street worthy of our young city.
