information from City of Seattle

Councilmember Mike O’Brien (District 6, Northwest Seattle), Chair of the Council’s Sustainability and Transportation Committee, issued the following statement after the Hearing Examiner ruled in favor of the City of Seattle and the Department of Transportation:

“At last we can move forward to complete the missing link of the Burke-Gilman Trail. I’m excited to finally see this project through to fruition with an alignment that makes sense for pedestrians, bicyclists, cars and trucks. I look forward to Mayor Durkan and SDOT taking quick action to complete the Burke-Gilman, providing a safer pedestrian and bicycle connector between Fremont and the Ballard Locks.”

The primary objective for the proposal is to connect the roughly 1.4-mile gap between the existing segments of the BGT through the Ballard neighborhood. The project is intended to create a safe, direct, and defined multi-use trail for persons of all abilities, for a variety o f transportation and recreational activities, and to improve predictability for motorized and nonmotorized users along the project alignment. Another objective of the project is to provide connections to the proposed nonmotorized networks shown in the Pedestrian Master Plan (SDOT, 2009) and Seattle Bicycle Master Plan (SDOT, 2014), while maintaining truck and freight facilities and access that support industrial and water-dependent land uses within the shoreline district and the Ballard-Interbay Northend Manufacturing and Industrial Center