Mayor Greg Nickels has added $2 million to the city's Neighborhood Street Fund in his 2008 budget and that addition means the fund will grow to $10.1 million over the next three years.

"We listened carefully to neighborhoods, and expanding this program was clearly a top priority," Nickels said. "The Neighborhood Street Fund is an effective tool to help communities build sidewalks, traffic circles and other improvements to make their streets safer and their neighborhoods more livable."

The Neighborhood Street Fund was originally designed to fund small community-selected road projects, such as traffic circles, curb extensions, and streetscape improvements. This year, the city budgeted about $1.2 million for projects.