In late September, SDOT will add Sunday time limits to parking spaces near retail and restaurants in Pioneer Square. The new time limits are designed for customers and visitors to more easily find parking on Sundays. The change affects about 25 percent of the on-street parking spaces in Pioneer Square with limits of two hours between 10 AM to 6 PM. The blue lines on the map show the streets affected. These new time restrictions connect to the existing time limits along the Waterfront, which SDOT found allowed an extra 30 to 40 percent of vehicles to find parking.
The Seattle Department of Transportation plans to replace all its parking pay stations between the summer of 2014 and the end of 2016 with new technology.
A one-month on-street trial will take place from February 14 to March 14, along Fourth Avenue between Stewart and Bell streets. There will be seven different models being tested, from four different vendors. During this time, SDOT invites the public to provide feedback regarding the aesthetics, ease of use and overall impression of each of the pay station models by completing a survey available online at http://www.seattle.gov/transportation/parking/newpaystations.htm.
New technology will provide a higher level of customer service and communications reliability, and will be better able to handle more complex parking rate programming requirements. It will also better integrate with other current and future parking management technologies and systems, from pay by phone to Seattle Police Parking Enforcement.
Seattle has approximately 2,200 parking pay stations that control paid parking for about 12,000 on-street parking spaces in Seattle. The oldest pay stations were first installed in 2004 and are coming to the end of their useful lives.
Steel beams are installed to temporarily support the structure.
The Washington Street Boat Landing pergola is in the process of being removed, protected, and restored in anticipation of the Elliott Bay Seawall project. The move is slated for Sunday, February 9th and Monday, February 10th.
There is a rigorous documentation process in place to record every detail of the historic pergola.
The historic boat landing’s iron shelter was built in 1920, and is one of three pergolas in Pioneer Square. The Pioneer Square Preservation Board gave its Certificate of Approval to move the structure to a storage site on Terminal 25, thereby ensuring its safety during construction. After the Seawall Project is completed, the pergola will be moved back to its original site and will be restored. Overseeing the project is the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) under Section 106 MOA agreements.
In part one of the move, the structure will slide off of the pier to the steel transfer beams that will support the structure during the move to Terminal 25.
From supervising project manager, Jessica Murphy, PE with SDOT: “Preparations for the relocation have been ongoing since early January 2014. Bracing of pergola walls, removal of the roof, lead abatement and other preparatory work has been performed under the oversight of Ron Wright, our architectural specialist. We are now in the final stages of preparation for the structure relocation to a site at Terminal 25. The move will happen in two steps: 1) The move eastward off the current pier structure, and 2) The final move south to Terminal 25.”
Steps have been taken to ensure restoration of the pergola will be historically accurate. Under the Section 106 MOA rules, a rigorous documenting process has been put in place and organizers are actively photographing and video recording every part of the structure that is removed.
This move and plans for restoration could not have come any sooner! In September 2012, the Alliance for Pioneer Square contacted SDOT about signs of deterioration on the historic boat landing. We look forward to see it renewed on a world class waterfront in the near future.
