[mhays]

I live in the Belltown district on the NW edge of Downtown Seattle, basically I'd guess about 200 acres (depending on definition) between the CBD and the Space Needle. It's been growing as a residential district for decades and has reached maybe 40,000 per square mile. It also has a scattering of offices and hotels, and gets a lot of tourists walking through especially during the five-month cruise ship season. There's plenty wrong with the neighborhood.

1. No supermarket. We're surrounded by supermarkets and the Pike Place Market but none are in the immediate area. Personally I use corner stores a lot.

2. Gaps. The neighborhood will need to grow by 50% to feel complete and cohesive.

3. Wide streets. Seattle is an isthmus, and a lot of pass-through traffic goes through Belltown and Downtown. Even so, the avenues are wider than traffic warrants. We narrowed Second Avenue by widening the sidewalks and adding a separated bike lane...others could use similar treatment.

4. Queuing cars blocking crosswalks. Fifth Avenue is gridlocked for a mile leading to I-5 (through the CBD), and we don't crack down on assholes blocking crosswalks.

5. Too many retail streets. We require retail in new developments pretty much universally, which means there's too much retail space and it's scattered instead of concentrated. There are a couple good restaurant/bar corridors, but the rest could really use consolidation. We should make two streets required retail and let the others add density without making the problem worse.

6. Lack of light rail. Like Seattle in general, Belltown's buses beat many cities' rail. But Belltown merits a top-level type of transit, particularly with how it's growing. A new subway route heading northwest from the CBD will be built, but it's heading for South Lake Union and Lower Queen Anne instead...deserving areas, but Belltown is again the hole in the middle.

7. Not tall or dense enough. Seattle has upzoned many areas, but Belltown is still the land limited to stubby highrises for the most part, and parts don't allow highrises at all.

8. Not enough daytime population. Belltown restaurants do far more evening business than daytimes. Too many places don't open for lunch. It's the opposite of South Lake Union. Belltown needs more offices, more hotels, and more other things that draw visitors vs. being a residential area and pass-through.