Last summer, we sent over 1,000 letters to each City councilmember (who owns the roads) and County councilmember (who runs the buses/Metro) as well as directly to SDOT and we now know that SDOT is working on Fixing Route 8!

Short Term (next ~year)

In January, the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) met with us and agreed to fund spot improvements for Route 8. These are typically relatively cheap/small (reconfigure a signal, rechannel an intersection, add a small bus lane, etc).

As a first step, a traffic analysis of the whole bus route at all times of day was done. Normally they just do rush hour but we pushed for all day and weekends because of Climate Pledge events and chronic unreliability even late at night. That study was delayed a number of times due to construction on Dexter Ave in SLU. We originally anticipated to get results in June but finally, the study is now done and we’re meeting with SDOT in October about what they think is feasible. We were told in January that full bus lanes along Denny Way is in scope but we’ll see what they say.

We’re hoping that anything they come up with would start construction sometime next year.

Long Term (next ~8 years)

30% of SDOT’s budget comes from the 2015 “Levy to Move Seattle”, which expires at the end of this year. City Council has proposed an 8 year $1.55bn levy (dubbed “Keep Seattle Moving”) to replace it which will appear on the November ballot for approval by voters. This levy includes funding for all things transportation: street repaving, transit improvements, bridge repair, bike lanes, tons of sidewalks, etc and calls out some specific ‘signature projects’ funded at over $10M each.

As the levy was being crafted, it wasn’t obvious that Route 8 would be prioritized. We worked with District 3 (east of I-5, north of I-90, south of the ship canal) Councilmember Hollingsworth who added an amendment to the Seattle Transportation Plan (the master plan document that guides the levy) to have “multimodal improvements” on Denny Way prioritized. Now, the levy proposal calls out “Denny Way / Olive Way” as a signature transit project that will be funded. If the levy is approved, this likely means something like full bus lanes along Denny Way or a major rechannelization to get cars somewhere else to speed up the bus.

How to Get Involved

FixTheL8 is a partnership between Central Seattle Greenways and the Seattle Transit Riders Union.

At Central Seattle Greenways, we advocate for more walking, biking, and transit in Capitol Hill, the Central District, and nearby areas. You can join our list (which has a link to our discord!) or join a meeting on the second Monday of the month. We’re affiliated with Seattle Neighborhood Greenways, which is the citywide nonprofit that lobbies city council to build more bike lanes, pedestrian spaces, vision zero projects, etc. You can donate to them on their website. There are also Greenways groups for nearly every neighborhood including Downtown/SLU.

The Transit Riders Union works to fight for all things affecting transit riders including a number of minimum wage hikes, low income fares, bus improvements, renter protections, etc. You can donate or join them on their website.

You can also help the “Keep Seattle Moving” campaign to pass the transportation levy replacement this fall by donating or volunteering on their website.

Thank you for your interest in Route 8! We hope to have more updates soon!