Friday, January 13, 2012

The Future of 35th Ave NE, A Community’s Decision


(This originally was posted on the Wedgwood Community Council's website) 
(Photo at left is looking north along 35th Ave NE at what would become the Post Office [foreground] and Hunter Farm [background] site in 1957, courtesy of the Seattle Municipal Archives Photograph Collection)
This past Wednesday, the WCC held its first general meeting of the year with about 50 people in attendance from Wedgwood, View Ridge, Matthews Beach, and Ravenna-Bryant.  The meeting kicked off with a presentation by CleanScapes on the Neighborhood Waste Reduction Rewards program and $50,000 that the Tuesday North collection service area has to work with for a community project.  We also provided a few details on the $13,000 Small and Simple grant the WCC received to work with other NE Seattle community groups on community emergency preparedness.  However, the meetings agenda largely focused on the future of 35th Ave NE and how we as a community will be developing a “neighborhood plan” over the next year or so.
Per Johnson and Mary Beth O’Neill with the Wedgwood Land Use Committee presented has been doing over the past year to identify suitable land use tools and a potential process for creating our “neighborhood plan.”  Details on the proposed plan and process can be found on the 35th Ave NE Neighborhood Plan page, which has been linked to through the Land Use Committee page.  In general though, the WLUC is beginning a process to recruit a steering committee of community members to craft land use planning tools that will comprise our “neighborhood plan.”  We will coordinate Community Learning Seminars to educate anyone interested in land use concepts and topics found in the Vision Plan, such as “how to make a neighborhood walkable” or “how to create a diverse and thriving business district.”  These Community Learning Seminars will be presented by experts in the field so that we, as a community, will be able to discuss through Public Workshops what shared goals our community want. We hope to present our draft “neighborhood plan” in January 2013 to the community for comments and have the WCC vote on the final plan in April 2013.  If all goes to plan, we will be submitting our “neighborhood plan” by mid-May 2013.
If you have questions or would like to join the volunteer steering committee, please email » the WLUC.
Here is a video of the meeting. The audio is a little quiet and it’s a rather long video. To make it easier for you to see/listen to what you want, the presentation by CleanScapes begins at 0:46, an announcement on the $13,000 that the WCC has received to work on emergency preparedness begins at 8:13, the 35th Ave NE Neighborhood Plan presentation begins at 14:14, and Q&A begins at 50:07.

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