King County City Council Updates Strategic Plan

As our roads continue to be overhauled, those of us who commute far outside of the immediate Bothell area might be facing some unwelcome interruptions in the coming months—or years. Fortunately, the Metropolitan King County City Council voted unanimously to update the county’s strategic plan for public transportation, which extends until 2021.

Councilman Rod Dembowski told the Bothell Reporter: “I believe the process we used to update the plan was a model of cooperation of leaders throughout the region partnering together to improve this vital regional asset…Working together with the Sound Cities Association and the city of Seattle, we were able to address some of our region’s challenging transportation problems; I hope to see this model of cooperation followed in the future.”

Among the new updates to the strategic plan are:

• Requiring Metro to develop a long-range plan;

• Refining the service guidelines to facilitate planning by cities and include college student enrollment when evaluating the need for transit service;

• Requiring a multi-agency study on community infrastructure that supports access to transit, including park-and-ride facilities; and

• Updating policy language to match Metro’s procedures for complying with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

To read more complete coverage of the King County Metro’s Strategic Plan updates, click here.

Detailing the Bothell Crossroads Detours

If you’ve been driving around town lately, you might’ve noticed how unrecognizable downtown Bothell seems with all the construction going on. The construction is part of the Bothell Crossroads project, which will hopefully move some of our traffic to the new State Route 522 roadway alignment.

Although local businesses along the construction routes will remain open, here are some of the detours you can expect around town, through mid-October:

Crossroads detours
Traffic will switch to the new roadway at 5 a.m. on Monday, Aug. 12.

Then, in order to complete side street connections to the newly constructed portion of SR 522, the following detours will be in place for approximately two months:

• Southbound traffic on Bothell Way Northeast (SR 527) will not be allowed to turn left onto Main Street. Drivers should use Northeast 185th Street to 101st Avenue Northeast to Main Street.

• Left-hand turns from Main Street onto southbound Bothell Way Northeast (SR 527) will not be allowed. Drivers detoured onto northbound Bothell Way Northeast to Northeast 185th Street to 104th Avenue Northeast to Kaysner Way to access SR 522 in either the east or west bound direction.

• Northbound traffic on 102nd Ave Northeast should use Kaysner Way to access SR 522 in either the east or west bound direction.

To read more about the Bothell Crossroads project, click here. And if you find a particularly nice detour, share it with your BFFs (Bailey Farm Friends)—on our Facebook page!

The Bothell Blues Festival

What are the “Four B’s”? Blues, BBQ, Beer, and Bothell, of course. We’re pretty fond of all those things.

So if you haven’t got plans for Saturday, August 31 yet, mark down the 2013 Bothell Blue Festival, presented by Carolina Smoke BBQ.

Featuring the smooth grooves of The Chester Dennis Jones Band, Eric Freeman, the Stacy Jones Band, and others, this year’s event is supposed to be bigger than ever—with delicious food provided by Carolina Smoke BBQ and Village Bean, and beer provided by the fun folks at Foggy Noggin Brewery. (The festival is still taking applications to be food vendors—click here to send the festival a message.)

The event will run from 11 am to 8 pm at Bothell’s Country Village and tickets are $17 per person, although this price include a wristband that will get you tons of discounts over the course of the day. We’d love to see some of you there! Click here for more info on the Bothell Blues Festival, and be sure to “Like” their Facebook page for up-to-date info on the event.

King County Metro Gets Green Transit Distinction

One of the things we like best about Bothell is its proximity to the big city. We get to enjoy the quaint, laid back lifestyle of the suburbs while still enjoying the nightlife, businesses, and amenities of the big city.

Perhaps one of the most underappreciated features of our region is its public transportation system, King County Metro Transit. If you talk to residents of other larger cities about their public transportation, you’ll quickly find that a good transportation system is a rare luxury. Fortunately, here in Bothell, we have easy access to one of the best systems in the nation—and one of the most environmentally friendly ones.

Last week, Metro was named one of the top transit agencies in the U.S. as recognized by the American Public Transporation Association for voluntarily reducing its environmental footprint. In fact, the King County Metro is one of eight agencies to receive this level of recognition, trailing only Los Angeles.

King County Executive Dow Constantine told the Bothell Reporter: “King County Metro has become one of the greenest fleets in America, and this award recognizes our legacy of environmental action – from pioneering the nation’s largest public vanpool program, to powering our trolley and hybrid bus fleets with the cleanest technologies available.”

The city’s efforts to improve green transportation also helps save the city money—the agency estimates that it saved nearly $5 million last year by using energy efficient hybrid technology, and saved $1 million last year due to the lower cost of electricity compared to gas.

To read more about the King County Metro’s recognition, click here.

Geocache Your Way to the Gold

Aren’t scavenger hunts great? Well, as a full grown adult, your scavenger hunts probably consist of grocery runs and frantic searches for your car keys. But just because you’re not a kid anymore doesn’t mean you still can’t have fun—and get a good workout in the process.

If you’re not familiar with the new phenomenon of “geocaching,” it’s essential a scavenger hunt that uses your phone’s GPS to help locate containers, and afterwards, participants go online and report their findings.

Washington State Parks has its own geoacaching program: The Washington State Parks Centennial GeoTour, which features 103 geocaches spread across state parks in Washington.

Participants can print out passports, which are like scorecards—and once they’re completed, you can mail them in to receive a commemorative geocoin in either silver or gold (depending on how many times you’ve completed your passport).

For more information on the Washington State Parks Centennial Geotour, click here. You can also download the GeoTour passport, map, and guidelines. And for those who are curious about geocaching in general, join other Washingtonians on the Washington State Geocaching Association’s forums, here. Happy geocaching!