Mayor thanks City Council for approving Bell Street make-over
Park boulevard to add natural amenities to urban setting

SEATTLE - Mayor Greg Nickels today thanked the City Council for approving a project to transform four blocks of Bell Street from First to Fifth Avenues into a "park boulevard" with improved landscaping, better lighting, and more open space. The project converts one traffic lane and reconfigures parking to create a parklike corridor through the heart of Belltown.

The City Council voted 9-0 to spend $2.5 million of the 2008 voter-approved Parks and Green Spaces Levy for the project. To be completed in 2010, the Bell Street park boulevard would create 17,000 square feet of new green space.

"We unveiled our Bell Street plans last month, and the response from the community has been overwhelmingly positive. People want more green in their neighborhoods," said Nickels. "We'll take the lessons learned from the Bell Street park boulevard and consider where similar improvement can be made across the city."

First proposed in the 1998 Belltown Neighborhood Plan, the Bell Street park boulevard has been endorsed by a range of community organizations. The city of Seattle Comprehensive Plan calls for "green streets" to meet open space needs in urban neighborhoods.

Sidewalks on the north side of Bell Street will be widened to nearly 30 feet with landscaping, lighting and space for children's play areas and other recreational activities. Natural landscaping and swales - vegetation in the right-of-way that collects and cleans rainwater - will be added. Well lit sidewalks and open sightlines will discourage anti-social behavior. The Parks Department's park rangers and West Precinct police officers will be able to issue park exclusions and conduct emphasis patrols to ensure everyone is able to enjoy this space.

The project will cut costs by taking advantage of a current Seattle City Light project to replace utilities along Bell Street from Second to Fifth Avenues, which includes replacing the existing sidewalks on the south side.

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Office of the Mayor