A couple of years ago, we wrote an article on Walk Score® from walkscore.com. The Walk Score® for an address is a measure of the walkability for that address, in other words how easy it is to walk to most destinations such as grocery stores, libraries, bookstores, etc. Scores at the high end (90-100) indicate an environment where “Daily errands do not require a car.” Scores at the low end (0-24) mean “Almost all errands require a car.”
The programmers at Walk Score® have recently implemented a similar index: Transit Score(tm) to indicate the transit friendliness of an address.
Try it yourself!
Go to WalkScore.com, enter your address, and see how you fare on these two measures of reduced automobile dependence.
Mayor McGinn appointed Bernie Matsuno as the Director of the Department of Neighborhoods on April 20th. From the news release:
Mayor Mike McGinn announced this morning the appointment of Bernie Matsuno as permanent director of the Department of Neighborhoods. Matsuno had been serving as interim director since February 1. McGinn also announced two additional personnel decisions, including a new permanent director of the Personnel Department.
Matsuno had served as interim director in 2006 under Mayor Greg Nickels before Stella Chao was hired. She also was deputy director of the Department of Neighborhoods in 2007, director of the department’s Community Building Division from 2004 to 2006, and participated in the creation of the Department of Neighborhoods and the Neighborhood Matching Fund in 1988. Most of Matsuno’s public service career has been with Neighborhoods.
“Bernie has great experience in the Department of Neighborhoods from its inception,” said McGinn. “Her experience will help all city departments engage and partner with the public in improving our communities.”
Bernie was appointed interim director in February. Matsuno replaces Stella Chao who ran the DON for four years under the Nickels and McGinn administrations.
In addition to her books, Amy is well-known for launching UrbanGardenShare.org and for her business tending edible gardens for Seattleites.
Please join City Fruit board members, a representative from the Greenwood Food Bank, volunteers, and a slew of supporters as we share an update on our activities for this year — including plans to expand the fruit tree stewards program, running our two neighborhood harvests, and growing our roster of tree care and canning classes.
We will have light munchies, wine and beer. The event is free, but without your generous contribution we will not be able to match (or exceed!) last year’s harvest of 10,000 pounds of fruit. Please consider what it means to low-income families in our community to have access to fresh, nutritious, local fruit.
A portion of all proceeds will go towards supporting City Fruit.
Details:
What: City Fruit celebration with special guest, Amy Pennington
The Seattle Police Department recently announced they secured grant funding for four neighborhood crime prevention coordinators until the end of 2011. Formerly there were six coordinators. Neil Hansen who helped many of us set up block watches, gave great tips on securing our property, and was a familiar sight at the Ballard District Council, retired a few months ago. The new coordinator for our area is Terrie Johnston.
It looks as though the Crown Hill (and Ballard) area has suffered a spate of residential burglaries in the last month (March 18th to April 18th, 2011). Just this afternoon (Monday), a neighbor on 12th (97xx block) surprised a burglar in his home. The neighbor pursued and caught the burglar on foot and was able to retrieve the burglar’s backpack in the ensuing struggle before the individual ran off.
Here are the burglary incidents detailed on the map below:
03/18/2011:Â 23xx Block of NW 85th
03/20/2011:Â 10xx Block of 11th Ave NW
03/24/2011:Â 10xx Block of 11th Ave NW
04/03/2011:Â 9xx Block of NW 96th St
04/04/2011: 14xx Block of NW 105th St
04/06/2011: 17xx Block of NW 89TH St
04/07/2011:Â 14xx Block of NW 95th
The map for Crown Hill over the last month looks like this screen shot snagged from the SPD Police Reports website. The burglaries are in green with a star-burst which resembles broken glass:
Crime Map of Crown Hill 3/18 - 4/17/2011
Normally Crown Hill is a fairly quiet enclave in the city of Seattle. Likely these crimes are the work of a small number of individuals who are moving through the neighborhood. Steps you can take to cut this crime spree short:
