Ryan Packer
Ryan Packer has been writing for The Urbanist since 2015, and currently reports full-time as Contributing Editor. Their beats are transportation, land use, public space, traffic safety, and obscure community meetings. Packer has also reported for other regional outlets including BikePortland, Seattle Met, and PubliCola. They live in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle.
The City of Kenmore was the first city to pass a resolution officially opposing Initiative 2117. Others have followed, but big cities like Seattle and Bellevue have not weighed in.
A bike and pedestrian tunnel underneath 10th Avenue E has been restored after advocates fought a cost-costing move to drop it from highway lid plans in North Capitol Hill,
Cities across the country are ditching arbitrary requirements around how many parking spaces must be built with new housing, but Spokane is the first major Washington city to take the plunge. Will others follow?
The Seattle Department of Transportation has wrapped up work on a new bike connection between Judkins Park and Mount Baker. Its roots can be traced back to a vision the Seattle City Council moved forward in 2019.
It had looked like the idea of reallocating street space to bike lanes was off the table in Bellevue, but a city council discussion last week restarted the debate.
Progressive urbanists appear poised to flip a Seattle City Council seat, win the Pierce County Executive race, and expand their caucus in the state legislature.
Despite backers collecting enough signatures to make the ballot, the Seattle City Council voted Tuesday to delay a decision on I-137, which would fund Seattle's Social Housing Developer.
Offering a bold vision for Downtown Seattle that could include as many as 7,800 new homes, King County has released a full strategic plan for how it might redevelop its civic campus.