SDOT Director Greg Spotts announces February resignation

SDOT Director Greg Spotts will resign February 12, he announced Tuesday morning.

“I depart the Puget Sound with great enthusiasm for Seattle’s future and profound gratitude to Mayor Harrell for the opportunity to serve a dynamic, innovative and fast growing city with unlimited potential,” he wrote in a Bluesky post. “I’m also very thankful for the community members who welcomed me so warmly.”

Spotts took over the job in September 2022 following the December 2021 departure of Sam Zimbabwe in the wake of Mayor Bruce Harrell’s election. It is common in for new mayors to bring in their own SDOT Director, though Spotts would be the first SDOT Director in a while to leave before their mayor’s term has ended. Mayor Harrell announced this week that he will seek reelection in 2025.

“On a personal level, moving to Seattle alone has been hard, particularly living so far away from my mother in CA and father in NY,” Spotts wrote. “In 2025 I will pursue professional opportunities closer to my loved ones.”

Though his time in the office was relatively short, Spotts oversaw a pivotal moment in SDOT’s history. Voters approved the largest ever transportation levy in November by a landslide (the final result was 67% in favor), giving SDOT a nod of approval that did not feel certain just a few years ago.

After a very rocky first couple years after passage of the Move Seattle levy in 2015, SDOT was in a bad place during the early years of the Jenny Durkan administration. They were failing to deliver promises, and morale was low. To make matters worse, Durkan took more than a year to select an SDOT Director after the December 2017 departure of Scott Kubly. When Zimbabwe was finally hired in January 2019, he took office in the midst of a major transportation transition. His first week was the week the Alaskan Way Viaduct closed, followed closely by a lengthy closure of the downtown transit tunnel. Zimbabwe was putting fires out left and right during his nearly three years in the position, including overseeing the emergency closure of the West Seattle Bridge one year into his term. These crises were not Zimbabwe’s fault, but he was the one who had to deal with them. As we wrote when he left in 2021, “It feels like Sam Zimbabwe never had the chance to lead the Department of Transportation without an emergency beyond his control dictating the work of the day.” Yet through it all, he was also able to get stalled projects moving and start delivering on Move Seattle promises, including major pieces of the downtown bike network.

The Harrell Administration did not wait as long as Durkan’s to pick their SDOT Director, which was a good call because SDOT still had a lot of work to do to win back the trust of voters who kept seeing delays and mishaps from their transportation department. Spotts immediately took bold stances on prioritizing safety and getting promised projects out the door. SDOT has been in project delivery overdrive ever since Spotts arrived as they raced against the clock to complete as many of the Move Seattle Levy promises they could before it expires at the end of this year. The Spotts SDOT successfully showed the city that their transportation department really can get things done.

Though early, his departure does come at a logical transition point. The Move Seattle levy is ending, and a new departmental funding regime is taking over. Hopefully Mayor Harrell does not delay in choosing a successor, because there is a lot of work to do to hire additional staff and scale up the department’s work to meet the new funding levels and workload. SDOT failed in 2016 to get a quick start, and then got pushed to the back burner in 2017 amid Mayor Ed Murray’s resignation following allegations of child abuse and sexual assault and all the turmoil from Trump’s first election. Seattle cannot afford to make the same mistake and get a slow start on its new transportation levy. There’s a lot of work to do, and only eight years to do it all.

We will update this story as we learn more.

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The Times Ed Board forgot to do the reading on the Transportation Levy

Just like they did with the 2015 Move Seattle Levy, the Seattle Times Editorial Board once again urged voters to reject the Seattle Transportation Levy. Seattle voters ignored them in 2015, approving the levy by a landslide 59–41. Let’s do it again in 2024.

Read our endorsement of Seattle’s Proposition 1 and see a breakdown of the proposed investments.

What caught my attention most in their editorial, however, was their accusation that the levy “is not an infrastructure plan as much as a political document.” Seattle is a democracy, so of course this levy is political. Every public budget and every public policy is passed by elected officials is influenced by advocates with stakes in the decision. It’s strange to hear this editorial board pretend that there was a non-political way to craft an initiative to send to voters.

Further, the politicians who crafted this levy were nearly all endorsed by the Seattle Times Editorial Board. Those politicians sought out support from important constituencies like the port, the Chamber of Commerce, major labor unions, transit boosters, and safe streets groups in an attempt to craft a levy that they would all support. That’s compromise, and it worked. All those groups representing Seattle residents and businesses are supporting the levy together, one of the few times you’ll see all these parties on the same side of a major issue. The transportation levy is an example of what the city can accomplish when everyone works together. It’s odd that the Times Editorial Board sees this unity as a bad thing.

This levy was very much not written by the big bad bicycle lobby, whose endorsed candidates did not fare well in last year’s City Council races. The Editorial Board tried to paint it that way regardless. They bemoaned that “the levy would spend $133.5 million on ‘Bicycle Safety,'” while spending “only $330 million for ‘arterial roadway maintenance’ and $67 million for pothole repairs.” The $133.5 million for bicycle safety will save lives while making up about 9% of the levy. It is a great investment that will do a lot to connect and protect bike routes across the city, but it’s not an oversized slice of the budget pie (see chart above). They also cite a survey in which 61% of respondents said Seattle was doing a good job, noting that “it’s the department’s highest score.” That’s great news. SDOT is doing something well and people have noticed it. That just confirms that our city’s bike investments are working. It makes no sense to say, “Let’s defund the things our city does well.” The Editorial Board members must not bike much if they think the city’s bike lane network is anywhere close to being complete. This same board once argued that “Seattle should be in the vanguard” of safe bike infrastructure. Well, Seattle needs the funding from this levy to get there.

Meanwhile, $397 million for paving work makes up more than a quarter of the levy and is vastly more than the city has invested in road maintenance in modern memory. It is more than the entire 2006 Bridging the Gap Levy. The paving total is more like $420 million when you add in freight projects that are also likely to be paving projects or ~$615 million when you add bridge maintenance or ~$770 million if you add together all the paving, bridge maintenance, traffic signals, freight mobility, and general road work planning.

The Editorial Board oscillates between calling the levy expensive and complaining that it does not include enough funding. They also accuse the levy of not having a plan, yet never once mention the 752-page Seattle Transportation Plan, an extensive document developed over several years incorporating tons of public feedback that is both the policy basis for the levy’s funding levels and the plan for how to invest it if voters approve it. Their editorial sounds like an essay by a student who didn’t to the reading.

The Board also cast shade on Mayor Bruce Harrell for saying that “other funds would be pulled into bridge work besides the levy” and that “it could amount to $35 million annually — but there were no guarantees.” The mayor is correct. The city consistently seeks out state and federal transportation grants, and it is never clear which grant applications will be successful or when those funds will arrive. Mayor Harrell is right to not make promises about this money because Seattle learned the hard way what happens when you rely on future uncommitted funds. The 2015 Move Seattle campaign made a bunch of promises based on the assumption that federal funding would keep arriving at a similar rate to previous years. Then Trump got elected and all but cut off funds from “sanctuary cities” like Seattle. This is one reason the Move Seattle Levy fell so far short on many promises and needed a mid-levy reset. Even without Trump, there could be a national recession or radical Republicans could take hold of the Senate, or any number of things could interrupt an anticipated flow of cash. The Editorial Board seems to be disappointed that the mayor won’t just lie to them and say the anticipated funding is guaranteed.

Perhaps the most telling sign of how out of touch the Board is on this levy is that the closest person they could find to a political opponent of the levy was one-term Councilmember Alex Pedersen, whose time as Transportation Chair was ineffective and forgettable. It is worth noting that the Seattle Transportation Plan, the basis for the 2024 levy, was almost entirely crafted during Pedersen’s time as Transportation Chair. As an observer of many Transportation Committee meetings (when he bothered to hold them since he cancelled about 25% of them in 2023 not counting holidays and budget season), I’d say he didn’t exercise his power in that role to have the kind of major influence on the plan that he could have had. But sure, now that he’s out of office he has gripes about it.

I do agree with the Times Editorial Board on one point: Seattle Transportation Levy is not big enough to accomplish everything the city needs to get done. This is why I supported the community push for an even bigger levy, though the mayor and council decided to play it a little more conservative. But even the larger version of the levy would not have been enough. The city built a ton of expensive road infrastructure over the past century without a plan to keep it maintained, and decades of under-funding this work has created an enormous backlog. The proposed levy would represent a major increase in road maintenance, but it’s going to take a long time to catch up. The city also has a lot of streets in the north and south ends that are missing sidewalks. The proposed levy includes a huge increase in the sidewalk budget and will make a big difference for many communities, but it’s still not enough to build a sidewalk everywhere that needs one.

However, the Times Editorial Board is making the same mistake that a couple Seattle Bike Blog readers expressed recently: That voters should reject this compromise levy in hopes of getting a better one later. There is no realistic path to a better levy if this one fails. If this levy is not approved on what should be a relatively friendly, high-turnout ballot, the city is not going to run an even bigger one on a future lower-turnout ballot. Whether you are hoping for more paving money or more bike lane money, neither of those things will happen if this levy does not pass in November.

Vote YES on Seattle’s Proposition 1.

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Mayor, Sen. Murray celebrate full funding for RapidRide J and Eastlake bike lanes

If there were any concerns that a controversial push to kill the planned protected bike lanes on Eastlake Ave might succeed, Senator Patty Murray and Mayor Bruce Harrell just put that idea to bed for good.

“When we’re done here, we will new and upgraded stations, miles of new transit-only lanes, as well as new protected bike lanes, which will all help connect the U District with Eastlake and South Lake Union neighborhoods all the way to downtown,” said Senator Murray during a press event Friday. “And when we’re done, this won’t just mean fewer cars on the road and less time spent in traffic, it is also going to help us lower greenhouse emissions while creating 250 jobs.”

Construction is scheduled to start “as soon as” this year. Bus service should begin in 2027, though the bike lanes will hopefully be operational before then. A more detailed construction schedule is not yet available.

The joint press conference between Seattle and federal officials celebrated the $64.2 million in Federal Transit Administration funds that will go to the project, which will also replace a water main under Eastlake Ave and repave roadways. The budget for everything, including the water main and King County Metro station services, is about $167 million from seven sources, according to the Mayor’s Office:

“$64.2 million from the FTA Small Starts Grant and an additional $9.6 million from the Federal Highway Administration. In addition to the federal funding, the Washington State Department of Transportation and the University of Washington will each contribute $6 million to the project. The City will provide $43 million, mostly from the Levy to Move Seattle. Seattle Public Utilities also plans to invest an additional $28 million to build a new water main, which will be completed at the same time but is considered a separate project. In addition to providing daily bus service, Metro is contributing over $10 million toward station amenities and staff resources.”

Since its inception, the RapidRide J project both shrunk in length and ballooned in scope. While it was once envisioned as a rapid bus line from downtown to Northgate Station, the northern terminus was cut back to U District Station as costs came into focus. But the scope of work, including the water main and roadway rebuild work, dramatically increased the full project cost. Cost increases like these (as well as the RapidRide G project on E Madison Street) threw a wrench in Seattle’s plans for build so-called “multimodal corridor” projects in nearly every neighborhood using funds from the 2015 Move Seattle Levy.

The project has also been heavily delayed. Our first story about the project (known then as the Roosevelt to Downtown High Capacity Transit project) was published nine years ago, and the target opening was 2021. A 2017 cost estimate pegged the downtown to 45th Street segment at $42.4 million in 2016 dollars, but did not include the pricey water main or roadway rebuild work. By 2017, the project was trimmed back to only reach Roosevelt Station and was estimated to cost $70 million. In 2019, the cost estimate had increased to $85.7 million, and the team added the roadway rebuild work for another $29.8 million just for Eastlake Ave. They were still targeting a 2024 completion and service start as recently as 2019. In 2020, the city officially cut the length back to its current scope and started a years-long environmental review and final design process, all of which was made more difficult due to the pandemic. By the end of all that, the project emerged in its current state with construction slated to begin this year and open for service in 2027.

Though the negatives of “scope creep” are clear, including increased costs and delays, there are also benefits. If water main and road rebuilding work are needed anyway, it makes sense to do that work at the same time as the transit and bike project so that crews don’t need to tear up the same street twice. But if Seattle wants to reach its transit and bike route improvement goals, the city needs to find ways to do so on a faster timeline and lower budget. Deciding when to go for the all-out rebuild versus targeted discrete improvements is difficult. The city cannot afford to use the RapidRide J/G method on every street. The next transportation levy will need to do a better job accounting for all these costs while also helping the city decide where faster and lower-cost options are more appropriate.

Video of the press event:

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