Rain. Alex Pederson Town Hall. Disability

RantWoman is exactly the sort of transportation nerd who will get on a bus on a dark and stormy night, journey through Amazonia at rush hour, and sit for two hours at a public hearing about transit and parking and  community.

Thanks partly to Nephew's great experience at TOPS, and to other travel patterns, RantWoman has very positive views about the Eastlake neighborhood. RantWoman does not in the least regret spending a recent evening at TOPS School listening to newly elected Seattle City Council member Alex Pederson dodge and deflect and even sometimes provide answers to attendees' questions about Eastlake and the RapidRide J line. Also on the agenda: parking and bike lanes.

Full disclosure going in:

RantWoman, a transit-dependent non-driver is basically anti-parking--UNTIL someone reminds her increased stop spacing on the Rapid Ride lines does make it harder for people with mobility limitations to use those buses. RantWoman thinks adding some kind of neighborhood circulator to the conversation would be a great start.

RantWoman does not presume to know as much about where protected bike lanes should be as the bicycle advocates. However as a bus passenger with limited vision RantWoman sometimes finds it scary to be on a bus with a bicyclist in front of the bus.

Here we get to the evening of the event.
RantWoman did not formulate any questions. That turned out not to be a calamity because the situation once again required RantWoman to be a bit of a bitch about sound and audio: if one sits off to the side and yells "Please use the mic" every time someone in the audience cannot be heard or everytime someone at the front of the room forgets to use the mic or forgets to repeat an audience member's question, that behavior probably gets in the way of having space for one's other legit questions anyway.

RantWoman here collects some links about the event.

Cyclists Pack Eastlake Town Hall The C is for Crank

RantWoman notes many tweets from The Urbanist but a fast check did not yield any whole articles at TheUrbanist.org

RantWoman found CM Pederson's presentation confusing in one respect: he spoke of the Move Seattle Levy and Transportation Benefit District. Both relate to funding but RantWoman found it hard to relate the different modes of travel under discussion to one or the other or both of these funding streams. The event's intro mentioned CM Pederson's previous experience with fiscal accountability so RantWoman hopes that future meetings will be a little clearer about why the funding streams are in the conversation, what projects are connected with each one.

RantWoman promised the Twitterverse some comments about disability and accessibility. RantWoman promises to be an equal opportunity ranter.

1. RantWoman does not track names very well but noticed in tweets ahead of the event a moment of what RantWoman would call "disability policing" in reference to a member of the Eastlake Community Council who appears to be able-bodied. A tweet says he does not have a disabled parking placard even though he talks a lot about parking as benefit for people with disabilities. Hello. Hidden disabilities are a thing. Maybe he has a family member with a mobility impairment. Maybe he is aging and cannot walk very far and wants places to park instead of , say, stops on a neighborhood circulator bus. In any case, please spare RantWoman the disability policing from others.

2. Reading urls and emails ath the beginning or at the end of an event or both are a HUGE #Accessibility measure. The Google exists of course, but some people cannot spell or can write something down more easily than type it in.

3. Movable mic systems cost less than $1000 and might be a good investment.

4. RantWoman suggests that CM Pederson and others who want to attend his events check with lawyers about first amendment issues in connection with the content of people's signs. RantWoman also thinks bolder print on signs would be awesome.

5. Note to self: check out what defines whether a meeting such as the Eastlake community council is a public meeting.