GAIT: Getting Around Issaquah Together

Despite it being the first weekend of May, this is the April trash walk. We’ll be cleaning up the Sammamish Trail where it runs along the north side of SE 56th Street (otherwise known as NW Sammamish Road). Meet at 9am on Saturday by the plantings at the wacky intersection where SR-900 comes into 56th across from Arco and Tully’s/PCC/Holiday Inn. This map shows the spot. We’ll work our way east from there. I’ll have a few trash grabbers, a couple of brooms, and bags. You should bring some gloves and any other implements of destruction you might need. There are some swampy bits that may need attention so if you have rubber boots then wear or bring them. We’ll work for at least an hour and no more than two. Hope to see you!

Normally we’d be having a meeting this Wednesday night (third Wednesday), but we’re going to skip that for this month. Instead here are a couple of other opportunities to do GAIT stuff in the next few weeks.

This Saturday 4/18 GAIT will have a table at the city’s Earth Day event in the Pickering Barn during the farmers’ market. If you want to spend some time talking to people about walk/bike/bus transportation and GAIT, I could use some company and help.

Next Saturday 4/25 GAIT will again have a table in the barn, this time for the Hobby and Volunteer Fair. I could use help at this event too, so let me know if you have some time that day.

The last Saturday is usually our trash walk day, but it’s being pre-empted by Hobby and Volunteer Fair. Instead we’ll do our next GAIT Trash Walk on Saturday 5/2. The location this time is the Sammamish Trail which is the trail that runs along the north side of SE 56th Street by the soccer fields across from PCC and Costco. I’ll send a reminder a few days before identifying our starting point.

Wednesday 4/29 at 7pm in the Eagle Room at the police station is another opportunity to find out about the new group Sustainable Issaquah. At the earlier kick-off meeting, groups formed to start a community garden, to work on home energy efficiency, to promote local businesses, as well as several other focus areas.

Monday 5/4 at 7:30pm at the City Council’s regular meeting, the city will be holding a public hearing on the draft 2010-2015 Transportation Improvement Program. This is the list of projects the city hopes to build in the next five years. You can view the draft plan and a map.

Hope to see you at some of these events!

CTC is the Council Transportation Committee. They’re meeting on a strange day this month: Tuesday 4/14 5pm at CHNW (City Hall NW)

Here are the agenda items of interest:

• ITS Enhancements – 2009 projects (ITS is the city’s “Intelligent Transportation System” traffic monitoring program)
• 2010-2015 Six-Year Transportation Improvement Program (TIP) (This is where big expensive projects get planned)
• AB 5956 SE Bypass Project Final Record of Decision (Yes, they’re still trying to get this put to bed.)
• Project Updates (These are current project status reports)
  • Newport Way W of SR 900
  • SR 900 WSDOT Widening
  • I-90 Undercrossing
  • SR-900 Pedestrian Overcrossing of I-90

I know the time is extremely inconvenient, but if any of this stuff looks interesting to you I urge you to join me in attending.