News and Analysis

I just attended a fantastic event here in Bellevue about food robotics, with a discussion of Moto Pizza (which you can try at Bellevue Square) and how area innovators enabled them to automate and are taking the next steps to create even more flexible food handling automation. With this inspiration, here’s an overview of some food-related items around Bellevue .  

In December, the Seattle Times reported that Amazon may run an Amazon Now site out of 12368 Northrup Way and provide 30 minute delivery using gig drivers to zip codes 98004 in Bellevue and 98033 in Kirkland. Unfortunately, I don’t see an update on their progress, but it looks like a great location for speedy access to many parts of Bellevue. I will note that this coverage preceded the recent changes in direction on Amazon Fresh and Amazon Go, so I don’t know if it’s intended to replace them or will also be swept up in the cancellation. 

If you’re interested in Amazon’s food delivery, you may be interested in certain episodes of The Feed podcast that I found enjoyable: 

https://creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/thefeedglobal/episodes/013–Vertically-integrated-food-delivery-with-Chris-Baggott-of-ClusterTruck-e11c01l

https://creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/thefeedglobal/episodes/124–Reimagining-sustainable-online-grocery-with-Cristina-Berta-Jones-of-Picnic-e2mgfm9

https://creators.spotify.com/pod/profile/thefeedglobal/episodes/157–Live-discussion-on-Amazons-omnichannel-grocery-strategy-e3btfnc

In Bellevue, we’re fortunate to have options close to the former Amazon Fresh and Amazon Go, so I’m not concerned that this decision will create food deserts. There’s always some level of turnover; the T&T Supermarket opened just over a year ago, and others appear to be on the chopping block. The QFC on 8th in Downtown will be bulldozed for the Pinnacle South project (and replaced with a smaller store in Pinnacle North), and H Mart is set to become Main Street Place. 

Once the HOMA upzoning Bellevue is working on now takes effect, the QFC in Northtowne and the S-Mart in Newport Hills seem likely to be redeveloped. In Crossroads, the India Metro Hypermarket, La Superior, European Grocery, and Grocery Outlet could all be redeveloped to 10 stories. The Walmart by 150th could be replaced by 8 stories, the T&T Supermarket and Target in Factoria (and the former Amazon Fresh) could be replaced by 16 stories, the QFC there could be replaced by 5-6 stories, and the Southgate Oriental Grocery by 10 stories.  Eastgate Plaza’s Safeway and QFC, as well as the ExtraMile and Jacksons Food Store could be replaced with 10 story buildings. IFB Market by the Lake Hills Library could be replaced with 8 stories, and I’m not sure what height will be allowed at the QFC in Lake Hills (it’s included on some maps too, but the StoryMap with details you can zoom in on has been taken down). Note: the maps (here and here) are from a October 8th Planning Commission meeting, so they say 7 stories, but that category was upgraded to 8 stories in the January 28th meeting. 

 Part of the HOMA discussion is how significant the incentives for including grocery should be, and how long the dedication to that use will be required to remain in place. On January 28th, the Planning Commission amended the HOMA plan to provide a 25 year limit on the grocery covenant, provided that at the end there is a transition to use with a similar level of public benefit, or fee payment. Developers were also requesting a 3:1 ratio instead of 1:1 as the incentive to put in a grocery store in the first place, but that sweetener failed on a 3:4 vote.

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There will be a Safe Speeds Bellevue information-only presentation, but members of the public have the opportunity to weigh in during the Oral Communications portion of the meeting (based on the agenda materials provided online). You can either sign up now or just show up at the meeting, and you also have the option to participate online or in-person at City Hall.

The map of proposed speed limit changes will affect many streets that are currently 30 mph+, and there may also be spillover to nearby local streets. There is also an item on the agenda about funding, which will include quite a few speed bumps, but I haven’t seen a map for those.

You may also recall that the city’s Transportation staff recently did a major outreach effort about locations where we may install speed cameras. The current program is listed here, and seven more cameras (Bellevue Way SE, Coal Creek Parkway SE, two on Forest Drive SE, 116th Avenue NE, 148th Avenue NE and NE 8th Street – see first map) will be installed in 2026, with a number of other locations identified for future years. The speed camera program was discussed at City Council on December 2nd, 2025.

It is disappointing that the camera outreach and survey was not conducted when the public would be able to see it in context with these big changes for the speed limits, but I’m generally a supporter of camera enforcement. It will be interesting to see in the presentation tonight what legwork has been done for the Safe Speeds program to make sure that such sweeping changes won’t cause problems, and also see what the expected timeline is.

Since this is only an informational presentation, I don’t think the Transportation Commission will be asked their opinion on the speed limit changes. I hope the community can still be heard about the importance of adding traffic-calming to local streets in parallel with any arterial changes, in order to avoid new cut-through traffic.

See camera maps below:

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During the middle housing debate, something that appeared to be true to me was that the housing urbanists** didn’t understand the implications of the proposal, since they were advocating so strongly for rules that would allow 10,000+ sqft duplexes, among other things – it seemed off-brand.  

An article that came out in November suggests that I was wrong about this, since the question in Clyde Hill’s case was specifically about the possibility of 5000 sqft “cottages” and their article still expressed a preference for that in the strongest terms, rather than a rule allowing a more typical cottage size that would be much more affordable. (It also seems possible there’s just a general antipathy toward Clyde Hill and the people who live there. Remember, there was a different Urbanist article last summer where they and Bainbridge Island were callously referred to as a “crash-test dummies“.)

There’s a similar situation that arose in Bellevue, with multiple 9-unit buildings that were built as part of a single project (to avoid triggering the 10 unit requirements for affordable housing). This was discussed in a December 10th Planning Commission meeting (Slide 11 of the presentation, timestamp 17:00-17:30) and the fix to address this will just be put in during the next code update that’s somewhat related.

Bellevue also has an emergency option called an Interim Official Control, which is authorized by state law under RCW 36.70A.390 (Clyde Hill mentions both that and RCW 35A.63.220 as supporting their interim zoning control).

In a recent example, we’ve used an IOC to add density (Ordinances 6736/6760/6785), but the IOC in Ordinance 6903 that will be considered by the City Council next week will put a hold on changes to the character of the Old Bellevue section of Main St between 100th and Bellevue Way. This IOC focuses on facade retention rather than reducing the overall scale of any new buildings, and this is also in the context of HOMA densification* that also appears likely in the near term.

This looks like a good use of the IOC option, and it will be interesting to hear the Council’s discussion on Tuesday!

*If you would like to see things I’ve written about HOMA, there are some summaries in the newsletter archives, which can be found using the link on the upper right. I did also comment on HOMA at the January 25th Planning Commission meeting to draw commissioners’ attention to SB 6026, which might upend Bellevue’s plans to balance commercial and residential growth as we enable housing in areas that have held retail centers and offices.

** In contrast, I consider myself a “generalist urbanist” because I care about creating wide sidewalks, retaining tree canopy, EV ready middle housing, better apartment noise-proofing, adequate off-street parking in neighborhoods, and promoting commercial space for small businesses to thrive. All of these things in Bellevue have recently been attacked by the housing urbanists because they *do* make it more expensive to build housing, but I believe they still have value for making Bellevue a place that people will feel fortunate to live in.

One more note: if you have commented on this site, please try also to reach out to me by email so I can let it through the spam filter, which has been somewhat deluged.

Added Note: I haven’t watched the meeting recording on YouTube yet, but it was surprising during the public comment that there were multiple property owners who appeared to be blind-sided by this proposal, and said that they’d only found out the morning of Feb 10th. There was an article you can find here that came out about it 2 months ago.

https://www.reddit.com/r/BellevueWA/comments/1pev8zo/mayor_scrambles_to_protect_character_of_old/

Added Note 2 (2/12/26): An update from the February 10th meeting has been added on The Urbanist.

The Link’s Crosslake Connection was just announced yesterday as starting on March 28th. Is it a surprise? Not really. Back in September, the bus schedules partially shifted in recognition of the upcoming Crosslake service, and the dates on the bus schedules issued back then say that they’re effective through March 27th.

So here’s the PSA: A new bus system map and service frequency is in the works for the Eastside, and I hope you’ll take a look to see whether any of these changes might affect you. They may make it easier or harder for you to reach a Link station or change the desirability of using the bus on its own.

https://kingcounty.gov/en/dept/metro/programs-and-projects/east-link-connections

One example is the 271.  In Bellevue, this will be “replaced” by the 270 and 220, but the 270 will go north along Bellevue Way to the 520, skipping Clyde Hill (which will then get half-hourly, meandering 249 service to Spring District instead of a direct connection to UW), and the 220 will cross 405 on Main Street instead of NE 4th, so it will have less coverage along 116th and travel on 112th instead. Newport Way will still be served by the 203 route, and Issaquah will be served by the 218 bus, which will start at the Highlands P&R and end at the Mercer Island Link Station, rather than going all the way to Seattle.  There is a segment of W. Lake Sammamish Parkway and NW Sammamish Road where service will not be replaced. 

Many riders will also care about the bus frequency and hours. While I don’t think the 240 bus is having additional modifications to its route, there will be an increase in service to four buses per hour instead of three, as well as service every half hour all night.  Many riders may not be using the Link at all, but hopefully they’ll have a better experience in Newport Hills just from the bus service increase.

I know it’s not easy to look at this and tell where the modifications are. For instance, on the B Line, there is a note saying that the route should now be more direct, but the shape of the route looks approximately the same as it is now (individual bus stops are not identified), so it’s possible that any changes to the route were part of the first round of changes* that took effect at the beginning of September. It appears from a quick scan that B line service on weekend evenings will be reduced by 1-2 buses per hour, and there may be other changes I didn’t notice.  

Keep an eye out for other swaps as well. There will still be a 249 bus going south of Downtown, but the northern section of its current route along Bellevue Way up to 520 will be served by the 270 instead, and it seems likely that some current 556 riders will switch to that as well.

When you look at the buses listed on the East Link Connections, you may need to open multiple individual route pdfs to figure out where the transfer points might be. Also, the current route maps are labeled but not to scale and the new maps are to scale but not labeled. I’m looking forward to using Google Maps, but right now when I search for a transit ride in April, it still shows me the existing bus routes. I don’t think they will update it until a new bus map is officially published. To see the changes at a glance, it might be easiest to compare the current system map with the map shown below, which you can find here.

Really, we don’t know for sure what will be happening until the new bus routes are released. The East Link Connections webpage has been a great resource for long-term conceptualization of what to expect, but if people have concerns with the proposed changes, it’s still possible they’d be willing to modify the plan. I hope you’ll take a look at the planned service for your area and let them know right away if you have concerns! You can use haveasay@kingcounty.gov to reach out to the East Link Connections team.

* Edit: I went back and looked at the revisions map, and actually, the B Line did not change in September. It’s possible there are some small changes still to come that I just had a hard time seeing. I’ve also added more info and links above.

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in this description and opportunity for feedback that was posted by STB.

Sound Transit’s 2026 Service Plan (Phase 4)

It looks like the changes to 550, 556, and 554 may not happen right away. There is information on the Annual Service Plan page, which says: “Below is an updated summary of ST Express route proposals that would be implemented beginning in fall 2026. Routes highlighted in the chart below have been updated since the last engagement period. [appears that that was November 7, 2025]”

https://www.soundtransit.org/system-expansion/planning-future-service/2026-service-plan

Over the next 20 years, Bellevue is planning for an additional 35,000 housing units. We don’t have that capacity with our utilities and roadways now, but we hope to support these with utilities we’ll soon be developing plans for. That’s 0.58 units for each of the ~60,000 current homes. 

About half of Bellevue’s residences (~30,000) are in multifamily buildings, and the zoned capacity for additional multifamily was estimated in the Comprehensive Plan FEIS (if you look at pages 69 and 1253 of the Comp Plan FEIS pdf, it appears that the non-suburban areas of Bellevue have a theoretical capacity of 322,000 homes. This is then multiplied by 25% before it is counted toward the total of 152,000 new units that were studied in the FEIS.  

This capacity will be bumped up by HOMA, which is having a Planning Commission hearing on December 10th. HOMA will allow 25′ taller buildings and is likely to mean buildings will ask for reduced building setbacks. A recently approved project (Pinnacle North) taking advantage of the IOC that HOMA is modeled after increased their number of units by 30% using these incentives. HOMA may have even greater impacts in the neighborhood shopping centers, which are getting a more significant multiplier through an increased number of floors.  

In the lower density areas of Bellevue, which also have approximately 30,000 homes, every house will be able to be replaced by at least eight units, though some lots could have more. For lots within 1/4 mile walking distance of the growth centers, 24 individually rentable sleeping units will be allowed on each lot.  The “infinite cottages” provision will most affect the areas with larger lots, since the number allowed per lot is simply proportional to the lot area and the size of the cottages – on a 3/4 acre lot that was formerly R-1, you’d be allowed to have 19 cottages that are 1500 sqft + 300 sqft of garage/storage. 

In the discussions about our capacity, there had been two items limiting density: CC&Rs in HOA neighborhoods and the Intensity Factor reductions in density that were supposed to apply when there are streams and wetlands, etc. occupying part of the site.  It would be typical to allow half as many units on a parcel that is half wetland buffer or half steep slopes, but this element is being removed in the Critical Areas Ordinance that the city is finalizing on December 9th. There are some lots that were only allowed to have construction based on a Reasonable Use Exception, and now that exception will permit multiunit buildings. It’s effectively a selective upzone of areas that are more environmentally sensitive, since it doesn’t add density to the non-environmentally sensitive areas of Bellevue. 

The second item, CC&Rs, depends on active enforcement by the neighboring homeowners, and in the Affordable Housing Strategy survey, which closed on Dec 4th, there was mention of streamlining lot-splitting and “addressing” CC&Rs to enable middle housing there.

In order to enable this growth, we are also cutting back our environmental laws and taking the teeth out of the tree code – leaving us in a far worse place than if we’d just kept the original 30% tree retention requirement. Having lived in Hawaii, which I think of as our climate future, I can tell you that going for a run in a neighborhood with big houses and an arms race of AC use is noticeably oppressive compared to a run in a neighborhood with lots of old trees where people are able to use natural ventilation for cooling. Some say that density is intended to help the environment, but when the middle housing rules were created, they deliberately left out the EV-ready requirement, even though it would have likely saved the new homeowners money and helped them choose an EV car.

Circling back to what Bellevue is planning capacity for in the next 20 years, if we were to allow an increase of ten units for every existing unit, that would mean your upzone gives you a 1 in 17 chance (10/0.58 = ~17) you’ll actually get to build what you’re theoretically allowed to sometime in the next 20 years. At a steady rate of growth, we could reach full buildout in the year 2365. It doesn’t seem like much to base a higher land valuation on, if you ask me. I also think Bellevue should be in the business of keeping our promises when people invest in us, and we should not mislead people by telling them their properties are zoned for X if we can’t deliver on that.   

Thinking about it a different way, Seattle had 385,000 housing units in 2022, Tacoma has about 95,000, Bellingham has over 45,000, and these are likely to add up to less than the zoned capacity within Bellevue (we’ll see how the CAO vote goes this week and then the CC&Rs over time). We’ll probably only be capable of adding a bit more than a Redmond, however (32,000 housing units in 2020).

My takeaway is simple – we don’t need to build on or next to our wetlands to make room for people, and if we do build on wetlands, those people are much more at risk from rain events like the one we are expecting to hit us this week.

The Council meeting on Tuesday night will feature a study session on the Curb Pricing Study recommendations: 10am-8pm in Old Bellevue, Downtown, Wilburton, Spring District, and BelRed (see map on page 48 for actual boundaries; Old Bellevue includes all of Wildwood Dog Park and BelRed is smaller than you’d expect). This proposal does not cover payment for loading zone use, though that’s been talked about in the past. 

The new curb pricing plans will completely reshape the city’s experience with parking. If you have your car out overnight, you’ll now be able to leave it until 1pm, though you’ll have to pay the meter starting at 10am. Free parking won’t start until 8pm, since the peak times are lunch and dinner.  

It is expected to break even on the $1.6M cost within a year, and $2.3M in annual net revenue thereafter (page 35) can pay for curb enhancements for pedestrians, wayfinding, and ADA on-street parking spots. It should also pay for enhanced enforcement, including occasional enforcement in adjacent RPZs. This is only the city’s portion of the cost, however; as people start trying to find free parking in library, park, mall, and small business lots, adjustments will be needed for enforcement there or to add parking gates. 

Page 27 says time limits would be enforced at parks in the downtown area (but there’s no mention of walk-offs). Page 36 does not include these in areas where there would be an hourly parking cost. I am not sure if current park parking utilization rates and park users vs. walk offs were evaluated in the study

When the data was collected to determine the need for curb pricing, around 25% of cars in 2 hr zones were observed to be staying over 3 hours (page 5 of 158). This means that the target occupancy might be reachable with enforcement only, but it is expensive and cannot break even when tickets are only $54. Tickets might need to triple to break even (page 28), and it’s unclear whether these are set by King County and/or will be the same after curb pricing is implemented. 

This curb pricing outreach effort was extremely thorough and might be a good example for other city policy changes to follow.

What do you think of this plan? You can email City Council now or come to the meeting this week and speak in the public comment.

Tuesday, December 2nd

City Council, 6pm (link)

There will be 30 minutes for public comment; speaker sign-up starts at noon (link)

If you’d like to find out about agenda items like this a little earlier, please consider signing up for the newsletter using the link in the upper right.

The two main topics that will be discussed at City Council on Tuesday are the Diversity Advantage Plan 2035 and the Sign Code. This is a very early conversation about the Sign Code, but we can already see quite a few survey responses that give a sense of what the community would like to see included. It is on the Council agenda as an informational study session presentation.

You can see that the proposed code is just a barebones outline right now, but there is expected to be a draft in Q1 2026. There are many possibilities for structuring the code to respond to the feedback in the survey; see below for some I’ve brainstormed, and please add your own.

I’m emailing my list to Council and the planner in charge of this project, who will be presenting on Tuesday night and whose contact info is listed at the project webpage. If you’d like to talk about this or any other subject that will be coming before City Council in the next 60 days, you’ll be prioritized during the 30 minutes for Oral Communications at the beginning of each Council meeting (sign up for Oral Communications at noon on the day of the meeting).

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Correction: This week’s Council meeting is on Wednesday because of the holiday. Apologies for the mixup on dates!

There will be two opportunities for the public to comment – First, on anything that’s not budget related during the 30 minutes for Oral Communications at the start of the meeting, and second, on budget-related items during the Public Hearing later in the meeting. I especially hope people are paying attention to the Critical Areas Ordinance changes and how they might harm Bellevue’s environment!

Here is a slightly modified excerpt from this week’s newsletter:

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Update: As of 11/18, the path is open along NE 12th and the sidewalk on 112th in front of the new fire station is still closed. Bike markings have been added to the street, and it is starting to look more finished.

Note: I spoke too soon – the pedestrian closure is in place again as of 11/11/25. I’ll add a clarification if I get any more info from the city.

Pedestrians and cyclists are celebrating the reopening of the NE 12th multipurpose path between 110th and 112th, which was fenced off in July due to work related to the new Fire Station #10. It is an important segment in the protected bike connection between Spring District and the north side of Downtown Bellevue.

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In the discussion about added height under HOMA, I’ve written a bit previously, but since the pedestrian core concept was recently misunderstood at a candidate forum, I’d like to clarify what I’m envisioning. 

When neighbors of one of the larger upzone spots (which currently has surface parking that separates the arterial from the covered pedestrian walkway at the front of the shops) questioned whether the changes would be “neighborhood-serving” with all the adjacent parking removed, it made me imagine the experience of walking from shop to shop. 

As a pedestrian, I do not think it is relaxing or desirable for the sidewalk to be sandwiched between the building and an arterial road with a fast stream of cars.  While “shopping streets” can have storefronts adjacent to the sidewalk, these are usually much smaller, with fewer cars that are traveling slower and conditions that permit jay-walking safely. Sidewalks around the outside of a block also make sense if they are part of a street grid, whereas HOMA seems to be proposing many isolated upzones. 

Here is a snippet of the map for Crossroads to show how scattered some of the additional height is; the bus stop locations were added by me. As a side note, the blue parcel at the top center appears to be wetland/stream, so I’m not sure if all the possible upzones are final.

In a letter to Planning Commission (Written Communications, page 6), I said we should start by designing this from the perspective of a transit user, with the goal that transit riders have an experience that’s just as nice as people who drive.  There should be enough room along the arterial side of the parcel for a bus stop to be provided, and the project should deed land for the pull-out to the city if necessary so that traffic along the street isn’t impeded.  We should combine bus location monitoring technology with signage that uses green/yellow/red lights to let rideshares, Metro Flex, and other drop-off drivers know when they can also use this curb space. 

This bus stop node should then lead to the pedestrian core of the facility. The pedestrian core could be oriented about 90 degrees from the arterial road it fronts, and the idea is that this would have shops on both sides (or shops on one side and the residential building on the other) and no cars whizzing by. The HOMA process is considering minimum amounts of ground-level space for stores, residential lobbies, etc., which are referred to as active uses. It is important that these active uses don’t have to have “street frontage” to be counted, and ideally they’d actually get extra credit if not pushed up against the arterial. 

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