News and Analysis

The headlines usually say that the Grand Connection “has been funded,” but even with the recent progress on generating $41M (in present value dollars) through the Tax Increment Financing (TIF), and the allocation of $2M from the federal government, there’s still a big gap in covering this $200-225M project. I attended the recent special meeting of the City Council on May 20th where the TIF was approved, and I was the only member of the public present. This level of public engagement is not in line with the budget impacts these decisions will have on Bellevue’s future, so I wanted to share more info before the City Council votes to award the Grand Connection work to contractors on June 2nd. 

The city’s current plan is to activate the previously approved Transportation Benefit District (TBD) sales tax to fund approximately 40 percent (approximately $141.4 million) of the Grand Connection Crossing total cost (principal and interest associated with debt issuance). Additional funds would be from Tier 2 funding sources (philanthropic private funds and dedicated/specific funds of the city) representing approximately 36 percent of the total Grand Connect Crossing cost (approximately $127.8 million). TIF would support the remaining amount 24 percent of the total costs ($84.4 million, present value $41.0 million) (see pages 8 and 81 of the Final Project Analysis). 

By activate, it means Bellevue will start charging an additional 0.1% sales tax. Approximately half of the TBD sales tax revenue might go to supporting the Grand Connection if we assume a consistent amount is used for bond payments over the 25 years, and there might still be another ~$5M annually for other transportation needs in Bellevue.  

That $127.8M is a big chunk of the project cost, so it would be nice to know how much of that will come from donations and how much from city funds. There is a group called Friends of the Grand Connection that is responsible for raising philanthropic funds to support the project. It is should be considered, though, that any funds raised may reduce contributions toward other important projects in Bellevue. For instance, Amazon donated $5M toward the $43M cost of the Wilburton Trestle work. 

The dedicated/specific city funds category might mean that funds which would have gone to other sidewalk and bike route projects will instead be used for the Grand Connection. In the context of recent spending on similar improvements, the 10-block stretch of multiuse path in progress along 100th Ave NE will cost $8.3M, and the widened path on the south side of Main St. between 108th and 112th is $2.7M.  There was also a recent allocation of $748k for the Urban Core Bike Network Connections Phase 1 work (Council mtg 4/28/26), which can be compared with the Bike Bellevue plans to see how construction prices are trending (I think this last one is an example of state grant funding that might be less affected by Grand Connection spending).  On the revenue side, the curb pricing plan to charge people to park on the street is expected to raise $2.3M annually (Council mtg 12/2/25) toward curbside, wayfinding, and ADA improvements.  The new speed cameras will also generate some revenue.

The obvious alternative would be to make a deal with Sound Transit for the segment between Downtown Bellevue and Wilburton, so that any fare enforcement that would have happened there is instead shifted to the adjacent segments, and some staffing is present to monitor for excess usage (there could be a rule that only one round-trip per hour is free). There would need to be improved signage showing the arrival of the next train and amenities like coffee windows and planted pathways on the Wilburton side to provide a sense of place for people to linger between trains, as well as ground-level and elevated connections to the new buildings. This wouldn’t provide connectivity after Link operating hours, but there might be an extension of BellHop service to cover that, and I’m not sure how many people would use the crossing in the dark anyway. The piece that would be hard to replace is the connectivity for bikes. Right now, there’s a new multiuse path along Main St (just rode on it for the first time this week!) that will provide a safe but somewhat steep route for cyclists getting off the Link at the East Main Station, and the Grand Connection of course connects to the Link at the Downtown Station. During non-peak hours, it’s easy to take a bike on the train, but as the train becomes more crowded, it may be necessary to add additional cars for cyclists to ride comfortably, and Sound Transit should probably start ordering more train cars now if we anticipate this need.  

I could be persuaded that the Grand Connection is the right thing for Bellevue, but I think there should have been a vigorous discussion about it with the context made clear, and this short summary doesn’t even cover the other transportation needs that Bellevue anticipates needing funds for. 

Bellevue has had no shortage of big decisions in the works, but I haven’t always had time to make a post here or elsewhere about them. Instead, I cover them in the weekly newsletter, and if you’re not signed up, you’d be likely to miss some.

Tonight, Council will initiate work on a major upzoning of existing housing around Crossroads and Factoria, to what is essentially R-60 zoning, and there will also be flexibility for planned unit developments and a big upzone for Overlake Farm (equivalent to R-15, so maybe 600 homes). It’s not a done deal, but speaking up early in the process may help community concerns to be factored in early on. There is also an item about upzoning the Factoria QFC and AMC and adjacent parcels to 110 feet, but that is on the Consent Calendar, so that decision is likely to be finalized tonight without any discussion.

Planning Commission will have their hearing on Wednesday for the Omnibus changes, which will disallow single family homes in some areas (formerly R-10 through R-30), significantly reduce tree requirements (by 60% plus) in some other neighborhoods (formerly R-2.5 zoning), and streamline the project approval process for some major projects. There are some building separation changes that will only affect certain residents, and lots of other tweaks. I would be surprised if there’s much pushback, since these were first announced in the beginning of April, and many community members still don’t know about them, but that also means that if you can attend the public hearing, your voice could have a disproportionate impact.

If you’re interested in seeing more about either of these topics, you can find the newsletter archives from the Newsletter link in the upper right.

There were also some big decisions last week that affected our budget – moving forward with the Tax Increment Finance tool to collect money for the $200-225M Grand Connection project; assumed future revenue will be the basis for creating bonds, with anticipated bond amounts of $75 million in 2026; $80 million in 2027, and $75 million in 2028. Council also voted on $9.5M for the KidsQuest move. There was also an Environmental Services Commission meeting with early steps toward increasing residents’ utility bills by lowering the fees paid in by developers.

The newsletter also includes the latest version of the Event Calendar and the Get Involved pages, but you can always come to this site for the most recent versions of those; they’re updated continuously as items come across my desk.

On February 24th, City Council had a preliminary vote to move forward with a proposal for HOMA upzones across the city, and an another vote that finalizes the plan will be happening on March 17th. 

Housing Opportunity in Mixed-use Areas (HOMA) is a Council-initiated plan to promote residential capacity. Many of the growth-related changes are coming from the state legislature, but HOMA is specific to Bellevue only.  Density will be added through rezoning, increasing heights of the zoning categories, reducing setbacks, increasing the allowable footprint of buildings, eliminating stepbacks for the upper floors, etc. 

HOMA will affect neighborhood centers (Northtowne, Newport Hills, Lake Hills) and also Eastgate, Crossroads and Factoria. It is separate from work that was recently done for Wilburton and middle housing in neighborhoods and also separate from planning that is in progress for BelRed and Evans Plaza. 

By adding height in mixed use areas, HOMA means big changes for the properties with grocery stores that Bellevue residents depend on. If the maximum height at a neighborhood center is changed from 20 to 60 feet, it is much more likely to get a new building. There would be even taller buildings allowed in the Factoria, Crossroads, and Eastgate areas (8, 10, and 16 stories), as well as at scattered locations across the city.  

It has been worked on by the planning staff for over a year, but substantive changes have been made quite recently.  At the end of January, Planning Commission decided the height of the MU-7 (mixed-use) category should be increased to allow 8 story buildings instead, so it will be called MU-8. On February 24th, the day of the council meeting, it turned out that the rezoning map didn’t include all the parcels that will be rezoned to allow taller buildings, so a new version was made. Some were also requesting reduced property line setbacks adjacent to single family homes so they can make their buildings larger, though this did not end up being included. At the last Council meeting about this, it was decided that stepbacks will still be required in Old Bellevue, and an opt-in provision and exemption for the floor plate increase were added.

It is concerning that neighbors, especially near the neighborhood centers, have not been informed that they may lose the small businesses* they depend on, and that other impacts on the immediate neighbors have not been adequately explained to them (setbacks are likely to determine how much adjacent properties are affected). The community should participate in the process of deciding which amenities would justify a height increase like this. People may want space for small businesses, continued access to groceries, and childcare space, etc.  

To put this in context, here are the heights** on parcels with grocery stores that would be allowed under HOMA, and their zoning:

QFC in Northtowne (NB, 20 feet -> 45/60 feet)

S-Mart in Newport Hills (NB,  20 -> 45/60 feet)

Crossroads: 

India Metro Hypermarket (CB (was 45 feet)->NMU, 110 feet)

La Superior (CB, 45 -> 60 feet)

European Grocery (CB, 45 -> 60 feet)

Grocery Outlet (O (was 30 feet) ->NMU, 110 feet)

(other parts of the mall are being changed to NMU and MU16, which will be 110 and 170 feet) 

Walmart by 150th (CB (was 45) -> MU-8, 85 feet)

Factoria: 

T&T Supermarket (F-1, subcategory DA-I and DA-II, from 60 and 40/75 to 170 feet and 80 feet) 

Target and former Amazon Fresh (F-1, subcategory DA-I, 60 -> 170 feet)

QFC (CB, 45 -> 60 feet)

Southgate Oriental Grocery (CB (was 45) -> NMU, 110 feet)

Eastgate Plaza’s Safeway and CVS, as well as the ExtraMile and Jacksons Food Store (NMU, 75-> 110 feet)

Lake Hills:

IFB Market (CB (was 45) -> MU8, 85 feet)

QFC (NB, 20 -> 45/60 feet)

There is also a Safeway on 140th in BelRed. Since it is just east of the section of BelRed that will likely become 250′ under the BelRed Look Forward LUCA, I believe it will stay as a Mixed Use Midrise (MU-M) at 100′ – but with an additional 45′ to provide building height flexibility in the case of life sciences uses (pages 18 and 20 of that LUCA draft).

*HOMA does include incentives for providing space for grocery stores and affordable commercial space, childcare space, and space for non-profits (page 138 of the draft), but it is not clear whether they are generous enough to result in the construction of that space. FAR exemptions can provide for a larger building only if the project is not already filling the maximum volume possible given the height cap and required setbacks.

** Where there are two numbers, like 45/60, the higher of the two is allowed if a small contribution is made to the affordable housing fund for each unit, $1.50 or $1.95 per sqft of a residential building (see page 66 and note (55) on page 78 of the draft).

Note: SB 6026 (currently on the Governor’s desk) had previously required the city to allow buildings to get a 10’ height bonus in areas where we chose to require ground floor commercial space, but that height bonus was taken out by the Ways and Means committee, so I don’t think it ended up in the final version. Still, things like this could easily be added at the state level next year, which we should be mindful of in our local planning. 

Note: There are still some things I’m not sure about – for instance, the deletion of the “DT-Tower” definition on page 111 of the draft may mean that the Tower Separation distances in 20.25A.075.B also apply to buildings that are under 100 feet, or maybe the requirement goes away entirely.

3/17 update to Note: received clarification that the DT-tower definition appears more than once, so it was considered redundant and this should not change anything.

Here’s a little background on an item from the Opportunities section of the newsletter:  

The Safe Speeds Bellevue Survey is open until March 31st. The city wants to hear from you about the streets where speed limits were reduced and evaluated in 2025, streets where lower speed limits should be prioritized and how you would like to stay informed of the project. The survey will take approximately 5-10 minutes and your feedback will remain anonymous. All questions, including demographic questions, are optional. There are 10mph reductions proposed for W. Lake Sammamish Pkwy, part of Northrup and NE 20th, BelRed Rd, part of Kamber and SE 26th, Factoria Blvd, part of Newport Way, maybe others, and 5mph reductions in many places such as downtown, LWB, part of 114th,120th, 124th, 132nd, 148th, 140th, part of the Lake Hills Connector and many more. 

Since the Safe Speeds Bellevue project is in the middle of the outreach and survey process, I thought I’d take a look at the results that are projected and the data that’s available from the state about our Vision Zero performance. 

In the four arterial segments where Safe Speeds Bellevue was introduced last year to test this program (parts of Northrup Way, 124th Ave. SE, Village Park Drive, and NE 40th St.), where 35 MPH arterials were reduced to 25 MPH or 30 MPH, it is reported that the incidents of speeding over 40mph were reduced by at least 19% and up to 42%.

Washington Traffic Safety Commission has a dashboard with the road fatality info for Bellevue. In the decade between 2015 and 2024, and deducting the crash info for 405, 90, and 520 (5 crashes), since these are not being changed, there were 19 accidents on surface streets that resulted in a death.  

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The Seattle Times has an fascinating article that talks about two big reasons new middle housing projects may need undergrounded power supplies in Seattle – electric heat pumps and EV charging capability (at a time when new projects might need power going to four or six homes per lot). 

Adding the tubing for an underground electrical connection and making street improvements at the time of construction was said to add 6% to the cost of one recent project. Cost depends very much on whether the existing power lines are on the opposite side* of the street, and will also vary depending on whether the lengthy process of getting Seattle City Light (SCL) approvals takes months or years. 

Under SB 5290, Bellevue and Seattle have already been working to speed up the permit review process. The developer community gets frequent updates about our average permit approval times at the Bellevue Development Committee meetings. Depending on interest rates, the approval timelines can be very important for helping a project succeed financially. It does not appear that this covers approvals from non-city entities like PSE, however, and I do not know whether they are as slow as SCL. 

To be fair, it is hard to imagine a middle housing development like this not needing a larger water supply line, which should also require excavation, and having an underground pipe for the electrical connection also has the advantage of facilitating future communications upgrades, such as adding fiber. It’s not clear what street improvements were made as part of that 6% of cost, and if they are valuable on their own. If you have experience with this, I would be interested in hearing your take. 

One difference in Bellevue is that EV charging/EV ready wires in the walls were not required for Middle Housing when Bellevue’s City Council voted on the new rules in June 2025. I had assumed that this would mean individual homeowners would be on the hook for installing those wires (and possibly upgrading the electrical panel) later, and that was disappointing from a sustainability and customer protection standpoint. I didn’t realize that constraints on electrical supply to the new homes might make it functionally impossible to add on later. 

On the other hand, in Bellevue this could be a greater concern because we’re allowing more homes per lot than Seattle; builders here are able to put six units of middle housing and 2 ADUs on each lot** (though in some cases they’d need to pay in $150k each for two of those units to an affordable housing fund). Of course, it’s not a requirement that there be eight homes on each lot, and four homes per lot is more likely to give families the Bellevue suburb lifestyle with room for kids to play.

Some of the proposals for addressing this problem: stronger poles may be able to hold up the heavier wires and larger transformers, but they are said to be unsightly (will be tested in Seattle this year, still expensive), smart panels may be able to limit EV charging when power consumption is being maxed out (a fourplex might have throttling only 1% of the time, but this is not yet approved in code), and some housing advocates say that existing residents should subsidize the new middle housing being built in their neighborhoods through a broad-based tax (though this is likely to impact residents whose homes are worth less than the new housing being added). 

*Developers are also using AI to identify investment opportunities, probably factoring location details like this, and this is a time of particularly asymmetric information – home sellers won’t know whether their properties are potentially cheap to build on if they’re not aware of things like this and the history of recent utility upgrades in their areas. 

**Seattle also has reductions in density if a portion of the lot is unbuildable wetland or steep slope, as is common in various jurisdictions, while Bellevue removed that provision with our recent Critical Areas Ordinance update. Bellevue is currently considering changes in the minimum lot size, which will enable twice as many units on some of the larger lots, since they could then have 8 or 24 units each, for a total of 16 or 48. 

Note 3/6/26: House Bill 2418, sponsored by Rep. Davina Duerr (D-Bothell), standardizes and accelerates project permit review for residential housing, including parallel timing for utilities (15, 45, and 60 day clocks, up to 120 calendar days if complex). It looks like it passed unanimously in the Senate on 3/4, so we can expect this to become law.

Note 3/16/26: There will be a 2026-2030 Sustainable Bellevue Plan Implementation Update at the Council meeting on 3/17 (tomorrow). The Better Buildings program includes ChargeReady Bellevue, which will provide free technical assistance to multifamily building managers and owners looking to take the first steps to install electric vehicle (EV) charging (free site assessments, electrical load studies, and funding and cost analyses). 

A new bus system map and service frequency is in the works for the Eastside. An informal poll of fellow bus riders recently seems to indicate that many people don’t know their route will be canceled with the Eastlink Connections plan, even though the changes that will come with the Link’s Crosslake Connection are less than a month away. We also have a major opportunity to spread the word about increases in bus service in other places, and hopefully get new riders since some people will have bus service closer to them or connecting to new destinations.

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

In Bellevue, the 271 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 and South Bellevue P&R 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. 

Even if Newport Hill riders are not using the Link at all, hopefully they’ll have a better experience with the 240 just from the bus service increase to four buses per hour instead of three, as well as service every half hour all night. 

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.

Changes to 550, 556, and 554 should not happen right away (some are saying October). 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]” More discussion of the shift on the Seattle Transit Blog is here.

Although it may be funny that some changes take place at the end of March and others in the fall, as asdf2 pointed out in this comment thread recently, it makes sense to have some redundancy when there might be unexpected issues with the bridge crossing. It wouldn’t be a surprise if there are outages like yesterday’s as well. The outage did stop the practice runs across the lake, though there’s no indication now of whether the schedule for opening will be affected.

Lots of celebrations are planned for Opening Day on March 28th: BelRed’s celebration will be noon-4pm (art, drumming, pottery painting, etc). Spring District will have a petting zoo, food trucks and vendor booths from 10am-3pm. Bellevue Downtown Station will have live music, food trucks and community booths (time?). South Bellevue’s celebration (10am-2pm) will include live entertainment, food, children’s activities, community booths and a firetruck.  Mercer Island’s new station has an opening celebration from 10am-2pm, and there are shuttles starting at 7am from South Bellevue that can get you to the ribbon cutting and street fair at Judkins Park in Seattle, and there will also be celebrations at International District/Chinatown in Seattle. There will be live music at Symphony and a library-hosted stop in Lynnwood. In Redmond, there will be food provided by Microsoft and a cricket demonstration and chai truck at Marymoor. There will be a prize for the first 1000 people who collect stamps at stations along the line. (link)

To see the changes at a glance, it might be easiest to compare the current system map with the map shown above, which you can find here. Changes to the frequency are on the individual PDFs for each route. Some info is adapted from the recent post We have a date!

Edit: https://www.reddit.com/r/Seattle/comments/1rlqah5/full_2_line_schedules_are_up_on_google_maps/

Edit from 3/2/26: a map of parcels that are most likely to be redeveloped has been added below – Bellevue has 423 acres of parcels that are each >1 acre in size and where more of the value is in the land.

First, I have received clarification that there were some “GIS errors” [1] with HOMA, so places like the India Metro Hypermarket actually *were* supposed to be 10 stories. The Council is set to talk about it at tonight’s meeting, so I believe they will be informed that the rezoning map that was posted on Friday is not final. 

I also wanted to take a deeper look at ground floor commercial space in the context of SB 6026 since a well-informed reader pushed back strongly on my statement in the “Food in our future” that 20% of Bellevue’s area (where we can require a little commercial [2] to be included with a ton of residential space) will be enough to meet our needs. It is of course, far better to have 20% than the previous version of SB 6026 that would have allowed us to require ground-floor commercial space only in TOD areas, but I wouldn’t rule out the possibility that this will result in an unacceptable reduction in quality of life for Bellevue residents. 

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Edit from 3/2/26: The heights for some of the grocery store parcels listed were too low in this post, due to an error in the map provided with the meeting agenda, and it looks like I also overlooked a zoning change for the Walmart parcel – see update here or refer back to the original food post here – strikethroughs have been added to the list below.

After my post yesterday, City Council’s agenda for next Tuesday was published, and staff is seeking direction on the HOMA proposal. If you look at the map provided with the meeting materials as Attachment 5.D, it would appear that only a few parts of the city are being affected by HOMA, but some of the areas I talked about in the last post already have NB (Neighborhood Business), CB, O, and F-1 zoning, so HOMA doesn’t need to rezone them to add capacity and increase building heights. 

Current zoning map is here.

Current building heights can be found here.

As you can see in Chart 20.20.010 (scroll down to the second half that has the non-residential info), the current max heights are lower than is being planned with the HOMA changes.  The Draft included as Attachment 3.B to the agenda materials for next week’s Council meeting has 211 pages; on page 75 you can see the proposed height limits.

Office is going up from 30 to 40/55 feet, OLB is adding the option of 15 more feet, the height listed for NB was 20′ and will be 45/60, and it references note (55). There is a new category of MU-8 that is 85 feet in height, NMU would be 110 feet instead of 75, CB will be 60 feet instead of 45, there’s a new MU-16 category that’s 170 feet, and one of the Factoria types is going from 75 to 135 feet (this last one is confusing because it has the note about alternative maximum height, but doesn’t seem to list a second number. It’s possible that it just means there’s no fee/affordability contribution required to get the 135 feet).  Building Height for the Factoria F1 zoning of the mall is not in this table, so you have to look at 20.25F1.040 (page 141 of the draft), and it will be mostly 170′ (instead of the former 60/75/45′), except for 80′ in a strip on the south side of the mall (that includes part of the T&T), which had been 40/75′.

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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 at 12368 Northrup Way that provides 30 minute gig driver delivery 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 article preceded the recent changes in direction on Amazon Fresh and Amazon Go, so I don’t know if Project Peregrine is intended to partially 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. 

(Update has been added, see new list below) 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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