Something new in our roundup this week – rain! Yes, the rain is finally set to arrive Friday morning, and we have traffic warnings from WSDOT on slick roads, and a heads-up on potential power outages from Seattle City Light. If you’re ready to switch from summer shorts & t-shirts to regular rain gear, then brave (or welcome) the weather and check out this weekend’s events!

Heads-Up for Mid-Week:
Sounders vs. Real Salt Lake, CenturyLink, 7pm

Weekend Traffic Impacts:
RAIN: yes, rain is finally in the forecast. Seattle City Light is on alert for outages and the National Weather Service (NWS) and WSDOT have both issued a warning about its return:
“We know the first big rain can bring slick driving conditions… This year may be more challenging because it has been so long since we’ve had any measurable rain.” — Dave McCormick, WSDOT
Aurora Bridge: Reduced to one lane in each direction Oct 14-18, 9pm-5am nightly
I-90 Snoqualmie Pass: “Major 6-day closure” I-90 over Snoqualmie Pass reduced to a two-lane highway from 9pm Sunday, October 14 to 7am Friday, October 19

Multi-Day Events:
Arts and Social Change Symposium: An Open Dialogue, Seattle Center, Friday, October 12, 8am-9:30pm and Saturday, October 12, 8am-4:30pm
Seattle Antiquarian Book Fair 2012, Seattle Center Exhibition Hall, Saturday, October 13, 10am-6pm and Sunday October 14, 11am-4pm
Seattle Musical Theatre Annual Costume Sale, Magnuson Park, Saturday, October 13 and Sunday, October 14, 10am-3pm
Seattle Polish Film Festival, SIFF Uptown, October 12–14 and October 19–21
Fantastic Mr. Fox, $4 Films4Famlies Matinee, SIFF Film Center, Saturday, October 12-Sunday, October 13

Daily Weekend Events:
Friday, October 12
Arcade Lights, Pike Place Market, Artisan Food, Craft Beer & Wine, 7-10 pm
SPU presents Liederabend: An Evening of German Art Song, First Free Methodist Church 7:30pm FREE
Northwest Seaport Chantey Sing with Spanaway Bay, Virginia V at the Historic Ships Wharf, 8-10pm FREE (donation suggested)
SIFF Uptown New & Continuing Films: Argo, Keep the Lights On, Arbitrage

Saturday, October 13
American Foundation for Suicide Prevention Community Walk, Green Lake, 8am
Walk Like MADD 5K, Seattle Center, 8:45am
Huskies vs. University of Southern California Trojans, CenturyLink, 4pm
Bob Dylan w/ Special Guest Mark Knopfler, Key Arena, 7:30pm
Seattle Opera’s Fidelio, opens October 13, 7:30pm, 6 performances through October 27

Sunday, October 14
5th Annual Steps Against Domestic Violence, Green Lake, 10am FREE (donation suggested)
Seattle Takes Care: Baby Shower for Military Families with Operation Homefront, Seattle Center Fisher Pavilion, noon-3pm
Seahawks vs. Patriots, CenturyLink, 1:05pm

Monday, October 15
SIFF Uptown (one night only): Hellbound? special preview screening, Q&A with director (regular run starts October 19)

Have an event that you would like us to report on? Drop us an email at tips@queenanneview.com

Update: Here’s a photo from WSDOT of last night’s work:

Earlier: WSDOT is warning North Queen Anne neighbors that they may hear noisy construction work from midnight tonight (Tuesday) until 5 a.m. Wednesday, as they lift the Aurora Bridge three-quarters of an inch. The bridge will be closed beginning at 10 p.m. for northbound lanes and midnight for southbound lanes, reopening at 5 a.m. on Wednesday.

It’s all part of an ongoing earthquake retrofitting project that you may have noticed if you’ve driven along 6th Ave. N. under the bridge.

Crews are installing new one ton bearings that will allow the bridge to gently sway during an earthquake. Work on the bridge deck takes place this week and next month as crews replace the bearings and lower the bridge back into place. Crews are nearly done with the project on the Fremont size of the bridge, and WSDOT expects the Queen Anne work to be completed by August.

Those lane closures along 6th Ave. N will continue Monday through Friday, between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m., until the end of August. Crews are building a skeletal system for the extra steel that will be attached to the existing girders, WSDOT says. Here’s the project page with more information.

Reader Cindy wrote:

Could you look into what work is being done on the underside of the south end of the Aurora Bridge?

Drivers heading from Queen Anne to Aurora Ave N pass under the bridge (on 6th Ave N?) and the traffic has been one way at a time, with a flagger, for a few weeks now– at least until about 3 or 4PM. Now there’s a sign saying that road will be closed next week from Monday to Friday, 9AM-3PM. I would love to know what’s going on!

The SDOT reports that this is work for the Aurora Bridge Seismic Retrofit project.

More information, including traffic advisories, can be found on the SDOT web site.

Crews will close all lanes of 6th Avenue North between Raye Street and Halladay Street between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. April 2 – 6.

UPDATE: 3:50PM
Queen Anne drivers should plan for closures on 6^th Avenue North between Raye Street and Halladay Street next week.

The two lanes will be closed every day Monday, April 2 through Friday, April 6 between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. Flaggers will be at both ends of the closure for local access.

During the daytime closure, crews will work on 6^th Avenue North underneath the Aurora Avenue Bridge. They are building a skeletal system for the extra steel that will be attached to the existing girders.

The $5.7 million seismic retrofit project will allow the 80-year old bridge to better withstand earthquakes.

Most drivers use 6^th Avenue north to get under Aurora Avenue North. Local detour signs will be in place and drivers will be able to get from one side of Aurora to the other.

We’ve seen a lot of new and improved features on Aurora Avenue recently, including radar speed signs and earthquake retrofits. According to a recent blog post by SDOT, there’s still a lot more to come.

The post outlines a whole bunch of impending improvements and changes in the area, while some of them will take place right in our own backyard.

Further south, SDOT is preparing to implement a series of safety improvements centered around the Aurora Bridge.  New signage will be installed warning drivers to expect merging traffic prior the Fremont Way and Halladay Street entrances.  This project will include improved directional signage to the Queen Anne neighborhood and minor tree trimming to improve the visibility of these signs.  Channelization improvements will be implemented concurrently on southbound Aurora at the Fremont Way and Raye Street entrances to Aurora.  At Fremont Way, a solid white lane line will replace the existing dashed lane line and extend 200 feet south of the point where the two roadways become one.  Since it is illegal to cross a solid white lane line, this new configuration will allow drivers entering Aurora to get up to speed before making lane changes.  At Raye Street, a new edge line will be installed to provide drivers with better sight lines when entering Aurora.  Coupled with the recently completed improvements at Halladay Street (for drivers entering and exiting northbound 99), the roadway around the Aurora Bridge will certainly funtion better.

I know the current set-up can cause some uneasiness when it comes to merging traffic heading onto the bridge so it sounds like these changes could help.

Read more about SDOT’s Action Plan here.

The bicyclist that was struck by an SUV in a hit-and-run collision Thursday afternoon has died, according to the King County Medical Examiner’s Office.

According to a witness, the driver of the vehicle was attempting to turn left onto Thomas from Dexter Ave N at approximately 3:44 pm. Thursday. The driver reportedly sped up to make the turn before a line of oncoming cars approached, and hit the bicyclist who was crossing Thomas at the time. The bicyclist was rushed to Harborview Medical Center with life-threatening injuries. The driver took off immediately following the crash and is still at large.

The vehicle involved in the collision is described as a brown, American-made SUV with tinted windows and a chrome roof rack, according to SPD. Police are still looking for anyone with information on the incident or the driver.

You may have seen fliers for Phil Irwin, who disappeared from his Queen Anne home on June 1st, all over Queen Anne over the last couple of weeks. Sad news via our sister-site MyBallard as Irwin’s family reports that his body has been found in Lake Union.

Phil’s daughter Emily, a Ballard resident, writes, “I just wanted to let you know that my father’s body was found in Lake Union yesterday by divers from the Wooden Boat Center who were working a regular dive for ship wreckages. It appears that he took his own life by jumping off the Aurora Bridge. Again, thank you for the help in trying to find him. My family is grateful to know where he is and, at the same time, deeply saddened by the reality of the situation.”

Condolences to the Irwin family.

WSDOT contractors will be doing some work on the Aurora Bridge over the next couple months in an effort to strengthen the bridge’s support and prevent it from damage in the event of an earthquake, all while maintaining its unique aesthetic.

As early as June 11, WSDOT workers will begin an 18-month long project to make the Aurora Bridge better withstand earthquakes. Construction will begin on the Fremont side of the bridge and take about six months to complete, after which crews will move on to work on the Queen Anne side.

For more information on the project and the reason it’s being done, visit the WSDOT site.

Since June 2009, the Seattle Department of Transportation’s (SDOT) Aurora Traffic Safety Project has been working to reduce collisions on Aurora Avenue North. Comparing the time between now and then to the time between April 2005 and March 2008, collisions have been significantly reduced Here are the details:

• Total collisions on Aurora have decreased 21 percent
• Serious and fatal collisions on Aurora have decreased 22 percent
• Injury collisions on Aurora have decreased 23 percent

Street improvements such as new sidewalks, curb ramps and new crosswalks as well an increased police presence and driver awareness have all been credited with helping.

See all the details on the report over at SDOT’s blog, and general information on the project at SDOT’s website.

The newly completed Aurora Bridge suicide-prevention fence attracted memorials over the last week. Two memorials can be spotted on the western side of the Queen Anne half of the bridge.

One memorial contains a large note to two victims, big enough to be seen from passing cars on the road:

The $4.6 million suicide-prevention fence was completed Feb. 15. It is the latest and most ambitious attempt to respond to the problem of suicide jumpers from the bridge with the country’s second highest suicide rate.

The construction of a suicide prevention fence along the Aurora Bridge has been completed, according to a report by The Seattle Times. City officials and Seattle residents now hope it can prevent more people from joining the list of 230 jumpers who have leapt to their deaths from the bridge to date.

Construction of the 8-foot, 9-inch-tall safety fence started in the fall and cost $5 million, according to a state Department of Transportation news release. The Legislature’s 2009-2011 transportation budget included $3.6 million to build the fence.

The fence’s construction was lobbied for by Fremont residents and those that work underneath it and was supported by the city of Seattle, King County and the state Legislature. Read more about the need for the fence and why it matters here.

If you’ve driven over the Aurora Bridge lately, you’ve noticed the posts for the long-planned suicide fence rising from the west side of bridge.

WSDOT Aurora Bridge Fence Mock-Up. Photo courtesy of WSDOT.

The Washington State Department of Transportation sent out some information recently on the status of the project:

Yes, those are fence posts sprouting up on the west side of the bridge. Crews begin installing the posts on the night Monday, Nov. 8, and are getting 20 to 30 done each night. So far they’ve installed about a third of the 684 posts that will make up the fence. If you’ve been looking closely as the fence posts go up, you might have a few questions. And we have the answers:

Q. Why is the first fence post at N. 34th Street in Fremont? Is that where the fence begins?

A. No, the fence will begin just north of N. 36th Street right above the Fremont Troll.

Q. But the posts don’t begin until N. 36th Street. Are you sure the fence goes all the way to the Troll?

A. Yes, the posts all look the same, but they differ in how they connect to the bridge. Six different ways, in fact, and there are five different types of posts. These post-to-bridge connections depend in part on whether the post is attached to the steel middle section or the concrete sections at the north and south ends. It turns out that the fence manufacturer completed the posts that connect to the steel sections first and so the contractor is installing them first. The posts in the concrete sections on the west side of the bridge will go up in the next week or two.

Q. Why are there gaps between some of the posts?

A. The gaps indicate locations where we must complete repairs before installing posts. As you may remember, crews discovered corrosion in 23 beams about three months ago. We determined the beams would need to be strengthened before we attached the fence posts at those locations and added this work to the construction contract. We completed part of the repair and are waiting for a manufacturer to build and deliver the steel braces that will reinforce the beams.

Q. When will the fence be done?

A. We had hoped to have the fence done by the end of the year, but the added repair work has taken longer than we anticipated. It also appears that panel installation may take more time as well. These two factors will delay completion by about a month, into early 2011.

Work to build a suicide prevention fence across the Aurora Bridge has been underway for months, but there’s still no sign of the fence itself. WSDOT tells us that will all change next week when crews start putting up the fence posts on the west side of the bridge.

So what’s taking so long? WSDOT says it has been dealing with small details they hope will make a big difference in the end. They drilled about 2600 holes for anchor bolts, used an x-ray device to make sure they didn’t hit rebar, and repaired the bridge’s steel that was damaged by corrosion.

The fence posts will go up first, followed by the fence panels. The fence should be finished by the end of the year. Image from WSDOT