West Seattle, Washington
03 Sunday
-Funny, we were just talking about Fauntleroy Place: A city council committee agenda that just landed in our inbox mentions a “possible vote” next Monday morning regarding the “alley vacation” that is a key part of the FP project.
-Another council committee has a briefing at 2 pm today regarding the latest version of the citywide skatepark plan. Two (updated from first version of this post; thanks to the reader who corrected us) proposed WS skateparks are currently on the list: Roxhill and Delridge.
-The city kicked off a push for low-flow showerheads today. If you haven’t tried ’em, you might be surprised. We converted to one during a remodel a few years back and it’s really not that dramatic a change.
The city permit files say a pet-food store is in the works for Westwood Village. We can’t find a center blueprint to match WV “suite numbers” to specific stores, so we can’t tell if that’s what’s going into the laundromat space (below) that just emptied out north of QFC, but crews are certainly working fast and furious to convert it into something. Also, the permit files mention progress on the WV in-the-works Taco Del Mar.
Two updates on the violent vandalism mentioned here a week ago — first, neighbors are working to revive the Westwood Neighborhood Council, which apparently had gone dormant; second, the vandalism story was featured on tv last night.
Streets on the north side of Westwood Village (off the stretch of Trenton shown below) are having trouble with a group of at least half a dozen teenage boys running around wreaking havoc — with violent vandalism that includes throwing rocks at people, through house windows, and through car windows. Neighbors are banding together and working to put more pressure on police to catch these culprits, which they note has been tough because it’s not considered an “emergency” and gets lower-priority response. However, our tipster does say three police cars were in hot pursuit of the group tonight; here’s hoping they are caught soon, and just as important, appropriately prosecuted.
That phrase apparently applies to the Westwood Village vicinity for a non-shopping reason.
After we referred to the forthcoming, long-in-the-works Giannoni’s Pizzeria at Westwood Village as “mysterious” one too many times, their owners surfaced in our inbox and shared some details about what they’ll be doing when they open (south side of WV, next to Sally’s Beauty Supply). And they confirmed, they’re not a chain! Click ahead to read their full e-mail:Read More
Tonight, a rare sighting of squadcarfuls of West Seattle’s Finest taking a break someplace besides Caffe Ladro: at the Westwood Village Barnes ‘n’ Noble.
Just spotted this as we drove home from a produce trip to Tony’s: SDOT is putting up left-turn signals on 35th at Thistle. If you’ve never tried to make that turn (in either direction), you’ve never enjoyed the death-defying thrills of cars relentlessly racing toward you at what seems like freeway speed. This should save some lives, from reduced stress as well as reduced collision rate:
While dropping off our ballot @ High Point Community Center, we grabbed a handy all-in-one spring brochure for HP, Delridge, and Southwest Community Centers, including SW Pool. Noticed while leafing through it this morning that registration for spring swim lessons starts tomorrow morning. 7 am sharp. That time is important, because lesson registration can turn into a madhouse (maybe not if you sign up online); classes are available for 6 months through adult age, and they fill up fast. We’re mentioning it because if you don’t live on the south side of West Seattle, you might not even be aware that Southwest Pool exists. It’s just east of Denny Middle School, and worth checking out if you feel like swimming but don’t happen to belong to the Y or a pool-equipped health club.
Great Presidents Day article in the P-I, set at the retirement home near Westwood Village.
-As a couple people wrote to tell us, a “retirement sale” is now under way at Leslie’s, just south of Spiro’s.
-The construction site at Westwood Village now has a banner up promising GIANNONI’S PIZZA (different from the website spelling but we still can’t figure out who’s behind it), COMING SOON, PIZZA BY THE SLICE.
-Lots of signs of progress as Garlic Jim’s Pizza in The Junction gets ready to open next month, including a NOW HIRING sign.
-Just up the block from there, facade work is under way at the ex-Bobby’s Hobbies, future (apparently) bakery.
-Today’s supposed to be the last day for Hollywood Video at 41st & Alaska (mixed-use megaproject coming soon).
A friend of ours who grew up in a mountain state told us that you know you’ve REALLY gotten some snow when, days or weeks after it melts, dirty slushy piles of it are still lingering in parking lots and similar places. So, we can now officially declare our Snow-n-Ice-mare ’07 a REAL event, upon discovery today of the official Dirty Slushy Leftover Pile near the southwest edge of Westwood Village:
Here’s an alarming tale that reportedly unfolded at “a” Starbucks (who knows which one, considering there are three) at Westwood Village. As of right this moment, the King County jail roster lookup shows the guy’s still in jail.
If you’ve got business at the post office — you might want to wait a while. WS Blogger Spouse reports that after two postal holidays (New Year’s Day plus National Day of Mourning for Pres. Ford), it’s a spillover crowd, at Westwood, at least. No word yet on the Junction branch.
Radio report says this new power outage — about 5,000 “customers” from South Park on into southeastern West Seattle — is the work of trees and lines down on Highland Park Way, which is apparently closed right now so crews can take care of it. There’s no hint of it on Delridge till just past the turnoff to Trenton as you head toward Westwood Village; then, heading west on Trenton, you can see where the power’s gone. Including apartments east of the shopping center, some homes to the south, and odd chunks of WV itself — the QFC and everything directly north of it (the whole strip of stores including the Sub Shop, Toshi’s, Starbucks, etc.), all out, along with Marshall’s, and the businesses inbetween those two buildings — Big 5, 24 Hour — but on the west side of WV, all looks well. Oh yeah, McDonald’s is out too. We’ll check back to see how long this lasts. The Seattle City Light page has a short update as well.
Off to check a possible new power outage. One tipster says it involves part of Westwood Village.
We apologize for, while tracking the events of West Seattle Unplugged ’06, slacking on one of our favorite things to do, keeping an eye on storefronts and permit databases to see who’s coming/going/changing around here. Two recent discoveries: The 2-story building at Westwood Village, north of Barnes/Noble, is apparently getting a “day spa”; and looks like we’ll soon have another location for coffee — 4800 Delridge, where the city permit info says they’re putting up a sign saying BUBBLES (any relation to Bubbles on Alki, whose site offers “business opportunities”?).
The lights are flickering; the Internet connection is wavering … Sounds out there like This Is It — the wind wallop the weather experts warned about. The National Weather Service “current observations” say it’s gusting to 58 mph at Alki Point! (Look for “K91S” here, under the “GS” column for gusts, “SP” next to it for ongoing wind speed.) E-mail and online reports mention a variety of problems around WS already, including some sort of sinkhole at Northrop and Thistle, up the hill from Lincoln Park, and power outages in Westwood and at the Fauntleroy end of the WS Bridge. We might be too powerless to post later, so to speak, but please keep everyone updated by adding a comment to this post with a report from your ‘hood. (And if you want to know what’s up elsewhere, the RPIN appears to provide decent updates.)
Three months ago on one of our episodes of “As the Blog Turns,” we found out from Rob that Westwood Village had updated its website to trumpet the impending arrival of Taco del Mar and a mystery pizza joint. Ever since, the WS Blog Posse has strolled frequently around Westwood V, staring into the vacant spaces, trying to guess which ones would become TDM and “Gionnoni’s Pizza.” Turns out … it will be new construction … and it’s been delayed. A week or so after e-mailing WV management in search of answers, we just got this from the operations director:
They will eventually go into new space that is an extension of the current Payless Shoes/Sally Beauty building (where the gravel is next to Sally’s) along Barton Street. Unfortunately we have run into some permit and design issues and construction probably will not start until early next year – hopefully January. Given that schedule, they will open late spring/early summer 2007.
… to West Seattle HS for the Huling Bowl victory against Chief Sealth last night. While we walked around Westwood Village in the same time frame (see below), we couldn’t miss the raucous cheers (and band drums) echoing from the field to the north.
Christmas stuff keeps coming out earlier and earlier every year. This year seems more out-o-control than ever. Three examples are in full force at Westwood Village as we write: The Rite-Aid Halloween stuff is already on sale, with Christmas creeping into the aisles; in the “seasonal” section @ Target, it’s already gotten to the point where cute-n-cuddly Animated Lighted Sea Lions (for your yard) are rubbing elbows, er, flippers with the Animated Teeth-Chattering Skeletons; and Pier 1’s window signs proclaim this to be Ornament Preview time. WAIT UNTIL HALLOWEEN’S BODY IS COLD, FOR GOD’S SAKE! ISN’T NOVEMBER FIRST EARLY ENOUGH?
Meantime, if you are doing early holiday shopping anyway, here’s a sincere recommendation: The 2007 West Seattle Calendar. Here’s where you can buy it. (Honestly, who needs “16 Months of Precious Pugs” when you can represent for WS Pride!)
The superintendent’s final recommendations just came out, and he’s not backing down from the Pathfinder/Cooper merger. But he did decide not to close Roxhill after all. The final word rests with the school board, in two weeks. UPDATE: Here’s the P-I story, with Roxhill reaction; there’s also some in the Times writeup.
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