Paid street parking will extend to 11 p.m. in Capitol Hill

If you’ve ever driven or even walked through Capitol Hill at night, you know: It’s full of cars.

Capitol Hill is full of evening and late-night destinations like arts venues—and people come from all around the city to hit up the neighborhood’s nightlife. So it’s little surprise that Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) data shows that between 8 p.m. and 11 p.m., parking is usually nearly completely full.

Courtesy of SDOT

But like with many neighborhoods, paid parking ends at 8 p.m. Starting this fall, SDOT is switching it up and extending paid parking hours all the way to 11 p.m.

The change would affect most of the Pike/Pine corridor from I-5 to Madison—plus a more concentrated area around Broadway heading north to 10th Avenue East and East Aloha Street.

How the pay structure for late-night hours could look is up in the air. SDOT has put together a few different initial options—and each has different benefits to people actually living and moving on foot in the neighborhood or to people who have to drive to and park in the area on a regular basis.

One option would cap parking after 5 p.m. in the area to three hours—which would create more parking, but may leave limited options for people on the hill for the whole night.

Another would charge a single, flat fee for parking after 5 p.m., which would be flexible for people parking but wouldn’t create much parking turnover. A third option, somewhere in between, wouldn’t put a limit on parking after 5 p.m., but would charge an hourly rate with a one-hour minimum.

SDOT started collecting feedback for these options in a survey last week. Public comment is open until Friday, May 12.

• Capitol Hill Late Nighters, We Want to Hear from You! [SDOT]