By now, you’ve probably heard the story about Tangletown resident, Paulo Nunes-Ueno, who installed a sandbox for his kids on the planting strip in front of his home, and was warned by the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) to move or it face a daily fine of $500. Here’s the original story that ran in the Seattle Times on August 3.
Basically, someone filed an anonymous complaint about the sandbox because it was too close to the street, and in violation of a city ordinance that requires play structures to be far enough away from a right-of-way. But last Tuesday, Nunes-Ueno made an appeal to the City Council, and they’ve agreed to work with him and SDOT to come up with a reasonable solution. SDOT has also agreed not to fine him or make him move the sandbox until they make a final decision.
On Saturday morning, I met with Nunes-Ueno and Seattle City Councilmember Tom Rasmussen, who paid a visit to the sandbox to determine if there were any public safety issues. Councilmember Rasmussen also chairs the Transportation Committee, which oversees traffic control, neighborhood and transportation planning, as well as pedestrian bicycle programs.
The street on which the Nunes-Ueno family lives is pretty narrow, and the block is teeming with little kids. There is also a large traffic circle a half of a block away from his home. Nunes-Ueno told us that the sandbox has become a gathering spot for everybody, and we witnessed this ourselves when a few of the neighbors came out to congregate around it. He also pointed out the planter box just steps away from the sandbox, remarking that the sandbox’s dimensions conform to the required dimensions of the planter box.
In an email to me, Nunes-Ueno added more insight to the bigger picture behind the sandbox as a gathering place:
I think we have so much to gain by allowing people to be creative in how they use the planting strips for community gathering places. Sandboxes, picnic tables, benches create places to gather with neighbors and make new friends–for kids and adults. These neighborhood ties makes us more resilient and safer as a community.
A lot has been made about traffic safety concerns of kids being in the planting strip. Although I appreciate the concern, anyone who actually visits our street will see there is no need to worry. Like two thirds of Seattle roads, ours is a quiet residential street made narrower still by parked cars on both sides. We should treat these streets differently from arterials. Neighborhood streets serve many purposes in addition to moving traffic. Rather than prohibit kids from playing in front of their houses, let’s double down on our efforts to make our residential streets even safer.
We’ll keep you posted once SDOT and the Transportation Committee of the Seattle City Council come to some sort of resolution. For now, check out this flyer Nunes-Ueno made for the cause.
how do they keep cats from using it as a litter box?
easy, the neighborhood cats our front yard for a litter box instead 😛
I support you and the initiative to bring children out to gather together on our neighborhood streets, Paulo. Blessings as you continue and as more follow.
Whereas I applaud the spirit of finding community gathering places, I cannot support this sandbox. Having worked in child welfare for a number of years, I know that tragedy strikes even the best intentioned parent. It only takes a second of inattention for a toddler to sprint off into the street (I saw this played out on my street just this afternoon). Perhaps if there was an additional barrier between the sandbox and street – a small fence or rail, line of bushes, etc – that could help. I don’t want ot be macabre, but, what I see in the photo above is a potential hazard waiting for an active & excited child and an automobile.
If I were a next door neighbor, I’m not sure I would like crowds of little kids and parents congregating by my house. I would grow weary of the noise and loss of privacy.
Just sayin’
The challenge with this particular sandbox is that it is in the DRIVEWAY! There would be no public policy issue if in the planting strip, but since it blocks the driveway, it is clear these residents are not using that for parking but would expect to use public space (streets) for their various motor vehicles. People should park cars on their own property — that’s what our land use codes encourage — and save the streets for visitors, emergency vehicles and — oh yes — travel.
Get it out of the driveway, and I support you all the way.
My guess is that the homeowner’s insurance policy would rule out coverage for that property because children play in a driveway skirt abutting a city street. In Seattle, municipal code stipulates that vehicles not park blocking a driveway and are ticketed if they do (many of then on the 4th of July).
Is there a front yard without a retaining wall where this community gathering place be relocated to? At least until cell phones are banned from cars and Priuses make noise . . . people carelessly swerve into planting strips all the time and little kids dart after things into the street. SDOT will remind that children in the street is “felony child endangerment” when citizens “play the kid card.”
@Jack, are you saying that you saw a kid run out into the middle of the street near your house and get hit by a car? That sounds gruesome. But, isn’t this an argument to completely fence off the sidewalks from the street? Or maybe shock collars so that children won’t be able to wander outside a given perimiter…
@Val, I would imagine that is the reason a neighbor filed a complaint, not saftey of children. As a parent myself, I grow weary of the noise and loss of privacy… I wonder if I can get the City of Seattle to solve that problem with some regulation.
Are there certain dimensions that the city is OK with? I was looking to do something similar.
tbear – not sure what area of Wallingford you live in or what streets do not have any cars parking on them unless they are main arteries . Most cars here are parked on the street. You may have noticed that our driveways are few and those that exist were built for smaller cars than we have now. some are too short to hold the cars belonging to families that house several generations under one roof.
Your post sounds almost like a rant against neighbors who don’t stay within the confines of the property they rent or own and get in the way of those trying to be somewhere else.
Kids at sandbox age seem to me a little young, to be putting their lives on the line fighting for Mr. Nunes’ vision of safer residential streets.
I don’t understand either Mr. Nunes or the content in his poster. There may be structural similarities between a planter box and a sandbox, but they are not equivalents. A sandbox is a play structure. Like others who have posted here, I do worry about the likelihood of a toddler straying into the street.
Here’s a quote from the Times article, offering the viewpoint of a representative from the Sightline Institute : “…(he) observes that it would be a tragedy if a kid ran out into the street and were hit by a car, but he said not having a sandbox doesn’t eliminate the risk.”
I don’t understand that “logic,” either.
This is so very Wallingford. If I don’t like the laws I shouldn’t have follow them.
How is it that playing on the planting strip is so much more dangerous than playing on the sidewalk? Why do we assume that on blocks without a sandbox the children never go near the planting strip? Should children be allowed to play outside at all?
Perhaps, if it is so dangerous for children to play near these quiet side streets, we should ban cars from the streets.
“… without a sandbox the children will never go near …” Wait, “never”? where does anyone assume that? It’s enough to assume that the children would spend considerably less time near the street, without a sandbox or other play facilities put there specifically for them. Please don’t impute unnecessarily nonsensical views.
If you really are interested in getting the cars off residential streets, let’s talk – that could be wonderful. There’s a lot of real estate there, taken up by cars and covered by impermeable pavement, that could instead be gardens or even new housing. And places for kids to play all over. It certainly is dangerous for kids to play around moving motor vehicles, so if you don’t feel that it’s reasonable to just keep them away from the street, guess it makes sense to get rid of the street.
@ #14
Fruitbat, I was thinking along a different track: yes, eliminating the sandbox doesn’t eliminate the risk of a child being hit by a car. And yes, children may well play in the planting strip regardless of whether a sandbox is there or not.
That’s not quite the point, though: I do think the presence of the sandbox encourages more activity, and thereby increases the risk of an accident. That’s my concern here.
I’m not going to go so far as to call the sandbox an “attractive nuisance,” like a unsupervised swimming pool or an abandoned refrigerator, but I remain concerned about siting a play area so close to moving vehicles.
So rather than trying to get the City to change its laws, I wish Mr. Nunes-Ueno would put his–and perhaps his like-minded neighbors’?–energies toward siting the sandbox in a spot farther from the street.