Pike Place Traffic Ban Sought -- Craftspeople Seek Space For More Stalls

Wagons were banned from the front of the Pike Place Market 62 years ago, because the horses were unsanitary and the traffic was awful.

Now some Market vendors say they'd like cars banned for similar reasons plus a new one: a chance to increase sales space by turning parking stalls into craft stalls.

Banning traffic outside the Market is an old solution to old tensions among the three kinds of Market sellers - craftspeople, merchants and farmers.

The endless line of traffic snaking up Pike Place pollutes the air and endangers pedestrians, say a group of craftspeople who want the city and Market management to eliminate street parking for several dozen cars or at least get rid of the last 12 spaces north of the arcade.

The craftspeople also complain they're being crowded out of the Market this summer by an unusually large number of farmers. The craftspeople have set up a volunteer committee to work out a solution to what they see as a problem.

The Market's management, the Preservation and Development Authority, says the number of farmers coming to the Market rose more than 39 percent in the first six months of 1992, compared to the same period of 1991. There are about 5 percent more craftspeople. One reason the number of farmers has increased has been the good summer weather, which has been especially beneficial for people who sell flowers.

The increase in farmers has made parking for everyone a premium.

Craftspeople are given parking space every day by seniority. Gary Westwood, who has been selling paper sculptures at the Market for about a year, says the competition is so great he's lucky to get a spot two days a week. He never gets one during weekend prime time.

If the street were opened for more crafts spaces, says Westwood, he would stand a better chance of making a living at the Market.

Two years ago, about half the 235 Market regulars answering a management survey said they'd like to get rid of the cars.

"This is an issue that's unbelievably volatile," says Shelly Yapp, PDA executive director. "There are those that consider it part of the charm of the Market to be able to drive through and look at the Market, and those that say it's the last free parking left in the city. There are those that say the cars cause too much exhaust and those that say we have to have access for delivery trucks. Some of the people who live there say they need parking for their friends, and some that feel the traffic is a terrible problem."

Westwood admits many of the Market regulars fear the loss of parking will hurt business.

"I really don't think parking helps the craftspeople," he said. "A lot of those people who park there just dash across the street for a croissant and dash back to their cars. They're not really spending any time at the Market. You can only park there for an hour anyway. What can you do in the Market for an hour?"

Another member of the craftspeople's committee, Thomas Graham, who sells dish towels and aprons silk-screened by his mother, said he considers the traffic a hazard to everyone.

"Is this a sidewalk or a street?" he asked, waving out toward the lunch-hour crowd of downtown workers, gawking tourists and parents with kids in strollers picking their way through a traffic snarl made worse by a delivery truck stopped in the middle of the street.

Graham said his fiancee, Laura Daughenbaugh, was struck in the foot by a car recently as she tried to cross Pike Place to the merchants' locker room where she stores stick ponies at night. Westwood said another driver recently lost his brakes coming down Stewart Street after regular Market hours, slamming into the Market arcade and knocking out four stalls.

Sheila Mead, a weaver, said she'd recently been bumped from behind by a car as she walked down the street. "There's a lot more traffic down here than there used to be. It happens all the time, some car comes blasting around the corner doing 25. They don't realize there are pedestrians in the street."

Merchants who rent shops in the Market are leery of a traffic ban.

"I don't know how it would affect my business," said Jonathan Warner, who sells books at Shakespeare and Co. downstairs in the Market. "The people downstairs don't get foot traffic until everything gets elbow to elbow upstairs and people come down to get out of the crowds."

The PDA and the city aren't likely to consider closing Pike Place unless members of the Market community can agree on a solution, Yapp said. That hasn't happened in the past.

But Westwood says he won't give up until the cars are gone. "I'm willing to work on this thing until it does happen, no matter how long it takes."