Neighbors who live along NW 49th St. near Market St. (map) are not happy with navigation apps Waze and Google Maps, according to a story on KIRO 7 (only available in video).
They said the apps are directing drivers to take 49th as a shortcut instead of sticking to thoroughfares like Market. St. or Leary Way. The street is narrow with roundabouts.
Neighbors told KIRO that semi trucks are getting stuck occasionally — and in some cases, even side-swiping their cars and leaving the scene of the accident. One neighbor says he’s going to apply for a grant to hire a traffic engineer.
![](https://www.myballard.com/wp-content/uploads/2024-My-Ballard-Tile-Ad-Troop-100.png")
Can’t get mad, it’s a public right of way. Perhaps if those people had garages they could park in there, but these developers don’t build parking anymore.
Thought everyone moving here didn’t have cars?
@SKIP
This is actually not true. The tech workers that live in the single family homes along market do still have cars. It’s a travesty they weren’t required to build parking!
Perhaps those people could buy or rent places with garages if they needed a place to park their car.
Snowflakes problems….
@KIMO
This is definitely NOT snowflake problems. All these people want is for the public roads to be used for parking instead of driving. Where are they supposed to park? Their garages?
common sense, of course you can get mad – while it’s a right of way, its certainly responsible for directing trucks or large vehicles down a too-small-street and damaging folks cars.
@guesty
Do you know what right of way me means?
common sense, sure. do you know what “trucks that know better don’t drive on these skinny streets” means?
“know better” is a relative term. Maybe the people that live there should “know better” than to park in the street where big trucks come down the road.
Why don’t these people just park in their empty driveways? Those people in Phinney Ridge sure are pretentious and demanding.
F your cars
I for one am guilty of this. I always try to go the fastest route possible.
Screw those Phinney Ridge chumps, they deserve what they get. Go Ballard!
Waze, Fuzzbuster for millennial. I love it!
The problem is that Waze takes input from drivers and Seattle drivers are horrible. It only takes a stroll down Mercer or Denny at rush hour to realize that Seattle’s gridlock is caused by impatient drivers who can’t freaking wait to enter the intersection. They’ll creep in knowing that they can’t get across before the light changes. Then when the light does change and they are the cause of the gridlock they blame everyone in the world except their own impatience. We don’t need to spend millions on infrastructure we just need to start ticketing the idiots who “block the box!”
Waze and Google Maps make some serious mistakes in Seattle. It seems they are more concerned with avoiding red lights than with avoiding congestion.
I don’t own a car but I do take Lyft. Once across the Ballard bridge I always have to take over navigation. There are some streets in Ballard that are so narrow they are effectively one-lane streets with two way traffic. Waze doesn’t know this so directs you down these streets to avoid the light at Market and Leary. But you don’t actually save anytime. First you have to take an unassisted left off 15th at rush hour. Then you have to creep down the side street, pulling over to let oncoming cars go by. The shortcut actually takes more time.
Alexa, get off my lawn!
Google or waze are dead wrong to direct cars and trucks down residential streets without knowing the characteristics of the street. North and Northwest 49th Street are steep and narrow wth limited sight lines. The one roundabout leaves little room to negotiate, trucks just go over it. Then the street below the roundabout is too narrow with parked cars on both sides. Drivers treat the street as if it were an arterial driving at speeds too fast for a residential area.