Working downtown...quiet areas north of Seattle? (Tacoma, Burien: townhouse, schools)

[Inkpoe]

Originally Posted by lingevity

I think the I-5 and 99 bridges will be OK. They're minuscule compared to those over Lake Washington. With regard to the floating bridge, he's shaking his head "No" after seeing pictures of what appears to be waves crashing over the sides.

"Minuscule"? Hardly.

I personally hate driving on the Aurora bridge (99) because of the narrowness of the lanes.

[Blondebaerde]

Originally Posted by lingevity

I think the I-5 and 99 bridges will be OK. They're minuscule compared to those over Lake Washington. With regard to the floating bridge, he's shaking his head "No" after seeing pictures of what appears to be waves crashing over the sides.

I seem to be crossing the Rubicon to "Old Fogey-dom" one step at a time, too. It's inevitable. Glad I'm not crossing the Styx, however. Not yet, anyway.

The greatest challenge actually has a couple facets: 1) COL 2) traffic and commuting 3) balancing needs and wants and locating appropriately.

No kids, so that's not one of the "usual" factors applicable here.

ORCA passes are good, I use mine now for enjoyment vs. necessity though that changes across the years. Only certain times I'd drive into Seattle, now: traffic is epically bad much of the time.

$450K may mean a nice duplex or townhome. That's pushing your luck on homes in Seattle proper to fixer-uppers or less desirable areas, but the realtors on here will know all about that. Bet you could actually find something fairly nice for that kind of money. Living in a townhome for 11 years, I really liked it in some ways. The blandness and impersonality was irritating after awhile, but I made my choices and there are always other options.

Lake Washington bridges are not "high span" by any stretch. But looks like that's off the table. No West Seattle, either. Guess you'll need to make do in Seattle-proper.

Make it Vote no. 3 on this thread for Magnolia. Two pals of mine (couple) live in Magnolia: when I turn up there every year or so we always have lunch in Ballard or Magnolia. He works for UW, she for King County, they've got it made. Nice, nice townhome that they didn't pay a ton for: he's waaaay too cheap to spend money on a house. Fairly close to the rail yards, but they deal with what appears to be modest noise w/o much complaint.

Only issue I'd have is really getting out of there on a regular basis seems to be convoluted, though may or may not be a traffic issue. They're city people. Similarly, I'm trapped by-design on Eastside (Kirkland) and don't mind that one bit. Hard to move around much on weeknights due to traffic.

You'll need to scout this out pretty carefully prior to deciding, btw. Might be a busy week or so in town, prior.

[flyingsaucermom]

Originally Posted by Kayela

The I-5 one that is north of DT - [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_Canal_Bridge]Ship Canal Bridge - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/url]. There's been a lot of talk about replacing it, but no one wants to deal with the traffic mess.

Okay, so we're talking about the same one.... being a double decker bridge I can imagine trying to replace it would be nothing short of catastrophic for commuters. But I get really uncomfortable on it, especially when I'm stuck up there for 15 minutes in traffic.

[flyingsaucermom]

Originally Posted by Gardyloo

I live in Ravenna and am never really bothered by airplane noise, but YMMV. I'd try to stay in King County; definitely not Mill Creek or Lynwood - way too long a commute, either by car or in the bus. Kenmore/Shoreline is a possibility.

Does it take more than an hour from DT Seattle to Lynwood or Mill Creek? I didn't think they were much further out than Shoreline...

[Gardyloo]

Originally Posted by flyingsaucermom

Does it take more than an hour from DT Seattle to Lynwood or Mill Creek? I didn't think they were much further out than Shoreline...

I did the reverse commute from north Seattle to Everett daily for 15 years, and yes, there were a number of days when the "straight" commute (i.e. into the city in the morning) from Lynnwood/Mill Creek would take an hour or more. It's not just time on I-5; if you want to live in Mill Creek you also have to factor in time to/from the freeway, which can be very trafficky on streets like 128th. Same goes for Lynnwood; unless you live at Alderwood Mall, you need to add time to get to the freeway. Edmonds, too.

Plus, by public transport, those areas will involve using CT rather than Metro, with much less frequency and far fewer routes/destinations. As soon as you figure a park-and-ride into the formula, say bye-bye to a short commute. And really, housing prices aren't that much different than in Seattle proper. More gas burned in the car, too.

[lingevity]

Thank you all, sooo much, for the wealth of information. The info about the bridges is invaluable. Opens up the possibility of areas to the east.

We thought about renting, but since the new company is paying all relocation expenses, we're trying to get it right the first time rather than having to pay for another move out of our own pocket. We've lived in condos and townhouses, but kinda need a detached house since we have three vehicles.

Our first trip will be in two weekends, so I'm expecting an eye-opening experience. We now live in the far far northwest suburbs of Chicago (walking distance to Wisconsin), and it sounds like the neighborhoods close to downtown Seattle are nothing like those near Chicago.

[BellevueNative]

Originally Posted by flyingsaucermom

Does it take more than an hour from DT Seattle to Lynwood or Mill Creek? I didn't think they were much further out than Shoreline...

Originally Posted by Gardyloo

I did the reverse commute from north Seattle to Everett daily for 15 years, and yes, there were a number of days when the "straight" commute (i.e. into the city in the morning) from Lynnwood/Mill Creek would take an hour or more. It's not just time on I-5; if you want to live in Mill Creek you also have to factor in time to/from the freeway, which can be very trafficky on streets like 128th. Same goes for Lynnwood; unless you live at Alderwood Mall, you need to add time to get to the freeway. Edmonds, too.

Plus, by public transport, those areas will involve using CT rather than Metro, with much less frequency and far fewer routes/destinations. As soon as you figure a park-and-ride into the formula, say bye-bye to a short commute. And really, housing prices aren't that much different than in Seattle proper. More gas burned in the car, too.

I did the Mill Creek-Lower Queen Anne commute for a couple of years. On most days it was 45-55 minutes. If there was an accident, it was 1.5 hours, but thankfully that was the exception, not the rule. 164th is a breeze in the morning - very little traffic at all, and well timed lights. Getting home in the afternoon was usually faster.

The worst traffic in that commute was getting from/to I-5 to/from my office in Queen Anne. THAT was absolute hell. Every. Day. It was so bad that it contributed to my change of jobs.

I also lived in Kenmore for a while, and the commute around the lake on 522 took just as long as via I-5 from Mill Creek. And that was before the tolling on 520; I can't imagine it's gotten any better. Some of my worst commutes from that end of the lake were via 522/Bothell Way/Lake City Way when there was an accident on 405; on those days everyone headed to Seattle would take the lake drive instead.

[Ira500]

I find the Aurora bride and the I-5 bridge much scarier than I-90, but maybe that's just me. Many choose to live on the eastside because of the quality of the schools, but if you're old fogies/empty nesters, then you might not want to pay all that extra in housing costs because of that.
A lot of the southern suburbs don't have much airplane noise. I almost never hear planes in Renton, except from the much smaller Renton airport( little planes)...Burien is a lovely little town,particularly the western part, the old downtown area,and heading towards the water. Nice, walkable, artsy town, and you can avoid traffic to downtown because there are emptier freeways. In the north, Edmonds is a great place for old fogies( and younger folks too). There's a train to downtown Seattle from there that travels mostly along the water

[RVD90277]

Bothell or Edmonds along the 522 (north of it) requires no bridge to Seattle since you'll be driving around the lake.

[Inkpoe]

Originally Posted by RVD90277

Bothell or Edmonds along the 522 (north of it) requires no bridge to Seattle since you'll be driving around the lake.

Bothell and Edmonds certainly require a bridge to cross to/from Seattle. Anything north of Seattle requires crossing a bridge as there's a canal that connects Lake Union to Lake Washington/Puget Sound.