This cul-de-sac was created in 1984 as part of the plat of Valley Ridge, and was named after the nearby S Raymond Street. Raymond Street was itself named by and for Herbert R. Raymond (1862–1933), and his wife, Minnie M. Raymond (1874–1947), née Truax.
This street was named in 1906 as Raymond Avenue, part of Replat Tracts 30 & 31 Sunnyside 5 Acre Tracts, by Herbert R. Raymond (1862–1933) of New Brunswick, Canada, and his wife, Minnie M. Raymond (1874–1947), née Truax, of Massachusetts. In 1907, it and Spencer Avenue became Raymond Street as part of the renaming of streets in Beacon Hill and Rainier Valley, and Grand Avenue, Grand View Avenue, and Sixteenth Street in West Seattle took the name as well. Three years later, when Georgetown was annexed, Raymond Street replaced James Street. (All this information from Rob Ketcherside’s extremely useful searchable table of street name changes.)
Herbert came to Washington as a child, along with his family; Minnie appears to have come later, and the two married in 1895. His eldest brother, George (Herbert was the youngest of eight children), sold shoes in Seattle and was also on the city council and in the territorial, as it then was, legislature. He later moved to Bellingham and was on the city council there in 1912 and 1913, and was mayor for less than two months, in December 1915 and January 1916, his term ending with his sudden death.
Herbert himself was also in the shoe business. As his Seattle Times obituary put it, he was:
Formerly one of the Pacific Northwest’s prominent shoe merchants and leading civic spirits… He had been retired for the past twelve years and had spent most of his time out of doors improving his two-acre residential property which overlooks Lake Washington. Mr. Raymond came to Seattle four years before the Seattle fire and helped fight it. His first shoe store was at First Avenue near Madison Street. He operated in other locations and under other firm names in subsequent years.
S Raymond Street begins at 51st Place S and goes just over ⅕ of a mile west to 48th Avenue S. It resumes at 44th Avenue S and goes a block west to 42nd Avenue S. There is another short segment that goes 1½ blocks west from Martin Luther King Jr. Way S, and then a longer segment begins at 33rd Avenue S and goes ½ a mile west to Beacon Avenue S, the portion crossing the Chief Sealth Trail being a pathway. A few more segments appear between 24th Avenue S and Swift Avenue S.
SW Raymond Street begins in West Seattle at High Point Drive SW and SW Graham Street and goes 1¼ miles west to 49th Avenue SW.
This portion of E Olive Street was renamed E Olive Lane by Ordinance 100274 in 1971. It is unclear why. For some reason, as the quarter section map shows, the name change wasn’t extended into the shoreline street end.
Olive Street was named for Olive Julia Bell Stewart (1846–1921), who was five when the Denny Party arrived at Alki Point in 1851.
E Olive Lane begins at Lake Washington Boulevard at the bottom of the E Olive Street stairway and, passing Howell Place, goes around 380 feet east to Lake Washington.
E Olive Street between Melrose Avenue and Bellevue Avenue was renamed E Olive Place sometime between 1912, when it was recorded in the Baist Atlas as E Olive Street, and 1919, the first time it appeared as E Olive Place in The Seattle Times. I could not find any information on the name-change ordinance, and no information appears on King County’s quarter section map. The motivation appears to have been the fact that it meets Bellevue Avenue a half block north of its continuation and was very recently established (1910).
E Olive Street was named for Olive Julia Bell Stewart (1846–1921), who was five when the Denny Party arrived at Alki Point in 1851.
E Olive Street continues the original name of Olive Way east of Bellevue Avenue. As noted in that article, it was named for Olive Julia Bell Stewart (1846–1921), who was five when the Denny Party arrived at Alki Point in 1851.
E Olive Street begins at Bellevue Avenue and goes ⅕ of a mile east to Harvard Avenue. On the other side of Seattle Central College and Cal Anderson Park, it resumes at 11th Avenue and goes another ⅖ of a mile east to 18th Avenue, where it’s interrupted by E Madison Street. Picking up again at 20th Avenue, it goes ⅞ of a mile east to 39th Avenue, where it becomes a short stairway down to Lake Washington Boulevard.
Its initial segment, the block between Melrose Avenue and Bellevue Avenue, was renamed E Olive Place sometime between 1912 and 1919, and its final paved segment, the block between Lake Washington Boulevard and Lake Washington, was renamed E Olive Lane in 1971. As noted in that article, the shoreline street end, for some reason, retained the E Olive Street name.
This street was established in 1926 as part of North Beach, an Addition to the City of Seattle, which overlooks Puget Sound. Just as my assumption is NW Neptune Place was so named because Neptune is the Roman god of the sea, I assume Triton Drive was so named because Triton is his son.
Triton Drive NW begins at 28th Avenue NW and NW 96th Street and goes around 870 feet northeast to an intersection with NW Esplanade, where it becomes NW Blue Ridge Drive.
This street was established in 1926 as part of North Beach, an Addition to the City of Seattle. As the advertisement below indicates, the addition features excellent views of Puget Sound. I assume Neptune being the Roman god of the sea was the inspiration behind the name.
NW Neptune Place begins at NW Blue Ridge Drive and NW 100th Street and goes around 650 feet southeast to NW 98th Street and 24th Avenue NW.
This street was created in 1926 as part of the Replat of a Portion of Blocks 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 of North Beach, an Addition to the City of Seattle. I presume it was named, similarly to Montavista Place W and Viewmont Way W, for the neighborhood’s view of Puget Sound (“mar”) and the Olympic Mountains (“mount”).
Marmount Drive NW begins at NW 96th Street west of 26th Avenue NW and goes around 775 feet north to NW North Beach Drive.
Like Loyal Avenue NW, this street was named by Edward B. Cox, Harry Whitney Treat (1865–1922), and Treat’s wife, Olive Marion Graef Treat (1869–1945) in the 1907 plat of Loyal Heights. The streets and the subdivision were named after Loyal Graef Treat Nichols (1906–2004), the Treats’ newborn daughter.
Loyal Way NW begins at 28th Avenue NW and NW 80th Street and goes just over ⅓ of a mile northwest to 32nd Avenue Northwest and NW 85th Street, following the route of the Loyal Electric Street Railway that Treat built in 1907.
This street was named as part of the 1907 plat of Loyal Heights, filed by Edward B. Cox and Harry Whitney Treat, and Treat’s wife, Olive Marion Graef Treat. Then, as now, the lots abutted a wooded (“sylvan”) area surrounding an unnamed creek that begins between Golden Gardens Drive NW and Forest Hill Place NW just north of NW 87th Street and flows to Puget Sound, heading into a culvert just south of Whitney Place NW and continuing under NW Esplanade and the BNSF Railway mainline to the privately owned North Beach.
Sylvan Place NW begins at the intersection of Loyal Avenue NW and Golden Gardens Drive NW and goes around 400 feet northeast, where it turns into Cyrus Avenue NW.
Note: This was originally published on Crosscut.com on April 4, 2011, as ‘Niehaus Way South: a nice tribute, or half of one anyway’ (reminder: stringers don’t write their own headlines). Recently, Cascade PBS took down what appears to be most of the stories from the Crosscut days, so I thought I’d repost some of my articles here. The original subhed was:
The new ‘designation’ for one stretch of First Avenue South will honor the late Mariner broadcaster without fully renaming the street. Here’s why that’s a good thing.
Later today (April 4), nearly 32 years to the day after S. Connecticut Street was renamed S. Royal Brougham Way for the late P-I sportswriter, the Seattle City Council is expected to honor another sports legend with a SoDo street. First Avenue South between Royal Brougham and Edgar Martinez Drive South will receive a “secondary designation” of Dave Niehaus Way South.
Though official, it is not a renaming in the same way Connecticut and Atlantic became Royal Brougham and Edgar Martinez, or Airport Way in front of the old INS building reverted to its historic name of Seattle Boulevard. As councilmember Sally Clark notes in the April edition of her email newsletter, “it will still be First Ave. S. on your street maps and GIS systems, but you’ll see a special brown sign with Dave’s name.”
Clark’s office says the Mariners are paying for the installation, and that there will be an unveiling on April 8, the day of the Mariners’ home opener. “The street naming is one tribute among many,” said Clark, when asked for comment. “I hope the signs remind people of Dave’s voice and of great plays seen from the stands or heard on the radio.”
”By renaming this street, we affirm that the legend of Dave Niehaus will never die,” said Glen Garnett, paraphrasing a line from “The Sandlot.” Garnett originally wanted to rename this stretch of First Avenue after Ken Griffey, Jr., but redirected his efforts after Niehaus’ death.
So what does this mean for proposals to name Seattle’s alleys and other unnamed spaces? A year ago, Crosscut’s Knute Berger wrote that “honorary names … won’t show up on maps or as addresses, and they can cause confusion… they can become controversial for being too outlandish, too commercial, or not politically correct.” But they could nevertheless be the best way forward. Budgets may never again allow for Great Renamings, but nothing should stand in the way of projects with smaller scope, catalogued online, funded by local property owners or heritage groups, and approved in, say, twice-yearly batches.
Pioneer Square’s Nord Alley, Downtown’s News Lane, and Denny-Blaine’s Swanson’s Alley are among the initial candidates I’d put forward. Yesler Terrace is another possibility. Regardless of one’s position on its redevelopment, a nod to Jesse Epstein and Nihonmachi (Japantown) seems in order. Considering the current and likely future funding environment, “secondary designations” deserve a serious look as a cost-effective way to bring a sense of place and history to the streets of Seattle.
In June 2025, the BNSF Railway‘s Balmer Yard in Magnolia/Interbay closed. Nothing had appeared in the news as of the end of the month — just in Facebook groups and railroading bulletin boards — but it looks as if over a century of railroad operations in the neighborhood has come to an end (with the exception of the BNSF main line, known here as the Scenic Subdivision).
Update as of June 26, 2025: Feliks Banel has received this statement from BNSF:
“Driven by the success of efficiency initiatives across our network, rail cars are spending much less time dwelling in yards and more time moving the nation’s freight. This increase in productivity has allowed us to move more freight than this time last year with significantly fewer cars. Given the close proximity of our Seattle Stacy Yard and Balmer Yard, with fewer cars sitting in terminals, we were able to consolidate the two operations into one location.
“Although we are not actively switching or repairing cars at Balmer Yard, it is still critical to our overall capacity and operations. We are utilizing the facility to position cars for future customer shipments such as intermodal, lumber, and grain to be quickly injected into our network. All employees that previously went on duty at Balmer were shifted to nearby locations in Tacoma, Seattle and Everett.”
The yard, originally known as Interbay Yard and first mention in The Seattle Times in 1900, was renamed for Thomas Balmer (1888-1959) in 1968 upon its modernization into a hump yard, which took advantage of the 1% grade of the land that had formerly been part of the Smith Cove tideflats.
Balmer began working at the Great Northern Railway in 1907, seven years after he moved to Seattle from Illinois. He went to law school while working there, and by 1929 had become vice president and Western counsel. Balmer retired from the GN in 1958, a year before his death. (In 1970, the GN merged with the Northern Pacific Railway; the Spokane, Portland and Seattle Railway; and the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad to form the Burlington Northern Railroad. BN itself merged with the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway in 1996 to form today’s BNSF.)
Balmer was also a real estate investor and a regent of the University of Washington. It is for this latter service, from 1934 until his death, that he was honored by the longtime home of the University of Washington School of Business, Balmer Hall. Completed in 1962, it was demolished in 2010.
This street was named in 1923 by Ordinance 45722, which provided that:
That certain alley in the City of Seattle, being the alley in Block one (1), Yesler & McGilvra Addition, running from East Howell Street to East Olive Street, and lying between Fortieth Avenue and Lake Washington, be and the same is hereby designated as, and named, EAST HOWELL PLACE.
It was named after E Howell Street, itself named for Jefferson Davis Howell (1846–1875).
Howell Place begins at E Howell Street just east of Lake Washington Boulevard and goes just under 400 feet south to E Olive Lane.
This street was created in two stages: the southern portion of this street in 1971 as 25th Avenue S, part of the plat of Beacon Vista; the northern portion in 1976, part of Goodwin’s Addition. A year before the second plat was filed, its name was changed to Vista Avenue S, obviously after the initial plat.
Beacon Vista itself was named for its view from Beacon Hill, not of Beacon Hill:
Today, Vista Avenue S begins at S Willow Street between Mars Avenue S and Beacon Avenue S, and goes 800 feet north to S Holly Street west of Beacon Avenue S.
This unnamed street, which was built sometime between 2002 and 2005, received a name in 2016 as part of a bill to improve emergency wayfinding, Ordinance 125106, which dealt with a number of other street name changes as well. It was named, of course, for Eastlake Avenue NE (the University Bridge), in whose right-of-way it was built. The bill summary provides details:
Name change of a lower roadway at the east of the present existing bridge on Eastlake Avenue NE between its south terminus at the shoreline and the south margin of NE Pacific Street to Eastlake Place NE: In 2010, this portion of Eastlake Avenue NE was informally renamed as Eastlake Place NE in 2010 by SDOT but it was not legally renamed by ordinance. This action will formally name the segment by ordinance. It is necessary to legally name this segment to get the name to properly present on mapping tools pulling from Street Network Database and SDOT’s asset management program, Hansen 8. Not showing the correct name is causing internal SDOT confusion. The University of Washington also needs to officially address facilities off of this segment and DPD cannot proceed until the name is changed. (Also relevant to new segment in Eastlake r/w north of Pacific; see below). SDOT sign records notes this intersection signed as Eastlake Avenue NE in 2004, however no notation prior. Per orthophotos, the Eastlake right-of-way under the University Bridge was built to its current configuration between 2002 and 2005, potentially as part of the new building construction for 905 Boat Street.
Naming a lower roadway at the east of the present existing bridge on Eastlake Ave NE between the north margin of NE Pacific Street and the south margin of NE 40th Street to Eastlake Place NE: Names this newly constructed segment Eastlake Place NE to agree with segment to the south.
Eastlake Place NE begins on the Lake Union shoreline south of NE Pacific Street and goes around 500 feet northeast to the Burke-Gilman Trail, the last 160 or so feet being a pathway.
This Queen Anne street was established in 1923 as Lee Place and received its current name in 1924. It was likely named for the Queen Anne Standpipes, a pair of water towers nearby that were built in 1900 and 1901 and served the neighborhood until 2007. Even though they were historical landmarks, they were subsequently demolished and replaced with the current single tower.
Interestingly, though its lack of a directional designation (e.g., Tower Place N) would imply it’s an east–west street, the quarter section map appears to indicate it’s both, beginning at Lee Street just south of Observatory Courts and going 175 feet south to a dead end, and beginning halfway down the aforementioned segment and going around 100 feet east to a dead end.
This street was created in 1977 to connect the proposed NOAA Western Regional Center to Sand Point Way NE. It was unnamed for many years, but was finally signed sometime before 2009, when the below picture was taken. NOAA, of course, stands for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which built its regional headquarters on the northern portion of the decommissioned Sand Point Naval Air Station.
NE NOAA Drive begins at Sand Point Way NE between NE 77th Street and the Fairway Estates access road and goes ¼ mile east to the beginning of a mile-long loop through the NOAA campus.
Like Heights Avenue SW, this West Seattle street was created in 1924 as part of the plat of Hunnel Heights, an Addition to the City of Seattle.
Heights Place SW begins at Heights Avenue SW between 41st and 42nd Avenues SW and goes 175 feet south to a dead end.
This West Seattle street was created in 1924, along with Heights Place SW, as part of the plat of Hunnel Heights, an Addition to the City of Seattle, named for James (1857–1925) and Mamie Hunnel (1868–1951). Why it wasn’t Hunnel Avenue instead, I’m not sure.
Heights Avenue SW beings at 41st Avenue SW between SW Frontenac Street and SW Holly Street and goes 350 feet northwest to 42nd Avenue SW.
This West Seattle street was created in 1909 as part of the Replat of Blocks 2, 5, and 6, Lincoln Beach Park. Based on its proximity to the Gatewood Acre Tracts and Gatewood Gardens subdivisions, it would appear to have been named for the developer Carlisle Gatewood (1860–1947), after whom Gatewood Elementary School and the Gatewood neighborhood itself are also named.
Gatewood Road SW begins at Glenridge Way SW south of SW Othello Street and goes around 850 feet southeast to 40th Avenue SW north of SW Webster Street.
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