New at Essential Baking: the "big fish" bike rack

Essential Baking Company now has another attraction to add to its bread, cookies and desserts: a really big fish.

Thursday morning Seattle Department of Transportation installed this bike rack on N. 34th Street and Woodlawn Ave. N., just outside the bakery. It takes up a car’s-length of space but can accommodate 14 bicycles.

SDOT program manager Doug Cox told us that SDOT approached the café manager Jason Circelli and let him know that they thought location was ideal for a big fish rack. Cox said via email, “The location has a lot in common with our first location (12th Ave outside of Café Presse [in Capitol Hill]) in that it is along a corridor with bicycle facilities (there are sharrows on N. 34th St, and the café is just a block north of the Burke-Gilman Trail) and does not have a lot of room to install more of the standard bike racks on the sidewalks due to the outdoor seating area.”

Cox said that Circelli agreed that Essential needed more bike parking for their customers (as anyone who’s stopped there on a sunny weekend can attest).

SDOT decided to use this style of rack because, Cox said, it is very functional for cyclists to use and easy to install and maintain. Many more pictures of the rack installation are here.

This bike rack, as well as the installation of more in fish and car motifs over the coming months, is funded by the Bridging the Gap transportation initiative. SDOT spokesperson Peg Nielsen said via email that the bike rack program addresses the expanding need for bicycle parking and is part of the ongoing implementation of the Bicycle Master Plan, which seeks to triple the number of people bicycling in Seattle over 10 years. For more information or to request bicycle racks in your neighborhood, contact SDOT at (206) 684-7583 or bikeracks@seattle.gov.