Children's Hospital Apologizes For Early Morning Non-Permitted Delivery

A few weeks ago, a large truck made a delivery at the Children's Hospital fire lane on NE 45th Street, across from 42nd Avenue NE around 6am.

Children's posted about this on their Construction Blog, but only a few minutes before the delivery was to arrive on the same morning. 

Their Blog post says at 5:50am:

Today, November  21, we will be bringing in a crane and large steel beams as part of our continuing construction. A large semi-truck will arrive with the crane around 6:00 a.m. and from that time until 8:00 a.m. the crane will be unloaded.

 

The Laurelhurst Blog Staff checked with the City of Seattle and found no permit on file for this delivery. The City of Seattle has a noise ordinance policy that states that no commercial trucks are allowed in a zoned residential area before 7am.

One nearby resident wrote:

The delivery was startling and loud to hear so early in the morning, as Children's is always so good about not making any deliveries or loud noises in our neighborhood before 7am, So we were quite surprised to hear the loud beeping for quite a long time and well as loud noises.

In addition the delivery was made to a small opening on NE 45th Street across from 42nd and 43rd Avenues NE. I don't believe that that area even has a driveway for deliveries so it doesn't seem to be a designated delivery area. Plus, it is in the middle of a zoned residential area. The delivery was not made to the loading dock, which is it in an zoned residential area, as it in a commercial area on Sand Point Way that allows deliveries before 7am. 

The Hospital's Blog post says the delivery would be at 6am, which it was. The post said the delivery was that early so as not to disturb traffic at NE 45th Street. Shouldn't there also have been flaggers since it sounded like it was quite a large truck.

Todd M. Johnson, Vice President | Facilities & Supply Chain, at Children's sent the Blog Staff this email:

Dear Laurelhurst Blogger,

Please accept my sincere apologies for the early morning beeping noise that came from the Children’s campus on November 21.  My team did not communicate to our neighbors in a timely and effective way.  We also failed to approach the City of Seattle to seek any needed permits for early morning delivery noise.  This was an oversight, due mainly to the fact that the team has not had to deal with these issues in quite a long time.  Those responsible for dropping the ball are aware of the errors, understand the impact on the community and offer their apologies as well.

The beeping that neighbors heard was coming from a  truck delivering two very large “I” beams to be used in our Psychiatry and Behavioral Medicine Unit. The beams will provide structural support for a new connecting stairway between the fourth and fifth floors of the River building.  We are changing the unit to better meet the community’s need for inpatient psychiatric services. 

Maneuvering the truck blocked all of 45^th Street for a period of time, so we chose to have this delivery early in the morning to lessen the impact on traffic along 45^th Street.  As you know, 45^th is a busy arterial at commute times, supporting trips to and from Laurelhurst Elementary, shopping destinations,  the University District, and downtown Seattle. 

The access drive (sometimes referred to as “the fire lane” ) is just west of 42^nd Avenue NE.  It is a seldom-used but important service access point to the middle of our campus.  It offers the only route in for our gardener’s vehicles, fire trucks, and delivery of very large building items. The back up beeping is a safety feature that many companies will not disable, even when flaggers are present.  We did not begin construction work until after the agreed-upon time of 7:00, but we realize that the beeping sound can be extremely annoying.
 

We at Children’s want to be good neighbors.  We regret this  error. and will not allow it to occur again.  Occasionally we must deliver items early  (for example, when the City insists that a delivery occur in off-hours due to traffic implications).  We will work with our contractors to minimize the number of these occurrences – we have no more currently planned. 
 
Thank you, and happy holidays.