It's true. Downtown Seattle and its attached "chic" neighborhood Belltown are both IMHO wastelands - and not at all the urban paradise they are advertised to be

It's true. Downtown Seattle and its attached "chic" neighborhood Belltown are both IMHO wastelands - and not at all the urban paradise they are advertised to be. Homeless folk, crackheads, petty criminals of all varieties, and a complete lack of pedestrian traffic pretty much defines downtown. Queen Anne, Fremont, Capitol Hill, and Ballard are much closer to the new urbanist ideal than anything else available in the area.