Here’s a one-mile radius circle drawn from our place:
If you stay up on the ridge in this circle you’ll find half-a-dozen pubs, at least that many coffee shops, a bunch of restaurants, a grocery store and a hardware store, the library, the post office, a dry cleaner, several dentists – basically the essentials of urban living without having to climb. There are also more churches than you can count. If you accept that you have to get back up to the crest of the ridge the circle includes 45th and Fremont, the west side of green lake including PCC, Greenwood almost all the way to 85th, 8th up to 80th, 65th and market over to 15th – including Ballard Market and Safeway and Walgreens.
Expanding that circle to 2 mile looks like this:
Now you’ve got all of Ballard, All of Fremont, Nickerson and fisherman’s terminal, all of Wallingford, all of Greenlake, all of Greenwood, and most of Crown Hill / Loyal Heights. A 2-mile ride takes maybe 10 minutes. Even with the climb back up to the crest of the ridge I do it on a single speed without special bike clothes or shoes.