Possibly relocating to Seattle - How do you manage your gear if living downtown

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Broct

Contributor
Messages
127
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Location
Seattle
# of dives
200 - 499
I am considering a new job opportunity in Seattle, and currently live in the Northeast in a house. Looking at moving downtown to be closer to city life and office location, and focused on 1 bed room apartments. Challenge will be how do I manager all my tanks (Aluminum and Steel) and all the gear I have accumulated over the years. So for those of you living in the city, how do you manage/ approach this situation; i.e. storage units, etc. Also any hints of dive shops or dive clubs to meet other divers. I am very open minded when it comes to diving, and I would like to hook up with DIR trained divers if possible.

Many thanks

** Feedback can be from other cities too, just looking for ideas.
 
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there's a big GUE/UTD crowd out there. TsandM is out there as well.

As one living in the city. Two options. One, get a storage unit/cargo trailer. I went trailer, don't regret it. Option 2, find a good dive buddy who likes you enough and has enough room to store your gear for you. I did that partially as well :)
 
Simple, become an instructor and keep your stuff at the shop.......easy peezy.


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There's a fantastic DIR community in Seattle, and a DIR-oriented shop conveniently located in West Seattle (Fifth Dimension).

As for storing gear ... can't help you there, as I live well south of Seattle and have a garage. Perhaps rent a storage unit, or find a friend with a garage and a willingness to let you use a piece of it.

Finding dive buddies here is super easy, with several local and very active dive clubs to choose from. The one located in Seattle is Marker Buoys, and they've got dives going on pretty much every day.

If it's diving opportunities you want, you're gonna love it here. Good diving's easily accessible ... lots of shore diving within easy driving from downtown (though the traffic sometimes is horrible), and if DIR's your thing there are weekly get-togethers at the local West Seattle mudhole.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)
 
Great feedback everyone! Looking to hearing more ideas and more info about clubs and gear storage. Any underwater photography clubs or groups you can recommend? I plan on speaking to the people at optical ocean sales, and image they might be able to help in this area.

There's a fantastic DIR community in Seattle, and a DIR-oriented shop conveniently located in West Seattle (Fifth Dimension).

Thanks for the hint on the DIR dive shop Bob!
 
Not exactly an answer to your question, but I would recommend to seriously consider other areas besides downtown. Unlike in most other large cities, there are many nice neighborhoods in Seattle where you can get a house at a reasonable price, see some green trees, hear the birds, and still have a 10-15 minute commute to work (of course, that depends on where you work). The downtown seems crowded, overpriced, and IMHO, really kind of pointless. AFAIK, a lot of students and other young people who like to go out a lot prefer to live in the Capitol Hill area. ( Disclaimer: I've been living here for less than a year, so take my advice with a grain of salt. )
 
Not exactly an answer to your question, but I would recommend to seriously consider other areas besides downtown. Unlike in most other large cities, there are many nice neighborhoods in Seattle where you can get a house at a reasonable price, see some green trees, hear the birds, and still have a 10-15 minute commute to work (of course, that depends on where you work). The downtown seems crowded, overpriced, and IMHO, really kind of pointless. AFAIK, a lot of students and other young people who like to go out a lot prefer to live in the Capitol Hill area. ( Disclaimer: I've been living here for less than a year, so take my advice with a grain of salt. )

Great feedback, the job I am looking at is located near pioneer square, and I plan on being close enough that I can ride my road bike to the office as much as possible. I am kind of interested to live in the city area however. I will consider your suggest also.
 
A friend of mine lived in one of the high-rise condos downtown. His unit had a kind of foyer, and he filled that with his dive gear. Renting a 2 bdrm and converting the 2nd bedroom is also an option -- you might look at the comparison in cost between a larger living unit and the cost of an off-site storage unit and driving.

there's a big GUE/UTD crowd out there. TsandM is out there as well.

I found this amusing, because the way it's written, it implies I'm not part of the big GUE crowd, which I kind of regard myself as being :)

To the OP, take a look at the NWUE and GUE-Seattle Facebook groups. Lots of dives are planned there, and all the GUE-Seattle activities are posted there. If you aren't GUE trained, we have TWO local instructors now, so classes aren't hard to get into. And there is an active and very pleasant group of GUE divers.

There are also two lovely UTD instructors and bunch of great UTD-trained divers.

All in all, the Seattle area is rife with divers and diving -- with photographers and wreck divers and technical divers and REEF fish counters and just plain lets-get-wet divers. You're coming to a great place.
 
Will they let you bring tanks and other dive gear on the water taxi from downtown to Alki? I remember my last visit there, the water taxi was a nice way to travel...
 
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