Sammamish ( ) is a city in King County, Washington, United States. The population was 67,455 at the 2020 census. Located on a plateau, the city is bordered by Lake Sammamish to the west and the Snoqualmie Valley to the east. Sammamish is situated 20 miles east of Seattle, is a member of the Eastside, and is a part of the Seattle metropolitan area.

Etymology

The name "Sammamish" is an anglicization of the Lushootseed name of the Sammamish people, . According to historian and writer David Buerge, the name derives from the word , meaning "willow," and the suffix , meaning "people," meaning their name translates to "willow people." Alternatively, according to linguist and anthropologist T.T. Waterman, the name means "meander dwellers."

History

Lake Sammamish and the adjacent plateau has been Duwamish, Suquamish, Snoqualmie, Sammamish, and Snohomish territory since the last Pleistocene glaciation, before contact with European people. They lived in longhouse villages in seven places on and near the coast of Sammamish Lake. Two of them were in present-day Sammamish.

The Sammamish Plateau was part of unincorporated King County for most of its recorded history. The first settlers arrived in the 1870s While the plateau remained predominantly rural, several other residential areas were established during the early 20th century. The Sunny Hills neighborhood was built in the 1960s and was followed by an elementary school. The city annexed Klahanie on January 1, 2016.

The city government approved plans in 2008 to develop a denser town center with mixed use zoning and taller buildings. The first two residential buildings and several commercial developments were completed over the following decade, but plans for the largest phase stalled into the 2020s. Construction began in 2024 on 38 townhomes in the phase, which is planned to be followed by more townhomes, 600 market rate apartments, and commercial space.

Geography

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which are land and are water.

thumb|Sammamish in late April, from [[Lake Sammamish State Park. ]]

Climate

The city has a warm-summer Mediterranean climate (Köppen: Csb), or oceanic (Köppen: Cfb) if the isohyet is used. Due to the rain shadow effect of the Olympic Mountains to the west, summers are much drier here than on the immediate west coast of Washington.

Winters are cool and wet; the wettest months are November, December, and January, when the area is directly affected by the Aleutian Low, and summers are warm and dry; the driest months are July and August. Snowfall is rare; subfreezing temperatures usually occur with a high-pressure system, which brings clear skies. Extremes range from in February 1950, to in June 2021.

Sammamish is in hardiness zone 8b, with small southwestern pockets as well as the immediate Lake Sammamish coast falling into type 9a.

Climate change

Sammamish is predicted to warm by 3-12 F (2-7 C) before 2100 regardless of future emissions, and around 2.5 F during the next few decades due to climate change. Warming by any significant amount will cause Sammamish to have reduced snowfall, hotter and drier summers, and more warm-season extreme weather events.

Sammamish's climate change action plan includes, but is not limited to, tree replacement, voluntary planting, protecting threatened species, protecting native fish such as Chinook salmon and the streams, lakes and ponds they live in, floodplain management, wetland protection, emission reduction, light/noise pollution reduction, toxin (pesticide) control, and many other measures.<br>2020 Census

The U.S. Census Bureau estimated that the median household income in Sammamish was $239,000 in 2022, placing it first among U.S. cities with a population greater than 65,000.

The top five reported languages spoken at home were English (56.3%), Spanish (3.4%), other Indo-European languages (14.6%), Asian and Pacific Islander (24.4%), and Other (1.2%).

The median age in the city was 41.3 years.

In 2007, CNN Money ranked Sammamish as the 11th Best Place to Live in the United States, and subsequently ranked it as #12 in 2009 and #15 in 2011. Sammamish was also ranked the 9th Best Place to Live by Money.com in 2018.

Racial and ethnic composition

{| class="wikitable"

|+Sammamish, Washington – racial and ethnic composition<br><small></small>

! Race / ethnicity <small>(NH = non-Hispanic)</small>

! Pop. 2000

! Pop. 2010

!

! % 2000

! % 2010

!

|-

| White alone (NH)

| 29,361

| 32,909

| style='background: #ffffe6; |34,652

| 86.09%

| 71.89%

| style='background: #ffffe6; |51.37%

|-

| Black or African American alone (NH)

| 273

| 427

| style='background: #ffffe6; |827

| 0.80%

| 0.93%

| style='background: #ffffe6; |1.23%

|-

| Native American or Alaska Native alone (NH)

| 91

| 106

| style='background: #ffffe6; |105

| 0.27%

| 0.23%

| style='background: #ffffe6; |0.16%

|-

| Asian alone (NH)

| 2,678

| 8,841

| style='background: #ffffe6; |24,122

| 7.85%

| 19.31%

| style='background: #ffffe6; |35.76%

|-

| Pacific Islander alone (NH)

| 30

| 46

| style='background: #ffffe6; |59

| 0.09%

| 0.10%

| style='background: #ffffe6; |0.09%

|-

| Other race alone (NH)

| 60

| 96

| style='background: #ffffe6; |280

| 0.18%

| 0.21%

| style='background: #ffffe6; |0.42%

|-

| Mixed race or multiracial (NH)

| 758

| 1,551

| style='background: #ffffe6; |3,795

| 2.22%

| 3.39%

| style='background: #ffffe6; |5.63%

|-

| Hispanic or Latino (any race)

| 853

| 1,804

| style='background: #ffffe6; |3,615

| 2.50%

| 3.94%

| style='background: #ffffe6; |5.36%

|-

| Total

| 34,104

| 45,780

| style='background: #ffffe6; |67,455

| 100.00%

| 100.00%

| style='background: #ffffe6; |100.00%

|}

2020 census

As of the 2020 census, Sammamish had a population of 67,455, 21,895 households, and 18,861 families residing in the city. The median age was 38.9 years, with 29.7% of residents under the age of 18, 6.1% under 5, and 9.2% 65 or older. For every 100 females there were 99.2 males, and for every 100 females age 18 and over there were 97.0 males age 18 and over; 51.1% of the population was female.

Of those households, 52.4% had children under the age of 18 living in them, 77.4% were married-couple households, 8.1% were households with a male householder and no spouse or partner present, and 11.9% were households with a female householder and no spouse or partner present. About 10.9% of all households were made up of individuals and 3.4% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older.

The racial makeup of the city was 52.6% White, 1.3% Black or African American, 0.2% American Indian and Alaska Native, 35.8% Asian, 0.1% Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander, 1.4% from some other race, and 8.5% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino people of any race were 5.4% of the population.

{| class="wikitable"

|+ Racial composition as of the 2020 census Eastside Fire and Rescue is contracted to provide fire services. Sammamish contracts with the King County Sheriff's Office for police services. Deputies assigned to Sammamish wear city uniforms and drive patrol cars marked with the city logo.

Education

Sammamish's public school system is primarily served by two school districts.

Everything north of Southeast 8th Street is served by Lake Washington School District, and has two high schools (Eastlake, Tesla STEM), two middle schools (Inglewood, Renaissance School of Art and Reasoning), and five elementary schools (Elizabeth Blackwell, Rachel Carson, Christa McAuliffe, Margaret Mead, Samantha Smith).

Everything south of Southeast 8th Street is served by Issaquah School District,

Transportation

Sammamish is served by several major north–south roads: East Lake Sammamish Parkway along the lake shore, 228th Avenue through the business district, and Issaquah-Pine Lake Road. Southeast 4th Street connects 228th Avenue to the city's town center. To the north and east of the city is State Route 202, providing access to Redmond, and to the south is Interstate 90 in Issaquah. A regional freeway, Interstate 605, has been proposed several times since the 1960s to run through Sammamish, but has not been built.

Bus service is provided by King County Metro routes 218, 269, and Sound Transit Express route 554 to Redmond, Issaquah, and Downtown Seattle. South Sammamish Park and Ride is the city's transit center with 265 parking stalls. Metro began running dial-a-ride buses to the Sammamish Plateau in 1993, and it later extended commuter services in the early 2000s.

The King County government started construction of an bike trail on the east side of Lake Sammamish in 1998. It was completed in 2023, replacing a disused railway.

Notable people

  • Hunter Bryant, professional American football player
  • Blake Hawksworth, professional baseball player
  • Surf Mesa, musician
  • Simone Rose, professional artistic gymnast
  • Kim Schrier, U.S. congresswoman
  • Matisse Thybulle, professional basketball player

References

  • City website