Seattle University students have a new option for rock climbing within city limits. Seattle Bouldering Project (SBP), part of the Bouldering Project family of climbing gyms, has opened a new gym in University District. Just a block away from the U District light rail stop, students can access two floors of climbing, a yoga studio, a sauna and cold plunge.
The gym opened November 2024 and students like Alex Bohls, a second-year nursing major, are already benefitting from its location.
“I’ve had a really good experience so far,” Bohls said. “The way it’s set up is cool, and they’re pretty good about changing their routes pretty frequently.”
The new gym is located inside the University National Bank Building, previously home to a 112-year-old bank that left the corner of University Way and 45th Street vacant in 2018. It joins two other SBP locations, Fremont/Upper Walls and Poplar, to grow the company’s Seattle footprint.
A key draw of the new gym, especially for Seattle U students, is its proximity to public transportation. In addition to the light rail, which has seen some delays in the new year with service updates, the gym is right by bus route 49. This line travels directly to Capitol Hill, closer to campus than the light rail.
The light rail is the preferred travel method of Will O’Connell-Joshua, a fourth-year humanities for teaching major.
“Parking in U District is pretty tough. So half the time, we probably just walk to the light rail station because… you can go and it’s just right there,” O’Connell-Joshua said.
U District has tough competition in its sister location to the south of campus. Poplar is the second-largest bouldering gym in the country, with 19,941 square feet of climbing compared to U District’s roughly 7,000 square feet.
Kara Stone, general manager at the U District location, sees the new location as a benefit for existing members as well as a way to get new climbers on the walls.
“I refer to it as sort of like a love letter to our members. We really just wanted to say, hey, here’s this really neat space for you to enjoy,” Stone said.
Bohls and O’Connell-Joshua are both serious climbers who climb three to four times a week. O’Connell-Joshua works at the Fremont location, but climbs in his free time at the other two gyms. If he’s climbing alone or looking to climb hard, he opts for the Poplar location.
O’Connell-Joshua prefers the U District location for casual climbing with friends who are newer to the sport. For these casual climbers, U District offers a wide range of difficulty options in a clean environment.
“The mats are way better than most gyms that I go to. They’re pretty creative with their route setting, which I like, and they have a lot of variability on the different difficulty levels,” Bohls said.
Another feature of the U District gym that elevates it over its counterparts is the sauna. The Poplar location has two saunas in gendered locker rooms, but the U District gym features a co-ed sauna inside the vault, which remains from the original bank.
“It’s iconic, right? Like it’s inside of a vault… it’s a really big pride point,” Stone said.
The sauna helps with recovery for all activities offered at the U District gym. Like other SBP gyms, there is a dedicated yoga studio at U District with its own yoga coordinator and instructors.
Access to the facilities and large network of gyms does not come cheap. For people under 21, a monthly membership is $95 per month. If you are over 21, it will cost you $105 per month. For students facing the financial hurdles of burgeoning adulthood, this can be challenging.
“I would say it is pretty expensive, especially it’s more expensive than my gym back home. But I would say that it’s nicer and it does have stuff that makes up for it,” Bohls said.
Bohls noted that they climb multiple times a week to make the cost of a monthly membership worth it.
O’Connell-Joshua finds that most trips to an SBP location result in an encounter with someone he knows through climbing or school. He hopes as many Seattle U students as possible can take part in a sport he loves.
“Find a friend at Seattle U and then go with them. I guarantee you that you have at least one friend that is a rock climber, just based on what I’ve seen at the gym,” O’Connell-Joshua said.
For students, there are a few options. The gym offers a student discount for day passes; for students over 21, showing your student ID allows you to pay the young adult price, saving $5 on a day pass. Stone also noted that the gyms offer College Nights, where day passes are only $12. No future College Nights are currently on the schedule, but information about events can be found on the gym’s website.
