SEATTLE -- Seattle's infamous "Mercer Mess" is about to get even worse for the drivers who use it and the business owners who count on its traffic.

While it only stretches a half mile, the Mercer Mess already causes a lot of grief for the more than 35,000 drivers who use it every day.

"It usually takes me 10 minutes to get home and sometimes it takes 45 minutes because it bottlenecks so bad," said Erin Dodge, who works at the Guitar Center on Westlake Avenue.

Weather permitting, on Monday the traffic pattern will move a bit as the city pushes forward on its project to transform Mercer Street to a two-way thoroughfare.

That means all eastbound traffic will shift over onto newly-laid pavement and the number of lanes will be reduced from four to three.

"We've got a chance to get things right in our city and that involves change and it's right here," said Mike McQuaid of the South Lake Union Community Council.

That change, however, may be difficult for some businesses located south of Mercer.

Starting Monday, drivers will no longer be able to turn right onto Mercer from Westlake, Terry or Boren avenues, creating three dead ends.

Lower Queen Anne’s Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced Jan. 26 in Switzerland it would be giving $750 million to the Global Fund to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.

“These are tough economic times, but that is no excuse for cutting aid to the world’s poorest,” Bill Gates said in a press release.

And, if you need further reasons to feel insufficiently charitable, the Gates Foundation released its 2012 Annual Letter from Bill Gates this month.

It’s 26 pages of looking at the good the foundation is doing in the world – from innovations in agriculture to global health to U.S. education.

“Throughout my careers in software and philanthropy – and in each of my annual letters – a recurring theme has been that innovation is the key to improving the world,” Gates writes in his letter. “When innovators work on urgent problems and deliver solutions to people in need, the results can be magical.”

Read the whole thing here.

Anyone looking for Harrison Street this morning needs to keep an eye out for "N" street instead.

Sometime overnight, the large Harrison Street sign on Queen Anne Avenue was broken off. As of 6 a.m., the majority of the sign was sitting on the sidewalk.