Category — Odds and Ends

Looking for a final report from the ‘Parks and Green Spaces Levy Citizens’ Advisory Committee’? Well, you’re in luck, you can grab it here.

Some interesting highlights -

Park Land, Facilities or Trail Corridors in Urban Villages and Single Family Neighborhoods - $24 million

Description:
This project will allow for the purchase of land in areas of the Seattle that have been identified by the Seattle Parks and Recreation as having most deficit in its 2006 Development Plan and Gap Analysis.

Urban Villages:
To increase open space in urban villages, this project focuses on those areas where the amount of available open space does not meet City standards in 50 percent or more of the village. Open space could be increased either by acquiring property for new parks, facilities or trail corridors and/or by buying property to expand existing parks, facilities or trail corridors. The 17 urban villages which do not meet City standards in 50 percent or more of the village area are:
  -12th Avenue Urban Center Village
  -Ballard Urban Village
  -Belltown Urban Center Village
  -Bitter Lake Hub Urban Village
  -Capitol Hill Urban Center Village
  -Chinatown-International District Urban Center Village
  -Commercial Core Urban Center Village
  -Denny Triangle Urban Center Village
  -First Hill Urban Center Village
  -Fremont Hub Urban Village
  -Greenwood-Phinney Ridge Residential Urban Village
  -Morgan Junction Residential Urban Village
  -North Rainier Hub Urban Village
  -Ravenna Urban Center Village
  -University Urban Center Village
  -West Seattle Junction Hub Urban Village
  -Westwood-Highland Residential Urban Village

Single Family Areas:
To increase open space in single family areas that do not meet City open space standards, this project allows for the acquisition of property for new parks, facilities or trail corridors. Single family areas that are deficient in open space are:
  -Wedgewood (sic) Neighborhood NE of Dahl Playfield
  -Beach Drive Northwest of Morgan Junction

Now I know the blogger’s kryptonite - nice weather! It’s hard to get online when the sun is finally out. So…with that in mind, sorry about the lateness of this post.

Last week I briefly stopped by a meeting of the Parks and Green Spaces Levy Citizen’s Advisory Committee’s final public hearing. You can get the entire meeting notes here.  But if you want a quick summary of what the public thinks - parks are a very emotional issue - the public thinks about quality of life, improving the environment and reducing the pressures of city life.

However the reality of any public effort is that there is only so much money to go around.

So, here’s what’s being reduced and what’s being considered to the list of projects that would be included in the levy. You can see the list here.

Projects Removed
- Langston Hughes Performing Arts Center - $5 million
- Bathhouse Theatre - $1 million
- Citywide Bicycle Facilities - $1.35 million

Reduced Funding
- Northgate Urban Center Park – reduction from $3.2 million to $2.5 million
Total Savings - $8.05 million

And here were the projects considered for addition to the levy:

Projects Considered for Additions

-Increasing acquisition by $5 million
-Increase shoreline by $500K
-Increase forest and stream restoration by $500k
-Increase green space acquisition by $2 million
-Increase funding for Magnuson Park by $2.75 million
-Lake City Acquisition $1 million
-Seattle Chinese Garden $500k
-Belltown Acquisition $3 million
-Off-leash Dog Areas - Magnolia / QA $70k
-Off-leash Dog Areas - Queen Anne $70k
-U-Heights $2.5 million
-Tree inventory $1 million
-Jefferson Park $3.6 million
-Discovery Park $500k
-Denny Park $500k
-Northeast Queen Trail Project $200k
-Opportunity Fund $5 million
-Carkeek Park Acquisition $180k
-Maple Leaf / Waldo Acquisition $5 million
-Restore neighborhood playgrounds $1.35 million
-Waterway #1 at Laurelhurst $50k

Industrial Area Park Acquisitions $2million
-Downtown/SODO Street Parks $2 million
-Pools - Study + UV $1 million
-I-5 Colonnade $250k
-14th Ave W - Ballard $1 million

Grand Total for all of this
$41.52 million

(photos from the meeting)

I have to admit it, I haven’t always had the best relationship with PCC. When I moved to Seattle from the Midwest way back in the 90s I got a snooty response when I asked where the Doritors were (hey, I lived in Central Illinois - how would I know what a specialty grocery store was? At the time I hadn’t even heard of organic food.), and last time I was there I *gasp* took a call on my cell phone and got lots of frowny-face looks. So…that’s why I have a feeling this may rub some people the wrong way.

When PCC’s  announced that it was saving paper by introducing double-sided receipt printing, I thought, you know, that’s nice, but it seems like a pretty minor issue. The big issue that would be great for PCC to solve is - reducing the number of cars that customers drive to PCC.

So, I’d like to make a suggestion - why not encourage your members to pay $1 each time they drive to PCC to shop. You could make it optional (but still kind of make it so people feel bad about themselves if they don’t pay - think collection baskets at church), and you could apply the funds to groups that help reduce carbon emissions.

I guess you could also take the ‘carrot’ approach and give those who say they took the bus, walked, or biked to PCC a discount on their bill. Anyway, those are just the thoughts of a cell phone user who every once in awhile can still enjoy a handful of Doritos.

(Note: yes, I know it’s ironic that this photo of cars in the View Ridge PCC parking lot was taken while I was in my car)

Don’t get me wrong, I’m extremely happy with my bus ride to work (especially considering it has wi-fi), but right now the bus is stuck in super-slow-moving traffic along with all the other cars - and I just feel compelled to mention that trains don’t usually suffer from this same affliction.

I live in Wedgwood, and have been trying really, really hard lately to find alternatives to using my car to get places. That’s why I was pretty curious to see how Wedgwood ranked compared to some other neighborhoods. Now, I know we’re not going to be as walkable as other neighborhoods like downtown, Queen Anne, Capitol Hill - but I’m pretty sure we can kick some Bryant butt.

And so imagine my surprise to see in Walkability’s most walkable Seattle neighborhoods such much red in Wedgwood compared to Bryant - and an especially high amount of red in the heart of Wedgwood (indicated by the arrow) where the following services are easy to walk to:
* QFC
* Rite Aid drug store
* Two places to get your hair done
* Nail salon
* Two coffee shops
* A place to get the dog groomed
* At least 4 banks
* Two restaurant/bars
* A laundrymat
* Post office
* A couple of gift shops
* A few elementary schools
* A few churches 

And compare this to where the arrow is pointing to in ’green’ Bryant - what’s really close by there - a school?

I don’t know anything about the algorithm, but I the heatmap is a little too diffused in the neighborhoods.

And on a side note, if you are in Northeast Seattle you might want to check out Safe Walks, it’s a group advocating for improved sidewalk infrastructure in the north part of the city.

At this Saturday’s ‘Townhomes-Can the Patient Be Saved’ forum, Tom Eanes of the Seattle Planning Commission quoted an anonymous planner who said that Seattle townhomes were ‘like a fungus network eating up our city’. He then showed a photo of the neighborhood around Aurora and N 85th St.

So I was curious, is the area that bad?

The area between townhomes on different sides of the block wasn’t so bad.

Still sucks to be a single family home in a land of townhomes, though.

With few townhome associations to take care of the landscaping (note: some developers feature as a benefit the fact that there are no association dues to pay), you gotta wonder how the owners are going to deal with maintenance issues in the future.

And like many other townhomes throughout the city - many of these suffer from useless garages and driveways - and the streets are pretty packed with parked cars.

The strange thing about this neighborhood is that even though you can easily find every townhome design problem that is caused by lax zoning and zoning enforcement (street facing fencing, unusable garages, hidden entrances), the neighborhood itself isn’t bad and certainly not worthy of being called a fungus. 

Allowing passenger flights out of Paine Field in Everett is super-contentious and long-established battle lines have been reawoken now that the FAA is requiring Snohomish County to begin negotiations with Las Vegas based Allegiant Air.

The pro-group:
Fly from Everett

The anti-group:
Save our Communities
 

There are lots of environmental and quality life arguments about allowing more commerical flights into Paine Field, but the folks up in Snohomish came up with one I wouldn’t have thought of in a hundred-years.

“They’re just going to export gamblers who should be going to the Tulalip casino and ship them out of the area,” he said. “You’re exporting dollars and you’re creating a huge liability. It’s not helping anybody.”

Nice.

Anyway, this decision will impact a much larger area of the North Sound as this Paine Field flight path map shows. So, even though it doesn’t impact Seattle as much - it will impact some sensitive areas around the state.

“Townhomes – Can the Patient be Saved?”
 
Capitol Hill Arts Center
1621 12th Ave, Seattle WA 98122
 
Members:
Sally J. Clark, Chair
Tim Burgess Vice Chair
Tom Rasmussen, Member
Jean Godden, Alternate
 
Staff:
David Yeaworth, Legislative Assistant
LaTonya Brown, Legislative Assistant
Dan Nolte, Legislative Assistant
 

Email: sally.clark@seattle.gov
Committee Chair Telephone: 206-684-8802
Homepage: http://www.seattle.gov/council/clark Council Meeting Listen Line: 206-684-8566

1. Introductions
(10 minutes)
 
2. A presentation on townhomes and the past, present and future of multifamily residential living in Seattle
Presenter: Tom Eanes, Seattle Planning Commission
(20 minutes)
BRIEFING
 
3. A panel discussion about townhomes and the various issues and perspectives surrounding them
Presenters: Greg Hill, Wallingford Community Council; Dan Duffus, Soliel LLC; Brittani Ard, Ard Consulting, Master Builders; Brandon Nicholson, Nicholson KovalChick Architects, Congress of Residential Architects; Mike Podowski, Land Use Planner, Seattle Department of Planning and Development
(45 minutes)
DISCUSSION
 
4. Public Comment
(45 minutes)

Planning for Seattle’s new municipal jail location program is rolling along. Over the next two months the city will hold public forums about the four different jail locations. One question about the jail that Renee has been asking is why is the city planning to build a minimum seven-acre low-rise facility when the city is encouraging higher density elsewhere? The city says that it is cheaper to operate a low-rise jail, but Renee asks a great question because other cities have been able to build their jails up rather than out.

Here are the upcoming forums about the different jail locations. 

• Thursday, June 26, from 6 to 9 p.m. at the Aerospace Machinists Union Hall A, located at 9125 15th Place S. – focus: West Marginal Way and Myers Way sites;
• Saturday, July 12, from 9 a.m. to noon, in the Wellness Center at North Seattle Community College, located at 9600 College Way N. – focus: Aurora site;
• Saturday, July 26, from 9 a.m. to noon, in the Brockey Conference Center at South Seattle Community College, located at 6000 16th Ave. S.W. – focus: West Marginal Way and Myers Way sites;
• Wednesday, July 30, from 6 to 9 p.m. at the Seattle Center Exhibition Hall, located at 225 Mercer Street – focus: Interbay site.

And for those of you who are interested in jail design, below are some municipal jail photos from some different cities I found.   

LA’s 10 story municipal jail (kinda looks like an airport Sheraton)

Multnomah County Jail (Portland) (kinda looks like a downtown Sheraton)

Las Vegas’ 3-story municipal jail and justice center (not quite sure if this looks like a Sheraton)
 

In Seattle’s Cedar Park neighborhood (it’s a more affluent neighborhood located just east of Lake City Way along Lake Washington) the neighbors are appealing a DPD decision (MUP-08-005) that would permit two single family lots to be developed on the hillside above their homes.

These lots would normally be too small to build on their own, but the developer was able to leverage a loophole in the zoning code that expands the size of the lot by allowing them to link two separate lots together via a connected 6-inch wide path of land.  (The Stranger wrote about this loophole back in Feb.) The neighbors themselves are concerned about the negative runoff effects these new developments will have on the houses below. 

The PI describes this zoning loophole as: 

The development that neighbors are challenging meets minimum lot size requirements for two lots by linking uphill land to steep-slope areas using 6-inch-wide paths that run along the outside of the other two lots.

However, the really interesting part of this story is the person who is representing the Friends of Cedar Park group that is appealing the DPD’s decision - land use attorney Peter Buck of Buck Law Group (not the Peter Buck of REM). Mr. Buck is often on the other side of the appeal table (he represented the developer when my neighborhood appealed) and from what I saw he seems to do a really good job.

And so I’m going to also assume this time he’s going to do a good job as an appellant. I learned quite a bit about what the Hearing Examiner can and can’t consider during the appeal process (such as why it is incumbent on the appellant to show that the DPD’s decision was ‘clearly erroneous’ ’Brown v. Tacoma’ 30 Wn. App. 762, 637 P.2d 1005 (1981)).  And I’m sure that the Friends of Cedar Park will do such a good job during their appeal at 9am on Wednesday July 16th, that I’d recommend any neighborhood activist should attend to learn how an effective appeal is made.

Also (this isn’t related to the Cedar Park appeal), I thought you may be interested in this copy of the list of witnesses and exhibits that we presented to the hearing examiner (and Mr. Buck) prior to our appeal back in December. Remember, these appeals are very much like court cases and so you will need to provide the examiner, the DPD and the developer with your list of witnesses and exhibits during a pre-trial hearing that is generally scheduled a couple of weeks before the examiner hears your appeal.

Preliminary List of Exhibits presented by the Wedgwood Action Group

-Cross section of current proposal from 35th/87th looking south and show proposed development on right, single family on the left and the disparity of height, bulk, scale and shading.
-Same section with alternate design stepping back to reduce shading, height/bulk/scale, and reduce building size
-Photographs/montage of standing water on 87th after rain storm
-Photographs/montage of building on 35th NE between 85th and 95t
-Video of children crossing street in area
-Photographs/Montage of view of site from 87th looking south to 35th NE

Preliminary List of Witnesses
-DPD Planner –we will call him as a witness so we can question him on SEPA Determination and mitigation of Height, Bulk and Scale, and other SEPA mitigations; question department’s determination of lack of significance of Environmental impact; discussion of EDGE Policy and impact on City’s decision
* will determine if he is available or ask Judge to issue a subpoena

Architect. He will testify as to the Height, Bulk and Scale of the Project—show how it looks from east side with pictures. He will testify as to the lack of compatibility with other buildings including problems with the transition or edge on the east side; Present possible design modifications.

Resident, next door to site, greatly impacted; Loss of light, view, increased shade, water run off, incompatibility with existing neighborhood; Testify as to pictures of project from her street to show angle of proposed project.

Business Owner of XXX; Testify as to impact on neighborhood, concern for kids’ safety with increased traffic; Concerns about impact on side streets.

Manager of Bank XXX; Testify as to impact of Height, Bulk and Scale on neighborhood/concerns about the impact on neighborhood.

Developer; expert witness will testify about building compatible housing, advocate for keeping the neighborhood characteristics that make Seattle unique; other ways to create housing.

Planner or engineer to testify of impact of building

Additional architectural testimony regarding impact of building

Request for Telephone testimony ( or Declaration Testimony) of Church Leader would testify as to impact of increased traffic on parishioners and school children

Anticipated length of Witness Testimony
It is anticipated that it will take ½ a day to present the Appellants case, not including argument

When I see real estate training courses I tend to think of daylong classes at the Seatac Red Lion where excitable salespeople encourage you to buy foreclosed homes in depressed areas.However, this training course blew my mind because they feature a story about the owners’ plans to flip a Summit Ave. duplex on our very own Capitol Hill! It looks like the duplex’s condo potential is being ballyhooed on Zillow at 1728 Summit Avenue and the DPD permits look for real.Although this story could be total BS, it at least doesn’t get all wrapped up in touchy-feely emotions, it goes straight for the reason behind the deal - to make money (or as it’s often called by the more polite set -’penciling out’).Anyway, I’m not sure how accurate or risky any of this investment story is so I’m not endorsing anything here - but I do think it it is interesting to read how these investors view their transaction:

The property is a duplex on a 5000 square foot lot zoned for unlimited density with a 60 foot height limit, but the current development standards require one parking stall per unit and the setbacks limit the building to a 34′x65′ footprint. Though these development standards would have prevented the Kos from actualizing the highest and best use of the property, they where able to gain important insight by following techniques discussed at Mike Watson’s 2-Day Camp for interacting with civic authorities. “A Multifamily Zoning Update is scheduled to take effect sometime this year that would remove the parking requirement and allow a bigger building footprint,” wrote the Kos in an overview of the deal they sent to the Mike Watson Institute……”The short-term strategy is to get the building permits and then sell them to a builder,” wrote the Kos. Their long-term strategy is to complete the project themselves and sell the condos with a profit of about $1.4M after 22-28 months.”After doing our due diligence, we found that even though the long term numbers looked fine, we were well shy of the 20% profit margin in the short term,” wrote the Kos. This inadequacy in their short-term profit came as a result of the projected cost of holding the property between the end of the feasibility period and the completion of the zoning update.”By explaining the part of the Foundation to Success where we require both a short term and long term exit strategy, and the fact that the impending Multifamily Zoning Update would give us the required short term returns, the seller agreed to extend the feasibility period until the Zoning Update passes (or doesn’t),” wrote the Kos.

Want to get out of the house and check out some other buildings in Seattle?

Did you know that the Seattle Architecture Foundation conducts a number of two and three hour tours of significant Seattle buildings and neighborhoods. Whether it’s craftsmen bungalows in Ravenna, touring the Pike/Pine neighborhood, or a street long open house - the SAF has got lots of options.

I learned about it this week when a friend of mine wrote:

On Saturday I went on the Art Deco Architecture tour of downtown buildings, sponsored by Seattle Architecture Foundation. It was delightful, made even more fun by the bright sunshine — I had no idea the sun would actually come out that day. The last building on the tour was the NE corner of 4th & Union, now Men’s Wearhouse, which was a bank building in the 1970’s. I had no idea the building was Art Deco and the tour guide pointed out some features that I’d never even noticed.

If you answered, ‘not Seattle WA’ then you’re right. (And extra bonus points if you answered Victoria BC). Now, I’m not going to say all the buildings I saw in Victoria were beautiful -but for the most part whether they were old, new or middle-aged they looked like they each fit into the neighborhood.

Unfortunately I didn’t get to make it into any of the units but did walk around quite a bit and I was really impressed with what Victoria has done to create a really dense, walkable collection of neighborhoods. The setbacks, the creativity in the different types of buildings and the focus on landscaped open space are good lessons for us.

• Victoria mandates does a good job of managing the minimum size of multi-dwelling parking spaces so that they’re actually usable by the people who live there.
• Victoria also protects privacy by varying setbacks based on use. Windowless walls (or windows of non-habitable rooms) can be closer to neighbors than habitable rooms with windows.
• And Victoria avoids the wooden fence problems and exposed ugly parking spaces that Seattle townhomes suffer from. They require surface parking to be screened by a landscaped berm at least 1m (~3ft) in height.

The more I think about it, the problem Seattle is facing isn’t with whether something is zoned multi-family or single-family— it’s just that the zoning code which determines what can be built does a really poor job of taking the sustainablity and health of a neighborhood into consideration. 

It doesn’t make sense why we don’t open up single-family zoning in Seattle for creative duplexes/triplexes, but yet we make it super easy to build 35′ tall megamansions. And it is really strange that we give very little consideration to ensuring nice transitions between adjoining properties - why not require multifamily and megahouse developers to give the neighboring property a break by creating nice setbacks and privacy screens? 
Nice street level entry for this corner townhome in Victoria’s James Bay.  

Okay, not the most beautiful, but I bet the owners here can at least pull their cars into their garages. 

The setback creates nice open space for the residents and doesn’t jam them up against the sidewalk.

I liked this - three story homes against the street corner and then two-stories where the townhomes were neighboring single family homes. Also, the nice wide driveway opened up some pretty nice balconies for the homes on the right. 

Okay, you know the story already - King County is getting out of the misdemeanor business and focusing its efforts instead on the felony segment of the market - so…that means Seattle needs a new municipal jail in order to process politicians such as King County Councilmember Jane Hague (DUI), Seattle City Councilmember Richard McIver (arrested on charges of domestic violence) or former US Senate Candidate Mike McGavick (DUI) when they run afoul of the law.

But the big question is, ‘where should we build this jail’. Actually, let me restate that question so it’s a bit more accurate, ‘in which politically influential area should we build this jail.’

North Seattle has already stated its position, and now SW Seattle’s Highland Park has put together a nice response to the two different locations being considered for their neighborhood. I’ve got to say, they’ve done a nice job of gathering letters, putting together action items for the neighborhood, and even naming the communications firm the city has hired to help promote the jail (here’s my idea - ‘free complimentary pat-down with every stay’)

Anyway, the planning stage that we’re in right now basically boils down to three neighborhoods trying their hardest to keep the jail out of their backyard. Although one neighborhood will be the loser out of this battle - getting organized and standing up for themselves is at least something of a victory because it shows they aren’t as influential as the city thinks they are. 

But personally, I don’t see why we just don’t build this jail it near our existing jail downtown - we’ve already got the infrastructure for it (ie bail bonds, lawyers, judges, police, city government) and you’ve got to think that putting them close together will save on all kinds of commuting costs by helping prevent sprawl development.

In fact as a solution, let me propose location #5. 

The city already owns the downtown property shown below, and we could make this a truly multi-use block by popping in condos on one half of the block and the city jail on the other half. (Oh yeah, and make sure to space the buildings as close together as you would in the Denny Triangle - don’t want to waste any buildable space here!)

But really, here we are talking about a Civic Square we don’t need - hello - have you forgotten about Westlake Park? And to me it looks like we’re willing to dump a jail on a Seattle neighborhood just so we can protect the view from City Hall.

The most fun about walking around New York is that you never know what kind of shops you’ll find.

Unfortunately though, that isn’t always the case in Seattle. And it’s not going to get any better when some of the newer high-density developments ( Mirabella and 1200 Stewart) planned for Seattle turn don’t always include retail spaces that open out to the streets they border. But rather than blame them for this, maybe they didn’t include street opening retail simply because they don’t know what kind of retailers would do well in those spaces - so here are some suggestions.

A real ramen shop - for being a Pacific Rim city the most shocking thing about Seattle is our lack of quality ramen shops (Takohachi’s about it - and they close too early!). But wow, finding a real one in NY was great - the place was high-volume, bright, steamy, and most importantly…packed with customers. Put one of these bad boys on your ground floor and people will love for it. (photo on the right - a real bowl of miso ramen)

Drug stores and diners that are open early in the morning don’t close until late at night - SLU especially is in need of a drug store (and Whole Foods doesn’t just always cut it - sometimes the only thing that’ll cure your cold is a bottle of Nyquil and a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos.)  And finding late night dining in Seattle is hard work - and this city needs more options.

Speciality popcorn and a Ripley’s Believe It or Not! Specialty cupcakes are already doing well in the city - so why not get a jump on the next big speciality food trend - popcorn! And if you need any help picking out a popcorn retailer - give Garrett’s a shot - if you ever want to bribe me, a bucket of their carmel/cheese mix would do the trick. And on another note, do you realize the Seattle market’s wide open for a Ripley’s Believe It or Not! - put one of these down by the Market and it’ll attract tourists like Seattlites to a plant sale.

Electronics shops and pubs. Why do downtowners/SLUers need to haul their butts up to the big shopping malls to buy their Xboxes and GPS devices? Probably because there aren’t many electronics retailers downtown. So why not try and encourage an electronics retailer to set up a crazy little gadget shop crammed with all kinds of blinking doo-dads, it may be more expensive - but a lot more convenient. And finally, more pubs, because, well, I like pubs.

Anyway, these are just some of my ideas…what kinds of retail stores would you like to see.