Seattle Land Use Blog

I’ve been working on a post to see how much neighborhoods pay in the long run when a development as a whole is able to wriggle around design review - and one of the most well-publicized examples of this recently was a 13-unit West Seattle townhome development built by Soleil Development.

The West Seattle Herald, Seattle Times and West Seattle Blog all wrote about how this townhome development as a whole largely avoided design review by taking advantage of a loophole in Seattle’s zoning code called ‘micropermitting‘ (which the proposed multi-family zoning update still doesn’t address).

(The WestSeattleBlog.com image below shows what this Soleil development looks like.)

The West Seattle Herald summed up negative impacts of this development not going through design review as:  

A 13-unit townhouse development under construction in the Gatewood neighborhood is raising hackles among neighbors who claim the developer flew under the city’s regulatory radar by dividing the project into three seemingly separate projects.

Had the Gatewood development been more thoroughly scrutinized by the city, Soleil would have to make improvements to the public infrastructure around the site such as better sidewalks, storm-water detention and street trees, Oustimovitch said. Probably the biggest environmental impacts of the project will be on traffic and parking, he said.

The developer might also have had to stabilize a 22-foot-tall bluff just east of the site. Perhaps a view corridor would’ve been required so passersby could still see an old log cabin that neighbors call the hunting lodge, Oustimovitch said.

Okay, great, this article helps my future post by providing some really good examples of infrastructure improvements the neighborhood (ie you, a city taxpayer) may end up having to pay for in the long run because this project as a whole did not go through design review.  

I then went over to Soleil’s web site to try and find out more about this townhome development, but wasn’t able to find more about it (maybe I’m just not looking in the right place). However, while reading about their other developments I did find something that I found to be a bit ironic - their description of the neighborhood benefits of their cottage properties.    

Our Cottages -Preserving Neighborhood Flavor
Our cottage projects have been specifically designed to integrate harmoniously into their single family neighborhoods. These in-city developments meet the need for more urban housing as well as fitting the character and feel of the neighborhood. Built on a smaller scale than the townhouse, our cottages are only 17-20 feet high versus 35 feet high, benefiting the whole dynamic of street appearances and property values in the area.

To me this kind of says that they are well aware of the benefits of lower height buildings within neighborhood settings - and how carefully designing buildings to fit into a neighborhood can both meet the needs of density and preserving neighborhood character at the same time. 

So, I went back to the Soleil site and found a townhome of theirs at 4117 SW Morgan Street. From the photo below the development looks to be in a neighborhood with a single-family home as its neighbor. The building also looks to be about 30-35 feet tall. So, if one were to apply their cottage projects benefits statement to this building could one assume that this townhome of theirs neither benefits the whole dynamic of street appearances nor benefits property values in the area as much as it would have if it were 17-20 feet high?

This all makes me wonder, if even a developer who is skilled at leveraging zoning codes understands the benefits of more thoughtful, lower height new development in neighborhoods - why is the multifamily zoning update rewarding developers who have been very skillful at finding zoning loopholes to build even higher in the future (35+ feet). Shouldn’t we first focus on closing down the zoning loopholes so we don’t encourage even bigger problems? 

(Soleil townhome development - 4117 SW Morgan Street) 

Have something to say about the upcoming SR 520 bridge replacement, or just want to learn more?
Well, you’re in luck, there are two open houses this week where you can have the opportunity to find out more.

Seattle
Tuesday June 24, 4-7pm
Naval Reserve Building - South Lake Union
860 Terry Ave N

Bellevue
Wednesday June 25, 4-7pm
Bellevue City Hall
450 110th Ave NE
WSDOT’s web site also has additional info. 

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.

About 150-200 people attended Councilmember Sally Clark’s townhome forum ‘Townhomes – Can the Patient be Saved?’ Saturday morning at the Capitol Hill Arts Center. (Oh yeah, this forum will also be available on the Seattle Channel’s web site later next week).

Sally seemed very pleased at the turn-out and even joked that she received some suggestions before the meeting that people wished it had been called ‘Townhomes - Can the Patient be Killed?’

I have to say, Sally’s starting to grow on me a bit. I think she’s been doing a good job of keeping the public discussion about Seattle land use moving along this year (of course, Sally’s final grade will be based on what that looks like) and every once in awhile you can see some signs that she’s starting to come into her own as a leader.

Tom Eanes of the Seattle Planning Commission started off the presentations with a 20 minute Powerpoint presentation showing lots of examples of townhomes (ranging from those described as the ‘Fungus eating up our city’ to some nicer examples). For those that fell within the fungus camp, Tom pointed out how the design of these townhomes suffer greatly from the lack of any kind of design or SEPA reviews. Another concern he mentioned is that without any kind of townhome owner association to support the long term maintenance of these townhomes as a group, there is grave concern about the long term sustainability of these units.

The negative impact of six foot fences surrounding the front of many Seattle townhomes was also a top point in Tom’s presentation. He showed photos of all kinds of creatively bad enclosures (from simple wood fences to more elaborate shrubbery screens) that each had the impact of reducing the friendliness of the neighborhood and making the place less secure for those walking on the sidewalks and those living behind the fences (security drops when neighbors can’t see you).

He gave a very nice presentation about ‘cookie-cutter’ 4-pack townhomes and how they technically manage to fit within current zoning code.

The following aren’t Tom’s words, but my observation. While watching his presentation I couldn’t help but think of 4-pack townhomes as the genetically-modified chickens of the multi-family development world. Instead of being injected with growth hormones and unable to stand up, developers inject 4-pack townhomes with too many amenities - enclosed garages, private fenced yards, three bedrooms, living rooms, laundry rooms, and ‘common’ open areas. It’s so much in such a limited area of space that the townhomes become bloated and parts of them become unusable (try to park your car in one of these garages).

Tom next moved on to give a historical analogy about the state of Seattle’s townhomes vs. the state of New York tenement design in the 1800s. He showed the gradual progression of zoning code improvements to these NY buildings which eventually created better tenements, making them desirable places to live a century later.

Tom wrapped up by giving some good suggestions for better townhome design - entries visible from the street, private open space on the sides, minimum lot widths of 100ft and wider parking courts. All in all, a very nice presentation that the crowd really liked.

Next began the panel portion of the event where each of the following panelists presented for about 10-15 minutes.

(Panelists left to right) Mike Podowski, Land Use Planner, Seattle Department of Planning and Development;Greg Hill, Wallingford Community Council; Dan Duffus, Soliel LLC; Brittani Ard, Ard Consulting, Master Builders; Brandon Nicholson, Nicholson KovalChick Architects, Congress of Residential Architects)

First up was Mike Podowski from the DPD. I was hopeful about this presentation when Mike first admitted the zoning code for townhomes was not having the desired effect on townhome design that was hoped, but then was brought back down to reality when the DPD autopilot part of the presentation started.

Mike pulled out the DPD’s favorite public relations stat of all-time - that over 60% of Seattle’s land is zoned for single-family. I really think this is the all-purpose flour of arguments for the DPD (see page 10)-I’ve heard the DPD use it to justify, ‘Why are you knocking down a grove of trees in Maple Leaf?’ to ‘Why don’t you increase setbacks between multi-family and single family properties so that there’s a little more privacy?’

This time the stat was brought up in the context of why we need to encourage as dense as possible townhome development in what little amount of multi-family zoned land Seattle has. I personally think its an important question, but I didn’t see how it related to today’s topic of bad townhouse designs. Is single family zoned land really to blame for encouraging bad townhome designs - if that’s true what kind of blame should we assign to other non-multi-family zoned land such as parks or cemeteries?

Mike then went on to talk about what updates to the multi family zoning code might make townhome design better - these included raising the height limit of townhomes by 5′ to encourage better and different types of roofs, pooling open space, reducing townhome fencing heights, encouraging curb cuts, wider driveways, and larger parking spaces. It definitely looks like these will make some improvements, but the next speaker, Greg Hill of Wallingford, suggested the DPD isn’t going far enough.

Greg started off by poking a hole in the multi-family update’s plan to add an extra 5′ of height by suggesting that an enterprising architect will be able to find a way to add a fourth floor. He then took a little bit of a side trip and gave an interesting example of how a homeowner sitting at grade facing a pedestrian at grade is naturally inclined to build a wall between the two. (I’ll give an example of that in another post).

Greg presented a pretty interesting critique of townhome design, starting off by showing an example of how missing trees in front of a new townhome development was an example of how DPD on-site inspectors basically give developers ‘pocket variances’. He then touched on how cars don’t fit into townhome driveways, how profitable the business of ‘cookie-cutter’ townhome production is, how little actual architectural design goes into the cookie-cutter townhomes, and how the multi-family update’s ’shorter fences for taller buildings’ tradeoff is a bad idea.

Next up were developer Dan Duffus and zoning-consultant Brittani Ard (I group them together because they touched on the same points and didn’t have Powerpoint presentations). Dan talked about how he supported the multi-family zoning updates because they will ensure future townhome development is profitable and fix some of the major townhome design problems (ie fences). Dan talked about how setbacks eat up buildable lot space and suggested that with the market slowing this was a perfect time for the city fix zoning before the next round of development kicks in.

The main point I left with was how Dan mentioned how incredibly costly from a time and architectural cost time going through the Design Review process is (this was challenged later by two architects/developers who spoke up during Q&A). Dan said that adding regulations will help make townhome development less affordable.

I feel that if neighbors are going to successfully push for better townhome zoning regulations in this city, they’ve got to be able to respond to this particular argument. Will better townhome design make townhomes less affordable? If neighbors don’t have a good argument to counter this, then developers are going to keep pressuring the city to keep permitting bloated townhome development.

And finally, Brandon Nicholson gave what I thought was the most informative and balanced presentation of the day. He’s an architect who will now only take clients whose projects go through Design Review, and he showed both the ‘pessimistic’ and ‘optimistic’ views of what could happen after the multi-family zoning update is approved.

The ‘pessimistic’ side is that the ‘4-pack’ townhomes will still be built in Seattle - and this time they’ll be able to go higher - (Brandon showed a slide where instead of a ‘4-pack’ townhomes with pitched roofs, they have Mansard(?) roofs).

On the ‘optimistic’ side, Brandon showed a whole bunch of really interesting townhome designs that would really do great things for the city. There were some nice examples of development that you can see in places like Portland and Victoria, BC. (I would really like to grab a copy of his presentation to show some of the photos.)

Leaving this meeting, I feel that the city still has some work to go on tightening up all the new updates in the multi-family zoning code. The ‘4-pack’ townhome will still continue to be built (although with lower fences) and nobody on the panel even addressed the ongoing problems with townhome micropermitting. I hope more creative thought will go into refining the final multi-family update that is presented to the council, because after listening to the presentations in today’s forum I would recommend that the council rejects the update as it currently stands.

“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)
 

For anyone following the status of the challenge to the Murray Franklyn on Pine and Belmont, Urbnlivn has put together a really great update. 

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

No reason for posting this other than I thought it was an interesting picture, and that back in 1919 when this picture was taken it was Seattle’s oldest standing house.  (Yeah, I’d have knocked it down too). It is pretty cool though to see that the Rainier club and First Methodist Church are still around.  

On Monday June 2nd the DPD will hold an early design-review meeting to discuss University Village’s plans to expand its retail space by 25% (100,000 sq feet) and parking by 500 additional spaces (433 according to the North Seattle Herald-Outlook).  

UVillage gives itself credit for being a pedestrian friendly mall - but that pedestrian friendliness is often after you’ve driven there. Because UVillage is located in a less dense area of the city - it relies heavily on car traffic for its customers. And because UVillage is fairly insular - it is really hard to walk from UVillage to neighboring businesses (they actually discourage this by offering to tow your car), no Metro buses actually stop within UVillage proper, and nobody lives within UVillage - the result is that UVillage isn’t really creating a sustainable neighborhood.

I think now is the time for the city to step up and really encourage UVillage to start integrating public transportation into its planning. UVillage could make it easier for riders to pick up buses within the mall - and they could designate part of their Monday - Friday parking as a Park and Ride for NE Seattleites who could then hop on a Metro bus to commute downtown or the Eastside.

And here’s one additional crazy idea - UVillage is the perfect place for condos. Can you imagine? It’d be like living in Celebration, Florida. You’d be living in a security patrolled community that is safely removed from the outside world. During the day you could shop at your favorite stores while at night you could grab your groceries and stroll UVillage’s pleasant walkways. You could even walk to Husky football, basketball and softball games - and hop on the neighboring Burke Gilman bike trail. 

Anyway, it’s not too often that you get a chance to give UVillage some advice, so this early design review meeting is a great opportunity for that. 

UVillage Early Design Review Meeting
6:30pm University Heights Center - 5031 University Way NE
  
  

Thanks for the tip on this Renee and Matt.

Councilmember Sally Clark is starting to make some really good moves in Seattle, and next week will be hosting two events to discuss townhomes and why Seattle has such huge fluctuations in townhome quality.

And I almost fell out of my chair when I read this part of her announcement. Wow, an honest critique of the situation. This is something you definitely wouldn’t hear coming out of the ‘loyal to a fault’ DPD.

While some new town homes blend into the neighborhood or, even better, stand out as well-designed additions, others are reviled by the neighbors for mediocrity, canyon-creating fences, asphalt wastelands, and impossible to navigate garage entries. The fault lies not just with imagination, but also with Seattle’s development rules. The City can do better. These upcoming forums are the start of Councilmember Clark’s effort to improve town homes’ design.

You can read more here,

First Forum: Courtyard Housing in Portland, Oregon, Monday, June 2, 5 p.m., City Hall, 600 Fourth Avenue in the Bertha Knight Landes Room on the First Floor.

Second Forum: Town Homes—Can the Patient be Saved?, Saturday, June 7, 10 a.m., Capitol Hill Arts Center, 1621 12th Ave

Seattle needs more of these

And fewer of these