Seattle’s much-delayed Comprehensive Plan update was released last week by the Office of Planning & Community Development (OPCD). Coverage of the broad points of the plan was quickly provided by The Seattle Times ($), The Urbanist, The Stranger, and Crosscut. The primary takeaway image is the “Future Land Use Map” (FLUM), here:
Coverage of subsequent disappointment from housing density advocates was then provided by The Urbanist and The Seattle Times ($).
The plan itself is full of florid prose describing how it supposedly expands housing opportunities across the city, meets equity goals, invests in walkable communities, and meets the challenges of climate change. It establishes “Key Moves” and proposes policy changes that sound good on the surface, but the proof will be in how these policies are implemented.
The plan as currently drafted assumes the majority of new housing would primarily be built in existing Urban Villages, but also establishes new neighborhood cores and proposes to expand housing options across the (formerly) single-family zones that currently dominate the city. As apparent on the FLUM, the Plan proposes some name inflation across the city, changing current “Urban Centers” into “Regional Centers”, “Urban Villages” into “Urban Centers”, and “Neighborhood Residential” into “Urban Neighborhood” zones. The plan includes some modest expansions of some existing villages, upgrade of Ballard to Regional Center, and creation of a new Urban Center around the 130th street Link station. The plan also calls for the creation of 24 new “Neighborhood Centers”, which is reduced from the 40 proposed in the 2022 Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) scoping report.
The text of the plan is not specific about how it would increase housing capacity in the various Centers it proposes (beyond allowing slightly taller structures), but it doesn’t preclude the concept of raising height limits or increasing floor-area-ratio (FAR) maximums in these areas.
What is concerning, though, is how OPCD plans to meet the requirements of new state laws requiring increased density in our most exclusive zones. These single-family housing zones, renamed “Neighborhood Residential” in 2021, will be again be rebranded under the One Seattle Plan as “Urban Neighborhood” zones.
Warning: it’s going to get wonky.
Technically Foul
OPCD has provided a summary of the proposed updates to the Neighborhood Residential development standards to turn them into Urban Residential zones.
Let’s compare the current development standards…
… to the proposed rules:
The key points here are FAR and height limits. Let’s see what the OPCD thinks would be technically feasible to build on a typical 5,000-square-foot lot in Seattle:
Due to the maximum FAR of 0.9, only 4,500 square feet of floor area could be built, resulting four units averaging a maximum of 1,125 square feet each, including the area occupied by walls. In areas of “high displacement risk” (which doesn’t include the already-upzoned formerly-redlined neighborhoods of the city), OPCD is also considering limiting some Urban Residential zones to only three units, which would look like this:
Two of these designs are not practically any different than what’s already possible under Seattle’s allowances for attached accessory dwelling units (ADUs) and detached accessory dwelling units (DADUs). ADUs and DADUs are already legal across all existing neighborhood residential zones, and displacement is already occurring, so it is unclear how continuing to restrict development in these areas will prevent continued displacement.
The reality is that even if these rules represented a tiny loosening of housing restrictions, any new homes built in these zones would still be unaffordable to any households making less than 1.5 times Seattle’s median income.
If the average single family house sells for about $800,000, and the average cost of new construction is about $350 per square foot, then it would cost nearly $600,000 per unit to develop a property to the maximum allowed density under the 4-unit maximum. Add a 15% profit margin, and that’s a minimum of sale price of nearly $700,000 for a 1,125-square-foot, three-story townhome.
That kind of minimum housing cost is what we’re already seeing today. The median household income in Seattle is $105,000, which might be able to afford a mortgage somewhere around $350,000, depending on several factors. If this plan wants to make any sort of real impact on the housing affordability crisis, we need to legalize higher densities to spread the cost of land value among more units. This would slow and potentially reverse the rampant inflation of housing prices we’ve seen in Seattle over the past decade, relieving the housing affordability crisis without mandatory affordability requirements or onerous fees.
Achieving the Bare Minimum
E2SHB 1110, passed by the Washington State Legislature in 2023, amended the Growth Management Act to require the following:
For cities with a population of at least 75,000 based on office of financial management population estimates:
https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=36.70A.635
(i) The development of at least four units per lot on all lots zoned predominantly for residential use, unless zoning permitting higher densities or intensities applies;
(ii) The development of at least six units per lot on all lots zoned predominantly for residential use, unless zoning permitting higher densities or intensities applies, within one-quarter mile walking distance of a major transit stop; and
(iii) The development of at least six units per lot on all lots zoned predominantly for residential use, unless zoning permitting higher densities or intensities applies, if at least two units are affordable housing.
[…]
Any city subject to the requirements of this section […] shall not require through development regulations any standards for middle housing that are more restrictive than those required for detached single-family residences…
I am not a lawyer, but while Seattle’s proposed Urban Neighborhood zoning appears to meet the letter of the law, it seems to take some careful steps to do no more than the bare minimum to engender new housing outside of urban villages. In fact, Seattle’s response to this law is far less permissive than the Washington State Department of Commerce’s Model Ordinance for cities larger than 75,000 people, which calls for a scaling FAR based on how many units are being built on the lot:
For example, a FAR of 1.2 would allow four 1,500-square-foot units on a 5,000-square-foot property; recall that Seattle’s proposed FAR of 0.9 would limit these units to 1,125 square feet. The State’s model ordinance allows for 375 additional square feet, or two 180-square-foot bedrooms. A FAR of 1.6 would allow for six 1,333-square-foot units on the same property; compare this to… actually, OPCD didn’t even bother to show how 6 units could be accommodated on a typical Seattle property. Each of these options are far more economically viable for builders than Seattle’s proposed FAR limit of 0.9 for Urban Neighborhoods.
Instead, Seattle is proposing to achieve a “vision for the future… to make Seattle more equitable, livable, sustainable, and resilient” by doing nothing more than the bare minimum.
Frankly, Seattle’s proposed updates to our Neighborhood Residential zones is nothing more than an abdication of leadership. Whatever Seattle does, other cities who may be eyeing minimal compliance are guaranteed to try to do less. If Seattle is allowed to implement this highly restrictive low-density zoning under HB 1110, not only will we be perpetuating the systems that engendered the current housing crisis, but we will embolden our neighbors to do the same, or worse.
How To Do Better
Most of our beloved neighborhoods were built before zoning limited new dense construction to a mere fraction of the city’s residential area. If we want to build our way out of the current housing crisis, Seattle must be ambitious about legalizing moderate-density to fill the missing middle across the entire city.
We could be ambitious like Spokane, which permanently legalized middle housing last year. With no statutory limits on unit density on lots less than 2 acres, no applicable FAR limits, and general lot coverage limits, Spokane may officially be the most housing-permissive in Washington. Sure, they still have height limits and setbacks, but Spokane is certainly blazing the trail on allowing middle housing.
If Seattle wants to retake the lead on providing sustainable, affordable housing, we need to upgrade our Urban Neighborhood zoning standards into something akin to our Low-Rise Multifamily zones. These zones allow for shared-wall rowhomes, apartments, and cottage housing. This means we need OPCD to not only raise the statutory limit on number units per lot, but we also need to raise the maximum FAR. We can keep the setbacks and the lot coverage maximums, but if we want to build our way out the housing crisis, we need to allow for 6- to 8-unit rowhomes and condos across the city with a FAR of at least 1.6, if not more (or consider eliminating FAR limits entirely, like Spokane). Even with height limits of 3-4 stories, new construction that can spread the cost of the property across several units is much more affordable to many more households.
What About Parking?
I can already hear the Concerned Citizen crying out, “but what about their cars!?” The Puget Sound Regional Council identifies local densities exceeding 15-20 homes per acre (or about one home per 2,200-2,900 square feet) as preferred targets for high-frequency transit. Assuming the average urban acre is ~50% residential (the rest as roads, parks, and other uses), a neighborhood of homes with an average of two units per 2,500 square feet, or four units per 5,000 square feet, are neighborhoods that would be well served by transit service every 15 minutes or more. There is little limiting the maximum number of parking spaces a developer can include for a residence, but it contributes to the difference between an affordable home and a luxurious one.
Not-so-coincidentally, these neighborhood densities also provide a strong customer base for small local businesses, which improves walkability and reduces reliance on vehicles for everyday errands. Increasing low-to-mid-rise density kicks off a positive feedback loop of reduced car dependence and increased walkability, which supports more small businesses and unlocks viability of more developments with no space for cars, which allows for more housing and supports more small businesses. This allows us to give street space back to the people, and allows more space for more street trees, which would reduce stormwater impacts, clean our air, and shade our homes from the increasingly hot summers.
With moderate density and good transit, not every house or shop requires a parking lot. But we knew that 100 years ago.
A Call to Action
If we want an equitable future, Seattle cannot plan to do the bare minimum for the next 20 years. To do so would be an abdication of leadership, would perpetuate the housing affordability crisis, and would directly result in Seattle failing to meet its long-stated goals for equity, livability, sustainability, and resiliency. If we continue to only allow high-cost new construction that’s only affordable to the highest income-earning households, then Seattle will perpetuate a cycle of displacement and gentrification that drives away creativity, excludes diversity, and increases sprawl.
OPCD is hosting a series of open houses to discuss the plan, and anyone who wants to make sure they or their neighbors can afford to continue living in Seattle can and should show up to tell OPCD they need to do better. However, apparently the vocal advocacy that pushed for “Alternative 5” (and for a more-ambitious “Alternative 6”) during 2022’s DEIS scoping meetings did not get through to OPCD leadership or Seattle’s City Council.
Seattle is not alone in the housing crisis, but Seattle should lead the region, if not the state, in responding to it. We cannot allow the city to set the standard of minimal compliance with state law.
The first public feedback meeting is tomorrow in Loyal Heights.
We must tell the City: Set the bar, and raise the FAR.
I’ve had a fundamental issue with the idea of an ADU maximum, mentioned in the guidance:
“An AADU is limited to 1,000 square feet in a neighborhood residential zone, including RSL, and up to 650 square feet in a lowrise zone.”
https://aduniverse-seattlecitygis.hub.arcgis.com/pages/code
This maximum appears arbitrary, and it discourages many middle housing concepts like having two or three equal sized units on a lot.
One of the most cost-effective ways to offer more housing is to add bedrooms but not completely new apartments. No matter what the zoning is, the costs of adding a full kitchen and bathroom with every new bedroom created (like an ADU or village small apartment) is significant. Finally, building apartment buildings requires lots of common areas and elevators adding to the cost , as well as added financing costs of a few years to design and get approvals for the structure before construction begins (which also takes longer).
What’s with the aversion to roommates? I get why people live alone (and I live alone admittedly) but an adult living alone should have a choice to be a roommate to save money rather than be forced to live in a very small compartmentalized space that has to have the tiny kitchen and bathroom along with it.
In many other countries, extended family compounds and other group housing designs are common. For example, in India, several related families can live together in one compound that is even larger than a Mc Mansion.
I even think that we should be more focused on adding bedrooms and less on number of units (both are important rather than just one). 1000 studio apartments generally results in the same population being housed as about 500-600 two-bedroom apartments or 350-400 three-bedroom townhouses. But the debate does not hone in on this.
My call is fo the city raise the FAR and the unit maximum (or eliminate both, like Spokane).
As I note, a FAR of 0.9 limits four units on a 5,000-sqft lot to 1,125 sqft each, which is a comfortable 1-bed or a cozy two-bed. Lot coverage maximum of 50% and height limit of 3 stories gives 7,500 square feet of floor area (a FAR of 1.5), which could be divided into a variety of 2-bed, 3-bed, or even 4-bedroom flats depending on the number of units.
It is implied that the new Urban Neighborhood zones would wholly replace design regulations for ADU/DADUs, but I am realizing I have not seen or heard this explicitly stated in materials and presentations to date.
Would our ADU-niverse work simply be scrapped?
I wouldn’t scrap the idea of ADU’s. I simply would allow them to be larger than 1000 square feet. The maximum size restriction seems both needless and arbitrary.
If that’s not possible politically, I would add the option of a new category called something like “Supplemental Dwelling Units” or SDU’s. The more choices the better. This approach could then address the issues that led to the ADU maximum.
And I do think there is merit for calculating increases in bedrooms rather than merely the increases in number of units. The ugly truth about just using units is that when Seattle talks about adding thousands of units, most will be for single persons — and that’s very different than adding 80K units of middle housing that may house 2 or 3 persons per unit. 100K small apartments will house a population similar to 60K units of middle housing, for example.
Plus, middle housing options can increase the potential for roommate situations — enabling a larger group of people to better afford their living quarters.
I’m agnostic about whether or not Seattle should scrap the ADU work, but it does seem like they expect these middle housing rules to basically completely replace those standards.
If OPCD were clever, they’d make it such that the pre-approved ADU plans fit within the standards set by these rules – making it so someone could still follow the ADU plans to add units to their lot.
As much as I like the concept of converting the ADU plans to Supplemental Dwelling Unit (SDU) plans with larger floor plans that fit within the Urban Neighborhood design standards, I don’t see this OPCD making that effort.
The Seattle ADU regulatory advantage is really about the approval process. It is like having a pre-defined contract for marriage as opposed to a time-consuming negotiated legal relationship contract. I don’t see any reason to cancel it.
If the legislation is liberal enough, then there would be no need for special ADU regulations. The ADU regulations originated because a some people don’t like triplexes. The size limits were designed to discourage developers from tearing down houses and putting up triplexes, even though that is exactly what they are doing. They are building triplexes (from scratch), but one unit is an attached unit (AADU) the other is not (DADU) and there is a “main house”. Yes, it is really silly, and should be replaced by regulations that allow more density in a much simpler manner.
Of course that is the nature of so much of the zoning. I get why you would want to limit the height of a building. But why limit density? Why is it OK to put up a really big house on a lot, but not an apartment — even if the apartment has the exact same dimensions? The simply answer is it isn’t OK.
With liberal legislation, we would see plenty of ADUs, simply because it is a good way to add density without destroying the old structure. We would also see plenty of houses converted to apartments for the same reason. I can see why we would want to encourage both (with say, tax incentives) but I’m not sure it is necessary. If the regulations aren’t so ridiculous these are things that people build naturally (just like multi-plexes, townhouses and small apartments).
What about housing types aside from townhomes? I though HB 1110 encouraged stacked flats and other housing forms. I don’t see that in the Seattle proposal.
And why is the plan fixated on low FAR? I guess it’s intended for bare compliance with the law while also functionally (due to construction costs) preventing actual redevelopment? Such an approach is profoundly disappointing. Seattle NIMBYism and incrementalism at its finest.
The law requires that Seattle allow at least 6 of the 9 identified “Missing Middle” housing types: duplexes, triplexes, fourplexes, fiveplexes, sixplexes, townhouses, stacked flats, courtyard apartments, or cottage housing.
Seattle’s plan repeatedly lists the following for Urban Residential: “housing types such as detached homes, duplexes, triplexes, fourplexes, sixplexes, and cottage housing.”
“Such as” is doing some heavy lifting there, since Seattle is only listing 5 of the 9 required middle housing types referred to by state law, but it belies a bias against townhomes, stacked flats, and courtyard apartments. Is it so hard to simply define “middle housing” as all 9 types and then have a policy that explicitly allows all types of middle housing?
Even for the Regional and Urban Centers, the document doesn’t really outline what exact zoning changes will be done.
Just citing
> Allow a wide range of housing types in Urban Centers. Urban Centers should generally allow buildings of 3 to 8 stories. Buildings greater than 8 stories may be appropriate in Urban Centers near light rail stations
But if they just approve 3 story housing for all the new urban centers it’s practically just townhouses.
Regional centers all of them they only want to approve lots of jobs and barely enough housing for them.
Downtown: 13.5k new homes; 60k new jobs
First hill/capitol hill: 9k new homes; 3k new jobs
South lake union: 4.5k new homes; 25.5k new jobs
…
Based on the plan and how OPCD’s explained it during some city council meetings, it seems like they aren’t considering any significant changes to zoning in existing villages.
Apparently they think the existing zoned capacity is plenty, which begs the question – if zoned capacity is plentiful, what do they think is causing the housing crisis? Do they really think that doing the bare minimum to meet the letter of HB 1110, and barely improving over existing primary/ADU/DADU housing allowances, they’re really opening up equitable new housing development?
Oh wow, I’m glad I read this. I thought the first meeting was today and I was prepping to go. Probably would have biked there if you didn’t mention it.
Definitely agree with all of this!
One interesting tidbid. All the “new/expanded” urban centers listed:
“Greenwood, Upper Queen Anne, West Seattle Junction at Avalon, Admiral, Morgan Junction, Othello at Graham Street”, besides the two ones next to light rail stations (Alaskan Junction, Othello), the 4 rest of the are the ones that originally failed qualifying designations as countywide centers.
Back in 2021, Seattle submitted a bunch of areas to be classified as countywide centers to the PSRC. The four that failed the minimum criteria (residential/job density) were:
* Admiral
* Greenwood/Phinny
* Morgan Junction
* Upper Queen Anne
The same ones that have expanded urban center borders now, I guess Seattle might try resubmitting them to qualify.
https://www.theurbanist.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Embargoed_draft_One-Seattle-Plan-3.4.24.pdf#page=20
I think what we see here is partially the result of a system where city offices are elected in odd years and state offices are elected in even years. The city electorate is much older and mostly doesn’t care about housing costs, and the officials they elect will allow as little housing as they can get away with. The state officials, elected by younger voters (and it probably helps that they mostly don’t live in Seattle, even if most Washington voters live near Seattle), are taking more steps to ameliorate the problem.
I wonder if an electoral system where the voters were divided up by age rather than geography would be superior. Perhaps assign one council member for each 5-year (or whatever, the number of council members is not important) age range.
I think our electoral system in the city is a big problem although this did come from Harrell. Harrell might have lost in an even year, but I doubt it. The city council is a different matter. There are two problems: odd-year elections and districts. Odd year elections lead to a more conservative electorate. Folks who are more stable in their lives are more likely to vote, which means people who own homes. With really tight races (which was the norm generally) this had a big influence on the makeup of the council.
Districts also make things worse. There is no incentive to increase growth in your district. If you do, you may very well be pushed out of your district. The areas that grow the least will add the most amount of land every time they redraw the lines. Districts really don’t make sense for the city. They were designed to help conservatives, and to a certain extent they’ve been effective.
District voting (like voting for the mayor) involves winner-take-all elections. This means that voters need to be strategic during the primary. Picking your second favorite candidate may be wise if your favorite candidate is likely to get crushed in the general election. This leads me to The Stranger. The Stranger and the Seattle Times have a tremendous amount of power when it comes to the primary elections, especially for these council seats. Which such a small turnout, a lot of people just go with the endorsements instead of spending a lot of time researching candidates. Unfortunately, The Stranger has been less than wise when it comes to endorsing candidates. They have repeatedly endorsed very weak candidates in the primary only to see them advance and get crushed in the general election.
Like so much when it comes to government, it is best to start by looking at how the Scandinavians handle it. They have proportional representation based on parties. If the Labor Party gets 1/3 of the votes they get 1/3 of the seats. This solves a lot of these problems. No districts. No worrying about who in particular The Stranger (or The Seattle Times) endorses. The candidates are chosen by the party. The people vote for a party. Simple, elegant, better.
As for now though, we are stuck with the city council. Interestingly enough, The Stranger had an article about the popularity of initiatives in cities (https://www.thestranger.com/news/2024/03/07/79416467/who-needs-the-city-council). I think that may be the only way to fix the zoning problem. It is definitely not the type of thing that is best fixed with zoning, but you could say that about legalizing cannabis. It wasn’t until there was an initiative that included a lot of regulations that it passed. In other words a “Just legalize it” bill failed, but a “Legalize it, and regulate it like so” passed. This is backwards, as the legislature should have hammered out the regulations. Nonetheless it was effective only when it included the regulations. At some point folks in the city should consider an initiative, even if it is as simple as “Do what Spokane Did”.
It’s a curious idea. I don’t think it would solve what I see as Seattle’s worst representational problem: general lack of interacting with the public.
I had hoped that district representation would create more of a grass-roots culture. But it hasn’t in a lot of Seattle.
When I’ve lived elsewhere, the local district council person at least tries to be more accessible. They would attend street fairs and weekly street markets. They would be at every open house, and would invite residents to talk with them as they circulate to listen. They would hand out campaign fliers at rail stations several mornings before the vote.
I just don’t see the meeting and listening I expect — and I have seen when I’ve lived in other cities.
Instead, there seems to almost be this unwritten objective to avoid the public in general.
I think some councilmembers make little effort to participate in community, and others make much more effort to attend community events and be (at least nominally) accessible to their constituents. The districts each contain about 85,000 residents, so I’m not surprised when individuals aren’t able to get the time of day from their representative. Do you really expect your councilmember’s office (much less the councilmember themself) to reply earnestly to every single question or complaint they get from the general public?
Maybe it’s because I grew up in an area where no one except busybody boomers knew or cared about their local politicians, but I think it’s pretty unrealistic to expect individual attention or even for a representative to be seen attending every community event of moderate significance. They have an actual job to do running the city, and they have to sleep just like the rest of us. Folks will whine then they get a canned response from a councilmember’s office (if they get any response at all), and then turn around and wonder why a councilmember needs so many staffers. Can you imagine the typical inbox for a senior public official?
That’s why organized community advocacy groups are so important – a known group of coordinated people is much more likely to be worth a councilmember’s time than some random constituent who’s mad that poverty is visible within their field of view.
Any City Councilperson who tries to hold a town hall style meeting in their district will be met with a Leftwing “scream team” of protestors who don’t even live in that district….. chanting something like “Free Gaza Now!” or the ever popular “Stop The Sweeps!”
The Left has zero interest in honest political discourse in Seattle.
This blog has much, much better free flow of ideas and opinions than Seattle politics in general.
“ Any City Councilperson who tries to hold a town hall style meeting in their district will be met with a Leftwing “scream team” of protestors who don’t even live in that district.”
Structuring a town meeting as an open forum is the by far worst way to get public input! The very structure encourages being obnoxious!
Getting constructive public input is an art form. It’s not good to have open whining. It’s also not good to spend 50-75 of a time limited input meeting with canned speeches and presentations.
*****
I’ve often found that multiple small focus group discussions is best — along with a focused topic. Each group of 4-8 people is assembled randomly (no group should have prior cohesion). Each group gets about 20-30 minutes to compile group recommendations for the same topic. Then different spokespeople chosen by each group have 2 minutes to summarize what they heard using notes scribed by someone else on a big board. The more common the results across groups, the more valid an idea becomes.
The exercise should happen at least a few times at different times.
Before the focused discussion begins, an elected official should give some intro remarks. Then while discussions are occurring, that official and others should observe with an eye to pulling the most vocal people away from the focus group; this “special treatment” is a great diversionary tactic for those too belligerent to participate in developing consensus.
*****
There are other ways to broaden the input as well. Voting with stickers about ideas. Post it notes on a map. Ranking objectives or options.
The important question is to ask thinks in a constructive but broad way — like “Given this alternative, what would make it better?”
*****
The key is to disarm those with a set agenda an encourage them to instead be mindful of the wider community. One someone’s issues are “heard” they often can relax and think about a realistic, consensus result.
*****
As far as open-ended access, a good council member should look to regular informal listening time in their district at a coffee house or community center or library for no more than 3 people at a time. And make those opportunities known beforehand. They should have an assistant to be the “bad guy” when needed to meter the access to the council member.
Al, I appreciate your considered response to tacomee’s comment.
I don’t live in the city, so it’s not my call, but I think all local elections statewide should be in even years, with 4-year terms aligned to the presidential years. For Seattle that would mean electing all members for 4-year terms, and not offsetting the at-large seats.
I do think some geographic representation is good, but I also like the idea of proportional representation. But I’m also not sure that a partisan system is the way to go. Maybe what you could do instead is have a 15-member council with one election with voters ranking candidates (as many as they want) with single transferable vote. The threshold for election would be the total number of votes divided by 15. Any candidate reaching that threshold would be elected automatically and the other votes would be reallocated until you had 15 winners.
You could retain some geographic representation by requiring candidates to identify their district of residence on the ballot. They could also list a party or bloc affiliation if they wanted. So then voters who value local representation could choose to rank candidates from their district higher and those candidates can run on issues relevant for that district, but would still need to get the 1/15 threshold to win a seat. The first candidate for each district to hit the quota would be the seat for that district, although still representing all city voters, and if no candidate from a district hit the quota, the remaining candidate with the most votes in that district would be the council member, such that you’d end up with 7 district members and 8 fully at-large members, but all of them selected by all voters. You could also make this work with the current 7 seats, but adding more seats makes it more likely for there to be council members for each district from that district.
Consider the enclosed map. It illustrates some issues and differences between long term land use planners and architects who dream of nodal development and Seattle’s history. Both streetcar and bus lines have closely spaced stops. Linear development resulted. See Rainier and Beacon avenues South, California Avenue SW, Fremont-Phinney-Greenwood avenues North, University Way NE, Eastlake Avenue East, Broadway, Pike-Pine streets, North 45th Street, Ballard Avenue NW, 15th Avenue NW, 24th Avenue NW. Link and subway stations foster nodal development; Seattle has not had them very long. The nodes could be pretty wide as intending riders are willing to walk farther to frequent and powerful transit. Did impressive nodes develop around streetcar junctions: Admiral, Alaska, Morgan?
The map has yellow lines showing frequent service. But just as with HALA, the plan does not up zone along the bus lines in between the centers. It could.
We are the transit blog. Let’s consider the yellow lines; they are the land use planners interpretation of SDOT and Metro plans. I question some.
The Haller Lake local streets (e.g., Corliss and Meridian avenues North and North 122nd and 128th streets) have had service for decades, but with the NE 130th Street Link station, they no longer deserve frequent, if any service. They do not have sidewalks, equity areas, or schools. NW Hospital can be served by North 115th Street and Meridian Avenue North south of there.
SW Admiral Way deserves to have frequent service. Route 50 is struggling; it is indirect. Route 56 could be two-way and all-day again. SDOT and Metro should step up.
Let’s consider the yellow lines; they are the land use planners interpretation of SDOT and Metro plans. I question some.
I agree and I think that is one of the many things that is wrong with this approach. Some call a “grand bargain“; others the “trickle and firehouse”. No matter what you call it, it doesn’t work.
To a certain extent it is inevitable. Some areas will be zoned higher than others. Magnolia will not look like Lower Manhattan. But what occurs in the “urban neighborhoods” matters a lot more than where we draw the lines for the “urban centers” or “regional centers”. We need to increase density across the vast majority of the city. When we do that, transit improves along with our housing situation. Coverage routes become ridership routes. Buses can follow a straightforward route instead of going back in forth of search of density. The network can be more anywhere-to-anywhere without sacrificing ridership which means it can be more a grid — which is also a lot more efficient.
Now that we are calling these neighborhoods “urban”, we should treat them that way and allow a lot more housing types. Doing so will improve transit, reduce the cost of housing and reduce homelessness.
Yes, RossB describes two hands clapping: transit and land use; either hand alone makes no noise; both together make noise and improve the urban fabric. The land use hand requires comp plans, zoning, and a market response from developers and households; the housing market is very atomic, or has many actors; the developers and households compete with each other for dirt, units, and opportunity. Competition should keep excessive “rent”, in the classical economics sense, down. The transit hand requires sound planning, funding, and execution.
Back to my two examples. The Admiral Way corridor is set up for success by recent developments: Link has the SODO station, 2009; SDOT opened the South Lander Street overcrossing in 2020, and SDOT controls transit flow on the high level bridge. It made sense for the Haller Lake local streets to carry radial service; when Route 41 was improved, it made sense for routes 345-346 to be oriented to it. But in 2026, a radial alignment will no longer make sense for the area; instead, east-west service should be very frequent on North/NE 130th125th streets between Lake City and Bitter Lake (better Shoreline CC); Link is key; it provides riders with radial connections to the urban centers; SODO has Link; NE 130th Street will have Link very soon.
Some of the Haller Lake local streets could have pedestrian and bike priority to allow North 130th Street to be provided transit priority. I am apprehensive that the three-lane profile of North 130th Street suggested by the SDOT plans will yield buses stuck in traffic.
I wonder about ST Link in 2025; could it have three six or eight minute headline lines in the DSTT; east, south, and SODO?
Former District 4 candidate “Urbanist Dad” Ron Davis has penned a much more eloquent and complete dissection of this plan, here: https://ronpdavis.substack.com/p/harrell-tosses-in-the-towel-on-housing
Nathan Dickey,
Please enlighten me and what exactly Ron Davis has in mind for a better housing plan. The guy lost an election and now he’s all bitter about Mayor Harrell and new council? If he has a different plan, please share it by all means.
From the link posted above.
“Failing at housing means prices will climb higher and faster. So unless you have a few million to loan your kids before you die, or a very roomy basement, there is little chance they will be able to afford to live in Seattle. And unless you made around $400,000 a year in your twenties and thirties, people like you will not be able to start a career or raise a family in Seattle.”
Gosh, housing in the USA a free market system. If Seattle remains popular with out-of-State folks with money moving in, I’m not sure families that make under 400K are going to be able to afford to live in Seattle regardless of the mayor’s housing plan.
Also from the Ron Davis article…
“The Harrell plan treats taxpayer money with very little respect—notably generating a mere 2,700 units near two new light rail stations, frittering away a billion dollars in taxpayer investment in our regional transit system. It also ignores the overwhelming feedback favoring social housing, as well as the significant margin the social housing initiative passed with. Overall, it fails to tackle the even larger housing gap when it comes to affordable housing of all types.”
Social housing?? Really? Ron Davis believes that social housing is s solution? I’d love to see his numbers on this. Low income housing currently costs well over 300K per unit to build…. that’s like 3 units for million dollars. Seattle needs thousands of units of housing…. the City just doesn’t have the money to build much social housing.
And finally,
“This is an absurd failure of leadership. Up until now, I’ve wanted to give the mayor the benefit of the doubt. He’s well meaning, and although we disagree about a great deal, he’s not a true conservative like Sara Nelson. He’s just afraid of big business.”
Maybe I’m missing something here? Harrell is afraid of big business is he shanked the housing plan? Big business is how housing gets built, right? I don’t get this at all. In fact, the irrational fear of big business is why the Left will have trouble getting anything done in America… Harrell is not a Lefty, not afraid of big business.. that’s the Ron Davis crowd, right??
You’d have to ask Ron Davis what he would prefer to see – I’m not going to speak for him.
I will say that what I think most folks interested allowing more free market housing construction would probably agree with: the City should reduce (or eliminate) design standards that limit what kinds of housing people can build on their own property. That would be a true free market.
No comments re: social housing, since your mind is already apparently made up about that.
I think what Ron Davis wants is to “toss out the entire Seattle zoning rules and write something else that’s a better fit for the current City. Something a Hell of a lot simpler and more straight forward than what we have now.” (to quote you).
That is what a lot of people are asking for. To be fair, no one is diving into the specifics as to what exactly that would be. We simply want something that makes it much easier to build housing. I do think this is an issue. It is one thing to pick apart a plan (even if the picking is justified). It is another to actually have an alternative. I’ve been arguing this for a while now (on this blog and on Twitter). It isn’t enough to criticize, you have to have an alternative.
I would start with what Spokane has. That is the baseline. Then I would go farther, likely by addressing setbacks. I would call it “Spokane+”. The message would be clear: start with what Spokane has, but make it more liberal. Is there a reason why the biggest city in the state can’t be more liberal with its zoning than Spokane?
Harrell is afraid of big business is he shanked the housing plan? Big business is how housing gets built, right? I don’t get this at all.
I agree. It is a weird criticism. It misses the point entirely. There are issues (such as the budget) that often come down to big-business versus spending. This isn’t one of them. This is one of those times that business, labor and tax-and-spend lefties are on the same page. If you make the zoning simpler, they will build a lot more housing — both market rate and public. Hell, even the environmentalists (with any sense) should be strongly in favor of liberalizing the code. The more difficult it is to build in the city, the more likely you will see sprawl. Even if your goal is to just protect the precious trees in the city (that are somehow more valuable than the ones in the suburbs that contain native wildlife) you want a more liberal code. It is much easier to build around a big tree if you aren’t limited by arcane and outdated rules.
The plans are just bad for everyone except those who don’t want to see more people in the neighborhood. If your goal is to keep the poor people out, this accomplishes it quite well. I very much doubt this was Harrell’s motive, nor do I think he was motivated by the interest of “big business” (not in this case). It is anyone’s guess as to why it looks like this.
For the regional centers and urban centers themselves, it seems most of the planning isn’t even in this document but will be in a separate document. Seems a lot of kicking the can down the road action, but not actually specifying any concrete details.
## regional centers
Subarea Plans for Regional Centers are currently being developed and will be adopted in coming years as part of the Comprehensive Plan.
Downtown Regional Center (2023–2025)
• First Hill/Capitol Hill Regional Center (2023–2025)
• Northgate Regional Center (2023–2025)
• South Lake Union Regional Center (2026–2027)
• Uptown Regional Center (2026–2027)
• University District Regional Center (2026–2027)
• Ballard proposed Regional Center (2026–2027)
## urban centers
Profiles of Urban Centers will be included as an appendix to the final One Seattle Plan. The profiles will include data on existing conditions, planned growth, and recent and ongoing area planning. The profiles will support requirements for designation as Countywide Centers by the King County Growth Management Planning Council. The profiles will include the following 23 Urban Centers. (It’s the ones in the map above)
So I guess the appendix will have the actual details?
Though looking at the unit numbers I’m a bit confused. It seems some say
> Estimated growth targets for the 2024-2044 period are 80,000 housing units and 159,000 jobs.
But then other pages say
> Seattle is responsible for accommodating certain minimum housing needs, totaling 112,000 units, over a 25-year period (2019-2044) in each category.
For checking housing units by area and type, it’s mainly in the deis chapter 2 (it says updated 2024 march, but it mainly seems the same as before so a bit hard for me to tell what was actually changed) https://www.seattle.gov/documents/Departments/OPCD/SeattlePlan/OneSeattlePlanDEISProposalAndAlternatives.pdf
Where page 41 has the best breakdown.
The other chapter 3 also talked about the zoning changes. Regional center height limits to be lifted (unknown limit) urban centers up to 145 feet, neighborhood centers up to 75 feet. But this is the DEIS, the actual draft “Draft One Seattle Plan” doesn’t seem to specify the height limit changes.
I’ll perhaps make a table later; also it’s interesting that the “Seattle West” region aka interbay and upper queen anne and uptown are slated to have the least housing increases. Seems a bit weird considering we’re building the light rail there.
The reason this is all bull pucky is nobody has any idea what the future is going to be. There’s no real reason to plan it was actual numbers for the growth of Seattle.
The parts of the comprehensive plan that do matter are changes to current zoning. Zoning can bring about (but certainly not mandate) changes in the housing market. As you point out, the actual changes to current zoning are every bit as fuzzy and the pie-in-the-sky long term projections.
What’s really needed is just to toss out the entire Seattle zoning rules and write something else that’s a better fit for the current City. Something a Hell of a lot simpler and more straight forward than what we have now.
After the zoning changes…. who really knows? Cities change, they expand and contract. The City can facilitate growth, but it takes private investment after that. The city government can’t actually make Seattle grow…. but it can block growth with stupid rules and regulations
I mean that is literally what we are discussing; zoning is the limits that block growth.
The parts of the comprehensive plan that do matter are changes to current zoning.
Absolutely.
What’s really needed is just to toss out the entire Seattle zoning rules and write something else that’s a better fit for the current City. Something a Hell of a lot simpler and more straight forward than what we have now.
Absolutely — welcome to the club. At the very least we should match Spokane in terms of simplicity.
Page 41 for Alternative 5 breakdown has the housing units zoned/allowed into:
* Regional Center at 43k
* Urban Center (Hub) 7.8k
* Urban Center (Residential) 22k
* Neighborhood Center 19k
* Urban Neighborhood 9k
Of course given that the numbers here total to 120k and the actual draft only highlights 80k will have adjust it downwards.
Appendix B has a more detailed slice of all the urban centers on page 37
https://www.seattle.gov/documents/Departments/OPCD/SeattlePlan/OneSeattlePlanDEISAppendices.pdf#page=37
Downtown is allocated 13k units in all alternatives
## Regional Centers
* First Hill 9k
* U district 4k
* SLU 4k
* Uptown 4k
* Ballard 6k
## Urban Centers (Hub):
generally slated around 1,000 or around 5 large apartment buildings
* Bitter Lake Village 1,000
* Fremont 1,500
* Lake City 900
* Mt Baker 1,200
* West Seattle Junction 3,100
## Urban Centers (Residential)
Surprisingly for all alternatives the urban centers above all have the same housing units. For the urban center residential ones there is a difference though.
* Admiral 400 or 800 under alternative 5
* Morgan Junction 300 or 1400
* Othello 1,100 or 2,600
* Rainier Beach 400 or 2000
* South Park 300 or 1700
Afterwards there’s a couple of informal categories. “large” urban centers.
* 23rd & Union-Jackson 2,000
* Columbia City 1,500
* Eastlake 1,000
* Madison-Miller 1,200
* Most of ones described above
Small ones
* Aurora-Licton Springs 900
* Crown Hill 600
* Green lake 800
* Greenwood-Phinny Ridge 500
* North Beacon Hill 500
* Upper Queen Anne 400
* Wallingford 900
* Westwood-Highland Park 600
Probably a combination of small apartments and townhouses
Then there’s neighborhood centers. A lot more population is allocated there then one would assume from the name. For North Seattle area 2 for example, while there’s 4k allocated to the urban centers, it expected 5k from the neighborhood centers.
Urban Neighborhoods (aka adu single family homes/ townhouses)
Generally it’s around 2k for each of the main sections of Seattle of Ne Seattle, Nw Seattle, West Seattle and South Seattle for a total 8k single family homes (townhouses?)
For height limits Page 172 lists them https://www.seattle.gov/documents/Departments/OPCD/SeattlePlan/OneSeattlePlanDEISLandUse.pdf#page=172
I suspect we’ll see more growth in the “urban neighborhoods” than the EIS gives these zoning changes credit for. Although it’s true the maximum developable size is staying roughly the same for 5,000 square foot lots where you scrape it clean and start from scratch, other proposed changes allow for much greater options for increasing housing on the many, many lots where there’s a perfectly fine house there already and demolishing it would make little sense.
Rear setbacks would go from 20′ currently to 10′ (or 0′ with an alley). Lot coverage maximum would go from 35% to 50%. The notion of one “main” house with two strictly regulated “accessory” units seems to be gone, in favor of allocating a certain amount of floor area to split across units in whatever way makes sense.
Add it all up and maximizing the legal options for a property where you don’t want to mess with the existing house will often look more like “3,000 square foot backyard duplex” instead of the “1,000 square foot backyard cottage” we’re limited to today.
And they think these changes will result in a mere 450 homes added per year citywide across the huge “neighborhood residential” zones? I have doubts about that.
Eric,
It’s impossible to tell what zoning changes will do, but at least it’s lawfully “possible” to build more. I think the economy and interest rates have a bigger effect on builders than zoning.
There’s also a big shortage on construction labor in Greater Seattle right now. High housing prices means sub contractors can’t buy a house with a garage to store tools in. It’s just easier to hang drywall in Round Rock Texas than Seattle. Everybody in the construction industry wants to own a house…. a fixer upper. Used to be a few of those a working class family could buy out in Kent….
> And they think these changes will result in a mere 450 homes added per year citywide across the huge “neighborhood residential” zones? I have doubts about that.
Well, it also sets a soft limit. When the number of houses exceed what is listed in the DEIS, in some cases it starts requiring stricter SEPA reviews.
Senate Bill 5412 (2023) added new section RCW 43.21C.229(3) allowing the City to adopt a
new SEPA exemption for all project actions proposing to develop housing units provided:
â–Ş the development is consistent with all development regulations;
â–Ş the development is consistent with the proposed use or density and intensity of use in the
designated infill area;
The number is not just an “estimate” but also invokes stricter environmental requirements once exceeded.
Sorry to clarify single family homes is probably not beholden to that rule, though the devil is in the details, townhouses might be? The SEPA exemption clause has many other exceptions tagged on. But the main thing is that
> As of July 23, 2023, most projects proposing additional housing units will be exempt from SEPA review, including several types of residential and mixed-use developments that would have previously undergone SEPA review. This SEPA change does not affect other SDCI discretionary approvals, such as Design Review, that may be required for specific proposals. This SEPA amendment will be in effect until September 30, 2025, when the Seattle Comprehensive Plan Update provides new housing growth targets and updated SEPA thresholds.
Unfortunately it is a bit detailed, I’d probably defer to the urbanist to understand exactly what are the ramifications. But the main point still stands, it’s not an *estimate* but actually a soft limit. Well can actually be a hard limit if neighbors keep invoking lawsuits.
I think the economy and interest rates have a bigger effect on builders than zoning.
Of course, as is the case throughout the country.
But there is a construction boom in Seattle right now. It is just that they aren’t building that many places to live. In the vast majority of the city they are basically building houses, although often with ADUs and DADUs. These are basically triplexes, but the labor and materials to build them are excessive. It is pretty clear just by looking at them that the rules make everything harder. If you haven’t seen these, Tacomee, you should talk to a builder friend in Seattle. They are interesting, but also somewhat bizarre. Sometime in the future people will wonder why they built so many places like that, and the answer will be “zoning in the early 2020s”.
In the handful of places where they allow more density they are building more density. There is really a tiny portion of the city zoned for apartments and townhouses yet they’ve built a lot of those. Labor is expensive but it is exceeded by the demand for housing. At some point the cost of labor may make it difficult to build cheaper places, but at that point the overall cost of living in the area will be much lower. Part of the reason labor is so expensive in Seattle is because there isn’t enough housing. Thus the cost of labor will go down if the stops trying to prevent people from building housing. If they changed the zoning we would be a lot more like the rest of the country (with costs going up and down based on interest rates, the cost of labor, materials, etc.).
Ross Bleakney,
I haven’t looked at the overall numbers, but I wouldn’t call the DADU + ADU builds in Seattle a building boom (they are clunky as hell, BTW. a compact 4 plex would be nicer, with a brownstone style layout. There’s a few of these wacky units going up, but it’s nothing like the explosion of units that happened in Belltown or S. Lake Union or the number of tract houses in Black Diamond or Puyallup back in the 80s and 90s. There are plenty of lots zoned for multifamily in Seattle not getting built on right now…. not because of zoning, but because the profit just isn’t currently there.
Rich people have by and large hijacked the construction industry in Seattle. Between mega mansions and high end remodels. everybody who wants work can find it. I helped build hundreds of houses in Puyallup in the 80s and 90s and none of them had tile in them, with builder grade carpet. Those houses were semi-affordable back then. Now everything is a high end finish, all top dollar. It’s actually less work and more money for the workers. It would be hard to dial things back to the old days now.
Also construction workers need houses, not apartments. There’s no taking public transit really. It’s a “building houses and raising kids” group. Workers are often religious, married, and tilt heavy towards home and hearth. The crazy thing is it doesn’t matter what color they are! The Mexican and Asian guys I worked with had the same core values as us White dudes…. Women in the trades? The same…. I worked with a women who’s main goal was to buy a fixer-upper, quit the 6 am to 3 pm grind and remodel the house AND have a baby! She had a husband with some white collar job, and it was still possible to do something like that at the time. That dream wouldn’t work now. Those sorts of people just move away to Red States where they can afford to buy a house and live the sort of life they want.
I think working on housing just drives in how important it is.
The big reason Seattle can’t solve its homeless problem or build enough housing is that the powers-that-be never ask the right question. The question is “Why would they do that?”
There are thousands of homeless drug addicts living on the streets in Seattle who could honestly get clean, get a job and fly straight. But ask the question… “Why would they do that?” Low wage jobs that recovering junkies and ex-cons can get in Seattle don’t pay enough for even the most modest place to live. There’s just no carrot for these poor bastards, so they’re not going anywhere. Where’s the upward path? I believe in that upward path!
It’s very much the same for many construction workers. This a group with pickup trucks and a burning desire to own a house. Most of them voted for Trump. Seattle is hostile towards them….. Texas awaits with open arms. But Seattle so desperate needs these people…….
Most of the problems are market driven, but it doesn’t help the City and State governments haven’t the foggiest idea about community planning.
@tacommee
> Also construction workers need houses, not apartments. There’s no taking public transit really. It’s a “building houses and raising kids” group. Workers are often religious, married, and tilt heavy towards home and hearth.
What is your proposal then, infill lake washington to build single family houses?
Like seriously have you actually thought about it for more than 2 seconds.
It needs to be noted that the changes here don’t do anything particularly radical. It is pretty much a continuation of what Seattle has been doing for awhile.
I’m a little mystified why there is a sense that apartment construction will slow down. I’m also not clear how those units already planned but not yet open, not yet built or not yet approved are being counted. I’m guessing that the new units listed here are additive on top of what’s already possible as opposed to what’s open in 2024.
Everyone seems focused on housing growth being projected low. I think the bigger problem may be employment growth being too high. With WFH, Link opening outside Seattle, issues with Boeing and other things that I just don’t see a market for lots of new office towers holding thousands of new workers .
My reasoning is that our recent employment boom inside Seattle is almost fully because of Amazon. Amazon has already made it clear that they want to add lots of new workers elsewhere, like in Bellevue or Northern Virginia. I also don’t see Amazon growing their market share. So what happened with job growth Downtown in the last 20 years seems almost certainly unlikely in the next 20 years.
WL,
Well, the folks that build the housing you want to see…. don’t care what you think, or anybody else, in Seattle. People have a right to pursue their own self interests… and If I want to set tile, or hang drywall or work in any other building trade… I don’t have to live in an overpriced crackerjack apartment. It’s a big country. There’s room for them to own their own house somewhere.
Seattle’s the loser here. Not the craftsman who bail for a different part of the country. The big building boom of the last 25 years was powered by workers now in their 50s. I know a lot of them. There’s not as many kids in trades in Seattle now… because buying a house is so hard and there’s more opportunity elsewhere.
I’m supportive of changing the zoning in Seattle…. but I’m also skeptical about the real impact . Zoning allows housing… doesn’t plan it, doesn’t finance it, doesn’t build it, doesn’t manage it. So it’s good to change zoning but it’s not a cure all.
If I was to guess the future of Seattle, I’d look at NYC and other East Coast hot spots…. you have a super rich White core with fresh-off-the-boat brown immigrants to work all the bullshit service jobs because working class Whites realize the good times are done and move away. Think of 7 immigrants sharing a crappy one bedroom apartment. That’s the NYC right there. Seattle is attracting rich people who want a second home they don’t even live in, also NYC.
> Well, the folks that build the housing you want to see…. don’t care what you think, or anybody else, in Seattle. People have a right to pursue their own self interests… and If I want to set tile, or hang drywall or work in any other building trade… I don’t have to live in an overpriced crackerjack apartment. It’s a big country. There’s room for them to own their own house somewhere.
Tacomee, and people should have the right to live in housing besides just single family homes as well. You talk about the right to pursue their interests and then insist on forcing single family housing everywhere. Will it seriously be the end of the world if Seattle approves more apartments?
“Also construction workers need houses, not apartments. There’s no taking public transit really. It’s a “building houses and raising kids” group.”
What a sweeping generalization. There are thousands of construction workers in Seattle, or probably millions if you count the whole country. They all have different attitudes. Some want children, some don’t, and some are gay. Some want a large suburban house, some want a small easy-to-maintain house/condo/apartment, and some are minimalists. Some vote right, some left. Some have been to college, some have an advanced technical certificate, some don’t. Some are pro-union, some aren’t. Some come from countries where transit is good, and would take transit to their jobsites if they could, or wish transit were better so that that was an option.
Construction workers are like everybody else: they find it hard to afford a place to live, and some of them realize that higher densities are the only way to scale geometrically to the high and growing population we have. It doesn’t have to be highrises: currently middle housing is widely favored as the ideal for cities.
“I’d look at NYC and other East Coast hot spots…. you have a super rich White core”
But why is it that only the rich can afford to live in New York City? It wasn’t like that for all the centuries the city existed until the 1990s or so. Most other large cities in the US are the same. The year they became unaffordable varies: some in the 1990s, some in the 2020s. There’s a huge demand for housing in cities and metropolitan areas that isn’t being met, and that drives up the prices. If the US had simply continued the trajectory of normal cities until the 1950s, there would be a lot more housing in and near cities, a wider variety of housing types to choose from, and everybody would have much more access to walkability and transit than they do now.
New York and Chicago grew like normal cities, filling in middle housing and highrises, and a lot of that was already finished by 1950, so the city continued that way. Newer cities like Seattle were prevented from doing that by zoning changes, that left 70-80% of the land single-family only, and almost all of the city 1-2 stories.
What really frustrates density/walkability/transit advocates is this attitude that 90% of people want a house and don’t care about the other things, when that’s not even remotely true. Roughly 33% of Americans want walkable urbanism, 33% want driveable sub-urbanism, and 33% would be equally satisfied either way. But 70-80+% of the land is single-family only (maybe in its relaxed form with ADUs, but no middle housing or corner stores). That means 13% of people are living with less density/walkability than they want, and a full 66% supermajority would be satisfied living in an area like Capitol Hill. Yet these people are constantly told they don’t exist, and only a fraction of the kind of housing they need is built for them. They can only live satisfied in 15% of American cities and neighborhoods — those that somewhat resemble normal cities.
When you tell people to go live in red states where housing is cheap, you ignore that most of these areas are completely unwalkable: you have to drive a mile or more just to get to a supermarket or see anything other than a house. Transit is much worse than it is in Seattle or Pugetopolis. And now they have to worry about the government violating their voting rights so they can’t participate in choosing their leaders. And the ones who are most trying to prevent people not like themselves from voting are the same ones that are most dug-in on single-family houses, residential-only neighborhoods, no support for transit, no support for the lower-income, and not even basic consumer safety and health, and are actively harming people not like themselves out of spite.
The newly-built housing has increasingly become bifurcated into single-family neighborhoods vs large breadboxes, with little in between. That doesn’t mean the vast majority of the population want one or the other; it’s only a fraction at the far ends that do. People in the middle don’t have a choice: their kind of housing has been illegal to build since the 1950s or 1970s, so they have to take one or the other. Most of them have to live in car-dependent suburbs with big-box stores, because that’s what most of the housing consists of.
Mike Orr,
I have a huge van with $10,000 worth of tools inside. I can’t park that on a street and live in an apartment. Homeless people are attracted to the van like flies to poop. It’s really sad. As houses in greater Seattle become more and more expensive, they’ll be less and less tradespeople will be here and their services will cost more and more. For Liberal Metro areas, this is a huge problem. For tradespeople…. plenty of work in the Red States I guess.
I just talked with one of my brothers about a short term rental he owns in Wyoming. It’s a house on the Big Horn river that rents for $600. That’s not a month, that’s per night with a 3 night minimum and $200 cleaning fee. So it’s $2000 to rent this place, but it’s a million dollar home. The locals are pissed off because they can’t afford to live there because of short term rentals and rich people buying summer houses. But that’s just life. Rich people ruin stuff for everybody else.
An apartment building is going up in downtown, and the developer told everybody it was “workforce housing” and now it’s two bedroom condos listing for $350K. Locals can’t really afford that. Rich people who fly fish 4 times a year can. Home ownership is hedge against these bastards…..that’s all I know. It’s why everybody in the construction industry is so dead set on buying a house. We see the bullshit money… the buyers, agents, builders….. they’re all money grubbers.
Right now, there’s no way New York City could build its way into housing affordability. Because new clean new units in even iffy neighborhoods in NYC attract out of town money. Out of the county money. You think any of us could outbid a rich Arab family? The K.S.A loves the Big Apple.
Seattle’s problems started the moment it became nationally popular. I mean some of us remember the days of Boeing controlled Seattle where everything closed at 8 pm in most neighborhoods. It’s so popular now! Outsiders pay stupid prices for real estate the rest of us cannot match. I know… rich people ruin everything. But what can you do?
So yeah, change the zoning, that’s a start and it can’t hurt. But that doesn’t mean enough units will be built that working people can afford. Doesn’t mean for every unit built, there isn’t a rich person or family trying to “escape L.A.”
Maybe the solution is to tax tech companies until they leave the State and enact rent control to stop almost all construction? Then Seattle can be a lower income backwater like it used to be. I don’t argue with people who want a “lesser Seattle” or “lesser Tacoma”, even though I’m pro growth. But I’m afraid “world class city” and “affordable housing” just do not mix in America.
“I have a huge van with $10,000 worth of tools inside. I can’t park that on a street and live in an apartment.”
Not all construction workers have such expensive or bulky tools. In real cities there’s a mixture of houses and middle housing and some of them have garages, and you, who have a working truck with equipment, can have one of those. Or the truck may be an employers’ and park in the company lot, or I’m sure people could make arrangements to park one or several trucks at another business securely. What do construction workers in New York City do? It’s not like there’s no construction there, or all the workers commute from other cities. What did they do before all the sprawl?
Sometimes there are solutions that only people in big cities are aware of. For instance, many people they need to shop by car to put six bags of groceries in the trunk or to bring home a cabinet. I read someone in Boston who said, “What do we do? There are delivery services for groceries and furniture.” And that was before Amazon and Uber Eats became big. So some people obviously have to have cars and trucks to make the deliveries, and those cars have to park someplace, but that doesn’t mean the entire population all need personal cars.
Tacomee, do you still live in this region? I’m looking for someone to cover the opening of the Eastside starter line when it opens on April 27th.
“But I’m afraid “world class city” and “affordable housing” just do not mix in America.”
That’s only because the governmental policies encourage it rather than trying to fix it. It’s not normal for half the population to be cost-burdened for housing, or for a large percent of the population to live in car-dependent areas and the government doesn’t take major steps to alleviate it by seriously increasing transit and mixing up land use. It’s the warped attitudes and politics in the US that have led to this.
but I wouldn’t call the DADU + ADU builds in Seattle a building boom\
I would. It is what dominates in most of the city. Folks don’t seem to get it. A very tiny portion of the city is zoned for regular apartments. The fact that there are still a lot of apartments being built in the city just shows what kind of demand there is for housing. Most of the city doesn’t allow that. The most density they can possible build is a house + ADU + DADU. Often this is after a subdivision (and often that is with a minimum lot size of 7200 square feet). Again, that is all that can be built in my neighborhood and the vast majority of land in the city.
Here is an example of what I’m talking about. Look at this map: https://www.seattleinprogress.com/filters. Now filter by “Completed in last year”. Zoom out so you can get a big picture view. Now filter again by “Include single-family homes and other projects that don’t go through design review”. Toggle that on and off and you can see there are a ton of those type of projects that were built last year. If you walk around the neighborhood you see it all over the place.
They are building these even though “they are clunky as hell” (as you put it). It is clearly really expensive to build that way. It is much worse for consumers. It is not what they want, but it is what they will buy, because it is all that the zoning will allow. If you allowed regular town houses they build have a half dozen of them, and they would probably be cheaper to build (since they could build them as a “kit”). They would be much more popular, and the price for each unit would be way cheaper.
Absent zoning, you reach a point where the cost of housing equals the cost of development. This is intuitive, but studies have also shown this to be true (and it has been confirmed over the years). It is the zoning (more than anything) that is causing prices to be so high.
Loosening the zoning law and SFHs are not in opposition with one another. Apartments near neighborhood centers relieve housing pressure on the surrounding SFHs, so they don’t get torn down and turned into skinny town homes or tiny ADUs. “Home and hearth” folks might actually be able to afford a SFH if there was enough housing near city centers for people who prefer more urban living. In the long term the urbanization of neighborhoods might spread out further and tear down more homes, but Seattle is a long way away from New York or Chicago (and a short way away from San Francisco)
We are entering the next stage of gentrification: Neo-protectionism. Once so many people have such wealth in their homes, any growth or change feels threatening.
What’s neo about wealth protection and aversion of change?
I doubt they’re more protectionist than they were thirty years ago. We reached the nadir in the 1960s and 70s when the prevailing policy was 1-2 stories, Seattle zoning was tightened, and density couldn’t get any political support. It started turning around in the 1980s but didn’t become visible until the 1990s (the first condo towers and urban villages), and then slowly spread from there. In the early 2000s there were still people trying to choke off any growth. (BANANA = Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anything.) Now this is seen as impossible: density will occur at least in the urban villages, and areas like far north Seattle with a lot of single-family homeowners (like RossB) are voting for some level of density and transit.
The idea that apartments or fourplexes will lower the value of neighboring houses is contradicted by local prices for thirty years. As long as there’s high demand for housing, both the apartments and the neighboring houses will go up, as they would if the apartments weren’t built. And those new apartments aren’t bringing drug-addict brown welfare bums who don’t take care of their yard like the stereotype says; they’re bringing middle-class people like the neighboring homeowners.
I don’t dispute what you’re saying Mike. I’m sure it was more prevalent 30 years ago. It also had the awful tinge of racism back then.
I’m only saying that I see that the kids and grandkids from that time were taught at a basic level that density is a threat to high property values even though there is not actual evidence that there is a correlation in Seattle.
I think there is another factor too: on-street parking. Because many of these new apartment building owners charge extra for parking, lots of those residents are instead parking on the street to save money. That’s fueling a sudden rise in on-street parking as far as 3 or 4 blocks from these buildings well into lots of these single family and townhouse blocks. The suddenness of it all can trigger that inherited protectionism.
So if I bought a house in Wallingford, tore it down and built 4 apartments on it (3600 sq ft total)
1) What do you think that would cost?
2) What do you think the rent would be?
@tacomeee
Well if you tried in the section of Wallingford labeled a historic district, first you need a couple tens/hundred thousand for lawyers.
“So if I bought a house in Wallingford, tore it down and built 4 apartments on it (3600 sq ft total). 1) What do you think that would cost? 2) What do you think the rent would be?”
Suppose each unit costs as much as the house. That’s four households that could live there instead of one. Four households who could live in a walkable gridded neighborhood with transit near the U-District.
In actual experience, each one would cost 50-75% of the house I’d guess.
## SEPA exemptions
Saw an interesting page document about exemption SEPA requirements on page 40 appendix DEIS; and generally how to increase housing production. It talks about how currently the exemption is at 4 units and discusses raising the limit. Simplifying, the one seattle DEIS would serve as the environmental impact statement instead if allowed to use the exemption. And the project would have to conform to the land use plan (aka one seattle plan)
> The City is considering a residential exemption and raising SEPA thresholds for, mixed-use development including housing, and single-purpose commercial (non-retail) development up to 65,000 square feet* throughout the City. Final exemptions could vary by place type or other geographic location.
*the 65,000 sq ft state limit for sepa exemption is just for commercial only.
Currently the city restrictions for using the sepa limits are set at 4 units for most areas, and then increases to 20~30 for other zones, while 250 for downtown.
https://www.seattle.gov/documents/Departments/OPCD/SeattlePlan/OneSeattlePlanDEISAppendices.pdf#page=40