This is an open thread.

A few things worth noting about Montreal. First — and this is objective — it is a very beautiful city. I’ve visited many times, and found it especially attractive. Second, with this much density, lots of people take transit. Prior to the pandemic, roughly 2.3 million people a day rode transit, with about a third of that on the Metro. Third, it is relatively affordable. So much so that it is an example of affordability for housing advocates. For all those reasons, I believe it is a model for Seattle, and hope that we evolve to be more like Montreal.

Just came back from Montreal on a short visit, I agree with Ross’s observation, a really beautiful city. It was so nice to take the metro and buses to various destinations, using a 3-day pass (CAD 21.25) for both modes. Unusual rubber tires on trains, I thought they would be quieter but are actually quite noisy in the tunnels, I can’t recall enough of my experience in Paris metro, tunnels from a long-ago vacation, to compare the noise levels, but Tokyo’s rail lines didn’t strike me as being as loud.

Other comparisons: I still prefer Pike Place to their public markets. More people ride bikes there. Food was great and a bargain with the current exchange rate. Staying downtown near Old Montreal is the way to go, and probably more welcoming than Seattle’s downtown. I’ll leave out my Chinatown experience for another reply in this thread.

The noise level of different transit systems varies so strikingly. Tokyo’s trains are, indeed, quiet compared to most other cities. I’ve noticed that in the US, systems that are aimed at the middle class (such as suburban trains) are much quieter than systems aimed at the poor (such as urban buses).

I though BART was the loudest metro I’ve ever experienced. That may be based on what you expect. You expect the New York Subway to rattle and shake, but man, BART was loud.

I think BART’s noise is well known as one of the most awful-sounding train systems in the world – because they didn’t camber the wheels.

https://www.bart.gov/news/articles/2018/news20180606

It seems like they’ve largely gotten around to fixing that on a lot of the trains, though.

BART is especially loud in the Transbay Tube under the bay. I assume there’s too much echoing.

BART also messed up and accepted a bid on new doors a few decades ago that did not meet sound insulation specifications. They kept the problem very quiet. BART accepted the doors because they were desperate to replace the existing ones that were constantly failing.

It’s situations like this why any rail transit operator needs to have an experienced rail operations manager. It’s much harder to actually run a system rather than to dream on up and draw pretty pictures and talk in grandiose terms.

Interesting article about home price to income ratios. A Timeline of Affordability: How Have Home Prices and Household Incomes Changed Since 1960? … they say a healthy price-to-income ration is 2.6. (It would take 2.6 years of median household income to purchase the median home). About a quarter of the way down the page they list price-to-income ratios by city in 2019, most affordable to most expensive. Seattle’s ratio is (or was), 5.69. San Jose’s is 9.69. But, cities in the rust belt, like Toledo and Scranton, , are in the most affordable camp, at 2.14 and 2.15. Montreal’s ratio (which I found on another website, is 8.65)

https://listwithclever.com/research/home-price-v-income-historical-study/

Recent reports show housing prices are declining by around 3% month over month, which for a $1 million house/condo is around $30,000, despite housing starts declining significantly. Rents are also declining, or increasing at a much slower rate, although rents are a lagging indicator due to lease terms, and because the high mortgage rates prevent renters from buying thus placing strain on the rental market. Meanwhile number of sales has jumped.

When you look at the three main methods of zoning you can see what influences “affordability”, although almost none of the new construction will be less than 100% AMI and will likely require a two income household.

1. Minimum lot sizes. Although population growth began on the eastside in earnest around 1970, many areas were already platted and were used as summer houses. This led to large lot minimums and smaller summer houses (like what my family moved to in 1970). This was the basic model for the eastside even as population continued to grow because of the size: Renton to Bothell to North Bend. Many of these areas were farms or vacant land before development. The price of land depends on location, schools, public safety, and location, but as Ross notes has become more expensive, especially on the eastside.

2. House size to lot area ratios (regulatory limits). Many of the folks moving to the eastside moved there because they had families. As I noted yesterday, even today MI has an average household of 3.1 persons, even including the multi-family zones. As someone who has raised two kids it is pretty hard to do that in under 3000 sf. Many of the summer homes were smaller than that, and over the years have been remodeled or more recently replaced, and most cities have worked hard to prevent the McMansion. But a smaller house on a big lot does not increase the number of dwelling units or housing, although a bigger house with more bedrooms allows more people to live on that lot (including kids, something urbanists don’t quite understand). Ross is correct that the marginal price on construction declines per sf say from 2000 to 4000 sf (and remember most eastside cities require 2-3 stall covered garages which most buyers demand) which is why building a DADU is usually not economical, but the cost per sf of construction has soared along with the price of land. New codes (the international building code adopted in Feb. 2021), sprinklers, green mandates, efficiency mandates, etc. has significantly increased the cost of construction per sf.

3. Use. The big differences between “stacked housing” (which is just multi-family housing) and row houses are not nomenclature but: 1. regulatory limits, because multi-family housing usually needs additional height and lower yard setbacks and has a higher GFAR than a row house, and is more economical to build with very large lots; and 2. common ownership. One of the big factors in the affordability of condos is the HOA fees. Not too long ago I posted an article about a new development in SODO that could not sell its affordable set aside units because the HOA fee was over $1000/mo. Recent regulations re: inspection for older condos after the collapse in Florida has increased HOA fees for older condos too.

From what I have seen from the GMPC hearings eastside cities will be able to meet their GMPC future housing growth targets without amending their zoning (even a city like Bellevue that has I believe a 35,000 growth target) despite population estimates I think are too high, because there is so much land on the eastside already zoned for housing but still vacant, unlike Seattle, large commercial zones to allow housing, and these cities will continue to segregate uses pretty strictly except in the commercial zones in which housing is now allowed. Row houses are more attractive and more desirable than say a condo or apartment but also more expensive.

I agree with Ross that Montreal is a pretty city. It too segregates uses pretty strictly. What Montreal has from its history of converting industrial buildings to housing is a smallish (2-4 stories) middle housing market (with yards) that places like Seattle do not have, with pretty historical architecture, not the shlock you see in Seattle.

The way to create that kind of middle housing is not to upzone SFH zones even if politically possible because the lots are too small, but to micro zone parts of the UGA and multi-family zones for this middle housing. The two biggest hurdles for this are it represents a downzone for multi-family property owners which is never popular once upzoned, and the row or town houses would be quite expensive, especially if near good retail like U Village.

MI has fought over “row or town houses” for some time. Property owners in the commercial or multi-family zone don’t want to build them because it is a downzone unless very very high end ($4 million if new), and the SFH zones are adamantly opposed. Studies show that even with higher GFAR than allowed for a SFH (and some believe these row houses should have a lower GFAR and be quite small), a 1000 sf row house on a 2000 sf lot (which is 10% more GFAR than in the SFH zone) would: A. be very expensive especially if new, well over $1 million; B. risky for a builder because there is a small market for an expensive small house on MI. MI actually has a code provision to allow such a subdivision, but to date developers avoid it because they make more on a full sized, full lot house, and it requires a dedicated public green space, and the city has basically run out of subdivisions more than two lots.

What the GMPC has learned that some on this blog miss is increasing the housing supply by replacing older more affordable housing with new more expensive housing exacerbates the affordability issue. Seattle for example will place a levy on November’s ballot. The GMPC wants to require that its housing targets break down along AMI bands, like 0% to 30%, 30% to 50%, and so on, but if fact any kind of mandate backfires: eastside cities that want fewer housing growth targets will require half the new housing units be 0% to 30% AMI which no one will ever apply to build so eastside cities will get the smaller housing growth they want.

The amount of housing and kind of housing does have an effect on price, but is just one factor among many. With the new mortgage and borrowing rates we will see a steep decline in new housing starts for the next five years or so, plus a decline in housing prices, although nowhere near affordable, but maybe within reach of a two income household with 100% AMI which for Seattle today is around $230,000/year combined. If you love your home and plan to live in it for many years it doesn’t matter what the value is. If you are investor maybe time to sell.

“As someone who has raised two kids it is pretty hard to do that in under 3000 sf. ”

I grew up in a two parent two kid household in an 1800 sq. ft. house, and we didn’t feel particularly cramped. The argument that you absolutely *have* to have 3000 square feet to raise two kids is incredibly elitist.

As someone who has raised two kids it is pretty hard to do that in under 3000 sf. Um, I grew up in a <1200sf house with a sister and two parents. We never felt cramped, though this was small-city WI so we had a decent yard. I know people who grew up in NYC with even less space and no yard, and they turned out fine too. Humans are remarkably adaptable, but it's really hard to adapt to the complete lack of affordable housing.

Skylar, so what you are proposing based on your upbringing is severely reducing GFAR on eastside SFH lots? So even if I own a 10,000 sf lot I can only build a 1200 sf house? Because that will create affordable housing, even though each eastside city will be able to meet its GMPC future housing growth targets within their existing zoning, both minimum lot size, use, and GFAR?

Interesting. I suppose if no house on the eastside could be larger than 1200 sf it would reduce housing prices, but I don’t see that happening. I also don’t see minimum lot sizes in the eastside SFH zones being reduced as that is a nuclear issue (some try to get around by increasing the number of legal dwelling units per lot like Seattle’s MHA), and even if they were builders would want higher GFAR so they could build just as large a house on the smaller lot, just with fewer trees and smaller yard setbacks.

I think the best way to understand how much sf a family needs is to raise a family, understanding different families have different goals. It is true many people raise families in very small residences, although that does not mean they would not like more space if they could afford it.

Like you I grew up in a pretty cramped house (five kids and two parents in around 1800 sf except for an unfinished basement although like you the area was quite rural with huge yards), but as a parent I certainly would not want to do that if I didn’t have to (and as the years went along my parents did “finish” the basement and add an addition like so many eastside summer homes).

Do I think some current homes are too large? Yes, and I have fought that on MI for many years, leading to the 2017 rewrite of the residential code that reduced GFAR, and removed some gimmicks from the code. But MI like most cities takes the approach it can’t tell you how big a house you can build, just how big your house can be compared to your lot area, although we do have a maximum house size per zone (8400, 10,000, 12,500 and 15,000 sf) to prevent people combining lots and building houses out-of-scale with adjacent houses on one lot. Still I think maximum house size for the R15 (15,000 sf residential) is 9000 sf no matter how large the lot is, which is quite a bit smaller than some HUGE houses that led to this rule.

I think the best way to understand how much sf a family needs is to raise a family

I raised a family, and I concur with those who feel like your statement is elitist and presumptuous. It is like someone who eats meat every day and can’t possibly understand how folks are vegetarian.

Ross, who cares what you think? I don’t …

[Editor’s Note: You are in violation of the comment policy. No personal attacks. If this continues, you will be banned.]

I don’t think anybody is proposing prohibiting somebody willing to pay for it from building a 3000+ square foot house to raise their kids in. Simply that a house that large should not be mandatory to be able to buy a house at all. All we’re asking for is an acknowledgement that different people have different needs and different budgets, and need different housing options to accommodate them.

I know plenty of European friends who live in apartments that are 320-500 sq ft in size and feel comfortable wirh their living conditions. Many would argue that 3000 sq ft is a lot of space for 4 people and borders on excessive when a lot of it will just sit empty for most of the day. McMansions like that only exist to show off wealth than be practical places for people to live.

“One of the big factors in the affordability of condos is the HOA fees.”

That’s one of the things that has deterred me from some condos. To me, the whole point of having a condo is someday you’ll pay it off and then you won’t have to pay the equivalent of rent every month and you won’t have to work as hard, which coincides with middle/retirement age. But if you have to pay $700 or $1000 a month on top of annual property taxes, that kind of defeats the purpose.

“A city’s legal obligation is to meet its GMPC future housing growth targets (even if probably inflated)”

Its legal obligation should be to accommodate its percent of the actual population, even if it exceeds earlier growth targets. Otherwise you’re shifting the burden to other cities who are building more housing. Or if no city builds housing for this above-target influx, then the housing shortage gets worse and prices skyrocket.

The PSRC growth targets may technically allow Mercer Island or Ballard to stop when they reach their target, even if they reach it 10 or 15 years before the anticipated time, but it shouldn’t allow it. And Mercer Island shouldn’t be able to say, “We built our target, no more,” if the actual population increase exceeds the target. That’s just beggar-thy-neighbor, nimbyism, “I’ve got mine so screw everybody else”

“Its legal obligation should be to accommodate its percent of the actual population, even if it exceeds earlier growth targets. Otherwise you’re shifting the burden to other cities who are building more housing. Or if no city builds housing for this above-target influx, then the housing shortage gets worse and prices skyrocket.

“The PSRC growth targets may technically allow Mercer Island or Ballard to stop when they reach their target, even if they reach it 10 or 15 years before the anticipated time, but it shouldn’t allow it. And Mercer Island shouldn’t be able to say, “We built our target, no more,” if the actual population increase exceeds the target. That’s just beggar-thy-neighbor, nimbyism, “I’ve got mine so screw everybody else””.

Mike, that is the entire point of the PSRC and its implementing agency the GMPC. Every 7 or 10 years the PSRC estimates future population growth, and where that growth will occur (and to come extent should occur), and then the GMPC allocates a city’s housing targets based on these assumptions. Your argument that cities should based future housing growth based on current population is exactly what the PSRC and GMPC are trying to avoid because naturally that burdens Seattle with the greatest future housing growth when Seattle will likely see some of the weakest population growth in the region over the next two decades.

The prior Vision Statement was through 2035; the most recent Vision Statement is through 2050, but is based on 2018 data. Although I think the future population growth targets are likely high based on ahistorical growth from 2010 to 2018 post pandemic — depending on whether last year’s 1%+ population loss by King Co. is an anomaly or not — the reality is these population growth figures will be reviewed in 7 to 10 years.

It makes no sense for a city to build or permit more housing than the GMPC tells it it will need. There is no point in you being moralistic about creating additional housing at market rates, which in most eastside cities is not remotely affordable. Some cities like Tacoma, Shoreline and Lynnwood may want to exceed their housing targets for the development revenue and to revitalize and gentrify their cities, but that only means other cities will have lower housing targets next time the PSRC prepares a new Vision Statement.

One factor some miss is the PSRC/GMPC also estimate and allocate job growth. The 2050 Vision Statement wanted to get away from the model in which all jobs are in downtown Seattle and housing outside Seattle, and move to a cluster model of job and housing centers to cut down on commuting. So the GMPC also allocated job growth, which is harder for a city to meet because it is hard to create jobs. For example, how does Mercer Island force businesses to move to MI with Bellevue and Seattle to the east and west?

The pandemic and WFH accelerated the PSRC’s goal to spread jobs throughout the region in a way the PSRC could not have anticipated, and much more suddenly than anticipated, although it did accomplish the goal of reducing work commuting. Unfortunately the sudden move to WFH and away from commuting to downtown Seattle has stressed transit budgets when TOD was a key element of the 2050 Vision Statement, and actually incentivized sprawl. It also reallocated tax revenue in a way not anticipated, and will likely have very severe ramifications for downtown Seattle’s commercial development which is a huge source of revenue for the city.

What the PSRC and GMPC haven’t figured out yet is how to allocate and require affordable housing throughout all the AMI bands. Ideally private industry would do it without cost to the state (who came up with this system) or county, or that cities would fund the affordable housing, but most cities are broke, their stimulus money (like MI) will all be used to balance their 2023-24 general fund budgets, and police and fire CBA’s are resetting with 9% COLA’s when the levy can only increase 1% per year.

Seattle is asking citizens to pass a levy to build affordable housing because Harrell’s proposed budget has a $194 million hole (without addressing the bridge issues) because IMO the only way you get “affordable” housing is with public subsidies. The irony of course is levies are property based and so are passed onto renters by landlords, although I don’t think a lot of renters understand that, and think levies are free money (which to some degree they are if county wide). My guess is the state progressives would like to force eastside cities to pass affordable housing levies but doubt they would pass. I doubt a county wide affordable affordable housing levy would pass either, UNLESS it relieved eastside cities of their obligation to meet the GMPC’s housing targets, which actually makes sense because to build affordable housing you begin with affordable land, and today that is not 90% of the eastside unless you count SE King Co.

Density advocates keep claiming density makes housing more affordable. Then why is Montreal’s home price to income ration on the high end of the range at 8.65? Seattle’s ratio is 5.69. Montreal is 50% more dense than Seattle, but it’s less affordable.

– Sam. STB Comment Section’s leading Mercer Island expert.

To add some clarity as to regional body roles, the Puget Sound Regional Council (PSRC) is this region’s Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) whose main responsibility is allocation of federal transportation funding. Through this, PSRC also (via interlocal agreement) has some certification powers over local Comprehensive Plans; if a city is determined out-of-compliance it would not be eligible for transportation grant funding, which is a pretty big deal.

The Growth Management Planning Council (GMPC) is a King County board composed of elected officials whose main duty is reviewing and approving the King County Countywide Planning Policies (CPPs), which form the basis for coordinated planning efforts in King County. The growth targets for individual cities are in the CPPs and were updated last year. https://kingcounty.gov/depts/executive/performance-strategy-budget/regional-planning/GMPC.aspx

Importantly, PSRC does not set the growth targets, but PSRC’s regional planning documents incorporate them. The growth targets are disseminated from the state (the Department of Commerce, specifically) to the individual counties, and then the county and its component cities can allocate the growth target more or less how they choose. King County does this via staff negotiation and ultimately through the GMPC. Cities are legally required to PLAN FOR their growth target, e.g. provide sufficient land and zoning to accommodate the target. However they are not actually required to achieve the target. Cities can also plan for growth in excess of the target, although this has caused issues in the past.

“that is the entire point of the PSRC and its implementing agency the GMPC. Every 7 or 10 years the PSRC estimates future population growth, and where that growth will occur (and to come extent should occur), and then the GMPC allocates a city’s housing targets based on these assumptions. Your argument that cities should based future housing growth based on current population is exactly what the PSRC and GMPC are trying to avoid because naturally that burdens Seattle with the greatest future housing growth when Seattle will likely see some of the weakest population growth in the region over the next two decades.”

Not future housing growth, current housing growth. If Mercer Island refuses to add more housing because it reached its target years early, then that puts a disproportionate burden on other cities to house the people that the estimate didn’t foresee. The problem is the target was too low, not that Mercer Island was so excellent it front-loaded its construction.

People live where housing is available. If it’s all in Seattle, then people will live in Seattle, regardless of whether they want to or not.

@Jason Rogers Great post. Spot on and very helpful as I still see a lot of comments that misconstrue the responsibilities of the PSRC. The only thing I would add to your excellent explanation is to this part: “Cities are legally required to PLAN FOR their growth target, e.g. provide sufficient land and zoning to accommodate the target.” This is also true for the county itself in regard to its unincorporated areas.

“As someone who has raised two kids it is pretty hard to do that in under 3000 sf. ”

I concur with asdf2, Skylar and RossB’s comments in reply to the above remark. It is remarkably presumptuous. I grew up in NYC in the first floor flat of a duplex my parents owned. Myself and my nine siblings were all raised in that 1250 sq ft flat. We also had tenants in our equally sized second floor flat, and for most of my youth that included a wonderful family that had five children and two grandparents all sharing that space above us.

We had a small yard in the back that got plenty of use of course, the basement was unfinished and unheated, as was the attic that was simply used for storage for both flats, and there was no garage to speak of which was fine since my family never owned a car while I was growing up. Despite the rather limited space we were very happy living there and I have a boatload of great memories as a result.

Myself and my other siblings eventually went on to college and careers and families of our own, some staying in the city or the larger metro area and others moving to other parts of the country. Myself and my siblings still love to share stories with one another about those formative years and we typically end up laughing and smiling whenever we reminisce about that old house in the city that we all called home for decades.

Mike, when did I state MI had stopped issuing new construction permits? I said that MI had met its housing targets to date despite the fact prior councils has agreed to more units than would have been legally required. The GMPC’s recent targets have a no new net target for MI but MI still has 1220 new units to go through 2044 from past inflated allocations.

I suggest everyone look at the link Jason provides to see allocations throughout the region. As Jason notes at the end of his post problems can occur when jurisdictions build more than their housing allocations.

It is also important to understand different cities build different styles of housing with different capacity. Seattle tends to build many small and micro units because so many Seattleites live alone or don’t have kids whereas on the Eastside a lot of new housing is SFH with 3-5 bedrooms, and often house relatives (or Nannie’s) rather than going to the hassle of an ADU/DADU although the property is zoned for an ADU/DADU.

However in the next 20 years as the Eastside SFH land — including vacant land — gets built out I think Eastside cities will use multi-family housing in commercial cores to build condos and apartments to meet their housing allocations, especially Bellevue because much of “Bellevue’s” surrounding SFH zones are actually their own cities like Medina, Clyde Hill, Beaux Arts and so on, and these SFH zones have sometimes one to three total new unit allocations over the next 22 years so won’t be adding much housing to west Bellevue. This is basically what Seattle has done for years. But I agree with the PSRC — even pre-pandemic — counties like Snohomish and Kitsap will see a lot of growth as people look for affordable SFH’s because there is lots of vacant land and many now can work from home full or part time.

One of the hidden reasons for the housing shortage is so many live alone or want to live alone, or as couples, and no longer have relatives living with them. Compare TISGWM’s upbringing with today. Although Tisgwm has fond memories of his upbringing I doubt he repeated the density of his youth as an adult.

No doubt someone will soon post that their entire family of 20 grew up in a closet and it was great, although none of those folks repeated that experience when adults. Of course such living conditions violate HUD and Sec. 8 requirements today.

Rather than memories of youth a more objective metric is to look at the size of current SFH’s owners and builders are building which usually are targeted at families. Most if not all homes are 3000 sf or larger even though there is no minimum size (except perhaps for the garage). Although most houses on the Eastside that date from the 1970’s or before were small summer homes like the one I grew up in all have either had additions added or been replaced with new larger construction.

Whether some on this blog agree with houses this large is irrelevant. That is the market. If the lot area exists they want larger houses, and since they want them their councils create and preserve lots large enough to allow larger houses while still maintaining a GFAR that preserves the characteristics of a SFH neighborhood.

Everyone on MI was quite excited about the 48 proposed Brownstones in the town center because most don’t want to downsize from a SFH to a shared wall unit or common ownership but the estimated cost — with two parking spots — was estimated at around $4 million when completed.

Of course these larger houses on larger lots cost more, especially if in a desirable area for families. That is just the market, and why a subcommittee of King Co. is trying to figure out a way to increase affordable housing minimums in the housing allocations. Even though many Eastside cities will likely permit more condos and apartments to meet their housing allocations in their commercial cores in the future, since they will be new construction they won’t be cheap, and my guess is they won’t be micro. At least on MI developers bristle at the requirement some of their multi-family units be studios, and really prefer the two and three bedroom units because these multi family prospective buyers on the Eastside (many of whom are coming from the shit show in Seattle) want … drum roll … bigger units, although for cities a housing unit of any size counts toward the city’s housing allocation.

The point of smaller housing is lower cost although new construction offsets that cost savings (which is why many younger couples opt for a larger fixer upper which is what my wife and I did starting out), which is why Seattle leads the nation in micro housing (although I doubt many Seattleites are happily raising a family in a micro unit). So far affordability has meant less and less GFA per person, or gentrifying neighborhoods of color which of course has the opposite long term effect.

Both the GMPC and PSRC forecasts are subject to faults and political pressures. For example, their forecasts are more projections than agents of drastic housing change. If an area is zoned single family and the population is stable, it’s very presumptive for the forecasts to assume that the area will have a radical upzone. While their system can result in some upzoning, the overall limit of regional housing in the targets and desired buildup of areas near light rail stations lets single family areas off the hook to a large extent.

There is no doubt the 2050 Vision Statement was influenced by ideology and “new urbanism”. Post Pandemic nearly all the assumptions in the 2050 Vision are no longer valid.

None more so than TOD, which was heavily influenced by ST’s last gasp at manufacturing the Link ridership it predicted in its levies, until the pandemic and WFH put the nail in the coffin.

The future population estimates drive the housing allocations. An ideological desire for TOD and ST’s political influence led to attempts to upzone areas within 1/2 mile near Link (some of which ST had purchased or condemned at pre upzoning prices).

Without the peak work commuter TOD in suburban areas makes even less sense than it did pre-pandemic. Even when Lynnwood, Federal Way and someday East Link open I am not sure daily ridership will be much greater than in 2018 considering Northgate Link didn’t move the needle.

If Link wants to attract more suburban riders from Angle Lake to S. Bellevue the best solution is park and rides because park and rides attract those who want or need to ride transit and serve a huge shed whereas most residents within 1/2 mile of Link — say on MI — will never ride link, while the rest of the Island doesn’t have first/last mile access to Link. MI has 26,000 residents. A mild upzone in the residential neighborhood north of the Link station (the town center is to the south) would add very few riders to East Link, maybe none post pandemic.

“If Link wants to attract more suburban riders from Angle Lake to S. Bellevue the best solution is park and rides because park and rides”

That’s the most expensive solution though. Taxpayers are paying $50-125K per parking space. Each space is typically used by only one car per day if it parks there from 7am-6pm. The P&Rs at South Bellevue, TiB, Angle Lake, KDM, Federal Way, and Lynnwood were agreed to in the compromise that enabled Link, so suburbanites can use them,. Adding more P&Rs, especially large ones, disproportionally favors the few drivers who use them, as opposed to the many passengers who can’t use them because they’re full, or those who don’t take transit. There’s an economic/social benefit for everybody in building a subway and/or BRT, but that doesn’t apply to expensive P&R spaces.

Why is Ballard’s post-2000 development not New Urbanist?

In the broad sense it is, as new urbanism is the same as old urbanism. But in a narrow sense, New Urbanism is a master-planned development. Ballard’s growth was individual lot owners doing their own things, not a master-planned development like the Spring District or Redmond Ridge.

Of course, everyone would in theory prefer a larger a home if they had infinite money. But, in the real world, money is finite, so by saying every single house has to be at least 3,000 square feet, you’re effectively saying anyone not rich enough to afford a house that large is not welcome in your neighborhood. Forget about not wanting poor people in your neighborhood, lots of middle class people can’t afford a home that large either. Again, to say that someone who can only afford a 2000 square foot house should be excluded from your neighborhood completely because they don’t have the income to qualify for a mortgage on a 3000 square foot house… I’m sorry, but that kind of attitude is extremely elitist and nothing but.

Yes, everybody wants larger homes, but money is limited and people can’t always have everything they want. Let’s take air travel, for example. People don’t fly economy over first class because they love the cramped seats. People fly economy because it is cheaper, and if it were possible to fly first class for the same price as economy, of course they would fly first class.

So, if we take your argument about homes and apply it to air travel, then every airline should just make the entire cabin first class, since everyone prefers first class over coach, charge over $1000 for every flight, and those that can’t afford that can just stay home and not go on vacations. For rich people, such a system would be an improvement, as you would have more first class seats to choose from, and you wouldn’t have to share a flight with people beneath your social class, who don’t want to spend more than $300-400 a ticket. But, for people with more average means, flights would become just plain unaffordable. Maybe the cough up the money for something really important, like a funeral, but otherwise not go at all.

It’s the same thing with houses. We all wish we could live in a giant one. Most of us can’t, and would rather buy a smaller house that we can afford than be stuck renting forever because the only path to home ownership is to buy something big.

“Of course, everyone would in theory prefer a larger a home if they had infinite money.”

Minimalists don’t. People who want just a large enough house to meet their needs don’t. People who would rather spend money on traveling or hobbies or investments or philanthropy rather than on the largest house don’t. Because large houses also have large heating/cooling costs, and time-consuming maintenance.

I grew up in an 11-room house for 3 people. We were unusual: most neighbor families had 2-3 children, and one had 6 children. I remember telling my dad, “We need 11 rooms because we do this in one room, this in another, etc.” My dad said, “But you can only be in one room at a time.” I didn’t understand it until later.

But in high school, my cousin moved from Nevada and has all her posessions in a Volkswagen (or so I thought), and lived in our guest room for a while. That made a lifelong impression on me. I vowed to keep all my posessions light and easy to move, and at least nominally to fit in a Volkswagen. They don’t literally: it takes 2 pickup truckloads to move, mostly because of my bed and desk and bookcase. But it’s an ideal.

Then my dad lived in a houseboat, apartments, and a cabin he helped build. I lived with him and his friend in a townhouse in 11th grade. And I saw that was enough.

My last apartment was a 365 square foot studio. Even then I only used part of the space. The rest of it had furniture or storage but I didn’t go to it much. Now I live in a 650 square foot apartment for two people, and that’s fine.

“People don’t fly economy over first class because they love the cramped seats. People fly economy because it is cheaper, and if it were possible to fly first class for the same price as economy, of course they would fly first class. So, if we take your argument about homes and apply it to air travel, then every airline should just make the entire cabin first class, since everyone prefers first class over coach, charge over $1000 for every flight, and those that can’t afford that can just stay home and not go on vacations.”

It’s not quite the same. A plane is something you’re in for a few hours, not something you live in every day. And economy has gotten to be sub-economy, smaller than it should be. I started paying extra for “enhanced economy” or whatever it was called, which gave you the legroom regular economy previously did.

And before the 1980s deregulation, everything was, if not first class, at least higher quality and more expensive, so it was the equivalent of $500 a flight if not $1000. Middle-class and working-class people didn’t jet around all the time: they used it to move out-of-state, to visit grandma every few years, or for a once-in-a-lifetime trip.

In the 1980s I remember a speaker from LA talking about how the average length of a phone connection was 11 months, and on weekends the planes would be full of children of divorced parents visiting their non-custodial parent. I thought, “People flying every week? How can they possibly afford that?”

“on weekends the planes would be full of children of divorced parents visiting their non-custodial parent… People fly every week? How can they possibly afford that?”

Forgot to say, I mean flying up and down the California coast. So between LA and the Bay Area or such. People seemed to do that there in a way they don’t do between Seattle and Portland or Seattle and Spokane.

Anyone who doesn’t enjoy an infinite amount of maintenance headaches and house cleaning would want a smaller house.

Asdf2, I didn’t state every single house needs to be 3000 sf. I said in my experience raising a family of four around 3000 sf was the least I would go if you can afford it, and the market these days seems to believe that as I see very few SFH homes being built on the Eastside these days that are not more than 3000 sf. When I get a chance I will post an article noting how houses in Seattle are getting larger while the number of occupants is getting lower. I am not the outlier.

Although not living in a 650 SF apartment for two like Mike I raised a family of four in a 2400 sf house which is 600 sf each. Eventually we added one room out of the three car garage for a playroom when my son and his friends got big. But nearly every house in my R-15 zone is much larger.

I can certainly see downsizing when the kids stop coming home to limit the cost and time and maintenance of a SFH, although I am not sure my wife will. We have a house on Whidbey Island that is 1600 sf and really well designed for two and occasional guests and I could see living there. Especially the yard: a beach of rock and driftwood God maintains. Literally no yard work or watering.

I agree many prefer row houses and town homes over shared walled condos with HOA fees and boards and risks. A point Mike touches on is many of these multi-family buildings were designed as apartments so often the construction is cheap with a short life expectancy (which means just when the age of the building makes it more affordable it gets replaced). Like many, finally getting a place with a yard and non-shared walls was a big step and I am not sure I want to go back. If we did downsize I would prefer a row house but not in a residential zone but where I could walk to retail vibrancy, although those are expensive. That is a multi-family zone.

What Ross doesn’t understand because like cars he just has a ideological dislike for SFH he thinks are “elitist” (although he lives in one) is that I think practically and politically it would be easier to create a micro zone for two houses out of the multi-family/UGA zone than the SFH zone, and they would be within walking distance of retail. Ross is so intent on destroying what he sees as the elitist SFH zones he wants to eliminate any zoning not realizing the “middle” (actually smaller than middle) housing he likes like Brownstones and Montral two story historical brick buildings with fairly large backyards will not exist unless restrictive (“exclusionary) zoning protects these zones from surrounding zones with greater regulatory limits because middle housing is not the most profitable in a denser zone, and it isn’t practical in a remote SFH zone with poor transit when Metro’s budgets are already stressed.

Very large SFH’s like first class on a plane are evidence of wealth disparity, but this is not what we are trying to solve with zoning (or transit) although it blinds some like Ross when it comes to some issues. What the zoning we are talking about is trying to do is allocate housing targets and encourage/preserve uses including trees and vegetation many urbanists do not value, and ideally create affordable housing although so far that part has been difficult due to the cost of new construction and the fact some have very low or no income, and it is not in builders’ interests to build “affordable housing”, no matter how small the lot.

The other thing zoning tries to do is regulate building to lot area, whether a SFH zone, town home zone, very undense multi-family zone like Montreal or Capitol Hill, to bigger middle housing that needs larger lots and roads, to commercial and very tall residential, in part to not destroy all vegetation and trees. When folks on this blog become ideological or begin insulting others on a fairly dry issue —zoning — because others don’t agree with them it makes it hard to have an intelligent discussion. I sometimes wish this blog did not include housing because so few on it understand it, although they understand transit although some still think transit is going to solve wealth disparity.

In any cases let’s see how the 2024 comp plan updates go, although changing zoning designations on a map sometimes has little effect or backfires.

Most Eastside cities can meet their future housing allocations with their current zoning and basically that is their only legal requirement other than designating critical areas under the GMA, and even if mild zoning changes are needed for some cities I don’t see them abandoning their traditional zoning that segregates uses. The voters are too emotionally connected to their SFH neighborhoods — whether Renton or Clyde Hill — to allow changes to the zoning by what they see as ideological progressive or to manufacture the ridership for ST, and I doubt Harrell will take on that fight otherwise. Tacoma kind of did, but my guess is like OR and Portland in 20 years we will see those “zoning changes” had much effect, in part because I think the housing construction market will decline or be flat for a long time, a much bigger issue than mild upzones in the upcoming 2024 comp plan updates.

“middle housing is not the most profitable in a denser zone”

That’s only because there’s such a scarcity of denser zones that it drives the prices up. Leinberger says 33% of Americans prefer walkable urbanism, 33% prefer driveable sub-urbanism, and 33% are equally satisified with either. But the zoned land is 30% multifamily/commercial and 70% single-family. So 13% of Americans live in less walkable areas than they’d like, and fully 66% of Americans would be satisfied living in a Netherlands-like environment. The mismatch between Americans’ desires and the actual built/zoned environment is what drives demands to expand urban villages’ areas or abolish single-family zoning. Because the housing that 13% of Americans want but can’t get, and that 66% would be satisfied with, is only allowed on 30% of the land. That creates fierce competition for the scarce available lots in those areas. That drives up the price immensely, and shuts out small local developers and missing middle housing, who can’t compete with deep Wall Street pockets building large luxury boxes with high rents/prices to recoup the investment within 19 years.

If we doubled Seattle’s urban villages, or made a large swath of North Seattle 7-story eligible (between 24th NW, 15th NE, and 65th like Chicago’s North Side), or abolished single-family zoning, it would reduce the price pressure on each multifamily-eligible lot, because there would be more lots than developments instead of more developments than lots. There’s only so much demand for highrises and lowrises before the market is saturated. That level is higher than the current urban village capacity, but lower than the alternatives I suggested, especially the latter two. And when large developers have built as many large buildings as they can find affluent residents for, they won’t be interested in the remaining lots. That leaves an opening for smaller local developers and mom-n-pops to build lower-cost missing-middle housing on remaining lots, without being outcompeted by the large developers. And even that market will saturate, leaving the rest as single-family houses, even if their zoning allows more density.

Then you have a win-win of walkable neighborhoods for everyone who wants them, at lower and less-escalating prices than currently, and single-family houses and single-family areas for those who prefer that.

The price of single-family houses would rise because the supply would be reduced. But we don’t need to worry about people who can pay $1M for a single-family house. They can get a house if they can find one, or live multifamily if they can’t. What we should be concerned about is those who can’t afford a $1M house, and who can’t currently live in a walkable neighbrhood with good transit because all those units are full, and the artificial scarcity of them raises their prices disproportionately high.

I said in my experience raising a family of four around 3000 sf was the least I would go if you can afford it, and the market these days seems to believe that as I see very few SFH homes being built on the Eastside these days that are not more than 3000 sf.

You can’t assume that. Unless camping on the sidewalk is an alternative for you, then you have to live somewhere. If the only thing being built is 3,000 sf, then that is what you have to buy, no matter what you actually want, or even can comfortably afford. If a 900 sf is what you want, you can’t just camp in a park until one of the several in the region become available.

What are you trying to state Glenn? That the Eastside has no multi-family housing. That is ridiculous.

Or are you arguing that new multi-family housing on the eastside — say The Spring District or downtown MI — will be priced so the homeless living on the street will able to afford a brand new unit.

You can do a search online for new SFH’s for sale on the Eastside to find out how many are less than 3000 sf. I know where I live 3000 sf is very rare, usually older homes. I live in a 12,500/15,000 sf zone and I am pretty sure my house is the smallest except one tear down next to the Roanoke.

I am not saying everyone can afford a 3000+ sf house on the Eastside, and many of us bought long ago when prices were lower, but I think the extra space is nice to raise a family in, although sf does not determine how the kids turn out (parents and schools do that).

According to the Census, 33 percent of the households in MI rent. Also, average household size is 2.54 persons per household. That suggests that there is a rental market in MI and that half of the households have only 1 or two persons. (If half of the households have 1 or 2 persons and half have 3 or 4 persons that puts the average near 2.5.)

Do you have a link Al. 33% rental seems high. The city’s consultant for the housing assessment needs gave a presentation to the council two weeks ago. He put average persons per MI household at 3.1. I will double check his number. The Seattle Times has an article about home ownership in Seattle by race and states 2/3 of white residents own while only 33% own. However the housing assessment needs is not about home ownership as affordable housing is nearly all rental.

The MI council previously voted unanimously to not amend its zoning or comp. plan unless required by law as part of its 2024 update since current zoning will accommodate its housing allocation through 2044, nearly all of it “TOD” since it will be in the town center although no clue how many will actually ride transit, especially with WFH.

Asdf2, there isn’t a single code I am aware of that requires a house be at least a certain size and no smaller. That is just the market at work. Most codes I am familiar with actually RESTRICT the maximum size a house can be by using regulatory limits to limit the house to lot area ratio.

The house I grew up in was an 1800 sf summer house on a 22,000 sf lot on lake Washington. We left a much larger and more polished brick Tudor on lower Capitol Hill for about the same cost in 1970.

A future owner could either build another 1800 sf house (the family still owns the house and property) or build a 7500 sf house in the zone, maybe bigger. My guess is somewhere in between if not built on spec, say around 6000 sf. But if the lot costs $5 million…

Of course if progressives get their wish and use state law to require the city to upzone properties within 1/2 mile of East Link —even though none of these folks will ride Link — we will be able to subdivide the property into three separate legal lots and I am retiring to Hawaii (because my house across the street will also be subdividable).

Will any of the new units be remotely affordable? I certainly hope not.

“ Of course if progressives get their wish and use state law to require the city to upzone properties within 1/2 mile of East Link… we will be able to subdivide the property into three separate legal lots and I am retiring to Hawaii.”

More housing, and you get to move to another island with impoverished people begrudgingly serving you – your favorite!

I believe every city regulates a minimum housing unit size. Not sure if this is covered in the zoning code or the fire/safety building code.

Small Efficiency Dwelling Units, or ‘microhousing,’ are by definition the smallest allowed dwelling unit in a city.

https://www.theurbanist.org/2017/07/13/sdci-adopted-new-rules-microhousing-large-notice-signs/

AJ is right that other building codes can end up requiring a minimum unit size. Specifications about minimum room sizes can be added together to result in a house’s minimum allowable size.

In trying to find how much the 1954/55 homes in Eastgate originally sold for, I could only find articles that reference Lake Hills and Surrey Down. Surrey Downs homes, in 1953, were selling for around $13,000. And same for Lake Hills. In 1955/56 homes where going for about $13,000.

“In 1955, Lake Hills was proposed as the largest planned community in the Pacific Northwest. As Seattle Times described it, a “self-contained city in a country atmosphere” (Boswell), integrating education, recreation, shopping, and worship with a carefully designed community of single-family homes. Homes in Lake Hills were about 1000 square feet and faced one another across streets with no curbs, lights, or sidewalks. The development project was inexpensively built on inexpensive land, and met an acute postwar need for middle income housing.”

Thanks for the Lake Hills reference. A relative of mine may be moving to an adult family home there. I visited it last week and was surprised to find a part of Bellevue with no sidewalks, even though I grew up just two miles away. The home is a mile from the B. The east side of 156th doesn’t have a sidewak, and there’s a hard-to-get-to bus stop at one point. The side streets don’t have sidewalks. Fortunately they’re wide enough they’re relatively safe to walk on, and the intersections on 156th have blinking lights to cross. The 226 and 221 go halfway closer, but they’re infrequent and meandering, and the 221 connects only to the 545 and 554 which are half-hourly on weekends. Metro’s future RapidRide list has a potential Redmond-Eastgate line, so maybe in the future I can take Link to Overlake Village and RapidRide 156th to the home.

I looked at some other homes, and their non-car access was worse. One in Burien on the 131 was in a neighborhood with no sidewalks, and to get to the northbound bus stop you had to cross busy high-speed 1st Ave S with no crosswalk or light, or walk out of the way to get to a crosswalk, and when you get to the bus stops there’s no bench or shelter so you have to stand, waiting for a half-hourly bus that’s often late. My relative has a walker, and there’s no way she’d feel safe on the sidewalkless streets, or crossing 1st Ave S to get to the nearest bus stop, and she can’t walk several blocks to the nearest crosswalk and back.

Another in Magnola was two blocks from Magnolia Center, so it’s near the 24, but that’s a half-hourly meandering coverage route.

Three more were in Skyway off the 106. One was luckily two blocks from the bus stop and Skyway Library. Another was a mile east, and a third was a mile and a half east.

The social workers and Medicaid case managers have no idea where the bus routes are or how frequent they are. I had to tell them which streets I could get to, in Seattle (where I live) and Bellevue (where she’s lived for 50 years). I said “Skyway near Renton Ave S’, and they suggested something 1 1/2 miles from Renton Ave S.

Of course, the homes are low-budget and need the lowest-cost land, and the lowest-cost land is in isolated single-family areas. Because even though Daniel says 80% of Americans prefer that, the vote with their feet and drive up the land costs near retail/multifamily districts and frequent transit corridors. People say, “Coverage routes are in low-density areas where everybody has a car and drives anyway.” That fails when a low-income person has to live there, or when somebody without a car has to go there because they’re there. It also fails for people under 16, people who can no longer drive, people who have temporary disabilities, and people whose car has broken down. In other countries there would be frequent or semi-frequent transit everywhere so it wouldn’t matter, and they wouldn’t force low-income apartments and social-service homes into isolated single-family areas without transit because that’s where the lowest-cost land is and they don’t adequately fund subsidized housing.

I looked at Crossroads Connect to get to the Lake Hills home. That’s Metro’s uber-like service. Thus far I’ve been able to avoid Uber/Lyft and taxis, but this is an archetypal “last-mile” problem I might be doing every week or two. It turns out Crossroads Connect was a one-year pilot that ended due to lack of ongoing funding. It was a partnership between Bellevue, Metro, and a state grant, to get coverage to the east Bellevue area that has spotty transit.

But Metro’s East Link restructure draft has something completely different. It plans to delete all fixed-route service east of 156th. So no more 226 or 221. Instead it would expand Crossroads Connect to serve that area. And that’s the area I grew up in, on the 226 near where Northup crosses 8th. I had an hourly route that went to downtown Bellevue, downtown Seattle, Overlake Village, and later Redmond. I took it to junior high and high school, to the Bellevue retail districts, to church, and to friends’ houses. Sometimes six days a week. At the time it was considered the best transit could be in a post-1945 America so I didn’t question it. I was glad I lived in the 20% of the Eastside that had an all-day bus route. And now I’m glad I lived there before this Crossroads Connect conversion. I’d hate to use an app six days a week to summon an unscheduled taxi, waiting an arbitrary amount of time, and sometimes missing my transfer in Crossroads or Overlake Village.

That 1st Ave S thing really bothered me. I crossed it twice on two different days. It’s a four-lane arterial like 23rd but higher speed. In Seattle cars often stop for pedestrians but in Burien they didn’t. There was so much traffic I had to go halfway and wait in the middle for a gap, and the middle is so narrow you can’t help jutting into the car lanes. I’m afraid to get in front of cars in case they can’t stop, and since I don’t drive I don’t have a sense of how much distance they need. So I wait for a gap, or about to step in to hint fir somebody to stop. The first time, a car just blared it’s horn at me. I wanted to shout, “All intersections are legal crosswalks.” I looked and saw the double yellow line even had a gap at the intersection.

The second time I got to the middle and had to wait a while, and then a car started approaching behind me. I hoped the car ib front of me would stop before the car behind me got to me, and fortunately it did.

I saw three other people crossing: an elderly person with a walker, somebody with a dog, and somebody going to the bus stop. So it’s something neighborhood people do.

It’s one thing to encounter this twice, and another every week for the next severak years. That really raises the likelihood I’d eventually get hit by a car. And my relative with a walker wouldn’t feel safe at all so she couldn’t take the bus. She’s gotten hit by cars multiple times just crossing 2-lane Seneca Street from the 2 to Virginia Mason clinic, which is supposed to be a safe area for pedestrians, but some cars won’t wait for a slow elderly person to finish crossing. Once it caused a foot problem that lingers to this day. And that’s on top of no sidewalks on the side streets. So I really hoped we could find a better home and wouldn’t have to fall back in this one. Fortunately, the one in Lake Hills is above average, the 156th intersections have blinking lights if they don’t have a stoplight, and the sidewalkless side streets are wider and lower-volume.

I wished 1st Ave S had blinking lights or a flag you could carry. The first time I held my hand up as if carrying a flag, but that was when the car blared his horn at me.

That sucks about 1st in Burien, Mike. A redesign is really needed. I avoid that road whenever possible, whatever mode.

It’s not about education and enforcement. Those are the 2 least effective Es. It’s a highway right next to a limited access highway. Fast, through traffic should be taking 509.

I honestly wouldn’t have stopped for you either, given the design. I have heard too many times about the first lane stopping, and the 2nd lane not, or a car zooming around the stopped car and the ped getting waxed. Happen to my boss’s daughter on a much friendlier street than that.

It needs to be dropped to 1 lane with a turn lane or refuge, narrow it and post it at 25. Particularly the area in downtown, and maybe a zone in front of the adult family home.

A big reason for this might be because Montrealers just aren’t that concerned with owning property. For many people, housing legitimately comprises a huge chunk of someone’s net worth (my grandfather, a bank president in the Philippines, said, “If you have property, you have money.”). For many Montrealers, housing is just housing, nothing more. Therefore, Montrealers don’t mind renting in perpetuity, even if they have the income for a house, condo or townhouse. (I believe this YouTube channel covered that different concept in another video.) That high percentage of renters might reduce heavily the supply of housing for those who want to buy, therefore jacking the price up.

Also, the city of Montreal is entirely on an island, and the resulting land scarcity helps inflate real estate prices in the city proper. What real estate prices are like in the Montreal suburbs and environs (outside of Laval, also a separate island), I wouldn’t know.

From what I can tell, homes (for sale) in Montreal aren’t that expensive. These are houses: https://www.realtor.com/international/ca/montreal-quebec/house/. There are several for under half a million. The first one I looked at is about 8 miles northeast of downtown. That seems competitive, if not simply more affordable than Seattle.

Looking at apartments (i. e. condos) is the biggest difference. You can see plenty of places with two bedrooms under 300K. A lot of these are right in the heart of the city. You just can’t find that in Seattle. I mean literally — I did a search for 2-bedroom condos for under 300K in Seattle proper and Redfin came up empty. You can get a 2-bedroom condo at that price by going to the northern or southern suburbs. But if you are willing to live that far from town, you can buy a house in Montreal (https://www.realtor.com/international/ca/3920-rue-beaufort-brossard-quebec-110079623452/).

Keep in mind, Montreal is just a bigger city. Absent zoning, bigger cities are more expensive. You would expect Montreal to be a lot more expensive than Seattle. The only reason Montreal is cheaper is because Seattle’s zoning is so restrictive.

What is true of Montreal is true of big cities in Japan. Tokyo is the biggest city in the world, and growing. There is tremendous demand there. Yet it is less expensive than tiny Seattle. Our zoning laws have created a cartel, which pushes prices up.

Ross, you miss the key metric:

Average salary in Montreal is $40,070 CD which is 15.8% lower than the average salary in Canada of $47,497 CD. Average total household income in Montreal is $82,589 CD with an after tax average income of $53,721 CD.

It isn’t the size of a city that primarily drives housing prices — or Mumbai would have the highest housing prices in the world — it is the wealth of a city. Monaco has a relatively small population but very high housing costs. Granted, if average incomes in Montreal were the same as in Seattle or the Eastside I would expect Montreal’s greater population would result in housing prices higher than Seattle.

I think a big factor about housing in Montreal is that it’s freezing cold and often snowy. For those that haven’t lived in a climate like Montreal, let me mention a few things:

1. It can take up to 20 minutes to clean snow off if a car. Montreal has lots more snowy days than Seattle has. Using transit is much more desirable if possible.

2. It’s bitterly cold to walk outside when it’s -10c — so minimizing outdoor walking is a factor in Montreal. Walking 4 blocks in that weather is like walking many more blocks in temperate Seattle. Plus, snowy paths require shorter steps unless you enjoy slipping and falling — adding even more time. Thus, residents seek to have homes closer together so outdoor walking is minimized.

Mike, I don’t know where you get these percentages from, but your central thesis is over decades politicians have zoned their cities contrary to the voters’ wishes. That just isn’t true. Harrell’s trouncing of Gonzales in large part due to Gonzales’ pledge to abolish SFH zoning proves that. So did the bruising fight over the MHA. And this is Seattle.

Abolishing SFH zoning on the Eastside is just as suicidal for a politician as it was for Gonzales. It is a common mistake to think that what we want is what every other person wants, or just a majority of others, especially if it hasn’t occurred in decades of zoning.

You lived in a 375 sf apartment and only used half. That suggests to me you are likely outside the mainstream. But make your thoughts known to your council person for the upcoming update of the comp plan. I probably wouldn’t write to Harrell because we already know how he and his voters feels. Max out the UGA’s under their current zoning before dispersing all this growth throughout remote Seattle that will only result in more drivers driving long distances.

Re: the comp plan updates I am familiar with on the Eastside councils have already promised to not touch SFH zoning to meet housing allocations (considering many are up for election this year and next). Which is why the Master Builders Assoc and progressives who don’t even live here want the state to do it, except the state can’t identify a result to support upzoning SFH zones, especially with such strong opposition from voters AND local councils: 1. Upzoning around East Link with more people who don’t ride transit when East Link is at least 3 years away and few will ride it and there is plenty of existing (and future) park and ride space; and 2. New construction in the SFH zones won’t be remotely affordable. 3. It is not necessary to meet housing allocations, 4. there is no transit in these zones and Metro doesn’t have the funding or ability to serve them (micro transit), and 5. the neighborhoods are not remotely walkable.

If you want to live in The Netherlands move there. In 33 years living on MI no one has ever said they want to live in The Netherlands. I have been there and lived several years in Europe and I don’t want to live there although I could. I only met one person the last 50 years from The Netherlands who married an American and they lived in a 5000 sf SFH, had multiple cars, and seemed to like it.

“If you want to live in The Netherlands move there.”

That would require qualifying for immigration; being accepted; learning Dutch; finding a job there; abandoning my country; and moving thousands of miles away from my family, partner, friends, contacts, and the familiarity of home. All to escape ideologically extreme and unsustainable land-use policies. People in a democracy like the US have a right to advocate for the policies they think best and to try to influence the government to do so, without their only choice being to move to another country where sane land-use policies prevail and walkable neighborhoods are the default choice.

RossB: excellent. I visited Montreal for three days in January 2003. I did not visit the highlighted areas, but did see close in areas with retail below residential. It was very walkable. The video showed two-way cycle tracks; when researching what SDOT was doing on Broadway, I found a few articles from Montreal. Other tangential comments: the Montreal metro was similar to that of Paris with rubber tires and the same green paint job. The limited access highway through the center city is buried. In Seattle, Eltana serves Montreal style bagels on Stone Way North and 12th Avenue East.

“I grew up in a two parent two kid household in an 1800 sq. ft. house, and we didn’t feel particularly cramped. The argument that you absolutely *have* to have 3000 square feet to raise two kids is incredibly elitist.”

And you probably walked five miles in the snow to get to school, and held three jobs while attending school and pulled yourself up by the bootstraps. What you don’t state is if you raised a family in an 1800 sf house.

You don’t absolutely have to have 3000 sf (and many want more). There is nothing “elitist” about wanting a bigger house to raise a family. I wish some on this blog would cut with the privileged and elitist crap like they grew up in Africa.

I grew up in an old summer home on Mercer Island that was less than 1800 sf with five kids and two parents, so your living conditions sound palatial to me, although I would not state it makes you elitist. I never had my own bedroom until my last year in HS. The strange thing is I am 63 and have never lived alone, ever, and for the last 20 years have lived in a 2400 sf house with four of us, or 600 sf/person. Finally when my son and his lacrosse friends became taller than I am we had to convert one of our three garage stalls into a playroom. Wasn’t cheap but man was the extra space wonderful.

If you have the lot area and the city has a GFAR ratio that preserves the yard setbacks and character of the neighborhood so you can’t build a McMansion build whatever you want. I am not going to tell parents how much sf they need based on my upbringing 50 years ago, or that they are “elitist” because they want a home office or great family room or bedroom for each kid or laundry room or theater or three car garage.

If you personally have not raised a family you really don’t know how much a family needs in SF.

I believe in SFH zoning. You are right 3,000 ft² is not enough to raise a family. When I was growing up, we lived in 9500 ft². This allowed for each of us to have our own playrooms, and each of our own nannies had their own private sitting room. The staff had their own areas too, including sleeping accomodations for the chef, butler, and driver. Anything less than $4,500 ft² is barbarian and uncivilized. If you’re going to live in something that’s small you might as well consider yourself a caged animal.

A Joy, you are poor. Can you tell us how you survive in a small living space?

I think my first time at Eltana in Stone Way was about 5 yrs ago when I took a friend to Archie Mcfee’s. He had not been to that newer location yet. They had coupons for free bagels if you spent a certain amount. That is how I ended up with a bacon wallet and Jesus action figure. Tasty bagels. We spent more on the spreads they had.

I had previously refrained from commenting on the placement of the ST3 CID station, as it is a sensitive topic with well-informed experiences and opinions on all sides. But now, having just vacationed in Montreal this past weekend (my first time), I got a chance to visit its Chinatown in the evening, and my experience strengthened my support for a more rider friendly ST3 station near Seattle’s CID stores/restaurants/services.

There was a short section (Rue de la Gauchetiere?) that was closed off to cars. It was clean (no visible dumpsters like in Seattle’s CID) and packed with people of all ages, most of whom seemed to be locals. The restaurants in this block are also packed, and actually even those on the perpendicular street which are not closed to cars, but it was definitely way more pleasant walking through the pedestrian only section. This made my wife and I think, why can’t we have this type of clean and safe street within the CID, that many people wouldn’t mind walking in the evening after dark?

It’s sad that station construction on 5th will have unavoidable impact to nearby CID businesses, but some of the opposition is based on loss of parking or car access. In the long run, though, more CID patrons will prefer pedestrian only streets where available, and they are the ones who will stop to go and shop at stores, not the car drivers who are just passing through. There is no question in my mind the way forward is to support pedestrian/bike/transit friendly business locations, and it will be self-defeating to insist that the CID oppose that trend.

I am not discounting that CID businesses will suffer more from a ST3 shallow station construction on 5th, but the best approach is to see the long-term benefit and really work with the community, constructors, stakeholders to minimize the impact to the shortest amount of time possible.

https://stdenisthompson.com/en/our-work/chinatown-arches-and-pagoda

I don’t really understand the point of “missing middle housing”. As far as I can tell, this sort of architecture made sense back when we had more primitive technology (in both transportation and construction). But now 6-story buildings are far more efficient, in terms of not only land use, but also labor and materials. Let’s not let our fear of tall buildings get in the way of cheaper housing.

Some might argue 6 story height limits are middle housing. It depends on the architecture and massing. Others would argue that if 6 story buildings “are far more efficient, in terms of not only land use, but also labor and materials” why not 12, or 24 stories? Or like downtown Bellevue 60 stories. I don’t see where height necessarily translates to more affordable housing. Often just the opposite.

The practical reality is 2-3 story middle housing like in Montreal or Brooklyn (especially if the architecture has some design and is not cookie cutter cheap like in so many areas in Seattle) in a mixed use zone tends to create a good mixed use “urban” zone, and Montreal’s zoning is mostly by accident by history. 6 stories becomes oppressive and you lose the retail, and there is no point to a mixed use zone without retail. We see this on Mercer Island: the five story mixed use buildings are not very conducive to a vibrant retail zone.

Why are Ballard and Capitol Hill vibrant neighborhoods? Who knows, but they are. Urban Planners, which is the definition of the light sciences, don’t know either. Other areas in Seattle are dead. Would a six or twelve story height limit in these neighborhoods kill that vibe? I believe it would, and believe the 14 story height limit in the CID will kill that vibe too. Not every Seattle neighborhood needs to be like downtown Bellevue. Luckily steel framed buildings with elevators and underground parking need around 22 stories to pan out, so for now the CID is still the CID although the push is on by developers to raise the height limit in the CID to … drum roll … 22 stories, so it can look just like The Spring Dist. when it is developed.

Sone believe height is the most important regulatory limit because height more than anything else determines a zone’s character, and what “use” you end up with in a mixed use zone. Start getting to tall the units tend to be high end, and even taller and commercial dominates.

Lowrise density (row houses, triplexes, etc.) can still be materially cheaper if they don’t require vertical conveyance – unless you can point me to 6 story walk-up new builds? IIRC, ADA requirements are stricter for ‘midrise’ and high-rise.

The point of emphasizing “Missing Middle” is to remember that there value in allowing housing forms that provide a transition between lower density outer neighborhoods (where less people are interested in living due to distance from goods and services), and higher-density neighborhoods (where more people are interested in living due to access to goods and services). Today, the assumption is that the middle-density housing forms that were popular and affordable in the mid-to late 20th century (bungalow courts, dingbat apartments, etc.) are now largely uneconomical to build because of regulatory limits, not economic limits; hence discussions of a “missing middle” in new construction.

For example, Sam’s hypothetical of a high-rise apartment/condo tower in an otherwise low-density neighborhood is ridiculous (and therefore not worth engaging) not because of NIMBYism, but because high-rise housing in an anotherwise low-density neighborhood would be logistically ridiculous in terms of inadequate public and private services regardless of the residents’ choice of transportation mode. A new high-rise residential tower on the periphery of Downtown makes sense because there are plenty of stores and businesses to support the needs of the residents, long-established high-density transit, and other needs, and naturally (historically), density grows outward from a core economic engine. Allowing the “missing middle” between areas of high economic activity and low economic activity allows new housing to be created without the major investment required for 6-story mixed-use apartments, but allows space for new residents, which engenders customer base for new local business, which (over time) attracts more interested residents, which then makes it economical to redevelop the middle-density housing again into updated, higher-density forms. Simple, natural growth.

The culture of a neighborhood is created by the nature of its residents, not the nature of its buildings, so when housing is allowed to gradually densify over time, the change in character of a neighborhood is similarly gradual and acceptable.

Would the “brownstones” like those in Brooklyn be an equivalent of these three-story Montreal walkups?

There isn’t that much difference in terms of density between 3 and 6 stories. But there is a huge difference in terms of what people will accept, and want around them. Most of Seattle is zoned for single family housing, and yet you can’t build a six story house. It can be very wide and deep, it just can’t be tall.

Building of the type that Montreal has would be a dramatic increase in density (you saw the numbers — Wow!). Yet they wouldn’t get the kind of opposition that six story buildings — of any type — gets. You are far more likely to get literal NIMBY opposition from potential political allies with a city-wide change to six-story buildings. Many, many people (who support an increase in density from a general standpoint) would object because they don’t want to live next to a big building. But homes the exact same height as what is currently allowed — but with a lot more density — is far more likely to happen.

You can build a three-story house in Seattle? I know there there are Queen Anne-style homes which have a “garret” level with one or two rooms and gabled windows, but a full three story home (other than a daylight basement)? Where does the City allow that?

The lowest density zone allows structures up to 30’ if your lot is 30’ wide, but the FAR is 0.5, meaning that if it doesn’t really make sense to build a 3-story house when you could just have a 50% wider two-story house.

You can build a three-story house in Seattle? … Where does the City allow that?

Pretty much everywhere. It is really based more on height, rather than the number of stories. But it is fairly common to see new houses that are that tall. For example, this is a new one in my neighborhood: https://www.redfin.com/WA/Seattle/1910-NE-120th-St-98125/unit-A/home/116890. Here is one in Tangletown: https://www.redfin.com/WA/Seattle/5847-McKinley-Pl-N-98103/home/304474. I knew someone who rented that one. The first floor is quite functional — it has a large room (that could work as a bedroom or play room) and a bathroom. The second floor has a kitchen and living room, while the third floor has bedrooms. There is even access to a rooftop deck (but I don’t think that counts). Very vertical.

Thank you. I guess that with eight foot ceilings and a pretty flat roof, one can get three floors in 30 feet.

This shows the hypocrisy of single family zoning. A 3 story 5000 SQ ft foot for just one household? Perfectly ok. Split the same building space between 5 households? Suddenly, it’s not ok anymore.

And, of course, the business of single family zoning being necessary for tree preservation is also a joke. Chopping down all the trees to build a giant mansion for one person is considered perfectly ok. While building even a simple duplex that preserves existing trees is considered not ok. Etc.

Roof can go up to 5′ above height limit, at a minimum 4:12 (1:3) slope.

http://www.seattle.gov/dpd/cms/groups/pan/@pan/documents/web_informational/dpds021570.pdf

This shows the hypocrisy of single family zoning. A 3 story 5000 SQ ft foot for just one household? Perfectly ok. Split the same building space between 5 households? Suddenly, it’s not ok anymore.

Yeah, exactly. The rules are really designed to preserve a lack of density. Even aesthetic arguments are BS.

Which is not to say that folks aren’t worried about aesthetics. If you ask people why they don’t want density, the first thing they will tell you is that the don’t want a big apartment next to them.

The crazy part is that is just as possible with single family homes as with apartments: https://goo.gl/maps/xLHZPHqeHyTwnoeo9. Same with the idea that you are preserving the “look and feel” of the neighborhood. If anything, small bungalows being replaced by McMansions is a much bigger change than replacing them with townhouses or apartments (the latter being more middle-class).

That is why I think we can convince enough people to modify the zoning codes. Simply saying “More Density!” is not going to win many votes. The “all or nothing” approach has failed miserably, in many ways. But pushing for attractive, high density, low rise development (like in Montreal) could very well get widespread support. The existing rules are focused on density, but most people don’t care. If you allowed — and encouraged — converting houses to apartments, you would likely get a lot of support. Keep the house, just add density. Unfortunately, like so much of our code, it does the opposite.

We need policies that encourage density, while encouraging attractive and relatively short structures. This means getting rid of the parking requirements, along with FAR, setbacks and the like.

To add to Ross’ point, dwellings are the only land use primarily limited by number of units per lot as well as parking spaces per unit. The rest of the land uses in zoning codes are regulated by height, setback, sq feet and FAR — but don’t vary based on the number of “units”.

And units are defined by where kitchens and locked doors are located. These are things that can quietly be changed without filing permits in a house. Most cities have tons of “illegal” apartments as a result.

The solution is ultimately to regulate residential like every other land use — height, setbacks, sq feet and FAR only. The only reason that units are counted go back to the days when residents didn’t want “renters” on their block (a code term for POC back in segregation days). Of course, they would opine that “renters” are “blight” in a neighborhood to be prevented.

“To add to Ross’ point, dwellings are the only land use primarily limited by number of units per lot as well as parking spaces per unit. The rest of the land uses in zoning codes are regulated by height, setback, sq feet and FAR — but don’t vary based on the number of “units”.

“The solution is ultimately to regulate residential like every other land use — height, setbacks, sq feet and FAR only.”

Al, you miss the entire point I have tried to make over and over. If the regulatory limits in a SFH zone remain the same no matter what the “use” is it does not create more housing. Height, yard setbacks, impervious surface limits, GFAR limits, parking minimums, are what create the character of a SFH neighborhood. But with the relatively small lot sizes if the regulatory limits for a SFH stay the same you won’t create more housing by changing the “use” for the lot. The number of bedrooms actually declines because now each unit needs its own bathroom, kitchen, entry, etc.

The reality is each of the zones has all kinds of restrictions or requirements that other zones don’t have. Some require retail and onsite parking for retail. Some require green space set asides. Some require a certain percentage for affordable units, and almost all multi-family zones require a certain mix of studios, one, two and three bedroom units.

Today if you want you can rent out any number of bedrooms in a SFH. In fact the state just eliminated any restrictions on the number of unrelated people who can live in one rental house (depending on the fire code). Converting this into some kind of separate legal dwellings each with their own kitchen, bathroom and entry plus living room reduces housing on the lot, or even worse creates a shared condo style ownership which would be nightmare.

The other two big problems are either you are converting the most expensive land per sf for housing, or you are going to gentrify poor areas like south Seattle, which is a huge issue before the GMPC today. Pretty soon Seattle won’t have any POC unless they are rich.

“That is why I think we can convince enough people to modify the zoning codes. Simply saying “More Density!” is not going to win many votes. The “all or nothing” approach has failed miserably, in many ways. But pushing for attractive, high density, low rise development (like in Montreal) could very well get widespread support. The existing rules are focused on density, but most people don’t care. If you allowed — and encouraged — converting houses to apartments, you would likely get a lot of support. Keep the house, just add density. Unfortunately, like so much of our code, it does the opposite.”

That is the definition of very expensive housing. I like the housing in Montreal Ross references, although the reason it is attractive and was preserved is because it is converted warehouses and industrial buildings, which were only preserved BECAUSE OF ZONING RESTRICTIONS, and luck. My guess is these units per sf are some of the most expensive in the city. Just like the restrictions on development in Ballard and Capitol Hill make those areas some of the most expensive.

Preventing a McMansion is pretty simple: use your regulatory tools: yard setbacks, impervious surface limits, height limits, and GFAR limits. That is what we did on Mercer Island. Simply reduce GFAR to 40% and adopt pretty large setbacks and remove any deviations like we did and end of McMansions.

Of course if you increase the regulatory limits in a SFH zone, which would pretty much be necessary to pencil out any multi-family housing, then the SFH gets the same regulatory limits. So to really make some kind of multi-family or row houses work on smallish SFH lots you need looser regulatory limits, whereas if you want to prevent McMansions you need stricter regulatory limits, because any allowed use in a zone gets the same regulatory limits.

I think Nathan had it right. There are some areas in urbanish areas like Ballard in which a transition zone between taller multi-family/commercial/retail and SFH zones is beneficial for row or town houses. They are usually very expensive per sf, and it is easier to microzone row or town houses out of the multi-family zone than SFH zone.

For example, in a suburban city like MI the SFH zones are adamantly opposed to row or town houses in the SFH zone, or any effort to reduce minimum lot size in the SFH zone, but a proposal to build 48 very high end ($4 million) Brownstones in the town center on a large parking lot for the Farmers Building was popular with everyone. Unfortunately the property including parking lot was purchased by Riot Games — although no one will move in until 2025 — and the Brownstones scrapped despite very high interest by Islanders looking to downzone, but not to some remote residential neighborhood (which is what they are living in now). The good news I suppose is Riot Games will help MI meet its GMPC jobs targets, although right now the GMPC is not counting WFH towards future job targets which I think will fundamentally change job targets.

Daniel: Suburban strip mall and indoor mall parking lots, often with vacant commercial spaces, are definitely low hanging fruit. You can at least get some of the NIMBYs on board by arguing that putting development there can help “preserve” the heart of their own neighborhoods, meanwhile the next generation of homeowners, some of whom previously lived in these developments, might end up being less “get off my lawn.”

Brandon, you are correct many eastside cities plan to allocate their GMPC housing targets to their multi-family/commercial/mixed-use zones, and not to the SFH zones. In fact most already have zoning that will allow this without upzoning any zones. The land and zoning are there to meet the housing targets through 2044.

Some cities are doing exactly what you suggest in their commercial and retail areas: for example, The Spring District anticipates developing many of the parking lots, although the housing won’t be affordable. I know Kemper Freeman has often lamented that he has around $500 million in land tied up in his surface lots at Bellevue Mall, but that parking is what his coveted customer wants and Bellevue Mall is the foundation of his real-estate empire all along Bellevue Way. Of course he has massive underground parking at Lincoln Square north and south, but women don’t like underground parking. What is Capitol Hill but one long strip mall along Broadway. Why not convert that retail space to housing?

Retail is a very precious thing. Many if not most eastside cities segregate out retail because otherwise housing will consume it (as office space consumes housing if in the same zone). You can’t have retail without parking, even in Seattle (compare 3rd Ave. with U Village) so what you are arguing for is eliminating retail for housing if you eliminate the parking because underground parking is too expensive for these low rise small retail malls. Why, if the city has the land and existing zoning to meet its GMPC housing targets without eliminating retail space which is so hard to nurture?

The reality some on this blog don’t get is the GMPC housing targets don’t require very many cities to change their zoning to meet their targets, and my guess is the housing targets will be adjusted down next time around due to lower population growth than estimated. Plus cities like Shoreline, Tacoma and Lynnwood want more housing growth because they need the revenue and need to gentrify their cities and neighborhoods, which lowers everyone else’s targets.

One thing the GMPC was sensitive about was trying to allocate more housing targets to those cities and councils that wanted more housing, although one problem is so many want to live on the eastside but those cities are not keen on more housing because they don’t need it. There is some tension there, especially with Sammamish because Sammamish does not have much commercial area to allocate the housing to.

Zoning for housing is not suppose to be some ideological or progressive tool to change how people want to live, or because they don’t like SFH. The first rule under the GMPC is find out which cities want more housing and give more to them, and less to those who don’t want it, and then let each city figure out how to zone for it. Upzoning SFH zones is not necessary to meet these housing targets, and does not create affordable housing.

Daniel, you miss my pont. While other zoning categories have other requirements, none limited by number of units. Instead, they are measured in things like square feet. Even hotels are regulated by square feel even though codes specify number of spaces per room.

For example, where is there a retail code that does not allow a developer to rent to only 4 commercial tenants in a 30ksf shopping center? The codes generally let them create many more spots that they can rent separately.

I know it’s really hard to see that we shouldn’t treat residential by counting units because that’s the traditional way that codes were written. I’m simply pointing out that commercial buildings can carve out more spaces to rent, while residential buildings cannot. Look at how many renters are in a self storage warehouse!

Changing how we measure density would not necessarily change the character on MI. They could keep their precious FAR and setbacks. It’s just their parking would not be something like 2 spaces per unit but instead would be something like 1 space per 1000ksf. So if you build a 4Ksf you must provide 4 spaces — a car for you, wife and two kids. But if you need a caregiver to push you around in a wheelchair in years to come, you could carve up your house and they could have their own homes yet be close.

It’s how most of the cities around the world work, and how homes were built in the 19th century in the US. It’s only been since the Supreme Court banned racial segregation zoning did units start becoming the measuring stick. People even used to be allowed rooming houses anywhere in a city!

“What is Capitol Hill but one long strip mall along Broadway. Why not convert that retail space to housing?”

A strip mall is a row of 1-2 story businesses with a shared surface parking lot in front. Broadway doesn’t have a surface parking lot so it’s not a strip mall. That’s what makes Broadway pedestrian-friendly and urban, while strip malls car-centric and suburban.

All the new buildings on Broadway for the past two decades do have several floors of housing. There’s the three at the Roy end where Safeway and QFC used to be, a couple south of them, a couple at the light rail station, and the one across from the college. The 1-2 story retail that doesn’t have housing is nevertheless pedestrian-friendly and contributes to the cozy urban vibe — the opposite of a strip mall. Even Dick’s is exemplary: it’s front-to-back rows of surface parking are narrow, and the ordering/eating counters are directly adjacent to the sidewalk, making pedestrians first-class citizens rather than second-class. It’s rewarded with crowds of pedestrian customers, which improves the ambience of the retail district.

What is Capitol Hill but one long strip mall along Broadway.

I tend to just skim some of the longer comments. I didn’t even read that comment until Mike quoted it. It shows that skimming (and largely ignoring those comments) is probably the best answer. How do you refute something so absolutely absurd? I suppose you could explain what a strip mall is for starters. Then write about Capitol Hill, along with maps, charts, and other data. All of it to refute a ridiculous statement. What a tedious waste of time, for a statement that is obviously trolling.

It would be as if I claimed that a chicken is a duck. Good luck refuting that.

Daniel has a problem with word definitions. Sometimes I clarify them for him, other times I clarify them so new readers unfamiliar with transit/urbanism won’t be misled.

Strip mall: A 1950s-style row of 1-2 story businesses with a shared surface parking lot in front. E.g., the block south of Bellevue Square.

Urban: A walkable neighborhood in a non-rural area. It can be highrise like Belltown, 7-story like Pike/Pine/Summit, 2-4 story like 15th Ave E, or small single-family houses near these like the Central District, or 2-4 story examples like Paris or Montreal or The Netherlands. “Urban area” can also refer to the entire built-up part of a metropolitan area including low-density suburbs and exurbs, in contrast to rural area; e.g., Kitsap County (growth area) as opposed to Skagit County (rural). Houses do NOT have large setbacks around them, most businesses do NOT have surface parking lots in front, there’s usually a mixture of housing and businesses, and buildings are ideally narrow and deep rather than wide and shallow, or at least have a facade that looks like that. All these are to maximize pedestrian convenience, and the last is for traditional vertical aesthetics.

(Note: Surface parking lots inside or behind, or front-to-back rows on the sides, are more acceptable than in front. One or two rows in front is more acceptable than several rows. Two rows in front of something denser than a strip mall is better than a strip mall.)

Transit-oriented development: a building oriented toward a transit stop; i.e., the shortest walking path. The building is usually denser than townhouses or a strip mall.

Transit-adjacent development: a medium/high density building whose entrance is NOT the shortest walking path to a transit stop. Especially large buildings where you have to walk around two or three sides and/or through a large parking lot to get to the entrance. Or clusters of such buildings that could be TOD but aren’t, like the Galleria in north Dallas, or Eastgate.

New Urbanism: A walkable neighborhood, usually referring to post-1970 developments in suburbs or exurbs. The same design in a city is just urbanism or pre-WWII design. The best example here is the Issaquah Highlands, which has a mixture of close-together houses and multifamily, within walking distance of a supermarket and Target and a regional transit stop. Snoqualmie Ridge is isolated and has only minimal retail. Redmond Ridge is isolated and I didn’t see any retail. Other examples are along Westside MAX in Portland, notably Orenco Station, and also Hillsboro Station, and in parts of Beaverton. The Congress for the New Urbanism originally intended to build wakable pre-WWII style neighborhoods in both cities and suburbs, like Ballard or Lake City, but it got stymied by zoning restrictions and was forced to build mostly in suburban/exurban brownfield and greenfield sites like the Spring District or Redmond Ridge), where it could get multiple acres and permission for density and reduced parking minimums.

It’s also a matter of ownership and property upkeep. Most 6-story buildings are rental housing owned by large corporations and financed as investment projects. They must have elevators and common hallways. They must also go through a long, elaborate approval process that includes heightened fire safety requirements which adds months if not years until the housing is ready for occupants.

The Montreal housing allows for easier homeowner purchases and even the ability to own 2-3 units and rent out the extra units for income. It’s also a great concept for extended families. Finally, many designs aren’t markedly out of a street’s character and fit in nicely with single family dwellings.

“It’s also a matter of ownership and property upkeep. Most 6-story buildings are rental housing owned by large corporations and financed as investment projects. They must have elevators and common hallways. They must also go through a long, elaborate approval process that includes heightened fire safety requirements which adds months if not years until the housing is ready for occupants.”

Multi-family housing rental buildings require the property owner to hold onto the property for a very long time to return their capital. A smaller builder cannot do that because they need to sell the development when completed to fund the next project, and there is tremendous risk in holding onto this kind of property as 2008 and the pandemic showed. REIT’s are the biggest builder of multi-family construction, and for many reasons including taxes and the requirement their investment pool have a certain percentage of capital invested in property they prefer rental properties, not condos. Or did.

The state tried to incentivize more condo construction because smaller builders can sell those when completed to repurpose their capital by reducing the long tail on warranties for new condo construction so they could get insurance and thus a loan, but all that did is incentivize builders to renovate or replace older already zoned multi-family buildings (rental or not) with new, much more expensive construction that actually reduced the amount of affordable multi-family housing, which basically is the only kind of affordable housing. Buy low, build, sell high.

The stock market has lost $10 trillion in capital since Jan. 2022. REIT’s have been badly hit, both commercial and housing. Interest rates and construction costs are too high, so REIT’s are scaling way back on construction, as are private SFH home builders. The recent DECLINES in property values — especially commercial and large multi-family projects — is putting tremendous strain on REIT’s and investors are bailing.

So look for way fewer housing starts of all kinds over the next five years, and with federal borrowing rates going from 1% to probably 5% this year to higher next year payments on the debt will become a heavy drag on federal spending. A local government can zone all they want but unless they are the one building the housing they can’t force builders to build when the market is bad.

Recently the new government in Great Britain announced tax cuts and energy subsidies and the currency tanked jeopardizing its vast pension system, so the government backtracked. Already calls are for the U.S. government to begin a policy of austerity because otherwise inflation will result in the bond market forcing government borrowing rates so high is it will begin to consume the discretionary budget. Same thing at the state and local level.

Over the last 10 years through quantitative easing 1, 2 and 3, followed by the Covid stimulus packages, the market was perfect for property developers of every kind. Thus we had lots of housing (and office) starts and high housing and office prices. We thought that was bad. Even worse, which 2008 proved but who remembers 2008, is when housing starts plummet but even worse housing prices begin to decline while adjustable rate mortgages reset. If you have cash — like Warren Buffett after 2008 — you probably will be able to get some great deals on housing in the next five years and owners default out.

Over the long term, business cycles go up and down. Even if conditions are not favorable for building right now, in a few years, that can change.

In any case, this is hardly an argument against upzoning. If builders aren’t building anyway, than what is a city to be afraid of?

This falls into the theme of several DT comments, that developers somehow need cities to protect them from making bad business decisions. It is not the job of cities to vet whether a building project makes financial sense; that’s the job of the developer and their lenders, since there the ones whose money is at stake.

“This falls into the theme of several DT comments, that developers somehow need cities to protect them from making bad business decisions. It is not the job of cities to vet whether a building project makes financial sense; that’s the job of the developer and their lenders, since there the ones whose money is at stake.”

Just the opposite asdf2. Zoning protects citizens and communities and neighborhoods from developers, although developers and builders are not going to build if it isn’t profitable.

For example, I support the more restrictive zoning for Capitol Hill and Ballard compared to other parts of the city because those zoning restrictions help create the neighborhood. That doesn’t mean I think those two areas are “elitist”. It is the city and citizens who bear the brunt of the costs of development, from roads to water and sewer lines to police and fire to schools to park acres per 1000 citizens. Which is why the Supreme Court held cities have the authority to zone. Do you think the two and three story buildings in Montreal Ross points to would exist without restrictive zoning?

Unless of course you are arguing for eliminating all zoning and the Growth Management Act. I disagree with that and it hasn’t worked where tried. The abusive zoning under Ron Sims in unincorporated King Co. is why so much of the county (certainly those parts that funded King Co.) either incorporated or sought annexation which has left King Co. a shell of its former self and constantly begging for levies to fund things.

You do what you think is best for your city and I will do what I think is best for my city. Each has its GMPC housing growth targets, and must decide how to zone for those although most can accommodate even the ahistorical estimates from the GMPC without amending their zoning.

There is obviously a lot of animus towards SFH on this blog, much of it irrational IMO when those same folks argue for zoning restrictions to create two, three, four, six story multi-family houses or row houses which is the definition of restrictive zoning, but I figure the SFH neighborhoods in Seattle can take care of themselves, and Harrell has bigger things on his plate than another bruising zoning fight.

If someone can come up with a proven method to create truly affordable housing without public subsidies I am all ears, and they may want to let Harrell and the council know before they place a very expensive affordable housing levy on the ballot (which of course renters get to pay for too, although I doubt they understand that).

“I support the more restrictive zoning for Capitol Hill and Ballard compared to other parts of the city because those zoning restrictions help create the neighborhood.”

What Alice-in-Wonderland inversion are you living in? Capitol Hill and Ballard have more density and multifamily housing and taller buildings than most neighborhoods like Wallingford or Beacon Hill or Greenwood, so how can you say they have stricter zoning than those neighborhoods? The only parts with looser zoning than Capitol Hill and Ballard are the three urban centers: downtown, the U-District, and Northgate. First Hill has a disproportionate number of highrises, but most of them are old, it’s an extension of downtown, and First Hill does not include east of Broadway that would bring the average neighborhood density down.

Daniel, you’d be hard pressed to find many 3k+ sqft homes in Ballard, but you will find plenty of families – living proof that middle-density housing is perfectly appropriate for families. I know of multiple families that live in the new 1-1.5k sqft townhomes near my house. What do you say to them?

Zoning does not create Ballard’s attractiveness. Before housing capacity was expanded by the Urban Village, Ballard was sleepy and geriatric. Upzoning in the Urban Village allowed more people to move to Ballard, and these people have fostered a vibrant and growing service and retail core.

I support the more restrictive zoning for Capitol Hill and Ballard compared to other parts of the city because those zoning restrictions help create the neighborhood.

Those neighborhoods were created before zoning. Most of the places people find especially attractive in those neighborhoods were built before zoning, or have evolved with fewer restrictions.

In contrast, neighborhoods like Kingsgate were built with very restrictive zoning. Is Kingsgate a stronger neighborhood than Capitol Hill or Ballard? That seems like a big stretch. All have Wikipedia articles, but Kingsgate just lists the date of annexation, and census data. In contrast, Capitol Hill is treated almost as if it is a small town. Same with Ballard (which was a small town, long before it was zoned). It isn’t just Wikipedia — there are numerous websites detailing the activities in Capitol and Ballard. They both have their own blogs, and at one time, their own newspapers. Kingsgate has a website, which features its ice rink, and that’s about it. Mostly it lacks distinction, unlike the neighborhoods whose character was formed before restrictive zoning, and has evolved because the zoning isn’t very restrictive.

To be clear, in all of these cases there is preservation. At least I assume there is — I’m not sure what is being preserved in Kingsgate. But in Ballard and Capitol Hill, particular buildings are preserved, while much of the neighborhood has been allowed to grow organically (or at the very least, more organically than most of the city).

The middle housing you like in Montreal was built well before zoning. But it is restrictive zoning that has Preserved it. Same with Brooklyn and a thousand other neighborhoods surrounded by much greater density that predate zoning that cities adopted because living conditions in large cities became uninhabitable.

(I grew up on lower Capitol Hill in the 1960’s and it was quite different than today and I doubt the Capitol Hill you see today was created before zoning).

What you might like in a neighborhood others might not. On the Eastside and MI folks like their SFH neighborhoods, and valuations would suggest so do many others. Most over 30 don’t really want to live or even visit Capitol Hill, and I find the retail there schlocky unless you are young, at least among those I know. I live minutes from Capitol Hill and haven’t been there in decades. Why?

If the zoning for Capitol Hill were allowed to match that in Belltown or First Hill you would have a much different neighborhood. Much more housing, taller buildings, higher rents. Which is why local Capitol Hill groups jealously protect their zoning. Good for them.

Kingsgate in the 1980s was a P&R and a single-family neighborhood, and maybe a couple multifamily apartments. The Wikipedia article is a minimal stub that many cities otherwise without articles have. I don’t know who enters the large demographics section in all of them, or why they do. The whole article is clearly statistics from a statistics reference as if written by a bot. Apparently nobody loves Kingsgate enough to add custom details. Or maybe nothing happens there because it’s generic suburbia.

In contrast, more people than the entire population of Kingsgate love Capitol Hill, and Ballard, and Fremont, and the U-District, and Greenwood, and Beacon Hill, and Rainier Valley.

“I grew up on lower Capitol Hill in the 1960’s and it was quite different than today”

Yes, families with children lived in the apartments in the Summit area. My friend in north Lynnwood was one of them in the 1970s. She walked to Queen Anne High School because the 8 bus didn’t exist then.

“I doubt the Capitol Hill you see today was created before zoning”

Some of it did. Zoning started around the 1920s, like the 3-story Summit studio I lived in. But it was much looser then. Corner stores were allowed, and many areas around Seattle were lowrise that became single-family in the 1970s, or the heights were lowered, and SRO hotels were outlawed. (SROs used to be all over 1st and 2nd Avenues and in the Summit area. Visible street homelessness started when the SROs were closed with no replacement.) Zoning was restricted in the 1950s, and further in the 1970s, essentially blocking the unbuilt part of the zoning capacity. Many grandfathered apartment buildings and corner stores couldn’t be built now. And those are what make a lot of the character of the neighborhood.

“Most over 30 don’t really want to live or even visit Capitol Hill, and I find the retail there schlocky” Really disrespectful to call the gay neighborhood of Seattle schlocky because it doesn’t cater your lifestyle. For many of us in the LGBTQ community it is our safe haven to be ourselves with no judgment from others. Lots of wonderful small businesses are there and cater to the community. And I know plenty of older people who enjoy the neighborhood as well, so I find that reasoning questionable. There is no reason to call Capitol Hill’s retail schlocky, if people want bland boring gentrified retail there’s plenty of places for that.

Zach, I don’t know what you talking about. Retail on Capitol Hill isn’t very gay oriented, unless you think Dick’s is gay oriented.

I lived for a couple years just off Broadway in the mid to late 80’s. I thought Capitol Hill was much more gay then. Oldest land use story in the book: gay community discovers a run down area which Capitol Hill was in the 1970’s, the area becomes hip, the straight folks move in, the area gentrifies, gays get priced out and find another area. Look at lower NY all the way to Harlem today if you want a good history of the migration

Personally I don’t find the retail or restaurants on Capitol Hill very good although it has been a while. My 19 year old daughter sometimes goes there to bargain hunt and people watch, and my 21 year old son and his friends go drinking there no doubt for the young girls. I used to go the Roanoke pretty regularly when I was his age for the same reasons . Just because the retail on Capitol Hill is not my cup of tea (or my wife’s) at my age has nothing to do with your sexuality. Although I do still like a Dick’s deluxe once in a while, and remember the Mexican restaurant where we would split a roast chicken with rice and beans and drink marguerits but that was in the 80’s (is it still there) and for a while some of Seattle’s best restaurants were just west of Broadway but they all moved. A close friend married a hostess from one of those restaurants.

I am sorry though Capitol Hill is the only place you feel safe as a gay person. I thought Seattle was more tolerant than that.

In any case, this is hardly an argument against upzoning.

No, none of it is. If you think that Daniel’s statements are some sort of cohesive and consistent argument, you will be sadly disappointed. That just isn’t his style.

This has been the pattern for Daniel for quite some time. Daniel just throws out various statements that have nothing to do with the original point of discussion. On the same content thread he makes several absurd assumptions. I’m not sure if it is just the rambling of a reactionary conservative, or an attempt at trolling. Just look at the various statements, just ripe for controversy:

Multi-family housing rental buildings require the property owner to hold onto the property for a very long time to return their capital. A smaller builder cannot do that because they need to sell the development when completed to fund the next project…

The state tried to incentivize more condo construction…

Already calls are for the U.S. government to begin a policy of austerity because otherwise inflation will result in the bond market forcing government borrowing rates so high is it will begin to consume the discretionary budget. …

I support the more restrictive zoning for Capitol Hill and Ballard compared to other parts of the city because those zoning restrictions help create the neighborhood…

There is obviously a lot of animus towards SFH on this blog, much of it irrational IMO when those same folks argue for zoning restrictions to create two, three, four, six story multi-family houses or row houses which is the definition of restrictive zoning, but I figure the SFH neighborhoods in Seattle can take care of themselves, and Harrell has bigger things on his plate than another bruising zoning fight.

If someone can come up with a proven method to create truly affordable housing without public subsidies I am all ears, and they may want to let Harrell and the council know …

I could go on. These are only a handful of the statements he has written. You get the idea. There are so many of them, it is like playing argumentative whack-a-mole. There is no theme here, other than “I know these things, and you don’t.” Each one of these comes with no reference, no evidence, and no reasoning behind them. Many are ridiculous. Others run in complete opposition to ideas repeatedly presented here — including ones that he has presented. For example, notice that the last two are in opposition — Harrell is disinterested in zoning, but let him know if you want to change zoning. But that last statement is perhaps the most telling. Let me repeat just the first part, this time in bold:

If someone can come up with a proven method to create truly affordable housing without public subsidies I am all ears…

Bullshit! You aren’t “all ears”. The “proven method” was presented in the very first comment of this post. It is right at the very top, so it isn’t hard to find. If you were “all ears”, you would have read it. It includes a link to the argument in more depth, which in turn includes plenty of references. This is proof, and you want more, I can provide it (I have before, several times). You completely ignored this and failed to make counter-arguments to this, because you aren’t the least bit interested in anything that refutes your illogical, unreasonable opinions.

You aren’t “all ears”, because there isn’t a single comment here that shows the slightest interest in anything anyone else has to say. Compare this to what other people write, and have written for a long time. Yes, we argue — sometimes very strongly. But we often come to a consensus, and change our opinion. My opinion on a lot of these matters have evolved over time, as I’ve listened, and gained more information. Sometimes these opinions lead to significant changes in policy.

For example, just the other day I rode the monorail, and commented to my son-in-law that we on the blog helped get ORCA approval. I remember the whole process. I assumed — like so many — that the only reason people took the monorail was to go into the Seattle Center. It was used mostly by tourists. Yet people on this very blog wrote about how they take the monorail all the time — to their apartment, in Uptown. Interesting. Then people mentioned how the monorail operates. It is owned by the city, but run by a private contractor. Again, interesting. The contractor has a long term contract of ten years. Even more interesting is the fact that it was coming up for renewal. The city generally rubber stamps the agreement. I suggested we ask the council to put in that agreement that they accept ORCA cards on the monorail. It is easy to be cynical when it comes to politics, but this is how politics works (I know from personal experience). So a lot of us wrote to the council, and now the monorail accepts ORCA cards. This is what we, on this blog, are capable of, if we have a good, reasonable discussion. My son-in-law (a very bright man with a ton of governmental knowledge) was very impressed.

I can’t imagine Daniel offering anything valuable in that discussion. I can easily imagine him saying it is only used by tourists, just like he makes the claim that no one under 30 visits Capitol Hill or no one at all likes Pioneer Square. Is there a point to those statements? Of course not.

Like several people here, I’ve given up. There is no reason to ban him, but there is every reason to simply ignore what he writes. At most I will skim to see if he actually offers up something of value, but I am tired of him making the same unfounded, illogical, sloppy arguments. Trying to refute all of these ridiculous statements is just too time consuming. I suggest that others do the same. Like the old cranky uncle at Thanksgiving dinner, perhaps we should just ask him to pass the mashed potatoes while we focus on having a more useful discussion.

“Multi-family housing rental buildings require the property owner to hold onto the property for a very long time to return their capital.”

Christopher Leinberger in “The Option of Urbanism” says Wall Street investors in multifamily and retail/office buildings look to recoup their investment in 19 years. After that they don’t care because they’re on to the next investment. This has led to buildings with a 20-year lifespan, where they’re substantially deteriorated by then. Because the assumption is that they’ll be torn down and replaced by another building that meets the new market trends. And if the building remains for 30 or 40 years and just keeps deteriorating and only lower-income people/businesses will put up with it in its latter days, that’s not the investors’ problem.

“A smaller builder cannot do that because they need to sell the development when completed to fund the next project”

A smaller builder might keep the building for 50 or 100 years, and actually use it themselves, and pass it down to their children. They’re also more likely to be local, so even if they don’t personally use the building, it affects their community. They might also build it higher quality, knowing they will keep it for a long time, and they’ll maintain it well so it will last that long without deteriorating.

Vancouver also has more missing-middle housing than Seattle, like in the Kitsilano neighborhood. Duplexes and small 4-8 unit apartment buildings that retain a leafy-green ambience and not too large a scale, so you barely notice it’s not a strictly single-family neighborhood.

Vancouver is ahead of us, but is still more like Toronto than it is Montreal. https://viewpointvancouver.ca/2019/10/17/the-grand-bargain-illustrated/

Vancouver would probably be fine if it wasn’t for the huge increase in demand there (owing in part to Hong Kong no longer being a British protectorate). Similarly, Seattle would probably be fine if it wasn’t for the big increase in demand caused by Amazon (and related tech companies). We now have a more liberal set of laws for (D)ADUs (which Vancouver allowed years ago). This, along with the tiny areas we allow new apartments might be adequate if not for the huge demand in the city.

Seattle was fine in the early and mid 2000s before Amazon started its SLU expansion.

Here’s an Eastgate starter home that was built in 1954, and probably originally listed for around $13,000. Parcel Viewer says it’s 950 sqft, 3 bed, 1 bath. It just sold in Jan 2022 for $1,275,000. I believe it was sold to a home builder. At the bottom of the Parcel Viewer Property Detail page, it says the house is going to be demolished.

https://blue.kingcounty.com/Assessor/eRealProperty/Dashboard.aspx?ParcelNbr=2203500405

Speaking of Montreal housing, I want to take a tour of Habitat 67 the next time I visit the city. I love the architect’s concept, and I’ve wondered why nobody’s really tried to expand on that idea since.

There are several videos on YouTube if you can’t get to Montreal. I don’t think a developer could replicate or even approximate the design and charge the going dollar per square foot (in any market) and still make money. In the video I noticed that the concrete walls are relatively thin ; it must cost a fortune to heat each unit in the Montreal winters, especially as they seem to share so few walls.

TriMet’s FX2 line has opened, but is it faster?” It was originally conceived as a bus rapid transit line, but today TriMet doesn’t even want to refer to it as that.

Among other problems with the route, instead of serving inner southeast Portland, the line now crosses the Tilikum Bridge. This means it has to cross the Union Pacific mainline, sometimes resulting in extremely long delays. It adds service from Division to South Waterfront, but southeast Portland already has the 9, 17 and 19 that make this connection, so I’m not sure it is especially valuable.

Based on my experiences, where the former #4 (later #2) Division bus was frequently overcrowded, TriMet’s first use of articulated buses at least adds some needed capacity to the line.

From Gresham Transit Center to downtown Portland the route takes about the same amount of time as the previous #2 (nee #4), but a key segment along Division is faster.

I’m not convinced that this is the way to get more riders on transit.

Why would somebody take this from Gresham to downtown Portland when there’s MAX? Why would they even build it for this when there’s MAX? It may have a unique coverage segment (Powell Blvd is not Burnside or Hawthorne Street, etc), but the downtown Gresham to downtown Portland time seems irrelevant?

The total travel time isn’t exactly relevant, except that they aren’t saving any driver hours by doing it this way.

It’s a bit like the difference between KCM 70 and Link from UW to downtown: only the end points are the same, but there’s 15 miles of different route with different connections.

Division is not easy. East of 60th it’s a busy thoroughfare, but west of there it’s narrow and very congested. There’s very little support for dedicated lanes here.

That guy at the eliminated stop probably just cut a few months off his kids’ lifespans. Most college kids can walk two extra blocks to a bus stop. Sure, there are people with disabilities who can’t, but if one of this fellow’s kids were disabled, you can bet he would have mentioned it.

By far my biggest problem with that part of Division is it can be a very long distance between safe crossings, just to get to stops on the other side of the street.

If you have to walk ½ mile just to get to an intersection to cross, I’m not sure the stop elimination is such a problem.

I’ve not been on that part of Division in a while. They have done quite a lot of work aimed at not killing quite as many pedestrians, so they may have added a few more traffic lights now.

Daniel, here’s an aerial photo of a sea of single family homes around Mercer Island station. Take a good look. How can you defend this?

https://www.google.com/maps/@47.577242,-122.3098154,747m/data=!3m1!1e3

I ran across this interesting video about Wawa Pennsylvania’s new rail station and related TOD saga.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=XBCNJQe6_ZQ

It’s a classic chicken-egg problem — and a classic case of how zoning needs to be in place before TOD can be planned and built.

Interesting video Al. But I have a problem with developing rural and farmland with hotels and retail at the very end of a train station in the middle of the country. I would have opposed the developers’ plan. I thought the goal of urbanism was to get more folks to live nearer where they work. This project makes The Spine look reasonable.

Developers love to draw pretty pictures of planned communities with hotels and roads and tall buildings replacing farmland they bought based on existing zoning with the hope they can bribe local councils to dramatically upzone the property. They call it progress.

What happens. The pretty plans almost never work out. Who wants to stay in a hotel in Wa Wa at the end of a tail line that doesn’t even connect with a major urban center. The retail never materializes as planned because retail is very fickle, and the only thing left are the SFH which is what the developer wanted in the first place.

It seems the better approach was to just enlarge the park and ride and my guess this was funded with federal money. . I suppose the council did what most do, rezone farmland SFH which was the developers real desire, and mo doubt they made a nice profit developing rural and farm zoned land.

I am trying to think where we could do this in this region. Waive the GMA, find a huge parcel of farmland, upzone it, run a highway (oops train) to it, and praise progress.

Personally I would like to see the amount of public funds to build and operate a train to Wa Wa from nowhere.

They put the station in the middle of a rural area known for its dairy farms. It’s like if Sound Transit put a Link station a mile outside of downtown Carnation, Wa., and some urbanists started walking away from the station and into the rural landscape, complaining it takes a while to walk to places.

Daniel, I think you may have missed the part of the video that talks about the location being a light industrial reuse site.

The curious thing about your comment is that you have routinely talked negatively about infill, slightly denser middle housing development. We wouldn’t need rural land if more of our cities allowed denser development. If you really feel that we should avoid developing raw land, then you should be advocating for more TOD. Where should new development go if we are to house another million residents?

The PA developers assessed that there was a market for denser development, and the new station project was originally funded in anticipation of denser development. The development was later scaled back only as a function of local zoning and not because of the market.

To protect public investment, it’s why I feel that any new rail station that any city wants the regional public to fund should only happen if that city provides the right adjacent land use to make the investment valuable. Stations should be earned rather than deserved.

A final comment is that Northeastern US suburbs often began as small villages with denser housing. Historic town centers are pretty ubiquitous near Philadelphia. The idea of a new town center is less hard to fathom there.

From what I heard the undeveloped site was zoned SU 1 that included dairies and R-1, 1 acre residential lots, although subsequent plans did attempt to use the zoning for offices. I still don’t see how this development in any of its five phases is any kind of urban TOD, and am not surprised by the opposition from people WHO LIVE THERE. If rather than a train it was served by a highway urbanists would have a fit. Comparing Wa Wa to parts of Camden NJ by the snarky teenage narrator was ridiculous to me.

I wish the narrator would have done a better job showing how successful the current development is, especially retail and hotels.

The point of the PSRC and GMPC is to plan for future growth. You don’t build enough units for an additional 1 million residents immediately, and every 7 to 10 years you revisit those assumptions with reality. Just look how much has changed since March 2020. Nearly every bases for TOD has disappeared. Transit ridership has declined because many no longer need to ride it. They still work and shop, now near where they live — many work where they live — they just don’t commute to urban areas. It is a brave new world. I now walk to work.

I am not opposed to multi-family zoning, but I do prefer traditional zoning that segregates uses. I agree with Seattle planners UGA’s are a better way to condense more affordable housing near transit (TOD), which helps develop retail if crime is not an issue, but also agree some of the UGA or multi-family zones should have micro zoning for row houses because otherwise property owners and developers won’t build it. But those row houses will be very expensive per sf if in a nice neighborhood. If in South Seattle they will be occupied by white people.

Your beef is with your own city. Seattle upzoned residential lots to allow three separate legal dwelling units with no restrictions on the number of tenants (except by the property owner) but that part of the MHA just proves changing zoning designations doesn’t create housing, especially if you don’t change regulatory limits that has taken me a thousand posts to explain to some.

It really isn’t the development that is the issue with TOD these days. It is the transit. So few are riding transit, and now Link is moving into the Wa Wa’s of the region and runs along freeways. So either TOD will only appeal to affordable housing who have to live next to I-5 or it is a ruse to upzone commercial areas like The Spring Dist. for people who have no intention of riding transit. But on the Eastside upzoning commercial areas is much, much easier than upzoning residential areas.

Do what you will in Seattle. The burden is on the urbanists, transit fanatics, and SFH haters on this blog to change Seattle’s land use after a mayor was elected in a landslide to protect those SFH zones where all the money is, and after a bruising fight over the MHA. Like politics zoning is very local. Make your neighborhood better, which is often harder with more density.

I don’t think any Eastside city plans to upzone SFH neighborhoods, certainly not to help ST manufacture ridership for a light rail line few will ride. Some like Issaquah have created a mixed use housing zone (which is what I am recommending Seattle xarve3 out of a UGA zone), Issaquah Highlands, that my niece recently moved to after selling her place in Belltown because it had become unlivable despite — or because of — the density, and she loves it although it isn’t cheap, but less expensive than a SFH in Issaquah. To be honest, if Seattle got its shit together I think it would take some pressure off Eastside office and housing costs.

I don’t know how many times I can repeat this. City’s must plan and zone for their future housing targets. Fortunately the four county area including Kitsap is so huge a million additional residents requires very little zoning change. Plus places like Shoreline and Lynnwood want more housing because they need the revenue and to revitalize their cities.

Places like MI did create TOD. It is called the town center and surrounding multi-family zones that are within walking distance of buses and someday light rail, although few use it. But since we on MI don’t hate SFH zoning just because there is no plan to change it, God forbid for transit.

We will meet our housing targets. They will be in the town center next to transit with some infill SFH although few will take transit even with empty park and rides. It will be very expensive, and much of the new construction will replace older more affordable housing. All we really need to do is get smarter about mixed use zoning so we don’t lose more retail space. But we are not going to amend our zoning for transit, especially post pandemic, and our housing allocation does not require that or recommend that unless you get a lot of political donations from builders like our 41st reps.

Focus on the zoning where you live is my advice, because rarely does someone understand someplace else. You don’t see me trying to rezone Seattle. Instead I left.

It should be mentioned that Wawa gets 19 trains on a weekday — and trains run until 10 pm. It’s true daylong regional rail unlike Sounder South.

As explained in the video, train service to this community was discontinued decades ago. It technically is service restoration rather than purely new service.

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