Whoa, my favorite blogger in my old neighborhood of 30+ years? I was on the Queen Anne Land Use Review Committee (LURC) some 25 years ago when regional planning for "urban villages" was getting real. The idea being to increase density in parts of the city, and limit sprawl outside of them. My group, LURC, had no real authority but many developers would run plans by us and most were surprisingly receptive to suggestions to improve them. Anyway, very cool you got a chance to visit a great place.
I started to follow some current residents that track design reviews for higher density housing. It seems that process has gone a bit off the rails since my involvement with a voluntary process 25 years ago. The reviews seem endless and often quite nit picky.
I moved, a town or two away, a couple of years ago. I started to write a response, but it became a rambling discourse on my fondly remembered neighborhood, and probably not of much interest. What sort of details would be of interest?
Not relevant in urban situation, but in the Hudson Valley a nonprofit called RUPCO is changing the meaning of affordable housing. They renovate old factories into beautiful condo-like buildings that are also super green. And they are all for low income tenants. They also built a complex from scratch in Woodstock that feels like a pleasant futuristic village. Crazy thing is self-claimed liberal nimbys still oppose these low income projects. Anyway I hope RUPCO’s vision is in the future of small towns everywhere.
Salt Lake City had a very similar project. The interior of the unit I saw had one of those half of an eggshell chairs suspended by a steel chain from the ceiling. Turns out, it couldn't support the weight of two people at once.
I'm not sure what happened to the project, because one night stands rarely invite you back if you break too much furniture.
Property taxes in Washington are much more complex than you imagine. We don’t have Prop 13 limiting appraisals, but there are limits on how much cities can collect in property taxes. It’s incredibly arcane and confusing.
Don't forget that ADUs/DADUs have a positive role to play in increasing density outside of neighborhood centers. Most are highly livable, can generate income for homeowners, and can be build pretty much anywhere with a large enough yard. (I would like to live in one next, so I would like there to be more of them.) Did you see any?
My parents live in one of those townhouses in a different neighborhood in Seattle. I call them "PC towers" in my head. My main issue with them is that they're highly unfriendly to disabled people. If you can't ascend two flights of steep stairs, good luck accessing anything that isn't the first floor of your house.
Not true. The effects of supply and demand don't set the price of housing, unlike every other market, because reasons. It's probably because of rich investors from a country I don't like. Also, there's no relationship between rising rents and homelessness. Homeless people must just like moving to places near expensive housing.
I lived in a three-story townhouse (part of a quadplex of them) in Queen Anne over a decade ago. This has definitely accelerated in recent years, but densification has been happening there for a while.
Also worth noting that it's happening more intensely in other, poorer parts of the city, like the Central District and Rainier Valley.
A little late to the party here, but there is still a very long uphill battle to climb with respect to changing the hearts and minds of homeowners to create this kind of "missing middle" infill. I recently got prompted to take a poll via text. It was a straw poll, so the methodology certainly leaves a lot to be desired (would love to learn more about changing methodologies of polling), but Interestingly they allowed comments. I guess that gets you some quant and qual data all in one go. Results were not encouraging:
The attack on CA Prop 13 seems misplaced. New construction in a "Queen Anne" type setting in CA would be assessed at current FMV for the current owner (and reassessed upon future sales). Prop 13 then serves as a limit on increasing the owner's property taxes to 2% a year.
Dense living conditions & mass transit systems are super spreaders during pandemics. Covid-19 blew apart any pretense that urban dwelling & mass transit were good ideas. Follow the science.
Look where Covid-19 hit first & hardest. They were crowded cities serviced by mass transit. Those places are now experiencing some level of herd immunity. But only after long months of suffering Covid-19 deaths & hospitalizations. If social distancing is an effective solution, then by logic urban crowding & mass transit are super spreaders during pandemics. The more crowding there is, the less social distancing there is.
Big cities are fine in totalitarian regimes where they monitor & control people's every move. Plus, China may have developed a vaccine against Covid-19 a long time ago. But it knew that the pandemic would put Trump's Presidency at risk & chart a pathway for Chinese dominance of the world. So China may have kept its vaccine a secret. And China is the master of secrecy & disinformation.
It’s household size not density that impacts covid rates. In short, overcrowding and being poor. Manhattan didn’t get hit the worst, far from it, it’s was poor and overcrowded places like South Bronx and Corona.
Whoa, my favorite blogger in my old neighborhood of 30+ years? I was on the Queen Anne Land Use Review Committee (LURC) some 25 years ago when regional planning for "urban villages" was getting real. The idea being to increase density in parts of the city, and limit sprawl outside of them. My group, LURC, had no real authority but many developers would run plans by us and most were surprisingly receptive to suggestions to improve them. Anyway, very cool you got a chance to visit a great place.
Wow, that's awesome! I'd love to hear more about the details, for a follow-up post.
So the design review process has become more formalized. Here's a great thread from someone currently following a project that has been on and off for decades. But it seems to be finally happening: https://nam12.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2Fqagreenways%2Fstatus%2F1334299921399177217%3Fs%3D21&data=04%7C01%7C%7C536ad5d110df45e9e7ed08d897306116%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C637425581320576212%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C1000&sdata=Porun28TMp7D%2Fhf4lipCTk6iL79z%2FFHIe10fXsaEyP0%3D&reserved=0
Just skimmed the whole thread. Epic.
I started to follow some current residents that track design reviews for higher density housing. It seems that process has gone a bit off the rails since my involvement with a voluntary process 25 years ago. The reviews seem endless and often quite nit picky.
I moved, a town or two away, a couple of years ago. I started to write a response, but it became a rambling discourse on my fondly remembered neighborhood, and probably not of much interest. What sort of details would be of interest?
I live in one of these neighborhoods in Denver: Berkeley.
Crappy 1908 single family 1000 sqft houses being scraped and replaced by two 2300 sqft duplex units.
Property tax revenue (and we have our own weird laws) go from $1400/yr to $8000/yr.
Thanks to the work of Peter park https://www.linkedin.com/in/peter-park-5897a6a0/ while he was employed by the City & County of Denver.
Not relevant in urban situation, but in the Hudson Valley a nonprofit called RUPCO is changing the meaning of affordable housing. They renovate old factories into beautiful condo-like buildings that are also super green. And they are all for low income tenants. They also built a complex from scratch in Woodstock that feels like a pleasant futuristic village. Crazy thing is self-claimed liberal nimbys still oppose these low income projects. Anyway I hope RUPCO’s vision is in the future of small towns everywhere.
Salt Lake City had a very similar project. The interior of the unit I saw had one of those half of an eggshell chairs suspended by a steel chain from the ceiling. Turns out, it couldn't support the weight of two people at once.
I'm not sure what happened to the project, because one night stands rarely invite you back if you break too much furniture.
Follow the science. Urban density is part of the solution to the challenge of climate change. https://www.ted.com/talks/norman_foster_my_green_agenda_for_architecture
Property taxes in Washington are much more complex than you imagine. We don’t have Prop 13 limiting appraisals, but there are limits on how much cities can collect in property taxes. It’s incredibly arcane and confusing.
http://mrsc.org/Home/Explore-Topics/Finance/Revenues/The-Property-Tax-in-Washington-State.aspx
Ugh! Wild.
Yeah. Our hospital district increased their tax take so our parks share automatically went down :(
Don't forget that ADUs/DADUs have a positive role to play in increasing density outside of neighborhood centers. Most are highly livable, can generate income for homeowners, and can be build pretty much anywhere with a large enough yard. (I would like to live in one next, so I would like there to be more of them.) Did you see any?
My parents live in one of those townhouses in a different neighborhood in Seattle. I call them "PC towers" in my head. My main issue with them is that they're highly unfriendly to disabled people. If you can't ascend two flights of steep stairs, good luck accessing anything that isn't the first floor of your house.
I didn't see them, but they might not be visible from the street!
Who knew that increasing the supply of housing would help hold down prices?
Not true. The effects of supply and demand don't set the price of housing, unlike every other market, because reasons. It's probably because of rich investors from a country I don't like. Also, there's no relationship between rising rents and homelessness. Homeless people must just like moving to places near expensive housing.
I lived in a three-story townhouse (part of a quadplex of them) in Queen Anne over a decade ago. This has definitely accelerated in recent years, but densification has been happening there for a while.
Also worth noting that it's happening more intensely in other, poorer parts of the city, like the Central District and Rainier Valley.
A little late to the party here, but there is still a very long uphill battle to climb with respect to changing the hearts and minds of homeowners to create this kind of "missing middle" infill. I recently got prompted to take a poll via text. It was a straw poll, so the methodology certainly leaves a lot to be desired (would love to learn more about changing methodologies of polling), but Interestingly they allowed comments. I guess that gets you some quant and qual data all in one go. Results were not encouraging:
https://www.voca.vote/r/6b2b41336f44384845675a6e76695133374f3530766e79782f6a44306b676e366c326963435a752f50766854a;c=6f4371585039764d7563426a6b2f526f6574796c726e795a574f6344726331515130505a6544456165545635a
The attack on CA Prop 13 seems misplaced. New construction in a "Queen Anne" type setting in CA would be assessed at current FMV for the current owner (and reassessed upon future sales). Prop 13 then serves as a limit on increasing the owner's property taxes to 2% a year.
Dense living conditions & mass transit systems are super spreaders during pandemics. Covid-19 blew apart any pretense that urban dwelling & mass transit were good ideas. Follow the science.
Check out the infection rates for North Dakota and South Dakota vs. San Francisco!
Look where Covid-19 hit first & hardest. They were crowded cities serviced by mass transit. Those places are now experiencing some level of herd immunity. But only after long months of suffering Covid-19 deaths & hospitalizations. If social distancing is an effective solution, then by logic urban crowding & mass transit are super spreaders during pandemics. The more crowding there is, the less social distancing there is.
Big cities in Asia were just fine. Our big cities got hit first because they have more international travel.
Big cities are fine in totalitarian regimes where they monitor & control people's every move. Plus, China may have developed a vaccine against Covid-19 a long time ago. But it knew that the pandemic would put Trump's Presidency at risk & chart a pathway for Chinese dominance of the world. So China may have kept its vaccine a secret. And China is the master of secrecy & disinformation.
Big cities in democratic Taiwan, Japan, and Korea did just fine, meanwhile our rural areas are seeing their hospitals overflow
Apparently, social distancing is a fraud. And the Danish study on masks say they had only a minor effect on preventing the spread of Covid-19.
Re: "Those places are now experiencing some level of herd immunity."
That's completely untrue. The disease has hit far less than 5% of "the herd" so far anywhere in the US.
It’s household size not density that impacts covid rates. In short, overcrowding and being poor. Manhattan didn’t get hit the worst, far from it, it’s was poor and overcrowded places like South Bronx and Corona.
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.05.25.20112797v2