Planning, Land Use, and Zoning Committee Public Hearing 12/19/18

Good morning, everyone.

It is 930 on Wednesday, December 19th, I think.

Welcome to the regularly scheduled Seattle Planning Land Use and Zoning Committee.

My name is Rob Johnson.

I'm the chair of the committee and soon to be joined by my colleagues, council members O'Brien and Herbold.

We've got three items on the docket for today.

Two of them are discussion items and one is an action item.

We'll have a discussion and a possible vote continuing our long awaited discussion about changing the comprehensive plan adopted level of service standards.

And then we'll have two briefings, one on neighborhood design guidelines in the university district and another on neighborhood design guidelines in the uptown neighborhood.

Due to council recess and our planned cancellation of the January 16th Planning, Land Use, and Zoning Committee meeting in order to make room for next year's discussions about implementation of citywide zoning changes to implement mandatory housing affordability, we're not going to have any PLEZ meetings scheduled for January.

So the next PLEZ meeting will actually start February 6th here, and we'll use the PLEZ slot in January to handle our mandatory housing affordability business.

We start our meeting with public comment.

We've got six people who've signed up to give public comment this morning.

We'll give you two minutes and ask you to come to one of the microphones at the front of the auditorium.

We'll start with Knut Ringen and then Colleen McEllar.

Good morning.

My name is Knut Ringen.

I'm from the Fisher Studio building on 3rd Avenue, and I'm here to talk mainly about the project that's being built at 1516, or being proposed for 1516 2nd Avenue that I've talked to you about before, and the last time I was before you, you promised somebody would get back to me about the questions that we have raised about it, and we haven't heard back from anybody, so I hope we'll you will contribute to helping do that.

We have a number of questions.

As you know, we have raised questions about whether the design guidelines have been followed.

We don't think so.

And we think a large number of them have not been followed in the early design review.

That's really the only time when public has opportunity for input.

And if they don't get resolved, if our questions don't get answered at that point in time, we probably lose out in the process.

So the questions that we have now are how to reconcile extremes in bulk and mass, dual zoning, how to make effective use of alleys without overburdening them, and how to provide public safety, and how to protect historical landmarks.

All of those have overlapping jurisdiction between departments, and we have a hard time figuring out who's who.

and who does what and which criteria they follow when they make decisions, and how can we have impact and input on that process.

Obviously, if you had a building that's going to be 500 stories A high proposed within 16 feet of your living room, you would probably be pretty upset also.

And this has been sprung upon us without any opportunity for comment, significant comment to the developer, and the developer has absolutely no interest in mitigating the kind of questions that we have, so we have to come here to City Hall.

And if we don't get any help here, then we're going to have to litigate it.

We think that's a very poor way of doing business.

So I thank you.

I also just want to mention that I've written to you and you've gotten response from NOAA that we're strongly opposed to CB 119398 as it stands now.

We think you need to include traffic impacts for high-rises in downtown Innit.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Colleen, you're going to be followed by Andy Fessel and then Megan Cruz.

Good morning, Councilman Johnson and Councilman Herbold.

I'm Colleen McAleer from Laurelhurst Community Club.

I live in Northeast Seattle, District 4. And it's quite the location for lots of intense development around our area.

So we have concerns about the change, dropping LOS, the level of service, which measures the capacity of the roads as a criteria for development of 30 units or more.

The curb reports suggest that no matter what we do in Seattle, the households about two-thirds will always own a car.

And there's lots of, we like to make sure that we are providing for multi-modal planning as we go.

So the level of service is just simply a tool, it's a measurement of the capacity of the roads to accommodate vehicles, not just SOVs, we're kind of stuck on that, but there's freight, there is service vehicles, garbage, utility, fire, police, our transit system works on the roads, so the capacity is really important for that as well to function properly.

So all the vehicles need to be measured, the capacity does matter.

A couple of things we'll also mention is the alternatives proposed in the menu are not necessarily effective in reducing the number of cars.

Really just reducing parking units is just a gift to developers and people will probably, two-thirds of those people will probably have cars in the future, which is if it's 40, 70,000 more people, that's 46,000 more cars by 2035. So finally, other alternatives may be a better shot, maybe car sharing or drivers in the buildings that would actually reduce the number of cars, but also provide that service that's necessary.

And I thank you for listening.

And again, I ask you not to change the LOS level of service for measuring capacity.

It's just one good tool and it's needed for our city.

Thank you.

Okay, Mr. Fessel passes.

Megan Cruz, you're going to be followed by George Danner and then Steve Rubstello.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Thank you, and good morning.

The new LOS bill may be okay for smaller developments, but it won't provide critical and timely information to reduce the impacts of the growing density downtown.

The standard changes from actually measuring traffic from proposed developments to an oversimplified goal of reducing SOVs across the city.

Its only measurement tool is a biannual household survey.

It calls for smaller developments to undertake transportation mitigation efforts, but says downtown towers don't need to do this because they comply simply by being near transit options.

It raises several questions.

How will the new LOS standard account for the biggest surge of traffic from delivery vehicles and ride hailing services?

What studies showed, the new downtown towers won't add to SOVs when they are adding thousands of new parking stalls and 10,000 residents and office workers in a very small area.

How accurate and helpful will a biannual survey be to assess current and future traffic impacts?

One possible answer is found in the bill's supporting document.

It reads, it might be arguable that outcomes of the proposed concurrency review system might not be as successful as conceptually estimated, with less progress toward mode share reduction and thus fewer overall beneficial effects on street system congestion levels than might be predicted as an ideal outcome.

end quote.

These aren't reassuring words.

Please create a better bill.

Thanks.

Thank you.

George, you're going to be followed by Steve Rubstel.

My name is George Danner.

I live at Second and Pike.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak and I want to thank Noah because he actually answers my emails even though we disagree.

He's a rare individual.

I've been started my involvement in Seattle with the proposal to tear down the Hahn building at the entrance to the market and they presented a ridiculous loading berth and since that's been about a year and a half that this has started and it's gotten to the point where in September the director of SDCI stated to us in an email that high-rise condos and apartments don't have a need for loading berths.

And consequently, the design review has been approving these things.

We've got to stop this.

We have to make each building support itself on its own footprint.

Because while getting SOVs off the street are a great thing, the delivery percentage in Seattle is growing about 15% a year.

We have to consider that.

We have to consider ride shares, whereas the basis for reducing traffic is a great idea, but it needs to be an all-encompassing plan.

The public has to be listened to, and we're not.

And I appreciate the opportunity today to speak to you and let you know how I feel about this.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Denner.

It is staff employee review time, so I'm sure Noah will grab that little clip of what you just said and remind me of that at the end of the week.

Thank you.

Mr. Rubsello.

Well, Merry Christmas, and you've been very, very good to your stakeholders this year.

Not so good to the citizens and the people they impact.

This committee, I think, really retains its honor of being the least likely to listen to public input in the City of Seattle.

Now, you remind me more of democracy under people like Putin and other folks.

You really have all the earmarks of a totalitarian state because look at what people have come and spoke to you about over the year and look at what you have done.

There's not much of a corollary.

It's the form of democracy without the actual democracy.

I think former president and dictator of the Philippines put it best, it's called guided democracy, and you are the guides.

And you have to put up with people coming and speaking, but you really don't have to listen because it's kind of a waste of your time.

But some of us are not going to give up, and what we say is we have to bring people back into the process.

And I think you're latest look at traffic is just a typical example of keeping people out.

More and more in this process, people mean less.

We used to have design review which looked at the entire project.

Now we exclude all sorts of things from it.

So when people object, they say, uh-oh, we can't do anything about that.

Why?

not because you have chosen not and the development community doesn't want it.

And look at how out rents are going down and how traffic is getting so much better.

Maybe if something doesn't work you might want to consider doing something else.

Thank you Steve.

That concludes public comment for this morning.

We're going to move on to our first agenda item.

Noam, I'd ask you to read that into the record, the abbreviated title please.

Agenda Item 1, Council Bill 119398, an ordinance relating to land use and zoning, amending the title of Chapter 23.52, Subchapter 1, and amending and repealing sections of the Seattle Municipal Code to implement the Comprehensive Plan Adopted Level of Service Standard.

Thanks.

We're joined at the table by representatives of several different departments within the city, and I'd ask them to start by doing some brief introductions.

Mr. Makani.

Good morning, I'm Eric McConaughey on the Council of Central Staff.

Jonathan Lewis with Seattle's Department of Transportation.

Michael Hubner with the Office of Planning and Community Development.

Gordon Clowers, SDCI.

Great.

Just as a refresher, folks, we were at the table a couple of weeks ago to talk about transportation level of service, but for those who might have had a little time between the last couple of weeks, why don't you give us a brief refresher and I'll maybe look to you, Mr. Hubner, to walk us through a little bit about what the objective of this bill is.

Sure so very briefly this started with an update to the city's comprehensive plan which was adopted in 2016 which as one of the elements of the plan update the city revisited how we are measuring level of service.

This is a state mandate that we have a measure of how well our transportation system is is functioning.

The system as the measure has existed prior to the plan update looked at what were called screen lines, a measure of volume to capacity as on different measurement points throughout the city on our major arterials.

This is an auto-oriented measure did not take into account other travel modes, did not align with the city's other policies, they're focused on moving people and not just automobiles, and was not responsive to state and regional policy requirements that we have a measure that looked at various modes and was more comprehensive.

So the plan update adopted a new measure that is focused on the mode of travel, looking specifically at the share of trips that are made during the PM peak hours, from 3 to 6 p.m.

by single occupant vehicle.

The concept here is by looking at the number of SOVs, single occupant trips that are made throughout the city, that is the biggest stressor on our limited right of way and the least efficient way of moving people around the city.

And consistent with our policies to shift people to other, to transit, to bicycles, to walking, which use our existing system, which has a limited ability to be expanded within the right of way.

But that was the best way to ensure that the system as a whole was functioning.

So we adopted the new level of service standards in the comprehensive plan.

That question is not before you today.

Rather, this is a question of implementation.

So this ordinance would bring our code, our development requirements into consistency with this comprehensive plan LOS measure.

provide a framework for looking at new development and what might be expected of new development as it is permitted by the city to move us toward achieving a share of single occupant vehicle trips.

And the comprehensive plan talks about a desired share in each of eight geographic sectors of the city and would move us toward achieving those goals over the next 20 years during the plan's timeframe out to 2035. So small steps the projects could take to provide choices and make it easier for people to choose to travel without being in their cars driving alone.

This would apply to projects above a certain size and the ordinance specifies a size threshold for projects and would apply primarily to projects that are located outside of our hub urban villages and our urban centers, areas which already are achieving a shared travel that uses multiple modes.

There's a menu of options that are specified in a director's rule, which include planning for providing parking that's closer to the minimums provided in our existing requirements, providing sidewalks and curb ramp improvements in the area of the project.

providing bus passes for tenants of projects, or providing a mix of uses that give people choices to do their trips locally without getting in their cars, or other options that developer may propose as long as they're showing that they're reducing the SOV trips.

The director's rule will be the way in which those requirements will be implemented as projects come in.

We have DCI here as well as SDOT.

They would be administering those requirements free on a project by project basis.

And we'd be collecting data over time to see how we're moving toward those SOV goals within each of our eight geographic sectors.

Michael, does the bill apply to any of our urban centers or hub urban villages?

It does with respect that it does provide an incentive and acknowledges the fact that projects that are located within the urban centers and especially our hub urban villages, which are denser, more, they have more of a mix of uses and a higher level of transit service generally.

But those projects are actually performing very well.

We have data from ongoing travel surveys that's provided by the Puget Sound Regional Council, and the city actually purchases a very robust sample of people who reside.

In those locations, we know that the more growth we have in centers and villages, that we are moving toward our SOV share goals and using our system more efficiently.

But it doesn't require, once projects are located in those areas, there aren't additional requirements on top of those because they would be performing well because of those locations.

So, Gordon, we talked about this last time, but I wonder if you can, again, reiterate for us what's the process with SDCI today if you're applying for a project, and what would it be after this bill is adopted?

The process today.

What are the options for a developer to choose from a menu of mitigation choices, for example, when they come in to SDCI for a project that is above the certain threshold that we're talking about today?

Well, the process relies on a traffic analysis, impact analysis that would essentially in the SEPA context identify whether there are any significant adverse impacts or not.

And then if so, recommend an action that would mitigate that specific impact, our planners can also make that determination and require an action of itself.

But that's in the SEPA context.

There is no such tool like that just today.

future with this proposal on the plan sets, the applicant would be indicating up front which of the strategies they are choosing to implement.

And have a preliminary indication that they'll provide a bus pass or that they will provide the sidewalk or curb ramp improvements.

or limit the parking to a certain amount, or provide a mix of uses, and essentially demonstrate or prove that in the information that they provide.

And so that's kind of a commitment, and it is followed, it is vetted before the certificate of occupancy.

Great, so we're giving people a broader menu of options to choose from.

That's right.

Anything SDOT folks want to add?

Great.

Questions, colleagues?

Yeah, please, Council Member Herbold.

Thank you.

So I just want to underscore a point I'm pretty sure I heard you make.

This legislation does not, we've heard from people saying please don't change the level of service standards.

So this legislation does not do that.

It addresses implementation, it does not change the standards.

Correct, the council acted to change the level of service standard through the comprehensive plan update in 2016. Okay, great.

And you also, when we were talking about the other thing that we've been hearing a lot from folks about is that Developments in urban centers particularly downtown and South Lake Union shouldn't be quote-unquote given given a pass for this type of review under the proposed directors rule and Although the level of standards review Would not be done for projects in downtown and South Lake Union there is within the bill a Well, it's existing.

There's some tweaks to it.

But there already is a transportation impact analysis in SMC 2352008C2 that could get at some of the same issues that we're talking about related to trying to reduce SOV travel.

And that section addresses specifically projects that may not meet SEPA thresholds.

Is that correct?

That is correct, and I apologize for not having touched on that in my summary.

It's a fairly minor part of the ordinance, especially to the extent that it is, in effect, a housekeeping change to clarify when a traffic impact study for projects that do not meet the SEPA thresholds Those additional projects would be required to do the traffic impact study and to clarify, given that the thresholds had changed since the last time this ordinance was touched.

So this cleans that up, but you're indeed correct.

The LOS implementation addresses one aspect of transportation impacts, more of a systemic.

impact but those project by project impacts will be addressed through SIPA and the traffic impact studies.

The LOS does not change that and in fact this ordinance clarifies and makes sure the projects are required due to the traffic impact study.

I think important to uplift in light of what we have heard from the public about their concerns.

I think it's also important because not only have we heard from the public, there have been some articles over the last few years about developers in Southlake Union and downtown taking advantage of a loophole that previously existed as it relates to exceeding parking maximums and that loophole has been closed so we can expect to not see that type of development to continue.

And so I really appreciate the extra time that we had so I could take a deeper dive into these issues and understand that even though this legislation does not deal with level of service and a review related to that for the urban centers, that we do, one, we've made improvements to how we do review projects in those areas as it relates to single occupancy vehicle travel, and we have other mechanisms that we also use to mitigate it.

Thanks.

Questions?

I heard a couple questions from constituents that I looked into a bit and I want to, one was a question of why exempt the projects near, in urban villages?

Why don't we make everyone do more to help improve the SOV goals?

My interpretation of the legislation is that we do want everyone to do more.

And there's a variety of things you can do to help.

One of the best things you can do to help is build your project really close to existing service or in a density that can much more easily be served by service.

And so by saying, hey, there's a range of things.

Land near transit is often more expensive.

So sometimes we'll push people further away.

And we're saying, look, we really want you to locate here, and if you do that, That alone, what we've seen from the data, is that alone will allow your residents or your employees to have better access to transit and will choose more of those trips.

If you choose to do a project further away from transit where it's going to be harder and the people using that facility will likely have less access to transit, then we're saying you need to do a little more and asking that.

And so it's really, at least my understanding, is we're trying to We are trying to create a differential.

We're saying, hey, we want to incent you to build near transit infrastructure, which is in our urban centers and urban villages.

And if you don't, we're going to ask you to do something else to make up for that difference of service that they're likely to have access to.

The other question, I see lots of nods, so I'm thinking I'm roughly on the right track.

But if you have more to add.

That sounded more like a statement.

I thought, well, I'll put then necessarily a question.

The only thing I would add to it is that, I think that this ordinance also focuses on getting the most bang for your buck through the requirement and that the biggest impact on the system is by projects that are generating the most single occupancy vehicle trips.

So they're by the focus on those that are not in the hub or villages in the urban centers and the light rail station areas I might add as well.

The other question folks asked, which I struggled to answer, was why exempt smaller projects as opposed to large projects?

You know, a project with over 30, you know, residents or units, for instance, will have more trips than one in the 15, but couldn't we ask them all to do something that's scalable?

And so this question came to my attention late yesterday.

I don't know if you had a chance to even see my response, Councilmember Johnson, but Eric, I know you scrambled to help me think through that.

I have a draft amendment that I wanted to discuss, but won't necessarily be bringing forward today because of some notice requirements.

But I'd love to get other people's thoughts on, is it a scalable problem that we can say, no, everyone should contribute to it.

And if you're just building a really small project, you should do a little something too.

It shouldn't be the same size as a 100 unit apartment building, but there's something you can do also.

Do you want to describe it a little bit more, Council Member Ryan, or ask Eric to do so?

Yeah, maybe Eric you can describe the actual amendment.

But the goal here, currently there's an exemption for projects below a certain size.

And the goal would be to not have that exemption and simply say everyone, every project has to do something in proportion to their scale.

I think you did a great job of describing the amendment.

I just sort of tactically took a look at the language in the bill and tweaked it so that that would be accomplished.

As changed, the geography as described in the bill would hold, but at least this draft doesn't put any size threshold on it.

excuse me, this amendment doesn't change how the director's rule would work, doesn't change any of that language, and so just to reiterate what that would be, the bill, the way it's stated now, points to the director's rule for how to implement this, and this amendment, at least as it's drafted now, would do the same.

So, for example, if this were to go forward as an idea, change the bill, presumably the director's rule would have something about scaling.

There would be some talk about, because the rule does now have numbers.

It's sort of ratcheted to try to be commensurate with what's going on with the development.

And that's set at that 30 trips or more.

So if we were catching fewer trips, presumably the director's rule would say something about that, that it would scale in some fashion.

And that's probably where I should stop talking about it because it's a relatively new idea.

I would say that, you know, to a certain level of size, it might make sense.

When we get down to the lower and smaller and smaller project sizes, it really makes less sense where We have all manner of different kinds of projects that are just adding a few units to an existing building or three, four townhouses on a unit lot or something like that.

And the mechanism for implementation doesn't necessarily make sense in the same way that it would for an apartment building.

Yeah.

I think scale is the right way to think about this.

There's a scale.

This is a scalable tool, and the director's rule is currently written is scalable from that 30 unit in a residential context on up to in terms of what would be required of our project.

But when you get smaller than that, the scalability issues, one is in terms of benefit.

As you get to smaller projects, the meaningful benefit in terms of what would be provided in the project would would shrink to.

where the tradeoff between administering and having that requirement on the books for all of those smaller projects, the benefit would be fairly small.

The other is a cost issue.

We know that there's an economy of scale built into as you scale this up.

And so it works as well going down.

So the per unit cost in terms of any housing affordability concerns about the cost of this requirement would then perhaps be more significant.

Lastly, what we did in putting this together and choosing the threshold, which is roughly based on a 30-trip generation threshold that then translates into 30 dwelling units and a residential 4,000 square feet of commercial floor area and 40,000 square feet for industrial.

But those are all at about that 30-trip generation level for the PM peak.

that that's a very common threshold that's used by other cities.

It is standard to have a size threshold for a concurrency type requirement that's such as this and we're trying to match generally how that is administered in Washington State.

One of the comments that the constituent group made or the organization made that sent this email as well.

some of the mitigation things actually reduce costs.

So lowering the parking you're providing, the discretionary parking you're providing above the minimums is one of the ways to mitigate.

And so that would actually, you know, that saves the project money in theory.

And so I want to be smart about this and sensitive, but I am interested in if there's a way to remove that barrier.

You know, I think of, I mean, I get everything you're saying, but I also think of certain neighborhoods where we've had hundreds of townhomes go in, and the cumulative effect of that is pretty significant.

And none of those projects, rarely you'd see a 30-unit townhome project going in, and even if one developer was doing 30, they would break it into multiple smaller projects for a variety of reasons.

Is there something that we can do that is scalable that's, you know, a relatively modest ask of these projects but would have a difference and could accumulate?

And whether that's one of the existing checkboxes we have or maybe there's another tool that they could use that would be geared towards smaller projects.

And so, I'm not an expert on all these things, so Eric.

reminded me that this is, we can't really vote on this today because there's a notice requirement, but I would love to spend the next couple days thinking about if there's a way to craft this that did bring that scale down.

I still want to leave the director the discretion to figure out where that is, but I guess I'm raising the specter of is that 30 trip size project the appropriate threshold or are there things we could do below that?

I think it's a fair question, Council Member Bryant, given that it came up at 5.30 last night and how quickly Eric was able to at least turn around conceptually some concepts I think is very valuable.

At the same time, as you've heard from folks on the staff side of the table, I think if we were to contemplate this, I'd want them to spend a little more time and energy thinking about that scale and about those options.

So I don't know if you would be amenable to this, but I think the idea of asking the council president to hold this until the 14th of January, assuming that the bill comes out today, which as we learned yesterday, even if we all voted no, the bill comes out of committee.

So assuming that the council president's okay with that, that would give us a little bit of space just on the off chance that folks from DOT, OPCD, and SDCI are all gone for the next couple weeks as we're on recess so that that first full week back we'd have a little bit of time and space to consider amendments before.

something coming to full council, and also allow for additional law and legal notice requirements too.

So if that's acceptable to you, why don't we say, yeah, that's an interesting idea.

Let's keep doing some more work and see where we land.

Please, Councilor Hurdle.

Thank you.

I just wanted to review my notes.

I want to clarify something I said earlier as it related to the sort of closing the loophole around development in urban centers that are building beyond maximums.

That is only a loophole that we close for commercial properties.

There are no maximums for residential properties, so I think that's something.

As we've talked, we should continue to look at, understand that it's been a policy decision in the past to not have parking maximums for residential development in urban centers.

But again, I think that's something that we should continue to monitor the impacts of.

And then finally, I just wanted to ask whether or not, you know, one of the topics that we had discussed at the table last time was, related to how the mitigation measures in the director's rule.

the department will try to anticipate and discourage developers from sort of gaming the system, maybe proposing less than they intend to do, knowing that the director's rule will require them to do the thing that maybe they were already intending to do, and whether or not there's a way to deal with that.

the number of units in a project?

Is that in terms of number of units in a project?

No, it is more in terms of, for instance, let's say they had already done a market assessment of how much parking they need, and it was a relatively low amount and they propose a project with a higher amount, to require fewer spaces.

My opinion is that there's no real benefit in proposing a higher number on a plan set and saying I want to use that parking strategy.

It's just more straightforward to propose that amount of parking in the first place, 60%.

So there's...

Are you saying the cost of the redesign of that facility to eliminate the number of parking would be more expensive than whatever?

Yes, and this is an important point to understand about how this is designed.

There are five, as currently drafted, the director's rule, which provides the menu of options.

They are specific with respect to parking, for example, or mixed use, or sidewalks.

If a project comes in the door and it has one of those elements already, and it's either it's design or they propose it out of the gate, that's it.

They're done.

Okay.

They're done.

They don't have to do something extra if it's already baked into the project.

Right.

It's not a relative thing relative to how the project started.

It's an absolute.

You meet the criteria.

Yes, it's an absolute.

If it's a mixed-use project that is generating internal trips that reduces SOV, great, and this recognizes that, and then they've satisfied the requirement.

for example.

Questions, please.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I just want to emphasize that the joint director's rule is very helpful.

This draft was provided to inform this discussion.

It has not gone out for public comment yet.

That would be subsequent, as we understand from the executive, from the folks that we've been working with after the passage of the bill.

So when that does happen, there'd be a time for folks to look at this.

It gets vetted through that public process.

And these kinds of questions would be the kinds of things that people could kind of test based on what's in this.

And that's the typical.

pathway for a joint director's rule, or a director's rule for that matter, that it goes out for several weeks, for a couple weeks for people to review before being set up.

So, Eric, since you have the microphone, I'll remind my colleagues that we do have one technical amendment that we have to discuss today.

Eric, I wonder if you could just walk us through that technical amendment.

Yeah, it's exactly that.

There were a few typos in the numbers on the map.

The SOV mode share targets by geographic sector map, and I will own these in preparing the bill and making some adjustments to the map for the bill.

I neglected to put in the existing SOV mode share for a couple of the sectors, and I made a typographic error in northeast Seattle.

This is me asking for a little dispensation here to fix it, because it ought to be right.

Any questions, colleagues?

So I'd move to amend Council Bill 119398 by replacing Map A in Section 3 with Map A shown at Attachment B of the Central ZAF memo.

Further discussion?

All those in favor, please say aye.

Aye.

And opposed.

Okay.

Eric, no additional amendments today, correct?

Just that one technical.

Any final thoughts, folks?

Okay.

Please go ahead.

Second, what you said, I responded to a constituent client email late yesterday and then asked Eric for some help, recognizing that he may not even see the email until after the meeting, let alone I came in this morning and you had actually worked through an amendment.

And I really appreciate it.

I'm not sure which hours of the day you were doing it, but that was very short notice and I really appreciate your responsibility.

So thank you.

So, given that, we've got an amended bill in front of us.

All those in favor, please vote aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

None opposed.

So, Council Bill 119398 is adopted as amended, and we'll ask the Council President to hold that until January the 14th, so we've got a little extra time to review the potential idea that came up late last night.

Thank you all for your work on this, gentlemen.

Exciting stuff.

Let's move on to agenda item number two and Noah, I'll ask you to read the abbreviated title under the record and ask our district folks to come forward.

Agenda item two, an ordinance relating to land use and zoning, amending sections of the Seattle Municipal Code to approve the 2018 University District Neighborhood Design Guidelines.

While everybody gets settled just by way of background, several years ago, or just about two years ago, the council adopted a set of zoning changes in the University District, and one of the work programs that was identified as part of that was to change and update the neighborhood design guidelines for the neighborhood.

And then we started through this quasi-judicial process with the University of Washington and their major institution master plan.

And I thought it would be super confusing for us to be having the design guidelines in front of us where people could comment while we have the MIMP also in front of us where people couldn't comment.

So we asked the planning department if we could hold off on the design guidelines discussions until after the MIMP is concluded.

That's why we're here a little bit later than we otherwise would have been, because I think it would have just been too confusing to have those two things run side-by-side.

But with that, please, yes, Council Member Brown.

I'll just mention, well, hopefully we are done with our work on the MIMP.

It's still quasi-judicial for probably another month or two, so we'll stay focused on this one aspect of this, and hopefully we'll be in the clear in a month or two.

So, good reminder.

Folks at the table, don't talk to us about the MIMP today.

Please, let's do some introductions.

Ms. Panucci.

Ally Panucci, Council Central staff.

Steven Andepit, resident and chair of the U District Partnership Urban Availability Committee.

Janet Shull, Office of Planning and Community Development.

And Janet, I believe you have some slides that you're going to walk us through.

Do I have that right?

Thank you very much for that.

Take it away.

Great.

Good morning.

Don't forget, you got to have that microphone kind of uncomfortably close so that the folks at home following along can hear you.

Good morning.

Thank you very much.

We're very happy to be here this morning.

For those of you who've been participating along with us for a few years now and planning in the University District, this is one of the items that's been on OPCD's work plan, work program for many years, even from the time we started work in the U District and looking at potential up zones around the light rail station.

Knew that the companion to that would ultimately need to be an update to the neighborhood guidelines.

It's really good to be here today and able to talk about this.

So I am going to just have a few slides that are going to be very familiar to the Pleas Committee members.

You've had a recent presentation on South Lake Union, and we will be following with your next agenda item on Uptown.

My colleague and I have coordinated our PowerPoint a bit, so we only have to go through the background once this morning, and that's for the benefit of folks who are obviously listening besides us here at the table.

So design review program, Seattle's design review program established in 1994. Approximately over 1,500 projects have been reviewed in the duration of the program and approximately 111 per year.

Design review takes place before new development can apply for construction permits.

And the purpose of design review is ultimately to encourage better design and site planning to ensure new development sensitively fits into neighborhoods, thus we have neighborhood design guidelines, providing flexibility in the application and development process to better meet the intent of the land use code, and very importantly, to improve communication and understanding amongst developers, community members, and the city.

context just to set this up.

So the University District design guidelines will apply in the U District Urban Center and that is located in the Northeast Design Review Board District and then later on when you hear from Uptown that neighborhood is located in the West District.

So in each of those districts there are boards that consist of volunteer members and they are appointed by the Mayor and City Council and then they're supported by staff in the Department of Construction and Inspections and in terms of the review process that they do.

And their duties include synthesizing the community input, providing an early design guidance, and that's where these guidelines are very critical, is informing that process, not only for the design review board members, but for community members who have interest in neighborhood projects.

So, just really briefly, how are the guidelines organized?

There's three general categories in the design guidelines, and those consist of context and site, which looks at the actual specifics of a site where development's proposed, as well as its context.

and how well a proposed project fits into that context.

The second set of design guidelines fall under the public life category, and that deals very much with what happens at the street level, where projects meet the neighboring rights of ways, or if there's an open space nearby.

Whatever happens down at that ground level, how well is the project relating to to those conditions.

And then design concept, the third category deals more specifically with materiality of buildings, specifics to open space when there's onsite open space being provided with a project.

What are the details that are being dealt with there?

Janet, can I have you pause for a second?

Yes.

One of the most common issues that we hear brought up as part of the design review process is actually the issue that we just discussed around parking and level of service standards.

We had a couple of folks here this morning during public comment talking about how they were concerned about parking of a building in downtown and how much parking was being developed and how much wasn't, and frustrated by the design review process because they didn't feel like they had an opportunity to be heard.

Parking is not on one of those issues that we are allowed to discuss for design review.

Can you talk a little bit about why?

Sure, and that is correct, and parking is dealt with in the land use code, and of course in urban centers there is no minimum parking requirement.

So what design guidelines address are when there is parking being provided, where is it located?

Is the access to the parking going to potentially infringe pedestrian movement?

or transit or other street-related movements.

So there are guidelines that talk about parking, but there's nothing in the design guidelines that specifies the number of parking spaces.

The whys for that are just really more bound into the First of all, guidelines are guidelines.

They're not law.

So parking just doesn't fall under that purview.

And other than that, it's really more of a policy base where we do not have this currently a minimum requirement for parking in urban centers.

They're very much more, sorry, served by transit and the densities allow better service by transit.

Before we get to you, Council Member Rahn, Ms. Panucci, you were grabbing the microphone, if something you'd like to add.

Yeah, I just wanted to add, and you've heard me say this before, that I think one of the challenges with design review, it is one of the, if not the only, public-facing piece of the development review process.

So that, I think, is where some of the tension comes up, where people want to talk about the entire project.

And things like parking issues and those sorts of things are not under the purview of the design review board, as Janet was just describing.

And so one of the things that this committee took up about a year and a half ago was changes to the design review program.

And one of those changes was requiring early outreach to communities from the developer.

And through that process, that's an opportunity for the public to engage with the developer to talk about things like parking requirements and other standards that are prescriptive in the code and not under the purview of the design review board, but can be, you know, discussed and negotiated with the developer themselves.

So that is one opportunity for the public to engage with the specific developer on that topic.

Hold on for one second, Mr. Underput.

Council Member O'Brien next.

The question about parking, obviously, and design review is one that overlaps a lot.

And I just wanted to share that from my experience, you know, I'm out in community meetings a lot.

A couple weeks ago, sitting in a living room with 25 neighbors concerned about a project going in next door, didn't have parking.

They wanted to know what they could do about it.

And what I tell them and anyone where I have a microphone is, As a policy matter, we have chosen not to have that be a discretionary review.

We have said this is a policy that says similarly, we don't have life safety issues or energy code issues.

This council has set a policy, and previous councils have too, that parking is going to be set at the code level, and that will not be a discretionary review.

And what I tell the folks in the room, if you want to change that, design review is not the tool currently to use that.

It's talk to your council members.

And we have processes about that.

And, you know, I think that frustrates some folks, obviously, because they want to be able to change it.

But I also think it's important that they have clarity on where that decision is being made.

And if you want to change that, that'll be a public process.

And there's a way to do that.

And we've been through that a number of times.

And the direction we seem to be going as a community is to fewer minimum requirements and sometimes having some limits on maximum in some places.

So I appreciate that.

I know it's got to be hard for folks that are running the design review process to show up and hear from community members that the one thing they really want to talk about is something off the table.

Whether you're a volunteer on a design review board or city staff, you feel a lot of heat for that.

I know that when I'm talking to communities, I'm saying, that's an issue you should take up directly with me.

The staff and the volunteers out there doing those conversations, we have taken that power away from them, and we control that at a different level.

But you have a vehicle to talk to us, and people do come talk to us.

And these two that we're talking about today, both the U District and Uptown, are designated urban centers.

want to see more development in those designated urban centers, because they've got great transit.

They've got great walkability.

They've got great access to jobs.

So one of those things we want to try to make sure that we control there is not only not requiring more parking, but to Council Member Herbold's point, my fellow Shupista, to talk about how we might be able to set some maximums.

And unfortunately, we didn't study maximums when we did our off-street parking options.

Otherwise, we probably would have talked about some of the issues that our downtown friends love for us to have implemented in some of the towers downtown and setting some maximums, but that's a story for another day.

Minister Antipa, please.

Just to amplify the value of that message that you described, Council Member O'Brien, about where that authority lies for dealing with parking, I will say that the early outreach process having now had more donuts than is in my weekly quota, and boxed coffee.

But standing on the sidewalk under a tent in the rain, or a meeting at University Heights, or other places at the invitation of a development team meeting with the community before we even get to EDG, which is what this tool is, that actually having that discussion about what's in and what's out, and particularly parking, is super helpful because folks that don't know where that authority lies and what happens in design review and what doesn't, I'm definitely seeing some folks getting educated, either getting concerned or getting their concerns addressed about that because of the early outreach process.

So I think that's actually yielding some good results.

It's not only is it educating folks about where the policy choices have been made, but also has helped some of the development teams learn some things about the places where they're doing their project and makes them better before they even get to the EDG and the guidelines and back to you.

Thank you.

University District.

So just a little bit of a setting the stage.

Planning in the U District began back in 2011 in terms of looking forward to the light rail station on Brooklyn Avenue, the need to consider what that meant for land use and zoning.

So in the first couple of years of that process, there was an urban design framework plan that was developed, and Stephen and others, members of the community, worked very hard out of that process along with the Framework plan was the U-District partnership formation that came out of that early planning work in the neighborhood.

And then the next three years, there was a lot of conversation about what the land use or the urban design alternatives might be in consideration of light rail coming to the U-District.

And part of that process in EIS was prepared on urban design alternatives.

There was also an update to the parks plan and a lot of community discussion around the importance of open space in the community.

And street concept plans were also adopted that consider particularly the streets along the new, the conditions of the streets adjacent to the proposed or the the Brooklyn Light Rail Station.

And so then that culminated in a rezone.

I wanted the first neighborhood to incorporate the MHA regulations and that, or requirements, and that was approved in early 2017. And following that, we got to work with, in partnership with the U District Partnership, and working primarily with their, what was at the time referred to as the Urban Design Committee, is now the Urban Livability Committee that Stephen chairs as a board member on the partnership.

Got to work in March of 2017 with the community and started having a number of workshops to consider what we needed to do with the existing neighborhood design guidelines to bring them into better representation of what was happening and what was potentially going to be happening with the zoning.

So I've already kind of talked about the whys.

There were priorities expressed in the UDF or the Urban Design Framework Plan around the importance of updating the design guidelines.

Obviously the change in character of the built environment since the guidelines were first adopted in the year 2000, so it's been almost 20 years since they were first So even without the up zone or the zoning changes, there's probably a good reason to take a look at them just because of the age of the guidelines.

Obviously, the light rail station coming online, the zoning changes, as I mentioned, and then also it's an opportunity to improve the compatibility with the Seattle design guidelines because that reformatting was done in 2013.

One of those pictures was a building that is existing in the neighborhood Is that other one a building that has been proposed under the new zoning the other building?

No, that's not one that's been proposed That's it's a it's just it's a stock photo of a great stock photo.

Yes.

Thank you So community involvement wanted you to spend a moment talking about that as I mentioned we began work in with the community in March of 2017 we had a series of three Focused workshops that focused on three topic areas that were identified as very important to the community first was on the core area This would be the area where the SMU zoning was implemented and we now have the ability our developers have the ability to And then we had a workshop on public realm that talked about the interface of new construction with the public right-of-way and then both private and publicly accessible open space areas.

And then finally a workshop on sub areas that were identified which include not only the core but areas around Ravenna Springs.

university place, et cetera.

Those were interspersed.

So those workshops were really the roll up sleeve sessions where folks gave up a significant amount of their time and really went through what the design guidelines needed to look like.

And then those were interspersed with a number of open house events that were taken up milestones along the way as workgroups did their work on draft guidelines.

And then we supplemented that with some other additional outreach events, including participating in the U District Street Fair, and then having some office hours and coffee shop meetups along the way, which is something we had done during the UDF and our overall planning process.

Just kind of kept that going.

So, now I'm going to just talk about a few highlights.

We don't have time to go through all the many guidelines, but just wanted to point out those that we thought were particularly unique or important in the U District neighborhood.

And first, I want to talk about the tall buildings.

Guidelines, and I think you were briefed on or I know you're briefed on this back in October when the South Lake Union Guidelines came through and were approved by committee and ultimately adopted so These are the same guidelines and just wanted to be clear the same guidelines that were proposed for South Lake Union are incorporated into the proposed U district as well as the uptown guidelines.

And those are, we're hearing from our design review board members, they're very much anticipating having these to use for future development that goes through their process.

And it really just adds some specificity to what needs to be considered for a tall building.

And I'll just point out that these will apply to projects that have 85 feet or greater in height.

And so they're located in the design concept, which is the third category of guidelines.

Okay, next.

Oh, yes.

There's a photo that says transitions to the sky.

Is that just the name of a project or is that a requirement?

Thank you.

No, transitions to the sky is actually one of the subcategories within the tall building design guidelines.

And so this image is taken from the draft or the proposed guidelines.

And what it is intended to talk about is how buildings transition to the sky.

So you have a tall building, what happens at the top of that building?

And so the idea is that it shouldn't just be a flat top, it should do something that announces its presence and is a little more interesting.

So, yes, thank you for that question.

But that guidance is not what it should be, it's just that it should be intentional.

And that's been really important in the district because we've been operating with high rise projects going to the design review board without that guidance.

Thank you.

Thank you.

That is what I've been hearing as well.

So I'm going to bounce back to just the highlights for the first category of guidelines that deal with context and site.

This is something that our workgroup members and community participants talked a lot about.

And so in the guidelines, we do identify these character areas that are shown on the slide here.

And this map A that's referred to in the guidelines and is shown on the slide.

is on page four of the proposed guidelines.

And so it's referred to in the context and site section where we have specific language that talks about University Park, U-Village, in the core area in the ave, for example, and some considerations that are important to community and should be considered if there's a development proposal in those areas.

This exhibit also identifies gateways and placemaking corners, and so in the upper right, There's an image with a reference to placemaking corner.

These were corners that intersections within the new district neighborhood that folks feel are really important.

Something should be happening there that represents and recognizes the pedestrian flow, the placemaking.

If there's a development that's located in one of these intersections, we should be looking for something happening here that both respects the amount of pedestrian activity and also is maybe a way finding or place making something special.

And again, there's a lot of flexibility.

identifying those key areas.

We're going to strongly encourage it in those places.

That is correct.

And there was a lot of discussion.

We started with actually some places that were identified in the urban design framework plan.

And then going back to the existing design guidelines, there were some gateways and special corners.

So we started out with looking at those as a start and then had some follow-up discussions.

And so there's sort of two tiers.

Gateways are slightly darker circles you'll see.

And then the slightly lighter ones are placemaking.

It's absolutely not the case that you can only do placemaking in those locations, but these were just highlighted as key intersections where it was felt like they're places where you're either entering the neighborhood or they're just places where things seem to happen, they're meet-up places, or could be.

So that's what those are about.

I would just add, Janet, too, that in the way the guidelines work, there is some specific guidance for those areas specifically.

So while any project could take advantage and consider that guidance, when the staff or the board is reviewing those projects at those locations, they will focus in on that specific guidance for those areas where projects outside of it might not be held to the So I think it's important for us to be able to have such a strict review with that guidance.

Absolutely.

Thank you.

And so I just have two more slides.

I wanted to highlight some of the content in the public life section.

And so in this section, there was a lot of community conversation about the importance of alleys, mid-block connections.

So there's alley activation work that's already underway in the U District, pretty successful.

So looking for opportunities to build on that where there are properties that are developments adjacent to alleyways, particularly those that have been identified as those that we'd like to continue And then there are also in the zoning requirements, in some cases, requirements for mid-block connections.

So there's a lot of discussion about if a mid-block connection is going to be required, how can the guidelines help inform how those take shape?

In the public life and connectivity section, there is a section that I have here represented on the slide that speaks specifically to shared alleys and mid-block connections, basically reemphasizes that they're encouraged, even if they're not required, they're certainly encouraged.

And that, and if there are design, the facades that fronting on these areas, they should be really provide, treated as a front, not a back.

And that there should be some activation going on opportunities things to happen along the alleyway.

And then wayfinding elements would also be important to traverse the blocks.

So that's one example.

And then lastly, in the public life section, there are references to the, there are some references to the transit center location, the importance of having convenient bicycle parking.

And then there's reference to mixed use corridors, which are also identified on the supplement, the maps that are found in the guidelines.

There are certain corridors such as the Ave and a number of, particularly north-south corridors between the Ave and Roosevelt and then the east-west corridors including 45th, 50th, 42nd, 43rd, so those primary most active corridors, that there be attention to I think it's important to be aware of what happens at the street front level, that there be activation, that there be mixed use.

And I will just point out that throughout the code, there are numerous places where there are references to the demarcation along storefronts at the street level where, and this is about activation and the fabric of the university district in particular.

People talk a lot about the ave and the smaller storefronts.

So there are continued references in the guidelines that encourage new development to replicate those in bays and entryways that you have rather than just a long facade with one entrance that you have, even if you only have one use.

that it appears that there's more going on.

So that's not represented on a slide, but I just wanted to point that out, because we do hear a lot about that.

So that really concludes what I wanted to say in terms of highlights.

And we have time for discussion.

Additional thoughts or questions?

Mr. Anteput, please.

Thank you.

And I appreciate the chance to be at the table with you this morning.

And I just wanted to point out that it's a good framework.

There is one issue that I know has been communicated with your office, Councilmember Johnson, about the labeling of the University Park area because University Park Community Club is very clear and they've worked very hard to be excluded from the urban center.

And what's labeled is actually south of the urban center line.

So they would respectfully request that that map be a label be amended to say University Park South.

I think they've communicated that with OPCD as well, but.

Do you mind going back to that slide, Jan, and just so that the folks who are at home can follow along?

Because they just don't want folks, my understanding is they don't want folks to think that now the guidelines refer to what happens north of the line, which is outside the urban center, and the guidelines do not.

So where it says University Park on there, if the word South was added, they'd be really happy.

And that has been communicated to us.

Ms. Panucci is hard at work on that amendment, and so it'll probably take a month or so, but we'll include it.

Okay, great.

But it's a great framework, and I think particularly, as Janet pointed out, the pedestrian network stuff, street-level activity and streetscape, so important with the 45th Street Link Station opening.

And notably the mid-block, the east-west connections because we've got these super long blocks and the connectivity that's absolutely critical.

And again, to credit to what the Northeast DRB has already been doing before these guidelines have been acted on, because we've had some of the, a number of those early outreach discussions, we've been able to point out to development teams that, oh, there are these draft guidelines and something that's really important are these, mid-block, east-block, east-west connections.

Like, oh, that's great.

So then they go to DRB for early design guidance and they can reference the conversation we've had and the fact that up here to four draft guidelines call out how important that is.

So that is super helpful and we're looking forward to that being, you know, sort of on the books for those purposes.

The only other thing that I'll just talk about really specifically is about tall buildings and not having had specific guidance on tall buildings.

Again, a shout out to the DRB for working with what's on the books and the citywide guidelines because we've got, you know, because of topography, the U District and that high rise zone, that's a whole new regionally significant skyline.

And to be able to, and to the question of meeting the sky, what does that mean for tall buildings, having this guidance, super important.

Teams that have come before DRB or in these early outreach discussions, have been apprised of that and responsive and so that's really great.

Although I will say that now that we do have a half a dozen real tall buildings, real high rises in the pipeline, I think it's important to point out that we still need some new, some additional important tools.

And, you know, those kind of new developments represent land values that are really substantial and that is displacing.

A lot of the fine grain that you talked about retail, you know, that retail that's fine grain, the below market rent that's provided in church properties and a lot of historic character buildings are now really at risk.

And knowing fully well that design guidance is not the tool to address those issues, I just feel it's important to point out that we have more work to do.

And you know the big old church properties that provide child care and human services, and they're on the auction block as we speak But what's happening on the Ave.

You know was sort of punted from the from the up zone process, so we still need tools to work to preserve and protect those and to leverage those important assets.

So I'm just looking forward to more discussion with the city, public investments, private-public partnerships, TDRs and other kind of things that aren't design guidance but are still necessary for us to keep going forward and I look forward to that.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Further thoughts, colleagues?

So this item, because we're not going to have a PLUS committee discussion in January, We'll use the PLUS time in January to discuss the citywide MHA discussions.

We're not going to have this back in front of us until February.

So, February 6th will be our public hearing on this topic.

I'm not anticipating a high volume of comments, so it's possible that we could suspend the rules on that day and have the public hearing and vote the bill out of committee that same day, but we'll just see how it goes when we get to that point in February.

Anything you'd like to add, Ms. Mucci?

I would just add one.

Thank you for the direction on the amendment regarding the University Park South area.

So I will work on that amendment for the February 6th meeting.

I'll just note that there will be one other clarifying amendment that I'll have prepared for you, which is adding language.

at the front end of the guidelines making it clear that while the guidelines sometimes, the guidance in these guidelines sometimes spills over into the right of way and the board certainly provides guidance and it's talked about at the design review board.

The authority lies with the Department of Transportation and so sort of approval of any exchanges in the right-of-way goes through that process.

So sort of getting at the question of parking earlier, just providing some clarifying language of what their authority is and setting expectations.

Excellent.

Okay, thanks folks.

Noah, would you read our last item of business and I'll ask the Uptown folks to join us at the table.

Agenda item 3, Uptown neighborhood design guidelines.

And I don't believe we have to switch presentations, but just hit the next button, right?

Why don't we start again with another round of introductions.

Ms. Panucci, will you start us off?

Ali Panucci, Council Central staff.

Maria Barrientos, co-chair of the Upton Land Use Review Committee.

Katie Edzorek, former West Design Review member and former co-chair during the design review guidelines process of the up lurk.

And Patrice Carroll from the Office of Planning and Community Development.

Thanks.

So we are switching over to the Uptown neighborhood.

And thank you, Janet, for doing that nice overview of the design review program for us.

So this has been a five-year process.

So these design guidelines are really culminating in a process that began back in 2013, similar to the university district.

There was an urban design framework developed with a lot of community involvement.

That moved into looking at zoning alternatives and an EIS process.

Also the MHA zoning was applied in the neighborhood.

Development standards and other incentives were incorporated into changes in the land use code.

And so today we're here to talk about one of the implementing, another implementing tool of all of this work with the community is the Neighborhood Design Guidelines.

Various entities have been involved throughout this five-year process.

And some of the issues of why to update the guidelines are very, again, very similar to the university district.

Some of the, in addition to the implementation of the urban design framework and the rezoning, we also had, we did a very thorough kind of comparison with the 2013 citywide design guidelines.

And so we were able to reduce some of the redundancy and really focus on the things that are unique to this neighborhood.

During this time, there was also the Uptown Alliance decided to form its own land use review committee.

And so we were able to take advantage and work with that new organization to develop these guidelines.

And then also over this period of time, there was also a new arts district formed in Uptown, which also influenced some of our thinking about design guidelines.

There was a lot of work going on, although we didn't have the final alignments or discussions of station areas.

But we certainly knew that light rail was coming to this neighborhood, and also that there were going to be significant changes at the Seattle Center.

So these were all very important things that were kind of happening at the same time that we were looking at the design guidelines.

We had a little bit more of a compressed community involvement process here because I think we were able to follow on with this very quickly after all of this other foundational work had been done.

Again, this is just an implementing tool.

The community had spent a lot of time identifying what was important and forming a vision.

And so this was really just a tool to sort of help us implement that vision.

So we worked just really over the last year So began working with the Uptown Alliance Land Use Review Committee and really focused on getting a draft that we could focus the broader community involvement on getting people's reactions to that draft.

So we participated in a joint public open house about a number of projects that were going on in this area.

We had office hours.

We did an online survey.

And so these were some of the tools that we were able to get.

We were able to get that specific feedback.

Priority design issues.

I think the thing I heard the most from the community was the fact that this really needed to be a walkable neighborhood throughout.

It's very unique in terms of an urban center in that it really has that very mixed-use character.

It's an employment center, but it's also a residential neighborhood, and it's a regional destination.

So yes, we do have important corridors, but there was really an effort to make sure that the entire neighborhood is walkable.

Then a new issue came up with we had a lot of discussion around what it means to be new development in an arts district and how could that be expressed?

How could we use the design guidelines to really make that district visible?

We too were looking at tall buildings and so we did incorporate the tall building guidelines because there is a small section in Uptown that is also going to have those tall buildings.

anticipating the new light rail station.

And the very unique characteristic of this neighborhood in that we have this regional destination, the Seattle Center, kind of right in the middle.

And so the edges around the Seattle Center was also an important thing for us to address in the guidelines.

So just a few of the issues that came up in the context and site section.

Topography, we know this is the lower slopes of Queen Anne Hill, so topography was very important.

Also, the green, and incorporating the green, even though it's the stents urban environment, a lot of emphasis on habitat and native species.

Important locations, the gateways, where are the gateways, the corner sites, and again, those areas that are adjacent to the Seattle Center, and ways to make the art district visible.

Here's just an example of some of the guidance that we came up with for the Arts and Cultural District.

So just flagging that there could be ways through banners, through wayfinding, through building names, plaques, and we're not saying specifically what that can be, but we're seeing a lot of opportunities.

Public life really was focused on this diagram, which came out of the urban design framework.

So this was where we were able to give some guidance for those things that were called out as the gateways, the very important heart of uptown, the edges of the Seattle Center, the special streets that were identified.

We, too, were looking for ways to include guidance about smaller retail spaces within the neighborhoods, particularly along those important pedestrian streets.

There was also an issue around live work and that sometimes that doesn't have the activating effect that we want, and so we did include some additional guidance on that topic as well.

And again, here's just an example of some of the guidance that's in the public life, paying a lot of attention to that interface between the private development and the adjacent street.

Patrice, you mentioned the live work.

Can you tell me a little more about that?

Tell me a little more about that.

So what we see in a lot of the live work development that's been incorporated in some of the neighborhood commercial districts is that the idea of those being kind of semi-retail spaces or spaces where there's more pedestrian activating uses.

tend to not have that effect.

And so just including some additional guidance that amplifies what's in the land use code, using landscape, using entryways, window treatments to try and make that a little more active.

So I know that that is a challenge in a lot of neighborhoods.

Yeah, and it seems, back to our theme in the last conversation too, how much can you do about design and how much is about use.

And so, it's a really creative tool and for the right spot, it's great.

It feels like in our current market, there's so much demand for just pure residential that seems to be absorbing a lot of the live workspace and doesn't have the desired effect.

And so, I don't, you know, maybe that'll shift with the market, but maybe there's other code things we need to think about.

Or Maria and Katie, if you have some thoughts about this topic that you wanted to share.

Oh, yeah, both as a developer and as part of the Uptown Alliance.

We spent a lot of time thinking about it, actually.

I think we spent a lot of time walking around the neighborhood and looking at what really works and live-work units and what doesn't.

And what we've realized is that there's an opportunity to really celebrate live-work.

It doesn't matter what street it's on, and the challenge is How do you create connectivity and making it feel a little more pleasant and security and privacy?

Because that's what happens.

Even in live work, if you assume someone's working there, After hours, they live there.

And what happens is the old architectural design guidelines really discouraged any screening.

And so I think all it did was contribute to making it even more passive and less active.

And what we've decided is to encourage screening so that there is privacy if it's going to be live work.

And there's so many ways to accomplish both privacy and making it visually pleasant and less passive by planters and screens.

you know, planting beds and other ways to make them look really good.

And there's a lot of examples of projects that have done it really well.

And we think that that's a good thing.

There's no, there's no, there's, it's not bad to provide screening in front of a live work unit.

It's what it looks like.

So it still encourages a peekaboo into that space during the day when there's someone working there, but also makes it pleasant in non-work hours that, It feels good for pedestrians walking by.

Yeah, I would echo what Maria said.

During the design review guidelines review process, we took a walk through the neighborhood of Patrice and Lyle and Jim and looked at some of the examples of what did work and didn't.

And the use itself doesn't really do the job.

We still see a lot of buildings with shades drawn, and we just don't have the activation.

But those buildings that do a little bit more to provide that kind of space, that buffer, the opportunity for personalization and some more interest at the pedestrian level are really the ones that are more successful.

Whether or not the blinds are drawn, there's something there that's activating.

Because even if people are working there, you don't want to be in a fishbowl during the day.

And so I think that there's been some flaws in that architecture around how you deal with it and realities that we're trying to correct, at least in Uptown.

So I think we had a very interesting discussion in looking at some of the design concept guidance.

Previously there had been a lot of guidance in Uptown that really tried to tie to the historic character.

There is this wonderful mix of buildings of different eras.

And also a lot of very new and exciting and contemporary architectural styles there.

And so I think that the community was ready to embrace sort of a more open, more openness to the architectural styles.

And so a lot of the old language about trying to mimic historic styles kind of fell away.

But there was no preferred architectural style, but still very much an emphasis on high quality materials.

And also recognizing that there's ways that I think the bottom picture illustrates that even a contemporary building can pick up some cues from the very wonderful and rich older buildings in the neighborhood and create exciting but contemporary architecture.

So that was something that we spent a lot of time talking about.

I'd say the other big topic that we spent a lot of time talking about was how to integrate art into some of these buildings.

And so here's an example from the neighborhood of where art has been kind of used to really enliven a street that leads to the Seattle Center.

So I think the community will be looking for more opportunities to do that in the future as part of their arts district's initiatives.

And again, here is just an example of some of the guidance that talks about that range of styles.

and highlighting some of the opportunities for art in the neighborhood.

So that's our quick run through.

Katie, Maria, any final thoughts that you want to share as we close out the discussion this morning?

I think Patrice did a great job of outlining the background for the urban design guidelines.

We've had a lot of changes in uptown in the past several years, the urban design framework, the rezone, the establishment of the arts and cultural district.

And as someone who sat on the design review board while that was going on, it's really great to see the guidelines start to reflect those values and changes that are happening.

So we've been very happy with the process from the neighborhood standpoint.

Yes, I have a little more to add.

First, I want to thank the Council for providing the funds to have OPCD work with us because we've wanted to update these design guidelines for quite some time.

I also want to do a shout out to the Uptown Land Use Review Committee.

We have a fairly large group of very smart, capable, thoughtful people who really love Uptown, and they spend a lot of time thinking about growth and what the Uptown community should look like as we grow in the future.

Everyone is, we embrace density and growth and we really want Uptown to be, have a lot more density in it.

And it helps us think about, so what should that look like?

I will also say it's been very frustrating for us as community members that the design guidelines, the current design guidelines for Uptown are very old and out of date.

The genesis of really wanting to update these has been six years since we did the urban design framework, which really defines our neighborhood plan of what we want Uptown to look like.

Also with the Uptown arts and culture designation, we want a lot more physical celebration.

of arts and culture and diversity, both in a lot of it physical and visual diversity, as well as diversity in the people who live there, because architecture alone can't create a wonderful neighborhood.

I think the diversity and encouraging more affordable housing and artists to live there will continue to make it a more rich and diverse neighborhood.

Again, it's frustrating to us that the Design Review Board is still evaluating projects in uptown based on old out-of-date guidelines when we've grown and changed so much, and there's just a big disconnect between the values of the neighborhood and where we're going and the old, old design guidelines.

So, we do desire these new design guidelines to be approved as quickly as possible.

I hate to think about February 6th, but we'll live with whatever process there is.

I also, one of the things that Patrice did not really capture as well is we really want A lot of creative lighting, creative signage, color reflecting a funky, creative architectural character.

So when we meet with developers that are going to build there, we really encourage that funkiness and diversity because it's going to make the neighborhood architecturally and physically more interesting.

for people that visit.

And that is one thing that we've really hit a wall on with Design Review Board, who discourages all of the things we want to do.

So again, the sooner we can get these guidelines in place, the better.

And how do you write a guideline for funky?

Well, you know, there's a couple of projects coming up one of them on First North that's eventually going to be across the street from a light rail station entry they wanted to and we encourage the use of color in the material the exterior cladding materials and we just thought it'd be fun and different and design review board nixed it.

So we've spent a lot of time writing to the planner to say, oh, come on, this is like exactly what we want to see.

The current design guidelines discourage murals.

We want murals.

And we've got this wonderful uptown arts and culture coalition that we encourage all developers to go meet with them to get ideas on what would be good for the neighborhood.

You know, they've just come up with their new branding.

We're going to have banners that celebrate uptown.

We're working very tightly with Seattle Center and OVG and the NHL folks to to have our branding include all three of us and include our logos and brands.

And they're really working with the Uptown Arts and Culture Coalition to make sure that we have continually pushing a celebration of different things.

So color, materials, textures, banners, murals, Funky signs, those are good things.

And lighting, encouraging more lighting.

We actually can't wait to see what the lighting and signage that OVG comes up with for the Seattle Arena, because we think it can really enhance and be a plus for the neighborhood.

I just want to, for one, thank the uptown community for recognizing how these kinds of design elements, while they in themselves cannot create out of whole cloth a diverse community.

They are an important element of attracting different kinds of people to want to live and work in that neighborhood.

So I think I agree it's a really important element, and I appreciate you guys lifting it up.

And Maria, we can't go any faster, because we don't actually have a bill yet.

So we're still waiting on that bill, although I think it's being transmitted this week, Patrice.

I'll move it.

We've got to wait for a bill, and then we've got to have a public hearing on that bill, and then we've got to vote that bill out of committee.

So it is going to just be another eight weeks or so, but we'd love to have you all back again on the 6th and saying a lot of the positive things about public hearings so that we can get this across the finish line as quickly as possible.

Thank you.

Other thoughts or questions, colleagues?

Okay.

Thank you very much for joining us this morning.

We appreciate this and appreciate your patience, as I know it's been a lot of years of a lot of work.

That is it for us for 2018, folks, and Happy New Year.

And we won't be here in January as a committee.

We will be here in January as a select committee on MHA, but our next PLUS committee meeting won't be until February the 6th.

We're adjourned.

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