Category Archives: Housing

Plans, Plans, Plans: The Visions for Seattle’s Future

Posted on January 30, 2014 by Scott Bonjukian

On Thursday night a crowd of hundreds gathered to share ideas for Seattle’s future. Co-hosted by the Seattle Art Museum and the city’s Department of Planning and Development, the evening kicked off the city’s comprehensive plan update process that will … Continue reading →

Posted in Demographics, Government, Housing, Land Use, Landscape, Parks, Public Space, Resources, Schools, Sustainability, Transportation | Tagged comprehensive plan, department of planning and development, DPD, Olympic Sculpture Park, Pecha Kucha, presentation, public participation, SAM, Seattle, Seattle 2035, Seattle Art Museum, update | 10 Comments

Residents Protest Lowrise Height Limits

Posted on January 14, 2014 by Scott Bonjukian

A 2010 change to Seattle’s Lowrise 3 (LR3) zoning designation hasn’t sparked much public interest until now, when the economy has picked up and developers are taking advantage of increased height limits for new multi-family buildings. Residents in neighborhoods with … Continue reading →

Posted in Demographics, Government, Housing, Land Use, Policy, Residential | Tagged affordability, affordable housing, Capitol Hill, City Council, codes, density, department of planning and development, growth, height, homeowners, housing, lowrise, lowrise 3, LR3, multi-family, neighborhoods, Seattle, single family, zoning | 2 Comments

Parking-Free Development Making Appearances

Posted on December 23, 2013 by Scott Bonjukian

In the postwar decades of the 20th century American cities stood by their carefully calculated minimum parking requirements, resulting in underutilized land and encouragement of car travel. Planners outside of the largest cities have started to reverse this trend by … Continue reading →

Posted in Housing, Land Use, Parking, Transportation | Tagged asphalt, concrete, development, garages, land use, off-street, on-street, parking, parking-free, Seattle, suburbs, urban, zoning | 2 Comments

Thinking Outside the (Big) Box

Posted on October 7, 2013 by Scott Bonjukian

The U.S. is seeing a slow reversal of a half-century of migration to the suburbs, with people more interested in walkable communities closer to the core cities of metropolitan regions. With the Millennial generation also less interested in driving and … Continue reading →

Posted in Editorial, Housing, Land Use, Landscape, Mixed Use, Parks, Public Space, Sustainability | Tagged green spaces, mall conversion, parking, solar panels, suburban redevelopment, thinking outside the big box | 6 Comments

(re)Building Resilient Communities

Posted on September 26, 2013 by Scott Bonjukian

As the impacts of climate change become more noticeable around the world, planners and politicians are taking steps to reinforce their cities against natural disasters. Though climate scientists stress that no single weather event can be attributed to climate change, … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate, Government, Housing, Land Use, Landscape, Megaprojects, Policy, Residential, Resources, Sustainability | Tagged 3C competition, barriers, beach, billions, buyout, climate change, coastal, defense, dunes, FEMA, flood zone, flooding, fortification, global warming, Hurricane Sandy, hurricanes, infrastructure, New York, ORLI, refugees, resilency, Sandy, sea level rise, seawalls, superstorm, winds | 6 Comments

Mixed-Use Project to Increase Urban Vitality in D.C.

Posted on August 19, 2013 by Scott Bonjukian

For a little break from the Northwest we venture to the nation’s capital in the other Washington, where an exciting urban design project is under construction. On a 10-acre megablock previously home to a convention center, the CityCenterDC project will … Continue reading →

Posted in Density, Housing, Land Use, Mixed Use, Parks, Public Space, Sustainability | Tagged apartments, CityCenterDC, condominiums, condos, convention center, green roofs, hotel, LEED ND, mayor, mixed-use, neighborhood development, office, park, pedestrian, redevelopment, retail, urban design, Washington D.C. | Leave a comment

Planning to Preserve Wilderness

Posted on August 12, 2013 by Scott Bonjukian

Trees, mountains, streams, and wildlife. These attributes and the recreational opportunities offered by them are why many people choose to live in the Northwest. The abundance of wilderness areas in this region goes back to European colonization being only recent … Continue reading →

Posted in Agriculture, Density, Government, Housing, Land Use, Resources, Sustainability, Wilderness | Tagged agriculture, boundaries, city limits, conservation, density, forest service, forestry, growth management, law, logging, mining, national parks, naturalists, Oregon, outdoors, preservation, recreation, urban growth area, urban growth boundary, Washington, wilderness | 1 Comment

Survey Affirms Millennials’ Move to Cities

Posted on August 6, 2013 by Scott Bonjukian

The Millennial generation, which I describe as people born between 1985 and 1995, has long been heralded as a game-changer in urban issues. Apparently we want to drive less, text and share more, and live closer to everything, and extrapolating … Continue reading →

Posted in Demographics, Housing, Transportation | Tagged density, diversity, housing, Millennials, transportation modes, walkability | 3 Comments