Members of the PLUS Committee:
Richard Conlin, Chair, email: richard.conlin@seattle.gov, phone:206-684-8805
Tim Burgess, Vice-Chair, email: tim.burgess@seattle.gov, phone: 206-684-8806
Mike O’Brien, email: mike.obrien@seattle.gov, phone: 206-684-8800
Sally J. Clark, email: sally.clark@seattle.gov, phone: 206-684-8802

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Yeah, I heard about this and read up on it already. I really wish this loop hole for developers was actually an honest attempt to build green buildings but it is obvious it isn’t. If it was legitimate the penalties for not succeeding would be substantial. It appears they aren’t. This pilot program is, as another person said, a scam.

We get to walk down dark streets for even more months of the year ! woohoo !

The proposal for 12th Avenue by Schemata is so out of scale and context that the image of its proposed building does not even fit on the cover with its neighbors on the street. Over half of the height is cropped out of the picture.
see it here: http://www.seattle.gov/dpd/AppDocs/GroupMeetings/DRProposal3

We have already gone up, from 3 stories to 4 in these residential neighborhoods. And we re going up like crazy in south lake union,,dexter, etc. cities have areas with different zoning, even Chicago has vast low rise areas.

More building just as easily promotes land value increases,,flipping, maximizing profit, etc. – no,guarantee at all that this leads to,affordability, unless you believe capitalists are community minded at heart.

*news* not new…. Sorry

A curious argument indeed, defending the scale of the proposed CHUC building by pointing to other proposed out-of-scale buildings along the same street. A bit like a mugger defending himself by pointing out that his neighbor to the south is a tax chiseler and the guy across the street is an embezzler.

The fact of the matter is this: the zoning for the site of the project is NC3-40. Buildings in that zoning are supposed to top out at 40′ above the average grade on the site. But due to all the goodies that the pro-developer folks downtown have slipped into the Land Use codes while nobody was watching, we’re seeing a whole row of proposed buildings on that street that make an absolute mockery of the nominal 40′ height limit. And they each use the other’s out-of-scale height to justify their own. A nice scam, don’t you think?

Another unfortunate fact: the CHUC project is capped by a very large rooftop penthouse, shoved against the north side of the structure to maximize the shadow it will cast over its neighbors. While it’s hard to determine the exact height from the poorly dimensioned elevation drawings presented for design review, here’s what it’s looking like: if you drop a bowling ball from the roof of the penthouse, it will fall straight down along a blank wall for over 70′ before landing in the shadows below. Anybody living within a couple hundred feet of this structure won’t get direct sunlight in their home or garden for much of the year. Some won’t get direct sunlight for MOST of the year. How’s that for showing the neighbors a little respect?

As for the building’s efficiency, the most efficient way I know to keep a building warm and bright in the winter and well-ventilated in summer is to provide lots of south-facing windows and lots of cross-ventilation. How many south-facing windows are there in the proposed CHUC building? Zero. Not a one. How many north-facing windows to capture that cool northerly breeze we get on warm summer days like today? Zippo again. Not a one. Why? Because the building will be shoved right up to the property lines, and its huge unadorned north and south walls have to meet the standard for 1-hour firewalls. No windows, no penetration of any sort. Just a big ugly blank wall on both sides. Lets hope those energy-gobbling lighting and climate control systems are good ones. They’re going to need them. Of course those problems could be avoided by stepping the building back from the property line a few feet so that windows could be installed. But then you don’t get the maximum return on investment, do you?

As for the “move to the suburbs if you don’t like it” argument, it barely merits a response. I’ll just point out that many of the neighbors who feel ill-treated by this proposal are from families who put their roots down in Capitol Hill in the 1920’s and 1930’s. It’s their city too, and like a lot of us, they’re not too happy about the way that the ground rules have been changed without a lot of community participation. But trust me, we’re all paying attention now, and things are about to get pretty bumpy.

The cute little diagram of green homes might represent 16th or 17th Ave north of John, but definitely NOT this stretch of 12th Avenue in the Capitol Hill Urban Village and the Station Area Overlay.

An accurate diagram of the east side of 12th Avenue would include the following, starting at Pine and moving toward the light rail station:
• 4-story mixed use building with apartments above.
• 6-story Capitol Housing 12th Avenue Arts (starting construction in November): 88 residential units, two theaters, commercial space.
• 3-story house

Proceeding north past Olive:
• Expansive 2-parcel parking lot for an auto repair garage.
• 3-story mixed use apartment building (lockshop).
• 1-story house (PRK)
• [our site, with proposed 5-story building mass on 12th]
• 1-story Capitol Hill Grocery
• 2-story house

North of Howell:
• 4-story apartment building
• 6-story micro-apartment building (finishing permitting)
• 3-story apartment building
• 2-story house as offices
• 2-story vet clinic
• 5-story mixed-use apartment building
• 3-story mixed-use (Chungees)

The west side of 12th also has two new 4-story apartment buildings coming our way in the next year, but is mostly 3 & 4 story buildings.

The existing 4-story apartment building at the corner of 12th Avenue & Howell Street (just north of our proposed building on 12th) clearly shows what is currently allowed on this stretch of 12th Ave, from Olive to Denny. How could they build this monster in 1909? Across the street from the site is the Roosevelt Apartment Building built in 1925, this has 4-stories clearly visible from Howell. Walk a short block to the 4-story apartment building just east of there at the corner of 13th and Howell built in 1923 – is this another monster? Walk north to the next corner and there’s a 5-story building built in 1928? Are you still scared?

As a future resident of the proposed building, our request through the Living Building Pilot Ordinance is an additional 10-feet of height over the currently zoned 44-feet of (4-stories) for a 5-story building volume on 12th Avenue. The 1-story slope from 12th Avenue up to the alley allows for the same height to be built on the alley (50-feet over basement), so the building terraces back at the midpoint of roof level. The additional 10-feet of height is in exchange for creating a courtyard space that is allows us to substantially reduce energy consumption in the building. Other sustainable aspects of the proposal that we commit to are reduced water consumption, reduction of toxic building materials, a rooftop agricultural farm (a full description of the “petals” can be found in the appendix of the Early Design Guidance packet for those who were not able to attend the public meeting.) The stair and elevator are required by the City for rooftop access and are allowed by the City to extend above the requested 50-foot height.

It appears that the writer and subsequent posters are unaware of the construction that starts in November – the 12th Avenue Arts project by Capitol Hill Housing will be a 6-story mixed use building with commercial space, two theaters and affordable housing. Just north of Howell is a 6-story micro-apartment project currently finishing its building permit reviews. There are 2 other developments at 4-stories on the west side of Denny that are proposed to start construction around the same time. All of those are very exciting to us, because it means more amenities nearby, more activity on the street and for local retail, and in the words of Jane Jacobs, more “eyes on the street” for a safer neighborhood.

Fortunately, there are larger buildings in the neighborhood that support a wide diversity of people living, working and playing on Capitol Hill. Without these larger multifamily buildings, we’d likely have an affluent neighborhood of expensive single-family detached homes with few residents per house. Look around Seattle to see other neighborhoods where large family-sized homes are now left with one or two residents. To the author of the original post, what would be really be scary is if we left the Capitol Hill neighborhood exactly as it is now, finished our light rail system & street car line, but didn’t have the residential population to support or effectively use that infrastructure. We need to increase opportunities for people to live within the 5-minute walk of the light rail station, and our proposed, narrow building is just one approach to do so, larger buildings on multiple parcels as will occur south of our site is another.

Architects who glance at the proposed plan for 1720-12th Avenue seem quite amazed by the “design.”

   • At least four of the bedrooms in the building are totally without windows – a design considered unsafe for fire and rescue.   Is it healthy or green to do away with light and air in a bedroom?

   • In a fire or other emergency, it is essential that one have access to alternate escape routes – we have come to expect this in modern building design.  Even the much maligned single family home has a front and back door that opens directly to the exterior.  Are we to expect less in a high-rise building containing twin type towers?  

   • Shouldn’t there be two sets of stairways at opposite ends of a building mass so people have alternate escape routes so they do not burn to death if a single pathway is blocked with smoke, flame, and burning debris?  Here, there is only one staircase to serve two towers.  It is located in the center of the building next to a light court.  A view of the sky is charming but forms a shaft of flame under pressure of a fire storm.  A building’s windows are blown out under pressure of expanding gasses.   Then with a shaftway,  flames leap high upward for oxygen. Where is the only vertical exit here?  It is in the worst place imaginable – immediately adjacent to a possibly red hot light shaft to the sky.

   • If one makes it through a fire in the towers and arrives at an exit elevation, he still finds himself in the middle of a burning building.  A journey to the exterior will take him through half the length of the building with but one direction out – toward the alley and one direction out onto 12th Ave.

   • Our Fire Department will have difficulty driving down the dirty, unimproved alley behind the building,  full of deep potholes and narrowed by foliage.   This is the same alley the designer takes no responsibility for fixing up and paving but uses it as an “amenity” for interaction amongst building occupants.  

   • As for the elimination of parking on building grounds, we know that on-site vehicular storage eats into floor area which can otherwise be used for living space (FAR).  If one can eliminate parking,  more rental dollars can be harvested every month.  In time, that can constitute serious money.  No parking for “green” reasons – don’t think so.

   • Also a building with parking requires a substantial, fire safe structure, perhaps even fire sprinklers.  With no parking in the building, guests, friends, repair vehicles are dumped onto our existing streets for absorption.  Since street parking is already overloaded, on come the parking meter people to keep things moving.

So what do the terms “green” and “challenge” mean to the designers/owners of this building and to our City?  What do the terms mean to YOU?  The terms are quite well defined but must be scrupulously met if they are to have merit.

Are designers and code authorities naively playing with our safety here?  It is quite apparent we have a cheap building, without parking, without alternate escape routes, with interior bedrooms devoid of windows, increased building heights over the 40 foot limit so as to stuff-in more money laden occupants, a protruding mechanical penthouse over and above the 40 foot height limit, an interior light court which will be a torch in a fire storm and placed directly alongside the only means of egress, a building full of occupants attempting to be green but failing.  This project is only a “challenge” to the status quo with little penalty and certainly no tear-down envisioned for failure.    

Usually, tall buildings with commerce fall under stringent Commercial Codes for good reason, residential codes fall short of covering all the bases.   Building and zoning codes can point to “green” safe structures if designers and City officials are so disposed.

On a curious note.  Take a look at neighboring low rise apartment complexes in the area.  On just two stories – 10 to 12 units, all generous, all with two means of
ingress/egress.  Lets learn from the past for we already have here on Capitol Hill, one of the most densely populated yet livable areas in the Nation.  Scrupulous development can keep it that way long into the future.

Several points of clarification:

•Mr. Mariano, searching to justify the scale of his project, points to 4 other nearby structures built between 1909 and 1928. Three of them would likely be allowable under the current 40’+4′ height limit without needing to take advantage of any of the pro-developer giveaways written into the code in recent years with minimal public outreach and participation. The fourth, being 5 stories, would exceed the current height limit, but what the writer neglects to mention is that Seattle did not begin systematically drawing up zoning ordinances until the mid-1920’s. So even the 5-story building was probably legal at the time it was built. The city later saw fit to scale down the size of buildings in the neighborhood to something more compatible with residential life, and for good reason, one might think. Mr. Mariano and his colleagues are now proposing a building with six floors capped by a rooftop structure about the size of my grandma’s little ranch house, and far taller than anything currently standing nearby.

•The requested height for the structure in question is 54′, not 50′, as Mr. Mariano states above. On p. 25 of the proposal submitted to DPD, one finds the following: “We propose 10 feet above the 44 foot limit (for a total of 54 feet). See SMC 23.41.012.2.F”

•Mr. Mariano points out that “The additional 10-feet of height is in exchange for creating a courtyard space that is allows us to substantially reduce energy consumption in the building.” His colleague Kimberly writes above that “One of the main reasons we cannot have north or south facing windows is that we know the buildings next to us will be built up to a height that will make those windows useless.” If the latter is correct, and another equally tall building is built along the south “party wall” (by whom,one wonders?), then this “energy-saving courtyard” will be reduced to little more than a dark, moldy airshaft. The only thing green about that feature will be the moss building up inside. Are the building’s future tenants aware of this?

•Mr. Mariano makes reference the proposed “rooftop agricultural farm”. Having once lived on a farm (a real one, with tractors, silo, livestock etc), might I politely suggest that we be spared the new-age hyperbole? A roof garden is one thing, a farm another thing altogether; at some point a difference in scale becomes a difference in kind, don’t you think?

Representatives from the International Living Futures Institute attended the Seattle City Council Meeting on July 9, 2012 and disavowed Part C of the Seattle law. Such buildings would not be certified as Living Challenge Buildings and not allowed to use the trademarked name of “Living Building Challenge.” Both the Capitol Hill building and the Wallingford/Fremont building fall in the C part of the law so it seems they cannot qualify or call themselves “Living Building Challenge” projects. So it seems, the International Living Futures Institute recognizes greenwashing when they see it.