A rendering of the future “learning terrace”
Seattle Public Schools plans to renovate and expand Montlake Elementary School are pressing forward, over the objections of some neighbors who say the new school will be too big for the site and for the neighborhood.
The city’s Department of Neighborhoods has completed a review of the proposal, and has passed its recommendation along to the Department of Construction and Inspections, which will make the final ruling.
The existing 22,000-square-foot historic school along 22nd Ave E would be maintained, while being renovated and modernized. The existing six portables, cafeteria and small greenhouse would be removed. In their place, the district plans to build a new, 80,500-square-foot building along E Calhoun, stretching the length of the block, and wrapping around 20th Ave E. Additionally, a new gym will be constructed at 20th and E McGraw.
The end result will give a roughly C-shaped campus, with a courtyard used as an outdoor play area. Additional outdoor space will be available on the roof of the gym, and in a mezzanine-like called a “learning terrace” coming off the new building with room for many more students.
The dramatic potential enrollment increase is a big part of what’s upsetting many neighbors. After the renovations and expansion, the school will be able to serve 500 students. In the current, 2022-23 school year, the school has an enrollment of 184. That’s down from a recent high of 268 students in the 2017-18 school year.
The all-time high for enrollment at Montlake was 487 students was back in 1935-36, when the school housed grades K-8. It’s now K-5.
Not all neighbors are upset about the proposal, of course. In public comments filed with the city’s Department of Neighborhoods, some gave the project unequivocal support.
An aerial rendering of the project
Those that were upset look at the potential enrollment and say it will play havoc with the neighborhood’s character. They note the school is a small campus (second smallest in the city) in an area with narrow streets and has no dedicated parking. They generally say the root of the problem is fitting too big a school onto too small a site.
“Shoehorning the buildings–proposed for 500 students– to cover most of what vies for the smallest school lot in the city, would be about a tripling of current school, staff, and student body size. This though even Seattle School District’s website indicates little to no growth in number of households in the Montlake community in the next five years,” wrote Montlake resident Arthur Dorros in a comment to the Department of Neighborhoods.
Additionally, parents and neighbors point to district projections which call for falling enrollment across the district for the next 10 years. 
At a January school board meeting, district officials floated the idea that some schools in Seattle may need to be closed (they used the term consolidation) in order to cut costs. The conversation was preliminary, and the district hasn’t yet started formal, public discussions about closures.
Even without the specter of school closures hanging over the process, neighbors questioned the need for more space on the site.
“Who is asking for this? What is magic about 500 students?” wrote neighbor Bill Kuhn.
During an online community update about the expansion, district officials noted that Seattle Public Schools only plans elementary schools in two sizes, 500 students or 650. In a Dec. 13 video project update, district officials said those levels exist because those student population levels create efficiencies in terms of programming and staffing levels.
Additionally, Seattle Public Schools builds projects to last about 75 years. So even though enrollment has been trending down, and is projected to continue to do so for at least the next 10 years, the space may be needed in coming decades as the city continues to grow. Designing added capacity is intended to allow for flexibility in the future.
The existing building was constructed in 1924, and has some features reminiscent of that era, such as entrances that had been designed to be gender-specific. They’re not used that way anymore, but it does mean the building doesn’t have a real main entrance. It’s also lacking things like an elevator to help people with mobility impairments navigate its multiple floors. Both issues will be addressed in the new construction.
Current plans call for construction to start in July 2023, lasting about 19 months, with completion in time for the 2025-26 school year. During the two school years of construction, students will be bused to the John Marshall Interim Site near Green Lake.
The renovation was approved as part of the February 2019 BEX V levy. The overall levy funds dozens of projects scattered across the city to the tune of $1.4 billion. The Montlake renovation portion of that levy is budgeted for $64.8 million.
Some facets of the project plan run up against building codes. In order to progress, the project will require nine “departures” from those codes. Departures are a common, routine occurrence for construction projects across Seattle.
When the project is a school, it falls to the City’s Department of Neighborhoods to study the proposal and make a recommendation on whether or not the requested departures are acceptable. In the case of Montlake. The Department of Neighborhoods recommended in a Nov. 22, 2022 document to allow all nine, but did recommend imposing conditions upon two.
The first conditional approval was about parking. Parking issues have long been an issue in the neighborhood, say residents. The school as is has no parking, forcing teachers, parent volunteers and other to find spots in the neighborhood. Expanding the school, they note, would obviously exacerbate this problem.
“During weekdays in the school year our area has pressure on available parking from four primary sources; residents, local businesses, UW Medicine, and Montlake School. Regardless of what various studies say, our experience is that there are times when weekday parking is challenging in our area for residents, some of whom are elderly and struggle to park a distance from their homes,” wrote Lorne Balanski.
By city codes, the expanded school should provide 131 spots. Instead, it provides zero, the same as is currently available. The Department of Neighborhoods said no parking is OK, if the school comes up with a transportation management plan; makes sure there is safe pedestrian access; develops a way to communicate with the neighborhood about school events; and updates access and signage.
Some neighbors had expressed concerns about a lack of accessible parking in early drafts of the plan. Current plans, as shown in the Dec. 13 video, show there is one proposed accessible spot, with the potential for two more.
Neighbors, also not surprisingly, had also been upset about the proposed height of the building. The new construction will have a roofline that matches the existing building. However, mechanical and elevator equipment will poke up about 15 feet higher. Dept. of Neighborhoods noted that the equipment will only represent 11 percent of the total building area, and will be set back from the outside edge, making it minimally obtrusive.
Other departures allowed without conditions include allowing the building to cover a larger percent of the lot that code would allow, encroachment into setbacks, fewer bike parking spots than would be required, and some details about the loading dock.
There is also debate about a lighted sign on Calhoun.
The overall project had been appealed under the state Environmental Protection Act in a hearing held in January. A ruling is pending. After that ruling, the Dept. of Construction and Inspections is expected to weigh in. That decision may also be appealed.
Assuming the school district is permitted to proceed with the plan, construction should begin in July.
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The 131 parking space code requirement comes from the size of the gym and cafeteria – assuming both are used for occasional assemblies in the evening simultaneously. The code requirement doesn’t have any basis on how the school functions on a daily basis. At every school, SPS has to go through the same process to get fewer parking spaces (or sometimes no parking) approved. It always gets approved (sometimes after an expensive appeal), but it adds a significant amount to the tax-payer funded cost of the project. Another example of how parking minimums are totally made up and not at all useful.
The same is true for lot coverage, building height and the electronic sign. They get approved every time, but take time and money to go through a ridiculous process. The zoning code needs to be changed to reflect what schools actually need.
Maybe not 131, but not providing parking for staff in a single family neighborhood is malfeasance. Try to do that with your project.
And where do kids with disabilities, or their parents with disabilities, drop them off?
Waive some parking but ADA and employee parking should be provided. The parents’ cars will be bad enough but that’s a shorter duration.
You know the school has functioned for a century with zero parking spaces, right? The malfeasance is when schools are designed to make cars dominant or when codes require car dominance at schools, even when the users of the building can’t drive and are put in danger by being in proximity to cars.
I’m also pretty sure this project is making the school more accessible: accessible entrances, elevator, etc. Assuming cars and car infrastructure make things accessible ignores the large portion of the population who can’t drive.
Parking concerns are a thing of the past. The last thing this city needs to do is concern itself with entitled car owners.
Whatever you say, edge lord!
Ad hominem attacks are the edgiest
I am so glad that we are building this public institution that would be of great assistance to you.
Enrollment is also down at nearby Stevens and McGilvra, with numbers hovering around 200 students, and SPS is going to expand Montlake? They are threatening consolidation and this news feels ominous for the future of our neighborhood elementary schools, both of which are beautiful and can host many more students than current numbers reflect. At the very least use these closer schools during construction.
So glad to see that ‘portables’ are being removed and in their place an actual structure is being built. Portables should never be anything more than temporary – they are tangible evidence of the under-funding of education and misplaced priorities. The problem is, ‘there ain’t nothing more permanent than a temporary solution’. If education is important, we should act like it is.
Gotta do something with the levies they keep getting approved, so they can continually ask for more!
Seattle politics makes perfect sense once you realize it is cash cow for developers/builders.
Seattle just approved a billion dollar levy to rebuild a stadium rarely used by the school district.
Why?
The developer/building lobbyist put the idea into the minds of the school board that it can be rented out, i.e. used to raise money.
To understand how SPS plans to raise revenue via renovating this building you need to follow SPS blogs.
We should all be concerned that our city leaders are not engaging in open dialog with the community members.
They are spending TWICE what they need to on these monster buildings and then complaining about budget woes (see Seattle Times article). Demand better from SPS!
I’m not a neighbor of this school (but was a student there in the 1950s). It seems the height of folly to expand so significantly when expected enrollment is down significantly. Why not just do the remodel now, then wait to see if expansion is necessary in the future?
Remodeling that school is going to cost a lot of money, You’d be polishing a turd because the existing school is horribly outdated and not conducive to modern use.
To truly modernize the school, it’d need to be expanded. It’s pennies on the dollar to expand beyond its present capacity needs. Not planning for the future is a folly that would be absolutely insane, expensive and passing the buck to future generations, something that our nation is currently grappling with. At that point, demolish the school and bus the students elsewhere. Nobody in that elementary’s district wants that.
There are so many other areas of the school district that need this money…including the staff! It’s shameful to think they can’t figure this out.