Debating future of Queen Anne, South Lake Union

[Editor's Note: This article has been changed. Lloyd Douglas' name was incorrectly spelled in the original version of this article.]

Walking into the Safeway on upper Queen Anne one morning this week, Deonne Lamb ran across a neighborhood acquaintance leaving the store.

"Hi."

"Hi."

A small gesture, but it exemplified why Lamb, 41, isn't happy about the new buildings in the neighborhood -- such as the four-story apartment building going up across from the supermarket.

Lamb's friend, who is 39 and has lived in the neighborhood for 10 years, worries about the neighborhood losing its small town feel. "I don't think I'll feel like I know everybody in the neighborhood," she said.

This isn't how the area wants to grow, says a group of community leaders. Thursday night, residents plan to unveil their visions for Queen Anne and South Lake Union as those neighborhoods face hundreds more households and thousands more jobs by 2024.

It includes bringing high-rises to the already rapidly changing South Lake Union area. Buildings around 25 or 40 stories would replace single-story brick offices, parking lots and motels just east of the Seattle Center, in a triangle of land bordered by Denny Way, Aurora Avenue and Broad Street.

Under the city's current zoning, which restricts building heights in the South Lake Union and Denny-Aurora-Broad triangle areas to roughly four to eight stories, future growth would target Queen Anne and South Lake Union.

The vision, developed for months by 35 leaders, including neighborhood groups, business owners and a low-income housing developer, would concentrate growth in areas best able to handle more people, and at the same time, relieve some pressure on more residential areas such as upper Queen Anne, said Craig Hanway, chairman of the land-use committee of the Queen Anne Community Council, who was involved in developing the plan.

Growth, according to the plan, should be concentrated around public transportation; blocks around the new streetcar line between South Lake Union and downtown is a potential high-rise location.

At the same time, the wide-ranging vision calls for more improvements, such as expanding the streetcar line from South Lake Union to Capitol Hill, and north to the University District.

The group offered no details about financing the streetcar expansion, and the vision is just a beginning -- before funding decisions and land-use changes are approved by the city.

Allowing developers to build bigger buildings means more condos to sell, and apartments and offices to lease.

Lloyd Douglas, president of the Cascade Neighborhood Council in the South Lake Union area, said the plan was filled with "developer candy."

But the support of community groups such as the Uptown Alliance on lower Queen Anne and the South Lake Union Friends & Neighbors Community Council, businesses such as the Vulcan development company, and other groups such as the Cascade Bicycle Club give the vision political weight.

City Council members Richard Conlin and Sally Clark, who participated in the group's discussions, said the devil will be in the details. But they supported the idea of creating coordinated plans for land use and transportation in the area. Both backed the idea of greater heights to concentrate growth in certain areas.

Casey Hanewall, a spokesman for the Seattle Department of Transportation, said the city already is looking at recommendations such as extending the streetcar line and making Mercer Street more pedestrian- and bicycle-friendly. The city's building department had no response.

Douglas worried new high-rises could block views of South Lake Union. But Hanway said zoning laws could be written so that the high-rises would also be skinny, allowing light in and preserving views.

In return for allowing taller buildings, the group said it would require developers to build housing for different income levels.

Kent Irwin, owner of SBRI. a non-profit biomedical research firm in South Lake Union, employs about 245 workers.

"In research much of the work is done in odd hours ... If they can live in the (same) neighborhood (as work), where they don't have to rely on a bus that stops running at a certain time at night, it's important."

The ideal urban neighborhood should be walkable, the group said. One step toward that would be installing traffic lights on Aurora Avenue at Thomas and Harrison streets to allow pedestrians across the highway.

"The growth is coming," Hanway said. "We're trying to get ahead of it."

LEARN MORE

The vision recommended for growth in South Lake Union and Queen Anne will be unveiled at a community meeting Thursday night at the Bertha Landes room in Seattle City Hall, 601 Fifth Ave. (between James and Cherry streets). The meeting will run from 5:30 to 8 p.m.

To learn more about the recommendations: slufan.org