The second design review meeting for the Imani Village apartment project at 20th and Fir is tonight (September 28), 8 p.m. at Miller Community Center. The project, which is funded in part by grants from Washington State and the Gates Foundation, will create a three-story building with a center courtyard. It will focus on providing housing for families of a nearby low-income school.
The name of the school is being obfuscated due to privacy concerns.
Here are some images from the design documents (download the PDF):
where are the parking spaces for these new families, and for the employees of the school? we are having a parking crunch now in our neighborhood, why hasn’t this issue been addressed in the plan?
So tax dollars help pay for this but they can’t share the name of the school that benefits from this?
The owner of the project has agreed to provide parking spaces off-site at a nearby church parking lot. The City has not concealed the name of the school which you can easily determine in any number of ways. I believe it’s the decision of Central District News not to name the school.
i live across the street from the project. at what church will there be off-site parking? also curious as to why they are doing parking this way instead of the original proposal which included parking?
Not sharing the name here is our decision following a conversation with members of the organization.
The buildings are nicely designed. This seems like a thoughtful project. It’s interesting to see the full PDF with the architects’ responses to the input on round one. For instance, they were told to reflect neighborhood architecture more, so they included pictures of a bunch of houses in the area and re-worked the trim on the buildings to echo the early 1900s feel of surrounding building. As a result, I think the proposed project fits in well on the street.
On the name issues – there are a few reasons for secrecy that I could imagine. I once volunteered at a shelter for women who left home due to domestic violence, and that place was fanatical about not disclosing its location for obvious reasons. I imagine this organization has a similar concern.
I think if you asked the school and housing developer they would say that locating parking on an underused nearby parking lot is a good use of resources allowing them to provide more housing at less cost for a population that can’t afford to pay market rate. (Of course there are some judgments involved there.) The specific issue of providing parking off site was the subject of a conditional use permit request reviewed by the Department of Planning and Development. DPD is supposed to give effective notice to neighbors about such a request and if you think this didn’t happen, or if you want to talk to the Land Use Planner responsible for this project call Shelly Bolser, 206.733.9067. The developer and its representatives have been quite good about talking publicly about their plans and listening to concerns. The architect Rico Quirindongo, 206.658.2721 is the spokesman for design-related issues.
Absolutely. Parking is a very costly affair, as in 10’s of thousands of dollars per parking space (and even more costly when considering an underground parking garage). Creating another surface lot is unsightly and just not a good use of land, in my opinion.
I’m not sure if the area is already a zoned parking area, but neighbors may want to check to see if Swedish subsidizes parking zone permits on their blocks. It may be too far away, but Swedish made a deal with the neighborhood to pay for residential zoning due to the expansion of their First Hill campus, to acknowledge and deter all the employee parking that it has brought to the area.
I know another parking concern! I really think that the people in the apartments will park as close to the apt,s as possible instead of walking a block or so to a parking lot. And where do they park on Sunday? I mean you may provide parking spaces but you can’t guarantee
they will park there.
i’m not worried about the apartment residents as much as i’m worried about the people who work at the school next door. what mechanisms are in place to make sure they park off-site instead of using up valuable street parking?
i agree, folks are going to park as close to their living space as possible. the church lot is under-used during the week, but forget about finding a spot on sunday! with four churches within two blocks of this project, good luck if you come back between 10am and 2pm.
has anyone talked to the developer about putting in underground parking?