By Cormac Wolf — CHS Reporting Intern
Ten years ago this month, the Seattle City Council and Sound Transit signed off on the agreement that shaped the combination of housing and new commercial space above the coming Capitol Hill light rail station. Capitol Hill Station opened for light rail service in 2016. The first new apartment dwellers moved in three years ago. New businesses like Glo’s are still moving in today.
The story of the 428 residential units, thousands of square feet of new commercial space including a new grocery, 216 parking stalls for cars, 254 parking stalls for bikes, and the AIDS Memorial Pathway plaza is still taking shape but it is tempting to define the Capitol Hill Station development by what it is not. The buildings aren’t tall enough. Community requirements like a daycare tenant have gone unmet. The bustling market plaza hasn’t really taken shape.
But what Capitol Hill Station is becoming and how it happened is a better story.
The project kicked off negotiations around 2007, when the properties overlying the station were acquired by Sound Transit, and continued through 2009, when community meetings began to be held. Right away, there was concern from the community.
Cathy Hillenbrand had just joined the Capitol Hill stakeholder committee in 2009, and quickly became one of the most prominent voices in the conversation.
“We went to the council and said, ‘We want this neighborhood to have a seat at the table with the city and Sound Transit,’” says Hillenbrand.
“The city needed some kind of entity in the neighborhood to deal with Sound Transit. So that was the genesis of the [Capitol Hill] Champion.”
Capitol Hill Champion was the central coalition between Capitol Hill stakeholders, including the Chamber of Commerce and Community Council.
At that time, Richard Conlin represented the area that is now District 3 on the city council, and had just been appointed to the Sound Transit board. CORRECTION: Conlin served as a citywide representative in the days before Seattle’s council districts. He was defeated by Kshama Sawant who would later become D3’s first representative.
“Eventually, we got the legislature to tell Sound Transit, ‘you can do affordable housing, that’s part of your mission, and you don’t have to be as conservative financially,’” says Conlin, describing the push and pull of yearslong negotiations.
“Everybody gave lip service to the idea of transit oriented development. But it was really hard to pin them down on what they actually meant by that.”
Hillenbrand and Conlin both describe Sound Transit as a reluctant partner.
“Sound transit never wanted to be a place maker on the surface,” Hillenbrand says. “They only wanted to build trains.”
After two years of community feedback, including a landmark 2009 charrette, the Department of Planning and Development produced the Urban Design Framework (PDF) in 2011, which went on to shape the 2013 agreement between Sound Transit and the city. The community was not party to negotiations after 2011.
The 2013 agreement was a compromise between the city and Sound Transit: Sound Transit would include a sizable percentage of units as affordable housing, and would devote an entire building to permanent affordable housing. This building was eventually sold to Community Roots. In return, the city waived its usual 40-foot zoning restrictions for the area, allowing the buildings to more than double to 85’ high, a highly controversial decision at the time.
“That was a landmark deal. People had been fighting anything over four stories for decades,” says Hillenbrand.
The agreement also set aside space for a farmer’s market and instituted a cap on the number of new parking spaces the development could create, a first for the city.
The affordable housing, farmer’s market and limited parking spots were all lobbied for and won by Capitol Hill Champion, according to Hillenbrand.
Despite these victories, Hillenbrand laments the lack of incentive for families to live in the development
“Our neighborhood was people who lived there for a really long time,” says Hillenbrand. “Now it just turns over. It’s a really different world that doesn’t build community.”
While the community was able to ensure the building utilized the Multi-Family Tax Exemption, which Hillenbrand describes as “groundbreaking,” she was disappointed that Sound Transit built so few units for families. 66% of the units across the projects are singles.
The project’s developer, Portland-based Gerding Edlen, recently rebranded Edlen and Company, declined to comment, saying they no longer have ownership of the project now being shaped by commercial tenants and property management companies.
In August 2016, Sound Transit signed a 99-year lease with Edlen to develop the properties it had acquired surrounding the station. The Portland-based developer led the project with designs from Hewitt and Capitol Hill’s Schemata Workshop. Community Roots Housing developed and operates the affordable housing component of the projects. CHS reported here on the 20 years of community engagement it took to make the development a reality.
One of the most lasting victories won by Champion was the agreement that one of the buildings would be permanent affordable housing. The bid was won by Community Roots, where Hillenbrand was a board member, and she resigned from Champion to avoid any conflicts of interest.
The Community Roots building now has a meeting room named after her, a far cry from the community gathering space she says Champion pushed for.
There are other projects also on Capitol Hill, like LGBTQ+ affirming, affordable senior housing project Pride Place, the development of which Hillenbrand traces back to the 2011 Urban Design Framework, which made clear the community’s desire for an LGBTQ+ “civic center.”
Conlin, who was unseated by council member Kshama Sawant shortly after the Sound Transit agreement was signed, has continued working with housing non-profits in the intervening decade. He emphasized the impressive number of affordable units in the project, and brought up other affordable housing projects he’s involved in.
Asked about future transit-oriented development projects he’s excited about, Conlin cited the U-Lex housing co-op, in development at Othello Station. Unlike the Capitol Hill station development, the co-op will have affordable for sale housing
“It will make a huge difference in allowing people to get up out of living from paycheck to paycheck,” Conlin says. “To actually having more stability and being able to maintain themselves in the long term.”
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Nowhere in this opinion piece does it describe any actual reason why the buildings aren’t taller.
All we got is the authors opinion they should be, and a zoning change that allowed for 85ft.
I’d highly recommend you visit the farmers market on a Sunday. It’s absolutely bustling.
But it does? “The 2013 agreement was a compromise between the city and Sound Transit: Sound Transit would include a sizable percentage of units as affordable housing, and would devote an entire building to permanent affordable housing. This building was eventually sold to Community Roots. In return, the city waived its usual 40-foot zoning restrictions for the area, allowing the buildings to more than double to 85’ high, a highly controversial decision at the time.
“That was a landmark deal. People had been fighting anything over four stories for decades,” says Hillenbrand” with more reasoning avail in the hyperlink.
Richard Conlin never represented District 3. He was defeated in 2013 before the switch to district based council seats. Like all of city council, it was at-large seats.
Thanks. That was my poor editing. Fixing
I don’t agree with every take away from this piece but I found it interesting. Thanks CHS for something different.
As someone who lives in the building, I have to admit it was to know that there are 254 bike parking stalls. Greystar’s bike parking fees are substantial enough that it would cost more than the value of my bike each year (on top of the $276/year in junk fees they already charge to live here).
So I instead leave it in a neighboring building’s garage a few blocks away (for free) and don’t ride it.
Personally, I find it more tragic that the ability to live in tight proximity to light rail in Seattle is largely controlled and exploited by crap companies like Greystar, and on a rental-only base.
For myself, I moved in when the rents were ~$2150/month after a 1 month move-in incentive. Two years later, Greystar wants $2750 for a renewal of that same junior 1 BR in this building. That’s despite their own website shows new tenant pricing that’s closer to $2150 — and our city population appears to have declined in that period.
With about 28 days until the renewal deadline, I have yet to get any clear answer (or even date) in which they would be providing their actual renewal offer despite numerous inquiries — and whether it will reflect market reality vs. “we know it’s a huge hassle to move, so our software prices the that into our rent demand.”
Moving into this building, you basically have to move out after 1-2 years. Otherwise, you’re stuck playing their yield management games where you’re paying increasingly above-market rent just to avoid the loss of weeks of your personal/professional to move.
In my mind, that’s the “real” new community center that’s been built here. It’s the exploitative capitalist greed that has long since taken over Seattle rental housing, and not any symbolic and largely unoccupied plaza.
Glad you shared this. At this point you could score a much cheaper apt right in the neighborhood and get rid of the aggravation. Will spread the word about this slime multinational property co. that has no interest per se in our community and should have been barred from the Hill. There are still decent locally owned buildings here.
That’s exactly the kind of situation Seattle should be able to regulate — existing tenants should never be charged more than a new tenant in a similar unit.
Greystar had class action lawsuits against it, too, right? For artificial rent inflation. Shocking.
Also renting a spot for your bike for a little less money than parking your car is absolutely insane.
Am I understanding correctly that your landlord/management company is charging you for bike parking in their building? Seattle’s Land Use code requires multifamily projects to provide a certain number of bike parking stalls (based on the overall unit count in the building as well as the size of any commercial spaces, like retail, restaurants, etc). I have never heard that it was legal to charge tenants for using those required bike parking stalls so if that’s what they’re doing it seems very dubious/shady….
In light of Greystar’s practice to lure in new renters w/ 1 month free rent incentives and then jack up the rent to above average shortly after I’d think it’s worth considering “taking your business elsewhere”. Good luck!
Would also have been nice if the neighborhood pushed for the developer to build some remotely attractive buildings too instead of the hideous cardboard garbage constructed with random dated colors that are aging like sour milk. As a positive, I guess, they can tear this junk down in 20 years and build the high-rises.
Thank goodness the buildings are not even taller. They already create a “canyon effect” along Broadway and 10th. And the ugly, cheap-looking appearance doesn’t help any.
Ahh yes, the infamous street canyon with Dick’s drive-in along it 🙄
Lmao, right? This is a wallbanger of a claim
Unfortunately I don’t follow your reference, but I do know that half of the street corridors being talked about are 1-2 story building or homes, so this is all BS
The buildings are probably not higher because, back then, 85’ buildings were typically all concrete, while 65’ were wood over 1-2 floors of concrete, and hence 85’ buildings were much more expensive. All wood skyscrapers have become possible only since all this was built (as I understand it).
I think what also played into the maximum height that was achievable here (apart from the zoning limitations) is the fact that large portions of these buildings are basically located right on top of either the station box itself or the tunnel and if I recall correctly there were fairly strict limits to the max loads that these below-grade structures were able to support.
There are skyscrapers all over the world built on top of rail stations. If that was the case someone messed up…
Higher would mean much taller than 85′. You’re right about the concrete bit, but the economics work just fine for concrete at 200’+, which is what we should be building on top of billion dollar infrastructure.
I live in a Community Roots Housing building and it’s been great. No funny business. Just the same rent every month w/o any surprises or weirdness. They are incredibly helpful.
Good to know b/c a few years back they were jacking up rents like crazy.
Currently living in the building above the station and desperately wishing it was taller. I’m thinking about moving to SLU, even though I love CH so much, because there’s just more space vertically.