Density much?

I wish I could laugh at the cause-effect obviousness of that gentification in SoLU has on affordable housing and the arts, but as a renter who sees the ability to buy a good place to live (One bedroom condo) at a reasonable price (like 50% of my monthly take home) in the Seattle area fading away this is much more depressing than anything else.

Then again, maybe laughing is the only affordable option.

I am not surprised at all that SLU has been lost to the same meaty fists that lay waste to working class homes and artist spaces throughout this city. No one, I think, should be surprised by this.

Remember when we all thought Bill Gates was Satan and he was going to take over the world? Turns out it was Allen all along.

Damn that Satan is a tricky one.

Erin @ 2, rent/mortgage should not be more than 25% of your income, or at the very least not much more. 50% of your income is really and truly more than you can afford.

I'm no fan of what has happened to the former South Lake Union, but it's disingenuous to lump the demise of ConWorks in with the development of Allentown. Not only is ConWorks' implosion unrelated to the development there, but IIRC, the reason CW was even located in that area was thanks to space either donated or rented quite cheaply by... Paul Allen.

@ Erin, I have to cheer you up. First, ask yourself do you need to buy a place? Seriously I am questioning this myself. Is it society that demands we want to own a place even though it is not always a good idea? Think about the mountianous debt one ends up with and for a condo and you just own an apartment (?). I can see property ownwership if one can actually buy a piece of land but I think with the psyco housing prices that have grown beyond what any of our salaries have grown ... well it does not sound like economically responsible to go into that sort of debt.

I just throw that out there as a sorta-lifeline. If our mayor really was thinking about economic responsibility he would push more rental units being built in Seattle and put a morotorum on new condos and townhouses.

All this bleating about gentrification is just frustrating. Development happens, and unless you significantly rewrite property rights in this country and completely change how land markets work, you will *never* solve the problem of the succession of land uses.

That being said, I have a lot more sympathy for lower- and middle-income families (many of them of colour) that are being squeezed out of the city, and are facing much longer commutes to get to work, school, etc. than artists that lose their studio spaces to make way for South Lake Union development. Cry me a river, but artists are often the REASON for gentrification; they have always gravitated towards areas with very low rents, but often serve as pioneers for further inmigration and development by the middle and upper classes.

Shockingly the more desirable a place is the more it costs. Downtown used to full crackwhores and drug addicts and therefor was cheap. Many went to the suburbs and those became expensive. today the reverse is happening as traffic and urban revival drives people downtown. It is not the end of the world nor of the city. Its just one of those things that happens from time to time.

@ 7

"If our mayor really was thinking about economic responsibility he would... put a morotorum (sic) on new condos and townhouses."

He can't. It's against state law for a city to limit rents or put a moratorium on condo-conversions. I hear this again and again from people in Seattle who don't understand that they need to take up the issue with their state legislators. Every single member of the city council wants the authority to limit condo-conversions, with Rasmussen leading the charge. And they have even lobbied in Olympia for a bill that would grant them that authority.

Ask Frank Chopp why he doesn't push things like this, or capping pay-day interest loans. For someone who represents the heart of Seattle liberalism, and a place where a lot of condos are going in, this issue should be front and center for him.

@9: Good, then maybe that means the suburbs will start having places that are hip, interesting and unique, instead of bland, cookie-cutter and redundant.

Yes, bless that wonderful coalition of knee-jerk lefty dipshits and anti-tax libertarian psychos who defeated the Seattle Commons.

It's nice to see you combining again in opposition to sports stadium funding!

Hooray for our future: a city where there's nothing cool to do, but it's REALLY CHEAP to live.

@7 "If our mayor really was thinking about economic responsibility he would... put a morotorum on new condos and townhouses."

Um, because that's working out so well in San Francisco, where rents are really cheap?

But what Dan was pointing out, I think, and I am so with him, is that when the Seattle Commons was under discussion, the populist argument against it, made repeatedly in The Stranger's news section under George Howland, was that the park was a giveaway to condo developers, who would transform the neighborhood into a condo monoculture.

The point (one Peter Steinbrueck made in a late conversion before a Commons vote) is it happened anyway, but we could have at least had a new downtown park in the bargain.

@11 some already do. Check out Burien, lots of small local business and few changes once you get off of 1st Ave.

These sorts of things don't go away they just move. Its just takes people a little bit of time to catch on to where they can be found.

@6:

Right on, ConWorks demise had absolutely NOTHING to do with development pressures, and the same goes for CoCA - it wasn't forced out of SLU by "gentrification" or any other such nonsense; it was a victim of its own poor management.

In addition, I would point out that Vulcan just provided Open Circle Theatre with a new space in SLU, since their old space was due to be next in line on the wrecking-ball list, so it's completely disingenuous, not to mention sloppy logic on Savage's part to attempt to make the connection here that these institutions would still be around were it not for the big, bad developers.

And that doesn't even take into consideration the fact that, had The Commons become a reality, there's no guarantee the low-rent artists studios and theatres in SLU would have survived any better in the wake of the inevitable upscaling of the neighborhood, than they have in the current environment.

@5: 25% is awfully low -- plenty of people get by comfortably with mortgage/rent at 30% or 40% of income. It really depends on your other fixed costs -- student loans, car payments, etc. -- and there's no single level that's "affordable."

And please, folks -- enough with the "no condo conversions" crap. There's certainly a lack of in-city housing in general, and that's part of our affordability problem. But condos provide a great in-between for folks who can't afford a single-family home but would like to own their own home. No one wants to be a tenant their entire life. Additionally, condo conversions at least ensure that the neighborhood appearance doesn't change, as the buildings have usually been there several decades or more.

Actually, the main thing that killed the Commons was that most voters thought there were a lot more important pressing citywide needs than yet another downtown glamour project (by way of contrast, the South Lake Union waterfront park now under development is a project that had nearly universal support - including among those who opposed the larger project).

Ironically, Commons supporters also used to frequently say that no one would develop in SLU without the park (and $400 million in public subsidies) as a development incentive. Just who was wrong about that one, Dan?

However, had the Commons gone forward, you can bet your bippy that a whole bunch of projects throughout the rest of the City (fe - the Ballard Civic Center and Cal Anderson Parks) would never have happened because the Commons would have sucked up every spare Federal, State, and local open space and transportation dollar for literally decades.

I tried to tell you guys, back when you were killing the Commons, what would happen, but did you listen to Dan or myself?

No.

See, exactly what I predicted would happen.

Now, let's move on. And tell John Fox to STFU about it.

Why should John Fox shut up. He won and you lost. Get over yourself, Willie.

Actually, he won and Will lost TWICE.

(Not to rub it in or anything).

Oh, and as long as Greg Nickels and Hallivulcan keep trying to squander upwards of a billion Seattle tax dollars to subsidize their biotech/yuppie/Borg "vision" - we need people like John Fox more than ever.

If you voted no on the commons, Mr. X, then you have no business bitching about the biotech/yuppie/Borg that south lake is becoming.

Horseshit - the two things are not mutually exclusive. And, mostly, what I'm bitching about is using Seattle tax dollars to subsidize the process.

Please move back to wherever you came from now. Thanks!

"Please move back to wherever you came from now. Thanks!"

When Pat Buchanan ran for president in 2000, his theme was "America for Americans." I love how old Seattle hands like Mr. X--doubtless from the Emmett Watson/Knute Berger angry old white male school of nostalgists and faux-populists--localize that slogan and accuse anyone who disagrees with them of not being Seattle enough. Nice cheap tactic for dudes who don't want the city to grow up. There's always a rationalization (new urbanism doesn't work as well as advertised!), and occasionally they're right, but in the end, it smells more than a little of old-fashioned NIMBYism. They just don't want to see their Seattle change.

Btw, Mr. X, enjoy your gloating (@20), because you've been losing and continue to lose. Your Seattle is gone.

And yes, I was born here.

The problem with Commons revisionism is that it's...well, revisionist. For example, the Commons project was supposed to turn South Lake Union into Paul Allen-dominated yuppie condo/biotech land. It was supposed to gentrify the neighborhood (along with a few government-subsidized low-income housing projects, most of which have been built). The big difference between what was proposed then and what is happening now is that Paul Allen and the development gang are having to pay full price to the longtime landowners and business people of the neighborhood for their property. They are also not getting a massive government development subsidy in the form of a supersized pocket park. Got it?

Thanks, J.R.

The Commons team didn't make such a great impression by sneering at concerns about homeless people in front of an audience at Fred Hutch they were supposed to be persuading to support the project.

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