hugeasscity

My urbanist geek friend DonV got all excited about some pedestrian behavior he observed downtown at 1st and University and snapped the photos below. Apparently people lose their ability to read during sunny Saturday afternoons, because the construction area at the front of the new Four Seasons hotel has the biggest and most explicit “sidewalk closed” signage I’ve ever seen. During work week days, there’s almost always a cop at 1st and Union who is constantly yelling at people to go back, and they obey. But on weekends, no cop, and so nothing to stop those wacky pedestrians from stepping out and taking back the street. And the cars put up with it, funneling into a single lane. A beautiful thing.

This section of 1st Ave, connecting Pike Market to Harbor Steps and S.A.M., carries pedestrian volumes that rank among the highest anywhere in the State of Washington (which, by the way, makes it all the more astounding that the Four Seasons was allowed to build such a lame impervious street wall). But still, even in this context, officially closing a vehicular travel lane and using it for a temporary pedestrian route is apparently an option that’s not even on the table. Because in car culture it goes without saying that the pedestrians, not the car drivers, should be the ones to suffer the inconvenience.

Leave it up to a starchitect like Rem Koolhaas to create engaging, lively, useful public spaces like the pivotol corner of 4th Avenue and Spring Street.  Someone tell me how this promotes an active street face? I don’t know whether to blame the City of Seattle for being so ga-ga over the Dutchman and allowing this to happen or the vanity of such a blow-hard (I’ve listened to his lectures) who doesn’t understand the context to which his buildings sit.  Form over Function?  You got it.  Too bad such a master couldn’t bridge the gap between both - or simply didn’t care to.  And don’t get me started about the interior.

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The scoldiest urban scold that ever scolded, Lewis Mumford, had a bone to pick with Marshall “the medium is the message” McLuhan back in 1970:

But it remained for McLuhan to picture as technology’s ultimate gift a more absolute mode of control: one that will achieve total illiteracy, with no permanent record except that officially committed to the computer, and open only to those permitted access to this facility. This repudiation of an independent written and printed record means nothing less than the erasure of man’s diffused, multi-brained collective memory: it reduces all human experience into that of the present generation and the passing moment. The instant record is self-effacing. In effect, if not in intention, this would carry mankind back to a far more primitive state than a tribal one: for pre-literate peoples conserved a large part of their past by cultivating extraordinary memories, and maintaining by constant repetition–even at the cost of creativity and invention–the essential links to their own past.

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The mass media, he demonstrates, are “put out before they are thought out. In fact, their being put outside us tends to cancel the possibility of their being thought at all.” Precisely. Here McLuhan gives the whole show away. Because all the technical apparatus is an extension of man’s bodily organs, including his brain, the peripheral structure, by McLuhan’s analysis, must, by its very mass and ubiquity, replace all autonomous needs or desires: since now for us “technology is part of our bodies,” no detachment or divorce is possible. “Once we have surrendered our senses and nervous systems to the private manipulation of those who would try to benefit from taking a lease of our eyes, ears, and nerves, we don’t really have any rights [read ‘autonomy’] left.”

This latter point might well be taken as a warning to disengage ourselves, as soon as possible, from the power system so menacingly described: for McLuhan it leads, rather, to a demand for unconditional surrender. “Under technology,” he observes, “the entire business of man becomes learning and knowing.” Apart from the fact that this is a pathetically academic picture of the potentialities of man, the kind of learning and knowing that McLuhan becomes enraptured over is precisely that which can be programmed on a computer: “We are now in a position…,” he observes, “to transfer the entire show to the memory of a computer.” No better formula could be found for arresting and ultimately suppressing human development.

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As with the transportation system, which cannot dispense with the free-moving and autonomous pedestrian without producing clotted urban congestion or equally baffling suburban dispersion, so with an efficient communications system. What is needed is a technology so varied, so many-sided, so flexible, so responsive to human need, that it can serve every valid human purpose. The only true multi-medium remains the human organism itself.

By the way, who are all you people out there? Most of us know very little about each other. Is that community? Can it make a difference?

As one commenter put it, “I am strongly of the opinion that blogs and such are great at raising issues but lousy at making progress towards workable solutions. For those of us who care about these issues on Beacon Hill, we need to be meeting face to face.”

is Two Union Square — at least that’s the word on the street. Designed by NBBJ, completed in 1989; 56 floors, 740 feet tall (third tallest in Seattle), with ~1,100,000 square feet of rentable space.

But there’s a pretty low bar for modern skyscrapers in Seattle, and to me, ranking them is sort of like ranking refrigerators. Modern skyscrapers are mostly about utility, with some nice sculptural elements or facade design thrown in on the best ones.

When we can put up a building like Two Union Square that’s naturally ventilated, perhaps using a curved facade that functions like a airfoil to draw air through the building, then we’ll have something worth raving about.

If you’re looking for indicators of the chances we can turn our self-destructing culture around before the entire planet is devoured, witness the howls of “nanny state” in response to Seattle’s 20-cent bag tax. Might I suggest that this reaction is not the most promising indicator?

In the context of the ecological limits of the planet, disposable bags are pure stupidity — can anyone possibly disagree with that? The bag tax will be effective at reducing this stupidity, as we’ve seen happen in other cities. We’ve known for decades that we could stop being stupid by simply buying reusable bags and bringing them to the store, but we haven’t been able to break the habit on our own.

Yet even in the face of the many logical arguments supporting a bag tax, there are apparently more than just a few people out there whose paranoid delusions about government taking away their freedom compel them to scorn it. Thankfully I don’t have to elaborate, because Daniel Burnstein’s recent PI opinion piece nails it (the whole thing is worth a read):

“Rather than curtailing freedom, this kind of environmental regulation is based on longstanding precedent allowing government to prevent nuisances in order to protect public health and safety.”

Enacting laws against certain kinds of sex between consenting adults is the nanny state. Eliminating the choice to dump PCBs into the ground is not the nanny state. The latter involves actions that harm others; the former doesn’t (and yes, there’s lots of gray area between these two examples). But while it’s true that the environmental impact of disposable bags is relatively small in comparison to that of the entire city, we are at a point in history where the tired phrase “every little bit helps” has never been more true. And in any case, the bag tax does not dictate behavior; rather, it is an attempt to account for externalities so that prices reflect true costs.

Still, there are those who work hard to conjure rationalizations for shooting themselves in the foot. As in, ignoring the scientifically established negative environmental impacts that disposable bags have, and whining that the city “wants to tax our politically incorrect garbage.” Or trying to claim that it’s a non-issue because bags are recyclable (scroll down), when recycling is more accurately “downcycling,” and only delays the final act of wasteful disposal.

The disdain for the bag tax is an expression of our cultural roots: We love our independence and we hate being to be told what to do. Meanwhile, the evidence that this ideology is failing in the case of a human population that is surpassing the carrying capacity of the planet is increasingly in our faces every day. We’ve created a way of life in which it is exceedingly difficult to even understand, let alone behave in accordance with the multilayered effects of our actions. And we can’t seem to manage even the easiest changes, such as keeping our car tires properly inflated*. If anything, an objective observer could only conclude that a nanny state is precisely what’s needed to save our collective ass.

Nobody wants an overly intrusive government. But we’ve got to stop being delusional about what it’s going to take to keep us from driving planet earth over the cliff: Overall, it’s going to mean letting go of our demented obsession with the individual, and recognizing that healthy communities thrive on mutual trust and cooperation.

And as best as I can tell, the bag tax is just the beginning.

*Case in point: Ten years after buying my house, I finally got around to putting up a clothesline today. Chances are it would have happened a lot sooner if I had to pay the full cost of electricity (including the part that hydroelectric dams have played in decimating salmon, which is perhaps the most perfect source of protein on the planet).

Cost, you say? Accessibility? Lack of imagination? Oh Europe and your ancient progressive ways…

HAC on 8/4/08

HAC on 8/7/08

NYT on 8/8/08

It only took the PI four days to catch up with the news, first reported on the Seattle Condo Blog, that Moda (shown above) is converting from condos to apartments. How far can the pendulum swing in this direction?  From the PI:

“The market and the financing conditions for condominiums have really taken a drastic turn,” said developer G. David Hoy, head of HMI Real Estate Inc. “The vast majority of (Moda’s) buyers decided not to proceed with the purchase of their unit.”

The 251-unit Moda made a splash back in 2006 when it announced the offering of condos starting at the unheard of low price of $150k. Of course the catch was the these cheapest units were only 300 sf, but still, the building sold out quickly.

It’s unfortunate that this conversion will price out many people who can’t afford a more typically priced condo in Belltown. Montreux Condominiums, built in 1999, is one other existing condo building in the neighborhood with a similar product. And Marselle Condominiums, a little further north at Aurora and John, is scheduled to open in Summer 2009 with units as small as 347 sf.

There is likely to be healthy demand for small, inexpensive apartments in Belltown, but there’s a growing pile of new apartment competition nearby, and also out in the neighborhoods.

[ Source: Oregon Department of Environmental Quality and EPA ]

Via Sightline, the 2005 U.S. greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions chart above illustrates an alternative way cut the pie, emphasizing the importance of goods and materials, and suggesting we ought to look at ways to use less stuff. But to intelligently assign priorities, it’s also helpful to know how challenging and costly it would be to make a given GHG source reduction. Behold the most excellent diagram below, via Worldchanging:

[ Source: The McKinsey Quarterly ]

The bars going negative indicate that the GHG emissions abatement measure actually saves money overall — free lunches, so to speak, i.e. no-brainers, one would think.

Note that four of the five most cost-effective measures address energy use in buildings. And now take another look at the chart at the top of the post and mark the second biggest slice of pie. And while your at it, ponder this analysis that attributes an even higher portion of GHG emissions to buildings. Translation: buildings are low-hanging fruit and there’s a lot of that fruit, and thus should be a focus for cutting GHG emissions.

(Also note: Increased fuel efficiency in commercial vehicles could potentially help put a dent in the emissions related to the provision of goods and services.)

Apparently my friend WB (who named this blog) has some “ideas” he wants to express.  So I beseech you, esteemed readership, please pay attention to the “posted by” credit at the top of the posts.  

I walk to work everyday and have, for a long time, been perplexed by why so many people don’t know how to use sidewalks.   The generally accepted method is much akin to how cars and bikes use roadways.  Your path of travel should always be to your right (Anyone wager on how many folks are going to comment about path of travel in, oh say, Britain?).  And as much as I adhere to this principle, I constantly encounter people “hugging” the building line of a sidewalk to their left.  Does anyone know why people are drawn to doing this? Especially downtown at peak hours.  For the most part I’ve begun to hold my ground and just plow into people who are refusing to move.  Hell, folks do it to me all the time.  So in case there are some people out there who are unsure of proper sidewalk travel etiquette, decorum, propriety (all imply observance of the formal requirements governing behavior in polite society), I’ve included the below diagram for everyone to understand how to properly use a sidewalk.

So writes Roger Valdez in a balanced little riff on affordable housing in the DJC.

“First, we know growth is good. Accommodating people in the city is more sustainable than sprawl, but sometimes neighborhoods resist growth. That resistance works to limit supply by making permits more expensive and time-consuming. Welcoming growth can help increase supply, which can reduce prices.”

This is the 1958 Logan Building at the corner of 5th and Union, and I like it. It was built with a complete air-conditioning system, which was an ultra-modern feature at the time. And no, your eyes do not deceive you: it has windows that open. Perhaps in 1958 people still had enough self-respect and/or common sense to not be willing to put up with a sealed building.

Today we need encouragement: green building rating programs such as LEED give points toward certification for operable windows.

The unaccounted for:

• AVA (8th and Pine): 36 stories, 200+ condo units, 190-room hotel.
• 7th at Westlake: 31 stories, 16 floors office, 184 condo units.
• 8th and Stewart: 400-foot tower, 300+ condo units.
• 8th and Westlake: 225+ condo units.

That adds up to over 900 housing units in projects that have been put on hold or canceled. For some perspective on that number, see here and here.

The current survivor list::

• The Olivian: (shown above): 27 stories, 224 apartments, under construction.
• Olive8: 39 stories, 231 condo units (at 455 feet, will be the tallest residential tower in Seattle), under construction.
• Kinects (1823 Minor Ave):40 stories, 340 apartments, has not yet broken ground.
• Howell and Terry (1800 Terry): 30 stories, 275+ units, has not yet broken ground (reportedly was put up for sale back in Feb 2008, no current info).
• Icon Tower: 32 stories, 283 condo units, has not yet broken ground (may switch to apartments).
• Steward and Minor: 29 stories, 168 condo units, 150-room hotel (project plans are being reconsidered).

These two stayed afloat by converting from condos to apartments:

• 1200 Stewart: two 36-story towers, 500 units, 800 parking stalls (switched to apartments).
• Aspira (Stewart and Terry): 37 stories, 325 apartments, 6000 sf retail, 355 parking stalls, under construction.

And two more have recently jumped in:

• 901 Lenora: 400-foot tower, permit recently filed.
• Trophy Tower: 440-foot tower, 19 units, permitting stages.

That’s over 2300 housing units, not including another 300 or so that would come with the two recently proposed projects. If anyone out there has info contradicting the above survivor list, please leave a comment.

(Thanks to Ben over at The Seattle Condo Blog for much of the above info.)

Unlike the irrationally exuberant housing market, the office market in Denny Triangle has avoided a major smack-down. Projects currently under construction:

• West 8th (2001 8th Ave): 28 stories, ~500,000 sf office, 32,000 sf retail, 452 parking stalls, developed by Touchstone (photo above).
• 1918 8th (8th and Stewart): 34 stories, ~650,000 sf office, 6400 sf retail, 584 parking stalls, developed by Schnitzer West (core in photo below).
• 818 Stewart: 14 stories, ~240,000 sf office, ~300 parking stalls, developed by Schnitzer West, construction nearly complete (on right in photo below).

Noisetank’s greatest moment came back in 2005 when, during an NPR Fresh Air interview, Terry Gross asked Paul Anka about “one last thing in the annals of Paul Anka lore, and this is a website that you probably really hate…” (starts at 20:55): The Guys Get Shirts had become an internet phenomenon.

The Noisetank IT Department has been unable to confirm whether the recent uptick in site visits is due to the rebroadcast of the Anka interview, or to the Seattle Weekly award for best new blog with the words “huge” and “ass” in the title.

The answer seems rather obvious to me.

So then why do so many people get their panties in such a bunch about them?

But before going there… talk about Instant Karma: Yesterday I had the closest call I’ve ever had on my bike downtown. A Metro bus blew by me within inches, and when I confronted the driver about it at the next red light, he essentially admitted he was just “playing games” with me because he was annoyed that I had cut to the front of the line of traffic stopped at the previous light. Though some of you dear readers are no doubt brimming with glee over how I got what I deserved, I trust there are a few sane ones out there who recognize just how fucked up that bus driver’s response was. I annoyed him so he seriously threatened my life; sort of like if I called him a poopy head and he put a loaded gun to my head and pulled the trigger halfway. This person should have his driving privileges revoked. Period. (I filed a complaint with Metro — it will be interesting to see how it is handled.)

Back to the point: Bicycles have but the tiniest impact on most urbanites’ lives. But judging by the way some people spew the bile (google “slog” and “bikes”), you’d think bikes were holding the entire city hostage.

The impact that bikes have on traffic flow is negligible. The damage that bicycles do to people and property is negligible. The objective reality is that pretty much the worst bicycles do is that they annoy people.

Perspective all right: As I was writing this late last night I heard a volley of gunshots go off a couple blocks away from my house followed by three or four police cruisers screaming down 23rd Ave. That, and the social conditions that led to it, is something worth being concerned about.

I mean really people, are bicycles riding on sidewalks really that big of a source of anxiety in your lives? Does my riding up to the front of a line of cars stopped at a red light have any significant consequence, other than annoyance?

Meanwhile cars kill something like 40,000 people per year in the U.S. And maim who knows how many times more. And destroy a few bazillion dollars of property.

And while it’s no doubt true that people sometimes have annoying interactions with bicycles, the frequency with which it happens has got to be low in comparison to the onslaught of daily annoyances faced by the typical urbanite. There just aren’t that many bikes out there.

I am baffled by those who express the same level of contempt for cyclists that break the rules of the road as they do for drivers that break the rules of the road. In the latter instance, someone might end up crushed on the pavement, while in the former, perhaps someone might get, well, really annoyed.  It’s awfully curious how these folks (including many cyclists) suddenly become sticklers for the letter of the law when it comes to bikes. But you can be sure that all but the purest saints among them have either jaywalked, or smoked pot, or committed some other trivial victimless crime.

Which brings us to the “we’ll only earn their respect if we set a good example” argument. Yes, there is some truth in that, but here again I find it remarkable how so many cyclists seem to believe it’s so important for all cyclists to strictly adhere to this saintly standard. Did cyclists in Europe have to prove they were all perfectly behaved at all times before their governments invested in serious cycling infrastructure? No, I think not. That’s because the Europeans are smart enough to focus on what matters: the support of cycling for the overall health of their cities — not trivialities such as a bike rolling through a stop sign.

And what also repels me from the “respect” argument is that it is based on — and therefore helps to propagate — the twisted attitude that drivers are doing cyclists a huge favor by merely putting up with their presence on the roads.  In other words, you cyclists best be kissing our asses, and maybe we’ll be good enough not to mow you down.  First of all, as I already pointed out, bikes have a miniscule impact on cars and people in the city.  But more importantly, the truth is that every person who opts to travel by bike instead of by car is doing a favor for everyone in the city, including drivers.  Cue up the indignant cries that I am claiming cyclists are superior moral beings.  Whatever.  The fact that travel by bike is good for the planet is objective, verifiable, quantifiable truth. 

I would like to propose a new strategy:  Cyclists ought to break the rules of the road at every opportunity that doesn’t comprimise their, or others’ safety.  Then, over time, drivers would begin to get used to it, and ultimately they would realize that, hey, you know what, it really isn’t such a big deal when, for example, a bike runs a red light after stopping to verify there is no cross traffic.  And then we can all move on, agreeing that in terms of the multidude of problems facing the modern city, bikes are like flies buzzing around the head of Godzilla.  That is, they don’t matter.

Nobody out there has anything to say about all this, do they?

(warning: echo-chamber post forthcoming)

Erica Barnett nailed it: “Cyclists are angry for a reason.” As I wrote back when hugeasscity was still an innocent babe, I appreciate the frustration that feeds the Critical Mass gestalt. And this is an appreciation that you cannot gain until you’ve spent a lot of time biking around the city. I’ve been bike commuting downtown every day for many years, and rare is the day that I don’t see at least one car do something careless. Too many drivers are not taking responsibility for the deadly machines they are controlling, and my risk goes up because of it. Any normal person faced with this situation day after day would become angry.

Cycling advocates worry too much about Critical Mass straining the relationship between cars and cyclists. Does anyone actually believe that a backlash against Critical Mass could cause the City of Seattle’s leadership to reverse position on the need for policy changes that promote cycling? No, of course not, because the City’s leaders understand the importance of planning to create a more sustainable city, and from that perspective, Critical Mass is an insignificant blip.

But what Critical Mass does do that matters is build solidarity in the cycling community and empower people to demand better conditions for cycling. And I’m down with that. Maybe I’ll even go on a Critical Mass ride one of these years…

[ The coolest house in Medfield — and children are still allowed to live in it. ]

Medfield made the Boston Globe in a story headlined with “Welcome to Medfield, especially if you don’t have children.” Medfield, like many other similar small towns in Massachusetts, has been encouraging “over 55″ developments because it costs so much for the town to operate the public schools.

I’m not sure which is a stronger indication of a moribund culture: the quarantining of children for economic reasons, or this.

Nothing has more universal appeal than the most technologically advanced killing devices ever created. Except maybe donuts.

The scene at Mt. Baker beach, where every age, race, religion, political affiliation, and socioeconomic class joins as one to bask in the glory of the paramount failure of the human race. I brought my kids. It was awesome!

[ Apropos of nothing, a scene from the Umoja Parade at 23rd and Cherry in the Central District ]

Is there anything interesting happening out there? Density this, sustainability that, bla bla bla. Can any of you readers out point us to something fresh and inspiring?

Summer laziness has set in, and I’m going to try a new approach: Why struggle to create original content when it’s so much easier to become part of the echo chamber? Just like Instapundit or Drudge.

Apologies in advance…

It’s almost as if I just returned from the nuthouse: what a sight it was to see the street life around Pike/Pine.

So what if a man was shot and killed on the street three blocks from where I live in the Central District while I was away. Last February there was a murder in Medfield not a half a mile from where I stayed. And suburban murders are always way creepier.

This is Medfield State Hospital, located adjacent to the 1960s subdivision in which I grew up. If you stood where I took the photo in this post, turned around and took a short path through a narrow boundary of trees, you would come upon the scene above.

When I was a tween my friends and I used to sneak up there to gawk at the “tahds” in the “nuthouse.” The patients would be out in that fenced-in porch and maybe they would be muttering to themselves and pacing, or if we were lucky one of them might sing a weird song or yell swears at us. Better than video games!

Medfield State Hospital opened in 1896 in the heyday or creepy Victorian insane asylums. The number of patients peaked at 1500 in 1952, dropping to 147 patients in 2001, and finally closing in 2003.

The State is currently negotiating with the Town to set the parameters for a redevelopment of the site — a truly hugeass project for Medfield. The latest agreement calls for 440 units of housing, of which 259 will be affordable. The housing will be a mix of apartments, condos, and single-family homes, and some of the historic buildings will be saved.

Predictably, many residents are uneasy about all those affordable housing units, even though the project will push Medfield above the 10% threshold for the State’s Chapter 40B code. Chapter 40B allows affordable housing developers to circumvent local zoning if less than 10% of the jurisdiction’s housing is affordable, and it has been notorious for creating controversy in small towns.

Goodbye Nuthouse…

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Goodbye Medfield…

Originally built in 1651 and last enlarged around 1850, Medfield’s Dwight-Derby House is one of the oldest intact houses in the U.S.

Built in 2005 for Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, this home features a miniature replica of Fenway Park’s “green monster” in the back yard.

I guess we’ve gotten better at garages over the past three and a half centuries.