College of Built Environments at the University of Washington.
Public needs to stay involved when development is reviewed
Thursday July 2008While Seattle continues to develop at a rate faster than expected, according to a June 18th Seattle Times report, public design reviews are an essential aspect in preventing this rapid growth from damaging the city's "sense of place." The process of design reviews can and often does improve design quality, helping to ensure that new developments compliment their neighborhoods. However, some designs are changed without public input, as is the case in about 25 percent of Seattle's projects. Professor Sutton recognizes that designs do shift as projects develop but argues that "major redos without additional community participation violate public trust." As an example, she cites the "redo" of the Opus development across from her own First Hill condominium. What troubled Sutton most about the Opus case was the disappearance of the drawings from the city's files during the redo, only to reappear once building permits had been issued. Sutton and her neighbors attended a total of five meetings, and the resultant response from Opus delighted the residents and board members, and it seemed this had confirmed the value of public involvement in the design review process. But the design that Opus developed in-house was very different from the one presented at the last meeting, and further, it eliminated the design features the residents had discussed as strengths.
Sutton concludes, "Such significant changes to a building design without public input violate the purpose of the design review. As Seattle undergoes exponential growth, the integrity of this very valuable public scrutiny must be protected by: 1) telling the public about rules for revising projects, and 2) having more stringent requirements about bringing those projects back for public scrutiny."
For the complete story, please visit The Seattle Times online.