Expanded e-Newsletter Articles

Check this page for the complete articles by guest columnists.

South Lake Union – The Evolution of Urban Form

Scratch the surface of South Lake Union’s impassioned “Height and Density” discussion and you’ll discover that nothing is simple.  There are myriad issues involved in intelligent neighborhood planning. 

“Height is just one variable.” States Michael McGinn, Director of Seattle Great City Initiative.  “Design, open space, affordability, and our environmental aspirations need to be taken into account as well.”

South Lake Union Friends and Neighbors (SLUFAN) has been putting these and other considerations into play throughout its involvement in the proposed zoning options for the neighborhood.

“The process is about quality of life and how to achieve it” says Steven Paget, SLUFAN Board President.  “It is critical that planning and zoning efforts take into account all the aspects and amenities necessary to develop an alive and eclectic neighborhood where people work, live and play.”

Beginning In 2005, SLUFAN’s all-volunteer board convened a series of forums and charrettes, inviting the City of Seattle, area residents, property owners, business owners and neighboring districts to come together to create a shared vision for future development of South Lake Union.  The updated neighborhood plan for South Lake Union  describes the details of this vision. 

The last of these stake-holder gatherings—the Urban Form Study—resulted in zoning concepts that were further advanced by SLUFAN into three alternative zoning diagrams.  At the request of City’s Department of Planning and Design (DPD), these diagrams were forwarded to Mayor Greg Nickels in June of 2008.   

“SLUFAN is not locked in to any particular height.”  Explains John Savo, a SLUFAN board member instrumental in implementing the Urban Form Study.  “We started with the original comprehensive plan and worked diligently to accommodate density targets while preserving and building upon South Lake Union’s favorable qualities.  We recognize that a critical mass of people, both residents and workers, is needed to generate the retail and community resources – such as improved transit, a library, schools and a community center – essential to a vibrant urban neighborhood.”

The zoning recommendations are accompanied by a call for specific public benefits as well as design principles that preserve light, air and view; enhance pedestrian activity and consideration of human scale in building design.



Matt Roewe, an architect and urban designer, illustrates some of these principles of design in his presentation “Bread Loaves and Pencils.”  It supports the idea that a push for density under the current zoning could create canyon-walled streets lined with uniform 85’ foot buildings built clear to the lot lines, whereas increased height provides the opportunity for varied building designs with smaller footprints that increase green space, create pedestrian-friendly streets and allow for plenty of light.

To quote Mr. McGinn again, “Design matters. For example, if residents of a building such as Mirabella want to protect views, a taller thinner building next door is more likely to do that.   A neighboring building of the same height and width as theirs would block resident’s views as well as eliminate light and views at street level.”

SLUFAN plans to co-sponsor an educational forum on urban planning principles and the elements of people-centered neighborhoods in early 2009.  Information on the forum will be posted on SLUFAN’s website and distributed as soon as it is available.   

Finally, SLUFAN encourages those interested in issues concerning South Lake Union to stay involved.  SLUFAN will continue to distribute information regarding opportunities to do so as they arise throughout the next stage of zoning consideration—the City of Seattle Environmental Impact Study.

 “When Your Business Can’t Host a Customer Group …Use Make it Simple Event Planning and Referral Service™”

By Jennifer Mitch, Kevin Bynum, and Jim Clark, Moss Bay Event Center.
[Published in the July 2008 SLU Chamber e-Newsletter]

Too often each of our South Lake Union businesses must turn away a group booking because of prior commitments or inability to match customer needs. This all too frequent occurrence raises at least 3 interesting questions:  1) as a local event venue or service, what kind of follow-up or referral do you offer customers that can’t be served at that time?   2) If you do turn away prospective users empty handed, does this negatively affect their desire to make future referrals to you or other Lake Union businesses? And 3) what might you want included in a complimentary and quick referral service for prospective customers that would encourage goodwill for future referrals to your business?

Although our Moss Bay Boathouse has been on South Lake Union since 1985, the Moss Bay Event Center [www.mossbayevents.com] has existed for only 2 years.  In that brief time, we’ve had to turn away numerous prospective customers because of booking or space conflicts, and until recently we neglected to make referrals to other event sites around the lake. In hindsight, we realize this was a mistake and therefore decided to play a role in helping to foster more mutuality for future visits to our site and others around South Lake Union. As a result, we are in the process of assembling an online event planning and referral service that would be simple to use and complimentary to area businesses to make referrals to each other.

In the next few months our complimentary service, Make It Simple Event Planning and Referral Service ™, will go online for other Lake Union area businesses to use at no charge. This shared online community resource will allow all Lake Union businesses to effectively and efficiently refer clients to other event sites in our community.  Should you not be able to serve a prospective client, you will ask them to briefly complete a 10-item online form that will be submitted to a secure service.  Within minutes the client will receive a summarized list of 3-5 matched service providers around the lake, along with contact information. Referral completed, relationship fostered, goodwill created.

In design, the Make It Simple referral process functions quite like an online data base search service, such as a dating service.  The system provides value by simplifying the search process for prospective users – it takes a huge array of prospective candidates and reduces the number of “best fit” possibilities, based on confidential answers to 10 specific questions for each category of need or interest. It truly is very simple in design. Of course, accuracy of the data provided about each event site or service needs to be carefully screened and approved – which is why we will be contacting each of you over the next couple of months to ensure that the data base information is accurate and complete.  We will be depending on you to ensure that all the stored data base information is correct. If you would like to be included please contact Kevin Bynum at 206-682-2031 or Jen Mitch at 206-384-5456.  Easier yet, simply send us an email at mossbay@earthlink.net and we will immediately forward you our mock-up data about your organization for review and editing.  Of course if you would not like to be included, please let us know that as well.

If it’s true that what goes around also comes around in life, the Make It Simple system will help each of us business owners to promote goodwill amongst ourselves and the many prospective customers coming our way.  Passing on customers is one way we can really help each other and foster goodwill throughout our community in ways that will bring more customers to all of us.