On October 8 DPD and Seattle Center cosponsored a community meeting to:
- Release the draft Uptown Urban Design Framework
- Begin an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) scoping comment period for a potential rezone for the Uptown Urban Center
- Kick-off the Seattle Center and Uptown Parking Strategy Study
About 150 community members attended the open house event. Many agencies and organizations were on hand to answer questions, including SDOT, Metro, Sound Transit, the Office of Arts and Culture, DPD, Seattle Center, and the Uptown Alliance.
The Uptown Urban Design Framework (UDF) helps guide the future physical development of Uptown. The UDF identifies concrete recommendations such as:
- Consider increasing heights to improve urban form and provide public benefits to support future growth
- Identify a preferred location for a Sound Transit Station should light rail reach Uptown
- Redevelop the Mercer/Roy Corridor
- Improve neighborhood streets, such as designing Republican Street from Queen Anne Avenue to Seattle Center as a ‘festival street’
- Establish the neighborhood as an Arts and Culture District
- Develop a parking strategy that balances the needs of Seattle Center with traffic and land use concerns of the neighborhood
- Implement the Century 21 Master Plan for Seattle Center
The meeting also served as the beginning of an EIS scoping comment period. The UDF recommends a range of building heights in the neighborhood. An EIS identifies potential impacts on the built and natural environment that increasing building heights may have on the neighborhood.
The scoping comment period is an opportunity to let DPD know what you think should be studied in the EIS.
DPD will be accepting comments on the draft UDF and scoping comments on the rezone EIS through November 9, 2015. The draft UDF can be found on DPD’s website. Please send your comments to jim.holmes@seattle.gov.