Design Perspectives:
Take a look at how Southeast Seattle is changing

Southeast Seattle — that vast swath of under-appreciated land that stretches from Interstate 90 south to the city limits — has suffered from poverty and invisibility, but its time is coming. After a decade of planning, excitement, conflicts and doubt, Link Light Rail is under construction.

Look now or you'll forever wonder just how it happened. Before you take your first train to Sea-Tac in 2009, take a drive down Martin Luther King Jr. Way. You'll probably find that whatever you've thought about the Southend in the last two decades — or even the past two years — is wrong or suddenly very out of date. There, emerging behind the shovels, Caterpillars and stacks of steel along the wide street, is the new Southeast Seattle.

Othello Crossing is built around a long, clearly visible central park. The Seattle Housing Authority brought in San Francisco consultant Daniel Solomon to develop the plan for the Crossing. (Photos by Clair Enlow)

City-building on this scale is rare, except when there is a large transportation project. After passing miles of orange cones and marveling at the sheer scale of the activity, you may be curious enough to return. Along the hillsides to the west of MLK, new neighborhoods are taking shape. Check out the prices in ads for marketrate housing.

The edges of Southeast Seattle are not well defined. Generally, it is bounded by Beacon Hill on the north, the Duwamish Valley on the west and the residential Gold Coast that runs along Lake Washington on the east. In between, there's a rough mix of quiet residential streets, post- war housing projects, semi-industrial property, immigrant enclaves and dilapidated apartments stretching towards Renton. The 10-mile-long commercial corridor follows the twin arterials of Rainier and MLK, which cross, scissor-like, south of McClellan.

Along the arterials, there are supermarkets, mini-marts, and plenty of banks and check cashers. On nearby blocks, the city has not stinted on schools, libraries and community centers.

Here, diversity is not a dream, it's a reality. Down on MLK, Buddhist temples stand cheek by jowl with evangelical storefront churches. And along Rainier, there's a pocket of gentrification in Columbia City, where the old, intact commercial area has become a magnet for upscale eateries and a multi-cultural music revival. All these mix comfortably with the neighborhood florist, butcher shop and nail salon. Even the movie house is back, along with the middle class.

Can for-profit developers be far behind? After all, the Rainier Valley is aptly named. There are spectacular views of the mountain just waiting to be grabbed by multi-story construction.

Southeast Seattle may have been out of sight and out of mind for big business, for-profit developers and many Seattleites, but it has not been neglected by the city, and in recent years, attention has stepped up to a new level. The Link construction crews on the ground should bring even more. Stephen Antupit of the Seattle Housing Authority said, "Up to this point its been: Β‘No, really — there is going to be a train'."

With completion of the line, riders will see the results of decades of planning, strategic investment and dedication by scores of community groups and many city departments. "This is the most studied, planned part of the city," said Earl Richardson of SouthEast Effective Development, a non-profit organization which will soon celebrate its 30th anniversary.

Rainier Vista features fenced, private courtyards for residents. The SHA worked with architects Tonkin/Hoyny/Lokan, GGLO Architects and landscape architect Nakano Associates.

SEED, along with many other groups, supported the Southeast Seattle Action Agenda, which shows that the city is ready to move beyond its many important investments in housing to prepare for commercial investment — reducing parking requirements, easing the permit process, and submitting an application for federal New Markets Tax Credits to encourage investment in the Rainier Valley.

According to Jill Nishi, director of the city's Office of Economic Development, the goal is to give up to $30,000 each to small businesses to help ease the impacts of transit development, along with money to improve storefronts and technical assistance to business owners with limited English.

The city has established a high-speed wireless Internet zone in Columbia City and continues to support arts groups in Southeast Seattle, with emphasis on combining programs with open space. All of these efforts, have laid the groundwork for future development. But behind the transformation of MLK are two major public investments: the light rail line and its stations, and reconstruction of Rainier Vista and NewHolly.

Link Light Rail will have four stations along MLK in Southeast Seattle: at McClellan Street, a major intersection next to Lowe's and QFC; South Edmonds Street, a five-minute walk from Columbia City; South Othello Street, near NewHolly; and South Henderson Street in the Rainier Beach neighborhood. High ridership is virtually guaranteed; Southeast Seattle has the city's highest bus ridership.

The rail line, stations and station-area development will bring Southeast Seattle together with the rest of the city as never before. Riders will see a lively mixture of street-oriented development, with lots of storefronts, signs in many languages, and people on the street.

This is not just another planner's scheme to lure people out of their cars. In Southeast Seattle, with its higher-than-average level of low-income and immigrant residents, there are more pedestrians and fewer cars to start with.

And there will be runners and bicyclists, too. The Chief Sealth Bike Trail will join the City Light corridor and follow it south, crossing the light rail line near Henderson and connecting the Rainier Valley with Beacon Hill neighborhoods. At Rainier Vista and NewHolly, the Seattle Housing Authority followed the U.S. Department of Housing and Development's Hope VI principles, taking an enlightened approach to subsidized housing that integrates it with work force and market-rate units.

Streets in both projects have been realigned to connect to the surrounding street grid so that there is no longer any sense being on the edge of a huge tract of low-income housing. Under the guidance of the Seattle Housing Authority, these projects bring the best of early-century urban housing — private front steps, porches, and small, fenced courts in back — to Southeast Seattle. Highly visible and usable open space competes the safe, attractive picture.

The city is trying to help businesses stay open during light rail construction. According to Jaime Garcia of the Rainier Valley Community Development Fund, 45 of 274 businesses along Martin Luther King Jr. Way have closed or relocated since rail work started.

After building hundreds of units of low-income and affordable housing, SHA sold the last parcels of land at both locations to private developers. When the first market-rate houses and townhouses were offered for sale at NewHolly earlier this year, buyers camped out on the sidewalk to be the first in line. All five of the single-family houses were sold in the first few days, and townhouses are selling before construction is complete, according to Antupit.

The last phase of NewHolly, which can be clearly seen on the southwest corner of MLK and Othello, is intended to take advantage of the transit corridor and add mixed-use and commercial buildings along with housing. After the light rail line is complete, Othello Crossing will complete the streetscape along MLK. Multi-story construction has already begun with a clinic and apartment building with commercial space on the first floor. According to Antupit, the commercial space is market rate.

This is becoming a place where elevator-core buildings will pencil out, he says. An elevator in Southeast Seattle?

It's already happened at Rainier Court. The multi-phase community, developed by SEED just across from Safeway on Rainier, will be built around private courtyards. There are rooftop terraces and 3,000 square feet of common areas in the plan, with commercial space at the street level. The seven-story first phase opened this month, with 178 affordable apartments.

Urban thinker Richard Sennett has written that the city is "the unbounded experience of otherness." The people living in Rainier Court are a sign of the times. They're proving that in Southeast Seattle, rich diversity is not an oxymoron, it's a real asset — and one that makes for more than a lifestyle. It's one of the things that makes life worth living.

Clair Enlow can be reached at (206) 725-7110
or by e-mail at clair@clairenlow.com.