Seattle is a city flush with forgetting
Historic preservation is tough in boomtowns, but a new push to landmark downtown buildings is a great way to get the city to broaden the discussion about the importance of our past.
Historic preservation is tough in boomtowns. The story of the West is the story of blank-slate mentality. It's when everyone is future-focused, and the past takes a back seat, if it's not forgotten or erased entirely. Explorers imagined urban grids on rugged wilderness areas. White settlers moved into "empty" Indian land and transformed "nothing" into "something." Newcomers displaced old settlers by building bigger cities and scoffed at their discomfort with progress as the disease of nostalgia.
That mentality is perfectly captured in University of British Columbia professor Coll Thrush's new book about the city, Native Seattle, which shows how boom times have demonstrated a convenient amnesia. He sets the record straight about the city's origins: Long before the Denny party showed up, we were a place and, specifically, an Indian place.
But that was inconvenient, and the boomers saw it differently. Old places were but an obstruction to a glorious future. Thrush describes a real estate brochure – written, he says, by "a nameless cheechako" (Chinook jargon for "newbie") – in 1925:
He began with his own encounter with the city: "First impression! As I found her so will I always think of Seattle. As young and eager. Life still the great unexplored; living still the great adventure. With no old past to stop and worship; no dead men's bones to reckon with; no traditions chained to her ankles." Here, then, was the prevailing place-story of the modern era (and not just Seattle): that the past was irrelevant (although it had been a great adventure), that only the future lay ahead of the city and nation, that all the negative consequences of modern urban life would be outweighed by the benefits. No old bones.
The battle between new blood and old bones continues. For many people, Seattle can't be transformed fast enough. Old Ballard? Raze it for eco-friendly urban density. Pioneer Square? Build more housing to create a real neighborhood. The Alaskan Way Viaduct? Tear down all vestiges of the auto age and prepare for mass transit and tolled roads. Fisherman's Terminal? It would make a great place for yachts. The Kingdome? Blow it up. Downtown? Let the shining towers rise.
Recently, the Clise family decided to sell 12 acres of the Denny Triangle, an area just south of Seattle Center. The property was described as "undeveloped." Hmmm. No old growth that I can see. I see businesses and parking lots, and concrete. The fact is, the Clise blocks are developed, but the boomers choose to see them as blank. Anything that is not maximally developed becomes "undeveloped." And if property is not being pushed to its "highest and best use," it is holding us back from civic destiny.
Go downtown to the 20th floor of the Seattle Municipal Tower and you'll find the Department of Planning and Development. I was there on a recent midweek afternoon and they were doing land-office business, which is appropriate for a land office. People in line for permits, checking plans, contractors on their cell phones with clients. It is the hive of a city on the move. Inside, the change is represented by the energy of the people, the long lines, the impatience of a city on the move. But there's no sign of the heavy lifting: It's all blueprints, microfilm, permits, and approvals. This is the new city in its virtual phase, where dreams and "old bones" are turned into paperwork.
Outside the tower windows, though, is the city whose symbol isn't a resurgent population of eagles, seagulls, or Canada Geese, but of cranes. Driving on Interstate 5 by South Lake Union and the Denny Triangle, the cranes are everywhere, slowly turning their stiff necks, standing tall and still as if stalking frogs in a marsh of high-rises. They are building nests of concrete and steel. It looks like Bellevue, or Medina during the dot-com boom. Only bigger.
History isn't forgotten in Seattle. Not entirely. In fact, history once was the force that drove urban renewal. The fight to preserve Pioneer Square and the Pike Place Market were emblematic of a new way to use history to create a better city. The past is part of the future, not steamrollered by it.
Developers and city officials in the 1960s thought they were doing the city a favor by removing blight, by channeling federal funds into downtown to revitalize an old port town that had stalled on the brink of the Space Age. Freeways were built, slicing the city in two. Seattle Center replaced a "blighted" neighborhood. Many of the Pike Place Market and Pioneer Square property owners rooted in favor of mass destruction in their own backyards. But minds were changed, the people spoke, the urban renewal that damaged so many other central cities was largely held in check. Communities saved from the wrecking ball became the kind of amenities that are driving the current boom, and their own future endangerment.
But there are two problems with what happened. One is that such historic districts can ghettoize the past – they create a false sense that all of the history worth saving has been saved within these enclaves. That feeds the idea that everything else in Seattle is "non-historic" and up for grabs.
The second is that the historic districts, too, are under pressure from within and without to change. The old "we must destroy it to save it" ethic is popping up. Around Pioneer Square, developers look to add stories to historic buildings to make their projects more profitable. Some people argue that density will bring more people and increase the neighborhood's political clout. Others argue for growth, saying there is greater public safety in numbers and in gentrification. The homeless? What kind of clout do they have at City Hall? The boom is nibbling hungrily at the edges of what amounts to the city's national parks.
The discussion about historic preservation needs to be broadened. It's more than the "soul" that is the Pike Place Market or the fight for a tacky Ballard Denny's. The Department of Neighborhoods has completed a survey of downtown buildings and structures and has recommended 37 for landmark status. City Council member Peter Steinbrueck says, "This is the largest preservation effort undertaken in Seattle since the Pike Place Market was saved."
The sweeping move has caught many property owners by surprise, and no doubt for some it will be inconvenient, for others it might advance an agenda. But casting a wide net has the advantage of sparking broader conversation.
Should all those buildings and structures be preserved? Did the city identify everything that is truly important? Who gains and who loses?
The effort helps take the discussion of Seattle's history and heritage out of the ghetto of historic zones and helps us recognize that the past is part of the weave of the entire city. It's long past time to get preservation debate out from under the pressure of a single wrecking ball threatening a specific music hall or monorail or Methodist church. The preservation movement needs to come out of its defensive crouch and argue for the advantages of remembering rather than forgetting. That's not easy, says Coll Thrush. "There's fear that if we remember, we won't move on, that we'll go back." Of course, no one is arguing to go back. It's a question of what values we carry forward.
Council member Jean Godden, whose onetime newspaper column was for years an arbiter of Seattle culture, says that "Seattle needs its past – it's what binds us together, what makes us distinctive, and what keeps us from becoming just another megalopolis." Of course, it would be nice not to become any kind of megalopolis at all, but certainly one with a grounded sense of its identity is far better than a market-driven berserker with a bad case of Alzheimer's.
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Comments:
Posted Mon, Jul 16, 7:58 a.m. inappropriate
Preservation is a Fundamental Northwest Value: Historic preservation is rooted in the same impulse that drove John Muir to call for the protection of natural landscapes for the education and enjoyment of future generations. The only difference is that historic preservation is geared toward man-made environments, such as cities. People who fight to preserve the Northwest's natural landscapes while opposing the preservation of signficant structures and districts, even if they symbolize our mistakes, are guilty of the worst hypocrisy.
To see how historic preservation dovetails beautifully with Northwest values of environmental protection, take the case of Skykomish, Washington. The small town on the Stevens Pass highway was dying, in part because of horrible industrial pollution. Oil-soaked soil extended underneath the historic downtown. In compliance with state and federal historic preservation law, the buildings will be moved, and then put back once the soil is cleaned. This has created an opportunity for the town to serve bicyclists, skiers, hikers, and other visitors with a vibrant downtown, while allowing local townsfolk to keep a place they love intact. When you preserve a significant structure, you are making a statement of faith in the future, not just recognizing the past.
Posted Mon, Jul 16, 10:56 a.m. inappropriate
why just buildings?: Why limit such preservation of grand ol' times to mere bricks and mortar? Knute Berger himself should be declared a historical feature! (site? edifice? treasure?) Until this action is made properly legal, Knute should have a suitable escutcheon crafted to wear about his neck, and Jonathan Raban should be made to pay for it.
Posted Mon, Jul 16, 11:43 a.m. inappropriate
Thank You knute!: Thank You Knute, You have hit the nail on the head!
Please keep writing and maybe it will inspire more mossbacks to speak up about the loss of livability their home town, and save its character.
I think some 1960s building are special too and should be saved not made taller.
I do NOT want my home town to turn into place that seems almost like you are driving and walking, through tunnels, with tall cookie cutter condos as far as the eye can see.
I don't care to live in a New York type town or I would have moved there.
Save Seattle from the developers. We need to get a new mayor and to change some laws FAST.
Thank You,
from a 4th generaration seattleite.
Posted Mon, Jul 16, 12:18 p.m. inappropriate
Thanks Knute!: As Seattle grows and changes, so does the need for community preservation advocacy. Historic Seattle supports the sensitive development of our built environment. We advocate thoughtful urban planning, design, and historic preservation that is focused on building community and enhancing livability. We act as a catalyst for community preservation action and a respondent to specific preservation problems, issues, and queries. We are especially grateful to Knute Berger for his consistent and thoughtful support of the preservation of the significant segments of Seattle's built environment. To learn more about preserving and shaping your neighborhood, contact Christine Palmer at christine@historicseattle.org.
Posted Mon, Jul 16, 5:33 p.m. inappropriate
Well-Preserved Worries about Preservation...: Worry#1: Why not just take pictures and movies of all the old buildings and put them in a museum? What is it that we're trying to preserve anyway? A way of life? A way of looking at life? A type of architecture? Unusual quirky buildings? I worry that too often the Preservationist movement is overkill.
Worry#2: It it's so valuable, why can't it stand on it's own financial legs? Lots of different places upgrade their facilities while keeping key historical and architectural components. Why should we pay to support old buildings that bleed money? I worry that we end up preserving a lot of ugly buildings and paying taxes to support them.
Worry#3: If we want historical preservation to PREVENT commercial development that annihilates whatever used to be there (the City of Bellevue comes to mind), then maybe zoning is what really needs to be done. I worry about what the agenda of an historical preservation movement is, what it can be hijacked to become, and how it fits into th greater scheme of things.
Worry#4: Is it the location of an historic building that makes it historic? If I build a new Ballard Denny's in Renton is that preservation? Or how about an Acropolis in Woodland Park or a Stonehenge in the Seattle Center? Is that preservation? I worry that we aren't clear about what is historic and that historic tastes shouldn't be dictated.
Worry#5: What if I am, anthropomorphically, a building who doesn't want to be preserved? I consider the Coliseum "historic" yet it's now KeyArena and I can foresee that someday its external architecture may change dramatically. And what about Memorial Stadium, that's horribly historic. And so is the Fun Forest (though "horrible" architecturally). Many "progressive" people want to tear them down. How do you draw the line? How do you get rid of the dead wood so that the new trees can grow? I worry that Preservation is just a finger in the dike of change (or else is the straw that breaks the camel's back, preventing significant good change).
Worry#6: I think the Sunken Ship parking lot at Yesler & James is a perfect Case study for Historic Preservation. Many people love this thing. I would love for it to stay as it is forever, as would many other like-minded people. Would they be willing to pay to make this happen? Probably not many and not much. I worry that the quirky cool and memorable stuff won't get preserved, and old hotels and office buildings will. I don't really care all that much about old hotels and office buildings.
Worry#7: Why not have architectural style credits? Let's say you as a developer blow up the Smith Tower, an old historic bldg if ever there was one, but one that I (in my exalted position of arbiter of historical good taste and economic sense) wouldn't mind seeing disappear. But let's say that you get to build higher if you build a new building that is in the style of the old Smith Tower, in fact, is a NEW Smith Tower, but 80 stories high, seismically sound, and decked out in the latest interior finery. Or maybe there's a case to be made that one or more floors must be created that are in the Spirit of the Old Smith Tower? I worry that the traditional "historical preservation society" is outmoded.
Worry#8: I think many times "Preservation" is used in the same way that people "use" spotted owls to stop permitted development (and only tangentially to save spotted owls). In this sense I worry that Preservation becomes a legal and political tool used to extort money out of developers or landowners who want to redevelop an area.
Worry#9: When I see statements such as "People who fight to preserve the Northwest's natural landscapes while opposing the preservation of significant structures and districts, even if they symbolize our mistakes, are guilty of the worst hypocrisy," I worry that all my other worries are well founded.
Posted Mon, Jul 16, 7:11 p.m. inappropriate
RE: Well-Preserved Worries about Preservation...: Stuka, you worry too much. Historic preservation is not an arbitrary thing. To avoid this, local, state, and federal regulators and preservation professionals follow the Secretary of the Interior's Standards for historic preservation. (See this page and this page, for example.) They don't have the force of law, but they're considered the best guidelines around, and only fools ignore them.
Your point about NIMBYs hijacking the preservation process to thwart growth is well-taken. But that point can be made about ANY process, including a zoning and planning process in Seattle that consistently caters to developers, often at the expense of the city's identity. But I'm generous enough to resist arguing that the Emerald City's cadre of bulldoze-it-and-build-bigger types have hijacked city hall. That wouldn't be Seattle Nice, would it?
Posted Mon, Jul 16, 10:51 p.m. inappropriate
Quality of Life: I think some of it all comes down to Quality of life. Before the big build and now during the big rezoning, tearing down and building as tall and fast as they can. Progress to me is not squeezing as many tall buildings and condos in as fast as you can in this city. Yes I think we do need to look at rezoning now. SLOW DOWN and stop some of it.
Ballard has been raped by the city planners.
We are losing our past and present, with a ugly future of giant cookie cutter condos, which are sold for millions with the best views to the water front and also probably where the via duct sits. City hall seems to be pro tall sky scrapper condos at all costs, to All. Nothing else seems matters, even traffic flow.
Posted Tue, Jul 17, 6:15 p.m. inappropriate
RE: Well-Preserved Worries about Preservation...: Your points are well taken. You point out that standards are in place and that Preservation doesn't look a multi-headed Hydra run amok.
However, I'm still not excited. When a place like Seattle doesn't have a 500-yr or 200-yr history to look back on (although the native Americans would argue that point) the sort of white Euro male history that tends to get immortalized doesn't really make me want to jump up and down about Preservation. Most of the old-time history is filled with the intrinsic racism and cruelty of earlier times.
I saw a tv show about the Seattle Underground on the King County cable channel and it is historically interesting. On the other hand, having seen the video, I don't really see the point of preserving the underground itself.
As for development, I don't know this for a fact, but my presumption is that the entire VIADUCT CONTROVERSY is driven 100% by property owners and developers who know that there's 100's of millions of dollars in profit in improving views and building condos or office where the viaduct now stands. I think this is all good--let the developers and land owners pay for the improvements jointly with the City, let them make a fair profit, and let them use some of their profit to build historically themed "stuff" (as defined by Preservation Societies) that helps preserve the old historical context that they are replacing. So maybe that's the way it ought to, or could work. But I don't know if that's how a real-life "preservationist" thinks. If all environmentalists are supposed to become preservationists, then I think that it starts to sound like Bush Republicanism, which I perceive as nothing but a bunch of empty policies acting as a facade for greed, incompetence and war. Insofar as environmentalism has ALREADY been coopted by government, lawyers, and developers in order to raise property values so that the rich get richer, then preservation will just become part of the same game of insiders gaming the system, unless the responsible preservation organization can stand independently and declare quite specifically what its standards are for preservation and stick to them, uncorrupted by the huge flow of dollars in the government and development world.
And let me put in one more plug for odd quirky "artifacts" such as Dick's Drive-in or the Sunken Ship parking lot or the Toe Truck or the Bulge in the old floating bridge. To me, a lot of these things are MUCH more important than preserving buildings, but they aren't particularly historical. Maybe that's all stuff for the Museum of History and Industry...
Posted Tue, Jul 17, 7 p.m. inappropriate
No worry about pigeons; one look at him and they're history.
As for Raban? I hear Monty Python is hiring...
The Piper