Pioneer Square: Some great signs, but still at risk
My picks for this year's list of the "most endangered" historic properties in Washington.
Joe Mabel, Wikimedia Commons
The Washington Trust for Historic Preservation is collecting nominations for its 2011 "Most Endangered" historic properties list. Nominations are due by March 21. Last year's list can be found here. And, by the way, Oregon is inaugurating its list this year, with the same deadline.
These are perilous times for preservation and heritage in Washington, with the threatened closure of the state museums and the proposed gutting of preservation programs (like capital grants). One of the most endangered things in the state right now isn't a historic barn, ship or an old school, but the infrastructure of preservation itself: slashed budgets, reorganized and reduced management and coordination, the diminishment of resources for scholarship and research resources, the shuttering of museums and historical societies, the downsizing of advocacy and economic development programs. The Great Recession and resultant budget cuts, combined with revenue and tax limitations, are damaging our ability to conserve, nurture, and protect heritage across the state.
We're not talking about a single wrecking ball, but the budgetary and organizational equivalent of a neutron bomb, targeted, but devastating to everything within the immediate blast zone.
So, one thing I propose for the Trust's list is "Preservation and Heritage" itself. While not strictly a "property," the infrastructure is a tangible asset, and the dangers faced are unprecedented.
Moving down a couple of notches, I also nominate Seattle's Pioneer Square for the list. Other heritage groups highlight dangers posed to historic districts and neighborhoods. For 2010, Heritage Vancouver, for example, listed "Granville Street" and "Strathcona North of Hastings" on their most endangered list. Downtown Granville is undergoing a major face-lift with street redesign and plantings, all of which sounds good. Yet zoning, incentives, density targets, and neglect threaten a number of smaller historic structures that could be done away with in the name of fixing blight or modernizing the neighborhood.
The Granville dilemma is a reminder that attempts to improve or revitalize heritage neighborhoods, especially ones with commercial, retail and tourist appeal, can also have negative consequences. And while Pioneer Square is showing positive signs of re-organized advocacy from the business community and attention from the city of Seattle, it also faces huge challenges from major "improvement" projects.
The Alaskan Way Viaduct Replacement is already disrupting the neighborhood, and will for years to come (add in the seawall and the waterfront redevelopment). The tunnel work has jeopardized the artists' haven 619 Western Building and could damage more historic buildings in the area between the Square and the Pike Place Market. It is already necessitating the relocation of artists and studio space, a key disruption of the Square's economic formula and cultural identity, and the structure still might be demolished in the process. Also, the tunnel environmental impact studies suggest a major impact from increased surface vehicle traffic as a result of the tunnel project, potentially damaging to the district.
Surface advocates like Cary Moon of the People's Waterfront Coalition, are calling for the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) to do more to explain how tens of thousands of more cars on unimproved streets after the tolled tunnel opens and the Viaduct comes down will be handled. Is there enough money to mitigate such impacts?
Many believe that the long-term answer to revitalizing the Square is to attract more residents and loosen development restrictions within the district. Thus the current push to raise building height limits. This raises big questions about scale, disruption, and damage to the Square's historic character. Previous economic development efforts have had mixed results: The development of SoDo as a stadium district, sold in part as a boon to the Square, has had some advantages, helping sports bars, for example, but also contributing to parking problems and retail disruption that damaged other key businesses, such as Elliott Bay Book Company (now happily relocated to Pike/Pine on Capitol Hill).
The Square is in transition, and as WSDOT's approach to the 691 Building demonstrates, proposed trade-offs need to be zealously watchdogged (as the Trust and other groups are doing) and public awareness raised about potential threats and the importance of the fabric of the district, not simply its individual buildings. The city must also ensure that WSDOT adheres strictly to the letter and spirit of federal and state preservation laws and requirements. And the city must consider that height-for-height's sake in the district could be damaging if it provides incentives for future tear-downs and demolition by neglect. A bigger challenge, even if nothing physical changed, would be economic recovery.
There is no question that the Square, much but not all of it in a discrete historic district, needs also to be connected to the city growing and changing around it. Its success lies in preserving what it unique, but adapting in the long run to make it stronger. This is already happening with the Square's growing position as a major transit hub and with more connection to Chinatown, SoDo and hopefully the Waterfront. But the Square will not be "saved" by destroying its essence, its buildings (another challenge is landlord neglect), major retail and pedestrian disruptions, or gentrifying it out of all recognition. It's a complex urban ecosystem (historic district, social service nexus, gamer mecca, arts hub, tourist attraction) that has to be treated with respect and sensitivity.
If nothing else, the Square's challenges are a reminder that you can't take anything for granted. No one is suggesting the Square's future be like a fly caught in amber. No one, not even the most ardent preservationist, thinks the Square's current potential has been tapped out. But neither is its viability assured by virtue of being our much-imitated national role-model of what historic preservation can do for urban neighborhoods, or by virtue of its importance in our city's history.
The Square's success, even survival, is by no means assured. Good things are happening, but its future is uncertain and it clearly meets the definition of being endangered by forces that are powerful, but not beyond our control.
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Comments:
Posted Wed, Mar 2, 8:49 a.m. Inappropriate
One simple improvement to Pioneer Square, which could be done with little or no cost, would be to remove most, if not all, of the "No Left Turn" signs in the district. Talk about improving carbon footprint. Would-be shoppers and diners spotting an (expensive) street parking spot would no longer find themselves on the slow boat to Chinatown or the Safeco Field parking lot. A secondary benefit would be to free up police officers from unnecessary traffic control duties, and allow them to assault jaywalkers and underground tourgoers.
Posted Wed, Mar 2, 9:19 a.m. Inappropriate
From the time that we campaigned to have the District designated by the City and placed on the National Register, we all knew that undertaking the stabilization and preservation of the buildings in the district was a risky venture.The list of risks included:
Earthquakes
Fire
Derilict owners (demolition by neglect)
Kingdome impacts
Perimeter development with impacts on the district
Inappropriate and illegal construction methods,
Compliance with current codes, etc.
Today, that list continues with the additions of:
Increased traffic congestion
Increased parking fees and lack of parking
Deep Bore Tunnel impacts
Lack of funds to continue capital improvements in the district
The current economic climate
Lack of funding for affordable housing and social services
And, increased negative social issues due to the economy.
I'm sure I missed something!
In any event, that's the state of affairs that most other neighborhoods do not have to contend with.
Getting the TOTAL community to be proactive and be on the same page is the major task if the district is to survive physically and ecomonically. There are no panaceas. Just feet-on-the-ground hard work.
Nothings new, just different. The transfer of this responsibility is a generational issue that must be passed on to new activiists. The task is theirs to be successful or fail.
Thus, Pioneer Square should always be on the endangered list along with the hundreds of other sites that are here for the moment, but could be gone in an instant.
I am waiting to see the responsible leadership that steps up for the next generation and evidence of it's effectiveness.
I don't see it as of yet!
,
Posted Wed, Mar 2, 10:13 a.m. Inappropriate
Gambling is illegal in King County. I believe that the historic cardrooms of Pioneer square shoujld be "grandfathered" and cardroom gambling and such be re-allowed in PSquare. Gambling is a low impact, high value economy and it is historically accurate.
Posted Wed, Mar 2, 10:34 a.m. Inappropriate
Let's not forget the SR 520 expansion coming up. Talk about out of scale. This mammoth project looms over the recently listed (National Register and Washington Heritage Register, 2009) Roanoke Park Historic District, the eligible Montlake Historic District, and many other historic properties along the SR 520 bridges, including the Evergreen Point Floating Bridge itself, which is also a SEPA-designated scenic highway. Instead of fixing the floating bridge, adding adequate shoulders, and earthquake-proofing the Portage Bay Bridge, WSDOT will construct a six-lane Brutalist floating viaduct to replace the low-profile floating bridge and a seven-lane Portage Bay Bridge. Excavation for the widening of the highway where it touches land on the west side will be across E Roanoke Street from the Gates-Bass Mansion, where Sophie Frye Bass, grandaughter of Arthur A and Mary Ann Denny, daughter of Louisa Denny Frye and George Frye, wrote Pig-Tail Days in Old Seattle and When Seattle Was a Village. We're not sure yet whther they'll leave the south sidewalk of E Roanoke. From the Bagley Viewpoint, which used to be the western terminus of Interlaken Park, WSDOT will excavate .9 acre, leaving .6 acre between the highway and the Roanoke Park Historic District. Montlake will fare even worse. WSDOT will erect a second draw bridge right beside the exquisite Montlake Bridge to send more traffic along Montlake Boulevard already a notorious jam of vehicles trying to get to the UW Medical Center, UW itself, the expanding University Village, the expanding Children's Hospital. The compensatory lid over the Montlake Interchange will be patrches of greenery among new arterials. How to handle the air pollution? WSDOT doesn't acknowledge the problem. How to handle the noise? Why, noise walls, which will make the Brutalist design even more hideous. What about traffic congestion? Well they might "add capacity"--that is, add lanes--to Montlake Boulevard and 24th Ave E. From the new seven-lane Portage Bay Bridge, a higher, wider reversible flyover will send Eastside traffic to the I-5 Express Lanes in the morning, via a connecting ramp that will take out one of the Express Lanes for vehicles traveling south. How the already crowded I-5 will handle more traffic coming from SR 520, the loss of a lane, and the addition of surface traffic during the years of tunnel construction is a good question WSDOT doesn't answer. I can guess that still another project "to put people to work" will be a widening of I-5. Out-of-scale state highways and Interstate highways don't belong in a city, and they especially shouldn't be plunked down on top of historic residential neighborhoods. We can only hope that our Mayor and City Council will prevail on WSDOT to pare this thing down.
Posted Wed, Mar 2, 5:41 p.m. Inappropriate
"Surface advocates like Cary Moon of the People's Waterfront Coalition, are calling for the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) to do more to explain how tens of thousands of more cars on unimproved streets after the tolled tunnel opens and the Viaduct comes down will be handled." I certainly admire Cary Moon but she must be having some fun with us to warn of the dire auto traffic that will result from the construction of and operation of the tunnel. Isn't she the person who advocates (as verified in the article) a purely surface street solution to the moving traffic? OK, I know she talks about moving PEOPLE, not CARS but still.
Posted Wed, Mar 2, 10:08 p.m. Inappropriate
It's time to get serious about the impact of the tunnel plan for the waterfront. When one of the main instigators of this dubious process (Moon) starts nervously asking the WSDOT simple basic questions about capacity as if they didn't realize the crushing congestion that the plan will produce, it’s time for some serious adult re-consideration.
Love it or hate it...the existing viaduct should be restored and utilized as the most effective and economical solution that it is. The squandering and waste of resources associated with this tunnel and the resulting damage to the region’s mobility make it a mistake of historical proportions.
Posted Thu, Mar 3, 4:16 p.m. Inappropriate
Talk about subsidies and upzones to keep an area economically vital are always curious - the value of a property is always based on its potential use and it is often the price of the property that needs to be changed and nothing else.
The economic value of historic districts is well established, and, FWIW, their restoration creates more jobs than new construction, for the same dollar.
What we are seeing here are the same scammers working in different arenas. The downtown elite has spent most of the past ten years advancing a fatally flawed tunnel idea and now blame the citizenry and 'process' for their mistake - and ask us to expedite the creation of yet another mistake.
The redevelopment of Pioneer Square would be so as well. Great piece Knute.
Posted Thu, Mar 3, 5:17 p.m. Inappropriate
Things are as quiet as I've ever seen them the 20+ years I've been in business in Pioneer Square.
Painful as things are now they are going to get an awful lot worse once the ill-conceived tunnel project really gets into high gear.
Oh well.
Posted Fri, Mar 4, midnight Inappropriate
Don't know Moon, but I am familiar with the plan she almost sold. It included transit and I-5 work. All or most of that work got dropped when the tunnel took center stage. My guess as to what Moon questions is the EIS assessment of the impact of aggressive tolling (to pay for the tunnel) on the dropped transit and I-5 work. Please, let's try not to use so much shorthand, communication is hard enough, let alone coming to sound public judgment.
Posted Fri, Mar 4, 12:06 a.m. Inappropriate
Tooley,
While I am on the subject of clarity, this passage of yours is thought provoking—but more so than it needs to be.
Prices go both ways, make the connection for "the rest of us."
"Talk about subsidies and upzones to keep an area economically vital are always curious - the value of a property is always based on its potential use and it is often the price of the property that needs to be changed and nothing else."
Posted Fri, Mar 4, 5:20 p.m. Inappropriate
"Transit and I-5 work" was the favorite fallback answer for dealing with the reduced capacities and resulting congestion associated with all of the various solutions for the AWV except for the refurbishment / replacement of the viaduct itself.
Hope that helps…this is a project that is in dire need of some sound public judgment.
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