Neighborhood Sustainability the Focus of New Code Ideas in Seattle

Chuck Wolfe, member of a roundtable group of experts that has crafted recommendations, discusses how the changes to the code can help improve the way development happens in the city.

"While the initial menu of fixes is designed to avoid duplication and enhance the prospect for new construction, the group will continue to work on longer term issues in association with pending revisions to Seattle's Comprehensive Plan. Those revisions are mandated by the Growth Management Act and championed through a dynamic update process recently launched by the Department of Planning and Development and the Planning Commission.

The group's goal is broad and ambitious: to help Seattle residents live closer to where they work. The starting place is to simplify and update the city's Land Use Code, what Sightline's Eric de Place calls 'making sustainability legal.'"