Bellingham WA City Planning Growth Proposals
Bellingham, WA - Planning a residential-commercial village along Samish Way and a new mixed-use development in Fairhaven are two of the priorities this year, the city’s planning director said.
City staff also wants to plan for developments in the Samish and Sunnyland neighborhoods.
The decision, by Mayor Dan Pike and Planning and Community Development Director Tim Stewart, may mean only a handful of growth proposals by neighbors or commercial landowners get city attention this year.
“While many other plan amendments have been proposed, our staff resources are simply not available to adequately support these efforts,” Stewart wrote in a Feb. 14 memo.
Nearly two years ago Stewart gave $2,500 in city money and five hours of a staff member’s time to each neighborhood to help update neighborhood plans, which are policy documents spelling out how growth should occur. It wasn’t enough, he wrote.
For example, the city’s effort to develop a plan for Old Town took more than four years, more than 1.5 years of a fulltime employee’s work and exceeded $100,000 in outside consulting costs.
The City Council and Planning Commission also will review which proposals should move forward this year. But according to a staff report “because of the limited staff resources available to work on neighborhood plans, any proposals approved for initiation by the Commission or Council may not get completed this year.”
City staff proposes focusing on the following projects:
Fairhaven: Changing zoning from industrial to allow commercial and residential development on eight acres south of Harris Avenue on both sides of 6th Street. City staff wants to host a design meeting with neighbors and require developers to include that design.
Happy Valley: Changing rules to allow a wider range of commercial uses (not just eating establishments) along the 700 block of 32nd Street, north of Bennett Drive. The proposal would allow retail stores, gyms, barbershops and laundry facilities. The city will automatically consider it.
Roosevelt: Changing rules to allow a second vehicle access to Orleans Street for a proposed commercial development at the southwest corner of Barkley Boulevard and Orleans. The city will automatically consider the proposal.
Samish: Updating the zoning and infrastructure plans for the entire neighborhood. The city also wants to study a proposal to allow hundreds of homes on 85 acres east of Wildwood Drive, a proposal to allow commercial and residential development on 2.5 acres on the northwest corner of Samish Way and Elwood Avenue, and a proposal to rezone 20 acres south of Adams Avenue, just off 40th Street, to allow houses on 3,600-square-foot lots instead of 20,000-square-foot ones.
Sehome: Updating the neighborhood plan, which includes planning a high-density mixeduse urban village along Samish Way. The plan should be done in 2008, but accompanying development regulations may not be ready until next year.
Sunnyland: Creating a plan for developing four acres along Sunset Drive, just east of St. Sophia Greek Orthodox Church. The proposal would allow development of nearly 50 homes. Neighbors largely support the proposal but mostly want fewer homes. City staff wants to see a design meeting involving neighbors in the project. The city must automatically consider it, per city rules, because Sunnyland has an updated plan.
Rejected: Pike and Stewart’s plan would reject many proposals, which range from the Fairhaven Neighbors’ proposed plan update to the South Neighborhood Association’s effort to halt development of Fairhaven Highlands.