soon to be opened roosevelt station here in seattle, v. vienna's nearly completed sonnwendviertel.
where is the open space for roosevelt? where are the thousands of units of social housing? where are the kindergartens? the baugruppen?
soon to be opened northgate v. vienna's nordbahnhof district. all those buildings in nordbahnhof? 6-10 story bldgs, to the donau.
northgate drops to single family zoning in TWO blocks
which one has more open space? more affordable housing? is more walkable?
not seattle
$2B husky stadium light rail stn (no multifamily zoning within walking distance - but multimillion dollar single family houses) v. munich's domagkpark - 1,800 homes - half of them affordable. kindergartens. open space. work spaces...
could house a lot of people in montlake
future 130th st. light rail station - with virtually no land zoned for multifamily housing, situated between a golf course and a highway... v. utrecht's merwede - homes for 12,000. ample social housing. open space. parks. jobs. cafes.
just... WTF are we even doing.
148th st station in shoreline, v. freiburg's rieselfeld - a compact district w/ ample social housing, schools, kindergarten, library, open space...
which one is more walkable? which should we replicate?
rieselfeld isn't even on light rail - it's the end of a *tram* line
seattle suburb (mercer island) v. paris suburb (boulogne-billancourt)
y'all... they put the MF light rail station in middle of a very loud, inaccessible highway.
and then there's virtually no multifamily zoned land near the station.
this should be criminal
i mean... this is how *suburban* paris is being developed near TOD... we can't even do this in the *largest* city in the pacific northwest
it's sooooo awful. it's pathetic. it's unwalkable. it's not climate action - it's just a massive waste
we're gonna building light rail to ballard. instead of putting it where density is, shift it recently built *townhomes* - and we won't even see it open until 2035 🤣
here it is against incredible mehr als wohnen district in zuerich. a massive cooperative for 1200. open space!
we are blowing what may be largest light rail system under construction in the US - by locating stations in areas least amenable to legit car-light/free districts around them. we're getting very little social housing, no open space v. EU peer cities.
it's incredibly depressing
smith cove (future light rail station in brownfield - at present, will have zero housing) v. stockholm's hammarby sjostad (tram/bus/boat access): ~11,000 homes for 25k. work space for 10,000. blue-green infra. open space. shops...
le siiiigh
judkins park light rail station in seattle v. malmo's Bo01 (bike/bus!)
yet *another* ST station in the middle of a highway v. blue-green ecodistrict w/ 1,400 units, ample social housing, 50% open space, biodiversity, shops...
we apparently lack the ability to do this anywhere
lynnwood link extension (seattle suburb, 16 miles to downtown seattle. that's a lot of parking! 😱) v. heidelberg's passivhaus district, bahnstadt.
bahnstadt: family friendly. 3,700 homes planned/20% affordable. 6k jobs. open space. schools. direct access to nature (farmland) 😍
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so a few months ago, i was interviewed by @Quicktake for a documentary on social housing in vienna.
vienna is doing so many things right on housing, on climate, on transportation, and on land use.
we should follow suit.
enjoy!
4 years ago over on @CityObs i wrote about housing lessons seattle and other cities in the US should take from vienna, after visiting for the passivhaus conference in 2017.
'our zoning, our lack of vision and leadership, our lack of comprehensive planning, our lack of innovation, and most importantly, our lack of funding make such a model difficult'
definitely wouldn't want to live on a car-light street lined with 5-story buildings, like this dietrich untertrifaller proposal for freiburg's dietenbach...
btw this was a staedtebaulicher wettbewerb (urban development/planning competition) that was won by k9 architects w/ latz landscape architects
it's situated to the north of the rieselfeld district, at the edge of the city. the site is actually a greenfield - so there's been a lot of discussion and engagement on how to develop here. the city has some really incredible goals here.
i write a lot about housing options & various housing forms. it's something i've been meaning to do a thread on for a while.
we don't have many options when it comes to housing in the US - our stock is largely detached houses or small apartments, and almost no social housing
our land use here is really spiky. most of seattle outside of the downtown core looks like this: car-dependent neighborhoods with detached houses as far as the eye can see. many of these neighborhoods don't even have sidewalks.
and then we slam apartment buildings in poorly planned/designed urban villages - and on loud, dangerous, polluted arterials. there is very little unit diversity in these buildings - most of them are small 1 BRs or studios.
will note the basis for home prices in this table are the KC assessor - which runs well behind market rate. will also note how out of date these numbers already are in just two years
today, a single family home in seattle is over $1 million.