Condo Project Planned for Seattle's Pioneer Square Neighborhood

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Bob Young

Four acres of striped asphalt next to Qwest Field would be replaced by 956 condos and apartments, transforming Pioneer Square into a more residential neighborhood, under a tentative deal to be announced today.

In a long-awaited decision, King County officials will name Seattle development firm Nitze-Stagen as the winning bidder in a deal expected to bring the county, which owns the property, $10 million.

Nitze-Stagen will team with Minneapolis-based Opus, one of the country's largest developers, on the potentially litigious project to develop downtown's largest vacant property. The Seattle Housing Authority would own and manage 140 apartments for moderate-income residents on the site.

In all, the $270 million North Lot project would include four new buildings totaling 860,000 square feet, said Kevin Daniels, president of Nitze-Stagen.

Daniels is also floating a separate proposal to build a lid over railroad tracks south of King Street Station and develop office, retail and hotel towers on the property between Fourth Avenue and Qwest Field. He said his company may decide next month whether to proceed with that plan.

"From a vast wasteland of parking will rise an extraordinary neighborhood," said King County Executive Ron Sims, who has pushed to break a logjam of competing interests that has kept the North Lot from being developed.

The King County Council would have to approve the deal. The Seattle City Council would have to approve a zoning change for two of the buildings to be 150 feet high - 30 feet higher than current rules allow.

The Pioneer Square Community Association has long wanted housing on the North Lot to support local merchants and calm the rowdiness of the neighborhood, which for more than a century has been a favorite drinking place variously for prospectors, longshoremen, rockers and suburban thrill-seekers.

The project would nearly double the number of residents in Pioneer Square, which now has about 1,100 condos and apartments, most subsidized for low-income units, according to association Executive Director Craig Montgomery.

A coalition representing auto, home, boat and RV shows at the Qwest Field Event Center is opposed to developing the North Lot, arguing it would take away precious space used to stage shows and make it harder to expand the publicly owned event center.

In a recent letter to Sims, that group vowed to "challenge the development of the North Lot ... publicly, politically, and, if necessary, in court."

Mike Kalian, managing director of the Seattle Home Show, said he couldn't comment on the Nitze-Stagen proposal because he hadn't seen it. But Kalian said the county's plan to develop the North Lot "destroys the future" for expanding consumer shows at Qwest Field.

Developers must break ground by July 2008 or the Washington State Public Stadium Authority - which is sympathetic to the consumer-show group - will control the property under terms of an agreement crafted in 1998, before construction started on Qwest Field, then called Seahawks Stadium.

Sims said he believes the project will go forward in spite of any lawsuit to stop it.

"Quite frankly, this is the most attorneyed project I've ever worked on," he said.

Sims contends the development would not gentrify Pioneer Square to the point of driving out some of its bars, businesses and subsidized housing. "The Pioneer Square funk ain't going to leave. The funky edge will stay there," he said.

The project would include 394 condos and row houses, 562 apartments, 1,035 parking spaces and 25,000 square feet of ground-level shops, including a grocery store. Daniels said it would be a "neighborhood grocery," not a supermarket that's part of a national chain.

The apartments would be concentrated in two shorter buildings in the center of the development. Tom Tierney, executive director of Seattle Housing Authority, said they would be one- and two-bedroom units renting for $875 to $1,020 a month. The buildings would have rooftop gardens providing residents with an acre of open space.

Parking would occupy four floors at the base of the apartment and condo buildings. Row houses would ring the outside of those buildings. Daniels said condos and row houses would cost $500 to $600 per square foot.

He predicted the condos would sell despite potentially fierce competition in the market, as real-estate experts have recently forecasted that 10,000 condos will be built near downtown Seattle in the next five years. Daniels said the stadium-area condos would have more appeal than condos in the South Lake Union, Belltown and Denny Triangle neighborhoods because of entertainment venues in the area, ethnic diversity in the Chinatown International District, and a mix of public-transit options with the nearby trains, buses, ferries and a waterfront trolley. Sims called the stadium district "the most transit-rich neighborhood in all of King County."

Daniels is banking on many residents going without cars. The 956 condos and apartments would have just 535 parking stalls; the remaining 500 stalls would be dedicated to fully replacing the public parking now on the site.

Nitze-Stagen redeveloped Seattle's Union Station and is converting the county-owned Johnson Building in Pioneer Square into a 68-condo complex called Stadium Lofts.

Only one other developer, Wright Runstad, submitted a proposal to develop the lot. County officials said it did not meet their demands for providing at least 133 units of affordable housing.

Daniels said he was confident his team will follow through on its proposal, adding, "Nitze-Stagen has never announced a project it hasn't done."