The Seattle chapter of the American Institute of Architects is putting out a call for designs for residential buildings that provide “progressive solutions for urban living.” The criteria, according to the AIA press release, include “forward looking solutions,” “new models,” and “innovative approaches to economic inclusion.”
So why does the panel of “public judges” consist of two Crosscut columnists (Knute Berger, one of the city’s most voluble opponents of growth and density, and Kent Kammerer, a prominent neighborhood activist who opposes increasing density even around transit stops) and a real-estate agent who described the minimal density increases associated with mother-in-law apartments as “not pleasant” on his blog?
The competition also includes a jury of professional architects. But it would be nice if the “public” view included someone who actually supports new, forward-looking solutions, instead of three guys who oppose even the most modest changes to Seattle’s single-family neighborhoods (and thus support the old, backward-looking “solution” that is suburban sprawl).
Wow. They should have Huge Ass City’s Dan Bartolet and you or Dominic Holden on the “public” panel and not those anti-growth dinosaurs.
Shut the fuck up.
Sounds like clever way to discredit the anti-density crowd, by showing just how clueless they are when it comes to adjudicating on these sorts of design issues.
I mean, who’s going to come out looking better on this? A panel of professional architects who study, develop, and practice solutions for increasing livable urban densification, or, a group of know-nothing blow-hards with all the design, engineering, and aesthetic skills of that guy down the block who builds bird houses in his garage?
Instead of trying to create wholly new forms, why not start by looking to other cities, seeing what looks good, and making sure (as a first step) our codes do not prohibit it?
I believe curent codes don’t allow the nice windows you see in bay windowed, front porched town homes in other cities. Or, our codes seem to require attached parking. Walk Kowalski didn’t have that stuff and his 50 or 80 year old townhome looks way better than our new ones.
Then as a second step, take things we know we do not like, such as those eight pack mis-named “townhomes” (I know of no four pack “townhomes” off the street with another four pack in front on the street….this is not what townhomes are anywhere else) and disallow them, for example, by requiring front to back lots for townhomes.
After these plain, dull, simple steps are taken, *then* maybe it would be time to try to out-genius the rest of the world??
For once PC hit it on the nose.
New designs are frequently:
A. too expensive
B. not worth the time and effort
C. not proven and fraught with problems
Other than not building things with totally flat roofs, we could easily borrow building designs. And they’re cheaper.
because the panel reveals the middlebrow bias of the AIA.
Which all brings me back to rezoning along arterials to 100-story inexpensive residential apartment buildings with greenspace.
Look, otherwise we’re constantly tearing down and rebuilding from one-story to two-story to three-story to four-story to six-story to eight-story buildings and keeping the neighbors awake with all the noise. Which really really sucks.
will you are droll.
I think Mr. Poe deserves the first Slog ban.
@9
that’s funny. hi poe.