It's a choice between a retarded corrupt communist who descends from wealth and privilege or a white guy with an electric unicycle?

I wish Logan, Beto, and Pat all the best.

@3 Maybe he means something like the duplex or triplex sized projects could be undertaken by small-time property holders on lots already owned. That would greatly reduce the overall capital requirements for the redevelopment.

Its plausible, I guess.

But any time somebody says "market solutions" for societal problems, they set the bozo bit in my book.

@3, you are quite right that the land cost goes down as you add more units, but the challenge is that after 3 floors, the construction code flips from residential to commercial, so the per-sqft cost to build structures goes up. Also, multifamily buildings over 4 or 5 floors have reinforced concrete ground floors and often excavated underground parking. Both of those things add per-unit costs over a wood frame duplex or triplex.

My thinking on this topic was really informed by this excellent Sightline analysis that covers the costs associated with larger apartment buildings: https://www.sightline.org/2018/11/05/whys-the-rent-so-high-for-new-apartments-in-seattle/. There's definitely a time and place for large apartment buildings, but it's not a panacea, so the real change over the current status quo is legalizing duplexes, triplexes, stacked flats, etc.

@4, don't worry, I'm not advocating for "market solutions," and I'm definitely not advocating for "free market solutions," mostly because such a thing hasn't really ever existed in the history of civilization. Everything is regulated, and land use is one of the most stringently regulated aspects of society.

It's just plain weird that we all want affordable housing in the city,* but somehow the council doesn't take the first step which is legalize affordable housing. Instead we outlaw affordable housing and then try to do all sorts of weird cross-subsidy schemes that are doomed to build too little housing on their own. ¯(ツ)/¯

it's almost like some special interest groups don't actually want this

The higher developers are allowed to build, the lower their cost per unit, and the lower the unit price required to get their return.

That's true as a general rule, but the jump from wood frame to concrete offers a wrinkle. A 5 story wood-framed building is going to have a lower CPU than an 8 story concrete building under the current code. Until the CLT revolution comes to WA (Logan, any thoughts on what if anything the council can do to move that along?), that's an important inflection point where the a general rule doesn't apply.

He wants Seattle to be a ‘world-class’ city, and ‘affordable.’

Is that realistic?

Every city I would describe as ‘world class’ is at least as expensive as Seattle, if not much more expensive.

@3. No that's not true. You're talking about an entirely different class of construction materials. You can't throw up a high rise on a basic foundation with timber frames and plaster.

Oh man this is my candidate!! Yes!!

But will he donate half his SCC salary to 'the movement'?

@4:

Ironically, in my neighborhood of North Ballard many duplex and triplex units have been demolished to make room for fourplex or even sixplex units on the same footprint - the difference being of course that most of what was destroyed were 50-plus years old and almost exclusively rentals in the roughly $1200 - $1500 per month-per-unit range, whereas what has replaced them are shiny new (and in some cases already deteriorating) SFH's that run $700K and upward.

Still going with that bogus “75%”, Stranger? It’s not anywhere near 75%. You’re as bad as the QA nuts whose claims you hate.

At least be factually honest.

The correct metric is 75% of residentially zoned land. You can do the math yourself, @13.

@14: From the article: “Currently, 75 percent of Seattle is zoned for single-family housing.”

No qualifier about “residentially zoned land” exists in that statement.

Before you lecture anyone else on doing math, please learn to read.

@12

If they're multi-unit buildings on the same footprint as the old ones, then technically they're not SFHs-- that term is commonly understood to apply only to stand-alone detached housing.

What you've got there are condos, not Single Family Homes. And chances are they will indeed be on the rental market some day, but neither you nor I will live to see it.

This is just how private housing for the general public has always worked-- the cheapest stock has always been the old, crumbling moldy stuff, not the clean new stuff. If you want new housing construction for the poor, then the only ways you're ever going to get it are through corporate (or military) owned-and-operated dormitories, or through public housing.

@12- I've seen the same thing. But the net result is that there are now about twice as many places for people to live in that area. No one is deciding not to move to Seattle because there is not a lot of open housing. The people who are moving in are in large part higher-paid tech workers. On the other hand, building more townhouses is not bringing in more people - the number arriving is based on hiring and how our businesses are doing.

The $1200-$1500/month rentals you describe were being taken up by the new arrivals (I know, I own a few of them). That makes it harder for everyone, including low- and middle-income people to find a pace to live. Time was when if you advertised an open apartment in Ballard, half a dozen Amazon or Microsoft workers would show up at the open house ready to sign.

The extra housing units we get by the conversions that you mention ease this situation for everyone. You can see it happening now - there are far fewer techies trying to rent the older apartments when they come open than there were a couple of years ago. This is greatly slowing rent increases for everyone.

And @17 is right - those townhomes will ultimately be rented at more average prices. What is "luxury housing" now will become not so lux in the future as more new housing stock is built.

Bowers is the ONLY one of the candidates profiled here so far who is really talking much sense about the housing situation. I'd never heard of him before today but would like to hear more.

And electric scooters are lazy. Just sayin'.

@8 -- Tokyo is certainly world class, and Tokyo is much more affordable than Seattle. Zoning has a lot to do with that.

@19

Housing costs in Tokyo are within a few percentage points of Seattle's.

Transportation and entertainment are far more expensive in Tokyo.

It might be a wash after accounting for health care, which of course is more expensive in the US than in anywhere else in the developed world, but overall Tokyo is probably a tad costlier than Seattle-- it certainly isn't "much more affordable."

Actually 35% of Seattle's total land mass is zoned single family. Anything else is just playing with the math. Too many urbanists in City Hall already. Definitely don't want another one.

@18: Agreed. Bowers actually seems to know something about housing issues, beyond the attitudinal sloganeering employed by the current incumbent.