A year ago, you might recall, our local United Way purchased some discounted land from the City for a cottage cluster project. The land was surplus at the conclusion of the realignment of Market Street at Swegle Elementary School, and United Way intended to build affordable housing for low-income seniors on the wedges.
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| Concept drawing via United Way |
Since then United Way advanced the project and gave it a name, calling it "Cottages United." The City also completed the HB 2001 code compliance package legalizing middle housing forms.
Now, there is new progress with applications for adjustments at the City. They are going before the Planning Administrator for administrative approval on small adjustments to setbacks. The cases do not require the full apparatus of a formal Public Hearing.
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| Lots at nos. 1, 2, and 3 for a cottage cluster |
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| Eight cottages at no. 1 |
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| Parking at no. 2 and ten cottages at no. 3 |
Significantly, the proposals call for fewer parking stalls and are on land zoned RS, formerly for single detached housing, but now considerably more flexible because of those new middle housing standards.
The project still seems a little remote from shopping, and will not be very walkable. But land at a discount is hard to find, and there are trade-offs for the affordable housing.
As likely the first newly legalized cottage cluster built under the new code, it will be interesting to see more details as the project moves along. Hopefully it will operate as proof-of-concept and other projects can iterate and build off its success.
Addendum
I should have included that there is proposed neighborhood hub zoning here, which if developed would mitigate considerably the problem with walkability.
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| A proposed neighborhood hub site |
4 comments:
Added bit on hub proposal in Our Salem.
As a footnote, here are some previous posts, with notes on the Market St/Swegle realignment:
- On eminent domain (2012). The City ended up demolishing five or six houses, some of which had been involved in bankruptcy and/or foreclosure. So the net is something like +12 new homes. But being new and built to contemporary standards, they are certain to be higher quality and more energy efficient than the demolished houses.
- On the transition from "substandard" two lane configuration to "urban standard" with two through lanes, a center turn pocket, and bike lanes and sidewalks. (2013)
This project is in ELNA. We have supported it from the initial concept and continue to look forward to the houses being built here. Its not clear that they will be stickbuilt houses. We got the impression that they will be modulars perhaps. Comments are due this Friday and we will again push for better screening from a very busy Market Street and for security. These cottages will sit right up next to a sidewalk that gets a fair amount of foot traffic from homeless people right now. If I were an older person living alone, I would sure want to feel safer. The cottages on the south side of Market are a bit isolated from bus stops and I'm a bit worried about how the reduced parking will work out. Not that people will have cars, but they will more likely seek some sort of transport to doctors and shopping. But it is interesting that right next to this cluster is a residential care facility. It is a cluster of houses that provide care in groups of 6 people per house. I wonder if there is some sort of way to connect the two communities. At the very least there was a requirement for a walkway that never got built. Maybe now is a good time to explore building that. It would give residents of the new cluster access to a quiet neighborhood street and the care facility.
In any case we sure hope this project proves successful and that it becomes a viable model for more such clusters.
Salem Reporter has an update here. They haven't started construction yet and in fact are still working on raising funds.
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