Urbnlivn - Latest Comments in Is Heron and Pagoda making Escala Cosmo 2.0?

Re: Is Heron and Pagoda making Escala Cosmo 2.0?

Woppenhe — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 19:49:44 -0000

This is actually a break for the future citizens of downtown. When buying a view unit and paying a premium, there is no guarantee of having those views that you paid for. Hence, all of these units ought to be lower in price than they are, given the uncertainty. I was enthralled with view property downdown, but I will now include coastal property in my searches, since once you are on the coast, you do have some view security.

Re: Is Heron and Pagoda making Escala Cosmo 2.0?

mattgoyer — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 20:15:13 -0000

Damnit. No more 2am posts.

Re: Is Heron and Pagoda making Escala Cosmo 2.0?

Josh — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 18:19:09 -0000

Don't you mean the Escala will be Cosmo 2.0?

Re: Is Heron and Pagoda making Escala Cosmo 2.0?

Cosmo Seattle — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 16:14:42 -0000

hi dan- i feel your pain. the seattle city planning cabal is seriously hard to breech!

one advantage you have at the moment is that the master use permit has not yet been approved. from my experience, the DPD is powerless in adjudicating these issues. it would appear that once an application is submitted, all the power-decisions have already been made. the role of DPD is to smooth the way and make sure the mayor's and city council's pet projects are enacted. key among their concerns are how the building will appear from the sidewalk and how it will change the skyline. my suggestion is to gather up as many escala buyers as you can and engage a land use attorney.

it's also nice that the escala developer is attending design review meetings on behalf of this issue (though clearly for self interest). our developer, continental properties, left us hanging in the wind under similar circumstances. they neither informed us nor acted on our behalf.

Re: Is Heron and Pagoda making Escala Cosmo 2.0?

Mark W — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 22:02:57 -0000

Keep in mind that Cosmo isn't necessarily Cosmo 1.0. Although some of the Cosmo complaints acknowledge that the property across the alley was approved for a 13-story office building, 13 stories of office aren't the same as 13 stories of residence or parking garage. With floor ratios of 1:1.6 to 1:1.8, recent construction office building near Cosmo suggest a 13 story office building will match approx. 20-24 floors of a residential tower like Cosmo. Thus at the time of the pre-sale, more than half of Cosmo buyers facing the alley had good reason to believe they'd have an office building view - long before the plans changed to a 36-story building. In other words, the fact that much of Cosmo was going to be an alley's width away from an office building didn't stop the pre-sale buyers. I can see why the folks on the upper floors might now be unhappy, but they didn't seem to be too concerned about tower spacing when it only impacted Cosmo below the 25th floor.

I don't know when Escala held its presale, but it's been almost two years since the city codified its current downtown tower zoning and setback requirements. For a section of downtown that seems to straddle the Westlake area, what they enacted IMO doesn't measure up to their references to Vancouver and discussion of skinny buildings. But the process was well-publicized, zoning information is readily available, and "buyer beware" is as good advice as ever.

Walks through downtown, Belltown and Capitol Hill show that the city regards alley views of other buildings to be acceptable. If you buy something that faces an alley, don't make any assumptions about the views.