Last week, Bellevue City Council approved a Land Use Code Amendment (LUCA) to allow for increased building density on a 60-acre site to the east of the future East Main light rail station. The unceremonious nature of Council’s vote to approve the LUCA at its last meeting of the year belied its importance as the culmination of eight study sessions, a years-long public outreach process, and thousands of work hours from planning staff. The 60 acres represent a fraction of the station’s 15-minute walkshed, which continues to include single family zoning farther out.
It’s no secret that Bellevue is experiencing a uniquely rapid employment growth, fueled in large part by Amazon’s and Facebook’s expansions into the city’s Downtown and Spring District neighborhoods, respectively. Because of prior work by planning staff and Council, these areas have land uses that have been able to accommodate the demand. However, the low-density area around the East Main station has seemed comparatively unprepared for the opening of Sound Transit’s East Link Extension in 2023 — an event that will represent the largest paradigm shift in Eastside mobility since the opening of the first floating bridge. Because a light rail line is only as useful as the land uses around its stations enable it to be, this process by Bellevue City Council represented a one-time chance to craft policies that encourage the redevelopment of this site into a transit-oriented and mixed-use community.
While the zoning plans that arose from the LUCA process represent a step in the right direction, the fact remains that Bellevue is acutely in need of more affordable housing. Political leaders need to be ready to take bolder action to make the $3.7 billion investment in East Link light rail reap its full potential. Taking a close look at current plans for the future of East Main provides insight into how transit oriented development is currently unfolding in Bellevue and what can be done to make it better.
The Site
The East Main development site comprises the area between Main Street and SE 8th Street to the north and south, and 112th Avenue and 114th Avenue to the east and west, respectively. The site is bisected by SE 6th Street, which is a minor three lane road that provides vehicle access to some of the office complexes. It’s also the road that several conservative councilmembers had wanted to select as the preferred alternative for an additional I-405 access point (luckily this did not happen). The portion south of SE 6th Street is heavily populated by a wetland area, which restricts the amount of development that can occur on this section (another reason not to build a new freeway interchange nearby, perhaps).
The northern portion is comprised of five parcels – these are the ones closest to the light rail station and with greater development potential. The two northernmost parcels are currently hotels owned by Wig Properties, who featured heavily during the public outreach process. The Bellevue Club, a local membership-based athletics club located on the southwest corner of 112th Avenue SE & SE 6th Street, also provided their input at several junctures. Many Councilmembers and nearby residents regarded them as a community asset that should not be subject to all LUCA provisions, so exceptions were carved out for them throughout the process. For example, an expansion of the Bellevue Club on its parcel would not trigger minimum housing requirements like development on other parcels in the rezone would.
Multimodal transportation around the site is somewhat limited. To the east, 114th Avenue SE serves as part of the Lake Washington Loop bicycle trail and provides painted bike lanes most of the way on each side, but portions of these facilities towards the north turn into sharrows. Pedestrian travel between parcels is restricted, with no cross streets between them to provide easy access. Throughout 2020 and most of 2021, transit service along 112th Avenue SE was limited to King County Metro Route 240 due to the Covid-19 pandemic, but Route 246 was recently restored as part of KCM’s fall service changes. Finally, the 186-stall Wilburton Park & Ride towards the southeast of the site provides quick access to I-405. East Main LUCA provisions would need to address both housing and transportation facilities to ensure this site has maximum utility as a multimodal development.
Land Use Code Amendment (LUCA) Discussions
Although this rezone process began years ago with the East Main Station Area Plan, the five most recent Council study sessions over the last six months represented an important juncture in the project. City staff collated stated priorities with stakeholder requests and technical considerations to create their recommendations for the site, which would then be subject to Council approval or modification. The study sessions also provided additional opportunities for stakeholders to drive the process in their favor — representatives of developer Wig Properties spoke at every study session to encourage various provisions that would make redeveloping the site more economically feasible. Unsurprisingly, these requests were not always in line with the most efficient ways to address key priorities of affordable housing and transit-oriented development, but it would ultimately be Council’s job to make these decisions on behalf of Bellevue residents.
Building Height & Housing Options
I’ll focus more on this later, but Bellevue, like every other city in our region, is experiencing an affordable housing crisis. This has been driven, in part, by a lack of commensurate growth in housing units as our city has enticed people with new jobs. With the shortage of housing units in the city in mind, Council expressed that providing housing at the East Main site would be a priority, with a particular emphasis on affordable housing.
Although there was some dissent from conservative Councilmembers, Council settled on maximum building heights of 300 feet (320 feet with mechanical components) with a minimum housing requirement of 35% in accordance with staff’s recommendation. Per their calculations, this would result in the creation of more than 1,500 housing units, of which approximately 87 would be affordable at less than 80% Area Median Income (AMI). Mayor Robinson, at a November meeting, also introduced a deed-in-lieu option that could open up possibilities for developers to partner with non-profit organizations to create deeply affordable housing. Nearly all of her colleagues supported her amendment.
