When the Vancouver City Council narrowly approved the rezoning of 13 acres from light industrial to general commercial in 2005 for what is today Grand Central, a course of action was set in place that is in play now.
The contentious process brought to light a number of issues about the largely light industrial area surrounding Grand Central, including the need for infrastructure improvements and direction for future development and redevelopment.
Listening to insistence by surrounding companies such as Columbia Machine Inc., the council directed staff that it was time for a plan.
“Inititially, our main concern here was we needed a plan,” said Rick Goode, President and Chief Executive Officer of Columbia Machine. “There hasn’t been that much development or new business coming in except for some of the additions we and other companies have made.”
The subarea plan would protect and enhance the employment potential of the area.
“Related to the rezone was a concern that approving it might actually make the area less marketable as an industrial employment area because of commercial pressures,” said Vancouver Senior Planner John Manley.
“We were told to look at that area, at how we can keep strong employment in relation to new commercial.”
What has transpired is the Draft Lower Grand Employment Area Subarea Plan (and the related plan district), on which the council will hear public testimony in September.
The plan is intended to set policies, guidelines, implementation measures and special standards to guide and support development and improvements within the 173-acre area bounded by state Route 14 to the south, Blandford Drive to the east, Fifth and Sixth streets to the north and Pearson Field Airport to the west.
Its goals for urban development include promoting or reinforcing unique identities or functions for individual corridors, planning for a compact urban form with an appropriate mix of uses, developing flexible standards to implement the vision for the corridors. Goals also include encouraging innovative and attractive private development that efficiently uses available land and resources and establishing connectivity.
And while businesses and property owners in the LGEA welcomed the attention and push for a plan, the current draft of the subarea plan has raised some red flags.
Raising questions
The proposed 20-year plan includes a number of guidelines for future development.
These include the prohibition of further freestanding commercial development and all residential land uses (except in the residentially zoned land north of Fifth Street).
This excludes trade or vocation schools, specialized instructional schools and on-site sales of goods manufactured by the same business – but the retail component can’t occupy more than 20 percent of the business’ square footage.
As it stands now, the plan establishes an area-wide maximum height limit of 45 feet with no option for increases, 25-foot setbacks along Fifth Street between Grove Street and Blandford Drive, exterior lighting standards to protect uphill neighbors and pilots from glare and prohibits new non-emergency access from Fifth Street to properties south of Fifth Street between Grand Boulevard and Blandford Drive.
It also calls for the rezone of the Washington State School for the Deaf’s athletic fields from higher density residential to light industrial in the event the school sells the property in the future.
Some of these restrictions are what have property and business owners within the LGEA worried.
The city’s light industrial code restricts building height to 75 feet. All of the light industrially zoned property in the LGEA—except the Quad Industrial Park property, where a development covenant restricts height to 45 feet —now comply with the 75-foot rule.
“The property and company owners object to any restrictions that are not imposed on other industrial property throughout the city,” said Stephen Horenstein, partner in charge of Miller Nash’s Vancouver law office and who is representing Columbia Machine, Quad Investments, Killian Pacific and JH Kelly in the subarea plan process.
“It affects their ability to develop, their property values and ultimately hurts the city’s goal of obtaining more family-wage jobs.”
Manley said the city is further examining the 45-foot restriction, which Horenstein said allows for a two-story building.
Industrial property owners also take issue with the restriction on commercial uses, such as restaurants, in the area, Horenstein said.
“In the industrial code, it’s pretty much allowed as long as you don’t exceed a certain percentage of the square footage of the industrial development, but the city is saying that if any is allowed at all, it should be included within the existing new industrial building,” he said.
Grand Central serves some of the need for commercial uses, Horenstein said, but some of the manufacturing companies run three shifts and might benefit from a small café that is not part of Grand Central, for example.
“It seems like just because of the existence of Grand Central, staff feels that further limitations on development are justified,” he said.
The city will work with business property owners to develop a multi-modal transportation system, and property and business owners and developers will be expected to work with the city to upgrade and extend utilities and services to support full development and redevelopment of the area – and help to coordinate a common agenda that supports successful implementation of the area.
“Nobody is opposed to creating a subarea plan that addresses design guidelines, transportation issues, landscape standards and a whole variety of things that could make the redevelopment of that area better for everyone,” Horenstein said.
“Those kinds of things make for higher quality development, better paying jobs and more tax revenue for city. But a plan that restricts fundamental uses or construction of buildings – the height restriction, for example – works against all of the positive attributes.”
GET TO KNOW THE LOWER GRAND EMPLOYMENT AREA
The land in the Lower Grand Employment Area was used for lowland agriculture before World War II, when it was rapidly developed as a temporary housing area for workers in the nearby Kaiser shipyards. After the war, the housing was quickly removed and the area was converted to industrial uses, according to the proposed plan.
Now, the area continues to have good highway access and increased visibility with the opening of Grand Central, and before the opening of Fred Meyer and other Grand Central businesses, provided employment to about 1,600 workers, according to the plan.
It is primarily zoned light industrial, with the exception of the Grand Central commercial node – about 8.6 percent of the proposed LGEA – and some higher density residential, which includes the Washington State School for the Deaf, its athletic field on the lowland south of Fifth Street and a small multi-family building south of Sixth Street.
The area is home to more than 40 businesses that provide industrial and/or office uses. The largest percentages of land ownership are Quad Investments, which owns the 52-acre Quad Industrial Parks lands on the east end of the proposed LGEA, the state of Washington with the School for the Deaf, Grand Central Partners LLC, Columbia Machine Inc. and Kiewit Construction Co.
Quad Investments is made up of the Columbia Machine family shareholders, said Stephen Horenstein of Miller Nash, who is representing Columbia Machine, Quad Investments, Killian Pacific and JH Kelly in the LGEA Subarea Plan process.
During the development of the subarea plan, planners worked with such property and business owners who are concerned about poor drainage, deteriorating streets, utility services, crime and complications from increased traffic in the area. The plan is intended to provide a coordinated approach to resolving these infrastructure issues and provide guidelines for future development and redevelopment.
