Breaking---Backyard cottages pass 9-0!

The ordinance  to allow backyard cottages in the other three quarters of Seattle just passed 9-0!  The council's comments focused on the exhaustive community outreach, successful pilot program and benefit of having this housing choice for Seattle. Excellent work by the planning commission, DPD and council.

Usually, the city's process oriented decision making can be cumbersome, and having spent hours in meetings, testifying, and communicating with council, I feel vindicated that our involvement has helped in some small way to bring some innovation to the Single Family zoning.

We're excited to design some of these--in part because of the opportunity to foster multi-generational housing, and the option of building a smaller free standing structure rather than building an addition.  Plus, it is a really fun scale--I think more people will be thinking about bonus studios rather than housing units.