Much of the land classified as buildable, within the City of Bellingham and its Urban Growth Areas (UGAs), is located in extremely challenging areas to build. Some of the land is in critical areas such as the Padden Creek watershed and steep slope areas, and much of it lacks the necessary capital facilities infrastructure, such as sewer and public utilities. Other areas also require expensive off-site road construction that may never be built as prerequisite conditions for any development. We know we need to be building about 825 homes per year to meet the demand but without a sufficient supply of buildable land where will we build? It’s time to reassess Bellingham’s existing UGAs and reconfigure the City’s urban growth boundaries to introduce new surrounding land that is proven to sustain responsible growth. #UrbanGrowthAreas #LandUsePlanning #ComprehensivePlan #GrowthManagementAct #WashingtonState #HousingCrisis #HousingforBellingham
Mary Hess
10mo
Over the years, Bellingham planners have learned a lot about cluster developments and steep slope building restrictions and conditions. There should be Lessons Learned and Best Management Practices that planners could share that work with BMC and GMA. Have these documents been developed by planning? Really let's try to prevent sprawl first.
Ryan Lewis, MPA
10mo
It's also been some time since any substantive amount of land has been annexed. And there is an awful lot of otherwise buildable land just outside city limits that can't get served with utilities due to BMC and GMA restrictions.
Authentic Leader focused on exceeding expectations.
10moI’ve repeated the following to both the county and City of Bellingham “If we are truly in a housing crisis/emergency then why don’t we act like it?”There are great examples all over the world that we can use as best practices (Ferndale and Anacortes are great examples locally). We can adapt and still be great stewards of the land and environment.