Aidan T
@buildhomes.bsky.social
220 followers 270 following 1.4K posts
For more housing, Seattle #urbanism #Seattle Seattle YIMBY member, Seattle New Liberals member
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buildhomes.bsky.social
The Middle Housing updates grant up to 2.0 FAR on all NR zoning, which is not that different than the state required 2.5 FAR
buildhomes.bsky.social
I think Washington's TOD bill HB1491 would do almost nothing in Seattle. The light rail stations are likely all already compliant, and most of the bus stops are too.

Especially with the ability to exempt 25% of stations if the rest reach 3.0 FAR average, the Aurora zoning is well above that.
buildhomes.bsky.social
Also bad take from Wilson, "build housing that tenants can't afford" is the same argument NIMBYs use against market rate housing. All housing improves affordability.
buildhomes.bsky.social
Good to see AMR supports it even if Katie Wilson doesn't. The vast majority of tenants that live in market rate housing will be better off due to the increase in feasibility causing an increase in supply.
buildhomes.bsky.social
A clear vision is this future
buildhomes.bsky.social
What's the math here? $1.45 minimum wage in 1970 adjusted to cost of living + inflation is $12.11 today, not enough for housing and coffee
buildhomes.bsky.social
Do you know the setbacks on this? In Seattle everywhere will be allowed 40', 2.0 FAR, 60% lot coverage, no parking, but with 5 foot side setbacks and 10 foot front and rear unless alley bsky.app/profile/nick...
nicksattele.bsky.social
I crunched the numbers so you don't have to but it seems like if you're able to preserve trees, things are looking pretty good for housing in Seattle's single family zones!

The standard 5k sqft single family lot will allow a 4 story 12k sqft building 🤯 (if you retain trees). That's 6 2k sqft units!
buildhomes.bsky.social
Think this is an example where neither FAR nor lot coverage are limiting factors, just parking access and setbacks. Proposal by a big middle housing developer/broker
buildhomes.bsky.social
Funny proposal to tear down 4 apartment units and replace it with 4 SFHs under the middle housing interim ordinance
buildhomes.bsky.social
Average firefighter sees a perfectly rectangular Spokane block with wide streets and universal two way access to every house and can't imagine anything other than a single family home safely occupying that lot
buildhomes.bsky.social
Another bill they're talking about bringing up again is one that benefits homeowners at the expense of renters is the corporate homeownership ban. Allowing people to rent single family homes gives renters the ability to live in all neighborhoods.
buildhomes.bsky.social
The homestead exemption bill last year got a lot of sponsors. It's basically a big tax break to homeowners, and a huge bias in the tax code towards homeownership. They talked about offsetting it with a tiny renter credit, but to fully equalize it would require billions and billions in renter credits
buildhomes.bsky.social
Watched the housing legislative preview. Not looking good, talked about how they want to ban corporate homeownership, and want to eliminate the uniformity clause to give homeowners a big homestead exemption. Not much on supply besides victory lapping washingtonstatestandard.com/2025/10/03/w...
WA Legislature’s housing leaders outline vision for 2026 • Washington State Standard
Permanent supportive housing, eviction workarounds and financing for rural homes are among the topics Washington lawmakers may soon discuss.
washingtonstatestandard.com
buildhomes.bsky.social
Does NYC not allow compact parking spots? Looks like the minimum parking space size is 8'6" wide, or 8' in some instances. Could lower it to 8' or 7'6 or eliminate parking space dimensional requirements in areas that don't have parking requirements.
buildhomes.bsky.social
All in labor cost for Uber in a city like SF probably $50-60+? $40 in wages *1.5 all in cost
buildhomes.bsky.social
We let people who have no concept of what a city is influence our cities. They could not explain to you how Rome, London, New York City still function despite not being "originally plotted" for what they are today.
buildhomes.bsky.social
This area is set for a SLU like transformation. Brand new zoning, weak Seattle housing market, strong Bellevue job market, light rail and not many other places for apts to go
buildhomes.bsky.social
Might as well just pack up the team and move it to Atlanta. More money that way.
buildhomes.bsky.social
I don't think so, which is really annoying considering the number of amendments that live in different places with different voting outcomes
buildhomes.bsky.social
In some red states. There are red states where pro-choice isn't a winning stance.
buildhomes.bsky.social
Outside of Ron Johnson, there aren't many swing state Republican senators, because they lose because they have bad candidates who take bad positions in Michigan, Georgia, Arizona, Nevada. In states that swung at some point 16-24 it's just Johnson and McCormick, who rode trump's coattails
buildhomes.bsky.social
Yep he goes out of his way to appear moderate and garner a bipartisan voting record, even on stuff like guns where he's out of step with his party.
buildhomes.bsky.social
In the senate it's not really working for them, most swing states won by trump and biden have dem senators