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Seattlest Pix 09Nov25
Can't Miss It: Thanksgiving Eve
Seattlest has lived in eight cities across the country, and we have to be honest. We've lived in Seattle longer than we have anywhere else because we love it here. It's clean, it's culturally vibrant, it's full of extraordinary natural beauty, it's safe. But, we've never been able to reckon with the fact that it's just so damned wealthy and white. Much as we like to think of ourselves as forward-thinking, inclusive citizens, we all know our lovely little city is about as diverse as a carton of eggs.
When we first moved to town, now almost five years ago, we were happy to know there was such a place as the Central District, where some semblance of diversity existed (because it sure as hell didn't exist full-throttle in our then-neighborhood of Ballard/Phinney). We bristled at the notion that corner of Madison and 21st was an eyesore. After all, most of the crime there was drug use and sales, which we tend to not equate with actual crime (the stuff you do to harm people other than yourself). But, of course, as the neighborhood near that corner began sprouting condos and town homes, it was only a matter of time before that corner of cultural and class diversity was shut down to make way for more condos and town homes.
Don't get us wrong. We don't want to live in a neighborhood that's half full of drug addicts and bar brawls, either, but shutting down those places doesn't extinguish those problems, it just moves them elsewhere. We don't have a problem with development and "progress." We're not trying to decry or denounce the right of real estate developers to do their thing and make their profits. But, you have to admit there's something lost when you knock down corners like that one to make way for more high-cost housing for the well-incomed.
Today, the Seattle Times has a nice little piece about what's in the works for that corner:
Mueller will follow through on Falls' plans to transform what had been a blighted, drug-plagued block — home to the notorious and now-shuttered Deano's Grocery and Club Chocolate City — into a high-end apartment and retail complex that for now he's calling 2026 Madison...This is a key neighborhood block and one of the last yet to be redeveloped on that stretch of Madison — Seattle's only Sound-to-lake corridor. Its renewal would finally bring to this locale the kind of gentrification that has been taking place east and west of it and throughout much of the Central Area.Finally! The gentrification we've all been waiting for!
photo courtesy of Seattlest Flickr user JiKenya
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it's keeping this city you love to live in safe for you. it's really too bad that seattle is staying so vanilla.
Well, I guess we're going to have to disagree a bit on this whole "redevelopment and gentrification" thing.
I don't like when restaurants/bars/clubs/bowling alleys and the like get displaced because some developer wants a 12% on their property rather than the %8 they would get from the property in its current use.
However, look at the picture of this property. It is run-down, decrepit and would alarm most people interested in moving into the neighborhod. It is certainly not doing anyone any good nor contributing to the tax base of the city.
There are much better/stronger cases for drawing a line in the sand against gentrification than this eyesore.
Oh, and on another note, why the comment about "so damned wealthy and white"? I know what you are getting at, but if you had said "so damned poor and black" there would be an uproar.
I just think comments like that are offensive and irresponsible.
I also have to disagree with you about the redevelopment of this area. I live a block from there. Two years ago a hail of bullets from a drive-by pierced my truck and thankfully not my head (I was sitting at my computer 15 feet away). Here's where drug violence can affect innocent lives. I know that the corner of 23rd and Union has seen an in increase in nefarious activity since they closed Chocolate City, so the activity has moved as you say. But so far I haven't seen the "open market" of prostitution and drug dealing that was routine constantly in front of Deano's. I, for one am counting the minutes until that block has a few nice cafes/bars/shops. And I hope that the clientele is diverse. If you took a poll of people living a block or two from there (black, white or other), I think they would echo my opinion.
well i would argue that drive-by shootings are violent crimes, and there are plenty of drug addicts who never resort to that. but, this isn't a post about the war on drugs. i'm with you, man.
i've lived in crime-infested neighborhoods in new york and new orleans, and would rather not repeat those experiences ever again. i just don't think developing crime blocks into condos does anything to stave off the the violence, it just dumps the problem on someone else's doorstep.
besides, that building could've been gutted and restored, retaining some small history.
I like the idea of readaptive use as well. I think its pretty cool to see old structures used for modern purposes, like that show on HGTV where they show people living in an old millhouse with the intact millwheel or living in a renovated church.
Sometimes, however, the building is too far gone and it's unprofitable to renovate.
I don't agree with the notion that Seattle is a "White" city.
When you compare it to the demographics of the United States as a whole, this means there are fewer Whites, fewer Hispanics, slightly fewer Blacks, about four times as many Asians and three times as many biracial people in Seattle.
My problem with all this redevelopment is that it is going towards the wealthy. Everybody wants to build million dollar condos while whining about the lack of affordable housing in Seattle. Every time you build one of these monstrosities, you raise the assessed valuation of the property all around it, until no one but the wealthy can afford it. This pushes people who have been there for years out. How about a rule that says that for every million dollar condo project, there needs to be five affordable housing projects and a couple of low income housing projects?
I call this the "Field of Dreams" economic theory. Believing that if you build it, more wealthy people will materialize is pretty much like believing in Santa Claus. Why not build for a market you know is there? Greed, simply greed. They'd rather sell million dollar condos than rent to working people who need housing.
I'm not against cleaning up this neighborhood, although I believe that it will just move the problem. But I don't think building more housing for the wealthy in the face of the crisis in affordable housing and low income housing is conscienable.
"We bristled at the notion that corner of Madison and 21st was an eyesore. After all, most of the crime there was drug use and sales, which we tend to not equate with actual crime..."
actual crime like.. murder? in the fourteen days i stayed with a friend at those condos or whatever above safeway.. i heard gunshots four or five times. one of those times resulted in a dead body sitting behind the twilight exit for a couple hours.
there were shootings inside.. outside.. fights.. drug deals.. prostitution.. you name it. the owners never called the police, even when someone was shot and killed inside.
i don't see what you're losing there. that's not culture or diversity, it's an area (or at least a block) that needed to be eradicated.
as an aside to my previous comment... i agree with the general point of your post that putting up these cookie-cutter condos everywhere is silly (they're filling up to what, 65% capacity on average?).
This post is so superficial, ill-informed and filled with hypocrisies that it borders on the absurd.
You say the “our lovely little city is about as diverse as a carton of eggs.” But as one of the comments below amply demonstrates, using ... you know … FACTS that is just factually wrong. PARTS of the city of course are not at all diverse … i.e. where you chose to live. But if you are so desperate for diversity, why didn’t you chose to live in the CD or one of the many other neighborhoods that actually are diverse. (That’s one of the primary reasons I chose to live there).
The answer likely lies in your ridiculously revealing comment that, “we were happy to know there was such a place as the Central District, where some semblance of diversity existed.” So yes, you wanted to live in a “diverse” city defined pretty much as – there’s a section of the city where black people live, but not near me (in other words, pretty much Segregation).
Calling 21st and Madison a “corner of cultural and class diversity” is just ridiculous (did you actually read the post you linked to there?). That lowers to bar on what represents “culture” to a degree that’s insulting and frankly racist. Go take a visit to the new NW African American museum (it’s in the CD – we’ll get you a map!).
Look around at the vibrant history of “culture” in Seattle’s African American community through the years and that exists in bushels all across this area if one actually opens one’s eyes and doesn’t typecast the African American community. Ask the curators or volunteers there – or any African American you run into (if you can find one of the 50,000 of them that live in the city of Seattle) whether they think that Deano’s Market or Club Chocolate City represented “cultural diversity” in any way.
Your assertion that the crime at Madison and 21st (or 23rd and Union) “tend not to equate to real crime” further proves that you have no idea what you’re talking about. Yeah, I suppose that “most” of the crime is drug dealing. (Leave it to others whether that’s a “real” crime). Of course, it overlooks: the shootings that have occurred in and around Deano’s/Club Chocolate City; the murder of the hard-working immigrant owner of the Philly Cheesesteak earlier this year because he had the gaul to try to keep one of the dealers from regularly trying to do business in his restaurant; the gunshots that have pierced a range of establishments in both those areas; the multiple drive by shootings that have occurred on our street; violent assaults on senior citizens in the middle of the day, etc, etc. Are those REAL crimes?
The issue is not about diversity – it’s about basic safety. Oh, and you may find this hard to believe, but African Americans in the CD actually care about that too!
And you bemoan the fact that new cookie-cutter condos, etc – raise property values in the surrounding areas and undermine “diversity”. Don’t know how you define cookie-cutter – I imagine you don’t, and just threw it out there along with a lot of other assumptions. But a fair amount of community involvement and engagement has taken place to ensure that these will not be cookie cutter. (And the ONE building that has some architectural appeal among the several that are being taken down for this project has structural and contamination issue that make preserving it completely unfeasible – but the idea was explored).
But the bigger issue is this – if you want cultural and class diversity in the city of Seattle (or at least some parts) you can help do that by building … MORE HOUSING! You see, there’s this little equation about supply and demand – there’s a lot of demand in Seattle (which has driven up prices). If you increase the supply to meet that demand – over time that increase in supply actually creates enough housing to also support those who are not wealthy and white.
If you don’t create new, more dense housing you in fact WILL end up with a city that lacks diversity – a concern for many of us who consider that a key element in where we live, so much so that we actually live in a diverse area.
templeton--i can totally agree with most of your comment, except the part where you called me a racist and made your own assumptions about why i live where i do. i really don't think that's relevant to this post. but, if you must know, i live where i do (and i recently moved) because that's where i can afford to live. i actively looked for affordable apartments in the CD (that's where i was living before i moved this time) and wasn't able to find any. maybe the timing was bad, who knows.
maybe i'm skewed about what's diversity because i've lived in very, very diverse places. in NOLA and brooklyn, both, i was one of maybe two or three white folks in my neighborhood. but this isn't about me. it's about developing and gentrifying neighborhoods so that people who can't afford to live in them anymore are pushed elsewhere. that's what i, personally, don't like.
i personally love the notion of adding housing, as long as it is affordable housing. having just moved recently, i can speak to the fact that it's extremely difficult to find a good apartment in this town if you happen to make less than six figures. i'd love to see some low-income housing, 3- and 4-bedroom rental apartments go up on that block. but, at least from what i understand, that's just not what's happening.
anyway, i have to concur, i haven't been to the seattle african-american history museum, and i'll have to check it out.
"in NOLA and brooklyn, both, i was one of maybe two or three white folks in my neighborhood."
uh, that's not diversity it's segregation. just because a few members of another race take up residence in an area that's inhabited by another race doesn't make it diverse. i'm sure you can find the same thing here (two or three white folks living in a predominately black neighborhood or even two or three black folks living in a predominately white neighborhood) and that would negate your whole argument.
and you may not be racist but the way you said some things in this post could make some people wonder.