Seattle is in the midst of a once-a-decade update to its comprehensive plan, a zoning document that outlines where, what type and how much housing can be built around the city.
City officials and housing experts say allowing for more housing construction is essential for addressing Seattle’s long-brewing affordability crisis. Opponents say it will lead to overcrowding, lost trees, lost parking and other problems in their neighborhoods. Some neighborhood groups have filed legal challenges to stop the plan.
How housing became one of the city’s most crucial and controversial subjects is now familiar territory for most Seattleites. Over the past 15 years, the city’s population grew from 608,000 to 755,000 residents, many of whom came for high-paying tech jobs that have driven up the city’s median income. Seattle added about 60,000 new units of housing between 2010-2020, the majority of which were studio and one-bedroom apartments.
That gap between population growth and housing growth was a central factor in the skyrocketing cost of housing. According to Zillow’s Home Value Index, the average cost of a detached single-family home in Seattle rose from $415,000 in 2012 to $945,000 in 2022. The city’s planning department reports that the median monthly cost of rent and basic utilities increased by 75% from $1,024 in 2011 to $1,787 in 2021.
That rise in housing costs, in turn, has displaced lower-income residents and contributed to the region’s homelessness crisis.
But when city officials attempt to change the rules to allow more housing construction, it is met with backlash by existing homeowners and, more often than not, legal challenges that drag the process out by months or even years.
Such is the case with Mayor Bruce Harrell’s proposed comprehensive plan update. He sent his final proposal to the City Council for amendments and approval in January. Neighborhood groups balked at the prospect of apartments in formerly single-family zones.
Now, the already-delayed comp plan — per state law, it was supposed to be completed by the end of 2024 — is on hold until a hearing examiner rules on the legal challenges. In the meantime, the Council is moving ahead on interim legislation to make sure Seattle complies with the state’s “missing middle” zoning law passed in 2023.
Cascade PBS spoke to city planners, elected officials, housing advocates and neighborhood opponents to unpack what the proposed zoning changes would look like, the cases people are making for and against increasing density and what’s happening as the city pivots in the face of legal delays.
What the comp plan would do
The state Growth Management Act requires Seattle to plan for 80,000 new units of housing and 159,000 new jobs by 2044. The comp plan update makes space for 120,000 units of housing and 158,000 jobs.
Though the mayor’s proposal goes beyond the state-mandated minimums for housing density, it is still more an evolution of the Urban Villages growth strategy that Seattle has had in place since 1994 than a reinvention of the wheel.
The Urban Village strategy concentrated apartment buildings and commercial development into the core of larger neighborhoods, mostly along arterial streets, leaving the majority of the city’s residential zones for detached, single-family homes. Until recently, 75% of Seattle’s residential space was dedicated to single-family homes. A 2021 analysis by the city found that the model exacerbated racial and socioeconomic inequities in housing.
A map of changes in the city’s proposed comprehensive plan update. (Courtesy of the Office of Planning and Community Development)
Regional Centers in the proposed comprehensive plan update. (Courtesy of the Office of Planning and Community Development)
Urban Centers in the proposed comprehensive plan update. (Courtesy of the Office of Planning and Community Development)
Neighborhood Centers in the proposed comprehensive plan update. (Courtesy of the Office of Planning and Community Development)
Urban Neighborhoods in the proposed comprehensive plan update. (Courtesy of the Office of Planning and Community Development)
The comp plan update divides Seattle’s residential spaces into four zoning designations: Regional Center, Urban Center, Neighborhood Center and Urban Neighborhood.
Regional Centers
The city is rebranding Urban Centers as Regional Centers. These are Seattle’s densest neighborhoods, with apartment and condo towers, office high rises, hotels, retail and entertainment hubs.
The new plan keeps the six existing centers — Downtown, Uptown/Lower Queen Anne, South Lake Union, First Hill/Capitol Hill, University District and Northgate — and reclassifies Ballard as a Regional Center. The proposal would also expand the northern boundary of the Uptown Regional Center around the future light-rail station near Seattle Center.
Urban Centers
Urban Villages also get a rebrand under the new plan and will now be known as Urban Centers. These are the commercial and housing cores of Seattle’s neighborhoods, such as Wallingford, 23rd and Jackson in the Central District, Green Lake and North Beacon Hill.
The buildings are typically four to eight stories high, with some taller buildings next to light rail. There are also restaurants, office space and retail.
The updated growth plan creates a new Urban Center around the future 130th Street light-rail station area in north Seattle’s Pinehurst neighborhood. It also expands the boundaries of the Greenwood, Upper Queen Anne, Admiral Way and Morgan Junction Urban Centers.
Neighborhood Centers
Neighborhood Centers are a new type of zoning for Seattle and have drawn the most ire from neighborhood groups and homeowners. These will be smaller-scale, mixed-use zones with four- to six-story apartment buildings with ground-floor shops, grocery stores and restaurants.
The plan proposes creating 30 Neighborhood Centers throughout the city with slightly greater density than exists today. Many of them would be located on the edges of existing Urban Centers. The boundaries will be drawn within 800 feet or one to three blocks from existing light-rail stations, major bus stops or commercial cores.
Urban Neighborhoods
Seattle’s primarily residential zones also will see name and density changes under the new plan. These areas of mostly single-family homes will now be designated Urban Neighborhoods.
Urban Neighborhoods will incorporate the changes required by the statewide missing-middle housing law. The state Legislature allowed the construction of two- to six-unit homes everywhere single-family homes are currently allowed. Seattle’s Urban Neighborhoods will allow four-unit projects on every lot, including stand-alone townhomes, row houses and cottage apartments. Lots within a quarter-mile of frequent transit can build up to six units. A developer can also build six units if two of the units are subsidized affordable housing.
Seattleites fight for and against density
Architect Matt Hutchins is disappointed that the mayor’s proposal doesn’t go further to increase Seattle’s housing density. Hutchins is a principal at CAST Architecture and a longtime housing advocate. He sits on the city’s Planning Commission but spoke to Cascade PBS in a personal capacity.
“This comp plan hasn’t met the moment,” said Hutchins. “We have so many challenges, and challenges we’ve seen coming. Housing affordability, environmental concerns, climate change. … We’re addressing them. But there’s no sort of big homerun swings [in the comp plan].”
Hutchins sees the Neighborhood Centers proposal as a bright spot in the plan, however.
“We are distributing housing production throughout all neighborhoods so that all neighborhoods have a stake in being part of the housing solution,” Hutchins said. “We’re exiting the paradigm where three-quarters of the city is preserved and then another quarter of the city is doing all the work of evolving to meet our housing goals. That’s an excellent rebalance of the inherent inequities of the Urban Village strategy.”
Construction crews work on a building in Seattle’s Roosevelt Urban Village near Roosevelt High School on Friday, March 14, 2025. (M. Scott Brauer/Cascade PBS)
While seen as one of the comp plan’s selling points for some urbanists, many neighborhood groups and homeowners view the Neighborhood Centers proposal as the worst part of Harrell’s proposal.
About a dozen neighborhoods have started online petitions calling for the removal of the Neighborhood Center designation in their community. Pro-density groups have started counter petitions in many neighborhoods as well.
Maple Leaf’s petition, started by longtime resident Phyllis Shulman, has nearly 1,300 signatures. Shulman and her neighbors argue that their community lacks the existing transit and commercial space that qualify it for a Neighborhood Center, and as such makes it a poor fit for the apartments and additional commercial construction that would come with the zoning change.
The borders of Maple Leaf’s proposed Neighborhood Center are drawn a few blocks on either side of Roosevelt Avenue, just north of the Maple Leaf Reservoir. Roosevelt is a major arterial with some existing restaurants, bars, coffee shops and businesses, such as a hardware store. The #67 bus route runs along it.
“One thing that’s important to think about is applying this one-size-fits-all approach and not thinking about on-the-ground infrastructure or a lack of infrastructure that’s needed,” said Shulman. “In Maple Leaf there’s a large area that has no sidewalks. Even the sidewalks that exist in a lot of places aren’t ADA [accessible]. The streets are very narrow. There are lots of issues with drainage.”
Shulman and her neighbors also raised the issue of mature trees being cut down for new development and replaced with smaller street trees that don’t provide the same environmental benefits as older trees.
Trees versus housing has become a central part of the comp plan fight. Density opponents often argue that newer, denser housing will result in significant tree loss at a time when climate change makes them even more important.
Hutchins argued that trees versus housing is a false choice. “We cut all the trees down in Seattle to build this city, and many of the trees we’re looking to preserve are younger than the houses that are next to them.”
He continued, “The amount of trees lost due to development is a fraction of a percent of our total canopy. And that could be offset by doubling our effort to plant street trees and plant trees in public parks. … We can do more. We should be doing more. We can have both.”
According to the city’s environmental impact assessment of the comp plan proposal, new development between 2016-2021 resulted in the loss of 35 acres of tree canopy in Seattle out of a total of 15,000 acres, or 0.25%.
The politics of a comprehensive plan
District 3 Councilmember Joy Hollingsworth, who chairs the Select Comprehensive Plan Committee, is unsurprised that neighborhood groups came out in force against the Neighborhood Centers proposal once there were tangible maps and plans in front of them.
She thinks more education and outreach will help assuage people’s fears and said she’s been hosting meetings and walks in her district in areas where Neighborhood Centers have been proposed.
“I like the Neighborhood Centers. I think they’re great,” Hollingsworth said. “We just need to have more conversation about what we’re encouraging to build in those Centers and what that looks like for all neighborhoods.”
Michael Hubner, the Office of Planning and Community Development’s long-range planning manager, said his department started doing outreach on the comp plan in 2022 and has collected more than 10,000 comments that have helped shape the plan.
“I’m not surprised that people in areas that have more significant land-use changes proposed are going to have some feelings about that and be willing to comment,” said Hubner. “The mayor is seeking to have a thoughtful approach to this plan that rises to the challenge of our housing crisis, that meets our future housing needs. There are some tough choices and balances [to be made].”
For her part, Hollingsworth wants to make sure the comp plan has the strongest anti-displacement measures possible, encourages the construction of multi-bedroom “family sized” housing and makes it easier for people to build duplexes, triplexes and accessory dwelling units on their own lots.
Not all Councilmembers are excited about the possibility of apartments in primarily single-family-home neighborhoods. For example, at a Council meeting in January, Councilmember Cathy Moore, who represents north Seattle’s District 5 and lives in Maple Leaf, shared a desire to get rid of the Maple Leaf Neighborhood Center.
“I’m not prepared to sacrifice this particular, my particular, neighborhood, and the reason that I live here and support this neighborhood, so that we can just throw a bunch of townhouses up that start at $700,000,” Moore said at the January meeting.
The mayor “respects the City Council’s role in the process,” a spokesperson told Cascade PBS when asked if he had concerns about the Council potentially removing some Neighborhood Centers from his plan.
“Our proposed plan thoughtfully adds zoning capacity for a variety of housing types across the city with a focus on growth near frequent transit routes and amenities and creating walkable, livable communities,” said spokesperson Callie Craighead. “We will continue to refine our zoning maps with [the Office of Planning and Community Development] based on the community feedback we received last fall as the plan moves forward.”
A legal battle (and further delays)
Some neighborhood groups have taken their comp plan opposition far past online petitions. Residents of Hawthorn Hills, Madison Park and Mount Baker filed legal challenges arguing that the city’s environmental review of the comp plan’s impact was insufficient.
The State Environmental Policy Act gives citizens power to intervene in government land-use decisions. The tactic gets used in nearly all major housing reform efforts in Seattle and can delay implementation by months or even years. It happened when the city proposed upzones for most of Seattle through its Mandatory Housing Affordability program as well as when the city proposed allowing basement apartments and backyard cottages in single-family neighborhoods.
It’s unclear how long the current challenges could delay the comp plan update. The Council is not allowed to pass legislation related to the comp plan until a hearing examiner has ruled on the legal challenges. But it will certainly delay it past the deadline to implement the state’s required missing-middle zoning to allow two- to six-unit buildings in all neighborhoods that currently allow detached single-family housing.
As such, the Council is pivoting to interim legislation to allow the changes required by the missing-middle law. The Council has set a deadline of the end of May to adopt its missing-middle zoning so the changes can be implemented before the state’s hard deadline of June 30.
