What gives? Just a couple months ago, Seattle Metropolitan Magazine named Ballard the “hottest hood” in Seattle. Now Seattle Magazine has released its list of best Seattle neighborhoods, and Ballard ranks 51st out of 60. Crown Hill ranked 27th, Sunset Hill 40th, Phinney Ridge 18th, Greenwood 47th and Fremont is 43rd. The top neighborhood is Queen Anne, followed by Broadmoor, Delridge, Windermere and Ravenna/Bryant. Seattle Magazine ranked the neighborhoods using a formula of home value growth, crime rate, WASL tests, park acreage, commuting time and neighborhood characteristics.
I don’t know about you, but Ballard should be in the top 5, at the very least.
21 responses so far ↓
1 tanaya // Jun 30, 2008 at 8:58 pm
Um, DELRIDGE beat out Ballard? Obviously there are issues with this ranking….
2 John Eddy // Jun 30, 2008 at 9:03 pm
The hell?
There are 60 neighborhoods in Seattle?
(but yeah, I’d love to see the formula… because I bet I could care less about half of what they are looking at…)
3 Nina // Jun 30, 2008 at 9:32 pm
Darnit… it’s cause DENNYS IS GONE!
4 Joel Niemeyer // Jun 30, 2008 at 9:43 pm
Should we have the debate about which of those are actually really Ballard? No, let’s not.
5 Kim // Jun 30, 2008 at 10:53 pm
I wonder what the demographics of the magazine are. . .might tell you a lot. I think the top five is unrealistic, if you’ve checked out a lot of the rest of Seattle. Ballard is great, but, a critical aesthetic eye and a united eye toward improving appearances wouldn’t hurt Balardites. I walk most of the the neighborhoods in the city, and Ballard has a number of visually unattractive areas. The neighborhood would do well, now that the monorail is dead, to encourage some clean up and of properties and parkways along its main arteries. I think especially of the 15th Ave NW corridor (a bit like Aurora in places) and the light industry area between south of NW Market and the ship canal (an area which I find charming and love as is, but it shouldn’t surprise anyone that it doesn’t appeal much to a mag editorial staff that ranks the manicured craftsmen and Edwardians along the tree-lined and tended gardens of Queen Anne view streets as their ideal aesthetic. Ballard residents, on the whole, don’t have the household incomes of QA and Windemere. They seem to be busy, smart people that don’t spend as much on their home exteriors and gardens as wealthier areas do. There are a lot more “starter” size homes in Ballard, too, so a lot of families seem to move to bigger digs after a few years. Queen Anne has larger pre WWII homes and has very few arm pit looking areas. The shopping streets tend to be charming visually (if you don’t mind ugly communications towers). QA has high achieving elementary and middle schools. Ballard has many more schools, so I bet the WASL average gets pulled south by that, and Ballard High has a lot of working class students whose parents and grandparents are alums and who don’t necessarily aspire to a college education when they graduate but will find local jobs or go to trade schools, enter service industries or the military. Although, if they do aspire to college, BHS does well by them, whatever their dream. Crown Hill and Sunset Hill seem to me to be micro neighborhoods of Ballard and shouldn’t be cut out of the mix unless they are going to throw in Loyal Heights, Whittier Heights, and Shilshole with the lot.
-Kim
6 pioggia // Jul 1, 2008 at 7:18 am
I think Kim’s spot on re why we didn’t appeal to the magazine, but shouldn’t we be glad not to rank too high here? we’re already growing too rapidly, why encourage it?
7 Peter // Jul 1, 2008 at 7:24 am
Could this be the reason?
8 lakreitz // Jul 1, 2008 at 7:25 am
How useful is this ranking anyway? Not much can be done with the results. Broadmoor isn’t really a neigborhood - it’s a collection of homes behind a fence. No library, no schools, no place to get a coffee or beer, no stores.
Anyway, Ballard, and its ’suburbs’ of Sunset Hill & Crown Hill were here long before Seattle Magazine and will be standing long after it’s gone. The only reason I will notice that Seattle Magazine is gone is that I will have to find something else to line my cat’s litter box.
9 Dusty // Jul 1, 2008 at 7:45 am
This is what happens when we lose Denny’s and Sunset Bowl. Those were the only things keeping us in the top five before. Ha ha.
Seriously though, I love Ballard and am fine letting the rest of Seattle believe Ballard is one of the worst. We all know the truth.
10 m // Jul 1, 2008 at 7:50 am
ok folks - truth be told: how many of you actually buy either Seattle Magazine or Seattle Metropolitan Magazine?
… much less care what they say about the neighborhood?
11 Milo Dakkat // Jul 1, 2008 at 7:53 am
Maybe if we’re ranked lower, then people will go the f*** away and leave our fabulous nieghborhood alone. If the outside world wants to dismiss Ballard, that’s fine with me.
12 Lindsarella // Jul 1, 2008 at 8:07 am
I’m with Dusty and Milo-Let them believe Ballard isn’t the tops! It’s kinda like telling the Californians that it rains here every day of the year- Let’s keep saying that- to keep them out!
13 gooner // Jul 1, 2008 at 9:04 am
peter… i drive past those homes all the time. they are so ugly and out of place. every new house that is built like that looks the same… those two have been for sale for a good 6 months now, both asking for over $900k. i can’t imagin who would buy those? if you have $900k for a house, there are so many other nice places you could get with bigger lots/views/quality proven craftmenship.
with regardes to the article, thats it, i am selling my house and moving to broadmoor. this magazine must know something that i don’t
14 Joel // Jul 1, 2008 at 9:04 am
>>ow many of you actually buy either Seattle Magazine<<
I bought it when my brother’s bar was featured in it!
15 Bella // Jul 1, 2008 at 9:12 am
I agree, let ‘em rank us low, who cares?
But for those of you who can’t figure out why such a blasphemous thing would happen! - Seattle Mag has a whole chart set up for their ranking.
It includes such things as median home price and average number of bedrooms/baths, crimes per 1,000 residents and so forth.
Compared to many other neighborhoods, the median home prices here are VERY high for what you get (2br, 1.75ba) and although ‘hoods like Georgetown still have more crime, apparently our crime rate is pretty darn high. Even higher than Delridge. That area may have more of a police presence? Anyway, there is a system, it makes as much sense as any.
16 Suthii // Jul 1, 2008 at 9:16 am
” apparently our crime rate is pretty darn high.”
I guess some folks still need to be ‘pushed out’……
17 rowbot // Jul 1, 2008 at 11:37 am
51st!? Well that’s good because Ballard has enough traffic, condo and extra peoples already so maybe the ranking will steer the overflow to some other neighborhoods and then they too can fulfill their destiny in becoming Seattle’s next hottest hood! Go Delridge!
18 Joel Niemeyer // Jul 2, 2008 at 4:51 am
One too many lutefisk joints…?
19 Steve // Jul 2, 2008 at 4:10 pm
It’s because realestate agents like Greg Stamolis and contractors like Creative Builders are ruining our modest streets with giant new garbage.
20 fudge // Jul 4, 2008 at 2:26 pm
The list is to advise people where to buy now. Why would Seattle magazine rank Ballard high on the list when home prices there are overly inflated and anticipated to go down, not up. Seems like a very valid ranking to me. Ballard was hot…but look what it got you.
21 Kara // Jul 6, 2008 at 2:33 pm
I think people would be surprised on how well neighborhoods like Delridge, White Center, South Park, and West Seattle are doing for themselves. Everyone has condo issues, but not as much as Ballard does.
And those neighborhoods have modest homes at modest prices…not to mention the small buisnesses that have made those neighborhoods better, such as, Bubbles on Delridge, the infamous Salvadorean Bakery in White Center…I love Ballard, but there is a lot to offer in other parts of the city.
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