Two 8-story apartment buildings proposed for Ballard

Meghan Walker Ballard

Two separate 8-story apartment buildings are in the works for the Fed-Ex building on Market St and a small lot on NW 56th St.

The property at 1740 NW Market St (.pdf) was bought by California company Wang Brothers Investments in 2018. Now, plans are in the works to turn it into a 76-unit apartment building with retail and office space on the ground floor. Parking is in the plans, but only for two vehicles.

The other 8-story apartment building would be built at 1741 NW 56th St (.pdf), and is set to have 84 units with retail and office space on the ground floor, and parking for 33 vehicles.

Both are being designed by Bumgardner Architects, who also made the Ballard On the Park apartments, Janus apartments in Greenwood/Phinney, and quirky Epi apartments in Fremont.

There is a public Early Design Guidance meeting for both proposals to be held August 5th at the Ballard Community Center (6020 28th Ave NW) in the Sunset/Captain Ballard Room.


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spark
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spark

Both great spots for more housing and shops. Bumgardner Architects also seem to do very attractive work! :)

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3 months ago
carsongbaker
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carsongbaker

Hey spark! Ive appreciated your optimistic outlook especially on housing and such. Are you in the industry or just a fan of quality community focused projects?

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3 months ago
spark
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spark

just a fan :)

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2 months ago
jpw
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jpw

The second image is not of 1741 NW 56th St. The building shown is on the north side of the street and that address is on the south side. It looks like this is the parking lot that today is between the FedEx building and NW 56th St. I’d much rather have retail, office, and housing than a parking lot there.

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3 months ago
CharlieD
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CharlieD

Why? Ballard is already overcrowded. I would rather the parking lot remained a parking lot, so I could pay a ridiculous amount to park there. This city is going to hell, and everyone is promoting more density. Rush hour is All day long, and there are bums, and druggies absolutely everywhere you look. 8 story apartment buildings are just an expensive experiment that will screw over everyone else in Ballard. Only a builder or an architect would consider this a good idea in this area. I loves this city when I moved here. Now I am loving the idea of leaving here, and I will, very soon.

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2 months ago
NA
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NA

I honestly can’t tell if this comment is satire or not

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2 months ago
becka
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becka

It’s gotta be right?

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2 months ago
Upwalker
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Upwalker

The mismatch between this continuing scale of development and the still distant timeline for light rail to Ballard is staggering and unfortunate for local residents.

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2 months ago
NA
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NA

On the other hand if you build the light rail first and then wait for development, you end up with stations like Mt Baker which is a light rail station in the middle of nowhere, and thus fewer fares contributing to pay for the light rail.

Both need to happen at the same time. Also, an 8 story building isn’t exactly huge scale development. The U District is getting 20+ story highrises in anticipation of their light rail station opening.

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2 months ago
Bill Tirrill
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Bill Tirrill

One of the D6 Council candidates, Kate Martin, is advocating for the Sounder to put in a station and stop at the Locks, while we’re waiting for ST3.

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2 months ago
rag
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rag

So another 160 apartment units with 35 parking spots. Where does the city expect all these apartment dwellers to park their 160 plus cars on already packed Ballard streets? Stop the insanity and make apartment builders build the same number of parking stalls as units in their buildings. Especially if there is going to be retail on the ground floor. Enough is enough.

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2 months ago
elenchos2
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elenchos2

I’m fine with that if all houses in Ballard are also required to build off street parking (and actually use it instead of storing their home brew setups).

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2 months ago
becka
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becka

Sounds like that will be a decision for the people who choose to live there to make, not you. Forcing everyone to pay for excess parking drives up rent, and if you look at actual statistics, Seattle has plenty of unused parking spots anyway.

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2 months ago