Planning experts to analyze Lincoln Heights retail area
A panel of experts from Seattle is providing suggestions today on how to improve the Lincoln Heights shopping area through better land use.
Experts in real estate, planning and development arrived Wednesday in Spokane and are focusing their attention on the broad commercial and residential area along 29th Avenue at Regal Street and adjoining parts of the neighborhood.
The experts are scheduled to make a verbal report to the community from 3-4 p.m. today in Council Chambers on the lower level of City Hall. A more detailed written report is expected in about 60 days.
Transportation improvements are expected to be addressed, including pedestrian access.
Potential land-use changes will also be part of the discussion.
The Urban Land Institute, a nonprofit, provides technical assistance to communities working on complex land-use issues.
The South Hill Planning Coalition and Lincoln Heights Neighborhood Council have identified land-use planning as a high priority. The coalition is a made up of five neighborhood councils on the city’s south side, including Lincoln Heights.
City staff is taking up the challenge of making Lincoln Heights a more livable and vibrant neighborhood and will continue working on it through this fall.
The city started gathering baseline information in 2013, including a public survey.
Residents in that survey called for more sidewalks and crosswalks, street trees, a greater variety of shops, more dining opportunities and converting some land from parking lots to new uses.
One suggestion would allow more commercial uses along the south side of 27th Avenue between Ray and Mount Vernon streets, although others said that street is more suitable for residential development. Others say they would like to see a plant nursery and gift shop.
A walkability tour was undertaken in 2014 through the urban and regional planning program at Eastern Washington University.
The institute’s technical assistance program “will provide unbiased, pragmatic advice from experts before further planning is undertaken,” according to city staff in a briefing paper. The team specializes in revitalization of struggling commercial areas and identifying public investments that can spur development, it said.
Studio Cascade Inc., of Spokane, is being hired to work in the neighborhood starting this fall.
That firm has done work on Bainbridge Island and in the cities of Monroe and Port Angeles as well as on an overpass study for University Road in Spokane Valley.