Rebuilding Camp Grande

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Just west of downtown Spokane, a dozen small cabins lie nestled around a central lawn.

They started life as a weekend getaway for motorists along an old highway. Over the years, they became rundown rental housing in an oft-overlooked part of the city.

Now, Spokane development company Wells & Co. is rebuilding this cluster of long-forgotten Vinegar Flats domiciles into what will become condos or apartments. Starting at just about 500-square-feet each, the Camp Grande cabins are cozy, but they reflect a regional trend toward cottage-style housing.

Cottages haven’t exactly caught on in Spokane, however.

Though it’s been more than two years since the city passed an ordinance allowing cottage housing – small, densely arranged dwellings limited to 1,000 square feet that are subject to certain design standards – the city has only received one application for such a development, the Ash Court project in northwest Spokane. And that project, which would include nine cottage homes on less than an acre, is on-hold indefinitely while the developer determines whether the project still makes financial sense after finding much of the site is unbreakable rock.

Camp Grande (also spelled Camp Grandee) developer Ron Wells found he could fit more units on the nearly one-acre site using the existing footprints than by applying the ordinance.