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Reviewing Design Review

The city of Seattle is currently evaluating its Design Review process, aided by Weinstein A|U.

I was anxious to see what the review would look like. I helped craft the initial program, managed it for most of the 1990s, and then served on the Queen Anne/Magnolia/South Lake Union Design Review Board for four years ending in April.

Should we leave it to administrators?

The review conducted by city staff and the consultants is very thorough and presents many compelling observations and recommendations. What I wonder, after reading the report, is whether the recommendations go far enough.

When the Mayor and City Council began the process of creating Design Review in the late 1980’s there was very little trust in the community for the then Department of Construction and Land Use.

Little did folks realize that it wasn’t for lack of talent or compassion that DCLU was approving ugly stucco boxes in Wallingford, Ballard or the U District. It was simply that the department had few tools to deal with design. But because of this lack of trust, the group-think of the moment was that DCLU surely could not be entrusted with an administrative design review process.

As a result, the Design Review structure as we now know it was formed: with seven volunteer, five-member boards, comprised of diverse stakeholders, reviewing most multifamily and commercial projects in the city, while city staff are left to stitch everything together.

The problem with this format is that the decision-makers see these often ponderous and impacting projects usually no more than three times, with their actual review period comprising often no more than 20 minutes of a packed board meeting agenda. The beauty of the board structure is the diversity of opinion, experience and talent. There’s no doubt it adds balance to the discussion and richness to the outcome.

The downside is obvious. While city staff can literally spend dozens of hours laboring over site design and architectural details, the decision-makers may spend no more than one hour cumulatively over a several-month period. What’s more, the role of regulator may be difficult for some board members, while city staff are steeped in regulatory practice. This often leads to timid recommendations from the boards.

The result is that many projects are built and citizens stand back to ask: “THAT went through Design Review?”

Other municipalities, Vancouver, BC and San Diego included, conduct very thorough and professional design reviews administratively. With architects, landscape architects, urban designers and planners on staff, they are able to work in concert with project architects to craft the design response to a specific site.

While I recognize that Seattle never met a process it didn’t like, perhaps it’s time the city consider a bolder alternative to the tweaks and tucks proposed in the Design Review report. Perhaps it’s time to take a serious look at an administrative Design Review process – maybe holding out the largest projects, master plans and institutions for the full-blown public process.

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This entry was posted by Patrick Doherty on Tuesday, September 2nd, 2008 at 4:40 pm and is filed under Architecture, Government, Planning, Zoning. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

  • JBlue

    Hmmm. Thought provoking. So…the idea is that a single planner at DPD [who may or may not - in fact, often do NOT - have a solid background in design or planning] could do a better job of helping to craft and shape the design of a project through an “administrative design review process” by working in a vaccuum, without the benefit of public discourse and DRB guidance? The current system while not perfect, at least involves the community and five members from divergent disciplines [design, development, business, community and member at large] that give guidance in an open forum over a series of 1.5 hour public meetings [usually about three, sometimes more]. It is easy to forget that before design review, the MUP process was internal to DPD, without public input, and the result was that a very substantial number of projects were appealed. After design review was implemented, less than a handful per year. When people ask about a given project “how did that get through design review?” – the truth is that in many cases it did not. More often than one could imagine, the DRB-approved design is later changed either before or during construction, and there is no one at the city to ensure compliance. Examples of agregious non-compliance to DRB guidance are abundant – that needs to get fixed. But even in cases where the design guidance is followed to a ‘T’, does this ensure good design? Unfortunately not, because you cannot legisilate or force good design through a committee – good design requires a competant architect and community minded developer. Not to mention that design is the most subjective thing on the planet and very few people agree on any given projects design merit. But DRB at least provides a forum for public discourse and a system where architects and developers are forced to demonstrate compliance with, and think through fundamental design issues involving context and sympathy to neighborhood. Will design improve if adjudicated through a single planner or even a committee of staffers at the city? That would be a no, Bob. Not to disrespect DPD, there are some great people here/there, but it takes a collaborative process to make an urban village. All things considered, you have raised some thought provoking points and we are ALL hopeful that the Weinstein study results in some positive improvements to the process – without going backwards!

  • Recuso

    The sad part of all this is that Design Review is even necessary. I do not argue that it’s a useful program, but one would hope that better design started with the architect, not a committee. The problem here this that between ever more proscriptive land-use guidelines and the uncertainity of the Design Review response, architects are forced further toward safe, inoffensive–and by extension–boring designs. Yes, one can work harder to present a creative, exciting solution, but that means convincing not just your client, but the City, Design Review and ultimately, the community. Very few architects or their clients can afford to spend the time necessary to take this chance.

    With this in mind, I should hope that the Weinstein A|U study does not recommend burdening the profession with more process, but rather focuses on a more streamlined program that perhaps focuses more on teh big picture and less on the details.