When it comes to encouraging the development of housing projects, there are a handful of things that jurisdictions can do to support architects and designers, streamlining the process of design and construction from start to finish. 

Our projects outside of Seattle, Canopy and Modera Shoreline, benefitted from an accelerated project timeline, a result of the City of Shoreline’s collaborative approach to streamlining the design review process. 

Project rendering of Modera Main Street

In the last 10 years as urban affordability and quality of life have become issues to residents, developers and investors have looked to new submarkets for development. Sharing its southern boundary with Seattle, the city of Shoreline has been recognized as one of the area’s fastest-growing residential hubs.  

After listening to developers, the city set about enhancing its portals, attracting brand retailers, planning for future TODs, codifying development incentives around sustainability, and streamlining their entitlement and permitting processes. Amidst the challenging economic times of the last two years, three developments alone – Shea’s Canopy and Verdant, and Mill Creek’s Modera Shoreline developments – have created more than 1500 units, demonstrating that a jurisdiction’s focus on encouraging development can have transformative impacts.  

Canopy

A motivated jurisdiction can work with the development community to create the vibrant city desired by its constituents. There are several ways this may come to fruition. 

Reducing Permitting Timelines

Bypassing Design Review and MUP milestones could yield significant time and cost savings on project delivery, expediting the approval process and speeding up time to construction. 

In 2023, the Seattle City Council amended the land use code to make two important changes to the design review program aimed at encouraging additional low-income housing.  

The first change permanently exempts low-income housing projects from the Design Review program.  

The second change provides a new Design Review exemption for projects that meet Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) requirements by providing units on site via the Performance Option under the Land Use Code.  

Due to this change, projects that opt into the Performance Option can skip MUP and Design Review and proceed directly to Building Permit where land use code compliance will be evaluated concurrently with other review subjects. 

The impact of this shift is an accelerated timeline for projects to go from design to construction, and as a result, an increase in the number of housing projects being made. 

Typically, the design review board can take anywhere between three to nine months to approve a project. During this process there are application fees to be paid by the applicant, as well as other payments made to parties such as land use attorneys who determine jurisdiction or design professionals who prepare and present the information to the review board.  

Reducing the permitting approval and design review timeline for a single building translates to more time that can be spent on additional housing complexes, boosting the total amount of available housing in Seattle. It also means less money is spent on a project overall through the extra costs associated with presenting a project to the design review board.  

This is just one example of how bypassing Design Review and MUP milestones could yield significant time and cost savings on project delivery. A full synopsis of the impact of reduced permitting timelines can be found here.

Lowering Impact Fees

Impact fees – also called system development charges in some places, like Portland – are the method cities use to collect funds that expand or provide infrastructure to support developments that are going through the permitting process. 

These fees cover everything from sewers and transportation to parks and schools and are used to either fund the construction of those services, or the maintenance and expansion of existing infrastructure. Essentially, they’re a city’s way of generating revenue to maintain the services and infrastructure that are needed for a project that is being built. 

Based on a per-unit cost, impact fees, along with review and inspection costs, can end up costing a lot more than a simple permit review fee.  

To encourage more developments, impact fees can be reduced or lowered. Recently, the city of Portland completely waved those charges until 2028, making it both cheaper and easier to initiate new construction developments within the city. The impact is so large that some projects currently in development would not be able to move forward at all, if it weren’t for the Portland SDC moratorium. 

Project rendering for Sandy Pine

Clarifying Code Language

The Portland City Council temporarily lifted restrictions on building heights for housing projects in specific planned districts at the beginning of 2025, a decision that will remain in effect until 2032. On top of changes to code language surrounding building heights, there were also adjustments to minimum lot sizes on single-family dwelling lots.  

“These amendments will help spur development to increase housing density, use land more efficiently, and create more affordability,” said Don Sowieja, Principal. “This limitation on height within the urban growth boundary for development has been very frustrating for developers. Hearing about this adjustment opportunity is a tremendous step in the right direction.” 

Another somewhat recent code change made by the International Code Council provided significant updates to accessibility clearances, based on a study of wheelchair users. While the overall impact of the code change on buildings was modest/minimal, only expanding a few rooms by a few inches, the impact on impacted users was immense. 

From a designer’s perspective, code changes can lead to added complexity, especially for considerations like accessibility. However, by clarifying the language around some of these codes, the design and construction process can be simplified and streamlined, leading to quicker project completion and more housing development overall. 

For example, the city of Shoreline provides the Deep Green Incentive Program, which is an opportunity for development to meet certain sustainable development and construction certifications. If met, the city provides developers with increased flexibility regarding development code criteria, such as allowing additional building height, reduced parking requirements, and other substantial cost or yield impacts. Additionally, this incentive program allows jurisdictions to provide preferential treatment during the building permitting review process, fast-tracking approval and construction. 

Extending Permit Life Before Expiration

Every jurisdiction has time limits for the permit review process. If there is no movement, a permit can expire, causing the project to have to restart the permitting process, adding additional costs and a prolonged timeline for a project to reach completion.  

For both the city as well as developers, it’s important to keep a timeframe on project development, since it helps people plan for future projects. For example, financial transactions like loans only take place once a permit is approved. Since loan repayments need to be budgeted out over time, having that timeline shifted can obviously throw a wrench in any pre-decided plans.  

Issued permits also have lifespans. Drawing them out is one way to prevent permits from expiring before a project begins construction, leading to more completed projects overall.  

Jurisdictions have realized that there’s a benefit to keeping the development community engaged throughout the permit review process. Desiring to keep people involved, rather than pushing them out, jurisdictions are reaching out to applicants, offering permit extensions if formally requested.  

With that change, permits can sit for longer periods of time before they have to secure/receive funding. These longer pauses come with the hope that conditions will soon shift in favor of developers, leading to more developments. 

Moreover, as time passes, code and design review criteria change. Essentially, by extending permit life beyond expiration, the efforts of going through the permitting process are retained, and developments are encouraged, rather than given hoops to jump through. If permits last longer, these projects have the potential to save time and money by avoiding being re-tooled to pass review again if a previous permit expired. 

All in all, these four examples of incentivizing construction and flexibility in the design review process are excellent options for jurisdictions to take advantage of in order to encourage new building developments. 

Don Sowieja

Housing Studio Leader

dons@ankrommoisan.com

(503) 892-7114 7114