Recap of May 8, 2001 CUCAC (UW Related) Meeting
Bill Clark
Ravenna-Bryant Community Association

The agenda consisted mostly of very routine and slow-moving items (like the schedule for publication and review of the next iteration of the Campus Master Plan this fall).

One fast-moving issue that is important to our area is the Blakely Village housing project planned for the old Vic Mix site south of the Silver Cloud.

As previously reported, this will consist of some 130 apartments in a campus-like complex of five or so buildings on the 3-acre site. The university has done a number of things to make the project attractive and open to the neighborhood, but to some extent the campus-like plan is made possible by concentrating a lot of units in a large 5-story building that will run along most of the site frontage on 25th with very little setback from the sidewalk (which is narrow to begin with). And at least in the elevations we've seen so far, the facade is not attractive--all straight lines and right angles although there is some texture provided by recessed and projecting sections.

The university (and some CUCAC members) claim that this layout is required by "neighbors" who insisted on retention of the small pond on the site, and is consistent with the Ravenna Urban Village Plan, which calls for making 25th into a "Main Street" of the urban village. I checked the plan and it calls for making 25th a pedestrian-friendly main street according to "design guidelines" that don't seem to be specified anywhere in the plan. Whatever the guidelines are, I question whether the Blakely Village frontage on 25th is pedestrian-friendly.

The UW will issue a SEPA checklist and DNS (determination of environmental non-significance) in a couple of weeks, and I think rightly so. I don't think there is any environmental issue here, but I do think there may be a question of consistency with the neighborhood plan.