Development Plans for Lincoln Street

Starting late spring of this year, the Puget neighborhood will become home to a new mixed-use urban village featuring retail space, offices, a hotel, parking garage, and apartments targeting university students.

 The 24-acre lot, located south of Fred Meyer on Lincoln Street, will be developed in three phases managed by AVT Consulting. The development will begin with the apartment complex and end with commercial space, AVT said.

The site, owned by Stebner Real Estate Inc., will begin construction in the spring and be completed by the fall of 2015 in time for fall quarter, city planner Brian Smart said.

Commercial space and a parking garage will be built along Lincoln Street as well as a parking garage. The apartment complex, called The Grove at Bellingham, will be located near Maple Street and will accommodate more than 500 occupants in 201 rooms.

Residents of Lincoln Street have voiced fewer concerns about this complex in comparison to the proposal of the University Ridge apartments on Consolidation Avenue, which is currently being reviewed by the hearing examiner. Noise, traffic congestion and potential concerns with college residents added to the opposition of University Ridge.

Although The Grove proposal received a more positive response from Puget neighbors, some concerns may remain unresolved. 

“Being in a senior park, I moved here for the quiet neighborhood and I know there are going to be a lot of college students,” Lucinda Christman said, a resident of Lakeway Mobile Park located across from the future construction site.

Parking lot plans for the development require more than 1300 parking spots. The amount of added cars brought by the urban village may also negatively affect residents of the neighborhood.

Christman has lived in the mobile park for more than seven years. Even though her home is located on the opposite end of the park, she is worried about how much more traffic will come from the complex.

“Traffic is definitely a concern,” Christman said. “Basically, there’s already enough traffic here as it is.”

Smart, the city planner monitoring the development site said added traffic will not be an issue to the Lincoln Street area. A turn lane will be added to the street so that traffic can easily turn into the development.

“There won’t be any new stop lights, but street lighting and lane configuration will allow for left turns into the site,” Smart said.

Aside from traffic congestion, other problems may arise from construction.

Gaythia Weis, president of the Puget Neighborhood Association is concerned about the drainage of Lincoln Creek. The creek runs through the lot next to the development and could cause flooding where the creek disappears into the ground near Fred Meyer. 

“The city ought to do a full watershed analysis of Lincoln Creek as increasing development depletes forest cover and increases impervious surfaces,” Weis said. “This also relates to uphill issues, such as the previously proposed [University Ridge] development, which is in an area with groundwater springs.”

The new runoff water created by the commercial and residential site will be “released in a forced rate into Lincoln Creek,” Smart said. There should be no added water into the creek, he said.

Apart from traffic and flooding concerns, there has not been much opposition to the Lincoln Street development site.

“It is a challenging site to develop, but the city has confidence in the design team,” Smart said.

If current issues such as traffic, bicycle and pedestrian safety and storm water drainage are resolved, Weis is not opposed to the development.

“I think that The Grove is well located and has the potential to make a positive contribution to the neighborhood.”

The City of Bellingham has investigated potential problems to make sure the environment and neighbors of the site will not be negatively impacted, Smart said.

“At this point we are looking at potential impacts to the wetland buffer,“ Smart said. The construction team has assured the city there will be no impacts to the wetlands, he said, meaning that water drainage will not negatively effect the environment around the development.

ATV Consulting refers to the site as a contained “Life Style” center and said it will provide “a wide mix of uses on a single, walkable site.”