Opinion - Letters to the Editor

POSTED: Monday, Nov. 24, 2008

Questions density of waterfront project

I’ve looked at the alternate master plans by the port and city for the G-P site. One thing that is striking in both is the astonishing num-ber of buildings each envisions. Why so many structures and so little public space?

The port claims that in order to pay for the cleanup costs it inherited from G-P, it will need to build out 6 million square feet to break even. This shows an appalling lack of imagination, in my opinion. It assumes that all of the money needed for transforming the site must come from dollars generated directly by the site itself.

I urge the port and the city to view the waterfront with something other than a revenue-per-square-foot lens. We should explore all alternative funding sources, such as grants, levies, bonds and corporate sponsorships, to reduce the enormous commercial and residen-tial footprint currently envisioned. We don’t need 200-foot buildings and 12,000 cars on the G-P site.

We deserve nothing less than a livable, human-scale, community waterfront we all can cherish.

Sean Kirk

Bellingham