Recently here in Seattle there has been a heated discussion over the expansion of Seattle Children's hospital as a Hearing examiner deemed the project too "aggressive" to the surrounding community. Predictably the arguments involve the scale of the development and the associated impacts on congestion and property values, so on and so on. If there are any precedents in the area, one could view the UW Medical Center located on the South Campus or the Swedish Hospital in Capital Hill. With medicine, bigger is better, this is intrinsically the nature of the beast. But the bucolic Laurelhurst community is arguing the expansion will go beyond the benefit of the institution, to the point of destroying the community's livability. The community at large in Seattle has reacted by countering this to be a myopic self serving constituency. But of course, they don't live there. Maybe as egregious, was the the chief administration officer saying, "... if we're not able (to move forward) or we're delayed significantly, that puts our region's children at risk." Defending his territory by striking terror in the hearts and minds of those who wish to embrace the care of children but are uncomfortable living in an area where one might not want to nurture a family. The reality is, that there is a valid argument against institutional scale redevelopment. Fred Hutch, which is a wonderful community institution, fundamentally affected the delicate balance of a industrial/residential community in the downtown Cascade neighborhood. And this happened not because of the size of the institution, but the manner in which it was designed. There is usually plenty of space to place these facilities, but designers have a tendency to choose outlying suburban models and plop them smack dab in more urban, or in this case, residential areas. Beginning with the vacation of right of ways, they become walled off fortresses with blockbusting cartesian structures that have no affinity with the neighborhoods they are expected to coexist with. Looking at the quick sketch above without out any labels, one could mistake that project with Northgate Mall or another Fred Meyer. Would anyone really want to live next to this? By not fully understanding issues related to the existing community infrastructure of right of ways, siting and setbacks, landscaping and construction sequencing, the institution is doomed to become an isolated island, in spite of its wonderful intentions. In this case both sides are justifiably correct. Children's hospital needs to expand and the community needs a better design. The problem here is not the size or the scope of the institution, but in the manner the architects and planners have laid it out.
