#560 Pointed Stilts

To certain folk in Olympia, the prospect of a seven-story building next to their beloved waterfront sends shivers of doom running up their spines. I'm not sure why.
It's not as if leatherback turtles use the area to deposit eggs or anything.
These folk have mounted a "Don't Wall off the Waterfront" campaign to enlist public support to allow no building over three stories within a half-mile radius of the boardwalk.
I don't know about you. But if I'm standing on the street, I can't see the waterfront through a one-story building.

The city council wants more income diversity downtown. They have already provided tax incentives for the construction of three-story low income housing a block away from the aforementioned beautiful boardwalk. It follows that appropriate incentives for high-income housing should be provided as well.
Contrary to the reasoning of the Wall Off the Waterfront people, hereinafter referred to as the Off-the-Wallers, those buildings did not erect any more of a wall than any building, taller or otherwise. There are still streets, and a radical new urban innovation the Off-the-Wallers may not be aware of, something called "sidewalks," that lead to the waterfront.
If you only load the downtown residential scale with low or even no-income folk, then stores, restaurants, coffee houses and theatres, and yes, even the beloved waterfront, will be deserted by folks favoring more diversity.
If you only have panhandlers, whom will they panhandle from?
As I sat grousing at the short-sighted and stilted reasoning of the Off-the-Wallers, I had an inspiration.
We should be thinking stilted.
As in "stilts."
Like I said, I can't see through a one-story building any better than a seven-story one. But I could see quite well if you built that seven-story building on stilts.
Yeah. That's it. Design and construct the building so open beams support the upper structure, but at street level you can see right through them to the waterfront.
And incidentally, that now empty space could also be used for another rare commodity in our downtown mix, parking.
Interesting point of information. I wrote this essay in June of 2002.
Some things never change.
America ya gotta love it