Bingen Livability: City partners with architecture firm to establish middle housing
Middle Housing in Bingen on Columbia Court
By Ken Park
Bingen-Feb, 15, 2024 — Finding housing in Bingen?
Well, that’s tough.
But maybe it’s about to change.
The City of Bingen agreed to a $35,000 contract with MAKERS Architecture to come up with a community engagement plan and ordinance to create more middle housing in the city at its Feb. 6 meeting.
The move is the first step in creating additional, land-efficient housing in the community as a shortage in housing stock has gripped the Gorge and the Pacific Northwest generally.
Bingen City Administrator Krista Loney
Middle Housing is a transformative concept that highlights the need for diverse, affordable housing choices in sustainable, walkable neighborhoods. “In a nutshell, middle housing is duplexes, triplexes, Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs), townhomes, and cottages,” said Bingen City Administrator Krista Loney. “Basically, anything other than single-family homes.”
Click to expand and see examples of middle housing
An ADU is a term for a secondary house or apartment that shares the building lot of a larger, primary home, allowing for greater density of people in one area where land is expensive.
“We are so lucky to get MAKERS to work with us, Loney said. ”They were hired by the Department of Commerce to build a model for middle housing for the entire state of Washington, we are a tiny blip on their giant portfolio of work.”
Back in May, the Washington State legislature passed House Bill 1110, which required all cities in the state to develop a middle housing plan to increase middle housing in areas that are traditionally single-family housing.
Another benefit of developing middle housing is affordability.
“Middle housing is meant to increase density as well as the affordability of places to live,” Loney said.
According to Zillow, the average cost of a single-family home in Bingen is $397,356, and the average cost of rent is $1,450 per month.
The City of Bingen has already done some of the work through code changes to increase housing density based on recommendations from MAKERS and other groups that participated in a community planning assistance team event in October 2022.
“Those code changes include lowering setback requirements and allowing for ADUs in Bingen,” Loney said.
The contract with MAKERS Architecture will be supported by a grant awarded to the City of Bingen from the Washington Department of Commerce in December.
This contract was unanimously approved by the Bingen City Council at its first meeting of the month on Feb. 6.
Support Local News
Available to everyone. Funded by readers.
