Building Tall in T-Town

Yesterday on the Stranger's blog, Dan Savage took a picture from Gasworks park. He counted 30 cranes over the Seattle skyline and that was before he gave up counting.

I have never been one to say Tacoma should be more like Seattle (and definitely not more like Bellevue) but it's hitting home that there's a lot of development going on that we keep missing out on.

I moved back to Tacoma in 2002 (right around the time the City passed the Destination Downtown codes). Can anyone tell me what the tallest building built in Tacoma since then was? I think it might be Hannah Heights--3 stories of parking and 5 or 6 of residential. 8 or 9 stories. Same goes for The Esplanade, 9 stories.

Those are the tallest buildings built in Tacoma in 6 years?! During the huge building boom that's the best we got? With Class A office space leasing at nearly 100% in downtown Tacoma we haven't built taller than that?

Is there one taller that I'm missing? Maybe before 2002 the tallest new office building was the Columbia Bank building, but I think only clocks in at 9 stories too.

What's hurting tall development? Is it the parking requirements that Andre Stone so clearly skewers here. Is it the B&O tax? What's causing this?

I would once again like to float my idea for encouraging tall development: offer developers a "Skyscraper tax break" akin to the 10 Year Property Tax Abatement for condos. After the 5th floor, developers only pay property taxes for 1/3 of the floors above it. So their 15 story project would be taxed at the value of an 8 story project for the first 10 years. Or their 40 story project would be taxed at the value of a 17 story building for the first 10 years. I would also add that at least half the floors have to be commercial office space, not more condos.

This might help make rents a little lower for office tenants and move more jobs downtown. We're lagging behind on height.