I was recently invited to a meeting of Renton airport users who have lost confidence in Renton’s airport management. They are considering forming an airport tenants union, to organize and push back on breath-taking rent increases. One airport business owner reports that the city has asked him to sign onto a 120 percent rent increase, 12 times bigger than what our state legislature said was the maximum a residential landlord could ever increase rent in a single year. Some tenants have said they have been given surprise retroactive rent increases, in which management said they forgot to raise the rent months earlier, and now demand tens of thousands in back rent– similarly to the billing failure that triggered the Landing Gear Works to ultimately move out.
Two years ago many small plane owners in Renton were issued surprise rent increases of 42 – 74%, making their tie-downs and hangars more costly than those at Boeing Field (which has much more infrastructure including two runways).
After more than two years of amassing fines and complaint letters, ION Renton presented Renton officials with a peace offering this past holiday season. In November they let the City know they were serious about getting started with the demolition of the smaller of the two abandoned buildings, and they offered preliminary concepts for a first phase of redevelopment of the site. Residents and nearby businesses have been glad to see the three-story derelict 500 Park Avenue building finally coming down.
ION Renton has provided the City with a preliminary proposal for phase 1 construction at the Park Avenue site where a derelict office building has been removed. Type VA construction is wood frame with 1-hour fire resistance. (From ION Renton project narrative)
ION Renton’s proposed replacement is still preliminary, and has not been widely advertised. I only learned these details from reviewing public records regarding potential upcoming Renton projects. ION Renton’s proposal was prepared for a pre-application meeting, which is a fact-finding introductory meeting where a developer gets advanced input from the city. It would not be fair to be overly judgemental at this early stage, but helpful input is valuable.
A conceptual view from North 5th and Park Ave North. The orange is commercial storefronts, and the blue-gray is apartments. (From ION Renton’s pre-ap package)
From my experience, I think their mixed-use (mostly apartment) proposal fits the existing zoning and could possibly work at this location, but I am concerned that ION Renton has significantly underestimated the costs of construction. I also have some design suggestions and want them to keep more trees.
ION Renton is proposing a 165,000 square foot project with an estimated construction cost of $30.6 million, which works out to be about $185 per square foot. Apartment construction can easily cost $300-$500 per square foot in our area, potentially double the estimate they submitted. Looked at another way, they hope to build 161 apartment units ranging from 1-3 bedrooms for about $190,000 per unit (based on $30.6 million construction, plus about $4 million for the land, minus about $4 million to be spent on retail space instead of apartments) . Building apartments for $190,000 each would be an amazing achievement, and it doesn’t seem possible these days. For comparison, Renton Housing Authority’s 2021 Sunset Oak project created 60 units for $26.6 million, a per-apartment cost of $443,000. ION Renton will currently need to pay mitigation to Renton for Transportation, Parks, Fire, and Schools, and utilities which could add up to $20,000 per unit just in fees.
And the construction costs could go much higher depending on the environmental cleanup effort that would be required. The Department of Ecology had determined this previously-polluted site had been sufficiently cleaned up to support office use by their 1970s-1980s standards. But Ecology’s residential pollution standards are more rigorous than office standards, and their 2026 standards are more strenuous than they were four decades ago.
Renton’s staff review at the pre-application conference addressed this with a broad brush by simply noting the project was “pending environmental review.” My experience says any significant soil cleanup could add millions in costs and years of flowtime to the project.
Hopefully ION Renton is just coming in optimistically about these low costs while preparing for potentially more realistic costs. Who doesn’t like an optimist, right?
Aside from my concerns about costs, their proposal to build multifamily housing seems like a reasonable use, with a few comments/suggestions of my own: demolish the 7-story building before they construct any new apartments to avoid dropping glass and concrete on the work site; add details to the final proposal that create nice street frontages and sidewalk connections (which is required by the zoning); save more of the trees, and find a location on the broader site to replant the trees they are removing.
In conclusion, I’m glad ION Renton is finally getting some of the demolition completed, and kudos to them for bringing a proposal forward for more needed housing. While ION Renton should have kept the office buildings in operational condition until the company was prepared to demolish and rebuild, I wish them success in achieving their vision for mixed use on their site. It will still be a long process for them to achieve approval and a viable financial plan, so they must remain focussed on completing the demolition of the seven-story building and making their property safe and presentable until building permits are issued.
The conceptual view from North 5th, showing the building’s connection to the existing parking garage. From ION Renton’s pre-ap package.The remnants of 500 Park Avenue North (a building I used to have an office in). This building would be replaced by the mixed use apartment/retail project.These trees between the demolished office building and Park Avenue North would be removed by this proposalSaved: these large redwood trees between the garage and the adjacent Metalcraft Fabricators would be protected under the ION Renton proposal. (Trees near the Garden Avenue side of the garage would stay, and trees near Park and North 5th street would be removed.)
In my previous post, I described how “The Reserve at Renton” has been accused of being too quick to tow resident’s and customers vehicles away. This includes vehicles that are legally displaying the state disabled parking permit but do not also have a special “Reserve at Renton” issued parking permit. Disabled residents have reported paying between $500 – $900 to retrieve their towed vehicles.
A quick review of the State’s website says any person who meets the criteria for disabled parking must be allowed to use the parking free of charge, without time restrictions (except in the case of certain on-street parking). Hence, it’s not surprising that disabled motorists are taken by surprise when their cars are towed away by the “Reserve at Renton.” I’m not an attorney, so I’m not going to opine on the legality of this, but I think it is very confusing, and I think residents cars should not have been towed without warning if they had a valid ADA permit. Here is the wording in state law, which can be found here. (The exceptions mentioned are for on-street parking or fraudulent use of credentials, and don’t apply in this case).
RCW 46.61.582 Free parking for persons with disabilities—Exceptions. (1) Any person who meets the criteria for special parking privileges under RCW 46.19.010 must be allowed free of charge to park a vehicle being used to transport the holder of such special parking privileges for unlimited periods of time in parking zones or areas, including zones or areas with parking meters that are otherwise restricted as to the length of time parking is permitted, except zones in which parking is limited pursuant to RCW 46.19.050(5). The person must obtain and display a parking placard or special license plate under RCW 46.19.010 and 46.19.030 to be eligible for the privileges under this section. (2) This section does not apply to those zones or areas in which the stopping, parking, or standing of all vehicles is prohibited or that are reserved for special types of vehicles.
Screenshot from State Law
Cars transporting disabled residents and customers, in front of a storefront in the Reserve at Renton apartment building. Parking spots are marked per state law, but with an additional “Parking by Permit Only” towing sign on the bricks.“Parking by Permit Only” sign does not make it clear their permit is additional to State Disabled Permit; and I’m not sure if this is legal anyways for ADA parking required by the building permit
Double-permits hang in this car window as resident works to comply with apartment policy
A Renton reddit user recently posed a question on a Renton reddit page asking “could we please have light rail connectivity in Renton?”
Click here to see the complete Reddit thread on this topic.
One commenter says Renton Councils and residents of the past didn’t want light rail, some point to unfair lack of Renton representation on the Sound Transit board when key decisions were made, some point to Renton’s lower density than Seattle, some say our topography is to blame, and some say we’re not working hard enough to get it today. One made an interesting point that Boeing, our largest employer, has many workers with shifts starting too early in the morning for Sound Transit trains (although Everett has a similar workforce and it is scheduled to eventually get Link light rail).
I’ve covered Renton’s concerns regarding Sound Transit extensively in the past, and I don’t agree with some of the reddit comments. For instance, I always wanted Link light rail during the time I was on council (first writing about Renton’s struggles with the agency in 2007), and I don’t think our topography or density are less suited than other areas like Redmond or Issaquah. I also agree with many of the comments, and I’m happy to see our community discussing it. I’m impressed with the level of interest and engagement by our community.
As I’ve said in my previous blog entries, I would like to see Sound Transit complete the five million dollar study that voters agreed to as part of Sound Transit 3 to determine an alignment and layout for a future Link light rail station in Renton. This study should be completed soon, to make sure Renton is not left out of any future Sound Transit 4 planning.
“There was once a Countryman who possessed the most wonderful Goose you can imagine, for every day when he visited the nest, the Goose had laid a beautiful, glittering, golden egg.
The Countryman took the eggs to market and soon began to get rich. But it was not long before he grew impatient with the Goose because she gave him only a single golden egg a day. He was not getting rich fast enough.
Then one day, after he had finished counting his money, the idea came to him that he could get all the golden eggs at once by killing the Goose and cutting it open. But when the deed was done, not a single golden egg did he find, and his precious Goose was dead.
Those who have plenty want more and so lose all they have”
For decades Renton’s prosperity has been supercharged by the Boeing Company, which provides thousands of living-wage, union-represented, machinist and engineering jobs to Renton residents and their families. Boeing also employs pilots, scientists, supply-chain specialists, logistics professionals, managers, administrators, and many others. And they typically give their employees benefits that include health care, vacation, sick leave, parental leave, life insurance, and 401K packages.
This money comes to Renton from global sources– everywhere in the world where 737’s are sold. The Boeing Renton factory can assemble three billion dollars worth of product per month. This outside revenue coming into Renton fuels economic activity throughout our region, as Boeing keeps local suppliers in business, and the money they distribute in payroll flows from aerospace workers to homebuilders, retailers, restaurants, service providers, and local and state governments. Boeing’s international revenue allows Puget Sound’s other successful large companies to flourish, like Starbucks, Costco and Amazon, as well as countless small Renton businesses like Common Ground Coffee and Cupcakes, Boon-Boona, and The Sub Shop.
But after the MAX crashes and the Alaska door plug blowout, Boeing’s worldwide prominence and reputation have taken a severe beating. The story has now been extensively covered by everyone… New York Times, BBC, Seattle Times, 60-Minutes, Congress, even Boeing themselves. Boeing’s 1999 merger with McDonnel Douglas sparked an identity crisis in their executive ranks in which a new focus on “shareholder value” overtook their historic culture of innovation, achievement, and excellence. Now Boeing and the FAA are working to fix things. Among their various efforts, Boeing keeps trying new CEOs, working to find one that can help them regain the safety-culture that propelled them to technical and economic prominence. Most of their engineers and machinists never lost this culture, so it’s more a matter of elevating it back into the top ranks. It is something Boeing can do, and needs to do, with a current backlog of 6,200 airplanes, and as our nation’s only builder of air transport jets for the future.
Boeing’s reputation had sunk so low that even before a door plug blew off a 737, Seattle’s progressive newspaper “the Stranger” was already seriously suggesting that the Boeing factories should be sold to Amazon.com to serve as warehouses. While I’ve heard this notion suggested before, I was surprised to read it in such a progressive newspaper. Only about ten percent of Amazon’s jobs are union, while the majority of Boeing Renton’s factory and engineering jobs are union. And while the average machinist will soon be earning six-figures and have full benefit packages under their newest 2024 contract, Amazon warehouse workers frequently make close to minimum wage, and are only eligible for benefit packages if working full-time in some jobs. Replacing career union machinist and engineering jobs with Amazon warehouse work is hardly progressive.
But “the Stranger” is not alone in suggesting Boeing has a limited life span left in Renton. Business journals like Leeham News predict Boeing may leave Renton in 2033, just eight years from now. If this happens, the future of the Boeing property should be of serious concern to all residents of Renton. Back in the 1990s, when a rumor broke that Boeing was considering consolidating in Everett, Renton’s Mayor Tanner spearheaded a plan to put overlay zoning on the Boeing property to turn it into a biotech research office center if Boeing moved out. Southport office towers were part of this plan. But pandemic-era work-from-home changed the landscape for office projects, and it’s doubtful this plan would work.
The most likely outcome would be the one predicted in “The Stranger,” a combined Amazon/Fed Ex facility that utilized the airport and the massive Boeing production hangars. These companies would likely be high-bidders for the property. And they would get political support from King County Port Commissioners and King County Council Members who need to free up space at Seatac and Boeing Field– moving air freight to Renton would help them immensely.
But Renton’s environment would suffer dramatically from this change. Instead of having two brand-new empty 737 takeoffs per day, we could have day and night air cargo operations using older airplanes. Much of downtown Renton would find itself in a noise zone, with windows rattled regularly by older jets and turboprop aircraft. In short order, FAA would be leaning on Renton, again, to extend the runway right into the newly rebuilt Renton High School. We would succeed in bringing the noisiest operations of Boeing Field and Seatac into the heart of Renton’s historic downtown. There is nothing desirable about this scenario.
“The Stranger” alternatively suggests that the Boeing Renton property could be used for low-income housing, which is certainly a possibility. I don’t think that non-profits or governmental organizations would outbid Amazon for the property, but perhaps they might. While this could help the regional housing shortages, Renton Council and residents must be aware that even market-rate housing is a net drain on Renton’s resources, costing more to provide services to than the users of the housing pay in taxes. In contrast, Boeing is a net producer of tax revenue, giving more to the city than they use in services. Replacing Boeing with housing would directly negatively impact the City of Renton’s budget by millions, and possibly tens of millions, of dollars per year. Along with losing thousands of living-wage jobs, this would deliver a one-two punch to Renton’s finances, and the impact would have to be made up with higher taxes on everyone in Renton.
The scenario for this property that works out best for Renton is for Boeing to rediscover its quality and safety culture, and to continue to build jets in Renton. And this includes the new small-medium airplane that eventually replaces the 737s and 757s that were always built in this factory.
Yes, Boeing has space in Everett where they could consolidate, and they’ve also shown a tendency to move work to South Carolina which has lower labor costs. But Boeing has historically thrived in Renton, running the most efficient airplane factory on the planet. And as their current home, Renton ought to be working to retain them here. If Boeing announced they were holding a contest to locate the production line for a 737 replacement, every city in America would be competing to win the factory. And Renton is the incumbent… the one to beat. Renton should be working NOW, doing everything reasonably possible, to remain the preferred site for Boeing’s small-medium (single-aisle) airplane manufacturing.
Unfortunately, that has not been happening lately.
Taxes:
In 2016, during a time of budget challenges in Renton, the City of Renton implemented a B&O tax for the first time. With a three billion dollar monthly revenue stream from 737 sales, Boeing was understandably concerned that they would pay the lion’s share of the proposed tax. Mayor Law reached an agreement with Boeing that Boeing would not fight the tax if Boeing’s share was capped at five million dollars per year, and the tax was imposed with Boeing’s acquiescence. In 2022, the City of Renton approximately tripled Boeing’s B&O taxes, escalating their rate over three years from the pre-agreed capped five million per year to 12 million per year plus a small fraction of their annual revenues. Renton already has one of the highest property taxes in the area, with schools getting the biggest share.
A four year step-up in Boeing’s Renton B&O taxes was implemented in 2022, and has now approximately tripled this tax (approximate because it is now based partly on confidential revenue data).
And Renton’s 2025 total property tax levy rate (including schools, county, city, hospital, library, and others) is $10.02 per thousand in assessed valuation. This is about 10% higher than Everett’s and Seattle’s rates of about $9.00, and 30 % higher than Bellevue’s rate of $7.30.
Currently the State Legislature is developing a suite of new B&O, payroll, and property taxes they may levy on Boeing and other large employers which would be additive to Renton’s new tax increases.
Airport Facilities:
Renton Airport and Boeing traditionally have worked together to keep as much property available for general aviation as possible, while supporting Boeing production as necessary to meet world-wide demand for airliners. Over the years Boeing has vacated leased airplane parking aprons and facilities they’re not currently using, but by mutual understanding, Renton Airport puts these properties in limited-term leases in case Boeing needs them again for airplane production. But new airport management, and a new focus on having tenants pay to completely rebuild airport-owned buildings, will require new 40-year leases with non-Boeing tenants. This will limit the options for Boeing in the future. Furthermore, an increased focus on Business jets at Renton airport increases the likelihood that the total number of Boeing new airplane take-offs, combined with business jet take-offs and landings, will reach the threshold that requires a longer runway.
In the past decade Boeing has also seen significant rent increases for their airport leased space, and new “through-the-fence-fees” for use of the airport; these charges would be okay if they went into diligent airport maintenance, but lately airport maintenance has been lacking as pavement and markings wear out and leased buildings get ignored.
Other infrastructure:
Boeing has special high pressure water lines serviced by the Seattle Water System. If these lines are broken, factory production stops (at a cost of millions of dollars per hour). Renton recently approved a controversial housing project that sits so close to these lines that it puts them in jeopardy in spite of Boeing’s warnings.
Sound Transit was unwilling to include either a Link Light rail station or Bus Rapid Transit station near Renton Boeing in previous phases, and Renton needs to keep pressing them for service in the future. PSE has modernized much of the Eastside electrical infrastructure in Bellevue and Redmond, running transmission lines through Renton to do so, but Renton’s grid near Boeing and the Landing still has less reliable equipment. Renton should be pushing them for continuous upgrades.
In summary:
Renton’s goose that lays golden eggs may be going through a moulting season, but that’s no reason to kill it. Renton’s Economic Development Department, Airport Management, and Renton Council should be actively working to ensure Boeing’s next single-aisle airplane gets built here.
Even on the off-peak hour of 10:30 AM, traffic on Rainier Ave is grid-locked through multiple stoplights by a lane reduction near Airport Way.
The Rainier Avenue Phase 4 improvement project was originally scheduled to be completed this week, but after multiple delays it’s now expected to continue until at least October.
The last major delay was approved by City Council last summer, when the Council authorized a change order that added about four million dollars and 129 extra work days to the contract. Utility franchises will pay the $4,000,000 in additional charges, but Renton’s motorists and businesses are paying for the delays through their lost time, idling, frustration, and lost business revenues.
This latest delay was specifically caused by installation issues with a Joint Use Trench (JUT) that will be used for utility routing by PSE, Lumen, and Comcast. Because of unexpected conflicts with other in-ground utilities, the JUT has had to be installed at a depth of ten feet underground instead of the planned 5 1/2 feet. The extra 4 1/2 feet of depth significantly increases the cost of the worker protection shoring in the trench, requiring excavator placing of heavy steel frames instead of the hand-placed steel sheets. The extra depth also put the trench deeper into the water table, requiring pumping and loose sand management. Making matters worse, some of the extra soil being removed has some minor petroleum contamination (probably from old service station activities), and the soil has to be taken to a special site.
The 31-month construction project will update the street, sidewalks, signals, planting areas, and utilities
While I understand that utilities can cause delays, I think there could have been more effort placed on minimizing the number of days with lane closures.
In past years Renton Council passionately debated every proposed lane closure; Council used to typically restrict lane closures to hours, not weeks or months, and Council tracked them. When asked about a planned lane closure, or how long a prior lane closure had lasted, former Public Works Director Gregg Zimmerman always had the answer. Mr. Zimmerman usually knew immediately because he had been personally overseeing the work site. In the previous (southern) phases of Rainier Ave improvement under Gregg Zimmerman’s management, he famously committed to keeping five lanes of Rainier Ave continuously open. And Council helped Mr. Zimmerman hold the contractor to it. As quoted in the Renton Patch in 2012 ” Renton Public Works Administrator Gregg Zimmerman’s promise to keep at least five lanes of traffic open throughout construction drew heavy applause and whistles from a crowd of more than three dozen attendees”
Minimizing lane closures should be a requirement in all future road projects. Even if it makes the job more laborious to keep moving cones and steel plates in and out of position when a lane closure is needed (as opposed to leaving the lane perpetually closed), the extra labor can easily pay off. Rainier Ave typically carries about 40,000 cars per day. Many motorists are reporting delays of ten minutes from these lane closures, and google maps confirms this. If every car suffered ten minutes of delay, that would represent 6,666 hours of lost car/driver productivity per day. Assuming $50 per hour for a car and driver (the Uber hourly rate), this amounts to $333,000 per day. (The real losses are people being late for work or school, paying extra for daycare, taking time from family, etc, but these are harder to put a price on.) Whether the delay actually costs $333,000 per day, or half of this, the point is still the same. It’s worth investing $5000-$10,000 per day moving cones, signs, and steel plates to keep the lanes open when work is not being performed in them.
A Facebook user recently asked about this project on a group page, and the question attracted over 70 passionate responses. Here is just a small sample:
“QUESTION???? at RAINIER and RENTON AVE Would anyone care to share why it’s taking so long for the Road / infrastructure project to move forward? It’s been several years and not a single person was working. It’s an absolute inconvenience to all, and taxpayers should know.”
“I have empathy towards construction workers and don’t blame them specifically. Lots of hands at play here. But as someone who travels this intersection at least 4 times a day, it’s absolutely an inconvenience. Is it convenient to have to wait up to 10 minutes to get through a light? Not an exaggeration, has happened multiple times and not only when the power was out. I’m pretty patient and do like city improvements but this project should have been planned better or the city should somehow help navigate the delays.”
“The entire project is an embarrassment to take this long. It would be interesting to know why it has been taking years upon years.”
“Very sporadic as to when they will be working and when they aren’t. Majority of the time not.”
“It shouldn’t be left like it is for the time being. I drive a lifted truck and it feels like I’m out off of exit 38 going through the mountains on Rainier. It’s sick”
“It’s inexcusable and not professional nor is the city functioning in the best interest of it citizens. You don’t just leave it a mess for years. They could at minimum reconfigure the traffic and the ridiculous lane closure if they’re going to do nothing for another six months.”
Billy O’Neill, “Dale Chihuly’s right hand man,” (in white sneakers) selecting the large facility on Airport Way for his decorative glass making studio. The venue was going to teach youth and adults the art of Chihuly style glass making. The large open-bay building features the same old-growth historic bowstring-trusses that caused our city council to save the Pavilion building in the 1990s.
It was a dream come true for Renton’s Arts Community, our youth, and our Economic Development department. A world-class glass studio was relocating to Renton, headed up by the vice-president and operations manager of Chihuly’s workshop in Seattle. Billy O’Neill, who Seattle Times calls Dale Chihuly’s right hand man, was working on a gift for Renton that would have taught new generations of Rentonites how to create beautiful glass sculptures and containers. Mr. O’Neill has served on the Seattle Arts Commission, as secretary on the Executive Board of Directors of the Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF) and on advisory boards for the Seattle Sounders and other non-profits– a perfect fit in Renton. He was instrumental in creating Chihuly’s Garden of Glass at Seattle Center.
But the exciting glass art studio fell victim to a School District Eminent Domain taking, along with numerous other businesses and homes, with no acknowledgment by the School Board of the glass studio’s extraordinary significance.
The business, called “Glass Eye” already has a permanent sales location at Pike Place Market, which would have soon been selling the Made in Renton glassworks. We would have a new Made-in-Renton products we could share with visitors and far-away family, to replace our much-missed Uptown Glassworks.
Sofia Farret carefully prepares landing gear kits for shipping to customers. She also performs other critical aviation roles at Landing Gear Works. Ms. Farret has spoken to Renton City Council twice, including this past Monday night, asking for help in settling the lease issue.
Renton Airport management and The Landing Gear Works are engaged in a landlord-tenant dispute that’s made its way up to the Renton Council, dominating Monday’s audience comment period. Eight aerospace workers could lose their jobs, and they were asking for Council help. Council Members seemed to want to help, but have been reluctant to engage directly with Landing Gear Works.
Renton airport management is frustrated with Landing Gear Work’s claim that the company repaired their roof in lieu of rent payments. Airport management asserts the roof was Landing Gear Works’ responsibility under the lease.
Landing Gear Works company founder Tom Anderson asked Council for help in settling the lease disagreement at Monday’s council meeting. He said his offer included his providing “good faith funds.”
The president of Landing Gear Works, Tom Anderson, said the city only made the roof his responsibility a few years ago through unfair pressure, and he doesn’t understand how the city would expect him to install a new roof and make other long-term upgrades to a building when he can only get a one or two year lease. He says he’s been trying to settle these issues for months, including making payments if they won’t accept his repair receipts, but the airport office has been uncommunicative. He points out the Renton airport is on their third airport director in three years, and recently had no director for several months after the previous director attempted to manage our airport from his home in Utah.
My opinion is that Council Transportation Committee should meet face-to-face with Landing Gear Works and see if an agreement can be worked out before going down the expensive path of litigation. Under RCW 35A.11.020, Renton City Council has ultimate leasing responsibility for Renton Airport, and past councils have engaged in these discussions with tenants when necessary. I recommend Council not go down the eviction path until they’ve personally tried to work this out.
Recent councils have not experienced many landlord-tenant disputes at Renton airport, thanks primarily to the long, productive tenure of a former Renton airport manager who worked closely with all airport tenants, and ensured there were regular monthly meetings of an empowered Renton Airport Advisory Committee (RAAC). The RAAC combined the perspectives of airport users and representatives from Renton’s neighborhoods to build a thriving, compatible airport community, and they addressed tenant issues like roof maintenance productively and early. In my early days on council, Prior to formation of the RAAC, up to 25 percent of my council time was spent handling airport landlord-tenant disputes. Recently, frequent changes in airport management and infrequent RAAC meetings are bringing back landlord-tenant tensions at the airport.
Sergio Nunez, a ten-year employee of Landing Gear Works, asks the Council to help save his company.
Background on Landing Gear Works:
For 11 years Mr. Anderson and his company “The Landing Gear Works” have designed and built specialized light plane landing gear at Renton Airport. Mr. Anderson pointed out at the Monday meeting that he has deep roots in Renton; his Dad ran a Machine shop in Renton dating back to 1947.
The Landing Gear Works’ most popular product is a titanium landing gear system for Cessna 180 and 185 aircraft. These specialized landing gear are lighter weight and less susceptible to corrosion than alternatives, and are sought after world-wide by Cessna owners seeking improved performance and durability. They are not available from anyone else.
On a typical day, the Landing Gear Works will have two or three customer aircraft on-site receiving new gear, and will ship out additional landing gear sets to repair stations around the globe.
The products are made entirely in Renton, with major components fabricated in their airport workshop and other components coming from machine shops throughout Renton.
The shiny Cessna 180 titanium landing gear strut in front, available only from Landing Gear Works, weighs half as much as the approved steel strut behind it, and it is less susceptible to corrosion. The titanium gear reduces an airplane’s weight by 23 pounds, extending it’s range, adding cargo capacity, and reducing its carbon footprint. These are made in Renton.
The Landing Gear Works must maintain key approvals from the FAA to sell these products. The FAA has issued Supplemental Type Certificates (STCs) approving the design, and Parts Manufacturer Approvals (PMAs) authorizing the manufacturing. Both of these approvals have to be rigorously maintained by Landing Gear Works, by showing they maintain high quality manufacturing processes and that their engineering team is responsive to in-service incidents involving their products. They have an FAA “continuing airworthiness” responsibility to care for the design, manufacture, and use of these products, as long as they are in service on airplanes.
One continuing airworthiness obligation is maintaining an approved spare parts supply. Needed parts must be readily shipped to anyone with an airplane on ground. FAA enforces this requirement to keep the world’s aircraft flying safely, and eliminate any temptation to use unauthorized parts in repairs.
An eviction of an STC and PMA holder (such as Landing Gear Works) with a mere thirty days notice is incompatible with meeting these Federal regulations and expectations. Ninety days for a move should ordinarily be considered a bare minimum, and more time would be better.
The Landing Gear Works maintains FAA-approved spares, manufactured in Renton, that can be quickly exported around the world to meet their continuing airworthiness requirements.
The Historic Building:
Landing Gear Works’ engineering and manufacturing takes place in a historic building at Renton airport. The “Old Tower Building” was built in 1943, and provided air traffic control when Renton was building up to one hundred and sixty B-29 superfortresses per month during WWII. Later, the building served as the Engineering Liaison office for Boeing’s flight line.
The Landing Gear Works occupies the old Renton Control Tower building, built in 1943.The view from Renton’s historic old control tower, looking over the Boeing flight line today. The black and white photo shows the view when Renton was producing 160 B-29 Superfortresses each month during WWII.The Landing Gear Works building still contains reminders of it’s long service for the Boeing Company. While at Boeing I personally spent long days and some overnights in this building as I worked with flightline “Liaison” engineers making adjustments to airplanes prior to first flight.
When Boeing gave up their lease on the building and turned it back to Renton, we searched for an appropriate aviation use that could occupy the building. The building does not have any hangar space and is designated in the FAA approved airport layout plan as “Aircraft Manufacturing.”
I remember when our long-serving airport manager enthusiastically announced he found the right company, with Renton roots and a high-end product. Landing Gear Works was to occupy most of the building, with the exception of the historic tower and some of the offices below the tower. At that time the city maintained the exterior of the building, including cutting the grass, picking up debris, and keeping the roof repaired. The airport manager also helped Landing Gear Works sublease three hangar spaces to install their equipment on aircraft.
Renton’s 2017 FAA-approved Airport Layout Plan available here, showed Building 36 (the old tower building) approved for for Aircraft Manufacturing (in green), which Landing Gear Works uses it for. Non-manufacturing use, general aviation, or non-aviation use would not be per plan.
The Landing Gear Works operated in smooth partnership with Renton for many years. The recent dispute took root when a later airport manager condemned the hangars used by Landing Gear Works and scheduled them for demolition, and insisted that Landing Gear Works must agree to rent the entire old tower building under a one-to-two year lease if they desired replacement hangar space.
Mr. Anderson says the city then stopped doing any repairs or upgrades to the building, asserting it had become solely a tenant responsibility. The roof began to leak in several locations, and a rusted AC unit broke from a wall in a storm and let water damage an office. The roof appears to be one or two decades past its design life, and is now subsisting only from frequent patching.
Normally, if the city expects a tenant to pay for long-term upgrades to a building, such as a new roof or HVAC system, the city will extend a lease for a long enough period that the cost of the upgrades can be amortized over many years. As a Council Member, I often helped negotiate these time frames, to ensure our tenants could amortize their improvements. That was apparently not done in this case. Landing Gear Works began to use a large percentage of their profits making short-term repairs to their building, not able to fund major upgrades without a long-term lease.
One of many manufacturing rooms. The large building comprises a compact factory, filled with carefully calibrated mills, presses, lathes and other machine tools that are used in manufacturing landing gear. Thirty days notice to move the FAA-approved operation is not respectful of the rigorous care and planning required for such a move.
The future for the historic Old Tower Building:
The Airport Layout Plan was updated in 2022. While the latest version is not yet on the City Website, I have included it below. The new layout plan shows that the historic old tower building along with several other buildings may eventually be demolished, and replaced with new hangars and offices. Ideally, new airport buildings would front the perimeter fence, so customers could visit a building without going onto the air side of the security fence. The layout plan shows such a configuration.
In the 2022 Airport Layout Plan, purple cross-hatched buildings including old tower building are designated for possible future removal, to be replaced by new hangar/workshop/office buildings shown in red along perimeter fence. Light blue area would get a revised taxiway.
Implementing this plan will require extensive coordination with leaseholders and other stakeholders to protect everyone’s interests. It will require a request for proposals, public review of options, planning, permitting, and FAA approval. Hopefully this plan will also include coordination with the Renton Historical Society and building architects, who should consider saving the historic tower cab and incorporating it into one of the new replacement hangars.
Finding an aviation tenant for a leaking office building that is planned for demolition will be difficult, and it’s possible the city could go months or years without income from this building. We can look a half mile east to the former Boeing Buildings on Park Avenue to see how poorly buildings can fare after a period without tenants. Unfortunately a recent airport break-in shows that the even the airport perimeter fence is not enough to stop intrusions on the airport.
I think Council and Landing Gear Works should sit down together and attempt to sort this out. If a settlement can be reached for Landing Gear Works to catch up on rent, with a possible allowance for continuing to nurse-along the aging roof, it would make sense to keep them in the building until demolition is near. If demolition will not happen for ten or more years, then a long-term lease that allows Landing Gear Works to install and amortize a new roof would make sense.
New titanium gear installed. (This photo is from The Landing Gear Works website)
Diners can sit range-side, and take turns driving golf balls for score, in a variety of games. Scores are tallied on the monitors.
Puget Sound Business Journal recently reported that the Topgolf property is up for sale, but that does not mean the restaurant and lounge with a high-tech driving range is going anywhere.
Topgolf has been a popular business, and has a long-term lease that will transfer with the property to any new owner. Here is the property listing:
The property sold for $27.5 million in 2019 shortly before the Topgolf was built, and it had previously sold for $10 million in 2010 when Boeing surplussed it. (In decades prior, the site held Boeing’s sprawling 10-80 and 10-85 engineering buildings, where Renton Boeing jets were designed. I worked in both buildings at different times.)
Sales history for the Topgolf property, previously the site of the Boeing Company 10-80 and 10-85 engineering buildings
From City of Renton presentation. The complete presentation is here
At 6:00 PM tomorrow night, Renton’s Planning and Development Committee will discuss updating Renton’s home occupations rules to make it legal for Renton residents to do home based online retail sales. I think this update probably makes sense in today’s world. If you have input one way or the other, you can address it to council via email or at tomorrow’s City Council meeting.
In 1995 during my first term on Renton City Council I helped write a new law that formally legalized home piano teachers, home tax accountants, and other similar small residential-based businesses for the first time in Renton. Prior to ordinance 4493 in 1995, these businesses were technically not allowed in residential neighborhoods, although some people were doing them under the radar if their business was small enough and neighbors were not asking questions.
This law has seen updates in 1997, 2008, 2012, as we made adjustments based on input from businesses and neighborhoods. Here is the law as it stands today. This law will likely be updated again in the coming days, primarily to allow retail sales from homes as long as these sales are online-based. Previously, retail sales were not allowed from home-based businesses.
Last night several members of my household enjoyed fresh seafood at one of the Landing’s newest restaurants, Kickin Kajun. My wife Cathy, our son Danny, his fiancee Julie, and I went for a late dinner around 8:00 PM. We gave ourselves just enough time to finish our fun, interactive dining experience right before their 9:00 closing. Bibs and gloves were provided to us before our food arrived. Cathy, Danny, and I shared a crawfish boil that included crawfish, mussels, clams, sausage, potatoes and corn on the cob in our choice of sauce. We enjoyed their signature sauce which has some Korean spices in it, and next time for variety we’ll try their L0uisiana Style which is closer to what we would find in the South. Julie (who’s not as much of a fan of shellfish) enjoyed breaded fried catfish and chips, and she was served a large enough portion that she could share. We had plenty of delicious food for the four of us, and the price was very affordable for seafood. Their complete menu can be found here.
Kickin Kajun is a Hawaiian chain established in 2012, and this is their first restaurant in Washington. We were warmly greeted by Ava, one of the four business partners who owns the Renton restaurant. At our prompting, she filled us in on the chain’s successful history and we talked about their popular Hawaiian locations on Oahu. She and the rest of the staff were attentive and made the experience top notch. Kickin Kajun is a great new Renton option for those of us that enjoy seafood, and in particular Seafood boils which are not available everywhere.
Their restaurant can be found at the Landing, 800 N 10th St, at the suite formerly occupied by the Balanced Athlete. I’m grateful to Ava and her partners for choosing Renton for their restaurant!
My son Danny, his fiancee Julie, me, and my wife Cathy enjoying a crawfish boil and fried catfish at Kickin Kajun. The restaurant has been open for about three weeks.
Cathy and Danny digging into the crawfish boil
My wife and me with Ava, one of the four partners who opened Kickin Kajun at the Landing.Cathy in front of Kickin Kajun, between the traffic circle and the parking garage at the Landing. (The location was formerly occupied by the Balanced Athlete.)
The office space at Southport was ready for tenants right around the time the pandemic hit, delaying occupancy. Marcie Palmer sent me this beautiful photo showing the lights finally on in the Southport offices, to the left of the Boeing factory. The lit up space will soon be occupied by Renton’s own global trend-setting game designer, Wizards of the Coast.
It’s appropriate for Wizards of the Coast to settle in next to Boeing. When I was a systems engineer at Boeing, I worked with engineers that had regularly played a pre-production version of “Magic the Gathering” with their colleague Peter Atkison during their 40-minute lunch breaks. “He would bring new hand-drawn cards for us to evaluate every week” they told me. Mr. Atkison had started a small side business, “Wizards of the Coast”, which took its name from the adventuring group he and his friends had created when they played “Dungeons and Dragons.” Mr. Atkison was close friends with a gamer named Richard Garfield, the creative inventor of Magic the Gathering (and also a great-great-grandson of US President James Garfield). Peter Atkison’s small company was working to bring Richard Garfield’s product to the market, and his fellow nerds at Boeing were an outstanding test market.
A reader of the “Randy Corman for Mayor” Facebook page recently asked me to comment on whether our city was favoring big box stores at the Landing at the expense of downtown merchants.
It’s not one over the other. Both of these shopping districts, the the Landing and historic downtown, and all our other business zones, are extremely important to Renton.
My wife Cathy and daughter Katie made it down for opening day at Marshalls on Thursday. They found some great values, and enjoyed the shopping experience. They felt there were more than enough dressing rooms for everyone, and that the checkout line moved quickly even though there were many shoppers in front of them. They came home with sweaters and slacks, and many nice accessories. Both of them plan to go back often.
At City Hall we are delighted to see new businesses opening during the recession. We are glad that citizens have new close-in shopping options, and approximately one percent of every sale comes back to the city’s general fund as sales tax revenue.
Trick or Treaters gather candy from a treasure chest and pose for a photo with Pirate hosts at “Eyes on the Landing” this afternoon
Renton’s local businesses helped get Halloween off to a great start this year with seasonal decorations and “Trick or Treating” events in downtown and at the Landing. Here are just a few shots from the Landing event this afternoon. (We spent some time with out in-laws at Eyes on the Landing, so I took most of my photos here…but many businesses participated.) Cathy and I pose at the elaborate decorations at Papaya Vietnamese Restaurant. The picture looks hazy because of the fog machine. Pirates from “Eyes on the Landing” pose for the camera.
Renton’s Economic Development Director, Suzanne Dale Estey and her family enjoy the festivities.
“Owners of “Eyes on the Landing, Dr. Evie Lawson (“mad-scientist” in labcoat) and Donna Jones (pirate on right) entertain the visitors and hand out candy.
I was recently invited to a meeting of Renton airport users who have lost confidence in Renton’s airport management. They are considering forming an airport tenants union, to organize and push back on breath-taking rent increases. One airport business owner reports that the city has asked him to sign onto a 120 percent rent increase, 12 times bigger than what our state legislature said was the maximum a residential landlord could ever increase rent in a single year. Some tenants have said they have been given surprise retroactive rent increases, in which management said they forgot to raise the rent months earlier, and now demand tens of thousands in back rent– similarly to the billing failure that triggered the Landing Gear Works to ultimately move out.
Photo: Renton’s newest and likely most iconic art piece, Erasmus the dragon, was unveiled in Downtown Renton in April
