Arcata Cal Poly Humboldt Gateway Plan City Planning For the Planning Commission & City Council Solutions

Uniontown Revisioning: Put housing over CVS and Safeway

April 4, 2023

Original article written August 11, 2022

In May, 2020, a group of six Humboldt State students submitted a well-thought-out proposal to the City of Arcata called the “Uniontown Revisioning Project.” The idea is that residential apartments could be constructed above the current buildings of the Uniontown shopping center, at 7th and F Streets.

In total, the plan is for:

24 micro-studios, with 350 square feet
10 one-bedroom apartments of 500-600 sq.ft.
12 two-bed, two-bath units of 900-1100 sq.ft.
15 three-bed, two bath apartments of 1200-1600 sq.ft.
5 four-bed, two bath apartments of 1400-1800 sq.ft.

A total of 66 apartments with an average size of about 830 square feet.

The proposal was based on the General-Commercial zoning in place, which had a height limitation of 35 feet, which would be 3 stories or less. With a 4-story limit, there could be about 90 or 100 apartments of a similar mix of housing sizes. And if the apartments were made to be smaller sizes, the unit count would be higher — but the blend offered is good for what the students perceived as Arcata’s needs.

The total area at the Uniontown shopping center is roughly 6.5 acres. In an imaginary universe, a developer would remove all the existing buildings and build all of it anew, based on contemporary notions of building height, housing needs, modern design, and commercial requirements. In more of a real world, the commercial businesses wouldn’t want to close up shop for the year or so that new development would take. When Safeway constructed new locations in Eureka and in McKinleyville, they built new buildings at a separate site and were operational there before closing down their previous location.

The report also includes a discussion of Form-Based Codes and required design elements and considerations.

The six students are: Carissa Graffious, Michael Holtermann, Jacob Nunez, Steven Okey, Aubrie Richardson, and Collin Slavey. The presentation is part of the HSU Planning Practicum. Currently the Practicum is led by Dr. Laurie Richmond; her website describing many Cal Poly Humboldt projects is here.

How to view the “Uniontown Revisioning Project”

The 58-page document (plus bibliography and appendices) can be seen on the Issuu.com website.

Images of most pages taken from the Issuu website are shown here (below — scroll down) so you can get a general overview of the proposal. The screen images (unfortunately, a little fuzzy) were saved in August 2022.

As published on Issuu
Update, August 2023 – No longer available
Update, March 2024 – It is now available

Please try the link below. If you are able to view this document, please contact me so I can update this message. Thank you.

At the current time, I am seeking to contact the Steven Okey (age 57), one of the authors.

58 pages
Viewing it on the Issuu site in its full-screen mode will offer the best viewing experience. The image can be zoomed in or out (use the sliding scale and the – + keys to zoom) so you can read it easily.