SEQUIM – A slowdown in construction? Sequim city planners don’t think so.
“There’s still a lot going on in Sequim,” despite the real estate market lag in much of the country, said Sequim assistant planner Joe Irvin.
“Little by little, those subdivisions approved in the last three or four years are still being built, and the commercial development is keeping up,” he said.
During last week’s City Council meeting – the last for 2007 – Public Works chief James Bay laid out a long list of projects.
Typical of recent years here, they range from rental housing to fast food to assisted living.
Soonest to be completed is the traffic circle at Washington Street and Ninth Avenue, also known as the Costco roundabout.
Lakeside Industries will bring out its asphalt blow-dryers soon, Bay said, and the paving should be done by the middle of this week – just in time for the final days of Christmas shopping.
Soon after that, a long-awaited Clallam Transit bus stop will be added in front of the Vintage apartments, Bay said.
A few blocks away, an 89-bed nursing home, Sequim Health and Rehabilitation, is nearing completion.
“The certificate of occupancy was issued” on last week, Irvin said of the 47,210-square-foot building.
Extendicare Inc., operator of some 267 long-term care homes across North America, plans to open the Sequim facility on Jan. 15.
The Elk Creek apartments, 138 units in seven buildings at Rhodefer Road and East Washington Street, are almost finished, Irvin added.
That complex will be among a raft of other projects to take shape in 2008.
Rock Plaza, a blend of offices, retail and upstairs condominiums, is planned for the intersection of Old Olympic Highway and Sequim Avenue.
Building permits have finally been issued for the Black Bear Diner and Holiday Inn Express on Sequim’s east side, Bay added.
The chain restaurant and 77-room hotel are scheduled to open by Lavender Festival weekend, July 18-20.
Another eatery coming to Sequim some time next year: Taco Bell, to occupy the corner of Lee Chatfield Road and East Washington Street.
On the west side of town, Lavender Fields, a 120-unit assisted living facility, will be built just west of Wal-Mart.
And “Walgreens is ready to go to construction right after the first of the year,” Bay said.
The drugstore-and-almost-everything-else will go up at Fifth Avenue and Washington Street, across from the new Rite Aid.
To serve all of this, the city plans to upgrade its sewer system and put in a new well off Port Williams Road in 2008, Bay said.
