The construction site at 235 S.E. Queen Ave. on Monday afternoon.
Somebody asked me what was being built just north of the curve of S.E. Queen Ave. I was wondering that myself, so I looked it up.
It’s easy to do. If you are wondering about construction activity anywhere in Albany, you can usually find information about it on the city’s website. Click on the link for “building & planning permits,” then the link called “buildingeye.” That brings up a map. With luck, the place you want to know about will have a link that leads to a summary of the building permit.
Anyway, back to 235 Queen Avenue S.E., the address of the 1.4-acre site where concrete slabs have been poured and other site work has been done on what used to be an undeveloped parcel, partly wooded and zoned for light industry.
Last year, the city’s planning division approved a site plan for the property submitted by the owners, Robert and Debora Lamont of Hillsboro. The plan was for a self-serve storage facility totaling 39 units in five buildings.
The storage units shown on the plan are of generous size, most of them measuring 34 by 22 feet. And the building permits that have been issued for buildings A through E call each one an “industrial storage building.”
A few hundred feet west of this address, on the north side of Queen, there are two other big storage businesses. In fact there are storage operations all over town. Their proliferation over the last few decades may be a sign that people these days have either too little space or too much stuff. (hh)
And looking west from the other corner of the lot on Queen.
I think “too much stuff” is the reason. Storage facilities are not the sign of a healthy community.
You are exactly right Ron.
How much stuff is “too much stuff” is so subjective as to be meaningless.
Being judgy about why your neighbors rent storage units gives the appearance of arrogance. Just keepin’ it real…
In keeping with Albany’s growing desire to become business-averse, the city council should ban the construction of this facility.
This facility and the “stuff” stored in each unit sit on private property that is a “good” held in common. The appropriate use of the private property must come from the healthy community, not greedy, obscene profit seeking, private investors.
If the city council doesn’t have the political will to ban this facility, then it should impose a stiff fee or tax on every storage unit. There seems to be a lot of local political will for that.
Ignore the benefit of the city growing its tax base.
The “common good” as defined by….well, I don’t know exactly who defines it…., demands that this facility not be built.
Part of the NEED for household storage is a SYMPTOM of a social and moral problem, nothing more. Pointing this out does not imply that government should do something about it.
The push for very small houses and lot sizes and ADU’s contributes
“The push for very small houses …” Where? I want one. All houses I see for sale are far too large even though lot sizes are getting smaller. There’s a big unmet need from non-family households who can afford to move out of their crappy apartments.
Definitely too much stuff as Ron says, though I’m curious if large units like these store mostly home or business stuff. Anybody know?
I store all my old stuff at Goodwill’s donation drop off. When I need it again, which is rare, I go to Goodwill and buy it. It’s much cheaper than renting a monthly storage unit.