Renton, located at the southern end of Lake Washington and near Sea-Tac Airport, has grown from a small, compact town between the Cedar and Green River Valleys to a mid-sized suburban city, with stable residential neighborhoods, a strong industrial base, and a growing commercial/office sector.

Renton's downtown spent the early 1990s focused on planning and developing a vision, making the city ripe for development when the market hit its peak. Part of this was having bold leaders, both elected and staff. The key accomplishments downtown include:

• Metropolitan Place mixed use development, including the public plaza, and shared parking garage.
• Numerous mixed use housing developments.
• Transit center.
• Performing Arts Center.
• New restaurants and business.

used in the employee evaluation process. The plan contains a vision and mission statement, and five goals that are shown in annotated form. By defining the goals in a concise manner, and using them in employee evaluations, the city is able to create clear expectations and get all its staff working to implement the vision.

Partnership and public investments are central components in the Metropolitan Place story. Deciding car dealerships were no longer the best use of downtown land, the city offered land with good freeway visibility to the car dealers who had long anchored downtown. To make the land swap work, the city discounted the cost of the necessary street vacations from the price of the land. The city then selected a preferred developer to build the mixed-use buildings. The developer had requirements of its own, including the city building a public plaza and securing a multi-story parking garage. These actions leveraged the transit center investment, creating a dense, mixed-use neighborhood directly within the existing downtown. This innovative public-public-private partnership, complemented and supported by a number of other private city-marketing initiatives, has set a standard that subsequent developments in Renton are now seeking to emulate.

At about 550 acres, the center accounts for almost 5% of the city's land, however almost half of the center is the Boeing plant. Because population and housing growth currently can't be sited on the Boeing land, the data describing what percentage of city growth was focused in the center does not fully show the true change in the area. For the center, the data shows the following:

• Around 5% of the city's population growth was focused in the center, with most of the growth in the 35-49 and the over 65 age groups.
• Around 4.5% of the city's housing growth was focused in the center. Almost all of the households added were renters, despite the fact that rents are now higher in the center than in the city as a whole.
• Around 26% of the city's employment growth was focused into the center; underscoring the presence of Boeing, almost two-thirds of the growth was in the manufacturing sector.

Interviewees in Renton shared a common belief that the city had followed a "can do" approach during the 1990s. Some offered that the downtown had been in a do-or-die situation, and bold actions were taken out of necessity. Most thought the lessons in Renton were about leadership and creativity. Interviewees stressed that the city had adopted a "business" model, speaking private sector language and using private sector goals. Long-time city staff referred to the change as "refreshing," suggesting that the results spoke for themselves as to the effect of the change.

As the center and city evolve, a number of challenges remain: continuing to position themselves to address changes at Boeing, participating in regional transportation planning, and using the same creative regulatory approach towards future development, such as in the South Renton Neighborhood Redevelopment Plan area.

For more information, visit the following regional growth center related sites:

• City of Renton
  • Economic Development, Neighborhoods, & Strategic Planning
  • City's Business Plan Goals
• Renton Community Marketing Campaign
• 2002 Regional Growth Centers Report, Renton Profile  [pdf]

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