Big Selig office project to bring change to Ballard's busiest intersection

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Martin Selig Real Estate is proposing to build this office project at the main crossroads of Ballard. The Seattle company is the latest office developer to show interest in the neighborhood, where large office projects are rare.

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Marc Stiles

Staff Writer- Puget Sound Business Journal

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Seattle office development company Martin Selig Real Estate is on a roll, and it's not just downtown that could see the effects. Ballard is in line for two big Selig projects, too.

Selig is proposing a five-story office building at the northeast corner of the main crossroads of Ballard: 15th Avenue Northwest and Northwest Market Street. The project will have a gross square footage of around 204,000 square feet. Also in the works is a two-building project at 907 N.W. Ballard Way, a block north of Fred Meyer, though Martin Selig said that project is not as far along and would require a rezone.

Known for his high-profile projects, including Seattle's tallest tower, the 76-story Columbia Center, which was built in the 1980s, Selig has been in the news recently. He is proposing a 36-story office/apartment tower in the Belltown area of downtown and a six-story office building on a half block in Lower Queen Anne. In addition, he is moving ahead with a 100-unit luxury apartment tower by Olympic Sculpture Park on Seattle's waterfront.

But Ballard? It's known as a hot development market for apartments, but not office space. This is changing, albeit slowly. Thirteen years ago an office building went up at 1455 N.W. Leary Way, and this spring C.D. Stimson Co. announced plans for a 500,000-square-foot office campus on the Lake Washington Ship Canal.

Now comes Selig with two projects whose gross square footage will total 436,000 square feet.

"There's a market there," Selig said Tuesday. "There is no office space out there."

According to commercial real estate company JLL, only 1.5 percent of the office space in the Ballard/University District submarket is available for lease.

Marc Stiles covers commercial real estate and government for the Puget Sound Business Journal.