Appendix: Glossary Amended Ord. 4896

Accessory Dwelling Unit: A second housing unit located on a residential unit lot. Typically, an accessory dwelling is a separate apartment with kitchen, sleeping, and bathroom facilities created within an existing residential unit or on land containing a residential unit. May be referred to as “mother-in-law” or “accessory apartment.”

Adequate Capital Facilities: Facilities which have the capacity to serve development without decreasing levels of service below locally established minimums.

ARCH (A Regional Coalition for Housing): An inter-local program formed by cities east of Lake Washington. ARCH staff advises member cities on housing issues. The ARCH trust fund helps create affordable housing for low- and very low-income households and people who have special needs or are homeless. ARCH administers Kirkland’s affordable housing programs.

Arterial (Minor): A roadway providing movement along a significant traffic corridor. Minor arterials interconnect and augment the principal arterial system. Generally, traffic on minor arterials serves the immediate local community for short to moderate trip lengths. Traffic volumes are high, although usually not as great as those associated with principal arterials. Traffic speeds for minor arterials are similar to that of principal arterials.

Arterial (Principal): A roadway providing movement along a major traffic corridor. Principal arterials serve major urban and activity centers and access points to the freeway. They also serve as high traffic volume corridors that carry local cross-town trips and regional pass-through trips. Traffic volumes are higher, and trip lengths are longer than those usually associated with minor arterials.

Available Capital Facilities: Facilities or services that are in place or a financial commitment that is in place to provide the facilities or services within a specified time. In the case of transportation, the specified time is six years.

Best Available Science Standard: Using science as the foundation for credible decision-making about the risks that certain actions have on human health and ecosystems.

Buffer (General): Any structural, earth, or vegetative form located along a boundary for the purpose of minimizing impacts. Buffers may include, but are not limited to, vegetative berms, high shrubs, dense stands of trees, trellises, or fences.

Buffer (Sensitive Areas): The area immediately adjacent to wetlands and streams that protects these sensitive areas and provides essential habitat elements for fish and/or wildlife.

Built Green: A nonprofit program of the Master Builders Association of King and Snohomish Counties, developed in partnership with King County, Snohomish County and other agencies in Washington State to set health and environmental quality standards for residential development. The program provides consumers with easy-to-understand rating systems that quantify environmentally friendly building practices for remodeling and new construction. The highest level of certification is Emerald Star followed by 5 Star, 4 Star and 3 Star. All levels are verified by a third party.

Business Districts: A type of commercial area that serves the subregional market, as well as local community. These districts vary in uses and intensities and may include office, retail, restaurant, entertainment, housing, hotel, and service businesses.

Business Park: A place of business activity that contains office, light-manufacturing, warehousing and/or high technology uses.

Capital Facility: A public facility that is classified as a fixed asset, has an estimated cost of $50,000 or more (except land), and typically has a useful life of 10 years or more (except certain types of equipment).

Capital Improvement: Physical assets constructed or purchased to provide, improve, or replace a public facility and which are large in scale and high in cost. The cost of a capital improvement is generally nonrecurring and may require multiyear financing.

Capital Improvement Program (CIP): The City plan that addresses construction, repair, maintenance and acquisition of major capital facilities and equipment. The document provides a tool for public comment and City review regarding projects planned for the next six years, including transportation, surface water management utility, water and sewer utility, park, public safety, general government and equipment purchases.

Carbon Neutrality: Carbon neutral or net zero carbon emissions refer to achieving net zero carbon emissions by “balancing” a certain measured amount of carbon released with an amount of carbon offsets. This assumes that changes in land use can result in taking CO2 out of the carbon cycle. Buying enough carbon credits to make up the difference is one way to achieve carbon neutrality.

Clustered Development: The grouping or attaching of buildings in such a manner as to achieve larger aggregations of open space than would normally be possible from lot-by-lot development at a given density. Clustered development may involve detached single-family residences and common-wall methods of construction, as opposed to the more traditional pattern of detached dwelling units with minimum lot sizes and setback requirements.

Collector: A roadway capable of handling relatively moderate traffic volume, moderate trip length, and moderate operating speed. Collector roads collect and distribute traffic between local roads or arterial roads.

Commercial: Includes retail, office services, entertainment, recreation and/or light industrial uses, depending on the location. Retail uses are those which provide goods and/or services directly to the consumer, including service uses not usually allowed within an office use. Commercial areas can range in size and function from small residential markets serving the immediate neighborhood to regional draws, such as Totem Lake or Downtown.

Community Facility: A use which serves the public and is generally of a public service, noncommercial nature. Such use may include: food banks, clothing banks, and other nonprofit social service organizations; nonprofit recreational facilities; and nonprofit performing arts centers.

Comprehensive Plan: A generalized coordinated policy statement of the governing body of a county or city that is adopted pursuant to the Growth Management Act.

Concurrency: Adequate capital facilities are available when the impacts of development occur. This definition includes the two concepts of “adequate capital facilities” and “available capital facilities” as defined above.

Congregate Care: Long-term housing in a group setting that includes independent living and sleeping accommodations in conjunction with shared dining and recreational facilities.

Consistency: That no feature of a plan or regulation is incompatible with any other feature of a plan or regulation. Consistency is indicative of a capacity for orderly integration or operation with other elements in a system.

Coordination: Consultation and cooperation among jurisdictions.

Corridor District (Mixed Use): Arterial districts are linear districts arranged along an arterial with commercial uses that benefit from automobile and transit volumes. Enhanced pedestrian orientation and integration residential uses are critical to integrating these corridors with adjoining land uses.

Critical Areas: As defined in the Washington State Growth Management Act, RCW 36.70A.030(5), the following areas and ecosystems: “(a) wetlands, streams, and minor lakes; (b) areas with a critical recharging effect on aquifers used for potable water; (c) fish and wildlife habitat conservation areas; (d) frequently flooded areas; and (e) geologically hazardous areas.”

Cross Kirkland Corridor Overlay: An overlay following the alignment of the Cross Kirkland and Eastside Rail Corridor through adjoining commercial areas. The Overlay varies in uses but is defined by its orientation to transportation and recreational amenities of the Corridor. A specific width for the overlay is not assigned. Rather, its geography is defined by potential relationships of developments and uses to the Corridor – both current and envisioned. Innovative land uses and development types, including the potential for transit oriented development, are critical to fully leveraging public and private investment in the Corridor.

DECLARE Label: Similar to a nutritional label, the DECLARE label program lists the ingredients of building materials so that architects, builders and consumers can select ecologically sound products without needing to do research. The label indicates where the product came from, what it is made of and where it goes at the end of its life. The list ensures that the materials are not Red List materials, those that are harmful to humans. Avoiding Red List building materials is part of the Living Building Challenge program.

Density: A measure of the intensity of development, generally expressed in terms of dwelling units per acre. It can also be expressed in terms of population density (i.e., people per acre).

Density Bonus: A greater number of units than would otherwise be permitted on a site under existing zoning, in exchange for developing in a more desirable way.

Development: The construction or exterior alteration of one or more structures, or a change in the type of intensity of land use, or the dividing of land, or any project of a permanent or temporary nature requiring land use modification.

Development Regulations: Any controls placed on development or land use activities by a county or city, including, but not limited to, zoning ordinances, subdivision ordinances, rezoning, building codes, sign regulations, binding site plan ordinances, or any other regulations controlling the development of land.

Domestic Water System: Any system providing a supply of potable water for the intended use of a development which is deemed adequate pursuant to RCW 19.27.097.

Downtown Kirkland (Mixed Use): Downtown Kirkland is an area of moderate commercial and residential concentration that functions as a focal point for the community and is served by a transit center.

Dwelling Unit: One or more rooms or structures providing complete, independent living facilities for one family, including permanent provisions for living, sleeping, cooking and sanitation.

    Attached dwelling unit: A unit that is physically connected by means of one or more common walls to another unit; that has its own exterior entrance; and that is not stacked above or below another unit.

    Detached dwelling unit: A unit that is physically separated by setbacks from other dwelling units.

    Stacked dwelling unit: A unit that is physically connected by means of stacking above or below another unit. Stacked units may have a common exterior entrance or each unit may have its own exterior entrance.

Eastside Transportation Partnership (ETP): An organization of elected and appointed officials from Eastside jurisdictions and affected agencies which addresses transportation issues, coordination and planning.

Endangered Species Act: The Endangered Species Act (ESA) of 1973 is a federal legislation for both domestic and international conservation. The act aims to provide a framework to conserve and protect endangered and threatened species and their habitats. The Endangered Species Act is administered primarily by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) of the Department of the Interior. The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) of the federal Department of Commerce has responsibility for threatened and endangered marine species.

Environmental Impact Statement: A detailed statement regarding proposed actions having a significant effect on the quality of the environment (see RCW 43.21C.030(c) for further definition).

Fee-in-Lieu: The payment of money in place of dedicating land and/or easements as required by adopted regulations.

Financial Commitment: Identified sources of public or private funds or combinations thereof which will be sufficient to finance capital facilities necessary to support development and the assurance that such funds will be timely put to that end.

Geologically Hazardous Areas: Landslide hazard areas, erosion hazard areas, and seismic hazard areas.

Goal: The long-term end toward which programs or activities are ultimately directed.

Green Business Program: A program created for Kirkland businesses that encourages sustainable practices, materials use and product stewardship.

Greenbelt/Urban Separator: Areas planned for permanent low density residential within the Urban Growth Area that protect adjacent resource land, environmentally sensitive areas, or rural areas, and create open space corridors within and between the urban areas which provide environmental, visual, recreational and wildlife benefits. The King County Countywide Planning Policies have designated the RSA 1 zone as an urban separator.

Growth and Transportation Efficiency Center (GTEC): A defined area of dense mixed development with major employers, small businesses and residential units within an established urban growth area. The Totem Lake Urban Center is a GTEC. The GTEC designation goes beyond the previously defined Commute Trip Reduction (CTR) boundaries of employers with more than 100 full-time workers to include all types and sizes of businesses and institutions in an effort to reduce single occupancy vehicle (SOV) work trips. The designation also makes a connection between land use and transportation, and rewards jurisdictions that design their urban form to reduce dependence on the automobile. The State GTEC program provides resources for jurisdictions to fund alternative commute efforts in areas of high concentrations of employment and population. See RCW 70.94.528.

Growth Management: A method to guide development in order to minimize adverse environmental and fiscal impacts and maximize the health, safety, and welfare benefits to the residents of the community.

Guiding Principles: The inspirational principles for guiding growth and development in the community over the 20-year horizon of the Comprehensive Plan. The guiding principles are based on the community aspirations and values described in the Vision Statement.

High Capacity Transit (HCT): Transit that carries a larger volume of passengers using larger vehicles and/or more frequent service than a standard transit system. HCT can operate on exclusive rights-of-way, such as a rail track or dedicated busyway, or on existing streets with mixed traffic. High capacity transit provides faster, more convenient and more reliable service for a larger number of passengers. Two common examples are bus rapid transit and light rail transit.

High-Density Residential: Detached, attached, or stacked residential uses at 15 or more dwelling units per acre.

Household: A household includes all the persons who occupy a dwelling unit. The occupants may be a single family, one person living alone, two or more families living together, or any other group of related or unrelated persons who share living arrangements.

HOV: High-occupancy vehicles, including buses, vanpools, and vehicles with two or more occupants. In some cases, HOV may be defined to include vehicles with three or more occupants.

HOV Lanes: Roadway lanes on freeways or arterials designated for use by HOVs and motorcycles, and which may facilitate reduced travel time compared with general purpose lanes. These lanes may permit turning movements by non-HOVs in certain circumstances (on arterials with multiple turning opportunities) and may be designated to be in effect during certain hours (such as peak commuting periods).

Impact Fee: A fee levied by a local government on new development so that the new development pays its proportionate share of the cost of new or expanded public facilities required to service that development.

Impervious Surface: A surface which prevents (or severely restricts) the passage of water through it, such as asphalt, concrete, roofs, and other similar materials or surfaces.

Industrial/Light Industrial: Uses such as manufacturing, assembly, processing, wholesaling, warehousing, distribution of products and high technology. Light industrial areas may also include office and limited retail uses.

Infill Development: Development of vacant or undeveloped land in already developed neighborhoods. Often includes smaller lot size and/or smaller unit sizes.

Infrastructure: Manmade structures that serve the common needs of the population, such as: sewage disposal systems, potable water systems, solid waste disposal sites or retention areas, stormwater systems, utilities, bridges, and roadways.

Institutions: Schools, churches, colleges, hospitals, governmental facilities, and public utilities for which special zoning districts are appropriate.

Intelligent Transportation System (ITS): Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) consist of the application of a variety of tools and advanced technologies to improve the operation of almost any transportation mode. A key feature of ITS is the reliance on advanced communication technology, such as fiber optic and/or wireless networks, to connect various field devices to a central management location. Examples of application are traffic signal operations, knowledge of traffic conditions, maintenance, lane configurations, transit speed and reliability, and parking management.

Intensity: A measure of land use activity based on density, use, mass, size, and/or impact.

Interlocal agreement (ILA): An agreement that enables local governments to cooperate with each other on a basis of mutual advantage to provide services and facilities in a manner that will accord the best with geographic, economic, population and other factors, influencing the needs and development of local communities. See RCW 39.34.010.

International Living Future Institute (ILFI): The institute administers the Living Building Challenge, the most rigorous and ambitious performance standard for the built environment. ILFI founded the Living Communities Challenge and is the parent organization for Cascadia Green Building Council, a chapter of both the United States and Canada Green Building Councils that serves Alaska, British Columbia, Washington and Oregon. ILFI offers green building and infrastructure solutions that move across scales (from single room renovations to neighborhoods and whole cities). They also offer global strategies for lasting sustainability, partnering with local communities to create grounded and relevant solutions.

JUST Label: The International Living Future Institute’s voluntary disclosure program and tool for all types and sizes of organizations. The program provides an innovative transparency platform for organizations to reveal much about their operations, including how they treat their employees, and where they make financial and community investments. Like the Living Building Challenge’s DECLARE label program, the JUST label acts as a “nutrition label” for socially just and equitable organizations. This approach requires reporting on a range of organization and employee-related indicators. Each of the indicator metrics asks for simple yet specific and measurable accountabilities in order for the organization to be recognized at a One, Two, or Three Star Level, which is then summarized on a label.

King Conservation District: A natural resources assistance agency authorized by Washington State and guided by the Washington State Conservation Commission to promote the sustainable use of natural resources. The district promotes conservation through demonstration projects, education events, technical assistance and providing funding. The King CD has no regulatory or enforcement authority. A five member Board of Supervisors is responsible for all district programs and activities.

King County Sustainability Scorecard: A scorecard developed by the O’Brien Company for King County to use for projects that are not eligible to participate in a third party verified sustainability program. The aim of the checklist is to provide a measurement of the environmental sustainability of a project. A stand-alone parking garage is an example of a project type that could use this checklist.

LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design): A green building certification program that recognizes best-in-class building strategies and practices. To receive LEED certification, building projects satisfy prerequisites and earn points to achieve different levels of certification. The highest level of certification is Platinum, then Gold, Silver, Bronze certified.

LEED for Homes: A certification program credited by the United States Green Building Council to measure the environmental performance of homes versus commercial projects. The highest levels of certification include Platinum, Gold, Silver, and Bronze certified.

Level of Service (LOS): An indicator of the quantity or quality of service provided by, or proposed to be provided by, a facility or service based on and related to the operational characteristics of the facility. LOS standards are the City’s adopted minimum acceptable level of service.

Light Industry/Office Area: A light industry/office area serves both the local and regional markets and may include office, light manufacturing, high technology, wholesale trade, and limited retail. It does not include residential uses.

Living Building Challenge (LBC): As the most rigorous performance standard for the built environment, the LBC calls for the creation of building projects at all scales that operate as cleanly, beautifully and efficiently as nature’s architecture. To be certified under the Challenge, projects must meet a series of ambitious performance requirements over a minimum of 12 months of continuous occupancy. The Living Building Challenge is comprised of seven performance areas, or “Petals”: Place, Water, Energy, Health and Happiness, Materials, Equity and Beauty. Petals are subdivided into a total of 20 Imperatives, each of which focuses on a specific sphere of influence.

Living Communities Challenge (LCC): A certification program that has been designed to measure the environmental performance of an entire community. The scale of what constitutes a community could be as small as a neighborhood college campus all the way up to an entire city.

Local Improvement District: A statutory process by which property owners within a specified area are mutually assessed for neighborhood improvements that benefit the properties in the area.

Local Road: A roadway serving relatively low traffic volume, short average trip length, or minimal through-traffic movements.

Low-Density Residential: Detached single-family residential uses with a density of one to nine dwelling units per acre, or attached single-family residential uses with a density of one to seven dwelling units per acre.

Low Impact Development: Various techniques to minimize impacts on the natural environment by reducing water runoff with less impervious surfaces and more landscaping and by absorbing water close to the source with permeable materials or retaining mature vegetation.

Low-Income Household: One or more adults and their dependents whose income does not exceed 50 percent of the median household income for King County, adjusted for household size, as published by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Medium-Density Residential: Detached single-family residential uses with a density of 10 to 14 dwelling units per acre, or attached or stacked residential uses with a density of eight to 14 dwelling units per acre.

Mixed Use Business Center: Mixed Use Business Centers are employment centers that incorporate a mix of uses including office, retail, restaurant, and hotels. Residential uses are encouraged to strengthen these areas as active 24-hour communities.

Mode Split: The statistical breakdown of travel by alternate modes, usually expressed as a percentage of travel by single-occupant automobile, carpool, transit, etc. Mode-split goals are used to evaluate the performance of transportation systems.

Moderate-Income Household: One or more adults and their dependents whose income exceeds 50 percent, but does not exceed 80 percent, of the median household income for King County, adjusted for household size, as published by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Multifamily: Residential use of land where a structure provides shelter for two or more households at medium to high densities.

Multimodal Transportation: Means of transport by multiple ways or methods, including automobiles, public transit, walking, bicycling, and ride-sharing.

Neighborhood Center (Mixed Use): A Neighborhood Center is an area that serves the needs for goods and services of the local community as well as the subregional market. These districts vary in uses and intensities and may include office, retail, restaurants, housing, hotels and service businesses. These centers provide facilities to serve the everyday needs of the neighborhood and grocery stores are considered a high-priority anchor for these areas. Residential uses are encouraged where they support and do not displace the commercial viability of these areas.

Net Zero Carbon: Used interchangeably with Carbon Neutral; see definition for Carbon Neutrality.

NPDES: The National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit program controls water pollution by regulating point sources that discharge pollutants into waters of the United States. Point sources are discrete conveyances, such as pipes or manmade ditches. Individual homes that are connected to a municipal system, use a septic system, or do not have a surface discharge do not need an NPDES permit; however, industrial, municipal, and other facilities must obtain permits if their discharges go directly to surface waters. In Washington State, the Department of Ecology administers the permit.

Office: Uses providing services other than production, distribution, or sale or repair of goods or commodities. Depending on the location, these uses may range from single-story, residential-scale buildings to multistory buildings and/or multibuilding complexes.

Office/Multifamily: Areas where both office and medium- or high-density residential uses are allowed. Uses may be allowed individually or within the same building.

Parking Management Strategy: Strategies that seek to either reduce the need for parking spaces or use parking spaces more efficiently. Strategies include pricing and time limits on parking, employee and residential parking permits, shared parking for multiple uses, establishing parking maximums in Urban Centers, use of Intelligent Transportation Systems, parking cash-out to encourage use of non-driving modes, transit subsidies, and preferential parking for rideshare.

Parks/Open Space: Natural or landscaped areas used for active or passive recreational needs, to protect environmentally sensitive areas, and/or to preserve natural landforms and scenic views.

Planning Period: The 20-year period following the adoption of a comprehensive plan or such longer period as may have been selected as the initial planning horizon by the planning jurisdiction.

Policy: Principle that reflects a method or course of action to achieve an identified goal.

Primary Jobs: Jobs which produce goods and services that bring income into the community.

Public Facilities: Include streets, roads, highways, sidewalks, street and road lighting systems, traffic signals, domestic water systems, storm and sanitary sewer systems, parks and recreational facilities, fire stations, libraries, and schools. These physical structures are owned or operated by a public entity that provides or supports a public service.

Public Services: Include fire protection and suppression, emergency medical services, law enforcement, public health, library, solid waste, education, recreation, environmental protection, and other governmental services.

Puget Sound Regional Council (PSRC): A regional planning organization that develops policies and makes decisions about regional transportation planning, economic development and growth management throughout the four counties of King, Kitsap, Pierce and Snohomish. It is a forum for cities, towns, counties, transit agencies, port district, Native American tribes, and state agencies to address regional issues. PSRC reviews local comprehensive plans for consistency with its policies and certifies the transportation plans that make local jurisdictions eligible for state and federal funding.

Queue Bypass Lane: A lane provided for the movement of certain vehicles, typically transit or HOVs, which allows those vehicles to bypass queues at a traffic signal.

Red List Materials: A list of materials that should be phased out of production due to health concerns. Under the Living Building Challenge program, a building project may not contain any Red List materials or chemicals. There is a small component exception for some complex products and temporary exceptions for numerous Red List items due to current limitations in the materials economy.

Regional Code Collaborative: A collaboration of cities in the greater King County area that advocate for more progressive Building, Energy, and Plumbing Codes with the goal of creating high performance buildings that use less energy and water, are less resource intensive and have little to no harmful toxins.

Regional Facilities: Public capital facilities of a regional or Statewide nature, such as wastewater treatment plants, airports, or in-patient treatment facilities. These facilities may be privately owned but regulated by public entities.

Regional Transportation Plan: The transportation plan for the regionally designated transportation system which is produced by the Regional Transportation Planning Organization (RTPO).

Regional Transportation Planning Organization (RTPO): The voluntary organization conforming to RCW 47.80.020, consisting of local governments within a region containing one or more counties which have common transportation interests, such as the Puget Sound Regional Council.

Residential Market (Mixed Use): A Residential Market consists of individual stores or mixed-use buildings/centers that are pedestrian-oriented and serve the local neighborhood. Residential scale and design are critical to integrate these uses into the surrounding residential area. Residential uses may be located above or behind commercial uses in the center at densities specified in the Comprehensive Plan.

Right-of-Way: Land in which the State, a county, or a municipality owns the fee simple title or has an easement dedicated or required for a transportation or utility use.

Runoff: The overland or subsurface flow of water.

Sanitary Sewer Systems: All facilities, including approved on-site disposal facilities, used in the collection, transmission, storage, treatment, or discharge of any waterborne waste, whether domestic in origin or a combination of domestic, commercial, or industrial waste.

Sensitive Areas: Wetlands, streams, lakes, excluding Lake Washington, and frequently flooded areas.

Shorelines: Lake Washington, its underlying land, associated wetlands, those lands extending landward 200 feet from its OHWM and critical area buffers within 200 feet of the OHWM. These are lands within state shorelines jurisdiction, pursuant to RCW 90.58.030.

Single-Family: Residential use of land where dwelling units provide shelter and living accommodations for one family.

Single-Room Occupancy (SRO) Hotels: Typically a small room with a sink and a closet. Occupant shares bathroom, shower, and kitchen with other rooms.

Sustainable Building Practices: Various techniques to reduce construction and maintenance costs and to benefit the environment, such as using recycled building materials, reusing water and installing alternative heating and cooling systems.

Sustainable Development: A process for meeting human development goals while maintaining the ability of natural systems to continue to provide the natural resources and ecosystem services upon which the economy and society depend. Sustainable development is the organizing principle for sustaining finite resources necessary to provide for the needs of future generations. It is a process that envisions a desirable future state for human societies in which living conditions and resource use continue to meet human needs without undermining the “integrity, stability and beauty” of the natural biotic system.

Sustainability: The concept of meeting our present needs while ensuring that future generations have the ability to meet their needs. This can be achieved by maintaining the built and natural environment, adapting to new situations, and considering long term and wide ranging impacts of actions.

Ten Minute Neighborhood Analysis: A mapping and analysis tool to help measure progress toward the City’s goal of creating a compact, efficient, and sustainable land use pattern. A 10-minute neighborhood (10 minutes represents a typical one-half mile walk) is a community where residents can walk short distances from home to destinations that meet their daily needs. These walkable communities are comprised of the following two important characteristics that are used to “score” the walkability of a given area:

•    Destinations: A walkable community needs places to which they can walk. Destinations may include places that meet commercial needs, recreational needs, or transportation needs.

•    Accessibility: The community needs to be able to conveniently get to those destinations.

Townhouse: Attached dwelling units (that is, having one or more walls in common) with each unit having its own exterior entrance.

Transfer of Development Rights (TDR): TDR is a program to conserve farm, forestry and open space land by transferring development rights to urban areas. Under the TDR program, landowners in “sending areas” (parcels from which development rights will be transferred) are paid a development value for their property, while retaining the resource uses (such as farming, open space, or forest). When the development rights are removed from the parcel, a conservation easement is placed on the land, permanently protecting it from development. This preserves the rural character and open space. Developers who purchase these rights or “credits” then receive bonuses, such as additional height, residential units or square footage, to use in “receiving areas” (sites to which development rights will be transferred) determined to be more suitable for growth. Consequently, a successful TDR program depends on the willingness of a developer to pay the market value to use them in a receiving area in addition to the development rights granted under the existing zoning.

Transit Oriented Development (TOD): A development of housing, commercial space, services and/or employment in close proximity to public transit.

Transportation Demand Management (TDM): Reduction or elimination of vehicle trips, through a variety of programs or strategies, such as carpool/vanpool, preferential parking, ride matching, flextime, working from home, transit flex passes, guaranteed ride home program, available showers and lockers at work and charging for parking.

Transportation Facilities: Includes capital facilities related to air, water, or land transportation.

Transportation System Management (TSM): Improvements that increase the capacity of the transportation network, but that do not include projects, such as adding additional lanes to streets. TSM strategies include, but are not limited to, signalization, channelization, and bus turnouts.

Urban Center (Mixed Use): An Urban Center is a regionally significant concentration of employment and housing, with direct service by high-capacity transit and a wide range of land uses, such as retail, recreational, public facilities, parks and open space. An Urban Center has a mix of uses and densities to efficiently support transit as part of the regional high-capacity transit system. An area must be designated by the King County Countywide Planning Policies to be an Urban Center.

Urban Growth: Refers to growth that makes intensive use of land for the location of buildings, structures, and impermeable surfaces to such a degree as to be incompatible with the primary use of such land for the production of food, other agricultural products, or fiber, or the extraction of mineral resources. When allowed to spread over wide areas, urban growth typically requires urban governmental services. “Characterized by urban growth” refers to land having urban growth located on it, or to land located in relationship to an area with urban growth on it as to be appropriate for urban growth.

Urban Separators: Permanent low-density lands that protect environmentally sensitive areas and create open space corridors within and between urban areas.

Utilities: Facilities serving the public by means of a network of wires or pipes, and structures ancillary thereto. Included are systems for the conveyance of natural gas, electricity, telecommunications services, water, surface water and the disposal of sewage.

Vision Statement: A summary of the desired character and characteristics of the community 20 years in the future and that provides the ultimate goal for community planning and development.

Visioning: A process of citizen involvement to determine values and ideals for the future of a community and to transform those values and ideals into manageable and feasible community goals.

Wayfinding: Coordinated and planned signage and/or pavement markings that provide a directional guide for specific transportation routes.

Wetland: Those areas that are inundated or saturated by surface water or groundwater at a frequency and duration to support, and that under normal conditions do support, a prevalence of vegetation typically adapted for life in saturated soils conditions. Wetlands generally include swamps, marshes, bogs, and similar areas. Wetlands do not include those artificial wetlands intentionally created from nonwetland sites, including but not limited to irrigation and drainage ditches, grass-lined swales, canals, retention and/or detention facilities, wastewater treatment facilities, farm ponds, and landscape amenities, or those wetlands created after July 1, 1990, that were unintentionally created as a result of the construction of a road, street, or highway. However, wetlands do include those artificial wetlands intentionally created from nonwetland sites as mitigation for the conversion of wetlands.

Zoning: The demarcation of an area by ordinance (text and map) into zones and the establishment of regulations to govern the uses within those zones and the location, bulk, height, shape, and coverage of structures within each zone.