 | Commercial real-estate
prices that average about half Seattle's. Prime downtown
commercial space leases for as low as $19 per square foot, compared
to about $45 in Seattle; and sells for $50-$60 per square foot in
Tacoma. On the residential side, the average single-family
home price in Seattle was $288,000 in September, up from $223,000 a
year ago. In Tacoma, the price this fall averages $206,000 -
up from $144,000 a year ago. |
| The nation's largest
city-owned high-speed telecommunications system, Tacoma Power's
Click! Network, a $100 million investment conceived in 1992 that
went on line in 1998. It offers five applications: cable
television, broad-band services for business, Internet-over-cable
modem, individual monitoring of electrical usage and an
institutional network for city government and schools. Tacoma
bought its electrical utility back in 1893 - the year the Great
Northern Railroad reached Seattle and trumped Tacoma's 1887 coup as
northern terminus of the Northern Pacific. |
| A book of city building
codes that has been slimmed down from 70 pages to seven, and a city
pledge that if building permits aren't processed within 90 days -
and city officials hold developers' hands throughout the process -
you get your money back. |
| Manageable scale, with a
population of 187,000 for the city proper and 700,000 for the
greater metropolitan area. Seattle's population now is 540,000
- 3.2 million for the metro area. |
| Just 30 miles from Seattle,
15 miles from Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. |
| An inclusive and
enthusiastic local business community, with networking groups
including the Chamber of Commerce, the Tacoma Technology Consortium,
the Tacoma Network and its own chapter of the Washington Software
Alliance. |
| View of Commencement Bay and
other reaches of Puget Sound, as well as the Olympic and Cascade
mountains and looming Mount Rainier, known to the region's Puyallup
and Nisqually tribes as "Tahoma," roughly translated as
"the source of water and life." |
| Enhancing the downtown core
are the new Washington State History Museum and a revamped Union
Station - its arched windows decorated with Chihuly glass - that now
serves as the federal courthouse. Still to come are a $58
million Museum of Glass with a 500-foot, $16 million "Chihuly
Bridge of Glass" linking the site on the Thea Foss Waterway
with downtown (due for completion in 2002) and a new $25 million
home of the Tacoma Art Museum (2003.) Plans also are in the
works for the city's Asia-Pacific Cultural Center and the Harold E.
LeMay Museum, which will house 2,400 vintage cars collected by a
late local businessman. |
| The growing downtown
satellite campus of the University of Washington, and two venerable
private colleges, the University of Puget Sound and Pacific
Lutheran University . |
| A new downtown convention
center, a public-private project scheduled for completion in 2002.
|
| Tacoma Link's planned
light-rail system, which will offer free downtown service by
2002. |
| Thea Foss Waterway
development, which began with the city's $6.8 million acquisition of
27 acres of downtown waterfront in 1991. Area waters qualify
for Superfund clean-up. An $88 million facelift - a
1.5-mile city-built esplanade with private retail, housing,
commercial and hotel development on city land that now totals 42
acres - is scheduled for completion in 2002. |
