How much parking new buildings must have
Next with the City Council · Before 27 January 2027
The city lists it as “Recommended Parking Reform Land Use Code Amendment implementing Senate Bills 6015 (2024) and 5184 (2025)”
Why it matters
State laws passed in 2024 and 2025 limit how much parking a city can require, and Bellevue has to bring its code in line by 27 January 2027. On 20 October four of the seven councilmembers favoured dropping the minimum for visitors' parking at apartments, and four favoured requiring no parking for homes within a quarter mile of bus rapid transit stops, rather than half a mile. source
Where it stands
- 13 January 2026Council starts the code amendment sourceDone
- 22 July 2026Commission public hearing and recommendation sourceDone
- 8 September 2026First Council study session sourceDone
- 20 October 2026Second study session. Four of seven favour dropping visitor parking minimums; all seven vote to send the ordinance to the consent calendar sourceDone
- TodaySunday 8 November
- Before 27 January 2027Council adopts the ordinance on the consent calendar sourceNext
What we’ve said and written
What this site has published on it
- Bellevue's parking lots cover about 5 to 6% of the city Measured lot by lot from 2023 aerial photographs, Bellevue's surface parking lots cover about 1,090 to 1,310 acres, roughly 5 to 6% of its land, as the Council writes the rules for how much parking new buildings must provide.
Next step and how to weigh in
Date not set · City Council
Council adopts the ordinance on the consent calendar.
How to comment
The date is not set yet. Email [email protected] at any time; it reaches every councilmember and stays on file for the meeting. Whatever you send becomes a public record.
How this was checked
Meetings and agenda items come from Bellevue’s Legistar meeting calendar, read by plat’s agenda watcher, which keeps items on housing, land use, parking and streets and leaves out the rest. It last read the city’s calendar on Sunday 8 November. Agenda headings and the city’s glossary of agenda terms are left out. An item is matched to a published story only where the watcher’s fixed topic list says the story speaks to it.
Each decision’s stages come from the city’s project pages, staff memos and minutes, linked beside each one. A date the city expects but has not fixed is marked expected. Quotes are copied from the city’s PDFs and checked word for word against the page they cite on every build; minutes marked draft are not yet approved.
Who wrote in counts the letters on the item in the meeting packet. Organisations, firms and property owners are named with what they asked for. Residents who wrote are counted, with what they wrote about, and not named.
Decided items come from the actions the city records on each agenda item. A decision this page followed stays under Decided for good; an agenda item it only linked a story to stays 30 days.
Our comments are quoted from the text that was sent. Whether one was taken up is filled in from the meeting record after the decision.
Sources: Planning Commission page, read 25 October; City Council page, read 25 October; Council oral communications page, read 20 October; Budget public involvement page, read 24 October; Parking reform project page, read 29 October; Staff memo for the 20 October study session, read 20 October; Draft minutes of 20 October, on the 3 November consent calendar, read 29 October.