Big plans for Mountlake Terrace

Michelle Robles is nostalgic for the days of her childhood, back in the 1960s, when Summers Plaza Drug store perhaps symbolized the small-town ambience of Mountlake Terrace.

She remembers when the price of a candy bar doubled, from a nickel to a dime. If a child bought two Hershey bars, the 20-cent total would trigger the sales-tax threshold, adding a penny to the cost.

"Mr. Summers would ring us up one [bar] at a time so we didn't have to pay the penny," said Robles, now a Mountlake Terrace councilwoman.

Today the pharmacy is gone. So is the Ben Franklin five-and-dime store and Wilner's department store, where Robles bought gloves for her First Communion.

"Pretty much anything you needed, you could go downtown and get. You didn't have to leave the city," Robles said.

Downtown's troubles began in 1979, when the Alderwood shopping mall opened three miles away. First customers, and then businesses, vanished from the local scene.

In 1990, arsons destroyed two small shopping centers at the heart of downtown, the intersection of 56th Avenue West and 232nd Street Southwest. Damage was estimated at nearly $3 million; local resident James Schmitt later confessed to setting a string of 13 fires, including those two.

West Plaza, built in the early 1960s and home to four businesses, reopened 20 months later. But East Plaza, which had housed seven businesses, was ripped down and replaced with a large gymnastics center.

"It took the pizzazz out of the downtown corridor," Councilman John Zambrano said.

A couple of years after the fires, then-Police Chief John Turner grimly predicted that the city's "victimization" would live long after Schmitt's sentencing. He was right.

The City Council has commissioned consultant reports over the years, studying ways to revitalize the commercial district and city center. Each report ended up on a shelf.

Now, the City Council is again taking up the cause. Council members say, rather adamantly, that times have changed, the council has changed, and they really will follow through and make something happen.

"This council, I get a sense of unity that we are all going to stand, hand in hand, and get the job done this time," said Councilwoman Angela Amundson, who has clashed with peers over city policies.

Zambrano, among her past foes, struck a similar tone. He also stressed that Mountlake Terrace has a new city manager, John Caulfield, in whom the council has great faith.

"The thing about Mountlake Terrace is we are an unpolished diamond. And we finally have a person who has the energy and the vision to help us polish it," Zambrano said.

On Monday, the council formally declared that revitalizing the city center is a priority and unanimously approved a set of interim design standards. For instance, new developments must be built close to the street with wide sidewalks, lots of windows, awnings and interesting architectural details.

Next, the council faces bigger questions, including an existing 35-foot height cap and possible development incentives.

Mountlake Terrace is a relatively young city — it celebrated its 50th birthday in 2004. Like its more bustling neighbor, Lynnwood, it grew up during the age of the automobile, with a focus on strip malls and parking lots.

"This is the city center, and look what we've got: parking lot, parking lot, parking lot, parking lot," said Amundson, standing in the sprawling parking area in front of West Plaza, pointing at the intersection's corner properties.

A Shell station sits on the West Plaza corner, across 232nd from the city's only downtown grocery, Roger's Market Place. The corners on the east side of 56th are occupied by the new gymnastics business — fronted with parking — and the Young Denture Clinic, which occupies a tiny converted cinder-block house.

Though it never had a traditional downtown of streets lined with shops and busy sidewalks, Mountlake Terrace always had a homespun feeling.

And it still does. Offered a chance to walk a reporter through downtown, with just an hour's notice, Mayor Jerry Smith showed up with three local businessmen in tow to help reminisce.

Smith, who operated Terrace Auto Parts out of an East Plaza storefront from 1972 to 1989, can see the former strip mall in his mind's eye. He shared it with a tavern, beauty shop, Radio Shack store, hardware store, computer-services business and dry cleaner, he said.

Manos Flemetakis, the owner of Time-Out Burgers, is considering buying West Plaza and is watching the council to see whether the investment makes sense. "The only thing I want to know is, what is the plan?" Flemetakis said.

Like many business owners, he's frustrated at how churches and nonprofits have proliferated downtown, filling what could be prime commercial spaces. A former Albertsons grocery, for instance, now is Calvary Fellowship.

The council responded last week by enacting a moratorium on non-mixed-use developments in the city center.

Caulfield, the new city manager, predicted that "significant change" could happen within five years.

Diane Brooks: 425-745-7802 or dbrooks@seattletimes.com