The proposal covers roughly 100 acres - or about 60 blocks - stretching from Northwest Ninth Avenue to Interstate 405, north of Burnside Street. The City Council will evaluate the proposal on Dec. 13, following the Planning Commission's review next week, on Nov. 28. Benefiting most from the proposal would likely be Homer Williams, who owns several blocks in the area being examined. Williams' Hoyt Street Properties is planning some 3,000 units in the district.

Sources at City Hall say some of the impetus for the changes came when a developer planning a residential conversion of the Bits & Pieces Warehouse at Northwest 14th Avenue and Lovejoy Street discovered that he wouldn't even be able to locate his mechanical equipment on the roof of the building because, at 107 feet tall, it already exceeded the height limit.