North City Got to Its New Commons Before the City Did

The lot at the corner of NE 185th Street and 10th Avenue NE holds a shuttered lawnmower repair shop, a parking lot behind a fence, and a small triangle of grass called Rotary Park. It sits about five minutes on foot east of Shoreline North/185th Station. As The Urbanist described it this spring, it is "a spot you could easily just walk by without really noticing."

The plan calls for a city-hired operator to run an Arts & Eats Market here. So far, every public use of the site has come from neighbors with gloves, rakes and, this month, a cider press.

The Order Things Actually Happened In

The idea started with the North City Neighborhood Association, not City Hall. In The Urbanist's account, NCNA advocates first pitched doing much more at Rotary Park, and the City of Shoreline then took the idea up. Since then:

1. Last year, the Shoreline City Council set aside $300,000 to begin interim activation of the site, a concept called North City Station. A few months later the Washington State Legislature added $275,000 in the supplemental capital budget.
2. March 21, 2026: about 100 neighbors turned out for a cleanup. NCNA, Urbanist Shoreline, the Salvation Artists & Makers Collective and the City recruited them, and the Shoreline Tool Library brought equipment and more volunteers. Together they hauled off at least three full containers of waste and several truckloads of vegetation.
3. Early April 2026: the Council approved moving ahead with an initial five-year temporary use permit with Seattle City Light, which owns the property.
4. Sunday, October 11: NCNA set a community apple cider press party at the site, run with Urbanist Shoreline and the City, with a tie-dye station, face painting and live music. Its call for help asked for "people with apples in their yard" and neighbors who knew where to find them.

Government supplied the money and the permit, while the turnout came from North City itself. Mayor Betsy Robertson and State Senator Jesse Salomon both joined the March work party. NCNA's recap gave the turnout credit for saving the city "precious capital resources." Robertson told The Urbanist that over 100 people showing up "to put in a little sweat equity" for a citywide asset was "really amazing."

What the City Has Drawn for the Site

On paper, the plans are bigger than a cleared lot. According to a city flyer quoted by The Urbanist, the City described it this way:

"North City Station will feature open space and greenery that adjoin a community gathering place that includes affordable vending opportunities for food trucks and artists in a shipping container-based market. A covered pavilion with restrooms and tables, with a performance space and play structures nearby, will give kids and adults a place to eat, shop, and play, or just relax in an outdoor oasis."

NCNA's project flyer splits the work into phases. In Phase One, an operator picked through a city Request for Proposals runs the Arts & Eats Market with food trucks and artist vendors for an initial five-year term. Planning for the old building's rehabilitation continues alongside. The flyer points to the site's commercial-grade driveways, built for heavy vehicles, and to core utilities that are still sound even though the building needs repair.

The larger idea reaches north. Between 2020 and 2022, the City bought four parcels just north of the City Light property for future park expansion. The Urbanist reported in April that demolition of the three houses on those lots was set for later in 2026. The whole assembly is now called North City Commons, meant as a park that also works as a small-business incubator, with shops running out of food trucks or shipping containers.

The Paperwork Still Ahead

In April, The Urbanist reported the hope that by the end of 2026 a private company would be running the site day to day. As of the Council's agenda planner updated October 16, two items are still listed as pending with no meeting date. The first is Council action on a contract to operate the North City Arts & Eats Market at North City Commons. The second is permission to accept the $275,000 state Commerce grant for Phase Two of the project at 910 NE 185th St. The operator's name appears only as "Contract XXXXX." NCNA's own Commons page still calls the site currently vacant.

So the year-end target depends on a vote that hasn't been scheduled yet. Until it happens, the site's public life depends on whatever NCNA and its partners organize next, and the neighborhood association's blog is where those dates show up first.

Why the push for a gathering place here, and why now? NCNA president Kevin Atkinson put it plainly to The Urbanist: "There's not a lot of stuff right off this light rail line, but there are increasingly going to be a lot of homes right here, so they need a green space and a third place to be." Those homes are going up now. My Edmonds News reported in March 2026 that Kinect @ Shoreline, a 240-unit building next to the station, opened in April 2025, and that Alexan 185 was under construction across from it. The city's planning is moving too. On October 1, the Planning Commission unanimously recommended the updated station-area subarea plans, and the City Council is expected to take them up in November and December.

Where 185th Street Gathers This Fall

The commons isn't open yet, but NE 185th Street and the stretch of Aurora around it already have a full fall calendar. Most of it runs on the same model as the October cider press: local groups, free admission, a weekend morning or a weeknight.

The Greenhouse Winter Market is the closest match to what's planned for 10th Avenue. It's a Shoreline Farmers Market production that brings makers and food trucks under the Sky Nursery glass roof once the outdoor season ends. The Arts & Eats plan aims to make that kind of weekend a year-round fixture a short walk from the train.

The North City Rooms That Already Work

Until there's a pavilion, NCNA has been gathering at North City's existing businesses on and near 15th Avenue NE. The association holds an informal meetup on the third Wednesday of each month, with no business agenda. All ages are welcome, alcohol-free drinks are available and no purchase is required. In 2026 the venues have included:

• Sodam Chicken, which hosted the July and August meetups.
• Suni's, the October host, which NCNA describes as family-owned and serving North City for more than 45 years.
• North City Lounge at 17554 15th Ave NE, which hosted meetups in May and June.

A few blocks away, North City Bistro at 1520 NE 177th St pairs dinner and wine with a live music calendar that runs through the rest of October. Café Dolce at 17547 15th Ave NE serves Italian coffee and pastries it bakes in-house.

The Urbanist noted that none of Shoreline's commercial districts sits within close walking distance of either light rail station. That gap is what the 10th Avenue site is meant to fill. The walk from the station east along 185th to the 15th Avenue strip passes right by the lot. Once an operator is chosen and the Council votes, the site would give that walk a stop in the middle.

Small public projects like this one often shape how a block gets used well before anything is built around it. If you own near NE 185th and wonder how the station-area changes might affect your property over the next few years, Samie Bryan can walk you through what's planned, what's still pending, and what that could mean for your block. Let's Connect.