Just south of downtown Spokane is a neighborhood that holds the city’s history from the late 1800s.
The Cannon Streetcar Suburb was formed in the 1890s after the city of Spokane installed a streetcar to transport people up the Monroe street hill. Before the streetcar’s installation, the only way up the hill was to walk.
Once access to the area improved, locals started moving in. 1898 was the year the suburb started to grow.
Now over 120 years later the neighborhood is still a popular place to live. The houses have maintained a historic charm over the years.
That is why neighbors in the area are working with the Spokane Historic Preservation Office to designate the neighborhood a historic district. That distinction would ensure any current or future owners of the area’s homes would have to preserve their original historic value.
The district would be comprised of about 475 homes that roughly surround the Huckleberry’s on Monroe street.
“If you love the neighborhood you live in, you move there because it was a historic neighborhood and you want to preserve that, then that’s one of the main incentives. You can have some say in what the future of your neighborhood looks like,” Logan Camporeale, Historic Preservation Specialist at the Spokane Historic Preservation Office, said.
There are also financial incentives for homeowners who own properties in historic districts.
Previously, only individual homeowners could apply for historic distinction. Now, this new historic district program allows for entire neighborhoods to be historic districts.
Browne's edition already went through the process, which takes about a year and a half. The Cannon Streetcar Suburb is hoping to get the distinction complete by summer 2021.
After a break in the process due to the pandemic, the historic preservation office is planning to restart workshops in January. They want to hold the vote in April 2021 at the earliest.
It will take more than half of the homeowners to vote yes for the area to become a historic district.