Living

With mild year-round temperatures and a low cost of living, both Aberdeen and the surrounding region have been attracting artists and retirees for decades. This has helped foster a rich local culture that is one of the best kept secrets on the West Coast.

As the largest city in the region, Aberdeen serves as the commercial hub for smaller communities and for people with rural lifestyles. This helps provide an astonishingly good commercial service level for a town of this size, including an assortment of Shopping and Restaurant options, plus a variety of local sources for Groceries.

Nonetheless, you can walk to a lot of essential local places, especially if you live in the downtown area or nearby. This can allow you to choose to establish a car-optional or car-lite lifestyle, if you so desire.

Currently, the downtown area has limited residential development. But all parcels in that area are zoned to support residential development to some degree.

If you wish to live within the downtown area, one option would be to purchase and develop a parcel to meet your residential needs. We would be happy to help you make that happen.

This is an edited outtake from the city's zoning map. In addition to the local programs shown on the map below, such as the creative district, the downtown area is also an Opportunity Zone.



There are four municipal zones in the footprint of the Main Street program, which is the primary program behind Downtown Aberdeen Association's work:

Downtown Commercial District

  • Permitted uses include:
    H. Residences in the upper floors of buildings;
  • Conditional uses include:
    H. Multiple-family dwellings;
    I. Boarding houses and single-room occupancy dwellings;

General Commercial District

  • Permitted uses include:
    M. Residences in the upper floors of buildings;
    N. Caretakers’ residences incorporated within an allowed use;
  • Conditional uses include:
    NA

17.40 W-D Waterfront Development District

  • Permitted uses include:
    I. Multiple-family dwellings, residences in the upper floors of buildings, townhouses and residential cluster developments;
  • Conditional uses include:
    NA

17.44 L-I Light Industrial District

  • Permitted uses include:
    I. A caretaker's residence accessory to a permitted or conditional use.
  • Conditional uses include:
    NA
So our downtown area has a great deal of room to include more residential development, thereby allowing more people to live close to where they work and shop. This can be especially desirable for individuals with personal limitations who cannot drive or people with harried lives, such as single parents.

We would love to see additional residential development in the downtown area because it would help reduce pollution by reducing automobile traffic while simultaneously enriching the community financially. Studies show that mixed-use areas with substantial residential development are more profitable for local businesses.