Bordering Madison Meadow, three houses go up where one once stood 

Chris Stebbins always saw the potential of the location.

He bought the house at 651 W. 23rd Ave., just west of Jefferson Alley, in July 2011, according to the real estate site Redfin. The two-bedroom, one-bath, 780-square-foot house was built in 1940 and sold for $180,000. Oh, and it was orange.

The house appealed to him because it bordered Madison Meadow, a two-acre undeveloped parcel of grass and trees that neighbors had banded together to preserve in the early 2000s. It’s a popular spot for people and dogs alike, and the meadow’s website says that “generations of neighborhood children have played among grasses and wildflowers, madrone, filbert, apple, pear and cherry trees.”

Stebbins, a designer and builder, never lived in the house. He rented it, always thinking that when the time was right, he’d tear it down and build a newer, nicer version. 

This summer, work began. 

“The house was really deteriorating pretty rapidly, and so yeah, it was time to knock it down and start the process,” Stebbins said. 

But since he bought the property, the city’s land use code has changed. In 2019, the Oregon Legislature passed a bill to allow middle housing, a variety of housing types on single-unit lots. Eugene updated its code in 2022.

Instead of building one new house, Stebbins is partitioning the 0.24-acre lot into three parcels, each with a house between 1,800 and 2,000 square feet, according to Markus-Thompson Construction, which is working on the site.

Two houses will sit side by side facing 23rd Avenue and sharing a double-wide driveway. The third house will be in the back, closest to Madison Meadow, with a driveway off the alley. They’ll scale nicely with the other houses and lots on the street, Stebbins said.

He sold the back lot to Rob Thallon, one of his architecture professors from the University of Oregon when Stebbins was a student in the 1980s. Thallon is now in his 80s. Stebbins is 67.

Thallon designed his home. Stebbins designed his, which is on the east side of the lot. The third house will come later — for now, that part of the lot is handy for parking construction equipment. 

Stebbins plans to do much of the work himself. He’s going to attempt to do the siding.

“I’ll certainly do the entire interior myself,” he said. “I’ll lay the floor. I’ll do the cabinets. I’ll do the trim.”

He’s hoping to be done within two years. “When a builder builds his own house, it could take a while,” he said. 

Stebbins said middle housing “has enabled these opportunities where they would not have been possible before. That’s really what middle housing is supposed to do. And ideally, it does it in a way that’s integral with the neighborhood.” 

But for all its promise, the middle housing rules are not easy to navigate, Stebbins said. He has been working for nine months to get the land partitioned and permitted. A few additional items remain for the city to sign off on. 

“You just have to be patient,” he said. 

A Madison Meadow spokesperson said in an email to Lookout Eugene-Springfield that the organization is eager to meet its new neighbors. 

“The owner has already shared with us his support and interest in the Meadow as a natural area and has offered future access to water for our native plantings,” the spokesperson wrote. “The two-acre open space relies on friendly relations and volunteers to maintain the land, and we anticipate a good relationship with the new folks across the fence line.”