Wall, freestanding: an exterior standalone wall not attached to another structure nor supporting a roof or other overhead structure.

Wall, freestanding, decorative: a freestanding wall with a primary purpose other than to resist the lateral displacement of soil. For the most part, the primary purpose of decorative freestanding walls is to serve an aesthetic, screening, or buffering purpose.

Wall, freestanding, functional: a freestanding wall whose primary purpose is to resist the lateral displacement of soil. Retaining walls and rockeries are types of functional freestanding walls.

Wall, landscape: a low retaining wall, no taller than two (2) feet in height, to retain landscape features within a site.

Wall, retaining: a structure designed and constructed to hold back material and prevent it from sliding or eroding.

Water surface elevation: the height in relation to the vertical datum utilized in the applicable flood insurance study of floods of various magnitudes and frequencies in the floodplains of coastal or riverine areas.

WCF project: a WCF for which a permit is required by the City.

Weather protection: a projecting element such as an awning, canopy, or roof form that provides shelter for pedestrians.

Wetland creation: the manipulation of the physical, chemical, or biological characteristics of a site to develop a wetland on an upland or deepwater site where a wetland did not previously exist. Creation results in a gain in wetland acreage and function. A typical method for wetland creation includes, but is not necessarily limited to, the excavation of upland soils to elevations that will produce a wetland hydroperiod and hydric soils, and support the growth of hydrophytic plant species.

Wetland, isolated: a wetland that is hydrologically isolated from other aquatic resources, as determined by the United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE). Isolated wetlands may perform important functions and are protected by state law (Chapter 90.48 RCW) whether or not they are protected by federal law.

Wetland, mature and old growth forested: a wetland having at least one (1) contiguous acre of either old-growth forest or mature forest, as described in Washington State Wetland Rating System for Western Washington: 2014 Update (Washington State Department of Ecology Publication No. 14-06-29, Olympia, WA, October 2014).

Wetland mitigation bank: a site where wetlands are restored, created, enhanced, or in exceptional circumstances, preserved, expressly for the purpose of providing compensatory mitigation in advance of unavoidable impacts to wetlands or other aquatic resources to compensate for future, permitted impacts to similar resources. Impacts mitigated through wetland mitigation banks are not typically known at the time of bank certification.

Wetland mosaic: an area with a concentration of multiple small wetlands, in which each patch of wetland is less than one (1) acre; on average, patches are less than one hundred (100) feet from each other; and areas delineated as vegetated wetland are more than fifty (50) percent of the total area of the entire mosaic, including uplands and open water.

Wetland of high conservation value: a wetland that has been identified by scientists from the Washington Natural Heritage Program (WNHP) as an important ecosystem for maintaining plant diversity in Washington State.

Wetland re-establishment: the manipulation of the physical, chemical, or biological characteristics of a site with the goal of returning natural or historic functions to a former wetland. Re-establishment results in rebuilding a former wetland and results in a gain in wetland acres and functions. Activities could include removing fill material, plugging ditches, or breaking drain tiles.

Wetland rehabilitation: the manipulation of the physical, chemical, or biological characteristics of a site with the goal of repairing natural or historic functions of a degraded wetland. Activities to rehabilitate a wetland could involve breaching a dike to reconnect wetlands to a floodplain. Rehabilitation results in a gain in wetland function but does not result in a gain in wetland acres.

Wetlands: those areas that are inundated or saturated by surface or ground water at a frequency and duration sufficient to support, and that under normal circumstances do support, a prevalence of vegetation adapted for life in saturated soil conditions. Wetlands generally include swamps, marshes, bogs, and similar areas. Wetlands do not include those artificial wetlands intentionally created from nonwetland sites, including, but not limited to, irrigation and drainage ditches, grass-lined swales, canals, detention facilities, wastewater treatment facilities, farm ponds, and landscape amenities, or those wetlands created after July 1, 1990, that were unintentionally created as a result of the construction of a road, street, or highway. Wetlands may include those artificial wetlands intentionally created from nonwetland areas to mitigate the conversion of wetlands.

Wildlife shelter: a place where stray, lost, or abandoned domestic animals, and sick or wounded wildlife are temporarily kept and rehabilitated.

Window sign: any sign located inside or on, affixed to, or located within the frame of a window of a building intended to be seen in, on, or through a window and that is visible from the exterior of the window.

Wireless communications facility (WCF): any antenna, associated equipment, base station, small cell system, tower, and/or transmission equipment.

Wireless communications service: without limitation, all FCC-licensed backhaul and other fixed wireless services, broadcast, private, and public safety communication services, and unlicensed wireless services.

Woonerf: a segment of right-of-way with limited demarcation of travel lanes where vehicles share the road equally with bicyclists and pedestrians.

Work release facility: a licensed facility used to support an alternative sentencing option offered by a correctional department within their jurisdiction. (Ord. 2401, 2020; Ord. 2425, 2022; Ord. 2434, 2022)