What's up with all the floating homes in Seattle?

It has become yet another thing that sets Seattle apart in some way. Once again we can probably thank "Sleepless in Seattle," since Tom Hanks' character lived in one and helped crystallize it as a quintessential Seattle experience despite it being a very small swatch of the population, relatively speaking.

But after ferries, and mountains, and the Space Needle and some of our other more distinctive public buildings, floating homes are definitely up there as a Seattle symbol.

It's odd, given that the city neither invented nor perfected the housing style, but as the relatively young Seattle grew, floating homes started popping up along its many shores.