Good evening.

Welcome to the January twenty-seventh, twenty twenty-six meeting of the City of Neurochel Planning Board.

Welcome for thank you for joining us this evening.

There are two portions of the meeting.

The first portion of the meeting is uh open to the public.

Um we do have a few um adjournments that I'll go over.

Um we have item two point one, application PB twenty-six, twenty twenty-three by Guild Capital LLC for site plan approval to construct a single family dwelling on Premium Point Road, block fifty lot one and R one ten A zone district is adjourned until further notice.

Uh block nine seventy-six, lot fifty-four, and R two seven zone district is adjourned till February.

Um, and then next month we'll have a pub open public hearing for comment and a vote, and that's application PB thirty-two-2024 by Crossroads Center LLC for site plan approval to demolish four buildings and construct a new twenty-eight story mixed-use residential and commercial building at Five Seventy Main Street, Block Four Thirteen, Lots One Three Eight in a DB DO Two zoned district.

Here.

Christine O'Connell.

Here.

And staff members with us today.

Jeff Bream, Deputy Corporation Counsel.

Paul Vaca, building official, Kevin Kane, Director of Planning Sustainability, and present here today, Adam Salgado, Commissioner of Development, and myself, Benito Seja, Senior Project Manager.

Okay.

So item one, we don't have any minutes to approve, so we'll move on to item 2.2, as I stated, application PB 32-2024 by Crossroad Center's LLC for site plan approval to demolish four buildings and construct a new 28-story mixed-use residential and commercial building at 570 Main Street, Block 413, Lots 138 and a DB DO2 zoned district.

Good evening, Madam Chair, members of the board.

My name is Mark Weingarten.

I am a partner in the law firm of Del Bello, Denellan Weingartenwise and Wheedaker, and it's my pleasure to be here this evening representing Crossroads Center LLC in connection with its request for site plan approval to permit the construction of a 28-story mixed-use building, which now contains 504 apartment homes, approximately 4575 square feet of retail at its base, together with 418 parking spaces at the properties located at 570 Main Street and 102 and 106 Center Avenue.

We are joined by our entire team who are here for questions, but after me, you will hear from our architects, Setra Rudy, John Setra, will come up and walk you through the revised building, which I'll give you a little bit of background on.

And then we also have with us our traffic engineer, Nick Tortorella from Stonefield, who is going to walk you through some of the changes we have made to the access, the egress, where the parking, the loading, and all the rest of that is.

The applicant, as you are well aware, is a related entity of Allstate Ventures, a New York-based real estate developer, which is well known to the City of New Rochelle and this subject neighborhood.

They have built three buildings, the 16-story Arc at 7064 Center Avenue, which is now open and fully occupied, the Altier, a fully affordable 65-unit building, fully leased, located at 8 Westchester Place, and the 27-story building, the Allery at 33 Westchester Place, which is now approximately 35 percent occupied, only having opened in August.

Allstate essentially converted a back alley into a beautiful downtown location for hundreds of new homes for New Rochelle residents.

It's made quite a significant investment in the city, and it keeps building, even though many of its competitors have stopped doing so and taken a step back.

Allstate has also enjoyed much greater success in its retail spaces than some of its uh competitors, particularly Sushi Baibao, and they have some other exciting uh things that will be opening soon in art galleries, et cetera.

As we have made presentations to you previously, we will not go into the details of those prior uh investments, but suffice it to say, Allstate is very proud of its accomplishments here in the City of New Rochelle, believes that this project will further enhance the revitalization of this particular neighborhood and strengthen its growing investment.

The subject property is 30,546 square feet.

It's located in the DOZ2 downtown overlay zoning district.

The current buildings, one-story and two-story retail and restaurant buildings will be removed as mentioned by the Chair to make way for the proposed improvements.

The project complies with all DOZ2 standard 3, and as you will see in a moment, it is fully amenitized as a luxury building.

We are also requesting a four-story community benefit bonus as part of the application.

The application was filed on October 7 of 2024.

This project required the reallocation of units from DOZ1 to DOZ2.

On November 26, 2024, our firm wrote a letter to Commissioner Salgado requesting the reallocation and outlining the necessary qualitative criteria for said reallocation.

We included a trip generation study from Langan Engineering, which analyzed the traffic impact of the requested reallocation.

Please keep in mind that the changed project that you will see now has reduced the amount of units as well as the amount of retail from the study, which was originally submitted to the city.

After much work with administrative staff and numerous submissions back and forth, we appeared at the planning board last March.

There were a series of comments from your board and the public at that meeting and thereafter.

Rather than proceed with the typical 90-day approval process, which has accompanied the other towers that have been built in the DOZ.

Allstate felt that many of the comments were reasonable, and rather than rely on pursuing its legal rights to proceed, it agreed to hire a new architectural firm to take a fresh look at the project and attempt to satisfy the stated concerns.

In addition to hiring a new architect with a new vision, Allstate met with the Halland School across the street from the project, as well as attending three separate meetings with the representatives of 25 LaRoy to discuss modifications to meet their concerns.

The main concerns which we heard at this meeting from the neighbors was a request to reduce some of the unit count and the commercial square footage if possible, enlarge the building setback from 25 LaRoy, creating public open space, reallocating some of the loading and resident parking on LaRoy to center, preventing queuing issues from our garages backing out onto the public street, and helping to fill the need for municipal parking in the neighborhood.

As a result, the building was pulled back 30 feet from the LaRoy lot line, which created an area for public open space between the buildings, which you'll see in a moment.

Changes were made to reduce the visual impact of the building to its neighbors.

The unit count was reduced by 41 apartments.

A subsurface municipal parking level was added to help satisfy the existing parking demand in the neighborhood, which is in addition to the our own parking, which is built again underground and above within the building.

The truck loading was shifted away from LaRoy, as well as much of the resident parking access and egress, which has now been reallocated to Center Street.

The entrance into our garage on center was significantly enlarged to accommodate more cars waiting to be picked up or parked, and the retail square footage was reduced by over 60 percent.

So that is it in summary.

The main summary of it is we tried to listen, we heard the concerns, we've made these changes, and now I'm going to ask John Setra from Setra Rudy Architects to come up and walk you through the plans themselves and the uh significant modifications which have been made.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mark, and thank you, uh members of the planning board.

I'm John Setra, the architect, design architect for uh this project.

And I'll go through these front slides quickly.

Uh this is just outlining some of the buildings that Allstate has been responsible for building in the city, quite an impressive uh group of structures.

And uh Setra Ruddy, uh I'm the one of the founding principals of this firm, is uh is a firm that is almost now 40 years old.

And one of the things that we have specialized in is high density residential design, uh mostly in the metropolitan area, but also outside of that area as well.

And so we're we're delighted to be able to propose this project for for uh New Rochelle.

Uh as Mark had outlined, these are the the elements that were quite different from uh the previous design that you saw.

Uh, some of the most important things that came out of the conversations that we had with the neighbors and the community was the relationship of the new building to their building.

And we realized that, and that was quite a valid concern of that original design.

And so we redesigned it in a way so that creating a 30-foot space between uh our building and their wall that for that literally is a lot line on our property, partially, in order to create something special, and you'll see some examples of that.

Number of spaces, uh number of apartments was reduced, and we paid a lot of attention to the ground floor to minimize the way the flow of traffic and pedestrians uh front onto the streets.

Uh the other thing that was very unique, uh New Rochelle is an old city, but it's also a new city.

And we're very lucky in that where this site is, it's really part of that the older part of the city where there's some beautiful Art Deco buildings, which we found to be very inspiring.

Where we're architects that like to try to work with context and find things that can be incorporated into it so that there's a sense that the building will fit in.

And so there's all of these beautiful landmark buildings that literally are like less than a block from our site.

So we took a lot of inspiration for that, especially the materiality and color.

Many of them are in terracotta uh built at terracotta facades.

And so we wanted to incorporate that material and color into our project.

So here uh you see the view from center and main.

Uh, the way that the building is positioned onto the site is such that is one of the elements of the zoning, which was very interesting, is that uh Main and Center had a significant corner, which was recognized in terms of how something could be done, especially uh with the bulk.

So the building comes to that corner, the height of the building goes up from that corner, and then sets back both on Main Street and also on Center Street and creates a form which is more interesting and broken up and not necessarily just reading as uh uh one large slab.

There's recesses, and there's also uh it's a kind of a modification of a tower or a podium that's sitting that where the tower is sitting on it.

It really the podium is integrated into the tower.

So the tower sets back as it goes up, and you can see here, and I'll have some close-up uh views that I can show you of that of that as well.

The color palette you'll notice as well is something which is very similar to some of the surrounding buildings where there's sort of a beige color and tan colors that are incorporated into uh into the design.

When you go around to the Leroy street side, this is like standing in front of the church, which is about a half a block away, you see again that the building is given some shape in order to break some of the massiveness of it, but also then you'll see next that where it sets back from LeRoy, 25 Leroy, also creates an interesting open space.

Uh the ground floor plan that we spent a lot of time uh working on in order to minimize how traffic would flow around it and how cars would go in in and out was very important.

We created an basically an into interior port cochere with some accessory parking uh within that space.

That's off center street, next to our lobby, and then going closer to the corner of main and center, that's where our primary retail space.

So I think this was one of the big differences between our design and the previous design, which had a lot more commercial space, retail space, uh, and a lot less uh vehicular space.

We also created uh parking arrangement where there's a combination of self-park and uh valet parking.

So it's kind of broken up.

So the valet parking is what is entered off of Leroy Street.

I'm sorry, the the self-parking is off of Leroy, and the valet parking is off of center.

The two uh the the great tone indicates the area that's dedicated to uh the parking.

So as you get closer to the building, this corner of center and main shows, I think some of the interesting unique characters, characteristics of the site and of the of the building, the way it develops.

It respects the requirement in the zoning for a low uh podium, uh which is four stories, then it sets back, uh as you can see here on the on the on the left, where there's a series of setbacks here, and also the same thing happens on center street, center avenue where the building again will set back a few times.

Um as you come around the corner, you know, we have parking which is both below grade and above grade within the structure.

We didn't want the parking to become or disrupt the kind of residential flow of the windows.

So you don't see any parking from uh from the street.

It's basically all behind a facade that will be developed here.

So this corner where you see parking, where you see the car going into the uh into the into the self-park area, uh, which is below, but above it where there is the uh valet parking, it doesn't look like a parking garage.

And now you get a glimpse of the space, the 30-foot space that we created when we slid the building away from 25 LeRoy.

So this space is we envision this as a public park, basically.

Uh it's it goes extends the whole length of our property, and then abuts the adjacent property that fronts onto onto Main Street.

It'll be secure, there'll be some fencing there, so it can be controlled, but it's open to the public.

Here's another view looking down.

If you were in one of the apartments at 25 LeRoy and stuck your head out, this is what you would see.

So we paid a lot of attention to this facade as well, and that was another thing that was brought up when we discussed uh the building with the community, is that they didn't want to be looking at a blank wall.

So we gave it uh what we're proposing to do here is to create a filigree uh panel of uh metal panels with a kind of an organic design which will fill in between the structure, the structural piers.

Then down at the ground level, this is what you're looking at if you're looking kind of south uh southeast.

And this is that facade.

Swinging around now onto uh onto Center Avenue, which is really where our entrance will be located for the residents of the building, you'll see that it would be just to the just to the left of this uh where the valet parking space is here, and the facade there is developed in a way to break down the scale.

So even though the building takes the entire frontage of the street, it's broken into a modulated pattern with recesses and shifts in plane to create some interest and variety.

The other thing is we uh Mark mentioned that there is a lot of uh amenity space, which is also worked into the building both in the as a part of the podium and then also at the top of the building.

So what we did was at the podium level, we separated the uh tower from the podium by creating this loggia that you see here on the left.

And that wraps around to create the distinction between the tower and the podium.

Uh Mark went through the statistics, so if you have any questions about it, we can go over that.

Uh basically that's what I have to present to you.

You want to talk about parking.

Uh good evening, Madam Chair, members of the board.

Uh, my name is Nicholas Tortorella, uh, just for the record, T O R T O R E L L A.

I'm a licensed professional engineer in the state of New York and a team traffic engineering team lead and project manager with Stonefield Engineering and Design, 5A4 Broadway, suite 310 in Manhattan.

Uh so as Mark and John just walked through, and I I won't belabor and rehash too much, but our sites located within the city's district overlay zone two or the DOZ2 zone, spans the entire block width on the north side of Center Avenue between Main Street or U.S.

Route 1 to the west and LaRoy Place to the east.

Our site is currently developed with approximately 22,268 square feet of commercial retail space and approximately 3,714 square feet of restaurant space with vehicular access provided via two curb cuts uh on the uh LaRoy Place along the site's eastern frontage.

So, as they uh just spoke to, our project proposes to raise all on site structures to provide a mixed-use building in the future with 504 units, uh, 4,575 square feet of commercial retail space, uh, approximately 4,000 square feet of publicly accessible open space, and 418 total on-site parking spaces, which will include 267 above grade valet spaces, 104 below grade tenant self-park spaces, and 47 below grade municipal self-park spaces, which will be available to the general public.

Um vehicle access for the project will now be split amongst the frontages and provided both on LaRoy Place and Center Avenue.

On LaRoy, a proposed right-in, right-out only curb cut at the northeast corner of the building will provide access to the three below grade parking levels.

Uh and those will contain 151 self-park spaces, which is about one-third of the total building's parking supply.

The first basement level, what we would call B1, will contain the 47 municipal self-park spaces, uh, and these will operate just like you would see municipal parking spaces operate throughout the city, including at the existing lot across LaRoy.

Um, I believe it's called the Prospect Lot.

The second and third basement levels, B2 and B3 will contain the 104 tenant self-park spaces, and there will be a gate between the first and second uh basement levels that will restrict access to the lower two levels for residents only of the building.

Um there will also be now significant vehicular access on Center Avenue.

Uh two of the proposed Center Avenue curb cuts will be located approximately mid-block to provide ingress and egress for the valet tenant operation.

The valet facility again for residents only will provide 267 total valet parking spaces in four above grade podium levels that will be accessed by three vehicle elevators or what we would call lifts.

On the ground floor itself, there will be 14 valet handoff spaces for vehicles to stage while attendants move other vehicles from the upper floors down to the handoff area on the ground floor and vice versa.

So my office for that valet operation conducted a specialized turnover and queuing analysis based on what we call the M1 queuing theory.

It's basically the theory of waiting in line.

Uh and coupled with a reasonable number of valet attendants during those peak hours.

That analysis demonstrated that the 14 handoff spaces on the ground floor will be more than adequate to accommodate the peak demand without the potential for those entering vehicles to build up in a queue where it extends back onto the site frontage sidewalk or even further into the right of way in Center Avenue itself.

That analysis factors in, you know, numerous, like kind of minute details to the operation, as well as the expected number of vehicles expected to enter and exit the facility during the peak hours.

And some of those metrics get all the way down to the time it takes for a valet attendant to accept keys and pull a car into the elevator, the time it takes for that valet attendant to press the elevator button and for the doors to close, the time it takes for the elevator to reach each one of the above grade podium levels, and the time it takes for an attendant to walk back down the stairs from those above grade levels to the handoff area and repeat that process all over again.

And what that analysis demonstrates is that with six valet attendants operating the facility during those peak hours, uh specifically, you know, for a residential building, right?

The weekday morning, the weekday evening, the Saturday midday hours.

The facility is expected to operate with four or fewer vehicles queued in the ground floor handoff spaces, more than 95% of the time.

And the probability for all 14 ground floor handoff spaces to be occupied at the same time is effectively negligible.

The analysis shows a probability of 0.02%.

Jumping back quickly to the access, the third curb cut on Center Avenue will provide access to the building's internal loading bay.

Uh the project's loading and delivery operations will occur during the off-peak periods, think very early morning, midday when people are at work, late evening, Saturday off peak hours.

So our design team actually was able to mesh the design of that ground floor valet handoff space so that a portion of the space is dedicated to interior loading during the periods when those extra handoff spaces are not required.

When trucks are utilizing the internal loading bay, I do think it's worth noting, and I'm just going to show it with my mouse here.

These three handoff spaces will not be available during that time.

On the page west or left side of the loading area, there is also a uh designated space for smaller trucks and sprinter vans, think like an Amazon package delivery van, uh, where those vehicles would be able to use that space on the ground floor while circulating in the interior portico share to conduct those type of deliveries.

Again, think like a package delivery to the building lobby, while those residential usage is lower than you would typically see in a peak morning or a peak evening hour.

And I do again think it's important to note that when those that space or those sprinter van vehicles are in operation, those two ground floor handoff spaces will also not be accessible.

So just quickly tying it back to what John discussed, uh the two interior loading areas, again, only operational during the off-peak hours so that the like when the residential traffic uh will be lower than its typical peak.

And when the loading areas are active, um the valet facility will still have nine of its 14 valet handoff spaces available for use.

Couple that with the drastically reduced demand during the off-peak hours, and really what that means and what our analysis shows is that the combination of 14 handoff spaces during the peak hours and a as or at least sorry, uh nine handoff spaces during the off-peak hours will be more than sufficient to accommodate that peak demand without the vehicle queue building up into the center AV right-of-way.

Uh and just I want to close the loop quickly on loading and look exterior to the building.

Uh, the project will also construct a curb bump out and a curbside loading zone on the west side of LaRoy Place that will be able to be used by uh ancillary and additional loading vehicles uh at all times, completely independent of the valet parking operation.

Uh the hours for that curbside loading zone would obviously be uh discussed and coordinated with the city's engineering department uh and the posted hours would be subject to city review and approval.

Um kind of transitioning here now just with respect to CECRA and previous environmental studies conducted for this area.

My office conducted a multifaceted analysis of the proposed project versus what's been approved in the DOZ2 district as part of the 2015, 2021, and 2024 environmental studies, just to ensure that our project complies with the development thresholds that were established by the city as part of these rezoning efforts.

So the first thing that we did is conduct new weekday and Saturday traffic counts at key intersections proximate to our site, uh basically along Center Avenue and Huguenot Street that were analyzed as part of those environmental studies that included the DOZ2 zone.

And that was done to establish current baseline conditions in the area.

We studied Main Street and Center Avenue, Main Street and Division Street, Huguenot Street and Center Avenue, and Huguenot and Division as well.

And what those counts showed is that during all peak hours, the volumes counted in 2025 are actually significantly lower than what was analyzed in 2015 and 2024, which basically tells me that the baseline conditions in both of those assessments was somewhat conservative at the time for what's actually out there today.

And the 4,057 five square feet of ground floor retail space represents less than 3 percent of the entitled supply in the DOZ2 zone.

And taking it one step further, we compared the trip generation projections for our current project versus what the approved projections for the DOZ2 zone in those previous environmental studies.

And what that secondary comparison showed is that our project will generate approximately 5% of the new vehicle trips in the approved development program for the DOZ2 zone during the weekday morning peak hour, and approximately 4 percent of the total new vehicle trips during the weekday evening peak hour.

So the long and short of that long narrative, and I apologize, is basically that the traffic volumes proximate to our site in 2025 are lower than the baseline conditions analyzed in the previous environmental studies.

Our proposed 504 residential units and 4,005 square feet of retail space constitute a reasonable percentage of the improved development program in the DOZ2 zone.

And our current project is expected to generate a maximum of 5 percent of the total peak hour traffic volumes that were approved in those prior environment environmental studies.

And all of that is just to say that our project now is consistent uh with the approved rezoning studies.

It is not expected to significantly or adversely impact traffic operations in the area beyond what was improved in those past environmental studies, and it's not affect uh excuse me, expected to impact the overall traffic analysis findings of the 2015 FGEIS, 2021 supplemental DGES, and the 2024 supplemental FGEIS, nor the CECRA finding statements associated with those studies.

Uh and that does include the planned conversion of both Main Street and Huguenot Street from their existing one-way circulation to two-way traffic on both streets.

Uh that is all I wanted to touch on specifically, but I'm happy to field any questions or turn it back over to Mark.

Did you do the traffic studies when school was in session?

Were those weekday mornings with school?

Yes, they were.

They were done in June of 2025, early June when schools are in session.

Okay.

So that that concludes the presentation on the new building.

I will only again sum up.

When we did meet with the Howland School, for example, we had lots of conversations about pickup and drop-off and timing and all the rest of that, and that has been uh incorporated into the design that you see, and I think we have done well with them.

We also had a lot of conversations with the people, particularly at 25 LaRoy, the main issue being that the building well, I'm sorry, but we certainly excuse me.

We're gonna have a public comment next week.

Um, just in terms of not interrupting the presenters, it's great for everybody to listen and next next week, next month, I'm sorry, um, the public comment will be open when we vote on the application.

To be accurate, we met with their board.

We didn't meet with the whole building, we met with their board.

There were a lot of conversations about pulling the pulling the building back from the, as you know, they were right up against each other, which was created, frankly, by the variants that was obtained by 25 LaRoy when they built their building and put it on the property line.

Uh but we went ahead, moved the building back 30 feet, created a public space in between, which was another question talk of at one of the the last plan at the first planning board meeting of people suggested there was a need for public open space uh in the area, and that accomplished that.

It did require us in the redesign of the building to lose about 10 percent of the units, which is a significant change, uh, and also about 60 percent of the retail, which is also a significant change.

Um, in addition to that, not just from the neighbors who have voiced concerns about the potential for future development of the public parking lot across LaRoy, uh, because that is slated as one of the properties that could be developed in the future, and that they have a current need.

Where are the people going to park that are in that lot, we were able to step up and create, as we said, a level of parking with 47 more parking spaces for municipal public use, uh, which the city I think was uh it was actually them who asked us to take a look at that and see if it was something that could be incorporated to help this particular uh the particular particularly the merchants in the area, and that is something that we've tried hard to comply with.

So uh without more that that's the presentation, of course.

We have our team here for questions, and we do look forward to that, and we look forward to being back here again next month.

We did receive a number of comments just in the last 48 hours from park, from uh the various uh departments from the uh city and uh we didn't see anything in there at all that was troubling.

In fact, uh we think we'll be able to uh comply with everything we have seen so far, at least in talking to our professionals.

Uh thank you.

And I'm sorry I made you sit down.

I'm gonna come back to parking in a second.

I just first wanted to say, you know, design is an it is an iterative process, and good design takes many iterations.

So I'm encouraged to hear that meetings have occurred, um, whether they were with all of the stakeholders that are relevant, uh, at least there's progress there.

Uh and I'm I'm hearing and seeing changes to the form of the building and the way the building is functioning that I think is addressing that.

So again, I don't know to the extent of which that needs to occur to be final or to be consistent with good design.

Um, I'm glad it at least started.

Um uh sorry, this is going to be an engineer's question.

On the parking calculations, uh which are on sheet SPA31, um, specific to the parking reductions taken.

Um there is some parking reductions for valet uh car share.

Um could you just talk a little bit about this idea of car share and if there's any data related to how new Rochelle residents may already be using car shares or will are projected to use car shares.

I just want to understand what that program, that car share program is about, and how it relates to the reductions that were taken.

Absolutely.

Uh with respect to the actual interpretation of the code and application of parking requirements, I would ask our architect to address that as they prepared those calculations.

But to talk about car share, uh, the best example I can use is is Zipcar.

Uh obviously coming from New York City from Westchester originally, but lived in New York City for a long time.

I am an avid user of of Zipcar.

I don't have the means to own a car nor to park it in Manhattan.

It's extremely expensive, but I do have the ability to use a zip car type program to basically reserve cars on demand.

So examples of that, uh sometimes they are parked on the street in designated locations, sometimes they are parked in uh designated facilities, but it's all used on an app system, shows you the location of the cars, you can reserve them, uh, and it basically reduces the need for residents to own their own vehicle for the limited number of times that they actually require the use of a private auto to get somewhere to and from somewhere when an Uber would not suffice.

Um it's a proven strategy to reduce the demand on single occupancy vehicle for high density residential buildings.

Uh it's something that we use a lot in obviously the five boroughs.

It's something we use in Hoboken, Jersey City, Newark.

Um a lot of those municipalities require travel demand management plans to be a component of these municipal applications.

Uh car sharing is an integral component of TDM plans.

In fact, the City of Hoboken actually incorporated the use of on-street car share parking spaces into their complete streets design guide because it had that type of proven effect to reduce residents' demand on owning their own vehicle in terms of actual statistics like percentages.

I can't give that to you right now off the top of my head, but I'm happy to look into it and come back prepared to speak on that uh at the next meeting, because I do think it's a valid question.

Yeah, I'd be interested if there's any new Rochelle data, existing users of car shares, percentage-based or something along those lines, or other similar, sim similar cities like uh White Plains or any other um urban remote city to uh a dense city like New York City, that would kind of help me understand what's the possibility of it actually being used as designed.

Understood.

Um if there's any trends of use, I mean, I think uh this seems to be something that the younger generation is adapting uh as we move on and on and on, and if there's anything that is different than my perspective on a car share being the age that I am and and and who might be occupying this building and who may be thinking of transportation modes differently, uh that would be just interesting to me to hear as well.

Understood.

Uh and and just maybe a little about the valet, again, how how that works and and the um and why that's a good reduction of parking based on the way a valet operates.

So when you say a good reduction of parking, you mean to the requirement or to what in theory could be provided.

I guess I'm looking for the principle behind why a reduction would be taken for a valet.

And this may be obvious, but I think I just want it stated when you give reductions for valley, because that's built into the code to allow that.

What is the principle behind that?

Right.

Um I can let our architect speak to the actual interpretation of the code, but valet space-wise, it just allows an operation like that to fit in a smaller footprint, right?

Like we don't have the ability to build um, and I'm doing math in my head.

So 150 spaces in three below grade levels.

Uh we'd have to get 200 and so you're basically almost two times.

So you'd have to go almost six levels down to build that level of parking below grade in a self-park layout.

Um valet operations are just proven to increase the efficiency of turnover.

Um, they also tend to somewhat cost money, so it can disincentivize people from using or tenanting a unit where they would have to pay for that.

Um if they don't really need a car, that becomes advantageous to them.

Uh if they really do need a self-park space, they look elsewhere for a residential unit.

Um, again, in terms of interpreting the code.

Uh if you have further questions on that, I'm sure our architect is happy to talk about it further.

I think I I guess I'm understanding that it's uh density of parking is increased with a valet operation, meaning the ability to get cars in and out uh more expeditiously.

Uh therefore you don't need as much traditional square footage of parking in in that operation.

And I presume the car share is a similar concept and principle.

I think your first statement is a hundred percent correct.

It was phrased perfectly.

I think I would separate the car share out a little bit in the sense that the car share can just reduce well, actually, I guess in that sense it's it is similar.

The car share just reduces the number of parking spaces that would be needed to serve the same number of residents, right?

Because you could eliminate, I'm just making up numbers, but you could eliminate a third of the parking that could be required for a group just by providing a small number of car shares so that they could use it on demand when they actually needed it.

The valet is more focused again, as you said very well, actually, it's about efficiency, right?

And space efficiency and turnover efficiency.

These are professional vehicle operators, they do it all day, every day.

They're able to get into spaces that normal people are not able to do with their car.

You can also provide different layouts, you can use stacking systems to even further optimize space.

Just gives you a lot more flexibility in like a dense urban area to provide enough parking uh that you think is going to be required for your residence.

And you are using stacking.

That is, we're using hanging systems.

I will clarify that.

Stacking systems are typically two levels with one car on a uh platform, I'll call it, that's raised above with another car below.

Uh it also involves um structural columns on each side of the car, obviously, to hold up that platform.

Hanging systems are different.

Hanging systems have structural supports at the very ends, but in the middle, they're basically pulley platforms that are lifted when cars are parked on them, but the space under the hanging system remains open and available for vehicle circulation.

So it almost stores cars in the ceiling and you can drive under them.

Uh that's probably the simplest way I could put it.

But pretty intuitive and interesting system that is kind of a combination of self-park and stacking.

So you talk a lot about uh parking for the residents or the users of the building.

Um what about residents that don't live downtown that may be coming into downtown to utilize either the retail stores or the adjacent um businesses.

Could you just talk about what their experience is, how they're getting in, and where they're parking on these plans?

Yeah.

So any so any ancillary parking demand generated by this building, the clear and obvious generation would be the retail space, would have to use the municipal self-park facility.

And that would be operated just as if they were going to the municipal lot across the street, which as Mark said, you know, may not be there in the future, but I'm just using it as an example.

And the way these spaces would operate is any one of these visitors would have to enter the project from LaRoy using the self-park ramp, and they would be able to park if they're available in any one of the 47 municipal self-park spaces on that B1 level.

Again, I don't think the final operations of these spaces has been uh either even really proposed to the city nor approved.

But if it's it'd be like a metered parking space, or like you could pay on an app on a per hour basis.

But it's just a municipal parking space that happens to be located within our building itself.

It would be signed as such.

And again, as I said earlier, there would be a gate system between level B one and the two lower basement levels that would not allow members of the general public to go from that municipal level on B1 to the residence level on B2 and B3.

Uh they would not have the key card that you need to get through that gate.

Um additional demand beyond what we could accommodate in that municipal lot uh would likely have to be street parking in the area, just like you'd have to do um in the downtown area here now, or or really any dense urban area um you know that you'd see in Westchester.

And so you're one level below the retail space and one level below the street.

That is correct.

Walking off property to visit an adjacent business.

You'd be walking in the public right of way on sidewalks fronting the building to get to the retail use.

But fair enough.

Yeah, I guess off property technically.

Okay.

Uh also I I'm not privy to the internal building logistics as well as our esteemed architect.

So there could be an internal connection.

I just I can't speak.

There is an internal connection, and it there's an elevator that serves the public parking area and takes you up to an elevator lobby near Main Street uh near that exit tower.

Great.

Thank you very much.

Even better.

Yeah, and then the last question.

You're welcome.

I'll move on.

Uh when you reduced your units.

Did you also proportionally reduce your parking?

Uh I actually have not was not intimately involved in the past iteration of the project.

Uh but the the short answer is yes.

We we reallocated accordance with the zoning requirements.

And you've asked a lot of specific questions that Nick is uh the perfect person to be answered, but I'll talk in the very general.

This client has built two build three buildings now, two of them fully occupied, so we have a very good uh thing to look at as far as statistics concerned, only a block away.

And they will tell you that having complied with the new shell ordinance and having complied with the zoning and with having car share and having valet and those other, they did learn their lesson about having more queuing area and queuing space, and that's been worked into this, but they are not fully parked uh as far as permits are concerned.

They're not fully used in their buildings.

They have extra spaces, so they're very comfortable because again, one of the things you try to do when trying to rent your apartments and make sure you have adequate parking for your people, or you're in a lot of trouble.

They're very comfortable with the number of parking spaces that we have here for what we have uh what we are proposing compared to actual counts that we have a block away in the buildings that are there.

That helps.

I just wanted to mention uh two things.

One um we have spent uh substantial amount of time uh, particularly in the last few months, um working with the applicant with Paul and his office and the fire department on this parking, the parking layout um to make sure it functions adequately and also in terms of the fire department's perspective to make sure that it can adequately adequately be treated in case um there was a fire.

So uh I just want to point that out because it was a really um notable amount of time that was spent really drilling down on this and making sure that it was in a at a point that it was appropriate to bring it here before you.

Uh that's one the other thing I wanted to mention was in terms of the car share.

Um I know of at least one developer that has multiple projects here in Urshell that has a car share program that is very successful, so we can provide more details on that.

Thank you.

I have a couple of questions about leasing absorption and uh affordability.

Um so you mentioned that the building that op that opened last fall is about or August September is about 35 percent occupied.

I saw there's a three-month lease um uh credit.

And so I'm wondering it's if there's about two hundred units left to lease in the other building, and there's maybe I don't know, uh three, four-year horizon for this building to be constructed with a 500 unit occupancy.

Um what's the marketing plan?

Do you expect it to be marketed within a sort of a reasonable time frame?

Is there a market study on on the um you know additional housing needed that would contribute to this being marketed and leased up in a timely manner?

Again, our clients are not here with us tonight, but I can tell you they're very excited about the timing of it because what again it's gonna take we get an approval, it's a couple of years to go ahead, finance, build, get it out.

The other buildings, based on where they are will be fully occupied at that point.

In fact, they'll be coming up for releasing at that point, but then putting the new building.

Our client is absolutely bullish on the market in your shell.

We all know there's a housing issue and a housing uh uh crisis, frankly, around, and uh they just don't think they're gonna have an issue with uh with these with these apartments.

They think it's gonna be fine.

And of course, on the affordable issue, we're complying with the city's ordinance.

And with the with the reduction of 41 units, was there an increase, a corresponding increase in the rents for those remaining units or and with the reduction of the commercial space?

Is there a corresponding?

Well, there was there was a reallocation of space at the ground floor, which reduced some of the commercial and and and uh increased some of the I'll call it common area, the things for the garages and all the rest of it.

Some of the apartments were enlarged, uh not necessarily by bedrooms, but by size, because we there was a feeling also that one of the markets that uh could be served here in the city is to have some larger apartments that there are a number of the buildings that have been built have been that traditional thing in the last 10 years of the smaller use with beautiful amenity spaces here.

I know John didn't go through it, but there's some really wonderful amenities in the building uh for the use there.

But we've also created some larger units, especially up on the top floors, and we think that's kind of a unique place, particularly for people who are selling larger homes in the area that want to move into the downtown and downsize, and to have some larger units we think would be great for the market.

So that's part of what was done as uh part of the reallocation.

So the there wasn't a corresponding increase in projected rents for for the reduction.

No, I mean again the rents are gonna be as there are projections, but the rents are going to be subject to whatever the market is when you open the building.

So it's again there's a there's no sense of exactly what that's gonna be until you go out and you you you finance it at a number and you come out and it's gonna be what they set it at at that time, but that's a few years down the road, and when you just you're getting educated guess, but it's a guess.

Okay.

Thanks.

Any other questions from the board?

Okay.

Okay.

Well, thank you for the presentation.

Uh we'll see you back next month.

We look forward to it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um we'll move on to item three, City Council MBA's referrals.

Uh we'll start with item 3.1, extension request for application PB 33-2024 by Pratt Landing Partners LLC for a previously approved subdivision to construct a mixed-use development at Main Street and Waterfront, Block 84, Lot 522 in a DO7 zone district.

It's just a standard extension request that we received by the applicant.

Okay.

No particular comment from staff.

Um just out of curiosity, have they started doing excavation?

I sometimes see trucks coming in and out.

And it's not believe that has started yet.

Okay.

No.

Okay.

Um so we have a vote for an extension approval.

Can I have a motion to extend?

So I moved.

Is there a second?

Second.

All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed?

Okay.

Extension granted.

Uh item 3.2, board on zoning referral regarding case 38-2025 by John Woodrow for area variants to construct a new two-family dwelling at 121 Caligny Avenue, block 1440, lot 15, and a R27 zone district.

Good evening, everyone.

John Woodruff, the architect, and I'm here for 121 Caligny.

Um we were here a couple months ago with a different house, and we got a positive recommendation.

And uh, we've been to two zoning board uh meetings, and um we've uh listened a lot to our neighbors and came back with a different house, which we hope to present uh next uh on February 3rd.

And I'll just take you through the application again very quickly.

Uh 121 Caligny is between Clove and Clinton Avenue.

It was built in 1906.

Uh 119 years ago, it's in the R2 two-family zone.

Our lot is 40 by 122.

That's us here on this lot.

Um it's about 5,000 square.

Excuse me if you're gonna um talk, would you mind just stepping outside?

Um, excuse me.

Excuse me.

If you if you're gonna be chatting, it's fine.

Just don't mind if you step outside so we can hear the next applicant.

Thank you so much.

Um just to continue.

So this is our proposed uh two-family home.

Our new house will be about uh 260 square feet.

The existing house is 268 square feet, so we're very close in terms of this square footage.

Uh we're proposing a uh duplex townhouse style house.

So this is our site plan here, and um we would have garages in the front of the house.

Um each house would have its own garage, and you would enter the house in the middle here, and this would have a large yard, about 40 feet of yard in the back, and um we need a few variances for the house.

Um the duplex would be each one apartment would have a three-bedroom, two and a half bath, about thirteen hundred and fifty square feet, and um here's the layout.

Um we have full basement, and then you'll see this is the dividing wall between the apartments.

This is the garage in front, uh a staircase, you know, going up to the first, second, and basement, um, a family room, kitchen and back, dynette, and then some stairs to the yard, and this side is a repeat of that, just the flip.

The house would be a three-bedroom house, two and a half bath.

It's front elevation of the house.

You see, we have the two garages in front, and then a sort of like a twin peak design.

And the site itself slopes down from the street, so it slopes down about four feet and back, and um this would be the rear elevation where we'd have two sets of stairs going down to the yard.

Um this is the old house that we plan to take down.

The square footage is a little larger than um about the same uh for the house we're proposing.

Um it's in very old house in disrepair.

It's also very tall, bulky house.

So we were hoping to build something that was uh two stories instead of three stories.

Um we went to the zoning board and we got a lot of feedback from the neighbors, and um they were talking about a lot of issues.

Um a lot of the members um did not like having the parking in the rear.

Um they were really asking for a yard and back and not having a driveway along the side of the house.

Um they wanted garages with the shorter driveways.

Um they wanted less bedrooms, obviously.

We started with uh eight bedrooms and now we're down to six, and um they're also concerned about drainage in the rear yard since the site slopes to the rear in this area, and we're very concerned with paving in this backyard here.

So we planned a grassyard and uh changed the the house um significantly, made it smaller and a different design, and um hope that uh we get a good recommendation so we can go on the third back to that zoning meeting.

John, could you go through the variances that um you'll be requesting from zoning this time around?

Yes, thank you.

So both houses John John, sorry, just I don't want to drag it out any further, but just as part of that, can you again include the the existing conditions so it's clear?

Yes, thank you.

It's there.

Yeah.

So both of the houses, the one we came before, and the one we have now both need five variances.

It's interesting when you design the house, no matter how you cut it or slice it, you need the five variances.

So the first variance that we need is lot area per family, and that will be no matter whatever we propose on this lot.

Um it's 2400 square feet, and 3500 is what's required.

So we'll need that no matter what we do.

Um the FAR, we're proposing a 0.55, where 0.4040 is required, but our existing is 0.54.

So we have the same FAR.

So number one is FAR.

We need side yard variances.

We're proposing five feet on each side, and right now we have 4.7 on one side and one foot on another side.

So we're we'll have five feet here, and then we also have uh a distance to um Caligny uh 117 Kaligny, I believe it is, and then we have uh about a six-foot distance here from 122.

So we need side yards, obviously you need the combined side yards, and then uh building coverage, and um that's it, that's our five FAR, side yard, combined side yard, lot area per family, and building coverage.

So those are our five variances that we need.

Is the building coverage changing from the current existing conditions?

Yeah, the building coverage right now is uh 22 percent and allowed is 30, and we're 35 percent.

So we're above what's allowed by 5%.

We don't need any parking variances, front yard, impervious rear yard, lot area minimum.

So our variances are really um bulk and side yards.

Hi, John.

Hi, I gotta I got a few uh perspectives here.

Um I just want to maybe state you know the purpose of uh section 331-117.1 as the planning board is to preserve and promote distinctive community character and appearance and to conserve the property values throughout the city, including this neighborhood.

Uh this is an early 20th century pre-war neighborhood that exhibits some distinct community character and appearance, uh defined by porch forward facades, consistent front yard setbacks, steep roof forms with dormers, vertical proportion fenestrations, narrow side yard driveways, um with garages not as the primary facade, and planted front yard edge.

Um now these common threads can be found in craftsman style houses, um, and I think can reflect similar styles as the American Four Square, Colonial Revival, and Queen Anne that are found on this block and within this neighborhood.

Um we're charged to preserve that character, and um if any designs produce visual discord, striking dissimilarity or incompatibility with these patterns, we can deny.

Uh I I don't want to deny.

Um, but I do think that there's some work that could be done on this facade to support those variances.

Um I have no problem with the lot area per dwelling.

So that variance I have no issue with.

I'm struggling to support the side yard coverage in FAR, um because of the character impacts on this particular building and in the context of the neighborhood.

Um so my suggestion uh when you return to us uh would be to um look at uh preserving the porch primacy, um, perhaps adding some columns or setting back the garages so that that form that is adjacent to this can continue.

Um look at uh trying to make it less garage door heavy on the front facade.

Um landscaping with some planning bands uh between the house and and the facade uh could be helpful, especially between the driveways.

Um, you know, I think some of in the technical meeting we were kind of discussing the four-square just to your right and the bay windows, you know.

I think you have a semblance of a bay window, you have a rectilinear, gable-like balanced symmetrical facade.

I just think if there's a way to interpret some of those characteristics into your design, I think that would make me feel better about the planning board approval that is soon to come.

It's funny because my initial design was the four-square, which I built a couple times around town, but it's not working.

We've tried, and everybody's coming back to me with bulk problems and density problems.

And it's interesting because when you analyze the two houses on either side, this guy's a three-family on a smaller lot than us, and this is about 3,500 square feet.

So we're we're the tiny guy.

Um, but we're really we're we're not getting anywhere with that with that shape.

But I can understand what you're saying.

Maybe there's a way to get the gables to look a little more uh similar here.

And then could you just say again what you were talking about with the with the landscaping in front?

Yeah.

I mean, so most of the front porch heavy designs have things in front of the facade of the house.

Like there is a staircase, there's balusters, there's columns, and and the the main entrance is set back.

Uh and and in this case, the garage doors are not set back.

You did attempt to set back the front doors.

I I would hardly call that a porch.

I think you you attempted to in some way.

But I wondered if you brought the um the roof line, the soffit line, the facial line, a little bit further out so that the garage doors started to be behind the column-like elements.

Uh the way that the house sits back from that porch facade, which is about the same distance off of the street as your current facade.

See from back a little bit, I get it.

Right.

And then maybe brackets or something to make it.

And then maybe that front porch, you know, is it does it project as opposed to recess?

And that leave the doors where they are, but maybe the again, more porch like where that front door of the house is next to you are eight, eight feet back from that first inclination of a porch.

The other thing that Mr.

Vaka reminded me of the code uh that we only can have one door here.

So we have to have one door, and then we'll go into a lobby with the two doors.

Okay.

Okay.

Well yeah, that's that's great.

It's good.

Yeah, I mean, I just you know, all of these features are like buckets.

And I think right now there's not many of those buckets being filled for me.

If we can fill a f I don't we don't need perfection, but if you can fill a few more buckets to be more neighborhood contextual, I think I can sp stand behind that.

Right.

John, I uh uh I we we've seen your houses and they're and they're all nicely designed.

And sometimes they fit into a place that no other house would fit into, and I I admire that.

But and and we've approved houses like this, sort of 1950s forward type design with the driveways are in the front and the garages facing the front, also, uh like Persian and Rosedale.

But uh they're hybrid now.

I don't know when the first one was created, but they're hybrid, so it's hard to say the character will change on streets like that.

Um even in in bigger areas where there's a ranch house on a might have been a side lot next to a tutor.

It it doesn't fit, but it's there.

And they they did it as of right at some point in time.

Maybe the zoning was different.

This seems so out of character.

It'd be like the first one that's coming in and bringing everything from the uh 1900s up to the the 2000s.

A contrast that I don't know if the neighbors want, I don't know if you as an architect would want ideally, but you're trying to create a two-family house here.

So if you could at least borrow some of the features of the existing houses, I I see bay windows uh and I see porches, and yours is a pretty flat utilitarian type design.

Is there any way you can pay a little homage with your architectural flourishes that would make this fit rather than stand out as so different in this neighborhood?

100%.

I I think it does and and uh said you know get some of these elements to relate back to this so it's not a plain chain facade and has a little more of a a a style, right?

A style stylistically.

We can definitely do something like that.

Because you can see here's Bayes, you know, you've got bay windows here, and it'd be I have to be careful because I can't enlarge it too much.

Um but I can pump my roof up a little bit and like you said, maybe make this a little more of a porch-like roof here with some columns to kind of be.

Right right now, excuse me for interrupting.

We're we're just working on uh a variance from the for the zoning board on a recommendation of that.

Eventually, whatever happens, if it's approved, you'll come to us and I'll make those same requests of you.

And I better be ready when I come back.

Better look at the same.

So is there any reason why you haven't presented something like that in the first place?

I presented a house that I really liked.

I had built the same house on Sydney Street, and we had a very nice uh house there, but I just got nothing but pushback from the neighborhood about the bulk and the size and the uh we don't want any cars in the yard.

We want all our cars in front, and we want people to have garages and people need garages.

So it got to the point where um we tried to to make the house a little smaller because people were rejecting the the design.

And it's it's a tiny lot.

It's 40 by 120.

I mean it's it's the smallest lot.

And um it's tough.

It's tough to fit it on there with only five variances.

But I think the good point is that you said that you know, we could stylistically do something with the upper half here with just really changing the architecture, right?

It's that we don't have to change the footprint of the house.

And and maybe the instead of the two front doors, so each one has its individual entrance, you can create some sort of a porch-like structure that could be shared, and then the one main door into the house and then the two separate doors once you're in there.

Right.

That that might make it less stark looking the way it looks in the right.

Right, because you come in.

It's very tight in here, so maybe there might be a possibility.

But I'm at my minimums.

You know, I try to keep it as tight as I can with all the variances to make it work.

Um not an easy one.

It's a tough one.

A tough one.

Some of the other garages on the block are half buried.

And I before I'm not recommending this, because I think Paul likes that the garages are on grade.

But I is there any you know two or three feet?

Does that change the scale of those garages?

Oh, you mean to lower them?

I'm not allowed.

DPW won't uh um give a permit if we lower the garage.

Okay.

Because they're worried about um city water coming down and then they they're liable for having that situation.

Can I make a motion on a recommendation?

Any suggestions on picking up just neutral neutral?

Yeah.

I think a neutral.

And let the community kind of get there in point.

That's uh neutral.

Okay.

Um so I will ask for a motion to make a neutral recommendation to the zoning board.

So moved.

Is there a second?

Second.

All in favor?

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good luck.

Thanks.

Uh the next item 3.3, the zoning uh case 7-2026, 516 Pelham Road.

Um we did share it with the board, it was in your packet.

Um the applicant is not here uh for this application to present.

Um so there's no presentation per se.

Um, but we're happy to answer uh any questions if you have them.

Okay.

So for the record, it's uh item 3.3 board on zoning referral regarding case 7-2026 by Tom Avalama for area variants to construct a three-story, four attached dwelling unit at 516 Pelham Road, block 463, lot 14, and an RMF 0.5 zone district.

Yep.

Yeah.

I mean, we we talked about at the technical meeting.

I think you have the plans.

Like I said, happy to answer any questions if you have them.

There are a number of variances.

Uh some subs some are substantial.

Um again, if you have any questions, let us know.

Otherwise, if you don't want to say, Do you just go through the variances for the for the record and then we'll make our uh Benito actually uh zoomed in and has them up on the screen.

Thank you.

So uh one of them, and and this is something that we actually talked about at the technical meeting, um, is regarding the the uh four detached four attached dwelling units within one building, which is more than what's permitted uh per two.

The technical meeting Doug had pointed out a provision about the planning board uh not being allowed to uh approve three or more.

Um Paul confirmed that this variance request, this first one would cover that provision in the zoning code regarding the planning board's role.

Paul, please correct me if I'm wrong.

Um You were not wrong.

Um I didn't have the denial in front of me when we did the technical meeting.

So I almost pulled this case.

But I looked at the denial, I'm like, oh, we actually we we we did cover it.

Um Doug was correct.

The last sentence says you're allowed that not no more than two, and they're proposing four.

As of right, the site would allow two dwelling units and have a little land left over, but not enough for three.

So you know, we have seven variances to for the for this case.

We reviewed it based on what they gave us and generated the denial.

Um the um the the net the next one is FAR.7E, where I think point point five uh is allowed.

Uh building coverage is not not so far off 33.4 where 30 is allowed.

Uh then the next one is also is a also a bit substantial, almost 2300 uh lot area per dwelling unit, which is less than the required of 3500.

Um front yard setback requirement for 17 uh almost 18 feet where uh 20 is allowed.

And then the rear yard setback with uh almost 21 feet where 30 is required, and then the last one is regarding the curb cuts.

There's 58 feet of aggregate curb cuts, uh, which is more than the maximum of 50 that is allowed for the frontage that they have.

So that's the full list of variances.

It's you know, one or two are not so substantial, but there's a number in there that that are for sure.

I mean, I don't have all the percentages here, but it seems like you know, sixty percent more dwelling units as of right, fifty-six percent more FAR than as of right, which is a high percentage of you know, doubling what almost doubling what you're allowed to do.

Um and so it it does seem like a lot on a little.

Uh and so I'm I'm I'm wondering if a lesser building would be more appropriate.

Um there's definitely density in this area, but there are still rules and regulations we have to abide by.

No, I'm not gonna say it.

Okay.

I mean, I think this is an interesting site because you have the Pelham Road frontage, which is can be dense, and then right behind it is a residential district, which we talked about is mostly, you know, single family houses, maybe a couple of two-family houses, but it's sort of straddling this area where it's on the border, but uh, you know, from the renderings that we saw, it's it looks like a quite dense, tall building um with this many variances.

Um sort of inclined for a a negative referral and then let zoning kind of parse it out and hear what the community has to say.

If anybody has strong feelings about negative or neutral Silence.

What is the zoning district behind this where the residence is is it a total district?

It's a multifamily district.

Yes, it's I believe it's all RMF point five.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's an anomaly because this site was you know, uh non conforming use that had been there and uh you know, I think for years they've been trying to get someone else to come in and take over the property.

Uh it had been a gas station, I believe.

Yes.

Right.

Um it still looks like a gas station.

It does still it's been abandoned for quite some time, actually.

Yeah.

Yeah.

There's a need for housing.

That's why I'm like kind of torn between negative and and neutral.

So negative, I think.

Negative.

Mm-hmm.

I think I think my point was that if it's all multifamily, the fact that there are single family houses there.

Um if it was a single family district next to this, I think that's a pretty jarring difference.

Um those single family houses could one day grow up to be multifamily houses, but we would hold them to the same standard uh developing within the density that the zoning that's in there would allow.

Um nothing here is existing.

This is all new, and so I I still think that's a far stretch, even if it wasn't single family houses there, a far stretch on density from what the zoning was intending to have in this area.

Years ago, uh I don't know if we talked about this at the technical meeting, but years ago when those other townhouse projects were done, um they had a less restrictive standard of lot area per dwelling unit.

They're on that corner, that Benito circling, and the diagonal corner across from there.

There's two sets of townhouses there.

Um at that time, I believe it was 3,500 square feet for the first dwelling unit and 2500 for each additional dwelling unit.

So there was a flurry of townhouse activity along the Pelham Road corridor, and um that seemed to get folks' attention, and the city council decided let's pump the brakes on that, and they changed the ordinance to 3,500 square feet of lot area per dwelling unit.

And it's never been changed back.

That's a brief synopsis for you folks.

That was addressed as to the other.

Can I ask repeatable questions?

No, but I think that's an indication of less dense being the preference in that area than what it previously was.

And if you look at the existing building stock, that was allowed much denser than it is currently.

Do we do we know though too if so it's four proposed units?

If three were constructed or if two were constructed, does it mean that the project's financially infeasible?

And then we're left with the abandoned garage structure.

Which is its own quality of life issue.

I I don't I do not know.

Um that would be up to their legal counsel to make the presentation to the zoning board to ask for relief on these seven variances.

Um you have seven area variances.

That that's that's a lot.

You're asking for extreme relief there.

So they had to know going in buying this property, or if they failed to do their due diligence when they bought the property, well, the shame on them.

Well, I I would I would imagine that they did do some due diligence and um we'll see what happens.

Yeah, I mean I think it's a good point.

It's it's it's something that you know you kind of discuss more in a use variance application.

Um but I think if what you're saying should happen, I think it's to the point where the city would need to take a more of a comprehensive look at the zoning uh for this lot and and determine what's appropriate and and maybe amend the zoning code as as necessary.

It's it's sort of an interesting one because it's it's it's this isolated lot, right, in a sea of of residential zoning, and I think that's part of the reason why it's sat the way it has for so long.

Um but you know, we are looking at other sites along Pelham Road.

Um so maybe that's maybe depending on what happens with this zoning application, it's it's maybe a reason to kind of bring this site into uh that more holistic analysis that we're taking for the whole Pelham Road corridor.

But we have to act on what's now.

Oh, yes, that may be the future, but um and I would imagine, yeah, reasonable return, right?

So um whoever bought that property hopefully did that calculation and uh if that property was overvalued at the time they bought it, well, that's on them for buying something that was too expensive that they could build.

Uh just not just the cost to purchase, but to finance the construction.

Yeah.

Everything costs more.

Yeah, especially if there's remediation.

Do we have any way of knowing whether the sale of the property has been concluded or that it's a contingent on whether these uh demands get approved?

I don't know.

Sometimes the applicant it's these contingent things.

I'll buy it if I can get approval.

Yep.

We had that with the Cooper's Corners for the quite a long time.

Don't know.

Yeah, don't know.

So just sat there.

Because this is a this is in my estimation, this is a reach.

This is a big reach.

And with Paul's, you know, prohibitive four it if that stands, then I don't think we have any right to even give anything but a negative on this because it goes against uh what you think should be allowed there.

It's not really what I think should be allowed.

It's we just evaluated it based on the code.

Well, I mean, you your your knowledge of the code is what I'm going by.

Well, yeah, well, that's just historical knowledge just floating around and it's factual.

Uh we did have a flurry of activity some time ago, and then city council found it in their wisdom to uh uh change the code to make it a little more restrictive, if you will.

RMF point seven is more dense than RMF point five.

That's a that's a question.

Okay.

So there is an RMF.7 catacorner to this.

Uh but there's also an R2, two-family district uh adjacent to this.

So like it kind of has a whole hodgepodge of adjacencies, which I think would support then maybe re-looking at the zoning, but not today.

Correct.

Okay.

All right.

Um comfortable with a negative referral to the zoning board just because of the number of variances required, not negative to developing the site itself.

We'd love to see something there, but with this many variances to construct this particular plan is a lot.

So can I have a motion for a negative referral?

So m so moved.

Is there a second?

Second.

All in favor?

Aye.

I think sorry.

Oh.

Um and we have uh item 3.4 administrative amendment regarding PB 20-2018 by 277 New York Company LLC for a previously approved site plan to construct a mixed-use development at 277 North Avenue, block 239, lot 33 in a DO2 downtown overlay zone district.

So uh we received a letter which is in your packet uh on behalf of the applicant regarding uh a matter that has already been taken care of with the applicant is requesting that we uh amend or remove a condition.

Um this is from resolution 89-2018, and the condition states the applicant shall purchase Section 1, Block 238, lot 15 from the City of Nurshell and merge the properties prior to the issuance of a building permit.

Um however, subsequent to uh this uh the approval of this application uh after conversations with the applicant with uh city staff, it was determined that instead of uh the applicant purchasing the parcel from the city, it would be best for the city uh to retain ownership and uh authorize uh allow an easement uh to the applicant and um that has taken place it was authorized by city council back in 2019 actually.

Um so that that that has already transpired.

Uh what the applicant is asking now is to just I guess uh have the resolution reflect that and remove or revise the language of that condition.

I think since it's already happened, my suggestion would be to make a motion to just eliminate that condition of approval from that prior resolution.

Um that's what the request is.

Okay.

And where is the that parcel in relation to the building?

Sure.

It is a s I'll call it a sliver of land uh between the building that was approved on North Avenue and the train tracks.

Okay.

Railroad right of way.

So to the north side of the Yes, correct.

Okay.

Um so the administrative amendment would be remove the condition that's already sort of been.

Removing condition two from that that prior resolution of approval, yep.

Does um the decision for the city to keep that land was it with thought as to what it would be used for in the future?

And if it's used in the future, does that make what's being built on the other lot severely deficient on zoning or any other?

No, it doesn't have any impacts in that regard, but it does open up some other opportunities for circulation and things like that in the area.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

All right.

So can I have a motion to approve the administrative amendment to remove the condition from approved?

Is there a second?

Second.

All in favor?

I'm not sure.

Any opposed?

Okay.

And can I have a motion to adjourn?

So moved.

There's a second.

Second.

All in favor.

Aye.

Okay.

Have a good evening, everybody.