Community Preservation or Overreach?

In Season 1, Episode 6, of Parks and Recreation, city planner Mark Brendanawicz shares this with Leslie Knope, deputy director of the Parks Department:

You know honestly, when I went to college, and I studied city planning, I thought I was gonna get a chance to build these perfect cities, with public transportation and downtown pedestrian areas, with beautiful landscaping, and all I ever get a chance to do is regulate the size of people's garage additions.

You get that same sense of disparity between expectation and reality with some of the current members of the Planning Board.

It will be remembered that, at the July meeting of the Planning Board, the findings and recommendations of a subcommittee made up of Ben Forman, Gini Casasco, and Susan Foster and tasked with doing further study of the apartment building proposed for Fairview Avenue between Oakwood and Parkwood boulevards, were discussed. The recommendations were presented again at the Planning Board meeting this past Tuesday. As outlined by Forman at the meeting, there are three:

• The number of units in the building will be reduced from 30 to 15 market rate apartments, at least 5 of which will have three bedrooms.
• There will be 26 offstreet parking spaces: one assigned to each of the 15 apartments; 6 assigned to workers in the commercial space; and 5 designated for visitors.
• The project will provide ADA compliant sidewalks and crosswalks at Parkwood and Oakwood and along Fairview Avenue to reach Aldi's.

Forman offered a fourth item that didn't seem to be a recommendation so much as it was an ultimatum--at least, that's what it sounded like. He said, "The Planning Board is really steadfast in seeing the need for these requests, and if they are not met it would result in possible __." The last word in that sentence was not clear. It sounded like separation, but that doesn't make sense in the context. I have listened to the video multiple times and can't figure out what he said. Efforts to find out from people who attended the meeting in person have yielded nothing. I invite readers to listen for themselves. The video of the meeting can be found here. The statement in question begins at 17:30. But whatever the precise language of Forman's statement, it seemed the message to the applicant was: Comply with our requests, or risk being denied site plan approval.

[UPDATE: A reader suggested Forman's statement ended with the words positive declaration. That makes sense. A positive declaration in SEQR (State Environmental Quality Review) is a determination that the project would have a significant adverse impact on the environment and an environmental impact statement is required.]

After some discussion, the members of the Planning Board agreed on the recommendations/conditions and voted to send the statement to the applicant.  

In justifying the request to reduce the number units by half, the Planning Board is relying on Section 325-18. C (2) of the city code, which states:

Density shall be determined by applying the area and use dimensions, set forth in the Schedule of Bulk and Area Regulations, to the net parcel size. As a result of features unique to a parcel or lot, the Planning Board may, through site plan or subdivision review, reduce density below the density otherwise permissible according to the application of the Schedule of Bulk and Area regulations to the net parcel size, as the Planning Board deems necessary to protect the public health, safety and welfare.

The reference to the Schedule of Bulk and Area Regulations brings to mind something that happened back in 2013, when Cheryl Roberts, serving as legal counsel to what was then the Planning Commission, misinterpreted the Schedule of Bulk and Area Regulations and declared that dwelling units in R-4 districts had to be a minimum of 1,500 square feet. The project being proposed at that time would have had five one-bedroom apartments that were each about 770 square feet. In fact, the 1,500 square foot requirement related not to interior space but to lot size, but, based on Roberts' interpretation, the Planning Board denied site plan approval 

The Schedule of Bulk and Area Regulations doesn't provide much guidance in the situation now before the Planning Board. The site of the proposed building is made up of six parcels being merged together. Three of them--117 Fairview Avenue, 119 Fairview Avenue, and 121 Fairview Avenue--are in the General Commercial (G-C) zoning district. Those three parcels total 0.46 acre. The other three parcels--1 Oakwood Boulevard, 2 Parkwood Boulevard, and 4 Parkwood Boulevard--are in an R-2 residential district. Those three parcels total 0.21 acre. The Schedule of Bulk and Area Regulations for Residential Districts specifies, for R-2 districts, one offstreet parking space per dwelling unit but makes no requirement for "usable open space per dwelling unit." The Schedule of Bulk and Area Regulations for Commercial and Industrial Districts doesn't address requirements for dwelling units at all. It should be remembered that less than a third of the proposed site is in the R-2 district.

A document prepared by the Planning Board subcommittee makes this argument:

As a whole, the density of the proposed building is of concern to the Subcommittee given the effects it would have on traffic affecting the health, safety, and welfare of the community. Furthermore, the most recent iteration of the Project shows that the merged lots have a combined area of 0.54 acres. Three of the lots are in the R-2 Zoning District, which does not permit multi-family dwellings, but allows 18.15 units per acre. The Applicant's proposal is significantly denser than the surrounding zoning of the adjacent and underlying R-2 Zoning District. Since the R-2 Zoning was the intended zoning of three of the lots, this comparison may be considered by the Planning Board to evaluate potential impacts to community character. 

Gossips' calculation of the site, based on the information provided in the tax assessment rolls, is that the six parcels total 0.67 acre. 

The subcommittee's argument for reducing the number of units in the building by half is summarized in this statement:

A reduced size would better fit the neighborhood's character and pose less threats to public safety and health given the reduced population.

It will be interesting to see how this all plays out. One thing to remember: This project had been before the Planning Board for close to a year before it was decided that a subcommittee needed to be created to give the project further study.

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