The city zoning map (www.municode.com) says the property at 1320 is zoned
C3A. That allows for one unit per 400 sq foot as part of mixed use
building. The site is 2.8 acres according to a Skyway news article, at
43,560 square feet per acre that yields 121,968 square feet. This would
theoretically allow 304 residential units. The tower was to have 90 units
and office space for some 200 people. Without getting into all the finer
points it appears that the proposed building would be less dense than the
current zoning allows (I imagine that the office requirements would be less
than a residential unit per employee). Given that, it seems reasonable that
the neighborhood should have the expectation of relatively high density
prior to any proposals. The fact that it is zoned as such renders both the
density and the traffic arguments as essentially baseless since the building
will not even be built to the maximum allowed density. Many posters have
debunked the shadowing issue with respect to the site. That leaves the
height issue which I personally think is a very weak and arbitrary argument.
Chris Johnson Says
"Dropping 5 or 6 tall buildings into the general area, as the current
drawing boards hold, is nearly a sure recipe for disaster, or at least, a
long slow slide into over-priced chain-store ho-hum-ness."
"See Cedar Square West and maybe Riverplace for an example of how that idea
can fail in a big way."
Nick Responds
First, comparing 90 units and 200 employees to either of these massive
projects is not a really the same thing. Second both the projects you
mention failed to result in "a long slow slide into over-priced chain-store
ho-hum-ness". In fact both Cedar-Riverside and St. Anthony Main have
vibrant commercial districts with considerably fewer chain-stores than
Uptown.
Sincerely,
Nick Frank
Elliot Park
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