City Council is scheduled to vote on CB119398 this coming Monday, January 14, at 2 PM. Exempting downtown towers from transportation mitigations required for smaller developments outside the city core is the biggest adverse impact and mystery in CB119398. While we understand and applaud the goal of bringing alternative transportation options to the SOV into greater usage, Transportation Performance [i.e. travel time] should be our primary measure of success or failure, not just a fuzzy feel good SOV reduction standard.

While the basic building design is more aesthetically attractive from the street than many of the “big box” designs we’ve seen, this design is not functional, and thus is nowhere close to meeting the standards for approval today. Further, they are not “preserving” the two historic buildings, only using the preservation of the façade to avoid necessary alley setbacks.You will be doing the Applicant a favor by requiring them to come back for a 2nd EDG with a functional ground-floor alley-side design. As is, you have a recipe for loading, servicing, and resident parking disaster.

Great article in The Urbanist, by Anton Babadjanov, May 20, 2016....

Using the extra 1000 sq. ft./floor of development capacity in new residential towers as the vehicle for achieving HALA’a funding goals is a “sticky” point for many of us downtown residents, but there is a solution that would work for everyone…and put the “L” in HALA.

I would mandate fair and equitable residential development standards for all of downtown....

The range of 60 to 80 foot tower spacing is generally considered appropriate as an urban minimum to assure light, air and view through and between buildings for both residents and the public beyond the project....

Most new downtown development is residential, but there are not the development standards in place to protect Downtown Residents’ Livability....

It was not even a serious consideration to propose raising allowable height to 400' unless you also provided 60'-80' tower spacing...