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Yesterday, we spoke about a slender single-stair apartment building on a small 60-square-meter site in Tokyo. Today, let's talk about a different kind of proposal. Earlier this month, the Park City Planning Commission heard a redevelopment proposal from the Kensington Investment Company for a site near Old Town at 1500 Kearns Boulevard. The site is 2.71 acres, and the existing building houses 48,000 sf of office and retail space.
The proposal is for a new mixed-use development including:
117 residential apartments (97 market-rate and 20 affordable)
Over 9,400 sf of commercial/retail space
Over 20,000 sf of amenity space (including a rooftop terrace and patios)
210 underground parking spaces
Some of the key development approvals being asked for include:
Master Planned Development approval & Conditional Use Permit
A reduction of the north setback from 25 feet to 10 feet
A building height exception to 49.5 feet (from the 35 feet currently allowed)
A formal vote has yet to take place, though apparently, the project is somewhat controversial. The developer is asking to increase the maximum height from three storeys to four. Ordinarily, the Planning Commission would want to see an increased setback accompany this ask, as opposed to a reduction.
But here we have a classic development trade-off. The developer could, in theory, build more density under the existing permissions, but the ground plane and the overall development wouldn't be as pleasant. So, the request is to build incrementally higher, but then open up the site more.
Here's a comparison between the developer's proposal and what is permissible by-right:
It'll be very interesting to see how Park City votes on this one.
Images via Building Salt Lake
This morning I was reading a CityLab article talking about a homeowner in London’s wealthy Kensington neighborhood who painted her house in red stripes after the city and her neighbors derailed her renovation plans. I’m thinking it is supposed to be symbolic of government “red tape.”
She had hoped to add a two-floor “mega-basement” to her home, which is curiously enough a thing in London due to how restrictive traditional home expansions can be. Locally they are called “iceberg homes.”
What’s interesting about this phenomenon is that it shows you how far people will go to find and/or create the space they want in the neighborhoods they want to live in. Kensington is an incredibly wealthy area and so one has to assume that she is not without other housing options.
As another example, here’s how the article describes her house:
The candy-striped home in question, for example, is actually a mews house, a kind of outbuilding running along an alley behind a great house, originally intended as a place to tidy horses, carriages and maids away from the main residence.
So not only did she want to create an “iceberg home”, but she wanted to do so in what was previously a back alley. In Toronto, this home would be called a laneway house.
What this tells me is that as real estate values rise, people will naturally start to seek out overlooked spaces to repurpose. They will look for some way to carve out a home. And it’s for that reason that I think laneway housing is an inevitable outcome here in Toronto.
Yesterday, we spoke about a slender single-stair apartment building on a small 60-square-meter site in Tokyo. Today, let's talk about a different kind of proposal. Earlier this month, the Park City Planning Commission heard a redevelopment proposal from the Kensington Investment Company for a site near Old Town at 1500 Kearns Boulevard. The site is 2.71 acres, and the existing building houses 48,000 sf of office and retail space.
The proposal is for a new mixed-use development including:
117 residential apartments (97 market-rate and 20 affordable)
Over 9,400 sf of commercial/retail space
Over 20,000 sf of amenity space (including a rooftop terrace and patios)
210 underground parking spaces
Some of the key development approvals being asked for include:
Master Planned Development approval & Conditional Use Permit
A reduction of the north setback from 25 feet to 10 feet
A building height exception to 49.5 feet (from the 35 feet currently allowed)
A formal vote has yet to take place, though apparently, the project is somewhat controversial. The developer is asking to increase the maximum height from three storeys to four. Ordinarily, the Planning Commission would want to see an increased setback accompany this ask, as opposed to a reduction.
But here we have a classic development trade-off. The developer could, in theory, build more density under the existing permissions, but the ground plane and the overall development wouldn't be as pleasant. So, the request is to build incrementally higher, but then open up the site more.
Here's a comparison between the developer's proposal and what is permissible by-right:
It'll be very interesting to see how Park City votes on this one.
Images via Building Salt Lake
This morning I was reading a CityLab article talking about a homeowner in London’s wealthy Kensington neighborhood who painted her house in red stripes after the city and her neighbors derailed her renovation plans. I’m thinking it is supposed to be symbolic of government “red tape.”
She had hoped to add a two-floor “mega-basement” to her home, which is curiously enough a thing in London due to how restrictive traditional home expansions can be. Locally they are called “iceberg homes.”
What’s interesting about this phenomenon is that it shows you how far people will go to find and/or create the space they want in the neighborhoods they want to live in. Kensington is an incredibly wealthy area and so one has to assume that she is not without other housing options.
As another example, here’s how the article describes her house:
The candy-striped home in question, for example, is actually a mews house, a kind of outbuilding running along an alley behind a great house, originally intended as a place to tidy horses, carriages and maids away from the main residence.
So not only did she want to create an “iceberg home”, but she wanted to do so in what was previously a back alley. In Toronto, this home would be called a laneway house.
What this tells me is that as real estate values rise, people will naturally start to seek out overlooked spaces to repurpose. They will look for some way to carve out a home. And it’s for that reason that I think laneway housing is an inevitable outcome here in Toronto.
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