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Fri
Feb 8
2013

Should a New Building in Cedar Park Fit in or Stick Out?

In West Philly, particularly on the blocks surrounding the Baltimore Avenue commercial corridor, we’ve talked more about large scale mixed-use development, business openings and community planning than smaller scale new construction projects. Think Apple Lofts and Croydon, or the unique West Philly stories about projects about the Dirt Factory and saving Saint Bernard Garden. Or questions about whether a Subway should come to Baltimore Avenue.

Today, we have the story of plans for development of four-story mixed-use property with five apartments and ground floor commercial space at 4812 Baltimore Ave., a few doors down from Mariposa. For many years, the lot has been vacant but occupied by community garden plots. But no one has come forward saying it’s their garden or attempted to save the plots, according to Cedar Park Neighbors (CPN).

The lot

Closer look

Developers from Diversified Reality Ventures, Stephen Danastorg and Brian Mays, presented their plans to construct the building to neighbors and members of Cedar Park Neighbors during a public meeting late in January.

The overwhelming majority of comments offered by community members and collected and reviewed by CPN stated the current designs illustrated a façade that’s out of keeping with the character of the neighborhood, according to Shawn Markovich, a member of the CPN zoning committee.

“It’s a building I think you can have anywhere in Philadelphia,” she said.

Distinctly West Philly homes across the street

CPN requested that developers make changes to façade design as well as increase the size of the commercial space from the current 650 sqft. Developers plan to use only the front half of the first floor for commercial space, leaving the back half as room for a one-bedroom apartment. Their plans call for a mix of one-bedrooms of about 775 sqft for around $1100 and three-bedrooms of about 1100 sqft.

Developers presented to the ZBA on January 30th, and the case was held for discussion. We weren’t at the hearing, but we’d guess that it was held to consider whether changes to the designs should be required, to meet the wishes of the community. Is it unreasonable for the neighborhood to ask for protruding bay windows and a front porch, like all the other homes on the block? Or should the developers be able to go with whatever design they desire?

“Everyone wants to see the lot developed,” said Markovich. “We would like it to fit into the scale and feel of the neighborhood.”

–Lou Mancinelli

6
COMMENTS
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Posted in University City | Tagged , , , , , , , | 6 Comments
  • Brandon

    I live nearby and I think they should try to fit in with the character of the neighborhood BUT I think the CPN needs to be flexible so we don’t miss out on a good project. The large Victorians are beautiful but they can be expensive to maintain and often have more square footage than is necessary. Increasing the housing mix is a laudable goal.

  • WeBuiltThisCity

    Would be nice to see zoning require the entire first floor as commercial. Developers are getting around this in areas of high student housing demand, building increasingly smaller “commercial” spaces into the first floor to cram as much residential in as possible while the demand is still there for student housing. This is all being done by right in CMX-2 zones.

    While it may be more profitable at this exact moment in time to do this, in 10 years the commercial will be much more valuable than the first floor residential. By then it will be too late, and commercial rents will be too high because of lack of supply and they will have to convert these buildings again. It is quite silly and needs to be addressed.

  • http://twitter.com/F1rstCitizen First Citizen

    What they’re probably going to end up with is a halfhearted attempt at blending in the building which will ultimately get majorly dumbed down from the submitted drawings during construction.

  • WeBuiltThisCity

    You mean they won’t build new construction using 19th century masonry technology and expensive and ornate (albeit quite beautiful) design features? Silly developer trying to make a profit. Not like those civic-minded leaders of industry of the 19th century who built the original neighborhood buildings using labor that was treated horribly, worked long hours and paid a pathetically small amount of money?

  • Hello, Neighbor

    I was at this meeting. The original design the developers presented to the zoning committee looked a lot like “The Hub” at 40th and Aveda. All modern with corrugated metal, floor to ceiling plate glass windows. We made suggestions to soften the harsh lines of the facade and encouraged them to look at other commercial buildings in that section of Baltimore Avenue for comparison. They integrated much of the input and the design presented at the subsequent community meeting was generally acceptable. They were actually very amenable to those suggestions.

    What they were not amenable to were the concerns about density, which some neighbors stood in strong opposition against. In the end, Cedar Park Neighbors was unable to take a clear position, either for or against, the 4 different variance requests due to that strong opposition to the request for a height variance which was believed to be intrusive and encroaching on neighboring structures.

    We negotiated hard and well and many felt the compromises were acceptable. The Zoning Board has not made a decision yet about these variance requests.

  • Hello, Neighbor

    Hi Brandon. Were you at the meeting to give your input? There’s another meeting this week about another variance request. It’s on Thursday at 7 pm at Calvary Church Center. It would be great if you could make it.

    It would also be great if Naked Philly would actually do some first-hand reporting before they write about something. Maybe they’ll be present for this meeting, as well.

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