[bouldercouncilhotline] Hotline: Planning Issues for Discussion Tuesday

[cmosupport at bouldercolorado.gov]

Sender: Cowles, Macon

Principal concerns:
1.              Design review results in the least objectionable, rather than good, design.
2.              Insufficient attention to the public realm. We need to apply the Dover/Massengale Street Design principles to the public realm-the space between the privately owned buildings-adjacent to new development. 
3.              Changes of ownership to projects after entitlements are secured. This change of ownership in some cases means that public benefits and sponsor aspirations, that were an incentive for the City to issue entitlements in the first place, are abandoned or significantly changed.
4.              Exterior materials used on buildings. There is too much use of cheap building materials on the parts of buildings that shape the public realm. 
5.              The Inability of neighborhoods or residents to initiate land use changes. Martin Acres is making a concerted effort to transform their neighborhood to a 15-minute neighborhood. Yet some of the zoning, including by right uses in adjacent commercial areas, are antithetical to the 15-minute neighborhood. While developers have "standing" to ask for exemptions from some requirements in Site Review, the neighborhood has no similar way of implementing land use changes or exceptions that would move them closer to fulfilling their aspirations for change. We need to provide a path for neighborhoods to do this.
6.              Disincentives to building smaller residential units. Affordable housing, parking and private open space requirements in residential construction incent the creation of larger units because the requirements are determined by the number of units rather than on square footage of the structure.
Action Items:
I would like to know the details about Site Review projects approved during the last three years as well as projects in the pipeline. I need more information to determine what response would help us achieve better results. 
   

Macon Cowles
Boulder City Council Member
1726 Mapleton Ave.
Boulder, Colorado 80304
CowlesM at bouldercolorado.gov
(303) 447-3062
(303) 638-6884