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HomeMy WebLinkAboutminutes.council.20081201Special Meetine Aspen City Council December 1, 2008 Mayor Ireland called the meeting to order at 5:05 p.m. with Councilmembers Skadron, Romero and Kasabach present. 1. Dale Paas, Limelight Lodge, thanked the building department for their professionalism and cooperation in doing inspections and in getting the Limelight Lodge a certificate of occupancy. Paas said they are happy to be back in the community doing business as a lodge. 2. Jack Donovan, Residences at Little Nell project manager, commended the city and the building department for their cooperation and working together toward getting C/Os for the Residences. 3. Elizabeth Milias said the loss of the Lofgren family was a senseless tragedy that a carbon monoxide monitor could have averted. Ms. Milias said she is working to create something good out of this tragedy and is working with Ace Hardware, who will discount the price of ls~ alert plugs, 10 percent. Ms. Milias told Council she has met with staff to get the building code amended to require installation of carbon monoxide monitors. Chris Bendon, community development department, told Council staff has looked at the city and county codes to see how they could be amended regarding carbon monoxide monitors. Mike Methaney, building department, said there are several ways this can be done from administrative orders to code amendments. Mayor Ireland requested staff evaluate the most efficient and effective way to do this and come back to Council with a recommendation. 4. Toni Kronberg presented a CD of the aerial tram presentation she would like added to the record. Ms. Kronberg said aerial transportation will be important to get cars off the roads. ORDINANCE #34, SERIES OF 2008 -Lift One Neighborhood Master Plan Chris Bendon, community development department, told Council this is the 3`d public hearing. There has been a project overview and a discussion of architecture, massing and heights. The next public hearing is scheduled for December 8`h. This presentation will answer questions from previous meetings and experts aze present to answer these questions. Dave Corbin, Aspen Skiing Company, told Council feasibility studies have been done on the high speed quad; site planning, grading analysis, platform dimensions, ramp angle have been studied and have been found to be feasible. These studies were done by DHM and by SE group. Corbin said after approval of the site plan, the lift manufacturer would look at the lift profile and perform the structural, civil and mechanical engineering. Corbin noted a question of whether the platter lib is sufficiently welcoming to guests, the platter lift was adopted by the task force as a means of accessing repeat skiing at the toe of the slope. Corbin pointed out the platter lift is designed to carry people from Dean Special Meeting Aspen City Council December 1, 2008 street to the high speed quad. Corbin said surface lifts are not as common in the US as they are in Europe. There is one at Snowmass, which works well for that area. Corbin said the Ski Company thinks this is a functionally efficient and physically well proportioned means to get up to the high speed quad. Corbin said other methods to get to the high speed quad are walking, drop off, or into an elevator at the top of Aspen street to the high speed quad. Corbin said concern has been raised if there is no snow under the platter lift. Corbin pointed out the 50' between the two buildings is too narrow to blow snow. Corbin said the Ski Company has discussed using natural snow; the area is shaded, which will protect the snow and they will groom this area with snow cats and keep it covered with natural snow. Corbin told Council in a low snow year, they could make snow at the top of this area and push it down into the platter lift corridor. Corbin said if there is no snow at the lower elevation, one could still get to the high speed quad. Corbin noted the poma lift is dependent on a variance from the tramway board. Corbin told Council there is a setback requirement of 35' on either side of cable. The gauge of the poma lift is 11.5', with the 70' setback, requires 80' plus. The reason for the setbacks in the tramway regulations is to protect people on the lifts in the event of fire. There is less risk to people on surface lifts, who could escape easily on a surface lift. Corbin told Council the tramway board does not grant variances in the abstract; when there is a final site plan, it can be taken to the tramway board and reviewed by them. Corbin said if this variance is not granted, the ordinance allows the applicants to come back and bring that issue back to Council. Corbin said the Ski Company feels they can get a variance and if not, there is a mechanism for this to be re-addressed by Council. Corbin said another issue raised by Council is whether there was a way to inject character or a special quality in the base area lift equipment facilities. Corbin said the lift equipment is manufactured equipment and is standardized. The Ski Company has thought of using one of the Deep Powder cabins as the lift shack in this area. Corbin said there are retaining walls that need to be installed uphill of the lift to garner room between the lift and the mountain and those slope walls could be used to create amine-like appearance. Corbin said this will be a new environment and the proposed Lifr One Lodge will bring an architectural character to the area that does not now exist. Corbin said another issue raised was whether a pulse gondola was considered to transport people from Dean street to the high speed quad. Corbin told Council the task force looked at a wide variety of options for this transportation, escalators, carpets, underground transportation, funiculars, trolley, and vans. Corbin showed a slide depiction of the area necessary for those types of transportation; the lift and all ancillary pieces take up a substantial portion of the 8 acres available for the Lift One project. Corbin said alternate means of transportation were the subject of lengthy debates at the task force; the surface lifr met all of the needs of the master plan. Corbin said attending to and unloading injured skiers has been discussed by the patrol. Sleds can be brought to the top of Aspen street where injured persons can be taken by elevator or off to the 2 Special Meetin¢ Aspen City Council December 1, 2008 ambulance. The Ski Company had a number of goals to consider including emergency access and those goals have been met. Councilman Romero asked the best timing for the installation of the new lift lA and where it would fall in the redevelopment of the entire area. Corbin said it will depend on the phasing sequence and how the buildings are excavated. Corbin said the earliest they would be able to do the quad lift is in conjunction with Lift One Lodge excavation. Corbin noted the poma would be put in pending the start of Lift One Lodge; however, once that lodge starts, they will not be able to operate the poma. Councilman Romero asked if the Ski Company can agree to a sequence of trigger points that would require the quad and poma installations. Corbin said the Ski Company is prepared to discuss coordination of those improvements. Councilman Romero asked what successes the Ski Company has had with the tramway board in seeking variances. Corbin said there are two variances of which he is aware on Little Nell and at Snowmass, Assay Hill lift. Councilwoman Kasabach asked how long lift installation will take. Corbin told Council they can install a lift in a summer season. Mayor Ireland asked what the plan is if the tramway board does not grant a variance for the poma lift. Corbin said if the tramway board does not accept the poma lift in this alignment, the Ski Company would consider smaller surface lifts, a ground based lift using the corridor in the site plan. If that were not approved, the Ski Company would return to Council to discuss the site plan alternatives. There is only 50' between the buildings and the Ski Company would have to find something to fit in that 50'. Mayor Ireland said the poma lift was important to the COWOP and Council needs a guarantee or a description of alternatives and assurances. Bendon pointed out the ordinance is written such that if there are big changes to the project, it returns to Council who has a choice to handle the amendment as a Council or to re-establish the COWOP and send any changes back to them. Bendon noted the variance from the tramway board had to be secured before the approvals are effective. Mayor Ireland suggested this be worded that no approval shall issue unless a variance is granted for a poma lift or an alternative system acceptable to Council, at its discretion, is approved. John Sarpa, representing the Lodge at Aspen Mountain, told Council the existing townhome approvals are 72,000 square feet. The previous hotel project plus the residential had 98 keys, 73 hotel rooms and 25 residential. Sarpa said the applicants have been listening to Council and public comment, and they will propose changes in massing to reduce some of the heights, which will be presented at the December 8`h meeting. Sarpa said this proposed hotel is 173,000 square feet above grade; the previous hotel was 127,000 above grade. Steve Holly said regarding vitality, there will be more people in this area. There will be a ski museum projected at 50/day visits and skiing at 300 to 400 first scan skiers. Holly said the COWOP is after "place-making". The plan is not to make another downtown core but to try and create spaces through the site plan, like the museum, the boots and beer, the apres ski bar, the apres ski deck, ski lift, ski lockers, to create a "there there". 3 Special Meeting Aspen City Council December 1, 2008 Mayor Ireland asked if fractional units a contributor to creating vitality. Holly said fractional units create "hotter" beds. Bob Daniel, Lift One Lodge, said there were questions about how the project will be serviced. Daniel showed the major access for servicing at the corner of Dean and South Aspen street; service vehicles will go underneath the building where there is a service and loading dock and a service corridor to service the Lodge at Aspen Mountain and egress onto Monarch street. Daniel said the idea was to make sure there were not a lot of service vehicles running up and down South Aspen street in order to keep it more of a pedestrian corridor. Daniel said most service trucks will be providing goods and services to both lodges, which could be facilitated below grade. Daniel said another issue is phasing the public benefits versus the private goods. Daniel presented a matrix showing how the parties are working on the delivery of community benefits, museums, beer, boots & brats, Willoughby park, the relocation of the Skier's Chalet lodge, Skier's Chalet and Steakhouse will be relocated and will have commercial on the ground flood and affordable housing above, public ski lockers, parking to replace that lost at Willoughby park, South Aspen street improvements, surface lift, relocation of lift one A, volleyball court relocation, Dean street affordable housing, affordable housing at the AABC, affordable housing partnership units. Daniel showed which party is participating in which benefit. Daniel noted the city is not participating financially in these benefits but has worked with the applicants on fees. Daniel said Council brought up the issue of what happens if one project goes forward and the other did not. Daniel said later there will be a discussion of the construction management plan. Councilman Skadron asked what will happen to the Skier's Chalet if this plan is not approved and is that building historically designated. Daniel said the Skier's Chalet and Steakhouse is a designated property. The Skier's Chalet lodge is listed in Ordinance #48 as a possibly designated property. Daniel said if the master plan does not go forward, the Steakhouse will still be historically designated and the Skier's Chalet Lodge will be reviewed under Ordinance #48. Councilman Skadron asked how the Skier's Chalet Steakhouse would be used if this project does not Forward. Daniel said in the pending application, the Skier's Chalet Steakhouse is proposed as affordable housing, the non- historic east portion of the building would be removed and the original structure would be converted to affordable housing. Councilman Romero said delivery trucks will enter South Aspen and will exit onto Gilbert. Daniel said that is the current plan. Councilman Romero said this could be split into an ordinance for each project to distribute the benefit and the burdens. Sarpa told Council both applicants have worked very hard on who pays for what and when. Bendon said the core of putting the master plan together is to get something that is greater than the sum of the parts. Bendon said it is the city's desire to keep the master plan together. Daniel said some communities have infrastructure reimbursement agreement where one party moves forward and installs improvements, other parties tie into and that is not part of the ordinance but is part of the conversation between the developers but has not been Special Meeting Aspen City Council December 1 2008 put together. Mayor Ireland said there has to be a way that if one project does not or cannot fulfill their obligation, the city could step in that pay that party's share Dave Houghton, Resource Engineering Group, said the goal is to make this project as energy efficient and sustainable as possible. Houghton said they will use less energy than other buildings, use a green design process, determine what is economically viable, look at energy generation possibilities, and verify and see how the project does and true up if the goals are not met. Houghton said this is a difficult site for energy issue; it is dense, there is not much energy generation potential, there is a wide variety of uses. Houghton said one can design an energy efficient building but it does no good if it is not operated efficiently. Houghton said the most common renewable energy sources are not viable on this site; it is a shaded site with little solar access; it is not a wind resource and there is a small hydro component. Houghton said the ground source heat pump has been discussed and it can reduce energy use; it is not energy-generating technology. Ground source heat pumps use the earth as a heat source and heat sink for high efficiently HVAC or heating system. This converts natural gas combustion into an electric use, which can be offset by purchasing wind power. Houghton said there is beetle kill which trees can be harvested as a carbon neutral fuel, made into pellets and those could be used to snow melt the street, as one option. Houghton said the city is looking at geo water utility, which could collect and generate heat. Houghton said there offsets which can be purchased to reduce carbon elsewhere. Houghton noted the ground source heat pump can do both cooling and heating. Houghton said there are 4 approaches to building green; prescriptive, performance, point system and post occupancy standards. Houghton pointed out prescriptive standards are a list of what one must do, like boiler efficiency, how much power can be used for lighting. This is simple and easy to verify but it does not encourage more conservation or creative approach. Performance standards look at the integral performance of a building through a computer model, look at the baseline building and the minimum per code and compare it with a proposed building. Point systems give a menu of techniques, for which you receive points, and then one has to achieve a threshold. This system is flexible and accounts for things other than energy, like recycled materials, using local products but it does not account for interactions within the building. Post occupancy is where one compares their actual utility bills to what was predicted; this encourages making sure the building is doing what it was expected to do. Houghton proposed the best of each system, designing for maximum efficiency, build a computer simulation measure it, verify and true up at the end of the process. Houghton said the commitment is a 50% building energy reduction, ASHRAE 90.1, a national standard which accounts for climate. The developers will identify energy data from other high end hotels to make sure this project is doing better. The utility bills will be compared to the predictions and trued up if the energy consumption has not been reduced 50%. Houghton said getting LEEDS certification looks not only at energy but at other things like material usage, indoor health. Special Meeting Aspen City Council December 1, 2008 Jay Hammond, Schmeuser Gordon Meyer, told Council the subgrade structure surrounds the site, very few areas will be left in dirt, which is an issue in routing utilities. Hammond said they have met with the utilities to see how to make the project work with their utilities. Hammond noted there is a 12" transmission line running down South Aspen street and through the Summit extension. This is a major line from the water plant and delivers water to the Aspen Mountain water tank. This line is not tapped for service but moves water to the tank. Hammond noted the plan is to take this 12" line down Dean street and up Monarch, keeping it in dirt and out of buildings. Hammond said there will be lazge service lines into the building on the site, off Juan, off South Aspen and off Summit street. Hammond showed how the lines would work for the Sanitation District and their line would be subgrade but they would have easements and access. Hammond told Council he has discussed the project with the fire district. Their main issue is the subgrade space with parking, service area, trash, laundry and accessing this for fire protection. Another fire issue is access to the exterior of the buildings. The fire department will have access along Juan street, the pedestrian way through to Aspen street, and in the separation between the two lodge projects. Hammond told Council they are providing information to the city engineer on drainage. The big aspects of the drainage plan are how to handle drainage within the site and what to do about carrying drainage that comes in from above the site. Hammond told Council the issue of water quality and drainage within the site is being discussed. They are talking abut green roof systems which absorb water and runoff and serve as filtration systems. Hammond noted the applicants have discussed a bioswale system, a landscape zone that is carrying water and drainage, running through the site to help contain water and to filter its discharge. Hammond said the other big issue is off-site drainage. Hammond said they will look at how water will pass through the Shadow Mountain project and how it is handled on this site. Hammond pointed out the regrading at the south end of the site will create a minor basin which will direct water from upslope to the lift base. They will capture that water, have a sediment removal and route that water down the ski comdor. David Leahy, TDA Colorado, told Council they have worked on traffic impact studies in this area for the last year. TDA has produced a report for Council. Leahy told Council the analysis was done for a high occupancy winter day. Leahy said on the high occupancy day, on a daily basis, 1300 vehicle trips would be generated over 24 hours, 650 coming in and 650 going out. The peak hour is 100 vehicles trips in the a.m. and 150 in the after peak hour. Leahy said their analysis comes up with a level of service, which level goes from A to F. The intersections presently operate in the A and B range and the increased traffic will keep the intersections at those same ranges. Leahy noted there are pedestrian improvements throughout the project; Aspen street will be narrowed to 22' with bends in it so that motorists will take that slowly. There will be a Dean street plaza and turn around. Juan street will be a pedestrian way from Garmisch into the site. Leahy said there is a proposed transportation development management 6 Special Meeting Aspen City Council December 1, 2008 plan to include things like a consolidated shuttle run by both lodges, the service and delivery will be centralized. The applicants will look at other measures they can institute to further reduce vehicle trips. Andy McCord, PCL Construction, told Council they are the 9`h largest general contractor in North America. PCL does a lot of resort based construction all over and understands what it is like to work in a resort environment. PCL has worked on the city parking garage, The Ritz, the gondola building in Aspen. Steve Kelly, PCL, told Council he has spent time on site with the applicants, looking at access for Shadow Mountain, continued access for the lift and for mountain operations during the summer, and minimizing disturbance to the neighborhoods. Kelly said they are proposing an efficient construction schedule to get this done as quickly as possible. Kelly told Council they have reviewed the city construction management requirements. They propose breaking the project into 3 phases of construction. Kelly showed how they will construct a temporary bypass road and shift traffic onto that road, realign Aspen street, put traffic back onto Aspen street and separate the site into 2 distinct sites. Kelly showed the critical path scheduling with the goal to get the construction done as quickly as possible. The plan is to start uphill and work down. Kelly presented the haul route plan using Main and South Aspen. Kelly told Council the PCL Denver district has had not loss time accidents in the past 3 years. PCL proposes monthly or more frequent meetings with city staff as well as the neighborhood and public. They will try and avoid peak traffic hours for deliveries and hauling. PCL will designate a liaison to work with the city and to oversee the construction management plan details. Byron Koste, University of Colorado, explained to Council the work they have done on the economics of this project, including meeting with real estate agents, retail businesses and other high end developers. Koste told Council they did their own pro formas; they did not use the developers'. Koste presented one of the spread sheets of which there are 50. Koste told Council his summary is that the current program yields marginal returns, positive, but low to mid-teens, not a robust return. Koste said one of the main reasons for the marginal returns is the public benefits including affordable housing, underground parking, museum, improved mountain access, reduced pavement and park improvements. Greg Come, Economic Research Associates, told Council his company has done a lot of consulting with resort areas. They met with the COWOP. Come told Council over 40% of the fractional ownership projects achieve occupancies that equal or exceed the most successful hotels in Aspen. Fractional ownership is a viable product and has strong economic benefits for resorts. Mayor Ireland asked to compare this project if it were fractional ownership or if it were condominiumized and is there more activity with one type of project over the other. Corrie said fractional ownership projects create better and more activity on properties over whole ownership. Mayor Ireland asked about prohibiting conversion of fractional fee units to condominiums. Corrie said once units are sold as fractional ownership, it would almost impossible to reassemble them and sell as a condominium. Bendon noted that would be a Special Meeting Aspen City Council December 1, 2008 substantive change and would have to be reviewed by Council. Mayor Ireland noted the ordinance calls for Council to approve condominiumization ofthese projects and if Council approves that, there is no legal way to prevent further condominiumization of a project. Bendon said fractional ownership requires condomiumization ofthe unit. Change in use from lodge to residential is a land use action that would be brought to Council. Daniel said a deed restriction to prohibit conversion of fractional units to whole ownership would be acceptable for the applicants. Mayor Ireland requested the city attorney review that deed restriction. Councilwoman Kasabach said in the economic information presented to the COWOP, after reviewing the pro forma, Koste stated there would have to be trade offs. Councilwoman Kasabach asked if the COWOP prioritized the benefits and trade offs. Koste said the COWOP discussed how much affordable housing is enough. Koste said the COWOP took votes on each item, reviewed what they felt had to stay as a benefit, and then allowed programmatic increases of up to 12,000 square feet by the developers on each side of the street to pay for those benefits. Koste said one of their charges from the city was to help the city judge whether or not the project was "too fat"; these public benefits reduce the return. Bendon said Koste was hired to address questions of financing and financial return that come up during development review, when developers state they cannot afford to cut square footage or add public benefits. The city has not had a way to analyze these responses. That does not mean staff did not come up with the best project for this neighborhood, weighing the community goals and compromises inherent to land use planning. Councilwoman Kasabach said her concern is that the project starts, there are large holes in the ground, and there is 10 years of no activity. Bendon noted there are some requirements the city has for bonding the public improvements to be able to recover the site and prevent it from being a public nuisance. Daniel said the applicants need a vested entitlement in order to go for financing. Daniel told Council the Lift One Lodge has an equity partner that has been with the project since the beginning and has been funding the project through this process. Sarpa said they, too; have an equity partner and in project of this size it is typical to bring in financial institutions. Sarpa said the completion guarantees will be part of the financing process. Mayor Ireland asked about the per employee subsidy cost at $130,000, the detail and what assumptions went into that figure. Mayor Ireland said this may use infrastructure costs and construction costs at Burlingame but not land costs. This would be taking a city resource and adding it to this project which is against the no burden on the city goal from the COWOP. Mayor Ireland said it would be appropriate if the project owners agreed to join a ground source heat pump district if one would be created. Mayor Ireland asked if this system will integrate with the storm water or runoff system and if the system the city is building will have capacity to handle the additional runoff created by this project. Mayor Ireland said he wants to know if this area is part of the city's parking management area and part of the license plate recognition system. Mayor Ireland said Special Meeting Aspen Citv Council December 1 2008 other construction sites have overrun neighborhoods with contractors and sub-contractors vehicles. Mayor Ireland asked for help evaluating when a 17% return means. Councilman Romero asked for benchmarking of peers for environmental sustainability. Councilman Romero said he would like to hear more from the fire district that they aze not being asked to carry too much burden. Councilman Romero said the construction management plan as if it were one project is a plus and there should be an ability to discuss this construction management plan with the public. Mayor Ireland opened the public hearing. Denis Murray, COWOP member, said a lot of information was given to the COWOP in an expedited format. Murray said he would like Council to score the project against the goals of the COWOP. Murray said he feels the Skier's Chalet and Steakhouse should be respected in its location and the mass and scale should radiate from that point. Murray said the accessibility goal was welcoming access to all users and the poma does not capture that goal. Murray suggested asking the tramway board for a variance for a ski lift, which would respect the history of the azea and would provide accessibility for all users. Muray said the COWOP did not get a chance to address the sustainability aspect of the project. Murray said there is no auto disincentive in this proposal. Cliff Weiss, P&Z and COWOP member, said he let go of the idea of a chair lift all the way to Dean street because the COWOP did not know what to do with the traffic and there was no good access if south Aspen street were vacated in order to put a chair lift there. Weiss suggested snow could be made up above the ski corridor and pushed into that corridor otherwise there will be no portal to the west side of the mountain. Weiss said P&Z and the COWOP noted there should be a shuttle with designated pick up and drop off points. Weiss said developers build hotels to meet demand and the current demand is for hotel with spas, room service, sizable rooms and high quality service. Weiss said compromises were found in order to get the community benefits, like ski lockers at the base of the mountain, which would draw locals to the west of the mountain. Weiss said the COWOP approved housing for 101 employees on site and 52 off site, which was a 50% mitigation and an integral part of "lights on" for the area. Weiss said he favors this area for hotels, not townhouses. Torre said this proposal needs some refinement. Torre asked why this wasn't broken into multiple projects rather than just one ordinance and separate lots be treated more separately. Torre noted by curving South Aspen street, the view of Aspen Mountain will be eliminated. Torre said the Lodge at Aspen Mountain is designed with bulked up ends, which block the views and make the mass of the building more imposing. Torre said some improvements are warranted and the ski lift is a commitment to Aspen as a ski town. John Kelly, representing owners on Gilbert street, said using Gilbert street as egress from the lodge is dangerous and does not make sense. Gilbert street is not more than an alley; it is very narrow and difficult to maintain, and is used a lot as a pedestrian corridor. Special Meeting Aspen City Council December 1, 2008 Kelly suggested service vehicles enter and egress at the same point, lower on Aspen street, for health and safety reasons. Kelly said his clients support the project in general except for the proposed use of Gilbert street, which is not wide enough to accommodate two-way traffic. Patrick Sagal asked what the project return is in dollars and is that amount calculated in today's dollars. Sagal said 15 years vesting seems too long and like this maybe guaranteeing profitability. Sagal said the project is too big. Koste explained the pro forma takes the money out and the money in and shows over time, discounted cash value, to calculate a return. Koste said the return is calculated at $50 million based on a $500 million project. This is putting money in a project where the return is 3, 4 or 5 years down the road; this is higher risk project. Koste said as far as vesting, if the time is shorter, another project could come in for review that is better, or not. Koste said master planning always affords a better result than doing it piecemeal. Koste noted a project with fewer community benefits could be smaller. Bendon reminded Council the financial information provided to the consultant is to be confidential and only to be shared with the applicant's consent. Bendon said staff does not evaluate projects For their financial success but to evaluate the community goals, the land use code, to manage the product, not the financial position of the developer. Mayor Ireland said the numbers developed by Koste were from public information, not from the applicants. Bruce Wank, Lift One condominiums, said they were not on the COWOP but have worked with the developer. Wank noted the location of Lift One makes it carry a lot of the burden of this project with traffic going up and down Aspen street. Wank said it does not seem as if the burden is being shared throughout the entire neighborhood. Eben Clark, representing Silver Shadow, asked the east building of Lift One Lodge has flat, grassy roofs that will that be used by guests. Daniel said there is some balcony access but it is not a rooftop deck. Clark asked the FAR to the private property not the entire 8 acres. Clark asked the total squaze footage including above and below grade and the FAR for that number. Bendon said the city regulates and measures square footage above grade. Clark said this project will eliminate their ski out, which the developer is trying to address. Clark said their largest concern is the lack of detail necessazy to analyze the project. Clark said the traffic analysis states the intersections will stay in the same range after the project is built and how can that many cazs be added and retain the same performance rating at the intersections. Clazk asked what would have to change with the design if the tramway variance is not granted. Clazk said his clients aze also concerned with 15 year vesting and that the approvals are being packaged for sale. Clark told Council his clients continue to work with the developers, which in general has been productive. Daniel said if the rights-of--way and public properties aze deducted, the floor area ratio for the master planned area is 1.34:1. The allowable FAR in the lodge zone district is 2.5:1 and the allowable FAR in the commercial core is 2.75:1. 10 Special MeetiaE Aspen City Council December 1, 2008 Mary Janss, COWOP member, asked if there is a transportation plan up Aspen street, like a shuttle. Daniel said the applicants have been talking to the city's transportation department and they are looking at integrating this area with the cross town shuttle or the Galena street. Ms. Janss said as a COWOP member it is hazd for her to imagine any part of the project going forwazd without other pieces. Howie Mallory said mass size and architecture are critical; Council should not lose sight of having a quality yeaz-round hotel operation in Aspen. This is what the community has been trying to get at the base of Aspen mountain. Mallory said when this hotel is operational, will the town have the best type hotel operation. Council needs to ask how this will operate as a hotel so it meets the goals of having a first class operation at the base of the mountain, functioning year after yeaz. Junee Kirk said she is concerned about the preservation of the historic grid system and realigning Aspen street does not preserve the historic character of the neighborhood. This could be fixed if the lodges were smaller in size and scale. Toni Kronberg said two important goals of the task force are transportation and traffic. The goals said this should create an easy and welcoming access to all users while minimizing traffic and pavement. Ms. Kronberg said the method of transportation recommended by the COWOP does not meet those two goals. Transportation should have been broken up into two sections; how get skiers up and down Aspen street and get the hotel guests up and down the street; the second section is to mitigate the transportation impacts on the rest of the community. Ms. Kronberg said there will be skiers, museum visitors, hotel guests, employees and residents all will be going in and out of the site. Ms. Kronberg said the platter lift is a form of transportation for skiers only. Ms. Kronberg said this project is offering paltry community benefits. The impact of this project will be adding 2,000 cars/day through the entrance to Aspen and this issue has to be dealt with before the project is approved. Mayor Ireland closed the public hearing. Councilman Romero said he would like to see more detail around the bus shuttle. Councilman Romero said he would also like more about the surface lift, hours of operation and snow cover. Councilman Romero questioned the performance of the intersections at A and B, even after the development and would like more detail about that, the service vehicle circulation plan. Councilman Romero noted the Aspen Area Community Plan addresses the virtue of having the elements of a resort community and the open and inviting opportunity for what residents get to enjoy 366 days a year. Councilman Romero said the public benefits list of this development is substantial and one cannot ignore all the parts and pieces of this list. Councilman Romero said one has to look at the benefits in conjunction with the requirements of the land use code and the goals of the AACP to measure this project fairly. The benefits and the burdens are trade offs. Councilman Romero said he feels for this project, the benefits outweigh the burdens. Councilman Romero said there are more details needed. 11 Special Meeting Aspen Citv Council December 1 2008 Councilwoman Kasabach said the construction schedule and which parts of the project come first concern her. Daniel said he will outline when pieces occur with each part of the development. In general one does not get a certificate of occupancy until the affordable housing obligation has been met. Sarpa said the applicants would expect that the community benefits be identified and a schedule when these occur prior to the developers taking advantage of their approvals. Sarpa said the applicants would not want their operation running unless the lift is installed and operating. Sarpa said they will commit to building the community benefits in a timely way prior to the applicants being able to take advantage of the approvals. Mayor Ireland said there were presentations that acknowledged this is a shady site and it seems pushing snow down to the corridor should not be a problem and the applicants could commit to making this work. Mayor Ireland said a plan B, which is not a line of cars going up Aspen street, is needed for when the poma cannot or is not operating. Mayor Ireland said if there are going to be poma operations, there needs to be assurance that this will continue and not atrophy. Mayor Ireland noted the affordable housing should be trued up so that if more employees are generated than anticipated, there is a requirement to meet that need. Mayor Ireland said if there is going to be snow melting of the streets, Council should make sure there is a guaranteed renewable energy source for that. Sarpa said the COWOP requested 70 to 80% affordable housing mitigation. The applicants have proposed 75% mitigation and if they could find a way to increase affordable housing without burdening the project, they would present it. Koste said the current affordable housing mitigation is 75%. With the sales of condominiums and fractional fees, 1.5% real estate transfer tax is collections, which will garner close to $12 million to use for affordable housing. Koste said the transfer tax could be increased for future sales of both project of .25%. Koste said that may raise enough money to bond the additiona125% of affordable housing, get it built up front, and pay for the revenue stream of sales of this project. Koste said an alternative is to set up a metro district, which could also have private increment financing with a sunset date. There would be a millage on all sales of the project which could cover the gap between the 75% affordable housing and 100% affordable housing. Daniel said this is a creative way to get to 100% affordable housing and to provide a long term benefit for the community. Councilman Romero moved to continue Ordinance #34, Series of 2008, to 2 p.m. December 8, 2008; seconded by Councilwoman Kasabach. All in favor, motion tamed, Council left Chambers at 10:25 p.m. ~'~ ' ~ ~~~ Kathryn .Koch, City Clerk 12