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HomeMy WebLinkAboutminutes.hpc.20120627 ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF JUNE 27, 2012 Chairperson, Ann Mullins called the meeting to order at 5:00 p.m. Commissioners in attendance: Willis Pember, Jay Maytin, Patrick Sagal, Sallie Golden and Jane Hills. Jamie McLeod and Nora Berko were excused. Staff present: Debbie Quinn, Assistant City Attorney Amy Guthrie, Historic Preservation Officer Kathy Strickland, Chief Deputy City Clerk MOTION: Jane made the motion to approve the minutes of June 13th second by Ann. All in favor, motion carried. Disclosure: Jan disclosed that she received the public notice on 204 S. Galena and she will recuse herself on that agenda item. 420 E. Hyman — Conceptual Major Development and Conceptual Commercial Design Review, Demolition, Special Review Ann asked if there were any public comments. No public comments. MOTION: Sallie moved to continue 420 E. Hyman, public hearing to July 25th second by Jay. All in favor, motion carried. 204 S. Galena St. — Conceptual Major Development and conceptual Commercial Design Review, Demolition Debbie Quinn relayed that the public notice and affidavit are in order— Exhibit I Amy relayed that this is a 9,030 square foot lot. The building was built in 1991 and currently the Gap is occupying the space. Your review is demolition and conceptual design review. Because the building is in the downtown historic district HPC has to determine if demolition review criteria are met or not. Staff feels the criteria are met and there is no evidence that the building is historic. The proposal is to remove the entire existing building which only occupies about 2/3rds of the site and there is a surface parking lot. The new structure will cover the whole property. Removing the car/pedestrian conflict is a good idea. The proposal allows HPC to make an exception to the public amenity requirement. Every property downtown has to provide 25% of the property open from the 1 ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF JUNE 27, 2012 ground to the sky. Because there is an existing building they are already allowed to reduce that requirement to 10% of the site but HPC needs to see that 10% divided on site so 900 square feet of the public amenity space which is usually an outdoor space needs to be on-site or they can pay a cash- in-lieu fee. Staff recommends the cash-in-lieu fee. We don't want to see the property have open space on the street because it is primarily a one story building and being on the corner site and anchoring building that it should occupy the entire property. One thing suggested is that the public amenity can be provided on an upper floor and this would be a good location for a restaurant where there is public access to the nice views. The applicant is entertaining that concept but they don't have a proposed tenant. Staff supports cash-in-lieu for the public amenity on the site. The property meets all the dimensional requirements and requires no variances. As they remove the 7 parking spaces they are permitted to pay cash-in-lieu which is $30,000 per space to provide for other parking options in town. There are no variances requested. HPC guidelines: It will be an asset to the scale and character of downtown to retain primarily a one story. There is an upper floor that is held back. Staff has concerns with the cornice line and it is important to have a uniform height enforcing the one story character. Staff is recommending continuation to restudy the cornice line and also the concern with the program. You need to account for how all the space in the building is used and as the plans are right now it is not clear how the basement is going to be used for. If it is for tenants it could trigger affordable housing which would change the shape. The height for a two story is 28 feet. Ann asked if there is a historic pattern for modules on a 100 foot lot. Willis asked if the commercial design standards talk about public amenity. Amy said with public amenity we don't necessarily want all buildings pulled back so we are discussing ways you can provide it and give more options such as second floors. The guidelines have three or four pages of discussion on positive forms of public amenities. Charles Cunniffe, Cunniffe architects Exhibit II — elevations 2 ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF JUNE 27, 2012 Charles said at the work session the only concern was the cornice. There are five spaces on the ground floor and one above where before there were four spaces on the ground floor. It has allowed us to create a smaller retail for the store fronts. The material would be a cut stone in a smooth and rough form. We have a restaurant on the second floor and you would enter from Hopkins. You would go into a lobby and up to the restaurant. We hope to use our roof deck for our public amenity space. We are proposing a common area for storage and if it is not allowed we would eliminate it. We do not want to come back with a redesign of a building and discuss housing issues. Chairperson, Ann Mullins opened the public hearing. There were no public comments. The public hearing portion of the agenda item was closed. Issues: West façade —restudy Public amenity space Net leasable North elevation Demolition Jay said the amenity space is a good idea. The demolition meets the criteria. Conceptually the north and west facades are OK. At the next meeting it would be helpful to have drawings of the mechanical on top of the building. Patrick said he is OK with the roof top restaurant and demolition. On roof top visibility I am not sure how you handle spillover. The three most vital places in town as far as bringing people to an area are Peach's, Paradise Bakery and Le Creperie. An opening on the corner across from Peaches would be a beneficial amenity to bring people in to shop. Sallie the building seems to be a little lifeless and the variation on the west façade brings some life to the building. The material selection anchors the building and the restaurant and public amenity would be great. I am not in favor of taking space out on the ground level because that corner needs to be anchored. The design is good. Willis said it is quite unusual to see a project that is not maxed in size. Creating a one story design will be challenging. It seems a little static on the west and the cornice needs restudied. Having the corner cutaway at the alley 3 • ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF JUNE 27, 2012 is a little inappropriate given the historic patterns (chamfer corner). That is a little out of the historic pattern. Ann said coming up to the sidewalk and the one story is OK. The demolition and cash-in-lieu is OK. Having the deck for public amenity instead of cash-in-lieu is a great idea. The north elevation needs a stronger cornice. I also question the 20 foot modules and maybe they need to be of different heights, 30 foot modules. The west side needs more study and the general massing is fine. Jay said the board needs to address the chamfer corner and should it be a right angle like all the other alleys. Charles said the client wants symmetry on the building. The chamfer provides symmetry from the other corner and more than that it engages pedestrians to notice the store and not just like you are looking into an alley. It is a new building and not trying to be an historic building. On the façade our materials are very sedate because we feel that the individual tenants will want to liven it up with their signage and awnings. We want the building to be serene and clean and let the tenants liven it up. Jay said he feels you will engage the commerce in the alley which is not pretty. Charles said for many years we have been discussing engaging the alleys with messy vitality and use the alleys for storefronts and businesses. City hall engages g ges the alley quite nicely. Patrick said engaging things in the alleys is desirable. It is a warm corner, south west and possibly the glass shouldn't go to the ground. Ann said part of what makes a district is a continuous façade. The board is somewhat split on the chamfer corner. Willis said you can achieve serenity without symmetry. The symmetry doesn't fit the downtown. Willis said he appreciates the monolithic quality of the building materials. I'm not sure you could have 30 foot modules in this building. 4 ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF JUNE 27, 2012 Charles said the existing Gap building is 20 foot modules. There are no 30 foot modules around this block and no references to them. MOTION: Ann moved to continue the public hearing on 204 S. Galena to July 25th, second by Patrick. All in favor, motion carried. MOTION: Jay moved to adjourn; second by Ann. All in favor, motion carried. 233 W. Hallam —work session — no minutes. Debbie Quinn, assistant city attorney said this is a work session and there can be no approvals and the applicant cannot rely on anything that is said by the commission as a whole or by any individual commissioners. There is nothing that can be stated up front that you can rely formally on. You are trying to get impressions and input. Meeting adjourned at 7:00 p.m. Kathleen J. Strickland, Chief Deputy Clerk 5