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HomeMy WebLinkAboutminutes.hpc.20141112 f ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF NOVEMBER 12, 2014 Vice-chair, Willis Pember called the meeting to order at 5:00 p.m. Commissioners in attendance were Nora Berko, John Whipple, Jim DeFrancia and Patrick Sagal. Absent was Sallie Golden. Staff present: Debbie Quinn, Assistant City Attorney Amy Simon, Preservation Planner Sara Adams, Senior Planner Kathy Strickland, Chief Deputy Clerk 229 W. Smuggler/426 N. Second — Conceptual Major Development, On- Site Relocation and Variances Continue Public Hearing to a date certain MOTION: Jim made the motion to continue 229 W. Smuggler/426 N. Second to January 7", second by Willis. All in favor, motion carried. 101 W. Main St. aka Molly Gibson Lodge and Lot 2 of 125 W. Main St. Historic Landmark Lot Split— Planned Development Project Review, Conceptual Major Development, Demolition, Commercial Design Conceptual Review, Design Variances, Growth Management, Subdivision Debbie said the affidavit of posting is in order including the public outreach and the applicant can proceed - Exhibit 1. Exhibit II— Staff Presentation power point Applicant power point Exhibit III Sara Adams said the parcel along Main Street is in the mixed use zone and the portion along Hopkins is zoned R-6 and the entire property has the lodge preservation overlay on it. Sara said the reviews will be the demolition of the existing lodge along Main Street, Conceptual Major development review, Conceptual commercial design review, residential design standard review for the single family homes along Hopkins. A planned development referral with city council for a project review. A project review is where all the dimensional requirements are established. HPC is also asked to do growth management review for affordable housing mitigation and you are asked to make a recommendation 1 ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF NOVEMBER 12, 2014 to City Council on subdivision. The subdivision review relates to merging the Molly Gibson lodge with the vacant lot that is adjacent to it. The purpose of the lodge preservation overlay is to encourage development that is compatible with the neighborhood and respective of the manner that the property was historically operated. It applies to lodges that are usually in residential zone districts. It allows flexibility in dimensional requirements to allow boards to find a balance to allow more floor area in exchange for in this case small lodge rooms and the development that meets the context of the neighborhood. The proposal is for Parcel I along Main Street and Parcel 2 will be the two single family homes along Hopkins. The proposal is the demolition of the entire lodge and staff is supportive of the demolition along Main Street. It does meet the review criteria for demolition. They intend to add a two story building above grade with a basement. They have surface parking off the alley and have one affordable housing unit to meet their on-site affordable housing requirement. They have one free market residential unit on the third floor of the lodge. They purpose a three story lodge which will be a great addition to Main Street. The modules and overall style of the project is exciting and will compliment Main Street. The Main Street parcel including the vacant lot is 18,000 square feet. We are also supportive of the height of 32 feet. The mixed use zone district has a height limit of 28 feet but you can increase to 32 feet through commercial design review. There are some setback variations along Garmisch Street for roof overhangs and a variation along the alley. Staff feels these setbacks are appropriate considering the lodging use on the parcel. We are extremely supportive of the site plan. The applicant is proposing to break the property up and have residential along Hopkins and have the lodge use along the Main Street. They are asking for a variance for their cumulative floor area from 18,000 the underlying mixed use zone district to about 27,000 square feet. If you take into account putting lodge on both parcels their overall floor area which is based on how big your lot is much much larger. One of the reasons we are supportive for the proposal along Main Street is because we are supportive of the site plan to all lodge use along Main Street as opposed to breaking it up which they could do and put lodge along Hopkins. Their growth management is a calculation of FTE "full time equivalents" is determined and needs mitigated and the applicant needs to tell us how they are going to do it. They are providing one on-site unit which will be a one bedroom rental and they will buy housing credits to make up the difference. 2 . ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF NOVEMBER 12, 2014 Staff is supportive of their growth management proposal. Staff feels there can be some restudy of the Main Street parcel setbacks. Most of the building is five feet back and the required is ten feet. Through special review you can decrease that to five feet. Some of the upper floors encroach 2 %2 feet into the setback. The existing building encroaches into the right-of- way so any improvement would be a great improvement to what exists now. The commercial design review requires a delivery area that needs to be along the alley and delineated. There needs to be some information as to how they are going to receive deliveries. The biggest issue for staff is to restudy the two story module which is adjacent to the historic landmark. They have dropped down the height and set it back to align with the historic landmark. Because they want to merge the two lots together we feel the purpose of the landmark lot split is not met because it is basically creating one long building. There is a step down for the two story module but we feel they can go a little further. Maybe make it appear that it is detached or detach it to reflect the different patterns on Main Street. Parcel 2 —two single family residences. Sara said staff is supportive of the residential use. This is a 9,000 square.foot lot. Staff is supportive of the architectural style and we support the growth management review. We are recommending a restudy of the neighborhood context. There are concerns about the requested floor area. The maximum floor area for those homes is 4,080 square feet and they are proposing 9,000 square feet to be split between the two homes. Staff feels that is too much floor area on the site and that impacts their ability to meet the residential design standards and the ability to meet the maximum site coverage and side yard setbacks. We feel there should be a slight reduction to better relate to the neighborhood. Staff is recommending a continuation to resolve some of the issues. Stan Clauson & Associates CCY Architects Michael Brown, owner thanked staff for a great ongoing dialogue on the project. We worked hard on the western exposure of the hotel. We feel the project is sensitive to community needs and the surroundings of the Molly Gibson Lodge. The Molly is one of the few remaining locally owned hotels. I have owned the hotel since 2007. This project is a culmination of the Hotel Aspen experience and the feedback we got from the community and various boards. Our ownership has continually invested back into the hotel. 3 ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF NOVEMBER 12, 2014 Michael said this project is the lowest floor area density and lowest height of any lodging project presently proposed in the city. The current hotel is 53 rooms and we are replacing it with 64 new rooms which is over a 20% increase to the current bed base. There are two free market homes on the Hopkins side and the lodge condominium is just under 1,500 square feet. The project has no requests for building fee waivers, affordable housing waivers or parking waivers. It conforms to the height of both respective zone districts. There is a need for a meeting space inside the hotel. We also intend to use local artists throughout the hotel. We have attempted to respect the neighborhood. We were also one of the early adopters of bikes for our guests to get them connected to Aspen. We also supply our staff with bus passes and complimentary airport transportation as well. John Cottle, CCY architects The rooms are small and smart,just over 300 square feet. The core of the hotel needs to be efficient and simple. The larger rooms have double queens and kings. The average size of the Limelite room is 450 square feet. The eastern part of the hotel on the ground level faces Paepcke Park and that area is public space. With the Hotel Aspen they have a full size pool. On the Molly we have a large hot tub which is 16 feet long as a private space for guests. With the historical society we are creating a Molly Gibson history corner. The building is 90 feet long facing Paepcke Park and 50 feet of it is two stories. Our intent is focusing on year round activities. The hotel fits within the grain of the town. Porches on small lodges are important. We are pulling the hotel five feet back in order to have a detached sidewalk and allow the street trees to continue. All of Aspen is built on 30, 60 and 90 foot modules. We tried to design this building around that in order to fit into Aspen. The materials are durable. We are proposing a wood siding with a metal. The residences are 112 and 114 Hopkins. There is a ground level bedroom, porch, stair roof and a secondary roof. All of those elements are between 16 and 25 feet wide. We are significantly reducing the scale on the street. Hopkins Street is a very varied street. 112 is the western house that has a first floor bedroom 16 feet wide and the gable is set back 60 feet from the curb line. 114 has a flat roof and is 7 feet lower than 112 and the flat roof is set back 60 from the street. We are requesting two variances one for a front door which is set back 13 feet and the requirement is ten feet. The other is the height of the break in the glass. We are asking 8 to 10 feet rather than 9 to 12 feet. 4 ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF NOVEMBER 12, 2014 Stan Clauson said the bones of the building which was the Smuggler Motor Lodge was built in 1954. In the 70's it was changed to a hotel. At the open house the only concerns were about construction and construction management plans. There were no concerns about the building and size etc. The AACP plan gives us guidance and calls upon the community to replenish the lodging base. The average room is slightly over 300 square feet. Since the 1990's the bed base has been lost. With the lodge preservation program that exists today allows free market development to be associated with the lodge as an incentive as a way of financing the development. You have the lodge, amenities and free market units and unfortunately the addition of those three components frequently does not compute. It essentially brings you to have larger numbers than the underlying zoning and brings you into the PUD process in order to bring forward a lodge plan. The City of Aspen's top ten goal in 2013-2014 was to implement an incentive program for the short term bed base. Stan said the project is L-PUD in the front and LP-R-6 on the Hopkins side. The site is 27,000 square feet and the current zoning is R-6 on Hopkins and on Main Street it is Mixed Use with a lodge preservation overlay. The LP overlay determines the permitted uses and the maximum of the floor area for . the residentials. The proposed project is almost 36,000 square feet but it does have a significant amount of affordable housing and on lot 1 a free market component and on lot 2 a 9,000 square foot component. Lot 2 has less floor area than across the street and fits with the lodge incentive program as well. The height of the hotel is at 32 feet which is the maximum. The lodge rooms are 304 square feet from 360 square feet and with new common spaces and energy efficiency. Stan said the LP protects existing small lodges and directs you to the L zone for free market parameters. The net livable lodge use is 19,000 and the average size room at 304 square feet permits 60% residential development and that means you would have an allowable floor area of 11, 491 square feet. This project is proposing 1,000 square feet less than what would be Permitted by the lodging incentive free market development parameters in the code. Stan said there will be a five foot parkway and an 8 foot sidewalk which conforms to the engineering standards on Main Street. Parking on Garmisch will be parallel. This is the last property on Main Street that has an attached 5 ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF NOVEMBER 12, 2014 sidewalk. There are bench seating insets along Main Street. There is also a little patio area along Garmisch. The guest parking is off the alley and there are 12 parking spaces that meets the requirement for parking based on the ability to retain the existing parking deficit. There is lots of landscaping along the parkway along Main Street and landscaping along Garmisch. We are maintaining the integrity of the historic district with the modularity and other factors. We have also maintained the building widths and we have maintained the roof forms. We step back and step down in scale. Nora inquired about further dialogue between the western module and the historic structure. John said one possibility would be to break the element further apart and consider changing the character of it. We would prefer not to change the character. We could study breaking it up further. Willis asked about the collaboration with the Hotel Aspen and the overhangs. Michael said there is an overlap and it is challenging to run a small lodge. We have shared staff and marketing as well as the shuttles. The pool can be shared and we have incorporated meeting space into the Molly Gibson. There are overhangs on the second floor that do not meet the five feet. The setback on level two and three is to accommodate queen queen configured rooms rather than just a king room which lends itself to the affordability of the lodge. The variance would be 2 %2 feet. The deliveries will be on the alley. Willis said Sara's recommendation is that everything meet the five foot setback. Michael said if we reduce the setback the room becomes smaller and two queens won't fit. Nora asked if there was a way that the side yard dimension be within the setbacks on Parcel I, the residential. Stan said in terms of the design that is the way it was developed and fits well on the site. There is a ten foot requirement between the buildings and that is dictated by the land use code and the building code. The ten feet is met. 6 ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF NOVEMBER 12, 2014 Vice-chair, Willis Pember opened the public hearing. There were no public comments. The public hearing was closed. Willis thanked staff for doing a great job presenting this which is highly complicated and HPC is not used to seeing. It is very digestible. Willis identified the issues: Restudy the 2 story module adjacent Meet a minimum of a 5' setback along Main Street Provide information on delivery area Reduce the floor area of the residence along Hopkins Meet the RDS standards Meet the site coverage and setback requirement for single family homes Parcel II. Willis said this is an exciting project and crafted well. The two story module does not meet the intent of the lot split. The aesthetic being contemporary are OK but the dialogue should be split between the historic property and the hotel. Willis said he can support the mass and scale of the project. A connector piece might be an option. Meeting the five foot setback along Main Street seems easy to do. The two vertical windows over two vertical windows needs restudied. All the public spaces are in the right places. Possibly see more development of the public amenity space. Willis said on Parcel II these are two houses that need to conform to the RDS's. The metrics in the code help to ensure the scale and that the context is respected. Patrick thanked the applicants for designing something that is close to fitting something that the public has longed for and that fits into most of the staff review. Possible introduce a connector to parcel 1. I am in favor of the five foot setback and the RDS regulations. This project will benefit the community. John commented on the two story module on the historic lot split. With the inflection and the fact that the historic building is only one story in my opinion a more modem approach is fitting. If this lot was purchased by someone else and they tried to fit something on a 3,000 square foot lot we would have more issues. The design is fitting. I also enjoy the undulation of 7 ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF NOVEMBER 12, 2014 the second story stepping out 2 '/2 feet. I am not opposed to that and it breaks up the fagade to have it step back rather than one sheer wall going up. I am also in favor of the increased square footage on Hopkins especially since you are not asking for a lot of other things. Hopkins Street should be residences. I feel the RDS standard are out dated. The few variances you are requesting one to change the window height and setting back the front door 13 feet are fine. Regarding the site coverage I am in favor of what is being proposed. This building still feels like the Molly Gibson and its fabrics. This is a well thought out project. They could be asking for huge height increases. We need to work with the applicants in order for them to move forward. Jim said he likes the project a lot and the public amenity is very positive. You aren't asking for any waivers. I don't have a problem with the setback in order for the queen beds to fit. I am in favor of the site coverage conforming to the code. I am in favor of approving this with conditions. Nora thanked staff and the team for their presentation. The hotel part is great. The historic corner is an exciting evolution of this hotel. On the residential side my concerns are Parcel II. The RDS's guidelines are there and should be met. I am in favor of approving with conditions. Willis said he is fine with the setback variance on Main Street. Patrick agreed with Willis. Willis said he has a problem with approving Parcel I with the two story modules. Debbie pointed out to the board that you cannot condition mass and scale. Willis suggested restudying the two story module, layout of the delivery area and to meet the design standards for Parcel II. MOTION: Jim moved to continue 101 W. Main Street Molly Gibson and Lot 2 of 125 W. Main Street until Dec. 3`a, second by Patrick. Patrick said for parcel II the side yard setback is not met for the residential parcel. 8 ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF NOVEMBER 12, 2014 Sara said both side yard setbacks are not met. There is supposed to be ten on each and five feet is proposed. They do meet the distance between the buildings of ten feet. Patrick asked about the FAR. Sara said staff is asking that the floor area be reduced. They can't meet the 4,080 of the R6 and that is not entire appropriate because they are doing an economy lodge project. Its reducing it a little bit in-trying to get closer to the setback requirements and trying to make it a little bit smaller to fit into the context but not meeting the letter of the law. John said this is a PUD and we are essentially making a recommendation to council Willis said the dimension for R-6 is 4,080 FAR and under the lodge overlay it is 11,000, 4091 square feet and we are somewhere in between. Nora said the side yard setbacks have to do with livability as well for the neighbors. Willis said the side yard setbacks are right now 5 feet east to west. In the R- 6 zoning it is ten feet. Stan said the lodging incentive program as it currently exists today provides for 60% of the lodging net leasable in the rooms be transferred to potential floor area. It is impossible to do that and at the same time reduce the floor area and provide a full ten foot setback on either side of the two residential units and reduce the site coverage and still have anything that comes close to the amount of lodging incentive that the code provides for. This is where the numbers don't compute. The LP should cause us to look at the buildings themselves and whether they work or not. What John Cottle has presented is a huge advantage over the current condition of having the Molly Gibson on Hopkins with its over 7,000 foot floor area. Coming back with ten foot setbacks on either side you have taken away the viability of the project. Michael Brown said we have learned from the Hotel Aspen to not go up higher. There has to be somewhere to put the residences. 9 ASPEN HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMISSION MINUTES OF NOVEMBER 12, 2014 Jim said he finds validity in the comments and the applicant should discuss this with staff. Willis said the applicant is seeing a range of things from the board and others are accommodating to the variances. John said when you have two neighbors that have bought their property and have lived there a long time with five foot setbacks. We'aren't taking away anything. We are leaving them what they have and making a good use of the development rights. They could come back with an 11,000 square foot Molly Gibson lodge on Hopkins rather than two residences. This is a win win situation for that neighborhood. Roll call vote: Patrick, yes; John, no; Willis, yes; Nora, yes; Jim, yes. Motion carried 4-1. MOTION: Jim moved to adjourn, second by Willis. All in favor, motion carried. Meetings adjourned at 7:30 p.m. (lf(�G4i1 % Kathleen S ickland, Chief Deputy Clerk 10