I lived in Houston in the early nineties and it was a shit show.
The lack of zoning or control at the city level meant miles and miles of crappy development along major arteries. You could literally have a day care next to a tire shop, next to an adult store, next to a nursing home. It was a giant mess IMO.
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No zoning requirements is absurd. Artificial height limitations in the downtown of a capital city are also absurd. There doesn’t need to be only one extreme or the other.
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This is true. The height restrictions, especially on the 40 story parcels, needs some serious explanation. If it’s city services or infrastructure, let’s hear how that gets rectified and what it costs. When a decision comes out without context, the presumptions about it run wild like it does here in the community.
What’s the real story?
Did the city intend for developers to NOT challenge the zoning or ask for Individual variances?
What was the basis for the relationship between floor counts and height? I ask because it neither makes sense, nor is it consistent.
Agreed, they are too conservative across the board (no pun intended).
I somewhat agree that there should be more graduation and/or parcel by parcel consideration. All zoning and height limits are ‘artificial’ sort of by definition. I do think the City would save some troubles up next to neighborhoods if they’d encourage taller stuff in the most central part of the core. Say 60+ along Dawson, McDowell, Fayetteville and such. I would then personally (I know you and others will disagree) only be at like 10 around the mansions on Hillsborough St and the warehouse district. Then we both kind of get what we want instead of a mesa top of 20 story stuff.
The Planning Commission Agenda for December 11th shows discussing changing the feet height in 7 , 12 , 20 , & 40 story projects ! Council referred this possible change back to them for their opinion .
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Thinking this belongs in a different discussion topic- but how exciting!! I bet this may change plans for Two Glenwood- someone on here said they did a site tour of One Glenwood and was told that the developers would’ve built taller if it weren’t for the height restriction. So perhaps they will keep Two G at 12 stories but could build to a taller maximum!!!
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This is good news, though the real disconnect between floors and height that needs to be solved is for taller towers. Below are heights per floor for each UDO classification:
3 floors/ 50 ft. - 16.67ft./floor
4 floors/ 62 ft. - 15.5ft./floor
5 floors/ 75 ft. - 15.0ft./floor
7 floors/ 90 ft. - 12.85ft/floor
12 floors/ 150 ft. - 12.5ft./floor
20 floors/ 250 ft. - 12.5ft./floor
40 floors/ 500 ft. - 12.5ft./floor
I argue that the height for 3 and 5 floors is a bit overblown since those buildings are likely to made of wood and be residential or small hotel in nature. Conversely, we have a real problem with 12 floors and up. It’s nearly impossible for concrete or steel buildings of a commercial nature to be built under those height limits with the maximum floors allowed. At minimum, these buildings should be 15 ft. per floor like the shorter buildings are allowed, and they should have some sort of add-on height for a crown on top of the building so that we aren’t left with a bunch of flat top buildings. My hope is for numbers more like this:
12 floors: 200 ft./ 15ft. per floor + 20 ft. crown
20 floors: 330 ft./ 15ft. per floor + 30 ft. crown
40 floors: 660 ft./ 15ft. per floor + 60 ft. crown
One could also argue that the floor count is inconsequential. For example, why not build a 60 floor hotel & residential building with 10’-6" slab to slab height and still stay under an expanded height of 660 ft.?
That was me, but since they’re supposed to start building this spring, I doubt they’re going to change at this point. But who knows?
They should have bought and built on Fayetteville st if they felt crimped at One Glenwood’s site. There’s nothing more aggravating to me than a buyer going ‘oh look, what a great area’, and then messing up the things that make it a great area…in this case just contemplating, but still…
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I…don’t think that’s what they said.
What I’m getting out of that is they don’t think the location is zoned high enough…otherwise why even say anything? And the zoning is meant to provide/maintain a certain aesthetic there. Any more than the zoning allows is presumed to, and felt by some/many, to change that aesthetic.
What aesthetics make that section of town so great that the area could not be rezoned to DX-20?
Further, based on your argument, do you believe all zoning should stay stagnant? If someone wanted to build 50 stories on the N&O site would you say too bad so sad, it is DX-40 and that is what the aesthetics demand for the area?
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Whoa there.
- I am not the purveyor of a particular aesthetic…I am just stating that is a big part of why a height restriction even exists. I can take an educated guess as to that aesthetic here…can you? Or are you just ruffled by what that guess probably is?
- Not one thing in my post suggested I think they should stay stagnant. If you want to turn the direction of the conversation towards entertaining that possibility, go for it…I was just working within the idea of what it is today. But it is sort of obvious that rapidly changing zoning, is more or less like not having zoning at all. We all need a solid framework to know what we’re working with, and tweaking it is fine, but erasing it and rewriting it to say fit a particular developer’s prospectus, might be kowtowing a bit too much.
Before I finish, know that I think its cool to read into what people say and try to figure out where they’re coming from, but holy crap, you took what I actually said and ran off a cliff with it.
Back to the N&O site…yes, very much so, put 50 stories there. Make it 80 even. That’s where I would want it. I have 6-10 sites in mind that I think would be great for that sort of thing, if the market was there for it. Plus putting 50 there takes the pressure off pushing mid rise stuff up into single family and historic areas.
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Regarding aesthetics, I am not sure that there’s anything associated with the actual UDO that speaks to that. It would seem to me that aesthetics issues reside in streetscape plans and the appearance commission. FWIW, here’s a mission statement of sorts from that commission.
Purpose
The Appearance Commission was established by City Council in 1973 to provide guidance, advice and recommendations regarding the visual quality and aesthetic characteristics of the City of Raleigh. The commission consists of 15 members, the majority of whom have special training or experience in architecture, landscape architecture, horticulture, city planning, or related design fields.
The Commission also appoints standing committees to undertake special design-related outreach and education efforts such as the Sir Walter Raleigh Awards.
I find it odd that the purpose has such weak language. It doesn’t look like they have any real teeth to affect actual appearance, other than dangling a possible Sir Walter Raleigh Award in developers’ faces. Do recommendations from the appearance commission go to someone who actually votes up or down on projects, or do developments that conform to the UDO not even go before an approval process for aesthetics?
https://www.raleighnc.gov/home/content/BoardsCommissions/Articles/AppearanceCommission.html
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The Appearance Commission is a joke. The key phrase is “recommendations.” Basically, any developer who is about to dump millions into a project can literally say, “thanks for the advice AP, not interested” and there is not a thing anyone can do about it as long as it conforms to the standard. The best they can hope for as an agreeable developer who is as interested in having the correct sidewalk trees as they are.
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That’s really, really depressing to hear, but thanks for sharing it.
What qualifies one to be on this commision? How are they selected? I would be worried that if it’s not diverse enough in its experience and expertise this group could conspire to only recommend buildings 20 stories or less and stick built apartment buildings with big lonely sidewalks except for the scooters.
I agree The Appearance Commission is a joke. Not only is it powerless but the city doesn’t really have a theme going on–just useless restrictions. If there was an iconic design language that we could build on, an Appearance Commission would make sense.
I would love to see a developer just buy a neighborhood size chuck of land near downtown Raleigh and have a running theme going on. Say like using unique handmade roof tiles made only in Raleigh and all the buildings having a color and material palette restriction with street designs that are very photogenic with many wonderful terminating vistas, lots of greenery, and a few pedestrian ‘high streets’ for shopping.
I doubt something like will ever happen though but I’m in Hoi An right now and it’s wonderful because of the consistency of the design language here.
Also have you seen the Theory student apartments on Hillsborough Street? You can tell they just used enough brick siding to appease the Appearance Commission and wrapped the rest of the building in ugly, plain vinyl siding
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Unless I am wrong, this sounds more like a statement from the town of Cary…
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