VeLa Longview - 220 East Morgan St - Marbles Parking lot

I’m usually the king of “just built a nice simple modernist box,” so it’s weird for me to be in this position, but I think the cutouts in this one are actually additive. And I like the lozenge shape of the building - it’s soothing.

I will say I only like the cutouts as long as we get a material that looks like that soft rose gold in the rendering. Otherwise we’re back to J. Davis style tacky nonsense.

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Not sure which (additive) cutouts you’re referring to! But I love the shape of the Raleigh building too… if they just hired someone else to design the façade and improve the ground-level articulation it’d probably be our best high-rise.

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:joy:

Personally I’m happy to wait and see what we actually get, but in general I’m happy for anything that’s not another red brick building. Glass box, a building with weird textures and angles, a curvy phallic tower, the Taj Mahal, pretty much whatever.

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These guys!

Screenshot 2022-12-07 at 10.39.30 AM

If that contrast material is really that shade of rose gold, I think it could look pretty nice for once.

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Nashville development gets bonus height for adding more parking. Just let that sink in. Nashville is very old school thinking.

Appearance Commission

“WHEREAS 220 E Morgan Owner LLC, property owner, requests the following design alternates: (i) to provide 46% of build-to in lieu of the 70% build-to requirement set forth in UDO Sections 3.4.8.C and 1.5.6 along S Person Street; and (ii) for complete relief from the 12ft stepback requirement set forth in UDO Section 3.3.3 along S Person Street, in order to construct a mixed use building on the 0.9 acre site zoned DX-40-UG-CU located at 220 E Morgan Street.”

Has passed with slightly adjusted conditions (minor appearance changes).

Not sure if this is the last hurdle for this project however.

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From the TBJ 0n 10/13/2022: “…VeLa officials said the cost for the project will be approximately $170 million and construction is slated to start in mid-2023. The project should be complete in late 2025.” Hopefully they will be breaking ground soon and bring another crane to DTR.

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I believe @Francisco said that permitting hasn’t been smooth sailing

Yeah, I saw that post fro, @Francisco back on 3/3. Maybe we have good news in the last month? We’ll know soon. What website does one visit to see the permitting process or do you have to work at the city to see such things? Or is it public info and then just a matter of polwing around to find what you are looking for? I dont know a lot about that sort of thing!

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Permitting isn’t smooth sailing for any projects now days.

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There are two locations off of the city website to look at things.
The first is you go to departments, click on planning and development, and then scroll down and click on current development activity. Here you can view ASR’s and annexations, etc.
The second is on the main page click on permit and development portal help center, then scroll down and click on permit and development portal, and then click on search public records. Here you have to know the project name or the exact address that they are using in order to do the search. Example: dslc-vela longview apartments. Here a couple of items come up, the ASR and a PR. Click on the ASR and you can see the status of the reviews. Click on reviews and you can see the comments…

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New review scheduled April 20th.

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@Alan- Thanks for the tips!

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Their ASR review has passed. The City has to finish the paperwork and then there is the appeal period.

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How long does the appeal period generally last?

And who is appealing what? The developer appealing the approval of their plan?

I have never understood the appeal period. I believe that it is 30 days. I guess some good citizen can object to the approval of the ASR, but I have not seen that happen.

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Oh ok. Well I’m gonna object. I don’t like tall buildings downtown. Especially not ones with glass. That causes reflections. Yuck.

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Lots of local wildlife in that parking lot, so we likely need an environmental impact study. Traffic could be slowed down to gawk at all the mirrored glass, so throw a traffic impact study on top. This historical parking lot has been here for quite some time, so let’s throw in a historical significance assessment. Big buildings are so noisy, so throw in a noise impact study. Shadows are spooky, so I really want a shadow study. This building is much taller than Marbles, so we’ll definitely need a visual impact study. Hasn’t been an earthquake in a while, so lets get a seismic risk assessment on the book. Ma house value, need a socioeconomic impact study. DRAAAAAIIINNNAAAAGE slurp noises requires a water drainage study.

I can do this all day.

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You forgot affordable housing

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