003-444-319
Gate Street, Parcel C.
William O'Brien is the attorney.
We have a letter of support
from Ridge Park Civic Association
and pre-requisite
streets department approval.
Mr. O'Brien has been promoted to panelist.
Mr. O'Brien, can you state your name and spell for the court reporter, please?
Yes, good afternoon, Mr. Chairman.
William O'Brien, O-B-R-I-E-N.
Do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
Could you identify your client in relationship to the property?
Yes, my client is Mizio Baker Real Estate, LLC.
and here in the Zoom meeting with me today
is Stephen Aschewski to the right
and Andrew Molson,
who are the two managing members of that company.
That company is the record owner of 319 Gate Street.
Our vice chair has a few questions, Mr. O'Brien.
Hi, Mr. O'Brien.
Do you agree to waive the reading of the refusal
and stipulate to its accuracy?
I stipulate to its accuracy.
Have you emailed the exhibit packet with proof of ownership, tax compliance, a copy of the refusal or referral,
photos under plans of the property five days in advance of this hearing, and have you met with the RCO, and do you have a letter?
Yes, to each of those items.
Okay, great.
You may proceed and begin to share your screen.
um so 319 gate street uh is a um 50 foot wide by 184 foot lot uh with an existing uh residence
the three-story residence it's a legal two-family dwelling um this is the existing structure on gate
Street. And you can see that there is a driveway to the right of it that extends past the right
side of this three-story structure. The lot, as I said, is 184 feet deep. It extends to Wright Street.
This is Wright Street, which is the next block south of Gate Street.
And this retaining wall that you see in the foreground is the end of 319 Gate Street.
As you can see, the retaining wall consumes probably about 90% of the sidewalk.
And that is all part of Gate Street.
And as you can see, and is also depicted on the topography plan, which is on paper.
and is also depicted on the topography plan, which is on page 9. 319 Greats is
substantially a level walk. There's no steep slopes in it. This is Wright Street looking
east. You can see the four single-family attached homes here. This retaining wall
is the end of the gate street lot there is a storage structure this part of the lot
and then this is 316 gate street an existing single family dwelling
this is looking north showing the end of the gate street property and that retaining wall as you can
see there are signs posted on that retaining wall, no parking, and there is no parking
on Gate Street. I'm sorry, on Wright Street. The curb line is no parking, and on the opposite
side, as you can see, is front-loaded parking on the homes across the street, a condition
that's no longer permitted in this area.
This is the topographic plan, the existing condition.
Here is the existing two-family dwelling at 319 Gate Street,
and then this is the whole lot, which I said extends 184 feet to Wright Street.
The zoning code allows the construction of four single-family dwellings on this lot, two on Wright Street and two on Gate Street.
That would have been permitted over-the-counter without any variances.
However, the neighborhood considers Gate Street to be a historic street, and that plan would have called for the demolition of that existing structure.
Anizio Baker decided not to pursue that plan to keep the structure that is considered by the
neighborhood to be historic, keep that in place, and pursue the development of the Wright Street
end of the property with a duplex, two single-family dwellings. Incidentally, since that
decision was made there is now a pending um nomination of the 300 buck of great street
before the historic commission um and as i said uh the the lot is predominantly flat you can see
there is no uh indication of any steep slopes on this uh on this plan um this is the zoning plan
again we're going to the existing structure stays the existing driveway will be used to access not
only a parking space for the existing structure but also to access parking for the proposed two
new structures on the elevations i just want to point out the pilot house the pilot house is four
feet wide by 16 feet in length which is a total of 67 feet which is substantially less than 125
feet allowed so while I acknowledge that the refusal was accurate I don't believe it's correct
the refusal for height I think is a mistake this structure is 30 feet 38 feet high from the average
ground level to the roof. The indication that the plan examiner put down is 47 feet
includes the pilot house. The reason the pilot house was included is that there is a wing that
comes off the pilot house to create some shade on the roof. It is that plan examiner's
interpretation of the code, and I don't believe it's a correct interpretation. In fact,
the four houses uh down the street or next to this adjacent to this house have that same condition
with a a roof or a wing that comes off the pilot house and that was not a refusal uh in those
dwellings um i can show you this is the pilot house in those houses it's it's four feet wide
as i said it's 13 feet and then there is a wing that goes across uh it's 18 feet from the front
the building, you really can't see it, but it does create some shade on the roof and makes
that roof deck a more livable space. So this is what is proposed.
These are the two new homes. It is a transition between the four attached townhomes on the right.
It is a transition between the four attached townhomes on the right and the existing single
family dwelling on the left. The existing house has a porch, so the porch is proposed
for these two new homes and that is the streetscape. There is a refusal for
steep slopes because the retaining wall that I showed you photographs of has been removed
and it steps back now to allow a sidewalk to continue in front of the Wright Street houses
and allows an entrance from Wright Street to the porches and to the homes.
The other refusal is for side yard.
Strict application of the code requires an eight-foot side yard.
We're requesting a variance to allow five feet.
The reason for that is that because there's no parking on Wright Street and because the distance to Gate Street is, as I said, 184 feet from the front of this house, each of these homes needs two-car parking.
If there's an eight-foot side yard, then the garage will only accommodate one car.
and that that presents a hardship for the neighbors who are going to have to compete for
more parking it creates a hardship for the homeowners who are now going to have to find
distant parking the request for five feet side yard is identical to what exists for this house
at 316. As shown on page nine, which I can go back to, this detail indicates that the current
side yard at 316 Rice Street is five feet. So we're only asking for the same thing that 516
and Rice Street has, and that is a five-foot side yard so that we can have two-car parking,
two-car garage. Let me go back. As indicated in the RCO's letter, there was a modification
made at the request of the neighborhood. This parking area has now been closed off to the
adjoining area so that this driveway is not a pass-through. There'll be no communication between
Wright Street and Gate Street. The Gate Street driveway will serve only the existing residents
and the proposed two new residences. And again, the turning radius is so small that if there's
not a five-foot side yard and these houses become narrower, there's simply no way to get two cars in
there. If we're allowed to have the same size side yard that 316 Wright Street has, then each
of these driveways, each of these garages will serve two cars. Then there's space behind for
guest parking when there's a dinner or some celebration, which makes it easier for the
neighborhood because, as I said, Wright Street has no parking. Mr. O'Brien, they're both
single residences right both single family homes uh with uh with a roof deck and uh and two car
parking as per person let's see let me ask mr o'brien do you want to have your testimony adopted
yes uh mr molson uh would you be sworn in please could you state your name and spell it please for
the court reporter? Andrew Molson, A-N-D-R-E-W, M-U-L-S-O-N. All right. Do you swear, affirm,
tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? I do. Proceed, counsel. You were here
and you heard my testimony? Yes. Was it accurate and correct? It was. And do you adopt it as your
own? I do. And you have the authority to do so and act on behalf of the corporate, of the company?
Yes, I do. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Questions from the board?
No, Mr. Chair.
Kyle, you're muted.
No, Mr. Chair.
Thank you.
Questions or comments from the virtual audience?
Chair, we have Adam Herbert.
Hi, sir.
Could you state your name and spell for the court reporter?
Certainly.
My name is Adam Herbert, A-D-A-M-H-E-R-B-E-R-T.
Right.
Do you swear for him to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Proceed.
I'm one of the neighbors on Gate Street and just wanted to voice my concern over the project.
wanted to voice my concern um over the project um would also just like to say that the baker
street partners build beautiful houses in the neighborhood so um i do appreciate the work that
they've done to do some of the different developments on green street and stuff like that
um on the evening of the vote that you received uh from the civic association in favor of this
project uh there was no role taken um and there was also no identifiers as to see who was on the
call so for instance there was some people who could be identified only by iphone or ipad and
some of the um people who voted were not members of the civic association or in the neighborhood
rather um and also were financially tied to the developers um like plumbers and real estate agents
and stuff like that. So I just wanted to, from the community standpoint, some of us feel like
the Civic did not actually represent our feelings on the project. We don't necessarily have an issue
with the development of two new houses in here. One of the issues is the particular neighbor at
316 Wright Street with that five-foot variance. She has a two-story, it's depicted here as a
three-story house it's actually just a two-story house and so she's going to lose a lot of sunlight
and and there's some some some unfortunate things that kind of happen to her as the homeowner in
the neighborhood understand that you know when you buy a house in philadelphia you're not guaranteed
sunlight you're not guaranteed that kind of stuff so we we asked for some compromises um one of the
compromises as you can see the two houses um you know and i'm not a developer by any means but one
thing we asked is could they just be moved over to butt up next to like 324 Wright Street so it
would give that eight foot variance and they could still build the houses and have the curb cut and
all that kind of stuff so we just like to stress that you know the the Civic Association did not
necessarily due to no role being taken represent the community's decision on this project.
The fact of the matter is the Ridge Park Civic Association wrote a letter right in support
the the civic association did write a letter in support based on the vote um which was a zoom
meeting 24 to 9 in favor of the project but there was no role taken to see who was actually voting
so i could have easily logged into three different devices and voted one way or the other
okay thank you for your uh your call and your concern is there anyone else in the virtual audience
i see no hands chair i'm planning commission
planning commission
i'm sorry i was on mute uh that's okay that's okay go ahead
this is greg waldman planning commission staff
um uh chair uh would it be okay if i asked a clarifying question to the applicant we certainly
can um the uh refusal for 47 feet in height um does that include uh the height for the pilot house
yeah so the as i understand it the plan examiner interpreted the code uh to include the area
underneath that wing as part of the the pilot house when clearly the pilot house is only 67
square feet. I believe that was a mistake and in fact we were the same day we had this meeting with
the Ridge Park Civic Association there was another matter on their agenda I think it was 353 Delmar
Street. And that plan had the same identical roof structure, a pilot house with a wing going across
the roof to create a shaded area. And in that case, it wasn't a refusal. So the height from the
average ground level to the roof is 38 feet. That's code compliant. But the interpretation of this
plan examiner included the height of the pilot house because of his interpretation or her
interpretation uh that the shaded area that the that's the area that creates the shade should be
included in the pilot house dimension i believe that's a mistake okay so the the planet examiner
was including i guess if it was just a pilot house without the canopy then it may have been
interpreted differently yes the pilot house is is that if you include the height of the pilot house
That's how he got to 47 feet.
The average ground level to the roof is 38 feet.
And just to clarify one more time, one other question.
What is shown on the screen, that cornice height, is that 47 feet?
on the screen uh that cornice height is that 47 feet or 38 feet this height the roof height
sorry the roof height is 38 feet i can go back to the uh zoning plan bear with me
why don't you do that i think it shows it better
I did see briefly. I'm okay to proceed. Okay. The comprehensive plan recommends a zoning map change
to RSD3 residential single-family detached at this location. It is within the Ridge Park
Rocksboro overlay which requires an eight-foot setback above the second story for buildings
abutting lots of buildings that are two-story and then a steep slope protection overlay which
prohibits site clearing or earth moving activity on portions of the lot with a slope greater than
25 percent which the planning commission disapproved at its zoning permit review.
The we appreciate the clarification about the the height that was presented over the hardship for
side yard width is self-created
with a new construction.
The Politic City
Planning Commission
recommends
that the zoning board deny that particular
variance.