Is that where it is?
Because I thought there was a spa and something.
There was.
There was a spa in the corner.
you're correct but that the floor has been completely demolitioned and demolished and
renovated okay great and then um how much square footage is it going to be for this bath house
and is it like a is it like a spa is it like so maybe we explain more move up please i mean you're
so it's really trying to explain that yeah jordan so it's 30 000 square feet and how do you get
closer to the mic too. And the amenities include sauna, the wading pools, if you want to describe
that. It's what's called contrast therapy. So steam room, saunas, cold plunges, hot pools,
et cetera. We do offer massage treatments as well. Okay. All right. So it's, I guess,
like a spa, the founders of our company don't like to call it a spa, but it's like a spa,
but more of a social uh atmosphere so our saunas uh for instance uh fit uh you know 50 people
whereas some saunas might be only eight to ten so it's a a larger scale and you mentioned that
day pass so it's not like you go in for a facial and leave it's more like a an experience is that
what you're going for that's correct guests um aren't limited in the hours that they can enjoy
so some guests come uh in the morning before work or and after the gym and spend an hour and other
guests come maybe as a special occasion and spend four or five hours or an afternoon and do you are
you having any food that's what that was my next question yeah yeah we have uh prepared food um so
we're food is a uh very very small portion i would say of our business but we do offer prepared food
on site okay and is there like cooking with this food or how is that gonna work um we historically
it's been just prepared food so we bring it from off-site to to ours i think we do have
to ours um i think we do have the ability to to prepare food uh but for the most part again
the ability to to prepare food uh but for the most part again
restaurant is not our business it's a very small portion of our business we really have it just as
a amenity for our guests okay and then the deck how is that i mean you're going from this bottom
level where the uh uh what do you call bath house yes so how are we getting there's an elevator
They're both elevators and stairs, but there's an elevator from direct directly from our space up to that roof, which is on the third floor. So again, the building is connected. So when you're inside the space, you have no
no idea that you're walking into 1418. It's completely an open span. So when you're on the lower level, you walk towards, we'll call it to the north and there'll be an elevator there. It'll take you right up
To the roof deck. Okay. And then you have like a check in and all this kind of thing. Yes, that's correct. There's a lobby or reception on Walnut. The photo that was shown is where that check in will be. Lockers, you might have, yes, separate men's and women's locker rooms.
okay all right yeah um any other questions yep real quick so the deck is intended
to be used year-round or it's just seasonal year-round so uh but there's no proposed covering
uh there won't there will not be covering but we have we'll have heated pavers which we have at all
of our other facilities as well all right thank you questions from our attorney not at this time
mr chitians or comments from the virtual audience no hands at this time planning commission if i may
should i uh summarize sure okay so we're asking for a special exception again is this a passive
use we believe it will create no adverse or detrimental impacts of the public health safety
welfare or traffic uh no sounds will be heard beyond the property line um it's again open to
walnut street and chancellor street and we believe it will cause no greater impacts than would be
expected from uh permitted use on the roof deck which would be your residential roof deck thank
you planning commission amy boyd with the planning commission the comprehensive plan recommends no
change to the current cmx5 commercial mixed-use zoning the appellant has demonstrated that the
proposed use will not have detrimental impacts beyond what would reasonably be expected
the planning commission recommends that the board grant the requested special exception for
non-residential roof deck mi 2026 000 352 1418 walnut street i vote yes michael johns my vote
is yes cheryl gaston my vote is yes tinetta graham my vote is yes ryan mcadams my vote is yes
great thank you thank you for the accommodation thank you very much
And by 2025, 007-735-2313, North 11th Street, Murr the Furliger is the attorney.
which one is this? 2313 North 13th Street. 11th. Okay. I'm sorry.
Council, could you please, I swore you went already. Just state your name for the record, please.
My name is Meredith Ferlger, F-E-R-L-E-G-E-R.
Could you identify your client, a relationship to the property?
My client is 231511 LLC, and that entity is represented today by Dennis Schifrin.
There's a recommendation of support from the 37th Ward RCO.
Thank you.
Our vice chair has a few questions.
Good afternoon.
Do you have submitted your documents and exhibits five days in advance of this hearing?
Yes, I did.
And do you waive the reading of the refusals and simply to the accuracy?
Yes, I do.
Great. Thank you. You can share your screen. Proceed with the case.
Thank you.
all right uh mr chairman members of the board uh the property before you today is 2315 north 11
street in north philadelphia just by way of background the board did grant recently similar
relief just two lots away from this however this development is admittedly a little bit larger so
However, this development is admittedly a little bit larger, so I will walk you through
I will walk you through everything.
everything in detail.
The exhibit packet includes 17 exhibits, including an overwhelming vote of support from the 37th
ward at exhibit 17.
Tax clearance is included at exhibit two, and the deed showing my client's ownership
is at exhibit three.
Before I introduce the neighborhood and the project, I thought I would start first with
a rendering of this project just so the board can get an early visual here of the project that we're
going to be presenting today as my client will share towards the end of the presentation the
aesthetics of this building are directly responsive to the history of the property
as you can see here the proposal is for a new four-story building with 20 dwelling units and
further utilizes the mixed income housing bonus to restrict two of those units as affordable
now stepping back for a moment uh the zoning map is shown up on the screen at exhibit five
as you can see here this area is a mix of rm1 and cmx2 zoning although here the cmx2 zoning
is relatively incomplete occupying only a portion of a few blocks on north 11th street
if you scan over to north 10 street to the right of the screen you will see a similar
several block radius of cmx2 zoning for which this board recently granted variances to accommodate
an exclusively residential pha project and then across the street in the other direction across
11th street you can see is predominantly zoned rm1 cmx2 and then there's a large swath that's
zoned i-2 this particular property sits at the corner of north 11th street and west dakota street
i did also include aerial views of the property in the area at exhibit eight
looking from the east the board can see here that the only act of commercial use
really in this entire area is the church that's directly across west dakota street from this
property directly across the street that large industrially zoned parcel that you saw a moment
ago is a large scale community garden that abuts the septa regional rail lines directly behind it
because of the trees in the aerial i believe that the street street level images here give
you a little bit better context uh to the area so i'm going to show you some of those
photographs that are at exhibit nine the first photograph i have here shows you the property
from north 11th street which you'll see here is in a fairly dilapidated state with the last use
being uh some form of an automotive use having ceased really some time ago at this point
i did also separately include the permitting history for the property at exhibit 14
if the board has any interest showing that the property has received many variances dating all
way back to 1955 predominantly as i said to support automotive uses such as assembling and
bonding of brakes and general auto body and fender repair flipping in the opposite direction you'll
again see that community garden that i mentioned a moment ago and then looking south along north
11th street you'll see here again that this street is devoid of any active commercial use whatsoever
ever really devoid of any active use altogether the next adjacent property along north 11th
street is a privately owned lot and then next to that at 2309 is land bank owned uh and then next
to that at 2307 is a soon-to-be developed lot that this board recently saw i believe just maybe
a month or two ago and then again flipping in the opposite direction here again you can see
the lack of dominant commercial uses except for that church next door and you can see the pha
towers off in the distance just to better orient you to this area and then again just moving
further in that direction north there's the church and otherwise exclusively residential uses
in this next view from west dakota street which is that intersecting corner street
you'll see the side of the building here that is proposed to be demolished and then you can
see that that very popular community garden off in the distance here and then finally this final
view shows again the exclusively residential nature of this area once you really get past
the exclusively residential nature of this area once you really get past the church to the left
and then this particular formerly automotive property on the right here
and then as always i did include our timely posting
at exhibit 10 we have the zoning site plans and we do also have renderings elevations floor plans
at exhibits 11 and 12 i will summarize and then i can call on our architects from design blends
who should be on the line if the board has any additional detail questions
so just in terms of the orientation of the zoning plan here again you can see it's oriented north
11th street is to the left here and west dakota street is up at the top this proposal is for a
A new four story multifamily building with 20 residential units.
All of the existing curb cuts that surround the site will be filled in and restored to clean paving.
The building itself is detached with an 11 foot rear yard along Dakota Street, and then a 5 foot side yard perpendicular to North 11 Street, and I'm just indicating that location with my cursor.
I will bring up the floor plans to show you in more detail, but on the right-hand side, you can see a layout of the general ground floor layout here, which has a lobby and mail space directly to the left here, and then a trash storage room that can be directly accessed in the building here.
this building will have an elevator which allows for the building to be entirely type B accessible
throughout in terms of the renderings at exhibit 11 the building itself is a mix of brick at the
ground floor with metal siding and architectural embellishments surrounding the building and the
color here is important just in terms of trying to bring in some of the history of this building
Because of the setbacks that I pointed out earlier, all sides of this building will be able to have windows.
And then on the floor plans at Exhibit 12, this again gives you a little bit better detail in terms of the ground floor design.
so the building overall has six different one bedroom unit types which range in size and layout
generally from 486 square feet to 710 square feet with most of them falling between 500 and 600
square feet the building has a front and a back staircase as well as an elevator towards the front
the building there is a basement proposed for this building but that will as i'm showing on
the screen here only contain mechanicals and utilities as well as a designated bike storage
area because the elevator goes all the way down to the basement this provides efficient access
to that bike storage area as well and then like i mentioned our architect is on the line as well
well, and he can walk you through any additional details that the board requires.
In terms of the refusal itself, the refusal shows that two variances are needed for this
particular proposal.
First, even with the inclusion of the mixed income housing bonus, the maximum unit density
for this lot is 13 units, where 20 are proposed.
second cmx2 requires a non-residential use along the ground floor where none is proposed
in terms of the ground floor non-residential space there are are a multitude of hardships
that support the board's grant of relief in no particular order as i mentioned the board did just
grant earlier this year identical hardship relief at 2307 north 11th street clearly establishing
that this board has already concluded that it would be a hardship to institute a non-residential
use along the ground floor, given the context of this particular block. I did include that
variance history here at Exhibit 7. Likewise, as the board saw in the earlier photographs,
this block and the general area is devoid of traditional cmx2 ground floor uses
and does not yet have the density that would be necessary to support those types
of smaller commercial uses that are often intended for pedestrian oriented traffic
With the exclusively residential PHA development, just a block over this area has been steadily transition transitioning to a predominantly multifamily residential neighborhood.
with the exclusively residential pha development just
This is further supported by numerous maps that the city maintains that I've included at exhibit sex.
very briefly the first map here is the commercial corridor map showing that this particular block
is not within a commercial corridor and sits many blocks from either the north broad or
germantown avenue corridors shown on the map the city also maintains a map of business licenses
and you can see that there are essentially no record of business licenses here except for
daycare a couple blocks away piling on the land use map here is also illustrative showing a
nearly complete devoid of red commercial uses except for this property which happens to be
mislabeled since it has been vacant for many many years and in fact the only history of this
property was for traditional industrial use not commercial otherwise the property is surrounded
by either vacant land or other residential uses and then again the next map further shows the
proliferation of vacancy in the area further supporting the hardship and establishing a
viable commercial use and then finally i did also include a map showing new construction in the area
since 2020 which again is exclusively residential showing that there is clearly an established
hardship that does not support the cmx2 required non-residential ground floor use
in terms of the density as the board has seen today this is a meticulously designed building
that includes the somewhat rare investment into an envelope into an elevator that would not be
required or necessary with a lower density the elevator itself will support the availability
of additional accessibility into the building, which happened to be a hugely favored feature
of the building among community members. Although the area surrounding the property has seen
significant multifamily development, there have been very few buildings that would trigger the
investment into an elevator. Furthermore, the area surrounding this property still suffers from
economic distress but is steadily improving as more and more investment is made the development
will significantly activate the corner which is especially critical with the well-loved garden
across the street the additional units in the building not only do not cause a reduction in
the quality of the proposed units but also allow for the inclusion of two required affordable
units at the low income level that will create two deed restricted affordable units to supplement the
significant affordable developments that are occurring just a block over by PHA I will spare
the board the analysis on this unless necessary but in my memo of law I do provide a few examples
of variances the board granted in the area that allowed for more density than the code would
allow with densities ranging per square foot from 187 per unit to 286 square feet per unit for some
of the larger projects in the area in this case the proposed density equates to 226 square feet
per unit which is entirely consistent with similarly dense projects as a reminder the
board did grant a variance just two doors down which not only eliminated the commercial space
but did also approve an increase in allowable density which is reasonably
comparable to the one proposed here on a bigger lot given all of the evidence
we've presented we submit that the variances represent the least minimum
request for relief and in addition as further outlined in the memo of law at
Exhibit 13 the proposal will not increase congestion harm neighbors
properties or impair light and air no dimensional relief is needed for this particular proposal
I'd be happy to go into more detail on any of these points and would ask at this point to have
my client unmuted for two quick questions so if the administrator could look for Dennis Schifrin
hi Dennis could you please state your name and spell for the stenographer
Dennis Schifrin, D-E-N-N-I-S, last name S-H-I-F-R-I-N.