and single-family zoning at this location the proposed height and occupied area variances are
minor and in keeping with the purpose and spirit of the zoning code this is a primarily primarily
multi-family block face with unit counts ranging from two units to nine units the appellant
proposes four the city planning commission recommends that the board grant the requested
use variance for four dwelling units and the proposed dimensional variances for occupied area
and height. Thank you. MI 2024 005 631
Thank you. MI 2024-005-631-5226 Chester Avenue. I vote yes with provisos. Revised plans, one page, stamped by CBA, March 12, 2025. No basement living, trash stored inside.
Michael Johns, my vote is yes with provisos.
Cheryl Gaston, my vote is yes with provisos.
Senator Graham, my vote is yes with provisos.
Hi, I win.
My vote is yes with provisos.
Thank you, counsel.
Thank you.
Is there anyone in the audience whose case has not been called yet?
3.30 list.
Oh, 2 o'clock list.
I'm sorry, 2 o'clock list.
All right, we're going to take a five-minute break, and then we'll be right back, and we'll
finish up.
Good afternoon.
My name is Bill Bergman, and I will be chairing this meeting of the Zoning Board of Adjustment.
With me is our board member, Cheryl L. Gaston.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Our board member, Tanetta Graham.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Our board member, Michael Johns.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
And our board member, Taya Nguyen.
Present, Mr. Chairman.
Also present is Hillary Emerson, our attorney, our zoning board director, Ian Haggerty, and our board administrator, Burstrator, Lakeisha Dandy.
Recording of this hearing will be posted on the ZBA website.
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Smart Street. Please remain near so we can account for you. Let's look at our schedule for this
afternoon. Number three, MI 2024-006-700-3801-Old York Road. That case is continued.
Number six, MI 2024-006-713-2618 North 22nd Street.
That case is continued.
Is there any other requests for continuance?
Excuse me, Mr. Chair, what are the dates that those cases will continue to?
Oh, I'm sorry.
So both cases will be August 27th at 3.30 a.m.
p.m., yes, thank you.
3.30 p.m., I'm sorry.
Okay, so number one,
MI 2023-005-909,
2219 West Oxford Street.
Alphabet of Equities is the LLC.
No exhibits, third listing.
There may be an attorney needed.
We also have Brenda Harris as the listed applicant.
Brenda Harris and Alphabeta Equities, LLC.
Good afternoon, Chair. This is Javette Benton. I'll be your co-host for this afternoon.
I see no hands at this time.
I see no hands at this time.
No one appeared on 710.
No one appeared on 710.
Applin requested a continuance on 3624.
She is selling the property at 322 on 32224.
So MI 2023, 005-909-2219, West Oxford Street, I vote to dismiss.
Michael Johns, my vote is to dismiss.
Cheryl Gaston, my vote is to dismiss.
Tanetta Graham, my vote is to dismiss.
Iowyn, my vote is to dismiss.
And number four, MI 2024-006-702, 1638 Porter Street, no exhibits, first listing.
Ralph Lane is the listed applicant.
Bai Fang X. Chen is the listed owner.
i see no answer this time chair so mi2024 006702 1638 porter street this is the first listing
the case will be continued to august 27th 3 30 p.m
we'll go to our regular list now
we'll start with
number 7
MI 2025
000471
4400 Market Street
Ronald Patterson is the attorney
there's a letter of non-opposition
from Spruce Hill Community Association
a letter of Councilman
Gauthier's office expressing
non-opposition
uh good afternoon good afternoon counsel could you state your name and spell for the court
stenographer sure my name is ronald r-o-n-a-l-d patterson p-a-t-t-e-r-s-o-n with claire harrison
law firm 1835 market street do you go ahead 19103 do you swear or affirm to tell the truth the whole
truth nothing but the truth yes i do could you identify your client the relationship to the
property? Sure. I represent the property owner and developer, which is 4400 Market Street, LLC.
The general partner owners group is the Orans Brothers Real Estate Group. And with me is Scott
Orans, who is a principal. Okay. Do you agree to the waiving of the reading of the refusal and do
you agree with its accuracy? Yes, I do. Okay. Well, why don't you proceed? Share your screen
and proceed. Great. Thank you.
Thank you.
Okay, so this application regards 4400 Market Street.
It's located here.
It's an aerial picture at the corner of 44th Street and Market Street.
It's currently vacant land, and it consists of 10,411 square feet.
The zoning district is a CMX-4.
Here's some ground-based pictures.
So, in 2024, we obtained a buy-write permit that approved a seven-story structure, show
you a picture.
Before that, I'll show you some of these site pictures surrounded by multifamily buildings, of which Scott will identify which ones are his under development and in operation.
So we, there we go.
Seven-story structure, having 84 single-family residential dwelling units,
nine of which are moderate-income units, with retail on the first floor of $2,300.
are moderate income units with retail on the first floor of 2360 square feet. Within the building
though we also were providing parking in a mechanical access parking configuration and if
you see this little elevation here you'll see how the cars parked beneath the surface
floor here, and we'll put into that more detail. So there's seven spaces below grade, and Scott
will explain how it works. Based on the number of units and the credits and all, we were required
to have 15 parking spaces, and eight of them were going to be provided off-site around the corner
of one of those buildings you saw in the initial pictures, which the Warren Brothers owns, and they
were going to park there under a non-accessory parking permit that the department had issued as
a matter of right so by nature of this mechanical parking garage you could add two levels atop as
you see in this photograph and here's what the rendering would look like because it's a it's a
it's an elevator type of nature and the cars go up the cars go down the cars they shift
so adding two more levels completely within the building would not change make any change to the
building to the exterior it would be imperceptible from the outside yet it would add additional 13
spaces and provide a benefit to the community to add additional parking spaces that are needed in
the area. The refusals that we received, one was a referral for providing above ground parking
garage, which is having the two additional levels above grade. And the second was a refusal for
not providing a sufficient ADA van parking space. And I'll show you that here.
So we were providing one space here, as you see. But in this area here, the walkway was only five
feet and the code required eight feet under the ANSI regulation. So what we did was we modified the plan.
Here we're showing the original plan at five feet in width on this area here and
we've modified the plan to provide the required eight foot width here so we have submitted
an application for an amended site plan approval with proviso to address that refusal so this case
then defaults to a special exception case so the referral was for the additional 13 spaces
which we believe would create no negative impact to the building or the area and again yet provide
a benefit. You'll hear about why the design would be necessary. So, but with that said,
I'll introduce Scott and get on with this. So, Scott, tell the board.
Yeah. Sorry. Let's start over. Tell the board your name and address, please.
Name's Scott Orens, O-R-E-N-S, 444 North 4th Street, Philadelphia, PA, 19123 is my address.
Scott, do you swear or affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth?
Please proceed, counsel.
And Scott, please tell the board your affiliation with the development.
I am one of the partners of Warren's Brothers.
We are the general partners of this LLC.
And you've heard my presentation so far.
Would you agree it's true and accurate?
And would you adopt it as if it were your own?
And briefly in these photographs that we started off with, are these your buildings?
Yes, the one you have your cursor on right now.
Okay, that's 4419 Ludlow.
4419 Ludlow.
And then how about back here?
That is 4415 Chestnut Street.
These are buildings that we've owned.
The land underneath these buildings we've owned since the early 1980s and 1990s.
And so in the 4419, there's 32 apartments.
Correct.
Is that fair to say?
And 4415, there's 40 units?
40 units.
And both have first floor commercial.
And parkings as well?
4415 Chestnut Street has parking.
Okay. And I show this because you have a kind of a mini master plan for the area you're developing under. Okay. And so it was true, we got a buy right, we obtained a buy right permit for the underground parking, the seven spaces, correct?
Correct.
And why couldn't you dig lower and put more spaces beneath the grid?
This was previously a gas station. There were a lot of environmental concerns which took us a number of years to clean up. The current Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection has allowed us to basically cap the existing ground upon which we are building, and they allowed us to go down one story enough to park the required number six.
go down one story enough to park the required number six cars below grade and in order to do
that we had to use a mechanized parking system which would lower the cars down and that system
can handle more than just the six or seven cars that were originally showed in the original permit
and and your first floor has a high ceiling correct and so that has not changed in the design
correct nothing so this is infilling the area and it would be imperceptible from the exterior
and how would this work with the two additional levels cars would pull into the garage and they
would enter the uh mechanized parking system and it essentially works as a shuffler it shuffles
cars around and uh there's always one empty space so if you call for a car and your car is on the
third level it moves cars uh in a jigsaw pattern until it gets down to the grade you get into your
car you drive off it's not a valet type system you can people can access it themselves without
any assistance okay and you met with the spruce hill community association we did and you presented
the plan and what was the response um they needed some uh my changes that they'd like to see to the
exterior facade uh based upon our original rendering uh we agreed to them and we presented
it a new rendering. And based upon that, I believe they've issued a letter.
Yeah, we received the letter late on Friday, I believe. I don't know if the board has it,
but I have it on the screen here. Is it on the screen? It's not on the screen.
How about that? All right. Let's try that again.
There we go.
so let me ask you as a developer that's vested in the area will would the granting of the special