An additional 96 parking spaces have been added to the
proposed Renaissance Plaza residential/retail complex at 400 N. Columbus
Boulevard, bringing the total to nearly 600 spaces.
None of the parking, originally planned or more recently
added, will be visible from the street. That detail was proffered by William
Alesker and David Farabaugh of the architecture firm Alesker & Dundon and
project attorney Hercules Grigos during a recent Central Delaware Advocacy
Group meeting.
Most of the parking is wrapped in retail space. The new
spaces are partially below grade. FEMA requires the retail/residential portions
of the building to be raised above the floodplain, Alesker explained. That
created six feet of wasted space. Five more feet of digging made room for the
96 additional spaces.
Renaissance Plaza plans call for about 1,360 rental
apartments, 72,000 square feet of retail space and 19,000 square feet of office
space.
The team representing developer Waterfront Renaissance
Associates - an affiliate of Carl Marks Real Estate - said code requires about
one parking space for every three residential units. The additional spaces are
for future shoppers, many of whom, the team said, will want to drive to the
area.
CDAG Chairman and Northern Liberties Neighbors' President
Matt Ruben joked that the development hit a parking sweet spot: “Just little
enough parking to make some of the residents around there nervous. And just
enough parking to [tick] off some of the urbanists.”
It's parking that requires Renaissance Plaza to seek a
zoning special exception. The proposal was made under the old Central Delaware
Overlay, which required an exception for above-grade parking, Grigos said. The
current CDO does not require an exception, so long as the parking is completely
wrapped, as in this proposal. The team will use the fact that the project meets
the requirements of the current zoning overlay in an attempt to convince the
Zoning Board of Adjustment to grant the exception at a July 23 hearing. The
hearing was required without the additional parking, but the team came back to
CDAG to discuss the parking change.
CDAG had already supported the project, and voted to
continue that support. It did ask that the developer put in writing a
previously made and recently repeated verbal commitment to include the planned
public open space and other landscaping in the first phase of development.
Development proposals have been floated for this site for a
long time. Remember the World Trade Center project? There's no set start of
construction for this project, but the team told John Scorsone, who represents
River's Edge, that funding is now being sought.
Source: Philly.com
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