Per city requirements, public notices have been posted in the area immediately surrounding the 1/2 acre lot on the corner of Almond Avenue and Oakland Boulevard. The project before the design review commission, next Wednesday, December 5, is called 'Almond Lofts', a 12-unit (3 building) attached unit loft-style project that would front Oakland Boulevard.
The owner/developer is Galen Grant, a local architect from Danville. He held a neighborhood meeting last year in which several of us attended and voiced opinions (both pro and con) on the project. I understand that our feedback has resulted in some design change. However, the city has not yet posted the agenda nor the plan details on their website. Once these are posted, I will make sure to include a link to this blog.
Here is the rub... the 1/2 acre parcel actually consists of two lots; 1 'sliver-size' lot on Oakland Blvd and a much larger piece that fronts Oakland, but also borders Almond.
The zoning on on the larger lot is M-1, meaning 'Multi-Family' 1 unit per 1,000 square feet of lot area. This typically allows larger, denser, higher development - similar to other Oakland Avenue buildings. The larger lot is zoned D-3 (same as Almond-Shuey neighborhood), meaning 'Duplex-Residential' with specific area lot requirements for number of units, area, width, setbacks, etc.
For this project to fly, the developer would need the city to allow him to sort of 'blend' the zoning of these to lots and allow him to build a denser project on the larger (Oakland-Almond) lot. There are legitimate arguments on both sides of this.
Stay tuned!
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2 comments:
I have a little more information on the project from Galen Grant, which came in an email response to my inquiry last September...
Tom:
The project is proceeding in a revised form. I have elected to lower the height of the duplex in the SE corner near Almond to two stories. This will relate nicely to the neighborhood.
Other refinements are also in the works.
The Design Review Commission agenda is out and unfortunately the Almond Lofts will be heard LAST, with three other public hearings ahead of us. We'll be lucky if they get to it by 10:00pm. If you can't go to the meeting (or can't stay up that late on a week night) please email your comments to Victoria Walker...
walker@walnut-creek.org
There are still some major issues with traffic and density related to this project.
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