The Springfield Planning and Zoning Commission voted to recommend approval of a rezoning request for the purpose of building an apartment complex at the corner of Grand Street and Market Avenue at its Sept. 7 meeting.
The Commission voted 6-1, with only Eric Pauly having voted against, recommending — alongside city government staff — approval of the rezoning case to the City Council, which will take it up on Oct. 2.
Aside from concerns raised by Pauly and some nearby residents at a recent neighborhood meeting, primarily regarding parking and traffic, the proposed development met no opposition at the Planning and Zoning meeting.
Details of the proposed development
The developer — GDL Enterprises, LLC — is seeking to rezone 1.08 acres at 505 and 509 W. Grand Street, and 931 and 937 S. Market Ave. from single-family residential to residential townhouse and medium-density multi-family residential districts, with a conditional overlay for the purpose of building an apartment complex. The property is across the street from a Walmart Neighborhood Market and next to City Utilities’ Grand substation.
GDL Enterprises owns 104 properties around Springfield, according to the Greene County Assessor’s website, including many in the West Central and Fassnight neighborhoods. The company is behind the proposed Loose Goose development at the nearby intersection of Grand and Grant Avenue. GDL Enterprises’ investors are Andrew Doolittle, Willie Grega and Cameron LaBarr.
Despite being currently zoned single-family, there are no homes on the property, which remains vacant and undeveloped, covered in trees and grassy open spaces. Forward SGF, Springfield’s comprehensive plan, labels the property as mixed residential placetype, which is primarily used for higher-density housing, including apartments.
Like the Loose Goose property, the proposed development is within the Grant Avenue Plan redevelopment area. That, among several other reasons — including its compatibility with Forward SGF — led to the city staff’s recommendation of approval.
The proposed development would be three stories in height, with a total of 30 units. It would house six studios, 15 one-bedrooms, nine two-bedrooms and two accessible units, all at fair market prices, according to a summary of the July 20 neighborhood meeting about the development.
The development would boast 46 off-street parking spaces, despite 50 spaces needed to meet parking requirements. In addition, the property would have interior bike storage, outdoor living and green space areas and a buffer yard and privacy fence along the north and west end of the property — where it abuts single-family residences.
P&Z commissioner, neighbors concerned about traffic, parking
The number of on-site parking spaces and potential traffic problems were the primary concerns raised by neighbors and Commissioner Pauly. However, no one spoke in opposition to the rezoning case during the public hearing.
“I have a concern, obviously, if there’s not enough parking available for that particular location that this is going to push that back out the neighborhood,” Pauly said, pointing to the limited on-street parking available nearby.
Because the development would provide 10 bicycle spaces, a reduction of 5 vehicle spaces is allowed, according to planning documents.
Pauly, who said that he recently visited the property, identified potential traffic problems near the intersection of Grand and Market, due primarily to the raised median, or island, that separates stretches of eastbound and westbound traffic on Grand and limits left turns into the Walmart Neighborhood Market.
“I travel that quite often, and although [the island is] a good idea, what I see a lot of people doing is making a U-turn right there in order to go ahead and get around that island so that they can go ahead and turn into the [Walmart] Neighborhood Market,” Pauly said. “With that intersection being right there where it Ts at Market and Grand, I’m really concerned about the amount of traffic as it’s trying to head southbound currently in order to leave that area and get to any jobs or schools that would be south of there.”
In addition, Pauly pointed to the limits in traffic nearby corridors could handle. Grant Street, is currently under construction for the Grant Avenue Parkway project, temporarily making it a one-way street, and Campbell Avenue is open to northbound traffic only north of Grand. Two-way traffic on Grant south of Grand will open following the completion of Section 3 of the Grant Avenue Parkway project.
“So you’re going to have to push a lot of traffic through the neighborhood in order to grab a southbound street in order to get yourself further into Parkview High School or any of the businesses further on down into the south portion of town,” Pauly said.
Parking and traffic concerns were communicated by several neighbors at the previous meeting and to the Planning and Zoning Commission via email.
In an email to the Commission, David Patrick, who lives near the proposed development, suggested a traffic light or roundabout be placed at the intersection of Grand and Market and Campbell to become a two-way street between Grand and Madison Street.
“It will be a replay of the Walmart disaster, just across the street,” Patrick wrote in the email. “Every negative outcome the neighbors predicted about that store has materialized, plus even worse problems than what we imagined.”
In a response to the email, Own, Inc. engineer Jared Davis said that “traffic will be considered as a part of the development.”
Procedural roadblock
Prior to being voted on, the Commission had to table the rezoning case until it voted on another rezoning case, which placed implications on the proposed development, at the guidance of city attorney Jill Burris.
The neighboring property that houses the Grand Substation, located at 529 W. Grand St., is currently zoned as a residential townhouse district. City Utilities is seeking to have the property rezoned to government and institutional use.
Rezoning the 0.66 acres would allow for the redevelopment of adjacent properties, including the proposed apartment complex — which the substation’s rezoning is being spurred by, without the buffer yard requirements that would be needed for residential townhouse districts. The rezoning of the substation property will also get rid of the proposed development’s bulk plane requirements — which “defines the relationship of the height of a structure and the structure's setback from the lot” — along the southern half of the west edge of the property.
In addition, government and institutional use better aligns with how the property is currently being used, according to senior planner Daniel Neal.
“That will facilitate redevelopment in the area because the other properties won’t have to have buffers against this property even though it is, in some cases, a more intense use than the others around it,” Neal said.
At city government staff’s recommendation, the Planning and Zoning Commission unanimously approved rezoning the substation property, 7-0.
Alongside the rezoning case for the development, the rezoning of the substation property will have a public hearing at the Oct. 2 Springfield City Council meeting.
Editor's note: A previous version of this story stated the project's name as “East Elevation.” Upon further review with a member of the development group, the project is unnamed at this time. The Hauxeda regrets this error.
