Board of Architectural Review Meeting   3/15/2022

Good evening, everybody.

I'll go ahead and kick things off so we can get started.

My name is Robert Watkins.

I'm city staff, and I will just be making sure that things run smoothly on the virtual side of things for tonight's meeting.

This is the March 2022 Board of Architectural Review meeting.

Before I hand things over to the chair of the BAR, Brett Gastinger, I will just go through a few items.

First of all, I'll introduce everybody who's on screen right now.

So anybody who's watching from home will just know who's who.

So first we have the chair of the BAR, Brett Gastinger.

We're also joined by the vice chair, Cheri Lewis.

We're also joined by additional BAR members, Jody Lehendro, David Timmerman,

Robert Edwards, Clayton Strange, and James Zehmer.

And I'm joined by my colleague on city staff, Jeff Werner as well.

Throughout the meeting, folks will join or leave the meeting as necessary.

So you might see some additional faces on the screen.

For anybody who might be watching at home, we have some places on the agenda where you can provide public comment if that's something that you wish to do.

For tonight's agenda, the primary place will be on the agenda before the consent agenda, where we'll allow public comment for items not on the agenda.

If you wish to provide comment, you'll need to register for this meeting through Zoom on the city's website, on the city calendar.

And then once you join the meeting, you'll be able to provide comment.

Additionally, other than a preliminary discussion, we won't have applicants or project representatives hopefully joining the call to provide presentations.

But if that does so happen,

For the applicants, I will just scan through pages of the packet to your application for visual aid So if you want me to show something I can just share my screen and go to that page number So with that I can pass things over to Brett Gastinger and we might take Periodic breaks as needed but our chair will direct us to when those are necessary.

Great.

Thank you, Robert.

Welcome to this regular monthly meeting of the Charlottesville Board of Architectural Review.

Robert has already given a pretty good rundown of how the evening will work.

And since we, other than the consent agenda, we do not have any projects that are being considered for a vote.

We do have several preliminary discussions.

I'll describe the preliminary discussion process a little bit further.

We will give the presenter several minutes to present the project.

And then the discussion for those can unfold as is required.

And so we encourage all of those presenting preliminary discussions to be specific as to the kinds of questions that you would like us to address in the preliminary review.

We will take cues from you.

If in through the course of the meeting, anyone is speaking before the board, please identify yourselves and provide your address.

And comments should be limited to the BAR's purview, that is regarding only the exterior aspects of the project.

Following discussion, then the applicant will have time to respond.

So we will go ahead and begin with an opportunity to hear matters from the public that are not on the agenda.

If you wish to provide comment, please raise your hand in the participant tab.

Excellent.

I will make a motion on the consent agenda that has few minor changes to the meeting minutes, unless there are any other comments or on the consent agenda from the board.

No.

Okay.

I will move to approve the consent agenda with the following three changes.

Typos should be corrected for meeting in the July 20th meeting minutes.

The first is on page 14.

Fifth paragraph, balls should be walls.

In the same paragraph, vanity should be humanity.

And on page 19 in the motion or the record of the motion, it should be that we move to accept deferral rather than referral.

I'll second.

Great.

So with the motion and the second, I'll call a vote.

Mr. Timmerman?

Aye.

Thank you.

Ms.

Mr. Strange?

Aye.

And Mr. Zehmer?

Aye.

Thank you.

Excellent.

I know we're joined by Kevin Schaffer.

And Jeff, did you want to provide a rundown on this or do you just want to dive into the discussion?

You're muted, but it sounds like we can dive right in.

Kevin, are you online yet?

If not, I can send him a quick email and we might want to jump into some of the other questions that might be remaining.

That's fine.

Yes, actually, all of them, except for Kevin.

Wow, you guys are running fast today.

You caught us off guard a little bit.

Sorry.

No, no, that's great.

Thank you so much.

No, but I have the packet that you sent.

No, I think that packet will be just fine.

Robert and Jeff, thank you so much for getting us on to tonight's agenda.

We were having continued conversation throughout the month since the last time we spoke in front of you.

Brett, thanks very much as well for meeting with us recently.

I have with me Bob Pinnio, again, principal of Design and Develop, and we also have Edward Carrington, who is the owner's representative on this project.

Robert, if we could go maybe just to, yeah, I think right here is a great place for us to start.

And so you're going to see obviously today is a much less developed model and presentation than what was presented previously, but there's an idea here that we're testing and we want feedback on more than anything.

Great.

Thanks, Kevin.

Thanks, everybody, for taking your time

to serve the city and help us work this problem out.

So basically, we in retrospect, and as we were presenting the last iteration, this nagging idea of what place making is and how to make places.

And the Sanborn maps kind of identify, let's say, a particular acute problem that's happening along Wordland Street.

And it's really just an experiential

You know, you're walking down Wortland Street and there's a lot of contacts and then all of a sudden there's a kind of a bend in the road that happens right about 12 and a half street and things start to change.

And there are missing gaps and missing teeth along the Wortland Avenue, but then there's a kind of distinct change that, and we'll show you a diagram that kind of illustrates where that happens.

but in the idea of making places and trying to, let's say, stitch together a feeling of the street.

And this is all in the context, we're not necessarily historian, we're not historians, we're at the best, we're trying to make places.

So we see this Sanborn map and we see that there's a

Disjunction between the two workman streets, there's a misconnection and it gets resolved eventually over time.

But what you're seeing here is the context of what was there and then also what was kind of obliterated and the salmon color shows kind of distinct changes of that fabric.

but the fabric was never really connected anyway in so many ways.

Like 12th and a half and 13th street, there wasn't a connector there.

In time there was, but that's where this kind of just disjunction comes.

So basically after the first iteration where we met with you, we started thinking about, we were always thinking about street wall, but what is this experience?

What if we add another building mass to this historic structure?

What does the feel of the street look like?

What's the cadence of it?

What are some of the rules that are already in place?

And somewhat, it feels a little artificial in that what we're looking at is the historic structure of property and location of housing, mass, but it's a completely different scale than what we see today.

And that's the pressure of urbanism

you know, taking bigger lots and smaller lots and the capacity to, you know, bring people closer to the, you know, to populated areas.

So it's a big, big question.

In the end, we're trying to make better places.

So this is what the context of what we have, and maybe we can step into the next slide.

And one of the more important things in breakfast, really inspirational, helpful, and trying to figure this out is that, as you remember, we did the Kai Sai house on Madison.

And it was an invention of sorts to invent a new facade where there wasn't one, but we looked at the street wall and we tried to identify what placemaking looks like.

In this particular place, and Breck also had an insightful thing, is we could create more street wall of the historic fabric and try to, let's say, mimic that cadence and that rhythm of street wall.

But what we're shaped with here is an existing large agrarian

a lot, and its relationship with this house is really kind of an anomaly to the street.

Some of the strengths of that, if you go back in time, this is 13 and a half, right?

13 and a half was the front entrance, the front drive for this particular property.

So he's trying to replicate, let's say, or at least

nod to the past, that front entrance to that property is really significant.

So that's one of the things in history that we were trying to focus in on.

The next slide, if you would.

This is a very quick and dirty slide that we were working on at last BAR meeting.

and it's this idea of what does this street wall actually look like.

And if you can remember the Sanborn map, that blue purple, that blue circle there, that's where it all kind of, there was not a connection between working the street, eventually there was, it wasn't aligned.

So it's a really significant disjunction in the street wall and plan left or plan, let's say west,

It's the fabric really starts to fall apart where there's this regular cadence of AAA on either side to a certain point to that juncture.

Then there's a smaller cadence of C, but then some of the newer buildings has really thrown off the pattern of development and street wall.

So we thought, well, if we're trying to create street wall and we're trying to synthesize and make the experience of Wirtland Street more conducive to the pedestrian experience and think about the past, how do we put those two ideas together?

So next slide, please.

So what's happened, and it's kind of a shame, what's happened to this property is because of the pressures of urban growth, the pressure to kind of develop backlot opportunities, this driveway has kind of dislocated and disconnected the house from its historic front.

So, and that's expediency, let's say, or there was, I think, at the time, an effort to save some large trees that are, you know, just off the side of this image.

But historically, it kind of, it feels much more suburban.

and kind of splintered in a way.

So one of the other things we're trying to do is to stitch back the house's relationship to the street wall, but also give it some gravitas as well.

Next slide, please.

Yeah, so all these ideas and evaluations of the street wall in Worland just kind of

raised some big picture questions and presented some big picture opportunities.

You know, and I think the most significant one of this is how do we protect and preserve and give gravitas, as Bob put it, to these historic structures after the context that's around them has changed significantly over time or even eroded.

So, Robert, I'll go quickly through these next couple of slides just as

as we move through it.

This is just a diagram of the existing conditions.

The historic house, as you can see, sits pretty far away from Wortland Street at this time.

And as we noted, the drive aisle cuts in front of that house and really kind of changes the relationship to Wortland Street.

The house has the benefit of being on access with 13th Street, which was its main drive aisle.

And that relationship is still there and it's still important as you come down 13th Street, but much of the streetwalk considerations along Wirtland have changed largely in part because of that very obtrusive drive while it comes in front of the historic house.

Next slide.

So here's an opportunity that we saw that could solve a few problems.

And one of the major problems that we heard or major concerns that we heard, there were two significant concerns from the previous hearing.

One was the dry vial entrance coming off of Wortland.

And then the two is the building masks on the street wall at Wortland.

So here's an opportunity to

that requires a boundary line adjustment that requires some significant site plan considerations and things like that.

We haven't we haven't chased this idea down to its to its full degree.

But before we did, we wanted to get it in front of you and see we could straighten the drive aisle and get it out of the front of the house, get it out of in front of that historic structure.

And then we could move that historic structure some degree, some distance towards Wortland Street.

that would then give it a presence on Wortland Street.

It would maintain that relationship with 13th Street, which is, you know, it's historic driveway.

It could reinforce the street wall cadence that is typical along Wortland Street.

and it would give us an opportunity to, as I quoted in the previous meeting, some of my favorite precedents or some of my favorite projects in town are the 600 West Main and the Quirk.

And the defining features of that is that they're tucking a larger building mass behind a historic structure.

And so now there's all of a sudden a much larger area for building in the rear of the house and we're bringing the historic structure to prominence.

So on the next slide, you'll see that idea kind of brought all the way to fruition.

We're suggesting a much narrower mass with opportunities for step back here that relates to the historic structure mass on the street.

But then the larger building mass could happen towards the rear of the site where the historic house used to sit.

And then there's a lot of opportunities here for interior courtyards, for front yards and landscaping that would be appropriate within this district.

There's opportunities for enhanced pedestrian experiences and pedestrian entrances.

There's a vehicular entrance that happens off the side drive aisle and not off Portland Street.

So there seems to be a number of positives that could come from this idea.

We're looking to the board today for guidance on this idea in relationship to the sanctity of the historic structure to its context.

How do we balance that?

The developer is very open to this conversation.

One of the things that we find

intriguing is how to support the existing structure.

And it's gonna take a lot of capital, a lot of money and effort to move the house, but there's also a possibility and a reality that newer foundations, a restoration of that, to move a house, you have to make sure that it's stable enough.

So there's gonna be restoration of that house

its foundation and its place.

We will make it last another 150, 200 years.

So we think that that's a benefit.

Obviously all these things cost money.

Robert, could you go to the next one?

So this is a summary of those advantages, as Bob just mentioned, provide new foundations for this historic structure, provide structural stability for the next 200 years, go through some amount of renovation project and rehabilitation on the existing house, give prominence to its streetwalk context, maintain its actual relationship with 13th Street, all these things I kind of talked about on the previous slide.

So we can go ahead and go to the next one.

This is a precedent that we had noted just when kind of googling, you know, Charlottesville historic structure move and seeing what what precedents were out there.

I thought this was an interesting one.

This is Varsity Hall at UVA.

Mr. LeHindro was involved heavily in this project and I, by all accounts, it was very successful and very noteworthy.

It brought new life to a structure that was underutilized and also falling into disrepair.

and it brought it to a place where it has been rehabilitated and thoughtfully renovated and now is in a different location, but has the same historic structural fabric.

So maybe we can, I don't know if Mr. Leandro is here, but you can weigh in on that thought.

And then the next, the final slide is just this idea that is not uncommon in Charlottesville and these precedents that I've already

but I've already mentioned here this marrying of new and old.

I think that's all I have.

I was gonna say the house across the street from 1301 was moved back when I was in grad school.

So Brett, do you remember like 98, 97, right next to the church, they lifted it up

Again, there's a lot.

When we have a building mass that's shielded from a historic structure, there's a lot more opportunities for step backs, for scaling down our mass, scaling down our width, scaling down our height on the street level and being more in kind with the historic house.

So this is just, you know, nothing more than a massing diagram that got us a rough unit count at this point.

And then the next slide shows the axial entrance on 13th Street and what that mask could feel like as well.

Thank you guys again for getting us onto the agenda and just letting us kind of test this idea with you.

That's great, thank you.

And I guess I'd just maybe summarize in that, and I had a chance to talk with the design team and Mr. Carrington earlier last week.

And they want to, really want to just get a temperature check on the BAR about whether this is an idea that is worth pursuing.

Obviously, this is a very preliminary discussion and it involves moving a historic structure

as an attempt to address some of the concerns of the previous schemes.

I'll start.

Personally, I really like the idea.

It solves a lot of problems for the applicant, but it also, as the applicants stated and I agree, it helps the street wall on the street and just, yeah, it's been tucked back there too long.

It would certainly bring to prominence this historic structure.

My only comment is that it looks like if this were to be accomplished, there are two applications that we would need to look at and we're bound by the job that we do.

We're not just commenting about design in general, but we operate just

under certificates of appropriateness that are submitted to us and this would be two.

One would be a vote to move and I just emailed to BAR members and to staff and probably if the applicants haven't seen them, Bob and Kevin could get a copy of our guidelines for moving and demoing.

They're pretty brief and they do include the National Register standards for any type of design review.

But there's not a whole lot to them, frankly, and I think just

Looking at them really quickly as you were presenting, I think your application would hit on favorably a lot of those criteria.

So I would just say my initial look is that would be great.

And then, of course, you'd have to come back with the COA for the actual new building.

And I'll leave it to Jeff as to whether those could be done at the same time.

It would be nice if they could.

That's a good question.

And I could look at that.

I think just, Cheri, just to kind of piggyback on what you said, one of the things that we'd certainly want to encourage is the tax credit opportunities are there.

It would be to maybe make sure that

Kevin Baum, whatever you guys do, make sure that you can do something that keeps those credits intact if there's an opportunity for them because they'd certainly be worthwhile on a project like this.

That would be one thing to think about is just explore

How far can you go and then still have those be viable?

I think I would say, Cheri, you're right, it's not a demolition.

But the only thing I would give caution on is there's an appeal of a demolition or relocation request.

When you talk about something, it takes up a lot of pages in our ordinance.

It might be worthwhile to do those separately.

That's my initial response, but that certainly doesn't need to be the answer.

I agree.

I think this is better than what we saw the first go round.

I think moving the structure does make no sense.

is still on the original property for the structure.

So, you know, oftentimes you have buildings that actually get really moved, you know, several miles away or something.

And so I think that helps argue the case for shifting it forward.

I was curious about the, you know, as your diagram showed, currently the house is kind of a skewed.

And I didn't know if that skew is to Wortland Street,

And therefore, by correcting that, are you on access with 13 and a half street?

Or is it now just kind of flush with Wirtland, but now not on access with 13 and a half?

Does that make sense?

It's a good question, and it's hard to tell why there's a five degree skew.

It is not on access on 13th Street, and it doesn't seem to be parallel with Wortland Street either.

James, it looks to me like 13th and Wirtland are 90 degrees.

And the odd one is the house itself.

So if you correct it, now maybe

This is one of the things that Brett brought up, which I enjoy, which is, well, yeah, but that's what, you know, it's a construct in some ways, so you move it forward, but you leave it on the skew.

That leaves this anomaly, is that an important anomaly?

It would tell some kind of story and still incorporate it.

Yeah.

I mean, I think that we may be jumping to the conclusion that the 13th and the Half Street is the driveway.

That's a 1907 map that you're showing.

The driveway may have been long before that, before any of that street grid was there and was on access with the house.

So the only other thought I had was in terms of the plan for your new building, I guess I would kind of like it if the front wall of the new building, the Wortland Street wall of the new building,

We're actually in line with the front wall of the house as opposed to the front edge of the front porch of the house.

So basically just pull it back another, whatever, 10 feet or something.

And I just think that would, again, give the Wharton Baker House a little bit more prominence.

I'd just like to reiterate what James said and how maybe a little bit more investigation historically, digging into it a little bit more.

One thing that I noticed in looking at the map, just I don't have it in front of me right now, but I was curious about the skew like everybody else's, you know, why did it happen?

I'd obviously

makes the house sit a little uneasy on the lot currently.

But I also noticed on that, the original map that you showed, that there was another house that sort of had the same skew, I think to the right.

So I just, I don't know, that leads me to think, well, what was there before?

You know, I'd love to see some, you know, some diagrams that tell a little bit more of the story of

What was there?

And that could be a really great design incentive or an influencer of the design moving forward to at least trace some sort of vestige of what was there, tell the story of the site in some way that's a little bit richer than, well, we're going to leave the

because it was skewed before.

I'd be interested in understanding if there was some sort of a little road or a path or some sort of historical context that would be fairly easy to weave into your new design.

And just an interesting story to tell so that when people like us are sitting around in 40 years and looking at the map,

There's a link between what was 100 years ago and what we're doing now, what you're planning on doing and what they're looking at at that point.

So I just think that kind of feeding the site with that kind of background can be really just kind of an interesting thing to do.

I also agree with everybody that I think it's a great idea.

I love the idea of interacting with the street

making the house more prominent.

I guess the question for you guys I have is, you mentioned as a considerable investment in moving the house.

And so I'd be interested in hearing how you wanna repurpose it.

It's one thing just leaving a house, an old house sitting there and you build around it.

I don't know what you do with it, but putting this kind of money into it, moving it, putting on a new foundation,

may lead to, you know, some more potential kind of a higher quality reuse.

Yeah, good suggestion.

No, I think I would just echo the comments.

I think it's definitely an improvement on what we saw before.

And I appreciated the discussion about the way that the urban context had been kind of transformed beyond recognition since the 1907 map.

I think that was a really good point to make.

And I would even suggest that

If we're relocating it, maybe maintaining that five degree angle isn't so important.

It might be more important to set up a new relationship to the street that exists today if we're going to go through the

through the effort of relocating it.

In the end, it might be about having a relationship that makes sense today with the context we have and that the building itself is what is important to preserve and maybe its relationship to the context is kind of beyond repair at this point.

Well, I agree with that, Clayton, and I want to maybe add a couple of things that might be useful.

I think it would be good for as

For the discussion of this project, as you guys are describing it to the public and to us, to others, is to distinguish about the things that you are doing that are relative to the historic fabric, versus the things that you're doing that are creating good pedestrian experience, good streets.

Because when you say something like missing teeth, that suggests a street where there might have been

fully developed, but there are buildings that were knocked down and that's not our condition.

In fact, in this case, the quirkiness and the missing teeth is a function of the change of the urban fabric over time.

So I think there are reasons that we want to improve the street wall, but it's not because that was the condition, it was because that's what makes for a good

contemporary pedestrian condition today, and that's what Clayton was talking about.

I agree with what everyone has said, and I really appreciate you guys coming strong with the history.

I know you said you're not a historian, but mad respect and props for bringing the historical research to the table.

I'm excited to see what the designs will look like in the future.

just because I think having that cultural and architectural history and knowledge of sample maps and what the city looked like, I think there's a way for you to really make a cohesive relationship between this new building or this new mass structure and the historic architecture.

I know right now it's just preliminary but it looks like there's no conversation happening and I think

I agree with you.

But one of the things we're really excited about, Robert, is the idea of a pedestrian front that has, Clayton, you'd mentioned a porch.

Maybe our building has some of those same features, but being able to pull the pedestrian vehicular away from Wirtland, tucking it in,

The massing of those two buildings, Jody talked about a building that helped, that was commiserate, let's say, I don't know if that's the right word, but that has more in line with the historic structure, whether it's punched openings or gable front or something, not to replicate it, but to give something complimentary to it.

Great.

Well, I think that's about the time that we had allotted for this conversation.

No, thank you guys very much for your time.

I appreciate it.

I will say, you know, of course, now that we've gotten the thumbs up from everybody, I will say we are, you know, we're still

It requires the agreement of everybody in the back condo association, which is a significant task to get that boundary line adjusted and to get drive access easements and things like that.

But this at least gives us the go ahead to pursue this path.

Yeah, I'm going to offer, if you want, I'm just looking at the historic survey.

It's interesting that the great granddaughter reported that the man who built it built it himself and made a lot of mistakes.

It's crooked.

But it's the, again, we are

ahead of schedule.

And so I just would encourage if there's anything else about this that would be helpful to discuss.

We can do that, or in my opinion, you can, and it's up to you all, but I would say if there's something to sort of, you talked about the movement of the house, are there any other elements that would be helpful and just encourage you to speak now maybe since we have the opportunity.

And I say that because you all know that we don't get evenings that often,

that, you know, are short nights.

So take advantage of it.

What you may be alluding to, and I think is a good discussion point, is the trees that I believe, what we believe is that the entrance drive to the condo kind of snaked in front of that historic structure to avoid those trees.

Those trees have,

been there for a long time and unfortunately they are not in good health.

One has been taken down already because it was dead and was losing branches significantly.

And so if you look on Google Earth, you'll see a stump now or above Google Street View, you'll see a stump of one of the two significant trees.

And we're happy to share arborist reports and photos and things like that, but the other tree is in quite poor health as well.

So it was something that we were considerate of.

And when you see the site on Google Earth there on Google Street View where you go there, it is a large looming tree that's right there.

It's just unfortunate that it's very, very old and not in great health.

So in discussions with Brecht, we're trying to piece this all back together.

We would obviously plant new trees.

Those trees would be small at first, but they'd have the opportunity to reengage the street.

And this is just to answer the big question.

We have a lot of work to do to stitch this concept together, architecturally, the landscape, history, massing.

But we didn't want to go down that route until we knew conceptually that this is something that was agreeable to everybody.

But make no mistake, we know there's a lot of work here.

Part of that tree, realignment of the street, is fixing the first sin.

or one of the sins, which was that suburban entrance.

And it really is not typical of anything.

It just doesn't fit and it hurts the connection to the house and the street.

All the things that we are trying to fix and ameliorate, that's one of the things that we would try to

The fix, obviously, the pain of that is the tree, but the tree is not doing well.

So it would, again, trying to throw out big picture concepts, realignment of the street, bring the house forward, occupy entrance, a forecourt to the building.

Those are all the things that we need to do.

I mean, I think that what I've heard today is that this is an idea worth pursuing.

I mean, I don't think that should be mistaken for an approval, but I think that given the response, I think there's a lot of promise with this approach.

I think we'd need to have more information about that tree.

I can't remember if you had an arborist look at that one or not, but a report will certainly help our

Deliberations.

And I would recommend that you also continue to reach out to Mr. Hendro, given his experience in this kind of project.

And certainly he's one of the more esteemed historians on our board.

So I think it would probably be good that this will be a project that I think he'll have some opinions on.

But

but you don't need unanimity anyway.

Great.

Thank you guys so much.

Okay.

Right.

It's also interesting reading this,

You know, unlike Windhurst, which was described as a manor house, Wortland Street really was a small parcel.

It wasn't the center of some mass estate and interesting stuff.

So what

I have some notes so when you work off, so this project, I have a better image.

I thought I sent something with some better photos in it, but yeah.

So the, is it small because of me or because?

There we go.

So we have here is the four-sided building.

Each one looks like this.

You've got the corner,

Elements have the, looks like a six over six double hung.

And then the, that inner bay on all four sides has, it has some double hungs over the entrance.

And then it's got those old metal casement windows.

So some interesting stuff.

However, this building is non-contributive.

So.

Yeah, so that's a, so that's where we get into this kind of, you know, I think, obviously, it would be something that you would, could probably encourage to get listed, you know, or designated, and you know, now that that's not necessarily the local designation, but the is, is a neat old building.

But it is it is not, it could be knocked down without BAR review.

So the question is, what would we be, and I don't know the extent of, are they thinking they have to replace all of them, some of them, you know, it's a, when we didn't get some information from them, Robert and I decided, well, you know, let's still kind of maybe tease out a discussion here of,

Typically, we are looking at a house to provide that window survey and tell us why these have to be replaced and tell us, you know, etc.

Give us photographs.

Does that matter here?

if yes or no, then what would that mean?

So I'm a little bit, the guidelines are a little silent on windows on a non-contributing structure.

What year was this, Tim?

It's in that survey.

I built right when all the, you know, the Copley Hill was going up and all those trailers and they still didn't have enough places for people.

So, yeah, is it, are they windows you want to replicate?

How would we kind of, I don't really,

and I was hoping maybe Brecker, you would say, oh yeah, back in five years ago, we had one of these or James, you might have a... Actually, James, you had mentioned some time ago that UVA has a window replacement policy.

Right.

They need to come because they're in the district, but they're not.

Correct.

And they want to replace all of them or?

And if you say, hey, Jeff, put together a staff report and give it to us, that's fine.

I mean, it just throw you a curve in the middle of the meeting, but it was, still wanted to see what you thought.

So like I had here, you know, is it legit to say, you know, replicate a period or, you know, do I, you know, it gets into some interesting questions about, you know, preservation.

I would say to them, you can't do vinyl.

It's a funky building.

How is this different than 500 quarts square?

And that was a good point that Robert Watkins brought up is that we encourage them to come up with a window replacement plan and come up with something that would say sort of there's a standard that as they replaced windows, they were using something that was at least similar that fit.

That was, remember the Monticello Hotel?

Yeah, the trick there is you had multiple owners because they were condos, right?

Is it possible that they replaced the smaller windows and then left the larger ones?

I think just trying to get a bigger picture question, which is, you know, for a non-contributing building in a historic district, are we okay with letting them replace windows?

And does that set a precedent for the next door neighbor who might be a contributing building?

saying, well, you let them do it.

Why can't I do it?

I think that's the bigger context question.

And Jeff, to your earlier question, UVA doesn't necessarily have a policy that I know of.

We typically, on historic buildings, restore rather than replace windows.

I mean, the kind of large exception that we've done recently would be the McCormick Road dormitories.

They replaced all those windows when we went through.

You know, on the rotunda, on the library, we're restoring windows.

My inclination, let me test this out, see what you guys think, is that even though this might not be labeled as a historic or a contributing building, the windows are part of a pattern that is replicated in the district.

And if they were to change substantially, what could have an impact on the district?

So I don't think we need to do necessarily preemptively do them any favors and apply our typical standard relative to windows unless they want to come and make a pitch for a different strategy.

And that would be to try to repair where possible and if not replacing them in kind.

I tend to agree, especially kind of walking down the street and seeing how it is such an oddball.

It's at a, you know, in scale and in form.

Everything else is pretty smaller scale residential.

You know, I think that's why I was asking about the windows because there is kind of a sense of like, there's a discrepancy there between those older, you know, older 1940s steel that you see in the middle.

And I don't know, the other windows might be same age too, but just trying to maintain a certain

sense of quality along that street seems a worthwhile endeavor.

I don't know if you guys have it up on street view, but the really interesting cornice detail, we're right on what the proper word would be, but I mean, up over top of the entry, there's this strange,

The Deco thing.

Always interesting.

And then someone of course busted a hole to put a dryer vent through it.

So, you know, in terms of like preservation is something I struggle with where they say, well, if you're gonna replace, then don't make it look, don't try to replicate.

Well, but windows, we do try to do that.

So, you know, in some ways you'd say, all right, well, if you're gonna take out the old, then, you know, put in a bunch of, you know, one light casements.

So I don't know, maybe sometimes looking at it as an extreme is a way to get where you wanna go.

But it's a,

Can the BAR say you can't replace windows?

I mean, you can say what they can replace them with, but can you say you can't replace them in a building that they could knock down without BAR review?

That's where it gets really strange.

I don't understand why people are so enthusiastic about tearing out and replacing windows.

In my house, I saved a lot of money.

Yeah, they're not wonderfully energy efficient, but you're never going to make back

The money these people, you know, repairing them is easy.

So, I mean, it's something, you know, we could certainly encourage.

And I think when Robert and I talked to them say, you know, what's the problem that you're trying to fix?

Cause I hear all the time, ah, we want to save energy.

Okay.

So at $1,600 a window times, how many windows?

You tell me how many years, you know, it's going to take you to get that back.

Yeah.

So it would be,

I think some homework to be done.

My thought would be fine.

You wanna replace the windows, then I think this is sort of an interesting building.

I would say you can do double hunks and I like the casements and you can replicate these windows with current products provided they're not vinyl.

But is that, you know,

I think the elephant in the room are the air conditioning units in the windows.

I'm fascinated that they're not going to do central air and they want to replace windows, which kind of begs the question, these windows will have to be operable.

I just blew up the front facade photo.

You know, half those windows are open, including the casement ones.

It's good that they still operate.

I mean, and actually it's cool how that, what is it, eight over eight?

Four, yeah, four over four.

It's amazing that the outside ones actually open like that, which is quite, it's quite attractive actually.

And that the, I guess the interior ones, the ones on the top are static and they don't move.

But I mean, and on the ones on the sides,

you know the three over fours they've got a couple of they've got one unit there so like I don't know how they're going and there's another one actually or two on the kind of return wall on the right um oh and there are three there's one on each level um so I find this a really curious

request.

I would augur to keep any original windows.

I think the casements are really special.

And that's a lot of light into these living areas.

We're not talking about changing the openings, but I would just think some grout and a little bit of repair, some of those last a long time.

I also really do, it's a not all that attractive building that looks like it has some stuff done to it, but there is a surround that

is on the three over fours and the casement windows that is consistent throughout the building.

And I wouldn't want that messed with because I do think it's as much as it can be a defining feature of this building.

So those are my comments.

I can think of other things about this building that need to be improved besides the windows.

Yeah.

Am I allowed to say that?

I don't know.

Well, but knowing that it's not essentially aired building or it's insufficiently aired if it is, and these tenants have got these window units in there, the replacements have to be operable, you know?

And that's where windows always worry me because the biggest complaint

and this is the property inspection folks at neighborhood development.

And there is the state maintenance code.

So we're trying to figure out how to overlap some of the inspection of how are buildings looking relative, not necessarily the BAR criteria, but to that state code issue.

But students will call and say,

My landlords, the windows don't open.

It's like almost a game, not a game, but it's a way to just like one applying pressure to the other.

And that is where I get calls and people say, well, I've been cited by the city, I have to replace the windows, what do I do?

And I spent a lot of time talking to people who like,

You go get some rope in Martin's hardware and you can fix the sash blades.

But it is a, I just really stuck on a non-contributing building what I'm going, what I should tell them.

And what I've heard is we're sort of going back to, all right, what's historically on this building and how do we protect the character of that?

And it seems, I mean, I don't disagree at all.

My question is, if it's in this historic district, regardless of it's contributing or non-contributing, if they're not gonna demolish it, but they wanna make a change, is it under our purview?

Yes.

Okay.

And I'll do our best.

I haven't really been able to talk to them.

I think they don't quite understand, although I get, you know, I don't like when these people that own these buildings go, I don't know, I don't know anything.

Well, yes you do.

So, you know, but the first line of defense is to sit down and say, what is it you want to accomplish with these windows?

And, you know, whether it's a 50 year old building or 150 year old building,

First thing is, can I save you some money on this?

But it's something to think about and I'll leave it at that, I think, unless you all have something you suggest I do homework on or look at.

By the way, speaking of

inspections of properties.

I sent out the email about 605 Creston Place.

Did you all see that?

where they are in the process of doing some significant rehabilitation and working with DHR on that.

So that was good to see.

And now they still need to do it, but that work is in process.

Tax credits are not the easiest thing to do.

I can say that personally because I wasn't able to get them, but it's always something I want to encourage people to do and try to help people when they can.

So the thing I know

Clayton and David, you weren't on at the initial part of the meeting, but this is also a good opportunity for me to, this is where we have a project that's within a historic conservation district, but it is, it was designated an individually protected property by the city.

long before it was incorporated, or the Historic Conservation District was created around it.

So this is one of those situations where the more rigid rules apply.

So even being a conservation district, we look at this, you know, at the same microscope, which we would look at something within an ADC district.

So that's the, I thought it was a, you know,

At least we could kind of, an example of sometimes where these things straddle the line a little bit.

And then just the background, I was contacted by the owner and applicant a couple of weeks ago and

They're planning to make a submittal, but John wasn't available tonight and I, but I said, hey, well, let me just ask the VAR.

They have any initial thoughts and it's always an opportunity to give an applicant some feedback and, you know, however informal it might be.

Sometimes it's easy, sometimes there's nothing there.

So, but, so David and Clayton, you really, and of course everybody else, but

what was said earlier was just this if you look at this the image there at the bottom the south face the south facing elevation the that porch and that the two twin windows on the on the left hand side that's that's all there is of the original store and house and everything else that you see extending from that is was an addition from 2002.

So the question

I had and you saw in my sketches, Robert, do we have those sketch that I did?

I'll pull those up as well.

Can I interrupt just for a second?

I had said in the pre-meeting, I'm going to recoup myself from consideration on this.

I've represented the applicant, the owner of this on two different applications before the BAR.

Sorry, I muted myself.

Jeff, would you mind just going over your comments?

I can't control the doober dabber.

Robert, go to the two elevations of the renderings at the bottom and there.

So, and the other piece I'll say, Clayton and David is that we get questions all the time from applicants and sometimes I'll float it out to you all in an email.

To me, it's always trying to,

give some feedback, help them out a little bit moving forward.

We're not making decisions, we're just building as we go.

And I've done this a lot, brought questions to you all and you all don't have to offer comments.

We're still have them, the applicant coming in, but it does,

sometimes help me look at something differently and help me see things.

So with this one, when I first got it from John, I don't have the notes on this rendering, but you can see where the addition roof line and the rake on that gable at the end there

replicates the profile, everything off the original.

So it would have been one of those where 20 years ago probably should have said that this edition looks too much like it was built with the house.

So then you go to the rendering at the bottom where the extension of the new edition or suggested edition, you know, that middle section certainly can't be confused with the original, but the roof line tends to be the same.

And then popping out at the other end is that sort of a continuation of the roof that

that looks almost like the old house is enclosed within it.

So that was what I said to John.

I felt like some variation in the entirety of that edition would be helpful.

And then there's also in the... James, my computer's telling me this.

All right.

Okay, sorry, James Zehmer just sent a note.

And then the end elevation, Robert, if you could scroll up to the rendering, John's renderings.

You might have to rotate it.

So there, use that one.

So there on the end, the gable on the end of the edition,

you know, again, are they respecting that or are they replicating?

And it was the conversation you all had a month ago about mimicry that really jumped out at me.

In fact, I think I put that in that summary.

That was one of the comments I made to John is, are you mimicking?

Are you respecting?

Are you emulating?

What is it?

And so those are that kind of wondering what you see and if that's,

You know, anything about this that would be helpful when John gets back that I can sort of say, you know, here are some feelings, opinions, B.R.

I mean, to me, I think that it feels like there are many different things going on.

I think that part of that is the attitude toward the existing structure of the 2002 edition.

And so that one is distinct from the original building, but it has the same style.

And now we're adding on something that's stylistically distinct, but we are continuing the existing roof line.

And then we're adding on another

Another piece on the end that is, I guess, trying to mimic the gabled roof of the original two structures.

So to me, it feels a little bit schizophrenic.

I mean, I guess if I had to give my two cents about how to improve it, maybe some kind of joint between what's existing now and what they're proposing to add on.

Maybe then I would like it better.

I'm not sure, but it does feel like it feels like a lot of different things going on at once right now.

And they're not really communicating with each other very well.

It's important in the sense that one of the key things about an addition is that it is distinct, does not look like it was there as part of the original.

And so this is maybe one of those places where sort of architectural sense is useful where some of the other things were a little more

they have a smaller box to work in, but here it is, you really are looking at what is the architecture of this edition?

What's the architecture of the prior edition?

And what's the architecture of the original and do they fit and do they work together?

I think I agree with Clayton.

I think it is,

I think it is workable that an addition be placed here.

And I think it's workable that a contemporary addition be placed in this location.

I think I also am confused a little bit that for a piece that is so different stylistically, it's carrying the same wall plane is extended and the roof line is contiguous.

So it seems

a little bit funky in that way.

And I guess the way that I have my own sort of design critique for it, but I think related to our design standards, I think one of the things we'll be concerned is that this really begins to be quite a long building in a residential neighborhood.

And so that material difference and the roof line difference are important to break down the scale of those

structures and maintain that kind of residential rhythm and proportion.

So I like the color difference.

I like the material change, but I think that it needs a little more difference when it comes to the roof line and the wall plane.

The back porch is a little funky.

My concern is that it feels like it

It's not going to last very long.

I just would have questions about the materiality of it and what's it going to look like in five years even.

Maybe if there wasn't such a kind of consistent dimensionality to the two different editions.

Right now, it feels so relentless, like one, two, three.

Maybe if it was a little bit smaller or set back from that wall plane, as you're saying, then it feels so repetitive and so massive, something that is maybe not just another letter in the alphabet.

I like the idea that it's related

I think there could be an argument too about how the multiplicity of the form and material takes away from the historic structure.

I think that

you know, a more consistent volume, you know, with the kind of issues of scale that you just went through, in some ways could make a, you could really set the historic structure off in a very nice way.

You know, there could be a great contrast between the two, but I think with the sort of, you know, ABCD repetition of it,

It's got that, yeah, like a telescope.

That's what I kind of saw in it.

It's a funny sight too because they're right up against the flood plain and, but, you know, Willam Mills is truly

and there's one of everything over there.

And things kind of like, there's not a lot of big tall, and I think the topography works this way, how these things are built up on the street, they seem short, but there are buildings that kind of grow to the rear.

It's like up there on Park Street, Breck where

down towards where Kevin lives, that houses along Park look all low.

But if you go down that alley in the back, these almost three story buildings.

One of the other things that occurs to me is that the dormer without a window is weird.

And I'm kind of curious what it's getting them.

Looks like a bedroom.

There's a plan in here.

That is strange because there is a window on the other side.

Oh, right.

Yeah, gotcha.

Yeah.

Yeah, it might be something

It's probably for privacy.

I mean, I would almost prefer that the addition is more of a, of an elaborated hyphen in a way, because then it wouldn't, it wouldn't make the whole, the entire building feel like it's, there's a third component.

Big rectilinear math.

I don't really like the juxtaposition there.

I don't know if I saw that.

I was repeat just, I did mention a comment in the pre-meeting, which

The 2002 edition, I think one of the things that makes it successful is that there is a hyphen to give that sense of separation between the original.

And so if they could do something similar here, I think that would help it.

We'll be seeing this in, we'll be seeing it in a month.

And it's always fun looking at things through your eyes, you know, how you guys, I know what I see and it's, group projects always better with this stuff like this.

Are we done with that?

Are we done with that?

Are we done with that?

Are we done with that?

Are we done with that?

Are we done with that?

Are we done with that?

Are we done with that?

Are we done with that?

Are we done with that?

Let me just go ahead and introduce it for the public 111 14th Street Northwest.

This is a preliminary discussion for the potential mural.

And yes, so Clayton and David, this is an organization in town that probably knows where every vertical wall is in the city and

you know, always checking on whether they can put a mural on it.

And it's the Bridge Art Initiative and good people to work with.

And they've done a lot of neat stuff around town.

So, and Alan asked me whether or not the VAR would consider an application.

And as I said earlier, you know, when you have a nonprofit and you can save them 125 bucks, that's what I try to do.

So the, we've,

Traditionally, the BAR has stayed away from painting of unpainted brick.

And obviously, you know, the reasons of, you know, it's not reversible.

But there has been, you know, some understanding that with a

or contemporary modern masonry, less of a concern about the damage to the brick wall and things like that.

And that idea of maybe civic art fits there and works there.

So there has been one case in which the BAR in the last four years did approve a mural placement on a more contemporary building.

The other option is that

We required them to do some sort of sacrificial coding on which the artwork would be done.

But the idea of the BAR's review is it doesn't review content.

We do make sure that it's not a sign.

That's done internally.

and so it's more of does a, is a mural appropriate here?

Is a mural appropriate on this wall, on this material?

Does it interfere with architectural elements or are there sign components that the mural would interfere with or conflict with?

And so

This one's relatively simple.

There's not windows and doors and things like that, but it does kind of come down to that.

Is it okay to paint an unpainted brick surface?

Yes, no.

If no, would it be okay to do it with a sacrificial surface?

Yes, no.

And if there were a, unless there were really, really,

reservations to this idea, you know, I could tell Alan, yeah, bring us a request to consider or, you know, go find another wall.

So yeah, it's Clayton and David, you know, you guys, it's your chance to say something or say something.

What happened to the other side of the, was the other wall altered at some point?

It looks like there was a wood wall that was put up.

Do we know the history behind that?

It doesn't matter.

I guess my feeling is that, I don't know, I don't feel that strongly about it, but I think that a new canopy would certainly enhance the overall effect.

And I guess I bring up the wood wall because you look at the wood wall, it's hard to make an argument about putting a small, it's not really a mural, it's more like a

It's like a painting, or like somebody was saying earlier on, a sign.

It's hard to make an argument about that.

I feel like there's certainly something that could be done there.

I mean, I think I'm basically in agreement.

I mean, I think reversibility is always a good thing, but I think it's also, you know, it's a building designed in 1979 and it already has a lot of colorful elements on the other side with the different awnings and the umbrellas.

I mean, it's not really a kind of austere structure in my opinion.

I agree.

I just add to my earlier comments in the pre-meeting that I think, I think my, I do think of reversibility as good.

I think it is so adjacent to the front door that I do worry about it being a sign or being read as a sign.

So I would be okay with it even moving closer to the street to Cheri's comment that it would be more visible from the street as one is traveling south on

on 14th Street.

So in terms of- Go on.

My question is about the reversibility.

Jeff, you're talking about like a coating or a sacrificial material.

Look it up.

And that's what sometimes I wonder if you guys will say, oh, yeah, we know there's some stuff out there.

But Alan, you know, it gets to where it's like, oh, yeah, there's stuff you can put on it.

All right.

And then the mural goes out.

Well, can you get that stuff off the wall?

You know, that might be great.

I guess the reason I ask is because my concern is more about, like, not necessarily opposed to a mural in that location, and I may not be opposed to it in the long term regardless, but when you look at the entire building that does house numerous commercial fronts, none of it is painted brick.

Our guidelines do say not to paint untainted brick, so we would have to find a way to get around our own guidelines.

Well, it is a slippery slope.

I would say the only other

in which the BAR did consider the painting of the brick.

There were several members who were opposed, but that was a, if you recall, a mural that was to celebrate Heather and what happened back in 2017.

And I will say, I think there was a lot of

It was difficulty.

Nobody wanted to be one and said, no, you can't do that.

But so maybe this allows us to, there's no emotion here.

I, some of the things, again, listening to you all, it's always helpful.

It is a

Once you paint it, it's painted.

And Alan talked about this, he said it's a non-woven, lightweight, synthetic fabric.

Space-age polymer, no doubt.

Installed with an exterior gel medium that would adhere well and conform to the texture of the brick, but could be removed.

I probably have to say, what is that?

What are you talking about?

Everything can be removed.

The guy will tell you, get me a power washer, I'll take it off.

I think I need to say, tell me more about what you want there.

but I'm inclined to, James, like you said, you just start to say, all right, at what point do we start just painting this building?

It's a death by a thousand cuts.

Oh, because it's not 1920s painted, but only paint a little bit.

And then, wow, we already painted it.

Nothing else here is painted.

And Breck, I agree, that is what's going on with the awning.

I was telling the others that we approved an awning design.

All right.

I will I will look at the awning.

All right.

You know, you do something with the you know, you do something with the awning and then you do something with the you know, the recently added wood siding

There could be something interesting.

There's potential there that, I mean, to some of your points, if you then painted whatever it is, a 10 by 6 painting right on that wall, you know, it sets it back.

It does have that kind of

Talk about uninviting.

They said, the reason you want to do something is because people keep spraying graffiti there.

Yeah, you can see the graffiti on the Google Maps.

kids.

All right, this is super helpful.

I know what to do and I'm gonna recommend they find another spot where they explain to us what this sacrificial coating does and how it works.

And yeah, I think it's gotta be just a slippery slope to start saying, yeah, you can paint a little bit because the next thing you know, it's all paint.

and it's just one more thing and I know Cheri's raised this off and one more thing to really think about when we hopefully get moving this summer on the design guidelines review and how we address that.

I don't think James has signed on yet.

I was gonna suggest maybe if you guys wanna take a,

10 minute break and come back.

If James is here, we can have a conversation with him.

Just your poison.

Well, let's do that.

I don't think at least a five or 10 minute break.

That didn't work.

He said he'd be here at 7.15

Let's do that.

Hey there, Robert.

Oh, he checked out already.

Cheri, I've been meaning to tell you I heard your voice on the radio several months ago.

I was pretty certain it was we were doing a marathon, a Costco marathon show.

You're muted.

WTJU's classical marathon at Christmas.

A friend of mine, Steve Harris, had me kind of pitch co-host.

It was great.

It was beautiful.

Glad you're a listener.

Yeah, me too.

We are taking it for granted.

You know, it's possible.

I've gotten into this habit of like,

Like even Sandy called me out the other day, she was working from home, goes, who are you talking to?

I was like, no one.

Like, well, just, this is what two years of being in this room has done to me.

Yeah, I'm my own best friend, I guess.

But I'm trying to put together some images that I want to send or have Robert put up that,

wanted to get, this is a little bit of homework for next month for you guys to, it's a good thing, it's a fun, or a positive thing, but it's, Ron and I had a good discussion today about, all right, what are all the things that we have to tackle?

And this is one of them, and I'll, you'll see in a second.

And it's an architectural historic preservation exercise that you all will be making a recommendation on, but I think it would be great to have your thoughts and assistance on.

Robert, I can't, I'm gonna just send this to you.

That's the best way to,

Yep, yep.

All right, save as, save as.

The, and while that's on its way over, wanted to tell you all about the, we met with, there's James, we met with, James and I and Robert met with the design team on the courts a couple of weeks ago and

I think we had a very positive meeting, very above board.

What do we need to do?

Where do things stand?

And, you know, I think there was some acknowledgement that everybody was got a little bit

Frade at the last meeting.

And I think that there's some very good understanding about how each group communicate better.

They also have some changes that they brought forward that I think really reflected what you all had said to them.

And then there were other things where it was like, you know, we're sort of, you know, the

our requirements have us here.

And so we had a good discussion.

I had urged them to attend this meeting and to discuss with you all, not the design, but what things do you want to see as far as making a decision for, you know, wall sections, samples,

whatever the type of things that you all would like to see and in what way that would help make a decision.

I think they felt a little uncomfortable doing that without having, you know, they wanted to share the new design.

And I said, well, let's, I don't want to, it's not the time or place for that.

Cause we didn't have the time to advertise for it, but I suspect that will be coming in in April.

I think you'll,

you'll like what you see.

And they were very receptive.

And it was a positive meeting.

I had gone in kind of ready to say, you're not gonna tell us what to do.

And it had been very positive.

All right, Robert, do you have the, that I just sent you that PDF, if you would put that up on the screen, it's gonna take two seconds and then I see James is here.

So if everything goes perfectly,

War in Ukraine Ends and The World is Wonderful.

Next month, Robert and I are hoping we can bring to you all, these are the six structures in a proposed Historic Conservation District, the C.H.

Brown HC District, which would be at 12th and Rosser at the north end of 10th and Page.

The

The next piece for us is to talk with the property owners about what are the architectural character defining features that are important here.

And then that would be coming to you all with a recommendation from the BAR because it's a zoning change.

So you all would be making a recommendation on

the change to the zoning and the change to the design guidelines, which are specific to each of the conservation districts.

So I was gonna, and I can send this out to you all just to say, you know, what do you all see and not answering tonight, but what are the things that, you know,

we would suggest the neighborhood or to the six property owners and what, you know, from the design perspective, what things look like, you know, what would you want to say are the things that would be emphasized.

Now in the bottom right, that is the church that is an IPP, that will remain an IPP.

So, but it is,

and David and Clayton, maybe everyone else, maybe you don't know.

So Reverend Brown back in starting in the middle of the 20th century was a minister and also worked for Allied Concrete.

And on his free time, he constructed houses, he designed them and built them all over the city.

There might be,

in excess of 150 houses like this that he built and his son Ralph and I think some brothers and sisters and cousins have really you know come together and want to acknowledge Reverend Brown's legacy and starting with these six houses or these six structures so they're you know very simply built, simply designed, cinder block and but it's a

It's a neat opportunity to recognize a contribution that maybe isn't architecturally elegant, but it certainly has its importance and we want to recognize that.

So that's where I said next month, hopefully you guys can look at this, go out there and we can talk about what you see.

All right, so I have at the bottom of the Hollywood Squares here, James Freeze, who is going to just give you all an introduction on where we are with the zoning rewrite, which is the next piece of the comprehensive plan change.

Thank you, Jeff.

Good evening, everybody.

Yeah, as Jeff said, I'm coaching my daughter's soccer team.

So I thank you for your indulgence in allowing me to go last night and to wear a sweatshirt.

We're all in.

OK, fair enough.

Good.

So yes, as Jeff said, my goal this evening was to

talk a little bit about our process and schedule for the upcoming zoning rewrite project and see if you guys had any questions on that project.

I'm hoping that each of you will take an opportunity to review that work as it comes out and

get involved and I understand Ms.

Lewis, Cheri Lewis is the BAR rep for the steering committee and we connected I think last week on getting her up to speed on what's going on there.

So, as Jeff said, we're on where you've kicked off the zoning rewrite process.

That's the third leg of our three-leg CIVO Plans Together project.

The first two legs were the Affordable Housing Plan and the Comprehensive Plan, both of which were adopted last year.

The Zoning Rewrite Project is itself a three-part project.

So where we are right now is in the first part, which is what we're calling the approach and diagnostic phase, diagnostic and approach phase.

And what that basically is referring to is that we are looking at our consultant team is reviewing the existing zoning and identifying where that existing zoning is out of step with best practices in zoning and the adopted comprehensive plan.

In order to develop our approach, which is going to basically describe what are we proposing to change within the zoning ordinance.

That approach will be documented in a report that we're going to be releasing in mid-April as a draft.

We'll collect feedback on that and then finalize that report to share with Planning Commission and City Council.

Hopefully by the end of June, that's our target so that we get the nod from those two bodies that say, yeah, this is the approach we want to take.

This is how we want to move forward, which then moves us into drafting the zoning ordinance.

zoning ordinance, the drafting of the zoning ordinance will happen over the course of the summer.

And then the draft zoning ordinance will be released in the end of September, beginning of October timeframe.

That's our target.

Again, that then kicks off a period of time where we're seeking feedback and input with the goal of doing a final draft of the zoning ordinance document

by the end of the year or so, which puts us in a timeframe for adoption of around this time next year.

I can put this back in front of Planning Commission and City Council.

So I'm calling that our Measure Twice, Cut Once approach.

What can I say about it?

A few things I want to note.

One of our objectives with this new zoning ordinance is to simplify and make this an easier to read zoning ordinance.

Easier to use.

I tend to work from a philosophy that zoning is something that's, well, often most people don't pay much attention to zoning.

It is in fact very important to understand what you can do with your property, understand what can happen in your neighborhood.

And so the zoning ordinance itself should be an approachable and easy to use, easy to read document.

So that's our guiding principle going into this drafting process and will be reflected in all the work that we have coming forward.

That means that it'll be an ordinance that has a lot of illustration, a lot of easy to use tables and charts, and it'll use simple language.

We're going to try and stay away from legalese.

The other thing to note is we have updated the website, so I encourage everyone to go and take a look at that and see the schedule is laid out there.

More of the information that I've shared can be found there.

One of the things we're trying to do in this phase is also release information that makes zoning itself an approachable topic for basically the layperson who doesn't understand, who may not understand much about zoning so that everyone can participate in this process on more or less equal footing.

or at least there's an opportunity to do so.

So we've created a glossary of common zoning terms that's on the website.

We're going to be building out a zoning 101 presentation.

And I'm actually working with a group of UVA students who are going to be building out some flyers, pamphlets, printed material, web-based material that not only

explain zoning in kind of approachable terms, but I'll also take the recommendations coming out of this approach report and make those approachable understandable.

So in a nutshell, that's the schedule, that's the process we're looking at and what we have going on.

One other thing I've been reminding folks is that our marching orders, if you will, on this zoning ordinance come from the comprehensive plan.

And in particular, I encourage people to review the land use chapter and the very first goal, which says the very first goal in the land use chapter of the comprehensive plan is write a zoning ordinance effectively.

Those aren't the exact words, but it says write a zoning ordinance.

And then it's got like two pages of guidance as to what we're looking for in zoning.

I've done this work in

a number of places.

I've seen it done a number of places.

I don't know that I've ever seen this much guidance in a comprehensive plan for zoning.

So it's fantastic.

We've got a huge amount of guidance to start with.

So we've been able to hit the ground running.

James, I wonder if you could speak a little bit more about

That's a great question.

I don't know that I've dove into that particular issue much yet at all.

Guys, I had mentioned to you, so that the key task in this is that there,

reviewing the ordinance relative to the comp plan changes, but it is also our opportunity to express anything we've got with the

Ordinance that addresses historic districts and the conservation districts.

So it's a, that's why there's sort of two pieces to it.

And I still want to encourage you all to take a look at those regs.

And if you had suggestions about what could be done or how they could be done.

Again, it's not necessarily the focus of what is happening here.

It is,

a key piece of that.

And it's our opportunity to get those ideas in.

And then there are those questions of how does the things that are happening throughout the city and things that are related to our design control, the BAR related things.

And I think it is that my invitation to you all is that there are

We merged the chapters, the land use chapter now has the historic preservation and design part of it all incorporated in one.

So it's being able to say,

what the BAR does doesn't happen throughout the entire city.

And looking at the ordinance in that way, sort of helping people understand that what's done in our districts doesn't happen everywhere and just kind of keeping that in mind.

And that's where, and I think Cheri you're on the work group, but the BAR can certainly

have conversations, we can incorporate that into our meeting agenda to sort of discuss things if we have ideas or something that we want to have Cheri take back to that committee.

And let me note, first, I'm more than happy to come to any meeting of the BAR throughout this process as we go forward.

Quite honestly, I value the time and I value the expertise that you guys bring to the table because you guys are working in a piece, essentially, of our zoning program overall.

to say it again, if there are policy changes that you guys think we should be considering at this point in time, or just things that you've always felt don't work well or could be done better, it would be really valuable to us to hear about those.

I'm excited about the process.

And I think it's a really important time

We don't get that many opportunities to communicate directly with the public about what this board does and what our historic conservation and design control districts do.

I'd say there's, even within the people that we speak with, part of that confusion is because people don't do this every day, but also our role has changed.

The rules that were written when the first preservation guidelines came out, it seemed to me to protect a certain kind of architecture in a city that was pretty narrowly focused on a certain kind of architecture in a certain kind of parts of the city.

and what we found is that those rules have been, while they might've been narrowly applied initially, they've been really effective over, as we've understood more about the history and context of our community, they've been useful in preserving pieces of architecture and districts that weren't deemed special or worthy of distinction earlier.

and a lot of the public doesn't understand that we see it that way or that it's a really important tool.

And looking forward, I think it's really imperative that the community understand the kind of amazing gift that we have to use the legal framework that protects these districts to grow in a way that preserves that

the opportunity for those stories, that it's a diverse set of stories.

It's not the original intention.

I appreciate that.

That's a great story.

It's a great part of this.

And that is it, folks.

I think it's the opportunity.

This is not a react to what comes out of a committee.

These are design related discussions that we can be contributing to.

proactively and I just want to just I'll bang my pots and pans together and Brett hears me talk about this all the time you know just sort of the design professionals this community kind of you know there's a great opportunity here to say what where do we want to head with Charlottesville how does this comp plan how do you take the vision of that comp plan and and and relate it into things that can be you know implemented in you know

transferring that vision into a plan and language that expresses the vision.

So that's it.

That's my rah-rah speech.

You all are invited.

So I wasn't aware of the first meeting

James, I guess there was a, anyway, miscommunication.

I didn't actually know I was on the steering committee.

I know he's supposed to be the BAR's rep and a meeting happened and I wasn't there.

So James, and then I was on vacation, I think two weeks ago when James sent me an email saying, oops, so I haven't had any chance to participate to your first question.

I don't, I mean, I personally don't have an agenda.

I would say that I have,

the good fortune to have been on the Planning Commission when we did the most recent large overhaul of the zoning ordinance in 2003.

And then we did some updates, I think in 2005, I'm dating myself here, but it helps, that helps me to, and I guess just because I'm a little bit more, you know, as the BAR members, we don't deal that much in the zoning ordinance, you know,

Our purview is enforcing the guidelines, interpreting the guidelines, and approving or denying COAs based on the guidelines.

I'm not saying we don't care about the zoning ordinance, but I have a little bit more background, I think, just because of my practice and also my time in the Planning Commission with our zoning ordinance.

I really don't have any burning agenda,

Something that I really want to see improved.

I completely support James's goal to have it be more approachable, especially in the zoning code.

and this is the part that we do deal with most as the BAR, the parts of the zoning code that deal with building envelopes, setbacks, sort of all of those regulations and then the different districts.

It's really hard.

You know, our use matrices are really useful and those are easy to find, but I think if you weren't familiar with our districts and you were just like a new owner or perspective owner in the city,

it would be really, it's not easy to figure out what regulations apply to your property or your prospective property.

So that's one, I mean, I just know I've been tripped up and I know the different mixed use districts, residential districts, districts period, and I'll be tripped up and think of properties in one.

And it's, I mean, I know there's a place where you can find it, but it seems like there should be a little bit of consistency

maybe based on just the zoning designation in the city instead of what district you're in.

I get that districts have a different flavor than others and a different way they were developed and different purposes and just a different fabric.

And I think there's a lot of repetition in the zoning ordinance.

So that's the only thing that I really thought about.

And I don't, you know, I know that's, for me, it's a trip up.

I'm not bright enough to know what the solution is.

I'm sure James

and the steering committee can come up with it.

But that's one, that's the biggest area that I think is used a lot by residents, consumers, you know, citizens, that it's not always easy to get a real easy question.

And I think once we, I don't want to say transparent, but once we make it simpler to find those answers, then I think NDS will get less phone calls, you know, and a lot of, honestly, I'm not saying this to suck up to our staff members, but

I mean, I don't know, I don't know how many times I've told a client or just a friend that asks, you know, they'll ask me a question.

I'm like, I don't know.

I would call the city and talk to Brian Holuska or Missy or, you know, and because I, you really, you really don't know.

And, and maybe I would say some of it is, is up to historic interpretation of staff members who've not, not trying to commit any mischief, but they've sorta had to fill in the gaps

Sarah, you found my ulterior motive.

Yeah, it's, I mean, I've said it before, like I've said a million times, I don't know, call the city and I feel bad, but there's, when a zoning ordinance doesn't present solutions and when it isn't really easily ascertainable and isn't a good tool for

development or guidance, you know, about building regulations.

I think that's, you know, that we'll be on it.

This will be on a good side of a lot of, you know, staff work that hopefully won't have to be done, you know, when we're done with this rewrite.

I said, go again with how the BAR, you all are, you exist because of an ordinance, you're not an appointed body that

provides recommendations.

You exist by ordinance and have very specific rules.

I would say those rules or that ordinances is poorly written in some places.

And, cause there are a lot of times I'm not sure exactly how to interpret that phrase.

And so you all say, encourage you to be involved in the land use side of things, but also in just looking at how,

Well, as I said, I'm more than happy to come back again at any point in time to this process.

Great.

Well, I was just going to reminisce, but I mean, I'm sure James is aware of this.

But really, before we redid the zoning ordinance in 2003-5, the city, I mean, the amazing amount of growth we've had in the city, good, bad or indifferent,

Our zoning ordinance before that was a suburban style zoning ordinance basically based on like a suburban county.

I mean we didn't have mixed use districts.

It is, it is amazing what zoning, and not even not up zoning not down zoning just changing

you know, defining what can be done has done for our city.

And I'm not applauding development as a end or be all or goal, but our city I think is better for that, you know, that first stab at getting to mixed use districts, at getting to define our entrance corridors, which hadn't been defined before.

A lot of things that were tackled in that rewrite, it's pretty unimaginable how it was before then.

You know, when Jim Tolbert came here,

So it can be a great tool in a lot of ways.

And it can be a tool for preservation too.

I'm not saying that development is the end.

It can be a great tool for preserving things that the zoning ordinance wants to preserve, like a certain building regulation within a district or a zoning code or a zoning designation or whatever.

So anyway,

Thanks for tolerating my walk down memory lane.

But just for those who haven't been in the city for very long, we really have gone a lot of like really far in 20 years on this.

Cheri, what was the, I've been asked about the BAR's role in that last rewrite and that

And I had people say, well, the BAR wouldn't let this happen or wouldn't let that happen.

And I don't recall the BAR having that much influence.

No.

And I think we were rewriting the guidelines about that same time.

And I wouldn't say we as the BAR, but Mary Joy and staff and interns were.

Probably that was happening at the same time.

I don't remember.

You know, a good person to ask would be Joan Fenton, who served as chair during that time, or my recollection is about that time.

She would have a good memory, but I think she served two terms.

I don't know.

That's a really great question.

You know, I don't remember the BAR having a role in it.

So maybe everybody on this call just breathed a sigh of relief.

Cheri's doing the work and we don't have to.

Well, thanks for coming to us, James, and good to meet you and talk to you a little bit longer.

Absolutely.

All right.

Well, thank you for the time.

All right, do we have anything else on the agenda?

There was other items, but I don't think it didn't get the sense.

No other items.

The only one is I will say I did not hear from any of you about the Belmont Bridge.

So I took that as a positive sign.

I sent it on that map, if you go on the Belmont side and try to walk through the parking lot.

Just to be clear, we're not in a okay it, don't okay it.

Somewhat, yeah.

Yeah, right there.

I don't know, but that I didn't hear back really was one of those like, okay, you know, something happened.

They didn't get it or they don't know what I'm talking about.

The only comment I made was that the panel right above the striation had a really bad stain from the release agent.

There are performance criteria, quality criteria, which you all were primarily in writing that sort of, these are the things that

the criteria for us to accept it.

So BAR participated in that, but it will be the city project engineer and the engineer that's doing the project to approve those products based on those guidelines.

So it was sort of a catch-22 because I said to Jeanette, well, what is it?

If the BAR doesn't like something, what is it that they can or cannot like?

And

but I said, to me, it has the striations that the BAR had wanted, whether it was too light or gray or too dark or gray or whether the concrete looked more like concrete here than there.

I said, that's not, I like material that looks like material.

I said, there was, for example, there was some pitting, it just naturally happens in concrete.

And I said, well, if you don't want pitting, then spray it with,

paint and fill everything or let's build it in latex.

But it's so I think the engineers finding some things to be critical about but it's things are moving quickly over there.

So we should be able to see things being erected.

I think that there's some uncertainty about handling

these panels that have these very sharp edges.

And I just said to them, I don't know how you're gonna keep those things from getting tore up.

I've built too many things in my life, but that's their headache to deal with.

Was there any feedback on

Well, the discoloration kind of that you see there.

Yeah, and they picked up on that.

That was one of the things they immediately said.

They don't want that to happen and that it would be, so they addressed that.

You know, I offered the idea of

painting them or sealing them.

I said, these things are gonna get graffiti on it.

Why don't we pick a color that then you can paint over to cover the graffiti.

But that sounds like something that's gonna cost extra that they don't wanna do.

But I think if you go up and stare at any surface, you're gonna find all kinds of problems.

We'll see what everyone thinks in another nine months.

Thank you, Jeff.

Thank you, Robert, Patrick, and all the other staff.

Thank you all, everybody.

No, that's all you.

Thanks everybody.