Board of Architectural Review Meeting   2/26/2025

If I do this, I can.

They're one of the bad things.

I'll call us to order.

All right, good evening everybody.

Sorry we're a few minutes late.

Welcome to this regularly scheduled monthly meeting.

I guess we're a week off due to snow, but of the Charlottesville Board of Architectural Review, staff will introduce each item followed by the applicant's presentation, which should not exceed 10 minutes.

Chair will then ask for questions from the public followed by questions from the BAR.

After questions are closed, the chair will ask for comments from the public.

For each application, members of the public are each allowed three minutes to ask questions and three minutes to offer comments.

The speaker shall identify themselves and provide their address.

Comments should be limited to the BAR's purview.

That is, regarding only the exterior aspects of a project.

Following the BAR's discussion and prior to taking action, the applicant will have up to three minutes to respond.

Right.

First is matters from the public, not on the agenda or on the consent agenda.

Do we have anything not on our agenda?

Hearing none, we'll move to the consent agenda.

This evening, the consent agenda consists of meeting minutes from December and January.

All right.

All in favor?

Aye.

I'll say aye, though.

I can't remember which meeting I wasn't at, and so I'll approve whichever one I was at for the meeting minutes.

Forgive me.

We had no deferred items.

Our first new item is 1000 Workland Street.

for Tenth and Wirtland.

Yeah, so this is a COA request for a multi-story residential project over at Tenth and Wirtland Street.

You all have had discussions about this.

It's coming for you tonight with a formal request for approval.

This project encompasses a couple of parcels at the northeast corner of Tenton,

because a section on the west side includes a parcel that's within the west main ADC district, the result is that the entire project is subject to BAR review.

So again, a COA request for construction of a six-story residential building.

The existing non-contributing structure on the site will be raised and no BAR review is necessary for that because it's not contributing.

briefly talk about, in the discussion I offer, as we talked about, there were some issues that went to the BCA and relative to length and building openings, and there was, the BCA met and granted those, but there's still a period of

and

and so on.

sort of left to you all to your decision how it's it won't have a door or window in it but how it looks will be what you all decide and then the length of the building was also allowed so that's but again you I you all can include the condition language in any motion just to cover the basis in case it has to come back and my my so everybody knows what that is I I feel like if

If something had to change and the result was that they had to add some fenestration on that section of the wall or a door, and it was consistent with what's going on with the rest of the building, that that's something that Chair and I could review.

Now, of course, if it comes back and the result is they need to put a break in the building and significantly change the design.

and so on and so forth.

the adjacent historic district, most of what this is being.

While this is across the street from the Workman District, this is really contrasting with buildings in the West Main Corridor.

And also in the staff report are some of the notes from the comments that you all made during the May 21, 2024 discussion and December 17th discussion.

So, Jeff, before we get into the body of our presentation, if I could just correct one item for the record with regard to the BZA vote.

So, the zoning administrator specifically brought before them the question of entrances, entry spacing.

He did not bring before them the question of the building length.

And then, what was the other one?

Oh my gosh.

Blanking on what the other thing was.

But he put those out through an administrative modification request.

So those are out for their public comment period right now.

But only the entrances went in front of the BZA.

Thank you.

Hi.

I've presented before JT Engelhardt with the National Housing Trust and I'm on the development team and yeah, nothing to add.

This is 180 units of proposed affordable housing or

at the beginning of our financing path.

Hi everyone, Liz Chapman with Grumman Parker Architects.

I have a few slides here that are background information, but since this is our third trip to visit with you all, I'm going to skip over some of those if anyone needs me to rewind to let me know.

But Kate, if you can go ahead and just kind of quickly flip through these first couple here, keep on going.

All right, and a reminder, we could have done 11 stories.

We're proposing to do six stories in this instance.

And go on ahead right here.

Okay, so.

You all wanted to know more about our overall streetscape and landscape package.

So I am not the landscape architect.

I'm going to do my best.

But we've provided some exhibits here showing you some of the things that we're planning within that street frontage.

So a long 10th will be retail spaces.

And we have a number of details provided in the packet for you.

So you can see the language of those areas, including street furnishings,

Landscape, Hardscape, also the composition of the windows, canopy overhangs, lighting, things like that.

And then along Wirtland Street, it'll be a little bit more, a little bit more landscape heavy in focus because we don't have those retail entrances.

But we'll go through those exact details as well.

If you want to go ahead to the next slide.

So there's more information here for those of you looking for specific details about the types of trees and bushes that we are proposing.

I'm not going to go into detail, but if anyone has specific questions, please let me know.

And then some of the lower plantings.

And then the final slide here shows some of our thoughts on hardscaping.

So we are planning a combination of concrete, colored concrete and then concrete pavers to kind of give an ebb and flow between the entry points for the retail and just general sidewalk areas.

Okay.

Also some fight site furnishings.

There'll be a number of exterior bike racks required by the new zoning ordinance.

but this gives you a flavor for the types of site furnishings that we are envisioning for this outside area along the street frontage.

You all asked for a daylight analysis and this is a bit exaggerated but so that it's very clear.

So you can see that in the winter the courtyard will get very little sun, but in the summer we will have some good sun in the middle of the day, and that will move throughout the day.

But it will be an important consideration on both the courtyard and the north side of the building to understand the types of plantings that will realistically live.

So you'll notice that we have not provided

proposed any, for example, green screens or vining type plants because we don't think they will survive on those, on those north sides.

Okay.

So in the corner there, you have the November 2024 elevation.

After hearing your comments, we looked at a number of different options and finally decided to look at

kind of coming back with a C. We have an A of E and now a C bay that the primary change is reversing the color of the panel siding in the window insets and the main exterior part of the bay.

And we tried a number of different things and frankly a lot of the other things we tried felt too cartoony and playful for

this location sort of next to some UVA buildings and some historic homes.

We felt like we wanted to stay a little more stately and keep a steady rhythm.

One of the items that you all commented on was really hoping to get some sort of a view or a connection through to the internal courtyard on the building.

We really looked hard at that and struggled with how best to do that.

We want to

some sort of mural or artwork or we're not sure exactly what it'll be, but the intention being that it will include biomimicry within it.

And then we'll also, we're also looking to bring the materials of the courtyard through the lobby and out through the entrance.

So it's sort of spilling all the way through.

You'll note that there is a bullet point kind of off directly out from the courtyard.

and on the next page we'll see a section of that location and what it looks like if you're standing on the sidewalk there.

So you can see you'd be looking physically at the structure of the building.

So even if we were able to provide a lot of glass in that area or provide a physical cutout through the building, you'd still be looking at the side of the structure.

I don't think you would actually see anything as a pedestrian walking past.

So that's the reason that we felt like this was maybe not the right solution, the physical actual cut through the building.

Next slide, please.

So there are, because of the length of this building and sort of the weird transition from the ground floor being on our lowest floor to the ground floor being on our next floor up, we have this area where we have some blank walls.

And so this is the item that we specifically discussed with the BZA and with the zoning administrator.

And because of the delay in this meeting, we have a vote from the BZA already that I will tell you a little bit more about.

So this is from our original packet.

However, Kate, I'm going to ask you to advance through the next slide and then one more.

Oh, we didn't get our new slide in there.

Oh, no.

Okay, so I'll describe it to you instead.

That's okay.

It was online, so I thought it would be here, but that's okay.

So what the BZA and the Zoning Administrator requested, if you can go back then to one more, and one more still.

Yep, okay.

This isn't a pointer, is it?

There we go.

Which button?

That one?

So this is just not showing up on that monitor.

Okay, so that middle section where you kind of see the white panels at the base, what the zoning administrator suggested is that we move forward with using some of the parking screening options available to us through

through the current zoning ordinance and so even though there's a parking garage

as opposed to a parking area on the surface.

We're still using those strategies.

So bringing in a low retaining wall that will essentially kind of screen that area and then additional plantings that meet the intent of that parking screening requirement.

And by staff's interpretation, that means that our ground floor

jumps from the first floor to the second floor sort of faster.

And then the other piece that they asked us to bring in is, right now we currently have two, in this rendering, there are two entries, one on either end, so one into the retail, there you can see them.

So there's the, in yellow, we currently had the ones on either end, on the far end.

The zoning administrator had us come back and add in the other two that are sort of in the middle And then the blue one is what would be required by the zoning ordinance that we asked permission from the BZA to exclude from the design So how this is different than what you've seen previously is you saw two entrances We will now have four entrances plus a retaining wall and additional landscape in that central portion

where we're lacking one entry point.

So three of the entrances will be covered entrances.

The third one will be raised and covered.

And I hope that makes sense.

Okay.

I want to keep on going.

just for reference on the section image.

Kate, yes, thank you.

Just for reference, there were some questions and comments about where the utilities are relative to things in this street frontage.

And so I just wanted to show you physically where the utilities are located so you can understand why the trees are where they are and why we had asked the city for

permission to flip the sidewalk and the green zone because basically otherwise we would not be able to have any street trees because of the utility easements.

So we flip them so we can still have the street trees.

They'll just be on the back side of the sidewalk instead of the front side.

But it'll still be public right of way.

Okay, go ahead.

So, one of the things you all asked for was to see the other sides of the building.

So, what you're seeing here is the view.

If you were standing on 10th and a half street with your back to Main Street looking at this building, you can see ghosts of the contributing historic structures that are sort of directly across from our property.

and what you see on the right hand side there is that we are going to need to build a new retaining wall.

The existing little cafe that's in that house currently sits on top of a very large retaining wall and we basically need to shore it up and make a better retaining wall than the one that exists now.

But then in that little depressed area there will be a nice flat outdoor space for the proposed daycare.

So they'll have a playground in that location.

And we can't put a building there anyhow because it is more utility easements.

And just to give you a sense of what this will look like in context, this is if you are standing up at the intersection of 10th and Main looking toward our site.

So you can see the site is the sort of brown gray building in the background there.

I think this really helps you see how far down the building is relative to those that are up on Main Street.

So even though it is a six-story building, I don't think it feels overwhelming to anything on Main Street.

Next slide, please.

All right, and then this view is if you are standing on the Stacey Hall rear parking lot.

So the white box on the right hand side is the end of Stacey Hall that faces our building.

and then again on the left hand side you see where we're proposing another retaining wall.

We're intending to have a little cut down driveway for a loading area and trash servicing and kind of hiding that behind a retaining wall.

So if you're standing on the Stacey Hall property that grade will just will continue to be a gentle rolling hill and hopefully you won't really even see the the trash the door to the trash room or the loading bay at all.

Okay, next slide.

And here's a view if you're standing with your back to the main entrance to Stacey Hall looking toward this site.

This is what you would see.

Okay.

So the transformers and some of the site utility infrastructure that is surface mounted is intended to go on the edge of the Stacey Hall property

So this is kind of their back of house area on their property.

So there is a lot of, I'm going to say, industrial stuff back there.

but we are planning to provide aluminum screening to screen this all these pieces and currently in discussion with Dominion to figure out exactly how they want to access this to decide what side is the open side for service.

Additionally, the main utility connection for water will be vaults in the sidewalk.

So I don't think from a pedestrian perspective, you're really going to notice them all that much unless you're somebody who's really excited about manholes.

Next slide, please.

So this view is if you were standing on the intersection of 10th and Workland where the light is with your back kind of to the Coca-Cola building, looking at our building.

And so the same view again, but in the evening showing you the types of light fixtures that we are proposing.

So generally looking at

primarily wall sconces at all the entries, a little bit of feature lighting on the main sort of brick architectural columns at the corners and then some back of house and kind of utility lighting sort of in the rear areas where there's some security concerns but there isn't really pedestrian access around the building and then also some canopy lighting up in the various covered entry canopies.

A bit more information about the specifics of the lighting if anyone wants more details.

All right, so our materials, we don't have exact things picked out just yet.

And part of the nature of this project is that it will be publicly funded.

So we will have to have an open bid.

But we're envisioning some sort of a red modular brick that has a velour sort of assuming that it's going to have a good range on it.

It's not just going to be monochromatic.

And we're assuming a buff colored mortar.

I know we're way over time so I apologize but there are a lot more details you all asked for some very specific things so there's more details on how we think the construction of the brick is going to work, the returns at window jams, details on the canopies and happy to answer any specific questions but kind of looking at a little bit of decorative brick work at that ground floor at the retail bays and then going into a

More standardized coursing once we get higher up.

Some information for you on the type of windows that we're planning on.

The project is targeting FIAS, so a passive house design.

So these will be very high quality windows with extremely low air infiltration rates.

and some more information about where the mechanical equipment is on the roof so you can understand the context for screening.

And go ahead to the next one.

It's just an image of the large pieces of equipment we're going to locate in the center directly over the hallways.

We think that they will be naturally screened just from the geometry of the building.

But if we find that additional screening is needed, we're planning on using something very similar to the screening that we'd be using on the ground.

unless there are specific comments from the bar otherwise.

And then a view for you all from Wartland of the main pedestrian entrance.

Just a few more views for context.

So this would be the view from 10th Street.

And we can skip over the whole appendix.

That was all for Jeff, specific things he wanted to see.

Thank you.

All right, do we have any questions from the public?

All right.

Any questions?

Yes, sorry.

Feel free.

Just one right now.

Why do you need lighting like you had the sconce lighting like on the third floor?

It was intended to accentuate architectural features.

So with the new ordinance, exterior lighting incorporates what you all have been, the BAR has been ahead of the curve on the requirement that it's dimmable, 3,000 K and color index.

It is not, I think it still would be fine to use one of the, should you all move forward with this, one of the conditions that we've traditionally used and that if there are, the applicant agrees that if there are any concerns expressed about brightness or glare, that steps will be taken, reasonable steps will be taken to address that.

So there's a requirement, you know, it has to meet what's in the ordinance.

Dark sky is kind of one of those things that's like we say it and refer to it but we've got the ordinance but again if there's something that

Any other questions from the public?

This might be your only chance to ask questions.

Yeah, so our intention is that where faces are exposed that they match the building.

Is there anything specific about the way you're being funded that has an effect on the way you're designing the building or the way that you have to build it?

Yeah, I mean, yeah.

The current plan right now is a 9-4 twin, so you've got the wording right.

And does that affect design?

Or construction?

Yeah.

We'll have to have two construction contracts.

The buildings will operate as one, but because it's two financing structures, you have to basically, Virginia Housing, as lender, not tax credit group, they will need to do an underwriting exercise to make sure each building can operate independently.

So we've got the main management functions in that pedestrian entrance.

and down in the concrete podium is our commercial space in daycare on 10th Street.

So we would, you know, it's not the design, but when it's underwritten, Virginia Housing has to believe that the management function could be in one of those retail areas.

Does that answer your question?

And operate it as one.

Other than the separation of the podium and up above, are there other separations?

Virginia Housing has some very specific requirements about the materials and what they consider a durable material.

So it's very challenging for us to use materials that aren't brick or fiber cement.

The finance team, not the architect, just had a meeting with all of Virginia Housing about the twin deal, it's a required step and they hinted towards potentially requiring

Fire ratings between this line between the two developments, so that it's an added challenge.

I hope they don't do that, but as it relates to the design of the building, there are a few things we have to do extra.

That's just Virginia housing is very prescriptive.

Yeah.

We have to cover the entry doors too.

Yeah.

I've got a couple of questions.

So I think you answered by email the question about the trees, although your response had to do with work on the street and I'm more thinking about 10th Street, where it looks like you have a lot more space between the building and the trees.

And the species you've picked are definitely very columnar.

Yeah, so I know that the landscape architect provided an answer.

If you feel like it didn't really answer the question, I'm certainly happy to go back to him and ask more nuanced questions.

But part of his concern is, this is yet another thing, that Virginia housing will not allow building, or excuse me, a tree at full growth to be, to touch the building at all.

We have to have clearance.

And so if you think of the predominant street trees that we are allowed to have in the city of Charlottesville or that are suggested in the city of Charlottesville, a lot of them are 50, 60 feet.

and so we're looking at something where we have maybe 12 to 8 feet of clearance between the center line of where we're going to plant this tree in the face of the building.

So there may be other species out there that we can find that would be a better fit.

But right now we're struggling to find something that the

This was actually a question that came up last night in the planning commission towards a building going on in Kindlewood, which I think is probably from your office as well.

And the question was, what happens when zoning conflicts with Virginia housing?

And the trees are part of our zoning, and the BAR is a zoning overlay.

I'm wondering what happens when we end up being a little more forceful and saying, no, you need to give us some actual trees, at least in this location where it's, you know, the trees are further away from the building than other places in town where we find larger street trees.

Well, because our ordinance is new, I think we're all learning together.

But I think if you have specific comments that you want to put on the project, conditions you want to put on the project, then

We'll work with the landscape architect.

We'll work with city staff to figure out what in the options that we have is a better choice.

There must be something that can thread the needle better than the choice that we've made.

I don't know if we're going to be able to find the perfect tree that's going to be able to do all the things.

It might have to be perhaps a little more ornamental and maybe not as much shade as being provided, but maybe we can find something that's going to sort of thread that needle and

I wish our landscape architect was still on the port, because I feel like it's not the concern of trees touching buildings doesn't actually seem to be a real, in reality, not actually a concern.

I'll reserve my comments on that particular Virginia housing requirement.

Anyways, and that's, I'm gonna waste your time here.

Let's see, you answer the question in the wall.

Though, you've got some, it's a little confusing, you have the security lighting for, I think it's for your, it's on the west side of the building.

It shows up on the third floor plan.

Yeah, the great outbuilding superimposed.

Or the view from Stacey Hall, either one of those would be helpful.

Keep going.

Okay, it looks like page 31, page 29 would do it.

There you go.

That works.

Okay, so you can see here we're only a four story building.

So two stories are actually physically underground at that top corner all the way up near 10th and a half street.

So I think I'm seeing what might be too.

So they're above the windows under one story of the grant, basically.

Got you.

I thought that might be the case, but yeah, I just wanted to.

I thought I had another question.

I got one other question.

It has a lot to do with funding.

If we go above this number of stories, then we would have to change to a different type of construction that would be much more costly on a square foot basis.

And so we'd have to go a lot more stories to make it worth our while.

But at this point, honestly, we don't think we have the parking to support more units.

And I would add, so yeah, that's right.

When you change construction type, you need many more units to get back at par where you were at six stories.

And then back to funding.

That is way too ex...

It's way too big for the pool of Virginia housing 9% tax credits that is allocated to northwest, north-central pool.

Charlottesville is a part of it.

It goes all the way up to Front Royal Winchester.

Yeah, it gets out of scale with the region.

I have a question.

Yeah, so we looked at keeping it, but it feels awkward.

It feels like it's at your feet because of that new little retaining wall.

And so we did

We did remove it from the final version that the BZA approved.

But we did, we kept the other components, the site furnishings, the plantings, all those other pieces are still assumed to be in that.

And so the retaining wall is

How is that functioning on site?

Is that just for planting?

I think you can, sorry it's a little small on the screen, but I think you could just see it in this section here.

It's kind of in the, in a peach colored box in the section.

And so it will, I think it will kind of feel like a raised planter for functionally.

We may end up needing to put some rails in there because I think it's going to be very tempting for kids to kind of get up there and want to jump off the end of it.

So we'll have to find the balance there of making it feel like a planter and making it safe.

Sure.

And I'm sorry, maybe you described this before in your presentation, so I apologize if you did.

Yeah, so there is sort of a quirk in the zoning code that says if we have parking, and in this case, this is a parking garage behind this wall, that if we have parking, we must screen it.

And so the ways that we can screen it are prescribed in the zoning code.

And one of them is to build a retaining wall and then also screen the retaining wall with landscaping in front of it.

So it's visual.

It'll be planting up above.

So the sidewalk is at that slope that you see.

I just had a quick question.

I correct.

There is a secondary pedestrian entrance.

There's one into the garage where people coming and going with their bikes could go.

And then there's another one that is sort of right parallel with retail bay four, which would be our proposed daycare space.

So people could kind of come and go from the residential

You are your mailboxes, your package room, your leasing office, all your amenity spaces are at this other, the main residential entry.

So I think a lot of people will come and go that way.

There are, the garage currently contains 83.

But we have, I think almost 200 bike parking spaces.

Just following up on Mr. Zehmer's comment, I see that there is a proposed sidewalk on the Stacy Hall side.

On the Stacy Hall side, there is a small sidewalk there.

It is only because they have an existing egress door.

on their property and they need that door to continue to be functional.

So the sidewalk is for them, for their emergency egress only.

And it will, the sidewalk is just connecting a rear parking lot and a front parking lot.

So someone who wanted to walk across that sidewalk would literally have to walk diagonally through a parking lot.

Now we do have indication

No timing that that's being rethought by the university, that space.

So they have looked at our design with an eye to some day maybe that will be a pleasant walk is my thought.

I'm sorry, Mr. Zehmer, I don't want to get this laser right in your eyeballs, but it's right here.

So this is Stacey Hall and there's a sidewalk.

Their egress door is right about here where this Pee in apartments is.

So it's just to allow them access out of the egress door to their front and rear parking lots.

And as I recall above, or basically below the word proposed sidewalk right there, that's a sliding door.

It's a big like garage door for the back of Stacey Hall.

We are

discussing that right now, whether or not that will be open or fenced, I don't know.

It is service for... So that's where the, this area right here is where loading will occur.

So when people move in and out of the building, they can utilize that space.

And then right here is our main trash room.

So this service area is physically depressed to be a little bit lower than the street.

The highest point is 11 feet.

Any more questions from the BAR?

All righty, we'll move on to our comments section.

Any comments from the public?

Anybody online?

All right.

I quick little thing, check our zoning code on the rooftop equipment because I think it has changed that you actually have to provide screening now.

It looks like the only things that might stick up are your air handling, either the big fresh air units or whatever.

I am

I'm still worried about the Whirland Street facade.

I think the only change you guys have made from the last time is you've added another color.

And I don't think it really does anything.

There's a lot of articulation happening that you're trying to do, but it's all within about two feet.

The plane's all within two feet of each other.

And I'm worried that

Well, I know I've compared it to the standard before.

It's three quarters the length of the standard.

So it's definitely not that it's, you know, it's smaller.

But it is still very long.

And it seems to have less articulation, less activity going on than the standard does.

And that, unfortunately, has been, that building is a mistake, unfortunately.

So I'm not really sure what to do with it.

realize that this is a foreign housing, so in that sense it's different from if it were a big, giant student housing project.

So we are allowed to consider the comp plan in our deliberations.

I will say the zoning code's way of dealing with a building is too long.

Had you not gotten your exception,

I think if you stuck it right in the middle of this it would be between 30 and 35 feet wide by 30 feet deep, which I think is deeper than your units are and probably wider than one of your two better units or close to it.

I do wonder what would happen if

You did maybe a slightly smaller notch that took you back to the corridor.

Similar to what you have, you have a little daycare courtyard on the south side.

Something similar to that on this north side to break up the facade.

that would provide a, it may not be a heavily used outdoor space, but it would be an outdoor space that would be visible to the public and make your building feel a little bit more open to the public as opposed to being, I think we've described it as feeling a little bit rolled off from the neighborhood.

So I'm throwing that out there as a thought.

I'm not entirely sure where I stand on that right now.

and I want to get your reaction on that.

I think it would be, you've got 180 units, so it would break out at least five.

That's, you know, five affordable units the city doesn't get, but then again it is also less than 3% of your overall project.

I don't know what that does to your numbers, your financial numbers.

some less severe things.

I think I'm going to push you to, I would ask that you need to put some street trees on 10th Street where the power lines are not a problem.

I understand what's happening in Portland.

They definitely are up against the side of the building.

But it's, you know, 10th and Page is one of the hottest neighborhoods in the city because of its lack of tree cover and having more exposed pavement

just continues to make that worse, and this is an opportunity to fix that.

And I think that was the goal of the zoning code, was to try and fix that throughout the city.

And I think you heard a little bit of grumbling about the lights.

I think at a minor point, the up-down lights in the corners, I don't think they do much for you.

It would be probably a little bit better just not to have them.

So I'm going to leave that monkey wrench out there for the rest of the B.A.R.

to toy with if I'm crazy or not.

So, Mr. Zehmer, if I can help.

So on the lighting, and as I said, we've long referred to a dark sky ordinance.

The old ordinance didn't use the word end, but it's

Just a few helpful things, if you don't mind.

In our BADC District Design Guidelines that were adopted in 2012, there is reference to, Charlottesville has a dark sky ordinance and that requires, requires full cutoff for lamps that admit 3,000 or more lumens.

Updated zoning for exterior lighting, specifically unshielded fixtures, and that would be uplighted fixtures that aren't shielded, may be used when the max initial lumens are less than 1600.

So our current ordinance

even lower than that reference dark sky requirement in the old guidelines.

So I just, this is a pretty standard comment that we've used in other conditions if you all wish to, but we've had some conversation internally and this does under the current code and with the understanding that

The Dress

and so on.

reducing the color temperature.

I do not get the complaints about lighting that I used to get unless someone has broken the rules.

Thank you.

Other comments?

Do we want to tackle the... It's my understanding that you guys have applied to the

B.A.Z.

So, we can weigh in on it.

Most likely will.

So, let's talk about that.

I think if we can focus that, Carl's kind of set it up for us.

I tend to agree with Carl.

I think it would be nice if there was a way to provide some openness into the courtyard in the middle.

I don't necessarily feel like this proposed solution does that from the public view, right?

It's a nice amenity for the lobby of the building itself, but it doesn't really address the public walking down the street.

So I think that there's not, and I also think that

Just because I think you had a diagram where they were sort of at the eye level was looking into the base of the building.

You still would see a light shaft, if you will, above you and from across the street, probably, to be able to see into the courtyard as well.

So I think it's a good idea.

I also think the depth of articulation could be increased, and that would give more shadow lines and a little more variety on the Portland Street side.

So I'll start with smaller stuff.

I liked the lance.

Sorry, I wanted to focus on that.

Okay.

Okay, now just keep us focused.

That sounds like a good idea.

So I agree.

I think that the main

The main issue I was going to bring is that the scale on Wirtland doesn't feel appropriate.

That's something in our guidelines that's pretty crystal clear about being an important thing to adhere to.

And given the fact that this is a transition point between the Main Street and Wirtland, I think special care needs to be made from an argument standpoint.

Just from an appearance standpoint, it still feels so big to me.

In the other study sessions that we've had, we've brought this issue up.

I think Carl really did a great job just now of explaining the heart of the matter.

When I look at the landscape inside, the thing that worries me, while I think it's an intriguing plan, it just doesn't feel like a space you're going to want to be in the way it is currently set up with the six stories.

The winter solar study kind of tells the story

and the

So I guess I second and third the comments about the need for the hope for some break in that building side.

The other thing I was going to mention about the lengths of the facade is the main street side feels to me

very similar to the Wartland side with a few exceptions of the color variations and I would 10th Street.

10th Street feels to me to be just similar enough where it just doesn't, there isn't enough of a change to orient me to where I am and further what I'm looking at the Main Street

in particular, the 10th Street side

from a detailing standpoint the cement paneling is a concern to me in the way that it's in the prominent masses I think because the materiality is harder to sort of detail and so when you start turning corners it gets to be even harder and so I worry about the

longevity of that.

And if you're just focusing on the materials I would think that replacing that with a brick or a more durable material where you have the corners and maybe swapping that out if you have to put the cement paneling in there as a percentage, doing it in the infills where you don't have to worry about the more prominent corner locations.

And I just wonder if there's a way to blend that idea with the greater idea of how do you differentiate the two different facades?

I agree with you all about wanting to break down the mass of the building on the Portland side.

Just for the sake of discussion, one idea would be to

Slicet, sort of on the 10th Street facade, like open it up closer to the 10th Street side, if possible.

I could imagine your courtyard coming out at that.

First Bay on the left, the dark gray there.

Just an idea to allow that courtyard to sort of peek out into public space a bit.

The other comment I have is about the entrances, the vehicular versus pedestrian, and kind of not really understanding the plan fully, but kind of wishing that those two were flipped

We pick the vehicular entrance location because there is currently an entrance to a parking lot there.

I think it's still a very attractive entrance.

It has large storefront windows.

It has a large covered canopy.

As soon as you get in there, there is a small lobby.

There is also an elevator.

So I think there's good access.

It just doesn't have any of the amenities that the other entrance has.

So I think it will still be a very attractive place.

So I know that we commented on this early on about

entrance off 10th Street in terms of, I personally feel like it's going to cause traffic jams and I agree it's not necessarily our purview but the entrance itself is part of the building and that's our purview.

So I wonder if, let me phrase this right, is there a way to use curb control or something such that you can only allow right turns off of 10th Street into that?

or maybe talk to your traffic engineers because I think people coming down the hill from Main Street trying to turn left into that is going to cause problems.

That's a great point.

I agree.

Yes, there's already a parking lot there, but it's not a residential parking lot.

And so you're going to have a lot more in and out traffic.

And there is a traffic demand management plan was submitted to the city.

And I'm not sure of the

Great.

Thank you.

So I think for the Wartland Street side, at least I'm hearing support for breaking up that mess in terms of somehow getting some sort of, I'll call it a light shaft or a notch to use Carl's term.

To be clear, I was not saying go all the way as deep as the courtyard.

I was saying just go as deep as the corridor.

I can see how asking for there to be access to the courtyard would be, I can understand that being problematic, and visual access as well.

I can see that it's never actually going to be visually accessible from the street because it is higher up, almost everywhere.

I wonder if it could be a pocket park with your retaining wall there where you've got an elevated planter, if you will.

I mean, I think you can hear the pain in all of our, we understand that you're working with serious limitations and I think we all understand those limitations, but you know, we're also trying to make this the best project it can be.

and I think there are a number of different ways of solving this whether it's a slot or I was even thinking of like a more elevated arch open way that has a bridge over it or whether it's just a much more pronounced indentation something that creates a pause between that corner and the rest of the

I do want to say that as a composition, you can tell you guys have worked hard.

It's not a bad building.

The standard was it looked good on paper.

It looked really good on paper.

And I think that's where there's some hesitancy that we've learned some lessons that when you have a building that's just this long and especially on the street where

Our guidelines talk about in transitional areas in West Maine should not overpower the traditional scale, the majority of the buildings on the street.

So I recognize that it's in the Main Street District, but it's also fronting the Portland Street District.

So across the street is, I'm looking at the context on Portland.

And it's, again, I understood that yes, this is the Main Street District, but our guidelines you talk about, neighborhood transitional buildings, well actually it mentions

Institutional multi-lot buildings by their nature will have larger footprints, particularly along the West Main Street corridor and in the 14th and 15th Street area of the Vinnable neighborhood.

The massing of such large scale structures should not overpower the traditional scale of the majority of, sorry, I doodle on top of this, and there's a big outline in front of it.

There we go.

The majority of nearby buildings in the district in which it is located.

I don't think we're overstepping by asking that the traditional portion of the West Main District relate to its adjacencies, especially when those adjacencies are also historic.

But even on West Main, I guess the standard set its own context, so it would be unfortunate to have to say it to relate to something that I think we've all discovered is not

And I think for me the point is that you have such different identities on those two streets and to me that's more of the issue here.

It's not relating to any particular building on 10th or any particular building on Wirtland.

It's just that they're very different locales and they represent different, you could almost say different design control districts.

I think that's the reason why we're focusing more on the Wharton side than we are the 10th Street side.

I think the 10th Street side, as far as the massing goes and the design.

I'm with Carl.

It's obvious you guys have put a lot of good time into this and a lot of good design work.

So I'd want to commend you on that.

But I think it's the importance of recognizing

The change of character, the change of identity as you work your way around the corner and respecting that and the design.

All right.

So do we feel like we can take a vote on this?

Do we feel like we can put conditions on this?

I think the tricky part is this Portland Street side.

Do you have a suggestion?

I don't think that.

So I guess it's up to you guys if I understand that you filed a major development plan or whatever it's called.

Hopefully you guys are still able to be moving through that without having BA our approval to be able to get your tax credit application moving along although we did kind of throw a pretty big

So the major, you know, when we were last with you, the major development plan, PATH, we didn't know about, and so I was working on it under the understanding that we needed to have a BAR approval by March 13th, or we wait another year.

But I'm just sort of thinking on my feet here.

We did say to Virginia Housing, through one of their required processes, if you're going to apply in March, we did tell them the number of units that we're going to build.

So, the loss of five, I mean, I'd have to double check, but I think that's problematic if we lose five units.

For being able to submit an application, a finance, this is finance driven.

With the major development plan approval path available to us, we could come back.

No, it doesn't.

We don't need BAR approval for March 13.

OK.

So I just learned this since we were last with you.

So given the two choices you've given,

Because this is the first time you are viewing it.

So the preference, I think, if I were advising the applicant would be requested deferral, in which case then they have time to prepare.

But I just want to caution again, are we been absolutely clear

and both groups here of what the expectations are, because I know we've left some meetings and they're going crystal clear and then it wasn't, so I'd just be absolutely certain.

We would request a deferral to an undetermined time in the future, right?

We'll just, I guess before we accept that, just to make sure that we're all holding to this, that we definitely want to see modifications to the Portland Street facade to try and break it up some more.

I've been very quiet about this, but I actually don't like this building whatsoever, but I also feel like it's certainly my purview of looking at the context, and unfortunately at West Main Street, I don't find it

particularly out of context.

I wish we could change the context, but I don't think we can do that.

So, listening to my more accomplished colleagues with regard to architectural knowledge, perhaps the breaking up of the Portland Street facade would make it a much more acceptable building

But it looks like a fortress.

It's just not a very attractive building.

And it's very hard for me to describe it other than looking like a fortress to me.

I don't like Kindlewood.

I think it's not a very attractive building.

And then a whole bunch of other buildings down on Broadway Street that I also don't think are very attractive.

Again, I understand it's a financing problem.

but I do wonder what damage we might be doing if anything to the historic district.

That all being said, given the context, I think that probably I would be able to approve this building but I wouldn't feel good about it.

But I think I would be following the design rules if I were to do that.

But there sounded a bit contradictory, but I think that coming back with a different design with regard to the Worland Street SOC would be helpful.

Yeah, that's not something I worry, and I think I'm right.

that were locked at 180 if we want to submit an application on March 13th, which reduces our options when we do come back to you.

Full transparency, not hoodwinking at all.

It's a constraint that conflicts with Carl's advice that everybody seems to agree with.

Sorry, Mr. Schwarz, that everybody seems to agree with.

Just trying to think about how to get from here to starting construction successfully and knowing everybody's working in good faith, including us.

I think you guys were going to meet with us in pairs last month, and that kind of went away.

I miscommunicated, sorry.

Okay.

The one thing that we have to be very careful with is the appearance of going behind the curtain and making deals with people.

Is your footprint totally maxed out on the retaining mall side?

I believe that we have some easements in that area that are constraining us.

You're suggesting like building it over the service entrance?

Yeah, I was thinking that.

I think we, one thing we should be clear about, because I think we were all saying something slightly different.

I'm willing to concede that.

I think as we've heard, this is a super challenging building because I think what I'm hearing from most of the board is the 10th Street side seems to react to Main Street

pretty appropriately, but it's the word on the street side that's having a challenge looking across the street, basically.

You've got three old houses, right, that are diminutive in scale.

I think we also spoke a while back about the Coca-Cola building there on the corner.

It's like maybe that's somewhere to draw inspiration as sort of a transitional building that it's an industrial style building, but at a residential scale somewhat.

And so I wonder if there's even some of the architectural details there with the like, slight gabled parapet on the top of the Koch building.

You know, maybe even just some of those detailing that changed the work on the street side of the building.

I want to go back to a comment that Mr. Timmerman made about the materiality and potentially switching

like the outside corners being brick rather than the fiber cement.

I think that's a great suggestion and wonder if that would also help bring down the scale on the Wharton Street side.

at all, and is that a possibility?

And that's, that is a commitment made to date and that is

I did notice some brick on those hidden elevations.

I guess that's the south and the west.

No elevation is really hidden.

The other common I want to make is the elevation on sheet 29, if you could go to that.

So this one feels very regular to me.

Yes.

Yeah, that one has a more sort of, I don't know, it has more variety and more kind of playfulness that may be more appropriate on the Wharton Street side, perhaps something to think about.

I love that big screen.

Just to clarify the previous comment, I met with their design team and yes, they had expressed that they want to be completely transparent and not have any discussion, so I will share with you all that my discussions with them were primarily to say, alright, what is the information that they need to prepare for the BAR, and that's where we talked about these elevations of, you know,

the not-so-visible elevation.

What's the view from Stacey Hall providing some building wall sections and details and I really am very grateful they were very responsive to that and it had been great to work with but the one thing I wasn't able to advise them on is what is the design, you know, that DeBier wants to see but we were really discussing what

Information is necessary for you all to make a decision.

I think we'd like to see them explore tree species on Tenth Street for the street trees, see if there's something that you can, you know, meet y'all at the Virginia Housing

requirements, but also trying to give us a little more shade and depth.

I think we've talked about the lighting.

Jeff, you can send them our typical verbiage on lighting.

This is a very complete application.

I will say, we brought this up in our pre-meeting.

Your windows are great, but their specific brand is great, so if you guys end up changing that later on.

I would mind seeing what that, that's a big retaining wall at the end of the service drive, so if there's a way to just capture what that perspective looks like, and you know, who knows, if you end up making a building, part of the building there, it might actually improve the condition where you're not just going way down into this kind of hard to turn around zone, but you're just going right into the building.

Got it.

No, I think the deferral is the only move right now to keep us on track for the financing application and I just need to sort of talk to

some of our finance experts to find out about any change in the number of units, whether we're locked in.

And if so, that is a constraint that we'll have to

Zoning, so they got their exceptions, so no, there is no requirements, but if zoning did not give them the exception?

They technically haven't yet on the length of the building.

Zoning would require it to be the equal to the width of the notch up to 30 feet.

So I think the notch itself has to be at least 30 feet wide if it's stuck right in the middle.

So it wouldn't be required of any deeper than 30 feet.

I don't know.

I guess that's where I was going.

If they can play with their depths, maybe they can retain their units.

I'm just hovering it as an idea.

I don't think it's going to be enough, but that is something you can play with, is what if you copy the upper unit all the way down?

So I think I'll make a motion that I'm hearing the applicant request a deferral.

Yes, we request a deferral.

So with the BR, I'd like to accept a deferral of this COA.

Second.

So high.

So it was a motion by Mr. Zehmer and... Second by all seconders.

Thank you all so much.

Carl, so you brought up about the roof screening.

I'm just talking in general now, not a particular project, but that's the thing with this foreign-based code or at least the version of it that we're working with.

There are these three-dimensional elements that are previously we'd only just addressed because it was in the guidelines, but a lot of things

are covered.

The ordinance requires it.

So I think that's one of the discussions as we go forward with reviewing the guidelines.

The only reason I brought it up was just because they have an actual section and they're trying to prove that it's not visible because you can't see it from the street.

And that was, I just want to make sure you check the code and then make sure you're okay.

Does anybody want to break?

That was a long discussion and I think this next one might also be long, so I'm going to call it a five minute break.

This costs back to order.

So our next certificate of appropriateness application is for 200 West Main Street.

It is a COA request for demolition of a contributing structure.

The front facade is non-contributing.

Yes, sir.

Thank you.

This is a COA request associated with 200 West Main Street.

It's currently the Violent Crown Theater.

I know that there have been discussions of a new building proposed at that site, but this application is regarding only the demolition of the existing structure.

And in the review criteria for demolition is very clearly stated.

laid out in our ordinance and our design guidelines and Ms.

Richardson has shared that with you from the ordinance so you can see that's the boundary in which your discussion for demolition can go.

This building on West Main Street

The current structures that you see in place were constructed in 1898 and then renovated in the 1930s

and over time there have been some alterations to both the front and the rear facades, including the addition out the back.

The current facade, which you see here, was added in 2014.

Prior to that, when it was renovated for real cinema, the entire facade had been redone.

and then the rear of the building facing Water Street, the section that's on Water Street, that was also renovated.

So neither the north or south facades are original and nor are they considered contributing.

So the contributing structure that you're actually looking at relative to demolition is the sort of from the inside of the north elevation to the inside of the south elevation

and now we do know that prior to, as you know, the town was laid out in 1762 and this was designated Lot 41.

We know that someone acquired it in 1786 and we know that in the 1870s there were some houses

on the site and some buildings on West Main don't quite know all the stories associated with that, but then that's when in late 1800s they came in and constructed the brick commercial buildings that are the front buildings you see now.

The building is known as the Gleason-Roby building.

again built in 1898 as a two-story brick structure.

There were two mid-19th century brick structures on the mall and out buildings.

There were

One of the curious things about it is the western portion of this shows up on the old Sanborn maps as a moving pictures theater, so something new at the time.

And again we know as early as 1877 until at least 1920 there was a two-story frame building and you see that there in the yellow.

that bottom corner is where the what's called the clock shop is and that's not part of this proposal.

So the building was used for commercial use and between 1956-1958 it was I'm sorry 1938 it was renovated for the Leggetts department store and then there were a series of alterations to the front the most

recent for the legates building was here was this enamel and metal panels so the request before you all tonight is for the demolition of the building the applicant has offered some information in their narrative

I can just, just so that we cover the basis, just offer some quick comments from the staff report and this is referring to the criteria for review of demolition.

One of the questions is what is the age of the property?

And I noted that the approximately 90 foot deep front of the structure was constructed in 1898 with a rear addition in 1938, I'm sorry, 1898 originally.

Rear Extension in 1938.

Is it on the National Register of Historic Places?

And yes, it is a contributing structure in the what's called the Charlottesville and Albemarle County Courthouse Historic District.

I just want to note that that's a distinction.

The question in the guidelines is about its designation on the state or national register.

We know it's

Locally designated, we know it's a contributing structure to the downtown ADC district, which is the reason you all are reviewing it, have purview over demolition.

But the question is, is it on the National Register and the State Register?

Yes.

And the question of whether and to what extent the building or structure is associated with an historic person, architect, master craftsman, or historic event, I know of no known associations.

Whether the building or any of its features represents an infrequent or first or last remaining example in the city My comment is the design materiality of the extent portions of the 1898 structure and the 1938 additions are not unique nor infrequent Nor is what is remaining the first or last remaining example of a brick commercial building in the city

The question of, is the building or structure such old or distinctive design, texture or material that it could not be reproduced without great difficulty?

My opinion, the extent portions of the 1898 and 1938 structures could be easily reproduced.

The question of the degree to which distinguishing characteristics, qualities, features or materials remain.

As I noted, the primary facade on the north and on the south had been removed, so they are no longer there.

What remains is the early brick walls at the second street side and at the rear behind what is the clock building 201 West Water Street.

Those walls are simple and unadorned.

Staff believes that's where I noted the visible section facing Water Street is part of the 1996 renovations.

The question, whether and to what extent a contributing structure is linked historically or aesthetically to other buildings or structures within the district, I noted that the extent portions of the 1898 and 1938 portions are linked historically and aesthetically to other late 19th century and early 20th century commercial and warehouse buildings in the downtown ADC district.

However, the current primary facade

as well as the rear facade are contemporary and not considered historic.

The question is asked about the overall condition and structural integrity of the building and whether an applicant has prepared a report by a qualified engineer.

Staff response, we have not on staff examined the structure.

However, it is currently in use as a movie theater and there are no claims that it is structurally deficient or unsafe.

So I would not have expected the applicant to send us the report saying so.

The question of whether and to what extent the applicant proposes means or methods for moving the building or demolishing the structure such that preservation of portions, features, materials, et cetera, of the structure

I understand the applicant intends to raise it entirely so it's not being moved.

There aren't features proposed to be incorporated into a new building.

Additionally, our guidelines refer to our criteria in the ADC district design guidelines.

and

and our code establishes historic districts and within those individually significant properties with the intent to preserve and protect those buildings, which serve important visible reminders of this dark cultural and architectural archaeological heritage of the city.

So the point being is

The reason this was designated historic is the city council designated the overlay district because of the historic character of the building and the district.

The question of the existing character of the setting of the structure or areas and its surroundings, I note that only the brick wall along Second Street and possibly a portion of the back wall behind 201 Water Street, they appear to be the only exterior elements remaining from the early 20th century building.

The question of whether or not a relocation of the structure would be practical or preferable to demolition.

My comment is, I can't comment on the practical ability of moving the structure and that what remains of the original buildings, the side and rear walls, are not unique within the context of similar period, predominantly commercial structures downtown.

The question of whether or not the proposed demolition would adversely or positively affect other historic buildings in this district.

As I've noted, the character defining facades were removed.

Now, granted that the incremental loss of historic resources does erode the character of any historic district.

However, staff cannot discern if removing the remaining brick walls, which are prevalent downtown.

would adversely affect the 71-acre ADC district or the 120-acre National Register District.

And finally, the question of

whether or not there's been professional economic and structural feasibility study for rehabilitating or reusing the structure or whether or not it's finding support to propose demolition.

My answer is the building is not structurally deficient or unsafe as I mentioned and there was no evaluation necessary to evaluate its structural safety and the applicant has provided in their narrative which you all received

They're making the case for the economic feasibility of the new project versus retaining the old.

So with that, do you all have any questions for me?

and I'll just also offer, I did share with Mr. Zehmer prior to the meeting a couple of conditions that we've used in other demolitions.

I omitted that from the staff report.

I just want to make sure that those are included or that they're considered for inclusion if a an emotion is made.

I'm a

Be more familiar, obviously, with the local applications.

Kayla Slater is still here.

I believe Joel's on the phone as well.

That has tremendous experience in building buildings like this, but I like to have a local architect involved, so that's where that narrative came out to send me confusion.

I'm mostly here just if there are any questions because the application I think speaks for itself.

Great.

Thank you very much.

I think we'll open the floor to questions from the public.

Just questions right now.

We'll get the comments in a moment.

Anybody online?

Sure.

Come up to one of the microphones.

If you could just state your name and your address.

Ted Mathis, 410 Oak Circle.

It's not individually listed, but it is a contributing structure.

I'll caveat that by saying that that survey was completed prior to the 1996 alterations.

Thank you.

I just didn't understand that before.

And then just an I apologize, it's really a question about process.

And in looking at, again it's a scope question, I apologize, I just don't know the answer.

In looking at demolition, do you consider

and then it was appealed to city council, then city council could take that into consideration.

And if you then consider, if you go through all your criteria and you deny it, that's what happens.

If you go through and you approve it based upon that criteria that doesn't factor, then where does that come into the discussion?

Well, as far as discussion goes, it would, a decision would have been made and so they would have

and so on.

before something is raised, particularly something as prominent as this, that there is some decision making on that something is replacing it.

So whereas the Board can't discuss or require some particular type of building, the point being that at least there's assurances that something is being proposed there.

and so on and so forth.

I guess the question is, if we were to approve the COA for demolition, is there an avenue for the public to protest that at City Council?

So to answer that, any aggrieved party can appeal.

So if the BAR were to deny the request tonight, as we had last month with 144 Chancellor, the applicant has appealed back to council, and council can consider other circumstances.

So the box in which the BAR works is a, you know, it's a, it's... But I think the question is if we approve the COA.

But if they approve the COA, yes.

Similarly, any agreed party can appeal that to council and council can consider other circumstances which are outside the BAR's purview.

And any appeal of a denial would have to occur within ten calendar days of the BAR's action.

There is a fee for that and it has to be a letter stating

So there is a process.

That's if it's denied, if it's approved, it might not be an argument that the BAR got anything wrong, because within the scope of what you were considering, that's kind of what I'm, you know, I know that's going to be a full discussion tonight and maybe after, but just trying to understand where's that opportunity

and Michael Kochis

There's just a question, which is a very important question, of now that we have a demolished structure, what should we build on that structure?

But it isn't competing against the current structure in that in any way.

I think the answer to the question is the appeal process.

because council can consider outside factors that are beyond our purview, i.e.

the function of the building currently and how it contributes to the community of what you're speaking to.

So I think that would be... So in the event and you might, you have your process and even if you reach that decision that you then approve based upon that, if somebody wanted to do that they would then

It best to ping me and make sure you get, you know, but as a for example, the circumstances at 144 Chancellor were such that the owner was, we cannot afford to do what's necessary, we don't want to continue maintaining that.

Council could, so that's the... I can't consider the fact that I took my son to see Top Gun Maverick there in my deliberation tonight.

That's why process questions.

Thank you very much.

That was a good question, and I think valuable for everybody to understand that process.

Thank you.

Other questions from the public?

Questions from the BAR?

You actually asked my question, which was clarifying the National Register.

Let's do comments from the public.

I'm deferred.

Genevieve Keller, I'm President of Preservation Piedmont and our Advocacy Committee has been talking about this over the last weeks and months and we always have a concern when there's a demolition request because we are a preservation group and we would much prefer

that the first round of any project look at continued use, adaptive use, how a building might be expanded on its site above its existing height or to the rear.

We understand this is complex because it's in two different ownerships.

Several weeks ago I spoke with Mr. Levine and he explained the project to me and I expressed my concerns at that point.

that we were not necessarily opposed to the project but we're very concerned about demolition because we believe that demolition

should be a very rare circumstance, particularly in a space like the downtown mall.

As I said, we're preservation groups, so we're also concerned with the preservation of downtown, preservation of downtown mall, preservation of our city and preservation of our region to keep it economically viable and to provide housing opportunities like you were just looking at.

But you're not talking about the design going forward, you're talking about the demolition tonight,

So we just ask you again to take that very seriously.

Make sure that there are safeguards so that if there were to be a failed project, we're not left with a hulk.

We're not left with a vacant lot.

And I would also say that it would be important to have some documentation.

More than just architectural, but also community history that is related to this building.

perhaps a phase one, maybe even a phase two, archaeology.

I keep thinking it's part of Potter Vinegar Hill or at least the setting of Vinegar Hill.

So what really happened there, Jeff's taken us through the Sanborn maps, but what families and what uses were associated there.

It might be very interesting for us going forward in the future.

And if new construction were and new uses were to happen there, I would hope that there would be some interpretation of that beyond just

the silly little plaque, something that really let us know what was the character of this area.

I guess I'm probably the only person in this room that remembers what that area was like when there used to be a fire station.

And when there were residences across the street, it was a pretty important and dynamic part of our city.

And I think that needs to go forward.

And I'm going to kind of differ from Jeff a little bit in that

in my career I've always been concerned with the characteristic as much as the unique and I do think that that

Second Street long brick wall is very characteristic Charlottesville at this part of the city.

There's some way, I'm not asking that the wall be preserved, but if there's some way to reflect that and some kind of reuse and documentation.

I know Mr. Penny-O's on the project and he has abilities to do scanning and that sort of thing.

It would be nice to do something kind of state of the art along with that.

And if there's any way

some of it could be incorporated if you should decide to approve a demolition.

I hope you'll kind of take that to the to the nth degree of what you can do because it's a really important part of our city and it's the western terminus of the mall and it really deserves careful consideration whatever you do.

Thank you.

Other comments from the public?

Well, first of all, I was going to say I'm very jealous of Portland because I

almost the year I've been trying to get to that part of the process with you to be talking about that detail.

I did want to address, what you're talking about is land use versus actual structure.

So BAR in my mind cannot comment to land use.

You'd want to go to the city and preserve.

If the theater is such an important part of the fabric of the downtown mall, you'd want to go to the city and appeal that that be locked in place as it's a theater because it's that important.

and I think what we're trying to do as a city is compare that to the trade-offs of what would a new residential development bring that's compared to that.

So that's kind of the differentiation.

And then, I don't know who I'm saying this for but I wanted to think, I've been here a few times and it's always, it's here's apparent that

Everyone kind of is topping off at six stories, and that is a financial restraint because of construction type.

And what you've heard is for anyone to kind of break through that six stories, they have to go tall enough to make it worthwhile.

Conversely, if someone wants to do a project and stay six stories and have any density, it has to be on a large parcel.

and

it adds a sliver effect versus having these long things.

Okay, thank you.

All righty, thank you.

Any other comments from the public?

Anyone?

Ron?

I think that the criteria would permit the demolition of the building.

It's not particularly historic.

I too have had many happy evenings at the theater, but it's obviously not economically working for them, and it could be a more useful space.

I do think that our criterion will permit the demolition of this building

I agree.

I mean, I'm kind of bummed that I've been on this board long enough that I approved the last facade.

And now we're demolishing it.

But no, I agree.

There's very, very little historical fabric left.

I guess there's the side wall.

But I don't think we have anything in our guidelines that encourages to preserve that side wall.

And I'm not even sure what's left on the ground.

I know the theaters.

I agree.

I would like to reiterate Ms.

Keller's point about going the extra mile and documenting the site in different ways to make sure that we

You know, encapsulate it, but generally I'm in support of demolition for the reasons that were laid out.

I think that in particular the anthropology or the sort of archaeological, I mean archaeological, but more of just the study of the site and more depth

in relation to the history of the last 150 years would really be a worthwhile thing.

I don't know, scanning is, you know, documenting the current building.

I don't have a good, clear picture of what is actually existing at this point, but I would definitely encourage the inclusion of those sorts of conditions.

Yeah, I mean, so the Secretary and your standards have standards for historic documentation.

I also do think your suggestion for more modern technologically advanced methods would be a good one, like a 3D point cloud or something like that, you know, should be

Undertaken, if we were to approve demo.

It's a little tricky because obviously our purview is sort of the exterior of the building.

I agree that our purview is going to tell us that we should approve the demolition but I really feel strongly that we need very clear protections against something going wrong and us ending up having a having the demolition go and having an empty lot there I want to be

So, Mr. Levine, maybe you were

getting at this, but, and I think we maybe asked this before, but if you could just repeat for the record, like, did you explore building on top of this building?

Yeah, you could not.

I mean, maybe you could put one wood structure or two on top, but you could not do anything.

And then also keeping even parts of it.

You've been in violation of the code, you've been in a lot of exceptions, and you couldn't carry out one of the fundamentals of the code, which is to have great walkability and green space and sidewalk space.

So there's really no path to operating in the DX zone without taking the building down.

There's not really.

I mean, we actually sat in our pre-app meeting and talked about where the utilities are and where those poles are.

If you could even maintain, it would be bastardized, you're almost better off like documenting and have an ode to it.

And that's something, again, I always say, we have to go through years worth of process.

We can collaborate on how you document that and how you make things have more than just a plaque and an ode to the history there.

I think that's kind of in the architect's world of bringing that about.

But as far as physically preserving it, there's no,

And I don't think that we, I know our zoning code wouldn't allow it, but I don't think that we would want to maintain a blank wall along that street in that fashion.

Yeah, I mean, this is a tough application to consider since

You know, I think deep down at the heart and root of this BAR, the BAR is preservation, but I do, to no degree, with other members.

And I think for me, it's largely due to the fact that the, really the character, the historic character, defining features and facades of this building have been removed.

especially the main entrance

which was shown in the staff report.

And then we're now on like two facades later.

And I don't, there's no getting the original facade back, right?

There's nothing you could do to appeal what's now there back to get any sort of historic facade.

I think it's long gone.

And the fact that the Water Street facade also was renovated or replaced in 1996.

Again, sort of

to me that those are the character-divining features of the building and the fact that those have already been lost and that basically demolition of those has previously been approved sort of opens the door and makes me feel okay about voting for demolition because I don't as you all know I'm not a big fan of voting for demolition but I just want to kind of state that as just for the record and for my own vote

You know, I think that it's not an individually listed building.

I think that also plays into the decision.

Yes, it's a contributing building in this district, but as Mr. Warren pointed out, the façades are non contributing.

So I think that we've heard a lot about putting some stipulations on this.

I think something we've done before in the past, and I'll just read off what I would propose it was be BR staff or BR approval of the demolition permit.

It's contingent upon

applicant will submit for the record documentation of photographs of the existing building and I think we can expound on that with some other documentary requirements.

BAR approval of a COA for this building's replacement and an approved building permit for construction of that replacement.

So those are the bar minimum of, I think, what we propose.

Some other things I've heard good ideas of would be that we would require a robust oral history program to be orchestrated and by the applicant.

Archeology, if you're on, I think oral makes a good point.

can't rule out that there's not sand there.

So maybe consulting with, at least consulting with a local archeologist to see if based on an initial survey, maybe looking at, again, at Sandborn Maps and perhaps a tour of the building and an understanding of the depths of the foundations could then determine whether further archeology would be required.

I think, yes, a scan of the mural along the second street wall, 3D point cloud,

of the entire building, just for documentary purposes.

If that's valuable.

The city, I'm sure, still has the permit drawings from 2014, which would have had the entire building.

But my question is, so where do these scans reside once they're done?

Does anyone ever look at them again?

There's a gap in where stuff is.

We only retain building permit drawings for I think seven years and they won't let me stuff any more old things in my office.

So the fire immersion is a bet.

But in some of the... There's a dark society.

When I just grab stuff in a pile and dump it in the corner, I don't know exactly what I have, but that's another.

So we will share it with DHR.

Preservation Piedmont does an excellent job of maintaining inventory information we've got.

because we've required the documentation.

So there's several places that that information resides.

As far as city's concern, it resides in our BIR archive.

As far as prior drawings, there are some gaps.

And some of the things were so poorly scanned in the past that it's difficult to determine.

I could find, I couldn't find a lot about this one.

But yeah, so that information, when it's provided, is I share it with Pres Biedmont for any sort of documentation.

It might be illuminating too to have a scan of the building because sometimes old as-builds are just as-builds.

There's not much behind them and it would be difficult to ascertain from those what is actually old and what is new and there's been so much patchwork in this building that something like a scan and a model of the building would maybe illuminate some of these areas that may or may not have been touched.

I'm going to be a little contrary on this one, because I feel like we're asking a lot more than we've ever asked anybody else for a building that is, that any portion that might be remaining would be like back of house warehouse of the total restore.

I think that would be a little onerous and very speculative on their part for thinking that somebody will want to recreate that.

I can't say that they won't, but I don't.

and I have not a historic preservation in that regard, but a lot of people go back and refer to the records and write monographs and histories and so forth of all the stuff that the BAR has acquired people to maintain and I honestly don't know the answer to that question.

I've done this before where we could maybe work on some language, Jeff, that kind of covers it that like maybe

with Ginny or something.

There's some model that could be built and maybe it goes somewhere.

I'm not, at first, I'm in both camps.

I don't know exactly what it is and it can't be, it shouldn't be too onerous, but I'm, it's with reservation that I take this building down.

I think it means something, so I'm there.

I think we, I just don't, I don't know if we're gonna hash it out.

I think the other thought is that, you know, honestly, these days with, again, modern technology, doing a point cloud scan is faster than traditional measured drawings.

And, you know, Bob, maybe you could speak to this.

It probably wouldn't take more than a day or two to scan the whole building.

And then you've got a digital file like that.

Yeah, I don't think what we're asking as owners is what it is.

It's an insurance policy, if in fact something is found.

Because you didn't say it and we've done it before and I think it's important whether it's me or someone else is that typically it's required to do like structural integrity review of the adjacent buildings before and after photos, stuff like that.

I know before they said I think the adjacent landowner doesn't want to hear it and it's a fair and reasonable condition.

you know there is direction in the Secretary's standards so I think referencing those is an appropriate way to go forward.

I think in the past the BAR has made recommendations or requested but they haven't required and so if there are things that you all feel should be considered you can offer it that way.

I would also suggest that any sort of incorporation of

Existing pieces and parts of the building could be contemplated when something new is proposed so hopefully that helps with that and I just want to let one last caveat to this discussion and I feel obligated to say this to everybody out listening I was contacted by the general manager of

The theater, there's been a lot of concern from them about what's been perceived as that this is because the theater is going out of business and they were emphatic that that is not what's going on here.

We have a property owner and Mr. Levine are working on a project, but this is not a function of

as was asked of me by the manager, this is not a function of the theater being in trouble or planning to go out of business, so I just want to make that clear.

So we can certainly, if you want to work on a motion and talk about it in March, this is a step in the process that Mr. Levine knows was necessary, but I don't know if it necessarily has to happen tonight, or you can

So the right way to do that is I would, one of us, or I got some notes here, would make a motion and then there's a technically discussion during which time you can offer friendly amendments to the motion.

And then actually does it get seconded first?

I think it gets seconded first.

It gets seconded and then there's discussion.

And then during that discussion we can

Yeah, I think it would be a shame not to approve this tonight.

I think we've been ready to move.

So if y'all would like me to, I think you had a good start.

Yeah, you did.

Okie dokie.

Sorry, Dad.

Having considered the standards set forth within the city code, including the ADC district guidelines, I move to find the proposed demolition of the existing structure at 200 West Main Street satisfies the BAR's criteria and is compatible with other properties in this ADC district and that the BAR approves the application with following conditions.

that the demo permit is contingent upon the applicant submitting for the record documentation by a point cloud scan and photographs of the existing building that the BAR approves a COA for this building's replacement, that an approved building permit for construction of that replacement is granted.

Can I make one suggestion?

So the contingent upon BAR approval of a COA for this building's replacement?

Do I hear a second?

Second.

Yes.

I would like to offer the amendment of a point cloud or existing construction drawings.

I think I'd want to confirm that those document the whole building.

I'll accept an OR if it documents the entirety of the building and that they match the existing current conditions.

Yeah, and the other thing is the oral history I think can be done anytime without having anything to do with demolition, so I'm not sure we even need to attach that.

That's fair.

I had that in there.

That is in there.

So strike the oral history, though, we do, I think I'd like to just note that we support Ms.

There were a few things, any consultation by local

What did someone say in the meeting today about, you know, someone, all of us die and five years later, someone starts saying, gee, what did they say in that meeting?

So I'm going to repeat this.

Yeah, put that in there.

If someone dies.

The point being is that I just want to be really clear about what we typically require are measured drawings, but we've not dealt with, I guess the only project we dealt with of this nature was the 1980

And then archaeology, how do you feel on archaeology?

You feel like it's deep down.

We do not have an ordinance.

It'd be nice if we did.

I think a strong recommendation to evaluate the site.

It is part of the original town.

I think, and this is something Kate and I talk a lot about, because she is an archaeologist.

We do have some sites in town that we know have not been disturbed, so we would love to do more archaeology.

I think we just recommend, would you all accept the recommendation as opposed to a requirement?

Sure, sure.

All right.

So would you let me run through this one more time?

Sorry.

All right.

Having considered standards set forth within the city code, including the ADC district design guidelines, I move to find the proposed demolition of the existing structure at 200 West Main Street satisfies the BAR's criteria.

It's compatible with other properties in this ADC district and that the BAR approves the application with the following conditions.

The demolition permit is contingent upon

The applicant submitting for the record documentation via a point cloud scan or existing building plans that reflect the current condition of the building, documentary photographs of the existing building, BAR approval of a COA for this building's replacement, an approved building permit for construction of that replacement, and a recommendation that the applicant consult with a local archaeologist.

I'll call a vote.

Ms.

Mr. Rosenthal?

Yes.

Mr. Timmerman?

Yes.

Mr. Schwarz?

Yes.

Mr. Bailey?

Yes.

And the chair votes yes.

Alright, thank you Mr. Levine.

Thank you everybody who helped participate in the discussion.

Alrighty, our next

I just dive real quickly into this.

After you all had the discussion last time, Greg contacted me and said, you know, it might make sense to just go up.

He said, should we talk to the BAR again?

I said, why not?

And I'm sorry.

We have your names.

Yeah, the spell check doesn't catch those, but so

Right there is where you can see on the left was where they talked about the addition on the east side.

On the right here you see where you can see the first force of the structures retain and a pop-up, if you will, a second story addition.

So a similar set of circumstances.

Obviously, I just wanted to

See if you all have any thoughts on that and share them with Clara and Craig.

Is that Carla?

Oh, that's me.

We got it right.

Thank you.

Yeah, after we really started looking at this a bit more, I thought for

The cost and the use, it would probably be better to just go up and to see what that might look like.

And so I contacted Greg and we started talking about that.

And it actually, it works well for the business.

And so, I mean, I personally like this more.

It also allows me to keep those parking spaces, which would be great for my business as well.

Yeah.

We were adding on more, I think it was 1500 or something around there, right?

Yeah, I think it was 1500.

Yeah, but it's interesting, just having just a thousand that's laid out that way, it allows me, for my business, it allows me to have just more open space.

That addition created smaller open space.

It was more square footage, but not as much open space.

So a lot of this, for me, is going to depend on costs.

Obviously, if I had my druthers, I would love to have a roof that we could access and eventually maybe make a roof similar to the way Common House did, I think, as an example.

That's what I would like for us to at least maybe put in the plans that we could build it so that that could maybe be added on later.

and other complicated ones where everything was designated contributing in order to not have demolitions and empty vacant lots.

But it's not contributing at the national or state level?

No.

So I think, yeah, question.

Same here, no concerns.

I mean, I think going up is actually better.

Building on your parking lot would be even better, but I don't know what's going to happen.

I don't think there's any need to preserve anything that you don't want to preserve.

I mean, I understand you're probably keeping most of the first four for cost reasons, but if something has to go away, I don't have a concern with that.

with a flat roof.

I just, my only caution is if you put an air handler on there, you're going to have to hide it.

One of the things I wanted to bring up, when I first came on, an engineer had already been there and deemed it maybe not feasible to go up.

So we went to the SAP for a while and

So we went back and got a second opinion.

We can go up.

Lightweight framing probably has to be EFIS.

No, I did that on purpose.

That's not the only reason I'm up here.

I did want to kind of just float something that didn't happen in the quick sketch that if there was a flat roof, the option would be that we would structure it that way, you know, have that, you know, configure that way.

But also, eventually that means that the stair volume would come up as a, you know, access.

and I wasn't sure if you guys just have sort of an opinion when you talk about the air handler, there's room in the back to put compressor units and stuff.

But is there any kind of like thoughts about what you, I know it's kind of without seeing it, where that volume would be like a tower element?

Currently in the plan, the stairs kind of in this front right corner, but there's other, you know, possibilities to just be in the back and the middle and, you know, pull back and, you know, there's probably too much to speculate on.

At this point, there's also, we'll be railing up there, things like that, because I think right now it looks pretty straightforward, it's pretty easy to digest, I think, this image imagery, you know, and the

I mean, a stair tower up there would give you a reason to, it might give you a reason to make sense of some mechanical screening or any railings that you might have for future abuse up there.

I mean, I think it might tie it all together.

I think more height, the better, in that corner, honestly.

Yeah.

Okay.

There's probably just a little bit of this office showing down from behind.

So then from?

You can read us both, but yeah.

That was a thought in this,

Yeah, it's not, it's not even, it's probably still the same cement type panel.

We've even explored going darker, like a dark gray, for one of the products.

Just on the side, yeah, the lines are a little bit stronger than they need to be, probably.

But yeah, so just the little entrance door, instead of that little dormer type thing that was over it with the original hip roof, there's just sort of a flat canopy and a flat canopy over the entrance.

The main sort of functions as a main entrance from the bigger parking lot.

And then the backside balcony is looking out.

and Servin as the canopy to the entrances below there.

And I'm going to look at the street view.

I see the two sort of, they're not really great murals, but the same sort of shape.

And then there's a little bit larger tree kind of on the corner.

It's not shown in your sketch.

Probably could, probably maybe have to.

That's really up against the building.

I'm not sure how it would

or if I'm understanding what you're talking about.

It's kind of adjacent to the parking lot.

Parking right side of the corner.

I think when you do your site plan, you probably end up having to add some trees anyways if you take them out.

Whether that gets preserved or not, there may end up being another one someplace else you have to add.

I am curious.

Yeah, yeah, we did go and talk to those guys.

Yeah, Jeff was at the meeting and they were, you know, by zoning, they wanted that first, that side addition to be 14 feet high.

We could probably get it down to 12 or something, but that was already kind of one of the reasons we were going back to some other alternative, because that was messing with us to a certain extent as well.

But second story, that isn't it.

We'll have to look into that.

and the others.

You know, she wants it high anyhow.

That's the whole point for the Pilati machine.

That's why I don't think they'd make you change your original first form.

That's what I'm wondering, is they make you raise the current ceiling, if that is, I don't know.

Oh, interesting.

I don't know if they'd make you do that or not.

But yeah, there's no, there's no context to this.

So it's, I think you have a lot of freedom to come up with something that

You don't have to, I don't think there's anything for you to respond to as far as surroundings that, so yeah.

You're gonna have to do that anyway.

Or you're gonna have to take that roof off.

I mean, it does, again, look at this tree view image.

The cornice turned and softened right below your roof line is tight to the top of the first floor windows and you know your sketch suggests a little bit of brick over those because obviously when you tail that roof off that goes away so you know to y'all's point it may just say take it on up but I think there's you probably want to try to match that brick to kind of bring it up to wherever you break to the second floor but hopefully it's a modern enough brick you can match

We need to have that discussion at some point.

We're changing our tune on EPIS.

You guys put it in my head.

Question.

I'm sorry.

I'm not understanding how you're imagining the roof.

The sketch was originally drawn thinking flat as shed is shed.

But since then we have kind of gone towards, you know, maybe let's go ahead and frame it for the possibility of a

to create a roof duct if possible, so I don't know how long it's going to take to do my best to make that happen.

Yeah.

Yeah, I'm at the very end of the day, so I need to make a decision.

I'm not hearing any major negativity from the board, so I think you're pretty safe to move ahead.

Thank you all very much.

All righty, it is 8.25.

Does anybody like a break?

The next one might take a while.

Next one is preliminary discussion.

This is one we've seen before so it's a really continuing preliminary discussion on 218 West Market Street

So yeah, this is a little bit of background.

Again, repeat what the current site of the people call the Artful Lodger site, the old AMP grocery store there, does have a COA for the demolition of it.

This had come before you, before another iteration as a seven-story apartment building with an S.U.P., and it's shifted now to the intent is to construct a multi-story hotel on this site.

You've looked at this a couple times in discussion.

The reason I have not brought it forward as a formal COA is that

Well, as we talked about with Workland Street, that was a complete application.

It had the information available that I feel would allow you all to make a decision, and I don't believe the drawings is presented due.

Also, there were a number of questions last time about the design.

So, there's been some slight modifications to that.

I'll let the architect explain those, but I think this is one where we've reached, you know, similar with others that, to the need to express where things are right and where they are wrong, and if in fact they are, and to really provide some direction forward.

I will just offer that

from staff's point of view when we try to look at new construction and within a historic district to one of the things we look at is what are the prevailing materials, what's typical.

This building while it has brick elements is

and predominantly Ephis and nothing against Ephis but there are very few stucco buildings on the downtown mall and in prior discussions I think the BAR has expressed something a bit more monumental is in line and

and less suburban strip.

But I think that the design is relatively similar with some changes.

There are a list of things in the staff report where I noted

I think still need to be provided and I would encourage you to read those that's on the, underneath the application I listed them and referred to them in your conversation with the applicant.

And the thing I really want to stress is that there's a lot of signage shown on the drawings that is not, that signage would not be allowed for our sign regs but it's in there for context but knowing that

A separate sign permit is required for any signage.

If someone wants to include it, they can, but be very clear that any approvals that show that signage doesn't mean that that sign permit is granted.

So do you all have any questions for me about this project?

And I would hand it off to Bob and his team.

Is there already a demolition?

In fact, the conditions that Mr. Zehmer referenced for the last work were verbatim from that one.

All right.

Mr. Libby.

Thank you.

I'm working with one hand.

Similar to what I said earlier,

We came to you a while ago, and I think, I know, we're like inside out.

I don't think we brought you anything nearly baked as to present a real exterior building.

I think at the time we're focused with Nitten, the project architect on satisfying Marriott's requirements, internal requirements, and kind of how that would go.

We felt, Alan and I, who's here, the developer, my developer partner, thought that what we're missing from the team was Bob, design developed to bring again local historic architecture, kind of taking a step back and looking at it holistically as what the site, the approaches, and so I think, despite Jeff saying there's a couple of changes, I think we've done

Good job in advancing it and bringing it to a new level, which will bring a different discussion.

Thank you.

Thank you everybody.

I've got something pre-written just so that I can get my mojo going here.

Thank you, everybody.

My name is Bob Pinio, and I'm a principal design-developed architect.

I'm going to use this as a cheat sheet, but the owner's group hired us to help contextualize the more nuanced connections between this project and the public realm.

We have thoroughly enjoyed collaborating with the architect, Mr. Patel.

and he's the architect of record and the ownership group to help refine the design.

My role here tonight is to help articulate responses to some of the comments raised by the board in the last discussion.

I want to revisit the design for the new hotel by starting at a scale we can all relate to, the downtown mall.

The rhythm of the mall is something we all recognize and appreciate, a cadence of streets, sidewalks, and the pedestrian experience.

This project sits within the broader context, but functions uniquely within it.

While the site is part of the downtown mall's more extensive framework, it differs from more prototypical relationships along the mall.

It is a critical site as a gateway into the area and the transitional point.

However, it is not directly on the mall.

Rather, it sits along Old Preston Avenue as it meets West Market Street.

Given the ongoing evolution of the city zoning, the site serves as an important case study for massing density and urban integration site and context.

Every building occupies a site in its own way.

This particular building interacts with its surroundings through four distinct elevations.

The Old Preston Avenue side, the West Market side, the Western elevation, the Eastern elevation.

What makes this site fascinating is its irregular geometries shaped by the intersection of two roads and the resulting property lines that generated visibility and impact.

Some portions of the building will be highly visible to both pedestrian and vehicles, while others will be obscured by surrounding structures.

Using site studies, we identified key viewpoints where the building has the most significant visual impact.

Importantly, despite its proximity to the downtown mall, the building's effect on the mall is less impactful than I first thought.

We have taken great care to revise the design so it can be a positive contributor to the urban fabric.

Design process and contextualization response.

A significant aspect of our process was leveraging 3D point cloud scanning.

My ears perked up on the last discussion.

Love it.

Technology to model the entire vicinity accurately.

This allowed us to test and refine our design in relation to its context and to better articulate opportunities to engage with a wide variety of dynamic pedestrian and urban experiences.

At our last meeting, feedback emphasized the importance of pedestrian experience, retail engagement, and massing clarity.

We have worked to address these concerns while we also rigorously tested how the building fits within its surroundings.

One of your key points was more diagrams and more pedestrian experiences.

So we'll share that with you as well.

Jeff, one of the comments that you wrote back was somebody on the board was talking about the 3D point cloud scanning data being a little distracting.

So we've revised.

So what we're going to show you is not materially different than what the proposal was, but we've cleaned up some of the graphics so it's easier to understand.

Elevation and Site Adaptation.

The site has significant grade changes, with the highest point of the northeast corner as it dropped about 14 or 15 feet down to the southwest corner.

The design accommodates these variations through strategic placement of entry points, stairs, retaining walls, ensuring an engaging and accessible pedestrian experience.

Key Urban Moves.

One of the most significant urban design moves was to restore the connection between West Market Street and the downtown mall, currently occupied by a surface parking lot.

This connection is realized through a ceremonial entrance, lobby, and restaurant space, reinforcing pedestrian movement and activating the street.

Parking and circulation.

The project incorporates two at-grade parking entrances.

positioned as far west as possible to prioritize pedestrian experiences close to the mall.

The circulation strategy ensures the efficient access while preserving the pedestrian realm.

Relationship, pedestrian and public realm.

We have taken significant steps to enhance the pedestrian realm.

Retail and restaurant spaces, ceremonial staircases and terraces, landscaping and street trees.

As we refine the design, we are exploring material strategies that bring depth and texture to the facade.

These elements will evolve as we gather further feedback and refine the design.

But we thought we'd explore and hopefully get your feedback on the resolution of some of the issues that you brought up last time.

In summary, this project is an opportunity to create a well-integrated, vibrant addition to Charlottesville Urban's fabric.

It respects its context while making a clear architectural statement.

We appreciate the Board's feedback and look forward to continued dialogue as we refine the details.

Okay, so you can explain me if you want, Jeff, but we're gonna go through, I've got about 50 slides.

The big idea here is to show you our design process, get you hopefully comfortable with some of the decisions, but also contextualize, visualize how this building is gonna impact the urban fabric.

So as we all know, but just an exhibit, just to place everybody where we are,

We're at a kind of an odd intersection between the downtown mall and West Market Street and Old Preston Avenue.

Next slide.

So when we're studying the mall, sometimes you think, well, this is a mall building.

What is the context of how that building should play?

This diagram for me was very instructful.

instructing that this is not really a mall building the way that it plays.

There's these 14 blocks or so, very orthogonal in nature, rhythmic, the cadence, the views down to a mall.

And we're going to go into this a little bit, but you can see all the blue lines.

What happens at the western edge of the mall, where this site is, basically there's two

two roads that split that urban fabric and there's a lot going on in that area so the blue lines are kind of running contrary to the grain of the downtown mall so we thought that that was an interesting and a dynamic thing to consider but some of these geometries are driving some of the architecture moves so this is a close-up

So we have two, the two green lines are obviously infill, you know, they're in-board property lines, so they have their own complexity to deal with.

And then we have the Southern Elevation, which is the old Preston Avenue site, and the West Market site.

And the other thing I want to point out here is these big orange lines.

These are kind of site considerations and site restraints.

The omni provides an urban edge on one side, and then there's a really large retaining wall, the northern edge, that also creates these kind of street walls.

What I'm showing here with these orange and yellow

Circles is where you can see the building and from what areas.

So if it's orange, it has a real impact on the pedestrian experience from the mall and where it's yellow, it's barely visible.

So we're going to show you that.

We used 3D Point Cloud scan technology.

We modeled the context and we're going to put you right where we are so you can see exactly what the impact is.

We modeled everything

The facades of this building, like I said, there's four different facades, how they contextualize, how they deal with the context, they're all quite different.

The northern facade doesn't have a building to bound it, but it does have this really tall concrete retaining wall.

And then the southern facade

obviously has the omni, and even the omni doesn't play by the same rules all the time.

There's about an 80-foot tower that runs, you know, with the mall, but then there's a kind of a, you can see all those jaggedy lines.

That's the building's response to the roadway itself to this old Preston Avenue.

So you can see that there's a lot, can you go back to one slide?

So you can see all those blue lines are trying to relate to this road change.

And where it can be orthogonal it is, where it can't be because of the road and the elevational changes, that's where you see these kind of movements in architecture.

Next slide, please.

Okay, so one of the primary things that we started with was this idea of where should the primary functions of the building be.

We wanted to be as close to the ceremonial side and the retail side and the use side wanted to be as far west as possible.

The reason there is so that we could engage on West Market Street and also on the downtown mall.

So this is a diagram, an intentional diagram.

Things have changed a little bit here, but the context and the objectives are the same.

Try to get the back house towards the westerly side, a centralized ceremonial side, and a meeting gathering space.

This is obviously on the ground floor.

This was a generative diagram that kind of changed where the program fit.

Those big red boxes are either outside terraces, terraces for decks, ceremonial staircases into the lobby, or viewing platforms looking south.

So the other part of that was re-taking a different look at where parking should go.

The lowest elevation of the site is also on the western side.

So being able to relegate parking entrances at that far south, which is also on the lowest elevation of the building, or on the site.

So therefore you can kind of enter

It's got this really cool, you know, circular pathway so you can come in, come through, and then pop out again.

They go in either one.

There's an entrance on the west market side.

That's a loop, and then there's one at a lower elevation.

Yeah, but they don't connect.

and that opened up not only for a clear parking and layout and all that but the retail space became bigger so there was a lot of efficiency found so that was a benefit.

Next slide please.

John is here from Timmins.

We're also, you know, elevating the pedestrian experience.

We heard loud and clear.

What does that look like?

What does it feel like?

What are the materials?

What are the entrance points?

Where are the terraces?

How do you get from one place to another?

So we're working diligently on that.

We'll show you a lot of

that worked there, but here you're starting to see street trees, planting areas, platforms, ceremonial staircases, street trees on the Old Preston Avenue side as well.

So this is our big, one of our big urban moves was to, you know, have the pedestrian experience navigate from one side of the site to the other.

And also, you know, all the engagement of the restaurant spaces, hotel rooms themselves, engagement on the street is part of what activates the street.

In the meantime, dropping all the parking below grade, as you can see, and there's that elevational difference.

The first platform is entered off of West Market, and the other one is from Bull Press Nav.

Here's another view.

This is on the old Preston Avenue side.

Here you're starting to see some of the 3D point cloud scan geometries.

We've kind of toned it down so that it looks more like ghosty, but it's easier to read.

And that was a comment that we got from one of the board members.

I appreciate that comment because it made everything clear.

It's two levels, but the bottom level winds down and goes underground, under the first level.

Okay, so I'm going to show you four kind of aerial shots.

And talking to Jeff, what we're trying to do here is to, I think the important part of this building, one of the important parts is it's really dynamic for a lot of different reasons, but predominantly because of where it sits, the elevational changes, and also the geometries of the site itself.

So we wanted to show all sorts of different viewpoints, but we'll start with the big picture.

The big picture is massing.

Does it feel appropriate?

What's its context?

Where does it start?