Church representatives obtained three of four variance requests for the project Thursday from the Zoning Board of Appeals.

The hearing was contentious, however. The plans pitted church members against neighborhood residents — and neighbors against neighbors in some instances. The project faces additional review by the staff of the Metropolitan Planning Commission and the Savannah city manager’s office and could be subject to additional public hearings before construction can begin.

The most compelling quote in the article comes from Jason Cobb, whose family business would share the block with the large new church: “Thereâ€s nothing neighborly about this building.”

Having considered the project as dispassionately as possible, I think the proposed church complex is simply too massive for that site.

There are a number of compelling arguments for it not being too massive, so I’ve attached a number of images below that give some sense of the issues so readers can decide for themselves.

The best argument for the appropriateness of the scale is that there are other institutions nearby with similar footprints.

But consider Wallin Hall and Sister’s Court to the east. Both face 37th Street, and do so rather expansively and graciously. In the case of Christ Church Anglican, a side wall — perhaps with no active entrances as required by zoning — faces the boulevard. The Christian Revival Center to the west clearly presents itself as two separate buildings — one facing 37th and one facing Bull.

And both the sanctuary and the attached parish house require significant variances in terms of maximum footprint. The two buildings, which are attached, have a total footprint of 12,600 square feet. The limit in the zoning district is a footprint of 5500 sf. Even if we view those as separate buildings, they both require variances. Interestingly, in the staff report before yesterday’s ZBA meeting, there’s this ruling regarding the issue of these attached but separate buildings:

The Site Administrator has determined that the coverage proposed should be calculated on the basis of all structures on the property. The petitioner proposes to construct 12,600 square feet of church sanctuary and parish hall/classroom building(s) and to possibly retain the contributing 1,300 square foot (footprint) historic frame structure already present on the structure. This would exceed the maximum 5,500 square foot building footprint by 7,100 square feet (129 percent). There are no extraordinary or exceptional conditions pertaining to the particular piece of property in question that would require the petitioner to exceed the maximum lot coverage by 129 percent.

Clearly, the size of the two buildings violates the letter of the neighborhood zoning code. I think the size also violates the spirit of the code.

One could counter by saying that the lot presents the exceptional condition of being very large and basically linear. But the largeness and linearity of the lot are the direct result of the petitioner’s own choices to a) move or destroy an existing building, b) ignore the historical block design with buildings facing 37th St, and c) combine two parcels (originally 7) into a single lot.

While the proposed complex meets the letter of the code in terms of lot coverage, I think there’s an interesting problem regarding the spirit of it. Given the large entry to the church and the parking along the lane, the property would offer very little visible green space to passersby. Note that one of the largest areas of green space is an interior courtyard that would be invisible from the outside.

For an interesting take on the church from The Very Rev. Dr. William Willoughby of the nearby St. Paul’s (and not a good speller), click here.

Click here for my last post on this issue, which includes a link to one of my City Talk columns.

Here are some pics and images from this link:

Every building sector is now expanding and new project inquiries are strongly positive (down from February, but still at 60.1). Note: This includes commercial and industrial facilities like hotels and office buildings, multi-family residential, as well as schools, hospitals and other institutions.

According to the AIA, there is an “approximate nine to twelve month lag time between architecture billings and construction spending” on non-residential construction. This index suggests some increase in CRE investment in the second half of 2013.

CRE=commercial real estate. The Architectural Billings Index is very noisy month to month, but it’s a great leading indicator of economic activity. In the graph here from Calculated Risk, you can see both the noisiness and the general trend lines.

A few things to keep in mind as you look at this graph:

• Any number below 50 indicates contraction. Any number above 50 indicates expansion.
• The ABI is a great measure of commercial real estate expansion, governmental expenditures, etc., but it says very little about residential real estate investment.
• You can see in the graph the dramatic declines that continued throughout all of 2008.
• Keep in mind, too, that the “rebound” in the graph at the beginning of 2009 does not indicate improvement but less dramatic declines. Any number below 50 indicates contraction.

There are some fluid elements to this controversy, and my next column doesn’t come out till Sunday. I have a Thursday deadline for that piece, which makes writing about the Avenues on 61st tricky for City Talk.

So let me put a few thoughts and links here.

First off, we’re talking about the unusually tall apartment buildings now under construction on 61st Street just east of Abercorn.

From an article by Adam Van Brimmer last summer in the SMN, Apartment complex planned for vacant section of Abercorn Terrace site:

A developer bought the Abercorn Terrace property in 2007 bent on turning the low-income housing units into luxury condominiums.

Now five years later, the site is on the verge of finally being fully redeveloped, albeit with a different blend of residences and new developers.

The Chatham County-Savannah Metropolitan Planning Commission blessed Tuesday a plan to build a 32-unit apartment complex on the north end of the nine-acre site. The Savannah Lofts would be constructed on the cleared part of the property across 61st Street from the larger section of the site already redeveloped into Savannah College of Art and Design student housing.

The Savannah Lofts would feature three-story buildings with a mix of three and four-bedroom rental units.

Problem #1 — and by far the most significant of the issues raised in Jessica’s column today: the developer is apparently renting these units by the bedroom rather than the unit. They’re essentially suite-style apartments with one lease per bedroom. This is not the understanding under which these units were approved. There’s no clear, confirming language of this model currently on the Avenues on 61st website, but an ad from April 22 on Craigslist includes this language: “IF 4 PEOPLE FILL A TOWN HOME TODAY, YOU GET YOUR FIRST MONTH’S RENT FREE!”

If the apartments were being rented by the unit, why would the developer care whether the units had four occupants or not?

Assuming the units are being rented with individual leases for each bedroom, then I expect city officials to pursue a stop work order until the issue is resolved.

UPDATE, 4/24, about 5:30 p.m.: As of right now, the a classified ad at SCAD District lists the following, which leaves no doubt that the bedrooms are being rented individually:

4BR townhouses—Luxury student housing located in Habersham Village. Fully furnished, rent incls. cable, internet, W/D and trash removal. Stainless-Steel appliances, walk-in closets, hdwd style floors and ceiling fans. $610/mo. individually leased. 12 month leases. $50 off first monthâ€s rent when you refer a friend, minutes from downtown and seconds from shopping and food. Call today for more information spaces are going fast (912)335-3661.

In her Connect column, Jessica’s main complaint is about the height of the units. I agree they’re too tall.

But take a look at the application before the Metropolitan Planning Commission last year. The developer needed only a 5-foot variance for a setback; no height variances were needed. The site was built up at least a few feet above grade for drainage purposes, but that in itself required no variance.

Is 40 feet (or a few feet more) too tall on that stretch of road? I think so. But the lot has been zoned for that height for decades. When the lot was first planned as condos a few years back, the plan was for some three-story units.

From Jessica and then from others later today, there have been various other complaints about density and especially parking.

Here’s the map of the buildings, with 61st St. at the bottom:

There’s no entry to the complex from 60th Lane. Each of the 32 units — a total of 128 bedrooms (or perhaps slightly fewer if some are 3-bedroom as reported last year) — has a two-car garage. Also, in the original application, the developer asked for parking to be reinstated on-street on the north side of 61st Street, which would add about a dozen spaces to the stock in the area.

Yes, 61st Street traffic would have to be more careful if we reinstate parking on that side, but it’s no big deal. There are residential blocks all over the city where two cars can’t really pass unless one pulls to the side and allows the other to pass. Here’s a screen capture from Google Street view of that block:

So with the 64 spaces under the units and those 12 on the street, that’s 76 spaces. Would that be enough for the 128 bedrooms?

The approved One West Victory apartments are providing 216 spaces for the 330 likely residents. That’s a slightly higher ratio of spaces/residents than the Avenues on 61st, but not much (roughly .65 to .60).

Will that be enough spaces? I think so.

So I’m very concerned about the business model of Chance Partners and Asset Campus Housing — it looks like they’re renting the units in a fundamentally different way than they described when they won approval for the project.

The height is regrettable, but entirely legal. The lesson here is that it pays to know your neighborhood zoning, use, height, etc. rules. I’m also surprised that some neighborhood organization wasn’t more vigilant in raising concerns last year before the development made it through Savannah City Council.

Some of the other concerns I’ve heard today seem off-key to me. Many neighborhoods would like to see more owner-occupied, single-family homes and fewer rental units, but Savannah’s older neighborhoods are pretty much all mixed use. The new apartments on 61st are on a lot that may never have had owner-occupied housing, is adjacent to student housing to the south, is adjacent to a range of businesses in Habersham Village, is on a major bus line, has access to SCAD shuttles, and is only about a mile from SCAD buildings to the west and just a little over a mile from Savannah Tech to the south and a few other SCAD buildings to the north.

That sounds like a great spot for some nice rental units. Just shorter ones.