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Microsoft Office Outlook Late Communication Planning Commission September 23, 2009 From: [email protected] Sent: Sunday, September 20, 2009 6:29 PM To: Harrison, Jordan Cc: [email protected]; Marks, Daniel S.; [email protected] Subject: proposed zoning for Panoramic Hill Attachments: section_1.pdf; section_2.pdf Follow Up Flag: Follow up Flag Status: Flagged Dear Jordan Harrison, In regard to the upcoming Planning Commission meeting and the proposed changes to the Panoramic Hill Environmental Safety-Residential zone, please distribute this comment to the commissioners. This is to inform the Commission that part of Panoramic Hill is listed as a historic district and is listed as such on the National Register of Historic Places. The listing can be found at the following Web site: http://www.nps.gov/history/nr/listings/20051028.HTM Two PDF documents attached here are the application, which was approved by city, state, and federal entities. The proposed zoning ordinance makes no mention of the historic district and the constraints on development implied by the district. There are many implications of the historic district listing but the most urgent is the implication for CEQA. It should be noted, for example, that the parking requirement would degrade the district landscape and would thus be an impact to historic resources. Because of the possible impact on historic resources, the proposed zoning changes will not be categorically exempt from CEQA. It is well and good to protect the "lives and property of Panoramic Hill residents in Berkeley and adjoining parts of Oakland" but a plan must be developed which also protects the "City's unique character and values..." (see purposes, sec. 23D.24.020) The protection of lives and property while also protecting the unique neighborhood character and values is the goal. The proposed zoning ordinance falls short of meeting that goal and the failure to mention this neighborhood characteristic is a significant omission. The district status is especially relevant given that the proposed zoning is a hill-wide zoning proposal that lumps the adjoining undeveloped Oakland area, and the upper reaches of the Berkeley area with the older, lower reaches of the Panoramic Hill neighborhood. The universal zoning ordinance that is proposed is more suitable for some parts of the neighborhood than others. This is also to comment on the parking requirement for additions or renovations, which are financially onerous to homeowners just as parking requirements are financially onerous to developers. Adding salt to the wound, in the case of owner occupied housing the goal is not to make money so much as to improve living conditions as money becomes available, as mortgages are paid off, etc. It would seem that the ordinance is designed with the assumption that all livable space will be used to increase occupancy. This assumption is actually quite explicit as the proposed ordinance states (section 23D.24.050) "...any project that increases habitable floor area...shall be considered an intensification of land use." An attic could be finished and increase habitable floor area while not intensifying land use but rather be used for a family's enjoyment, e.g. movie room, archive, etc. This requirement presumably takes into consideration the neighborhood's proximity to the university and the demand for housing. It's perhaps counterintuitive, but eliminating the parking requirement will discourage high occupancy of any dwelling even more than prohibiting room rental. Parking is an amenity which renters seek. I also object to the prohibition on the rental of rooms. This interferes with the property rights of owner occupied houses. There are no more impacts from room rental than from group living in which six unrelated people live together, in which one person leases the property, and the remainder of the householders pay rent to the leasee. To prohibit room rental is to unfairly eliminate one means of earning income for those individuals who occupy their homes while granting rental opportunities to those property owners who did not live on their property. 1 Late Communication Planning Commission September 23, 2009 Finally, it would seem that the proposed zoning ordinance is a prezoning plan without properly stating this purpose. The adjacent undeveloped land in the Oakland area of the neighborhood has great development potential. Development could occur if there were a specific plan, if emergency access were provided, etc. The listed requirements is grossly inadequate, however, and has not been properly vetted and would improperly mislead a potential developer about the potential costs. Development of the upper reaches of the hill could not be developed without building a second road, not just an emergency road. The proposed ordinance tries to eliminate cars on the road by requiring off-street parking. But not all properties have street frontage, the off-street parking will degrade the district, and there are other problems as well. The street does not have sidewalks and in general is unsuitable for the kind of everyday traffic and construction traffic which would ensue should the upper part of the hill be developed. In other words, the proposed off-street parking requirement might be conceived of as a way of improving traffic flow on Panoramic Way so as to accommodate intensification of land use in the Oakland part of the hill. If this is the implicit plan, it is a bad plan. It is not a solution. Whoever develops the uphill property, or whoever is representing those who develop this property, must face this fact now. Development in the Oakland area will not occur without accommodating the intensification of land use in that part of the neighborhood. And what this means is to build a road, not just an emergency road, to accommodate this traffic. This is common sense, which any reasonable man would see. Meanwhile, to unfairly require people living in old, out-of-date houses to build off-street parking when they remodel and increase "habitable floor space" borders is grossly unfair. This requirement only makes sense if there is some overarching plan to clear Panoramic Way of vehicles. Again, it is unfair for some people to carry the burden of improving traffic flow so that more people can move to the hill. Moreover, to eliminate the cars on the street does not necessarily improve emergency response times. Fire trucks have already documented the difficulty navigating the two hair pin turns. These are real problems that are never addressed in the proposed zoning ordinance. In short, the proposed ordinance makes many assumptions, improperly; comes up with a prezoning plan implicitly rather than explicitly; tries to address the implicit assumptions in a round about way. It would be far better to acknowledge that the neighborhood has several different development patterns and to recognize and even honor those differences. From there, an ordinance could be developed that anticipates the future in a realistic way. Thank you for consideration of these comments and concerns. Yours sincerely, J a n i c e T h o m a s 2 NPS Form 10-900-a OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Section number _8_Page SUMMARY The Panoramic Hill Historic District is eligible for the National Register of Historic Places under criterion C at the local level of significance. Under criterion C, Panoramic Hill is significant in the area of Architecture as a neighborhood that represents the Bay Area Tradition in architecture, primarily the first phase associated with the Arts and Crafts Movement. The district includes notable houses by architects Ernest Coxhead, Bernard Maybeck, Julia Morgan, Walter Steilberg, and others; a distinctive street plan; and paths and steps that provide pedestrian circulation. Since the north side fire of 1923, Panoramic Hill is among the most extensive surviving Arts and Crafts neighborhoods in Berkeley, which was the center of this important early twentieth century architectural movement. The district is significant for the period from 1888 when the principal street, Panoramic Way, was laid out to 1941 when a long period of development ended due to World War II. HISTORIC CONTEXT Architecture Late nineteenth-century California residential architecture for the middle and upper middle classes was characterized for the most part by repetitive floor plans, wood construction, and decorated interior and exterior surfaces. These decorated surfaces reflected the possibilities suggested by mass produced illustrations and realized by steam-driven machinery in wood- working factories more than they did any conscious aesthetic ideas. Painted houses of this sort line the streets of Berkeley’s new neighborhoods that were expanding with the University of California, notably the College Homestead tract on the south side of the campus, the principal residential neighborhood for the University. In later yeas, houses like these came to be identified collectively as “Victorian,” or labeled by stylistic terms as Italianate, Eastlake, or Queen Anne. Victorian Berkeley was little different from Victorian neighborhoods throughout California and the rest of the United States. Likewise, Victorian America had many similarities with comparable districts of Europe and other industrialized countries. The common ingredient in all of these places was the recent and rapid industrialization of societies. Everywhere, industrialization resulted in a growing middle class and, at the same time, a growing gap between those who could afford to live comfortably and those who struggled in poverty. The architecture we now call Victorian was developed to accommodate those who benefited NPS Form 10-900-a OMB Approval No. 1024-0018 (8-86) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Section number _8_Page materially from industrialization. The plentiful and conspicuous architecture of Victorian houses struck many as a symbol of the age, for both good and bad.
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