There was a discussion during the SLC Council work session regarding zoning heights, specifically the area direction East of the Central Station.
• Video Link
The discussion starts about an hour 20 into the video.
There are also a few documents that are provided on this as well:
Staff Report:
https://slc.primegov.com/Portal/viewer?id=15947&type=2
Administrative Transmittal:
https://slc.primegov.com/Portal/viewer?id=15859&type=2
There are a few other documents that are linked to this under the Meeting Documents for the overall meeting.
I did notice that there were a few reasons given against raising the heights, as of right.
1: Historic Preservation, increased heights could lead to demolition of historic buildings to get a better use of the land.
2: Reduces/Removes incentives the city can offer to increase affordable housing.
I don't like the idea of Historic Preservation via limiting zoning height. It doesn't save the building, as someone could still demolish the building as long as it was within the height requirement.
I also don't think that any incentive is lost with increased zoned heights. Sure, developers could all build taller as of right, but the incentive would still be there to build taller with the inclusion of affordable units.
Next, I noticed that there is a conflicting set of issues that the City is starting to realize. For some reason, there are some in the City that are set on the pyramid shape with the CBD (D-1 zoning) being the tallest and then extending downward to the West.
At the same time that they reference the pyramid shape, there is also reference to diminishing space within the CBD area for taller buildings. They call out that the recent building boom has reduced and removed many of the remaining D-1 parcels. There are now very limited spaces available due to either planned projects or land banking.
Here is the conflict: The City has it codified that as the CBD/D-1 area fills out, the D-1 would eventually extend to the West over time.
So the City knows it is running out of space in the D-1 area but also hamstrings itself by not wanting to allow taller buildings in the GMU, D4 and D3 areas. This is done to again, preserve the Pyramid.
How can the increased D-1 heights be extended Westward as planned when there are those that are against this.
Additionally, there is a reference to both the CCH and Block 67 Phase 2. Both project areas are in the D4 zone, both are adjacent to D1 and requested to have their project area zoning changed to D1 to allow for increased heights.
It is mentioned in one of the documents that both projects were scaled down to fit into a D4 overlay zone with a 375' cap on height.
I think that this is the City shooting itself in the foot, while giving more power to the Land Bankers. The good thing is that there is an appetite for changing the heights and work is being done to make this happen.
I do think that in many ways STACK development should get a lot of credit for this push to increase zoning heights. They are still pushing for the area East of the Central Station to have the heights increased, both min and max heights.