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HomeMy WebLinkAboutA002 - Staff Report dated June 12, 2007 t 3aa Staff Report June 12, 2007 POTENTIAL AMENDMENTS TO FLOOR AREA RATIO (FAR) STANDARDS During recent discussions with the City Council pertaining to both the adaptive reuse proposal for the North Grand Mall and development within the Ames Industrial Park, questions were raised regarding the applicability of Floor Area Ratio (FAR) standards to these projects. Staff therefore promised to further review the City's Floor Area Ratio (FAR) standards as they pertained to all development in all zoning districts in which FAR standards have been adopted. Floor area ratio (FAR) standards are common zoning tools that ensure new development is compatible with, and does not visually overpower, existing development in terms of scale and building coverage. In order to accomplish these goals, the City of Ames has adopted maximum FAR standards in the following commercial and industrial zoning districts: Neighborhood Commercial (NC), Community Commercial Node (CCN), Highway-Oriented Commercial (HOC), Community Commercial/Residential Node (CCR), Planned Industrial (PI), South Lincoln Sub Area Mixed Use (S-SMD). In addition to maximum FAR standards, the City of Ames has also adopted minimum FAR standards in the following zones: Planned Regional Commercial (PRC), Downtown Service Center (DSC), Campustown Service Center (CSC), and General Industrial (GI). Minimum FAR standards can be an effective tool in achieving compatibility between new development and existing development in zones that are characterized by structures carefully aligned at the street face and of consistent scale and massing, such as in Downtown and Campustown. Compliance with minimum FAR standards is reasonably easy to do on the smaller lots that characterize the Downtown and Campustown areas because it does not take large buildings to cover these smaller lots. However, compliance with minimum FAR standards on the larger lots that characterize the City's PRC and GI districts may require larger buildings than are feasible for a given use. In addition, minimum FAR standards may be at odds with other development standards that apply in these zones. Specifically, minimum FAR standards may conflict with maximum building coverage standards, and minimum parking standards of the code. To overcome these conflicts, it may be necessary to subdivide the land in order to break it down into small enough pieces to support the smaller buildings the owners or tenants may desire. This may inadvertently affect the ability to plan and develop larger pieces of land into a functional and cohesive site layout. This may also result in more disjointed development and circulation patterns in a developing area. In working with the developers of North Grand Mall, staff learned that these types of standards (and the possible inherent conflicts) limit the ability to develop a viable regional commercial project. In response to these concerns, the City Council waived (through the adaptive reuse process) the minimum FAR standards that were otherwise applicable in this PRC district. Because of the information provided above, staff is suggesting that Council revisit the FAR standards in both the PRC and the GI zones. The issue of FAR's in the GI district may be somewhat complicated because the standard pertains only to office buildings. A more comprehensive analysis and approach in addressing the FAR issue in this zone will therefore be required. However, the application of FARs in the PRC district is fairly straight forward and, for reasons stated above, it seems prudent to eliminate the FAR standard altogether from the PRC district. Staff is therefore recommending that Council take the following two actions: 1. Initiate a change in the development standards of the PRC zone to eliminate FAR standards from those districts. 2. Direct staff to further explore amendments addressing FAR's in the GI district.