Print
E-mail
Comment
Rate
Downtown Visioning Moves Toward Plan
By Kurt Helin
Editor
Downtown residents and business owners came up with a vision, but making that vision a reality takes a plan.
Hence, the “Downtown Community Plan,” currently being put together by the city’s Development Services Department. It is essentially putting the meat of the bone of the visioning process, but adding some interesting new twists that officials hope will help speed a new round of growth downtown once the economy turns around.
“I really think this Downtown Community Plan is the most important thing for downtown going into the next year,” said Jim Anderson, current president of the Downtown Long Beach Associates. “I think this is the right short-term and long-term process to move downtown forward.”
City officials said they are working on the plan now and will look to get approvals on it in the next year so that, when the economy does turn around and development interest picks up again, they can be ready. In the short term, that means some detail work.
“The next step is to reflect the visioning process our zoning and land-use plans,” said Craig Beck, director of development services for the city.
More than just zoning, the Community Plan will have things like design guidelines for specific areas and what is called a “Program Environmental Impact Report,” essentially doing an advance EIR for a certain area.
The Program EIR may cover one block or several, but will be done at the maximum development level for that area. For example, if one area has new zoning saying buildings can be up to 15 stories with ground floor retail and up to 150 residences, than the Program EIR would look at the impacts if every building in that area was built out to those standards.
With that Program EIR in place, if a developer comes in and the project fits within the zoning and EIR limits, then said developer does not need to go through the year-long process of its own EIR. This worked well in places such as San Diego, Beck said.
“If I can get someone through the (permitting and approval) process in 12 to 18 months, the likelihood that building gets done goes up,” he added.
Another part of the plan is to give developers some rough ideas of what the buildings in an area should look like — matching the historic look of some areas while encouraging more modern designs in others. One key suggestion out of the visioning process was to have more aggressive and inventive architecture downtown.
“We set up the outline of what to do so when a developer comes in and says ‘I want to build on this property’ we can say these are some of the things you need to think about,” Beck said.
But the Community Plan is more far reaching than just simple zoning.
One aspect being worked on by the Downtown Long Beach Associates (as well as the city) is a retail and business recruitment effort. That will start with an inventory of available space as well as estimates of what kind of demand there will be when the condominiums and apartments in downtown are filled.
The results of the visioning process called for many more things as well, such as better public transportations and connections to the various parts of downtown. The visioning process also calls for a true waterfront that connects all of downtown, although Beck said a revitalized Ocean Boulevard can help fill that role.
The zoning being put together follows out of the visioning as well. The core of the plan is to have taller buildings in a more compact downtown (similar to New York or San Francisco). That would free up land to have more and better public spaces. Some areas of downtown need to keep their mix of historic buildings and ones that reflect that, where other areas should encourage iconic architecture.
Beck said he hopes to have the first phase of the plan done soon after the first of the year. At that point, there will be several meetings and community outreach efforts to get feedback on the ideas.
Hence, the “Downtown Community Plan,” currently being put together by the city’s Development Services Department. It is essentially putting the meat of the bone of the visioning process, but adding some interesting new twists that officials hope will help speed a new round of growth downtown once the economy turns around.
“I really think this Downtown Community Plan is the most important thing for downtown going into the next year,” said Jim Anderson, current president of the Downtown Long Beach Associates. “I think this is the right short-term and long-term process to move downtown forward.”
City officials said they are working on the plan now and will look to get approvals on it in the next year so that, when the economy does turn around and development interest picks up again, they can be ready. In the short term, that means some detail work.
“The next step is to reflect the visioning process our zoning and land-use plans,” said Craig Beck, director of development services for the city.
More than just zoning, the Community Plan will have things like design guidelines for specific areas and what is called a “Program Environmental Impact Report,” essentially doing an advance EIR for a certain area.
The Program EIR may cover one block or several, but will be done at the maximum development level for that area. For example, if one area has new zoning saying buildings can be up to 15 stories with ground floor retail and up to 150 residences, than the Program EIR would look at the impacts if every building in that area was built out to those standards.
With that Program EIR in place, if a developer comes in and the project fits within the zoning and EIR limits, then said developer does not need to go through the year-long process of its own EIR. This worked well in places such as San Diego, Beck said.
“If I can get someone through the (permitting and approval) process in 12 to 18 months, the likelihood that building gets done goes up,” he added.
Another part of the plan is to give developers some rough ideas of what the buildings in an area should look like — matching the historic look of some areas while encouraging more modern designs in others. One key suggestion out of the visioning process was to have more aggressive and inventive architecture downtown.
“We set up the outline of what to do so when a developer comes in and says ‘I want to build on this property’ we can say these are some of the things you need to think about,” Beck said.
But the Community Plan is more far reaching than just simple zoning.
One aspect being worked on by the Downtown Long Beach Associates (as well as the city) is a retail and business recruitment effort. That will start with an inventory of available space as well as estimates of what kind of demand there will be when the condominiums and apartments in downtown are filled.
The results of the visioning process called for many more things as well, such as better public transportations and connections to the various parts of downtown. The visioning process also calls for a true waterfront that connects all of downtown, although Beck said a revitalized Ocean Boulevard can help fill that role.
The zoning being put together follows out of the visioning as well. The core of the plan is to have taller buildings in a more compact downtown (similar to New York or San Francisco). That would free up land to have more and better public spaces. Some areas of downtown need to keep their mix of historic buildings and ones that reflect that, where other areas should encourage iconic architecture.
Beck said he hopes to have the first phase of the plan done soon after the first of the year. At that point, there will be several meetings and community outreach efforts to get feedback on the ideas.
 |
 |
|
| School District Freezes Spending | Wetlands Land Deal Sputters |
Allyson wrote on Nov 21, 2008 4:53 PM: