Agenda Package - City of Vernon

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ANALYSIS:
A. Gommittee/BoardRecommendations:
At their meeting held on February 9,2010, the Advisory Planning Board adopted a
resolution supporting the recommendation in the staff report.
B. Rationale:
1. The applicant is proposing to construct a 12 unit townhouse complex (refer to
Figure 6) on the property at 3705 - 24 Avenue (refer to Figures 1 - 4). The
property is zoned RM1 - Row Housing Residential which permits row housing
buildings that consist of no more than six units per building. The subject proposal
has twó buildings with six units in each. The proposal conforms to all aspects of
the zoning provisions except for the minimum unit width and parking which are the
subject of this aPPlication.
2. The minimum unit width for a row housing unit is 6.5m. The applicant has designed
a 5.5m wide unit that provides for 57 sq.m. (965 sq.ft.) ground and second floor
area (refer to Figures 10 and 11). The ground floor contains the enclosed single
vehicle garage, bathroom, entrance way and a flex room (rec room, bedroom,
etc.). Thê second contains the kitchen, dining, living room, master bedroom and
bathroom. Staff support the unit width reduction as the design submitted provides a
functional unit. Staff also support the width reduction because there are green
space areas to be installed between the garage and entrance doonruays. The intent
for the 6.5m building width is to allow for opportunities to provide landscaping and
open space in the front of the unit. The landscape design meets that -objective.
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the application is to be approved, then the proposed site plan should form part of
the approved permit as it will contain the noted landscaping.
3. Compact sized housing units provide an opportunity to provide lower sale prices
and rental rates. The unit width forms part of the ability to achieve compactness.
Unit size criteria in various residentíal zones will be included in the upcoming
review of the Zoning Bylaw in order to provide the mechanism to implement the
policies and guiding principles in the Official Community Plan,
4. With regard to the proposal to lower the number of off-street parking spaces for the
12 unitJ from 20 spaces to 18 spaces, staff support this as the site is proximate to
services, transit and trails, There will be one enclosed parking space per unit, plus
six spaces for visitors. This allows visitors to not have to park along 24 Avenue'
S. The initial site plan submitted by the applicant did have 20 parking spaces.
However, after the staff review, it was determined there would need to be a 1.7m
road right-of-way widening along 24 Avenue in order to construct the necessary
off-site works (i.e. sidewalk, curb, gutter, road tie-in, street lights, etc.). The initial
site plan had an outside parking space between each building and 24 Avenue.
Those parking spaces would not fit if the 1.7m road right-of-way widening is
required as a condition of the approval of this application. Consequently, those
parking spaces were deleted from the drawing and a second variance item was
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