Planning commission approves 11.5-foot front-yard setback variance for 4200 Morningside Road

The Edina Planning Commission unanimously approved on a motion to grant an 11.5-foot front-yard setback variance for 4200 Morningside Road, permitting a modest second-floor addition above the existing garage and minor adjustments to a bay window and portico.

Planner Acker, the city planner presenting the staff report, told the commission the property is a narrow, corner lot of about 7,015 square feet at the northwest corner of Grimes Avenue and Morningside Road and that the house was built in 1979. He said the buildable area along the south front yard is constrained (the buildable width is about 19½ feet) and that the existing home is already nonconforming to the front-yard setback on Morningside Road; the project would reduce the south-side setback from about 15.9 feet to…