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DRC recommends sketch-plan approval for 75-unit workforce housing at 1400 S. Highway 89, with material reviews and conditions
Summary
The Design Review Committee recommended approval of a 75-unit workforce housing sketch plan at 1400 South Highway 89, while asking the applicant to refine materials and to consider landscape and retaining-wall screening. Committee discussion centered on massing, screening of a large retaining wall and materials palette.
The Design Review Committee recommended approval, with conditions and recommendations to the planning director, for a 75-unit workforce multifamily housing project at 1400 South Highway 89 after a detailed sketch-plan presentation and lengthy committee discussion about site response and retaining walls.
Will Chapel of Noble Development Group presented the project and said the team studied multiple alternatives, including underground parking, slip-deck parking and terracing. Chapel said underground parking raised project cost and excavation impacts and that moving the transition of eastern slopes westward increased structure and costs. Landscape architect Hans Bling summarized updates to the landscape plan: narrowed parking stalls to gain a 5-foot planting strip at the base of the east retaining wall, added raised planters, introduced small parklets with benches and bike parking, added a lawn and grill area at the south building and increased aspen planting along the south elevation.
Architect Steven Denia explained design steps to reduce the perceived mass: adding three recessed planes, increasing recessed depth, enlarging windows by about 50 percent from earlier schematics and developing balcony banding held off the façade to create shadow and reduce perceived height. Denia said the design aims to relate to existing farmstead clusters and to tie the plant palette to the neighboring hillside.
Committee discussion focused on a tall retaining wall along the eastern boundary. Multiple members praised the landscape revisions and façade modulation but several said the proposed 20- to 28-foot retaining wall on the back of the site remained a major concern; one member said they intended to vote against the project because of that wall. Planning and design staff responded that much of the site already shows historical cuts and that the proposal limits disturbance to previously disturbed areas and stays within the no-disturb line where possible.
Despite the split views on the retaining wall, the committee voted to recommend approval with conditions to the planning director. Conditions and recommendations included refinement of the exterior material palette, further study of the back-of-lot retaining wall and continued coordination with planning staff on wildlife-friendly fencing if required.
Planning staff will record the committee's material and screening recommendations and work with the applicant on the next submittal for final development plan review.
