Council calls up large Baseline Road redevelopment for detailed review

Council called up the site-review and use-review application for the proposed redevelopment at 2952 Baseline Road on Oct. 23, 2025. Planning staff presented the proposal: redevelopment of approximately 7.96 acres of a 9.86-acre site into a mixed-use project with five buildings, 427 dwelling units (including 122 units for students), 58,365 square feet of commercial space, and 534 parking spaces. The applicant is requesting a height modification to allow buildings up to 55 feet in height.

Planner Chandler Venscock summarized prior process steps: the concept plan application was submitted in July 2023, Planning Board reviewed and recommended approval with conditions on Sept. 30, 2025, and the project had previously been referred to the Design Advisory Board (DAB), Transportation Advisory Board and Environmental Advisory Board. Planning Board conditions included adding an active, ground-level programmatic open-space element and electrifying additional bike-parking spaces beyond code requirements.

Several council members said the project’s scale and its visibility as an entry point to the community warranted council-level review of facade articulation, massing and other design details; they moved to call the item up for council deliberation. The motion to call up item 3B carried by a show of hands, 7–2.

Council directed staff to bring the project back with additional design details and to consider prior advisory-board comments about active ground-floor uses, rooftop and facade articulation, wayfinding, and solar/energy strategies. Planning staff noted that the applicant had made significant revisions in response to advisory-board feedback but that council-level scrutiny was appropriate given the project’s size and prominence.

Because the call-up initiates a deeper council review, further hearings, conditions and potential modifications will follow the council’s direction.