Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Hospital Redevelopment topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Board approves variances for proposed rehabilitation hospital at 5301 Wrightsville Avenue
Summary
The Board of Adjustments unanimously approved two variances allowing a consolidated 90,000‑sq. ft. rehabilitation hospital at 5301 Wrightsville Avenue: a reduced hospital setback (to 55.7 ft north, 97.9 ft east) and an exception to the Wrightsville Avenue corridor footprint limit.
The Wilmington Board of Adjustments on Dec. 18 approved two variances that clear the way for a new rehabilitation hospital at 5301 Wrightsville Avenue, permitting a reduced setback and a building footprint larger than the Wrightsville Avenue corridor overlay’s typical limit.
Staff summarized the proposal as redevelopment of a roughly 15.7‑acre campus that currently contains multiple older buildings, including the New Hanover/Novant orthopedic hospital (formerly Cape Fear Memorial). Staff said the applicant plans to remove 11 existing structures and replace them with a consolidated, three‑story hospital totaling about 90,000 square feet with a 30,000‑sq. ft. building footprint.
Applicant counsel Charles Baldwin (Brooks Pierce Wilmington) said the hospital use pre‑dates the 1990 overlay and that the site’s configuration and existing nonconformities create hardship under the variance factors. Baldwin summarized the two variance requests: reduce the 100‑ft required hospital setback to 55.7 feet on the northern boundary (a requested variance of 44.3 feet) and allow the building footprint to exceed the 3,200‑sq. ft. limit in the Wrightsville Avenue corridor regulations. “Unnecessary hardship would absolutely result,” Baldwin said, arguing the consolidated building would be more centrally located and farther from neighboring property lines than the structures being removed.
No members of the public offered evidence during the evidentiary hearing. Board members discussed the tradeoffs: the project would demolish roughly 29,515 square feet of older buildings and replace them with a modern facility set farther from property lines and with landscape buffers and a healing garden. Several members said the lot size and the preexisting hospital campus support the hardship findings.
On a combined motion to grant the two variance requests the board voted unanimously to approve. The approvals clear the zoning obstacles the applicant cited; the project proponents told the board they are under internal budget timing constraints and would like to proceed quickly.
What happens next: Variance approvals allow the applicant to pursue building permits and site work subject to any standard permits and conditions; any appeal would follow statutory procedures.
