Height

Alexandria Times, Letter to the Editor, April 21, 2020 by Steve Milone, Yvonne Callahan & Robert Ray

April 12, the City Planning and Zoning Department held a “community meeting” to inform the public that current height limits in the Old & Historic District were likely to be abolished.

The staff report is titled “A Draft Text Amendment to the Bonus Height provision of Section 7-700 of the Zoning Ordinance to allow bonus height to be utilized in zones with height limits of 45 feet or more.” In other words, it is proposed that City Code Section 7-700 be extended to other neighborhoods within and around Old Town, thus allowing a vast increase in density and height if affordable housing is provided within the development.

In 2020, the City Council endorsed the recommendations of the Council of Governments (COG) for each jurisdiction to provide a fixed level of affordable housing. Staff has informed us that its commitment to COG will be meet with the creation of 222 new additional units of affordable housing, in addition to what is now available or under construction.

This isn’t an impossible goal. However, at this juncture, in order to provide an additional “tool in the toolbox”, as staff terms it, the current height limits in the Old & Historic District are essentially being abandoned.

It is critical to look carefully at the maps set forth on Pages 11 and 12 of the report, which can be found here: https://dbeta.alexandriava.gov/sites/default/files/2022-04/CM%20PPT%20-%204.12.2022%20(4.13.2022).pdf

Page 11, titled “Map of Relevant Zones”, shows areas of the city where there are zones with have 45’-50’ height maximums. The accompanying legend shows eleven such zones depicted in and around the city.

At the outset, it is obvious that it is impossible to ascertain with any reasonable clarity which zone is where and how the neighborhood would be affected-- particularly in the downtown area of the City. For example, in the brown area that mostly delineates the Southeast quadrant of the Old & Historic District, there is a small and indistinct rectangle, shown on a larger city zoning map to be CL—with a maximum height limit of 35 feet.

That rectangle is where the Safeway and the Departmental Progressive Club are located, as show on the larger maps on the City website. Under the proposed zoning changes, these two properties, literally in the heart of historic Old Town, 60-foot-tall buildings could be constructed on those two sites. Nothing was explained about the possible future of building on those sites at the community meeting.

The zones with 45’-50’ feet height limits along both King and Washington Street are also shown on page 12, titled “Likelihood of Use”, showing areas of “Potential Application of Updated Bonus Height Provision”. In other words, the city is proposing that height limits along virtually all of King Street may now become 70 feet in height, from Metro to the Waterfront.

So, all of King Street is now in jeopardy of having no reasonable height restrictions because we need to find space for 222 affordable housing units? Isn’t there a better way to go about this?

To date, the city has failed to provide adequate information to its citizens concerning this far-reaching proposal, one that could absolutely upend the entire configuration and architecture of the Old & Historic District, not to mention its beauty and historic uniqueness.

If these zoning changes are enacted, it will be the end of Old Town and the Old & Historic District as we know it. The jewel that has made Alexandria what it is today, and what we should be fighting to maintain, will shine no more.