Related: How many stories needed for office buildings downtown?
By Tim Pallesen
City commissioners agreed Nov. 18 that future downtown buildings should be limited to four floors.
But to achieve a complete downtown where people live, work and play, they are stumped over how to get more office buildings.
“We’re missing the work component,” Commissioner Jordana Jarjura alerted the others before they approved the city’s new downtown development regulations on first reading. Final approval is set for Dec. 9.
Limits on height and residential density have been the most controversial aspects of proposed regulations for new buildings.
Mayor Cary Glickstein called Delray a “four-story town” in October and the other four commissioners now support that height limit. The proposed density limit is 30 units per acre with some flexibility.
But the discussion shifted Nov. 18 when Community Redevelopment Agency executive director Diane Colonna pleaded for a fifth floor as incentive for office buildings to be built downtown.
“Without it, it seems to be putting a nail in the coffin of our ability to have office space,” Colonna told city commissioners.
New residential buildings have been built around the popular Atlantic Avenue entertainment district in recent years. Delray’s downtown has become a great place to live and play.
But the city wants to lessen traffic congestion by encouraging a pedestrian- friendly place where residents also have a place to work and don’t need a car to drive someplace else.
Commissioners agreed with Colonna that office space is needed. They instructed staff to find some incentive to attract office developers before the new regulations are approved on Dec. 9.
The new regulations are an update to a downtown master plan approved in 2002 when city leaders wanted higher-density housing to generate year-round customers for Atlantic Avenue shops.
Worthing Place, the highest-density project at 92 units per acre, started construction as the economic recession began in 2008.
Other big new projects have been approved since then. Atlantic Crossing on East Atlantic Avenue prompted the Beach Property Owners Association and others to argue that height and density incentives are no longer necessary to attract residential developers.
“The city was trying to get residential development back in 2002,” city planning and zoning director Dana Little explained to commissioners.
“But the city has become much more sophisticated in the last 12 years,” Little said. “The regulations need to reflect that.”
The proposed rules would require wider sidewalks and public open space on private property equal to 5 percent for new buildings that have 20,000 to 40,000 square feet of floor space and 7 percent for larger buildings.
The latest Nov. 18 draft still allows residential density bonuses above 30 units per acre. The mayor said he will oppose any density or height bonuses on Dec. 9.
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