A rendering of the project at 2717 Van Buren Street

A French developer advanced plans to build a 78-unit cluster of rental apartments and townhouses on city-owned land west of downtown Hollywood near city hall.

Hollywood commissioners, in a unanimous vote Wednesday, directed city staff to negotiate a land-sale and development agreement with Prestigia Real Estate FJM Inc. The entity is part of family-owned Prestigia Immobilier International Group, founded in 1989 and based in Reims, France.

Prestigia offered to pay $1.2 million to acquire a 1.89-acre parking lot at 2717 Van Buren Street from the city of Hollywood. A local appraiser hired by the company estimated in October 2019 that the property is worth $960,000.

Our proposal is higher than our appraisal because we really want to develop this project and settle down in Hollywood to become a major actor in the continued renaissance of the city, Jihad Salahdine, COO of Prestigia Real Estate FJM, told commissioners during the meeting.

Prestigia submitted the only proposal in response to the citys request for proposals to acquire and redevelop the underused parking lot that is about two blocks southwest of city hall.

The planned development would have two four-story apartment buildings with a total of 63 units and two three-story townhouse buildings with a total of 15 units. The development also would include 111 parking places and a pool, according to a 108-page development proposal that Prestigia submitted to the city.

Monthly apartment rents would range from $1,195 for 57 one-bedroom, one-bathroom units to $1,570 for six two-bedroom, two-bathroom units. Monthly rents for the 15 townhouses would be about $2,300.

Prestigia is currently developing another South Florida project called Prestigia Pompano, designed as a mixed-use property with 51 residential units. The company, which is waiting for a permit to start construction, paid $800,000 for the development site at 30 Northeast 5th Street in Pompano Beach in a multi-parcel deal recorded Jan. 28, according to property records.

The Prestigia development in Hollywood, designed by locally based Kaller Architecture, would create an urban-village environment with lush landscaping, Raelin Storey, the citys communications, marketing and economic development director, told commissioners. This would be a new housing type for the immediate neighborhood, with high-end exterior and interior finishes, she said.

Prestigia expects to spend $16.8 million to develop the four-building residential complex, which would have about 85,000 square feet of interior space. Financing would include $4.9 million of equity and an $11.3 million mortgage, according to Prestigias proposal.

The company expects to obtain long-term mortgage financing from Socit Gnrale, and a construction loan from Miami-based International Finance Bank. Fort Lauderdale-based Moss Construction would be the general contractor, and Miami-based Lloyd Jones would be the property manager.

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French developer plans to build a cluster of rentals in Hollywood - The Real Deal

There's nothing particularly surprising about the fact a developer wants to build a four-storey, 30-unit apartment building in a residential Ottawaneighbourhood.

Nor isit shocking that the community opposes at least parts of the plan, whichwould see a 12-metre high complex built on Grenon Avenue, just east of the Bayshore Shopping Centre.The project would first require rezoning to allow more intensification on the property, and then an exception to that new zoning so it can be builtcloser to the lot line than usually permitted.

"This application is an effort on the part of the group of investors to exploit a unique and small land parcel in question to its maximum, without having to observe the rules of rezoning and construction," said Lisa Zanyk, a resident living next door,atthe city's planning committee last Thursday.

She's not wrong. The community was being asked not only to accept intensification which delegates said they did not object to but also to accept exceptions to the rules of that intensification.

But without an exemption, argue the developers, a housing complex wouldn't be feasible as it would only be six metres wide at one end.

It's a familiar quandary for the planning committee: should they uphold the agreed-upon rules, or grant an exceptionto fulfil the broader goal of intensification? But this particular conversation took on broader meaning, as it occurred just days after 20 hours of discussion on how Ottawa should grow over the next two decades a debate on the urban boundary that continues Tuesday for the third day.

And, oddly, it's an example that could be used by both sides.

This month, council will decide how to house the additional 400,000 residents forecasted to be living in Ottawa by 2046.

The city recommends adding 1,650 hectares to the suburbs of the 91,000 new homes that will be needed, the city wants almost half to be apartments, but also envisions 23,000 homes in what are now rural areas. Thousands of other homes also need to be squeezed into existing neighbourhoods, ones just like Grenon Avenue.

There appears to be intense interest in this debate, as councillors heard from 100 public delegations last week.

A number of environmental activists, community associations and other non-profits made appeals to hold the line on the urban boundary, positing that many residents are in favour of intensification if it's done well andin conjunction with the community.

Many in the home-building business, meanwhile, called for even more land be made available. One of their key arguments? There's too much community opposition to theintensification that would be needed by not expanding the boundary.

Developers could point to the Grenon Avenue project as a case in point.

In this project, the property owners a firm called Building Investments Inc. reduced the number of proposed units from 34 to 30, and moved all planned surface parking underground.

Staff supportthe proposal in its current form, and capped the maximum height at 12 metres. (Zoning for four-storey apartments actually allows heights ofabout 14 metres.)

There's a three-storey townhome complex next to the site, and a highrise just down the street, so proponents say afour-storey complex should be considered reasonable infill.

But the factsome community members opposed it will surely be used by those who argueintensification is too controversial and hence the urban boundary should be expanded.

Those who want little or even no expansion, however, can also use the Grenon example to bolster their argument. And many councillors on the planning committee did just that.

"If not here, where does this go?" asked InnesCoun. Laura Dudas.

Councillors conceded that the complex,which would be built onlargely open land, would be a significant change for the street's residents. Next-door-neighbours, for example, will be subjected to a long, tall wall once it'sbuilt an unpleasant prospect.

But planning committee members spoke in favour of intensification, despite the challenges.

"The residents of Kitchissippi are keen to see that they're not the only ward in which intensification is going to happen," said Coun. Jeff Leiper, whose own wardhas recently experienced a big jump in density relative to other areas of the city.

"They want it to happen everywhere around the city. We know that this pressure is going to be coming to the wards beyond just the downtown."

Rideau-GoulbournCoun. Scott Moffatt, however,saidthese sorts of imperfect proposals must be considered if the city is "to achieve our intensification targets."

"There's difficulty when we implement this type of stuff, and that's what we're going tosee," Moffatt said. "We've seen it already and we're going to see more of it as we as we move forward with our official plan."

It's a topic that will surely be discussed in more detail Tuesday, when councillors pepper staff with questions about urban growth, debate motions for everything from protected farmland to demands for more information, and vote on once-in-a-decade policy.

As for the Grenon Avenue project: the planning committee unanimously approved it.

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How one apartment complex has become a microcosm of the urban boundary debate - CBC.ca

The developer behind a luxury project on Dubai's World Islands said its first homeowners will move in this year and that a desire for isolation could deliver more interest in the coming months.

Kleindienst Group said owners who bought into the Heart of Europe project would begin occupying villas on the man-made islands towards the end of 2020.

The project's 10 'palaces' featuring and private beaches have all been sold to mostly GCC buyers, though hundreds of smaller villas and flats remain under construction.

Chairman Josef Kleindienst said actual sales have dropped off due to the coronavirus pandemic, but there has been a rise interested parties.

We sold enough to fund what we are building. And it is important for us to build only what can be sold

Josef Kleindienst

Our sales dropped more than 50 per cent since corona started, he told The National during a tour of the sprawling island development.

New investors are not buying when they cannot visit."

But he said boats will begin taking investors over to the islands, 4km off the Dubai coast, from June 15.

Development on the World Islands has repeatedly stalled in the years following its construction in 2003 and handover to developers in 2008.

But significant progress on this latest project has been made in the past two years. Today, multistorey apartment and hotel buildings rise up from the low-lying islands.

Half a dozen floating 'seahorse villas' are lined up in a row and beachfront properties near completion.

Mr Kleindienst, an Austrian former police official turned businessman, said he would prove critics wrong.

I guarantee you by the end of 2020, people will have moved into our villas, floating villas and hotels, he said.

If anything, the lockdown that was put in place because of coronavirus has only increased productivity here.

"Nobody was allowed on or off the islands, so we were able to get people to work longer hours and pay them overtime.

Among the flagship properties is a Dh100 million beach palace on 'Sweden Island', now sold, with a price tag that rivals high-end Emirates Hills villas and Downtown penthouses.

Along with wealthy buyers, the project also relies on tourism spend to ensure it is a success.

Mr Kleindienst said the remote location would be attractive to people looking for a holiday, while maintaining social distancing.

Towards the end of the year, when the project is open, there are two possibilities, he said.

Either a solution will have been found for the virus or we will be able to test everyone coming here.

Everyone who is tested, and found not to have Covid-19, will be free to travel to the island and enjoy a holiday.

Portofino and Cote DAzure, the two hotels, together have almost 1,500 rooms, about the same as Atlantis on The Palm.

The global hotel industry is forecast to face significant challenges in the years ahead, but Mr Kleindienst insisted enough of the project has been sold to fund the rest of the work.

This week there were 1,200 workers on site pushed ahead with the hotels and apartments.

Our master plan allows us to build 4,000 bedrooms. We have 2,000 under construction today," he said.

"We sold enough to fund what we are building.

It is important for us to build only what can be sold.

The first of the floating villas sold for Dh5 million, about the same as an upmarket villa in a wealthy Dubai neighbourhood, while the last one to be sold went for Dh20m, he said.

The project has had some setbacks along the way.

It was reported in 2018 that one of the floating villas had sunk near the Burj Al Arab.

Mr Kleindienst said it was an events platform that had fallen into the sea, not one of the prestigious floating villas, as reported by some media, but that it was enough to make buyers think twice about investing.

We lost agreed sales because of that, he said.

We are seeing island destinations doing well globally in lockdown and it does have a USP to be successful. It was not something that was going to pop up overnight

John Stevens

Despite the anticipated economic impact of the pandemic, there were 1,824 property sales in Dubai in April, worth Dh3.62 billion, according to Property Finder. Seventy per cent were off-plan projects that are still to be built.

John Stevens, long-standing property consultant in Dubai, said the Heart of Europe project could arrive on the market at the right time.

"Hotels that were offering packages during the quarantine period in Dubai did amazingly well," said Mr Stevens, managing director of property management firm Asteco, which is not involved in the islands project.

"Some had occupancy levels as high as 70 per cent and there seems to be a move to find nice locations to sit it all out.

"The question is how long will it continue for though?"

He also said private villas on a neighbouring island off Dubai were fully booked out during the lockdown period, which required a permit to leave home and which ended on Friday, April 24.

"This is a huge development with expensive costs, it was never going to be easy to get it off the ground," he said.

"We are seeing island destinations doing well globally in lockdown and it does have a USP to be successful.

"It was not something that was going to pop up overnight."

The World Islands were in the headlines in 2018 when actress Lindsay Lohan announced plans to build her own themed resort there.

The American star of Mean Girls told her followers on Instagram she was planning to build "Lindsayland" in Dubai.

The post received more than 2,000 likes before being deleted soon after.

Updated: May 21, 2020 05:33 PM

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Dubai's World Islands developer insists outbreak will not kill off Heart of Europe project - The National

Construction of the 31-floor Kompassi residential tower in Helsinki Kalasatama, Finland has begun. This is after developer SRV Group signed a contract agreement with Kojamo for the construction to begin.

The rental apartment building project which is part of US $213.4m cooperation agreement with Kojamo, was recorded in SRVs order backlog in the second quarter of 2020.

The apartments, altogether 291 units, are mainly studios and two-room apartments. The construction will start immediately and the project will be completed in 2022.

Also Read: 270-unit high-rise apartment to be developed in Dallas, US

According to SRV Group Plc President and CEO, Saku Sipola, Kompassi is a good example of a project, where there are strong customers and which do not significantly tie up SRVs capital. When implemented as planned Kompassi will release approximately EUR 22 million from the companys balance sheet during year 2020. I am delighted to see that with our recovery programme our customers trust us and we have been able to start several new projects this year, he said.

Kim Jolkkonen, Senior Vice President, Housing at SRV said that with the companys long-term cooperation with Kojamo, they respond to housing demand in growth centres. Kompassi, which construction now begins, will have excellent location in the vicinity of good transport connections, said the VP.

SRV Group Plc and Kojamo Plc signed a cooperation agreement on 2nd March 2020 on construction of rental apartments valued at US $213.4m in Helsinki and Espoo. The contract includes a total of six residential development projects, with a total of 676 residential units. The contract includes Kompassi, which will rise 120 meters high.

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Construction of 31-floor Kompassi residential tower in Helsinki, Finland begins - Construction Review

Construction of a new Target on 82nd Street in Elmhurst was still going on during the coronavirus epidemic, April 22, 2020. Photo: Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY

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The list of essential construction projects and permitted work has ballooned sixfold since Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced a virtual construction shutdown last month, Department of Buildings data shows.

Some 4,936 job sites are now allowed to be worked on, up from about 800 on April 3, according to the Buildings Department.

Among them: hotels in Manhattan and Brooklyn, a new Queens Target, and, as the Columbia Spectator first reported, the future home of Columbia Universitys business school.

The greenlighted projects also include renovation work on rental buildings under an exception for a sole worker, raising concerns for tenants.

Under a revision of its original shutdown guidance, the state has expanded essential building work beyond primarily infrastructure projects, hospitals and affordable housing.

As long as ground already has been broken, construction now can also proceed on any type of business thats allowed to continue in-person operations during the states coronavirus-driven pause.

That broader list includes hotels, restaurants, convenience stores, banks, appliance stores and storage facilities, among other businesses. Public and private school construction is also permitted.

One worker on a Manhattan hotel project fumed, saying his bosses were treating the pandemic like a joke.

To make the hotel essential, they might as well open every job, because that hotel is far from essential, he said. That hotel is deemed essential while we are deemed expendable.

The citys rules for essential business construction appear somewhat narrower than the states.

Work on essential businesses can proceed only if it pertains to alterations of existing buildings and has been permitted by the department prior to April 15, 2020, the city guidance says.

DOB notes that the vast majority of the 35,000 sites that were ordered shuttered in March are still closed. But some local residents say theyve been shocked to see work going forward on a wide-ranging set of long-term projects while the pandemic still claims hundreds of lives per day.

The far-from-complete Target site in Elmhurst, also slated to contain a Starbucks and a Chipotle, will eventually house some type of ambulatory diagnostic treatment or healthcare facilities above the 23,000-square-foot big box store, city filings show. So the Department of Buildings is allowing construction to continue.

Patricia Chou, a member of the grassroots community group Queens Neighborhoods United, which has long opposed the development, said that while a medical office may be in the offing, the core of the planned facility is still a shopping center.

Our primary concerns are that they are endangering workers at the site and exploiting loopholes to complete this project, she said.

A rendering of the planned Target in Elmhurst Photo: Courtesy of Target

The construction work takes up space on 82nd Street and Baxter Street, which are routes to the emergency department entrance of coronavirus-slammed Elmhurst Hospital, Chou noted.

Renovations also go on at residential buildings, under the exception that allows one-person jobs.

One resident at an Upper East Side rental building said his landlords continued remodeling work on apartments puts his family and other tenants, many of them elderly, at risk for a less-than-pressing reason.

Unless its a hot water issue or a heating plumbing issue, this is not the time to have any extraneous people in the building, said the resident, who didnt want his name published for fear of retaliation by his landlord.

Delivery people may not enter the buildings elevators, but construction workers do. Meanwhile, the buildings doorman is currently fighting for his life on a ventilator, the tenant said.

Every time I take an elevator down to the basement and I run across a construction worker, thats a potential interaction that I do not need to be having, he said.

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Construction Exceptions Keep Many NYC Building Sites Open - THE CITY

YIT Corporation Investor News April 23, 2020, at 08:00 a.m.

YIT started residential apartment building projects in Finland, the CEE countries and Russia in January-March

YIT started several apartment building projects in January-March. The company took a cautious approach towards starting projects for consumers due to the uncertainty caused by the coronavirus pandemic. Instead, lots of projects were started for investors.

In Finland, the projects started will comprise more than 590 apartments in total with a total value of over EUR 110 million.

Furthermore, the company announced on April 8, 2020, that it had agreed to build more than 210 apartments for OP funds.

In the CEE countries, the company started the construction of over 160 apartments with a total value of over EUR 23 million.

In Russia, YIT started the construction of four locations, comprising more than 900 apartments with a total value of approximately EUR 48 million.

The projects are located at central locations in growth centres and will mainly be completed in the spring and summer 2021. The start-ups of the apartments are booked in the order backlog of the first quarter of the year.

YIT CORPORATION

Tommi Jrvenp

Vice President, Investor Relations

YIT is the largest Finnish and significant North European construction company. We develop and build apartments and living services, business premises and entire areas. We are also specialised in demanding infrastructure construction. Together with our customers, our nearly 8,000 professionals are creating more functional, attractive and sustainable cities and environments. We operate in 10 countries: Finland, Russia, Sweden, Norway, the Baltic countries, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Poland. Our revenue in 2019 was approximately EUR 3.4 billion. YIT Corporation's share is listed on Nasdaq Helsinki Oy. http://www.yitgroup.com

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YIT : started residential apartment building projects in Finland, the CEE countries and Russia in JanuaryMarch - Marketscreener.com

Peritus Entreprenr AS, part of AS Merko Ehitus group, and Haakon VIIs gt 5 Holding AS have entered into a contract for the reconstruction of an office building located at Haakon VIIs 5 in Oslos Vika district.

The contract includes reconstruction and upgrading to WeWork shared workplace concept of the first three floors and partially the fourth floor of an existing office building.

The contract value is approximately NOK 50 million (EUR 4.3 million), plus value added tax. The works will be performed from April until October 2020.

Peritus Entreprenr AS(peritus-entreprenor.no) is a Norwegian construction company, which provides construction services in general construction.

Additional information: Peritus Entreprenr AS, CEO Arne Austad, tel. +47 4738 8380.

Priit RoosimgiHead of Group Finance UnitAS Merko Ehitus+372 650 1250priit.roosimagi@merko.ee

AS Merko Ehitus(group.merko.ee) group consists of AS Merko Ehitus Eesti in Estonia, SIA Merks in Latvia, UAB Merko Statyba in Lithuania and Peritus Entreprenr AS in Norway. Besides providing construction service as a main contractor, the groups other major area of activity is apartment development. As at the end of 2019, the group employed 694 people, and the groups revenue for 2019 was EUR 327 million.

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Construction contract in Norway (office building in Oslo) - Yahoo Finance

Thanks to COVID-19, the City Market development might never happen

With the COVID-19 crisis and worries of permanent damage to the economy, Capitol Hill might have a new lost generation of neighborhood developments swallowed up by a possible economic abyss. In areas around the Hill that have gone through such thorough waves of redevelopment, any slowdown might offer a respite. Heres a look at what is on hold and what might never be as the Seattle City Council will vote Monday afternoon on Mayor Jenny Durkans plan to streamline design review and the landmarks process to ensure our city work and projects move forward in a responsible way that keeps everyone safe and healthy.

Durkans proposal would temporarily allow the Seattle Department of Construction andInspections and the Department of Neighborhoods to administratively make somedecisions that would otherwise be made or informed by an in-person board or committeemeetings. In the case of processes like design review, the goal would be to eventually establish virtual meetings.

On Capitol Hill 2020, most major construction is currently only hold due to COVID-19 restrictions including hundreds of new apartments above Capitol Hill Station. Those new developments are nearly complete and likely will open later this year despite any larger economic devastation.

But several more are set to be stuck in a COVID-19 limbo with delays and, for some, full on cancellations.

READY FOR REVIEW

PLANNED

READY TO BUILD OR NEARLY COMPLETE?

Theres no roadmap for how we need to reinvent city government, but as we navigate this public health crisis, we have to turn to unconventional ways to ensure our City work and projects move forward in a responsible way that keeps everyone safe and healthy, Durkan said of her push to streamline the citys development pipeline through the crisis. Our boards and commissions are essential to development in our City and by making these administrative changes, we will be able to fulfill regulatory milestones, keeping us on track to support businesses and develop the housing we desperately need.

Industry proponents say the changes are necessary to not hold up some 28 developments across the city in a stage of the design review process that requires a public meeting and another 35 approaching that milestone. Critics worry that the city will rubber stamp approvals and take a pro-developer position when it comes to decisions like landmarks protections. Others point at decisions like this over an issue with the color of a Capitol Hill buildings siding as proof the processes needed an overhaul prior to COVID-19. The city has been working to revamp design review and find more effective ways for neighbors and the community to weigh in on development plans.

City council members have a full roster of possible amendments to the legislation to be voted on Monday but none of them will be powerful enough to overcome a longterm economic downturn.

The global economic slowdown of the late 2000s left many plans across Seattle and Capitol HIll on the drawing board. On 19th Ave E, an example of one of those developments that went unbuilt left room for a neighborhood favorite to thrive. Elsewhere, like the Key Bank property on 15th Ave E where a planned development also ended up mothballed, the lost development feels more like a lost opportunity.

Many if not most of the above projects across Capitol Hill, the Central District, and First Hill will see the light of day. But any significant economic downturn will mean some of these plans end up on hold forever with or without changes to the Seattle design review and landmarks process.

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As Seattle looks at temporary takeover of citizen design review, here are the projects around Capitol Hill in COVID-19 limbo - CHS Capitol Hill...

Most of the 18th and 19th century buildings in Moscow underwent crude renovation at some point. This work continued until the beginning of this century and has left an unfortunate mark on the citys architecture.

For an architecture-loving tourist, walking around old Moscow can be quite a shocking experience. One minute find yourself admiring the exquisite facade of an old building in the baroque, empire or classicism style, and the next you raise your head and see a characterless monstrosity perched on top of the original building, increasing its height by a couple of additional stories. And no, sadly this is not a mirage.

It is widely believed that a significant portion of the pre-revolutionary buildings in Moscow were destroyed in war or demolished as part of Stalin's1935 master plan for the city's renovation. While this is partly true, an even larger number of historical buildings were lost as a result of numerous rebuilding and renovation projects. This is why many of the citys surviving 18 and 19th century buildings have a radically changed in appearance, becoming monuments to the bizarre transformations of Russian history.

In the majority of cases, the reconstruction of old aristocratic and merchant mansions, as well as tenement buildings, was necessary in order to modernize and adapt them to new functions. The first wave of these renovations took place in the 1920-1930s, when the newly established Soviet authorities urgently needed to resolve a housing shortage. They began putting additional stories on three- and four-story buildings that usually housed dormitories or administrative offices. One- and two-story mansions almost always had attics, and these were usually converted into communal apartments by crudely dividing spacious halls decorated with stucco moldings and frescoes with partitions. The architects who undertook those renovation projects were seldom concerned with preserving the building's original style. In fact, the opposite was true.

Smolensky Boulevard, 10.

One example of this efficiency drive in urban planning is a quaint building designed by Peter Lavinon Smolensky Boulevard, 10. This three-story building in the classical style with carved plat bands and a decorative stone faade was built in 1892 as an apartment building for several families. During an acute shortage of housing in the 1930s, a two-story constructivist addition was built above it and the building was converted into communal apartments. The result is a hybrid building that is characteristic of Moscow's urban development at the turn of the century, which is defined by a grotesque contrast between classical and avant-garde architecture.

Golitsyns' mansion, Volkhonka

A similar modernization befell the Golitsyns' mansion in Volkhonka, which now belongs to the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts. The two-story mansion a fine example of Moscow classical architecture was rebuilt in the late 1920s. The buildings austere facade was changed, and it lost a pediment that adorned the central portico. In addition, the building had two attic floors added to it, which for a long time housed the Russian Academy of Sciences' Institute of Philosophy. It should be noted however that, unlike the tenement building on Smolensky Boulevard, this extension was executed in a style that was consistent with the original building.

Mansion of the Lukutins.

This barbaric approach remained a part of Moscows urban planning until the end of the 20th century. For example, the mansion of the Lukutin merchant family (art patrons who backed the production of the famous Fedoskino caskets) on Vishnyakovsky Lane, 23 was built in the 18th century. In 1910, the owners ordered another floor to be added to the three-story mansion with the idea of turning the mansion into an apartment building. The final loss of the building's historical appearance took place in the 1980s, when two more floors were added to it. As a result, what was once a classical style mansion was transformed into another faceless specimen of Soviet architecture.

One of the last victims of Soviet architects was the Zavarzina tenement building on Lyalin Lane, 14. Over 80 years after its construction in 1907, the art nouveau building had two additional stories added to it in order to house residential apartments.

The collapse of the USSR did not yet spell the end to Moscows architectural tragedy. A second wave of renovations of pre-revolutionary buildings took place in the 1990s and early 2000s, when private investors bought up historical mansions for peanuts and added attic floors to them, often to house offices because at the time Moscow had a severe shortage of modern business centers.

Malaya Dmitrovka 20.

One particularly sad symbols of the new era in urban development was the reconstruction of a two-story mansion in Malaya Dmitrovka 20, which once belonged to the poet Aleksey Pleshcheyev. In 1999, the city government handed it over to a private investor, and the building was dismantled up to its front wall and incorporated into a high-tech business center.

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How the USSR disfigured historical buildings in the name of progress - Russia Beyond

Some changes might be made to a planned redevelopment project in the Virginia Square area.

The Arlington County Board is set to consider a request to add 15 apartment units to the 7-story building approved by the Board last June. The project, which has yet to start major construction, will replace a State Farm insurance office and other small commercial buildings near the corner of Washington Blvd and N. Kirkwood Road.

The developer says it can squeeze in the additional apartments by reconfiguring the courtyard and parking garage, and making some minor changes to the building facade and rooftop area.

While the height, building footprint and massing remain unchanged, approximately 8,649 square feet of gross floor area (GFA) will be added as a result of a minor reduction of the internal courtyard and more efficient use of space previously allocated to parking and mechanical uses, a county staff report says.

In exchange for adding the new apartments, the developer has agreed to designate four additional units as committed affordable housing. The plan has critics, however, notably residents of the townhouses across the street.

Issues raised by members of the community, including the Bromptons at Clarendon Homeowners Association (HOA), include concerns around additional density, increased parking demand on local streets, reduction of on-site greenspace and the design of the corner faade, said the staff report.

County staffers are recommending approval of the site plan amendment. The Board is expected to take up the request at its upcoming Saturday meeting.

More from the staff report, below.

The applicant is requesting a site plan amendment to make interior and exterior modifications to accommodate an additional 15 dwelling units, a revised parking garage layout, minor changes to the building faade and changes to the rooftop area. While the height, building footprint and massing remain unchanged, approximately 8,649 square feet of GFA will be added as a result of a minor reduction of the internal courtyard (from approximately 8,000 square feet to approximately 7,380 square feet) and more efficient use of space previously allocated to parking and mechanical uses (Figure 4). To further accommodate the additional 15 units, the average unit size based on total GFA will decrease from 1,021 square feet to 994 square feet. The number of one-bedroom, two-bedroom and three-bedroom units will all increase, with the number of studios remaining the same.

The applicant is proposing a revised parking garage layout with changes to both below-grade parking levels and ramps. The parking garage entrance will remain in the same location but will be reoriented with a maximum slope of 20%. While the total number of parking spaces (including tandem spaces) for the site is reduced from 198 spaces to 194 spaces, all 20 tandem spaces will be converted to non-tandem spaces. The number of parking spaces increases from 63 to 99 spaces on garage Level 02 and decreases from 135 to 95 on garage Level 01. Overall, the parking ratio increases from 0.64 spaces to 0.67 spaces per unit, not including visitor spaces. The visitor parking ratio remains at 0.05 spaces per unit. The site will also accommodate 114 bicycle spaces at the same bicycle parking ratio as previously approved.

To accommodate the new units on the ground floor along the north and west alleys, there will be changes to the faade including replacing the louvers and mechanical vents that previously served the parking garage ramp with new windows (Figures 5, 6, 7, 8). The applicant is also proposing minor modifications to the layout of the rooftop amenity space and decreasing the size from approximately 920 square feet to approximately 850 square feet.

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Developer Seeking Permission to Add 15 Apartments to Va. Square Project - ARLnow