HomeMy WebLinkAbout02-13-17 Public Comment -E. Darrow - SoBo LoftRE: SoBo Lofts Pizza Hut Development
February 13, 2017
TO: Mayana Rice, Associate Planner MRice@bozeman.net
Martin Matsen, Director of Community Development Mmatsen@Bozeman.net;
Bozeman City Commission agenda@bozeman.net
Dear one and all:
SoBo Lofts-Pizza Hut will not make life better in Bozeman and is another example of hasty
development that does not reflect a proper Community Involvement Plan. The confusing
announcement last year which did not even reach all stakeholders in our neighborhood that a
planned "North 7th Ave Corridor "midtown" Rezoning" -really meant that we had to accept mid
and high-rise apartment blocks in our residential historic neighborhoods.
We are not opposed to the development at the Pizza Hut site--but what we reject is the scale
and design of a structure that violates the letter and spirit of the NCOD about buffers and
transitions that abuts directly an historic residential district, the degradation of our quality of life
on a residential street and traffic increases that are a safety hazard and that will lower property
values. We have worked, as many have to make West Babcock and Cooper Park District an asset
for us and our city representing aesthetic, sustainable and community values.
The proposed SoBo Lofts with roughly 60 more cars will add more that 400 more car trips a day
spilling out on a one-way street already busy, forcing cars into alleys and quiet residential streets
and also into circuitous routes at the 8th Ave boulevard. This is not good engineering. Also the
42 one-bedroom units make this building a dormitory rather than a place where people will live
for years, know their neighbors and contribute to the well-being of our beautiful still livable
Bozeman in the long term.
Again we are not opposed to development--we have lived with the ugly now derelict Pizza Hut
structure for 20 years, and INTRINSIK Architects have made some admirable changes to the
design, but they have not gone far enough. The preservation of our neighborhoods can also
mean reasonable fair managed growth in scale and design. We propose that the SoBo Lofts
building be three-stories, and in aesthetic compatibility to neighborhood character in Cooper
Park Historic District and overlay That it contains 20 units of varying sizes. How can the city
approve this mega project when there is no real data about so many of the affects on our city
and neighborhoods for years to come?
Sincerely,
Elizabeth Darrow