In anticipation of the August 15 Zoning and Planning meeting, where Chair Deb Crossley noted that the intent was to review the text of the Village Center Overlay District (VCOD) zoning amendments and take straw votes within the Committee, City Councilors submitted these comments for consideration. The comments include suggestions regarding the use of terminology; the need for clarification; suggested amendments regarding architectural features such as building articulation/facades, elimination of affordable housing option 2, reduction in the threshold to trigger special permit requirements, elimination of the site plan review process; and suggested map changes to include or exclude certain locations (e.g., add MRT zoning in the half mile of the Boston College T stop), and reduction of the intensity of uses.
Planning Board member Peter Doeringer offered his support for the direction of the current VCOD proposal but suggested one editorial deletion with regard to Half-Story Stepback for Flat Roofs, and recommendations on the following:
- Extension of setbacks, stepbacks, and other special considerations to include where residential and VCOD zones are “adjacent to and separated by roadways, except for wide corridors such as Washington St., Boylston St., and the Mass Pike.”
- With regard to Adaptive Reuse and Building Entrances, add requirements that if entrances for additional residential units are created, they should be located either within the building or fully enclosed if external and must not encroach on any setback.
In addition, nine city councilors (Baker, Gentile, Laredo, Lucas, Malakie, Markiewicz, Norton, Oliver, and Wright) submitted a letter to the Mayor requesting a “pause” on the proposed Village Center Zoning efforts until after the submission of the MBTA Communities Act plan to the state later this year. Their letter reads in part:
“We believe that the Planning Department’s proposal for complying with this law sets us on the right path – creating several zones near transit stations that will meet our legal obligations by the state’s year-end deadline and allow significant additional housing in the city, goals that we support. However, we believe that the Planning Department’s proposal for 10,000 units, rather than the required 8,330, is too high. We do not think that this unilateral 20% increase is necessary or appropriate, at least until after we have had an opportunity to see what gets proposed and built in the next several years.”
They argue the need for “an open, candid discussion with our residents about the future of our city of the next five, ten, and twenty years is necessary before rezoning the village centers and allowing further additional development” because:
- There are a number of large housing development projects in the pipeline — such as Riverside, Northland, Dunstan East, and Craft Street — that will add thousands of housing units, and
- There will likely be a large number of housing units approved and built through the MBTA Communities Act.
The Councilors state that this “pause” should not stop the City from moving forward with “common-sense, non-controversial improvements to our zoning code that will improve our Village Centers” — changes to parking requirements, adopting rules regarding building facades, and encouraging first-floor commercial spaces.
The Mayor issued her response to their letter stating, “The rezoning serves a dual function of meeting our year-end strict MBTA compliance requirement and also importantly strengthening and enhancing our village center commercial districts while providing housing opportunities over time—a chunk of which will be permanently affordable.” She added, “I am confident that the City Council, with the continued assistance from staff in our Planning Department and Utile, will find the right balance to meet both our goals for thriving village centers and for zoning in compliance with the MBTA Communities Law.”
