City officials have approved a rezoning that will allow a developer to build duplexes on a property in northeast Columbus.
Columbus City Council voted on Tuesday to approve the second reading of an ordinance rezoning about seven acres from Residential: Single-Family 2 to Residential: Two-Family at the request of Vision Housing, LLC.
“The property to be rezoned is a yet-undeveloped portion of the Princeton Park subdivision,” city/county planning director Jeff Bergman wrote in a memo to council members. “It is located on the west side of County Road 150 West, west of that road’s northernmost intersection with Paula Drive. This property is separated from the rest of the Princeton Park Subdivision by the Joseph Anthony Regulated Drain. The applicants have indicated their intent to develop a new neighborhood of 32 ‘garden homes’ arranged as 16 duplexes on the property.”
According to the planning department’s staff report, Vision Housing has requested the rezoning so that it can work under density and development standards that would facilitate this type of home.
Tim Thomas with Milestone Design Group, who spoke on behalf of the applicants, said at a previous council meeting that each unit is expected to have two bedrooms, two bathrooms and a one-car garage. The shared wall between units will be the garage wall.
“The target demographic is empty nesters, single professionals, those with smaller families, those kinds of things,” Thomas said. “It’s planned to be more affordable, but would be the little a ‘affordable’ and not the capital A ‘Affordable.’
The cost of materials will be a factor in the eventual price, he said.
City council’s approval of the request includes a commitment that the eventual development of the property will include a shared-use path along the property’s County Road 150 West frontage.
As stated in the ordinance, the path will be a minimum of 10 feet in width and meet all other standards provided by the city’s Bicycle and Pedestrian Plan.
“This new path shall connect to and provide a continuation of the existing path on the property to the north,” the commitment states. “The new path may be incorporated into the development and is not required to be immediately adjacent to 150 West for the entire frontage if (1) user access is provided at the south-west corner of the 150 West / Paula Drive northernmost intersection and (2) the path is provided in a right-of-way or an appropriate easement for its entire length.”
Per the staff report, flood hazards on the site include 100-year floodplain and 500-year floodplain.
“A portion of the property is located within Flood Zone AE (100-year and 500-year floodway fringe),” planning officials wrote. “The proposed development will be required to meet the standards for development in a special flood hazard area, as described in Section 4.7 of the Zoning Ordinance. These standards include, but are not limited to, constructing the lowest floor of all structures at or above the flood protection grade.”
