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Happy Cars & Guitars fest week! Downtown Kirkwood's premier event will begin with a pancake breakfast ("Carbs and Guitars") from 8:30-11am Saturday morning and then the main event will run later that afternoon/evening from 4-11pm. You check out this page on the city's website for the full rundown on the day's festivities. But even beyond all that fun, it's an absolutely massive news week here at Gadfly HQ, so we need to jump into some quick hits!
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- Tonight's City Council meeting agenda is stuffed to the gills, so would be a great meeting to attend and offer some public comments at or email your comments to the city clerk, Laurie Asche (aschelb@kirkwoodmo.org) so that they can be distributed to the Council ahead of the meeting:
- There's a public hearing on the ADU proposal at 1319 Forest Ave. Once approved, it will be the city's third.
- There's another public hearing on loosening Kirkwood's floor area ratio (FAR) maximums. That's a good idea, but unfortunately the Council has attached so many strings to the change (it only applies to single family homes, the homes have to be at least ten years old, and the addition can't add any to lot-coverage) that it's not actually going to do much:
- P&Z voted against recommendation by a 4-3 margin, arguing that it would achieve almost no substantive impact. That means that the legislation will require an affirmative vote by 2/3rds of the Council; five yes votes if everyone is there.
- While I agree with P&Z's critique and think this is the Council trying to give the appearance of doing something for affordability without actually changing much, and while I'm glad they were publicly shamed for it, I still do think it is a little better than the status quo and I think the Council should vote for it. If you live in an old house and want to add a second story, expand a second story, or enclose a currently unenclosed porch, this will help a little
- I don't get why we're not letting new homes take advantage of the rule change. Do we want Kirkwood to be for families or not? Families need space regardless of when the home they bought happened to be built. The Council has time and again chosen to write laws that apply to some people and not others (see the sidewalk infill ordinance) and I think that's bad for the social fabric of the community.
- Finally, there's a vote to change which types of projects require Architectural Review so that adding things like solar panels, pools, fences, and signs don't face as much red tape. The Architectural Review Board itself voted to recommend these changes 5-0 and P&Z recommended the changes 7-0, but the Council has punted on signing the changes into law twice now. Let's hope the third time is a charm and they finally pass the damn thing.
- Speaking of ARB, they had a fun item on their agenda Monday night: It seems a duplex is coming to 223 W Monroe Ave, a lot that was rezoned to R-MM (Kirkwood's special missing middle zoning) a year or so back. This will be Kirkwood's first stand-alone duplex in a very very long time, so I'm excited! Plus it has a cool modern design (you can check out renderings of the project on page 116 of the packet linked to above)
- Planning & Zoning got in on the fun too! The minutes from their May 7th meeting offer a development project update from Director of Planning, Jonathan Raiche:
- In amazing news, city staff have been contacted by a new developer who is planning to submit a new mixed-use proposal for the new vacant Commerce Bank site! As I've mentioned before, the previous 60-unit Kirkwood Apartments mixed-use proposal required very little in the way of variances from the Council so if something similar is proposed, the council won't have much leverage to scale the project down. To put 60 units in perspective, it's about 40% of the size of the 152-unit James, which sits a block away.
- The proposal to build a small expansion of an existing yoga studio on Earl Ave was rejected by a 7-0 vote by the council despite receiving a favorable recommendation from P&Z. Isn't our conservative city council supposed to be in favor of economic growth? Apparently it's more of a pro-vacant lot caucus than a pro-business caucus...
- Finally, Doc's Harley Davidson is closing up shop and is moving to South County where they will merge with Gateway Harley. I'm a bit nostalgic for Doc's so I'll be a bit sad to see them go, but the even bigger travesty is that the lot they'll vacate is zoned B-3 Highway Business. That means the best we can hope for is another strip mall fronted by a big parking lot. Meacham Park deserves better, and Kirkwood deserves better. Why the hell would a city mandate that a piece of land on Kirkwood Road has to look like the type of business you would find on the side of a highway? Get rid of B-3; your constituents will thank you!
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That's it for this week! The first Thursday Night concert at Station Plaza kicks off tonight with the Hulapoppers from 6:30-9, so you've got a perfect pre- and post-Council Meeting activity! Have a great weekend everyone!
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