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Rule change in Summerside will allow larger apartment buildings

COLIN MACLEAN JOURNAL PIONEER colin.maclean @journalpioneer.com @JournalPEI

SUMMERSIDE — The City of Summerside has changed its rules pertaining to apartment buildings in the hope of making the community more attractive to developers.

The changes will, in most cases, allow developers to construct bigger buildings with more or larger units in them. They were brought forward by city staff who said they will put Summerside’s rules in line with other P.E.I. municipalities.

City staff started looking into Summerside’s R4 (highdensity residential) zoning after developers ran into problems trying to make projects fit the rules in Summerside when the same design worked on similarly-sized properties in other P.E.I. municipalities.

“Our rules evolved 20 to 25 years ago. Three (city) planners ago,” said Aaron MacDonald, Summerside’s technical services director.

MacDonald added that highdensity housing is relatively new for Summerside. Traditionally, developers have not been bringing forward projects larger than 12 to 20 units. But in the past five years, the city has seen an increase in projects looking to go bigger.

There are four proposed amendments to the zoning bylaw, three that relate to apartment buildings and one that deals with duplexes.

During the discussion, council was generally supportive of these recommendations, but several councillors expressed concerns about what the changes will mean for already approved projects.

Residents living near an R4 zone could be in for a surprise if they expected whatever is being built there to be one size, but these changes allow for something larger without requiring some kind of notice to the public.

“My concern is anything that has previously been rezoned. One of the number one concerns we hear about as councillors when we’re going through a rezoning is increased traffic — now this is obviously going to increase traffic or the number of people who can live in one area,” said Coun. Cory Snow.

MacDonald explained that these changes would not cause a huge increase in units per project. Most buildings will be able to fit in a handful of extra units at most.

“If we’re allowing 20 (units) and it went to 24, that’s so minimal and incremental ... it’s not a major concern,” said MacDonald.

AMENDMENT 1

This amendment changes the floor area ratio of R4 projects from 60 per cent to 80 per cent.

Floor-area ratio is calculated by adding up all the square footage on each floor

of a building and comparing it to the size of the lot it is on. So the total floor area of the building can’t exceed, if the change passes, 80 per cent of the lot’s size.

The rule is meant to keep structural height relative to the size of the lot.

This change would allow builders to potentially add more vertical space to their buildings.

AMENDMENT 2

Summerside currently requires apartment building foundations to take up no more than 30 per cent of the lot they are on. The other 70 per cent is supposed to be dedicated to things like parking, utilities and green space.

Staff have recommended increasing that total allowable building size to 35 per cent of a lot. This will allow for slightly larger building footprints, which translates into larger units or potentially more units per project.

AMENDMENT 3

A new covered parking bonus has also been adopted.

This is something new for the city and reflects a move by developers toward more underground or first-floor parking.

The idea is that if a building has at least 75 per cent of its required parking inside its structure, then developers would get a 20 per cent bonus to the total number of residential units they would be allowed to include in the building.

This rewards builders for reducing the amount of land their projects occupy and encourages higher density developments.

AMENDMENT 4

This amendment is different in that it deals with what qualifies as a duplex.

The city’s rules previously restricted duplexes to two distinct side-by-side living units separated by a vertical wall.

City staff indicated that in a few cases builders have wanted to put one of the units behind the other, on a narrow lot for example, or even have one unit on top of the other. The bylaw will now allow for both of these eventualities.

CONSTRUCTION

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2021-06-09T07:00:00.0000000Z

2021-06-09T07:00:00.0000000Z

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