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| Dealers, neighbors seek 122nd Avenue regulation changes LEE PERLMAN, THE MID-COUNTY MEMO
The Hazelwood Neighborhood Association, Ron Tonkin Auto Dealerships, the Portland Design Commission and the Portland Planning Commission all showed enthusiasm for design review for new development in the area at meetings held last month. “We already have design review on residential properties, and we need it on commercial properties too,” Hazelwood’s Linda Robinson said. Tonkin consultant Peter Finley Fry, in arguing for the loosening of some regulations said, “Design review ensures good quality.” Design commission members Paul Schlesinger and Lloyd Lindley both supported design review. Hazelwood wants the “nodes” at Northeast Glisan and Southeast Stark streets, where the Planning Bureau proposes to retain stricter development standards for new businesses and to be expanded beyond the 200 feet in all directions now proposed. They received support from some members of both commissions. Lindley agreed and said in particular that regulations that cover only part of a property make things “more messy.” Later, at the Planning Commission, members Don Hanson and Tim Smith added their support. “We don’t want to put the dealerships out of business, but we don’t want them to dominate,” Robinson said. “We need community services as well. We don’t want 122nd to look like 82nd Avenue does now.” She did not want facades like that of the Safeway Market, with “display windows with the same cutouts they’ve had since the store opened, and ugly as hell!” Fry continued a quest he and Tonkin have pursued for years: to get legal sanction for exterior display of cars. Current regulations ban this near transit stations, and make their facilities on 122nd Avenue non-conforming uses. Dealerships are “extremely important, and we need to nurture and support them,” he said. Showrooms are “not just a box that you can plop down anywhere and add a door. They’re complex facilities.” Fry proposed a series of code amendments that would allow exterior displays of cars, with landscaping that would not obscure the view from the road. He also argued that regulations governing development near transit stations should be geared to the character of the area. Right now 122nd Avenue is “120 feet of right of way with no nothing” to create a pedestrian atmosphere, he said. The proposed regulations would require that at least 50 percent of the street frontage of dealerships and other businesses be devoted to buildings. Hazelwood has asked that this requirement be increased to 70 percent, while Tonkin wants it reduced to 30 percent. Tonkin is also asking for the required minimum Floor Area Ratio, a measure of density, for this area to be reduced from the current 1:1, of one foot of building for every foot of lot area. |
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