Tag: jeff levien

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In brief: form-based code delayed, UVA soccer wins, A12 appeals denied, and more

UVA President Jim Ryan has decided to reinstate the 21-gun salute during the university’s Veterans Day ceremony next year.

Rain check

Planning Commission delays form-based code proposal

After much debate, the City Planning Commission has decided to table its plans to introduce an alternative kind of zoning, called form-based code, to the city’s Strategic Investment Area south of downtown.

Unlike conventional zoning, form-based code focuses on the physical form and scale of buildings in relationship to one another, rather than on building use. It can be used to encourage mixed-use and pedestrian-friendly development as well as streamline the development approval process.

The commissioners present at last Tuesday’s meeting were all in favor of implementing a form-based code but did not think the proposal was ready for approval.

“We want to have a code we’re comfortable with,” said Commissioner Lisa Green.

Dozens of Charlottesville residents came to the meeting, and 16 spoke out against the proposal. Many were concerned that the code did not place enough priority on affordable housing and could allow developers to use loopholes.

Under the proposed code, for example, developers would be allowed to build one to four additional stories if they provide a certain number of affordable housing units. However, affordable units would only be required to be a percentage of the units in the additional stories, not of the entire building.

Several residents recognized that outgoing Councilor Kathy Galvin, who has pushed for the code, wanted the proposal to go before City Council before its final meeting, but urged the commission to delay the proposal until it adequately addresses the city’s affordable housing needs.

“Kathy, I’m sorry that you’re leaving in December, but this plan can wait,” said Joy Johnson, chair of the Public Housing Association of Residents.

The commissioners will vote again on the form-based code sometime early next year.

The proposed code would allow for buildings up to nine stories within the IX Art Park property, but would specify that they surround an area of open space.

 

Such great heights

A plan by Jeff Levien, owner of Heirloom Development (and the man behind 600 West Main), to erect a 101-foot building just off the Downtown Mall came another step closer to reality last week, when the Planning Commission voted to recommend approval of a special-use permit for 218 W. Market St. 

Levien is seeking to construct a mixed-use building with commercial space and rental apartments on the site that’s currently home to the Artful Lodger, The Livery Stable, and other small businesses. The permit would increase the allowable height and density for the project from 70 feet and 24 units to 101 feet and 134 units.

If approved by City Council, the new building will become one of the tallest in Charlottesville. 

Quote of the week

“Take it down and put it in a hall of shame.’” —Rose Ann Abrahamson, descendant of Sacagawea, on the proper course of action for the West Main Street statue of Lewis, Clark, and Sacagawea

In brief

Unappealing

Virginia’s Court of Appeals denied the appeals of two men convicted in the violent beating of Deandre Harris inside the Market Street Parking Garage during the 2017 Unite the Right rally. Jacob Goodwin and Alex Ramos were caught on video beating Harris, and the judge cited that footage in upholding Goodwin’s conviction for malicious wounding. Goodwin will continue his sentence of eight years behind bars, while Ramos is serving six.

November madness

UVA soccer teams continue their electrifying seasons. The men’s team raised the program’s 16th ACC tournament trophy last week and earned the top seed in the NCAA tournament. The top-seeded women’s team thumped Radford 3-0 in its opening tournament match. 

Jumped the gun

UVA President Jim Ryan removed the 21-gun salute from the university’s Veterans Day program this year, but he’s rethought that decision, and says that next year’s ceremony will include the salute. “Sometimes you make mistakes,” Ryan said in a Facebook post. He had hoped to avoid class disruption and minimize the amount of guns being fired on college campuses, but others disagreed with his course of action. “My sincere apologies to any who may have doubted our commitment to honoring our veterans,” Ryan wrote. 

 

Updated 11/21: An earlier version of this story contained an item that mistakenly attributed to city manager Tarron Richardson a claim that the camera found in Court Square Park last week belonged to the city. In fact, Dr. Richardson was talking about a camera on 8th Street and Hardy Drive. 

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Sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll: New apartment complex promises at least one of those

Six Hundred West Main is scheduled to open next fall. IMAGES courtesy six hundred west main

Next fall, residents of a new housing complex on West Main Street might have 99 problems, but their apartment won’t be one of them—or at least, that’s the verbiage that was handed out on keychains at Six Hundred West Main’s metaphorical groundbreaking ceremony last week.

Despite pouring rain, about 40 people and a bulldog named Butch came out to the future site of the swanky apartment complex set to open behind the Blue Moon Diner in 2019.

More reminiscent of a concert than a press conference, the event featured black graphic tees that nodded to the desire for backstage passes and edgy, apartment-branded posters that were up for grabs at a merch table about 20 feet in front of the stage, where developer Jeff Levien, designer Ivy Naté and architect Jeff Dreyfus shared some words about their project.

“We’re sort of reclaiming West Main Street for the rest of the city,” said Dreyfus.

The group made it clear that the apartments aren’t for UVA students, and Naté said one reason Charlottesville needs such a space, which will have its own art gallery, is because it lacks “curated design” for its non-student population.

Rental costs aren’t established yet, per Levien, who also declined to comment on how much the project cost. Levien and Naté, who are married and moved to Charlottesville from New York City about five years ago, have tag-teamed on a number of developments, but this will be their first in the city.

This one will feature modern design elements such as perforated metals and glass, according to the architect, a principal of local firm Bushman Dreyfus Architects, who couldn’t help but mention Thomas Jefferson: “That’s what he would be using today,” Dreyfus said.

A rock ’n’ roll theme has dominated the marketing for West Main’s newest digs. “Is it a little rock ’n’ roll?” asks Naté. “Definitely. But it’s where rock ’n’ roll goes to kick back.”

The quote appears in a folder that was handed to reporters, which features a photo of Naté and Levien at the Blue Moon bar. Levien, sitting on a barstool and pouring an inordinate amount of either sugar or cream into a cup of coffee, stares longingly at his wife, who’s positioned on the countertop sucking back a shot of Jack Daniel’s while wearing aviator sunglasses, studded jeans and platform boots.

Levien credits Naté with the theme.

“She’s much cooler than I am,” he says, a gray beanie on his head that he claims his wife made him wear. As Butch, the pair’s dog, sniffs his leg, the developer says hints of the rock ’n’ roll lifestyle will be carried into the apartment design, with dark bathrooms, dark kitchens, chandeliers and the art gallery.

For what Levien called the “proverbial shovel in the ground,” folks who’ve had a hand in bringing Six Hundred West Main to life put on black hard hats but ditched the golden shovels often used during such a ceremony. Instead, with a giant stencil and a few aerosol cans of paint, they permanently sprayed the apartment’s logo onto the pavement, as “Kansas City” by The New Basement Tapes played over a loudspeaker.

For perhaps the first time in Charlottesville’s history, an apartment complex comes with its own Spotify playlist. Give it a listen at spoti.fi/2poxUPO.

Between now and the grand opening, the Six Hundred West Main team will do 600 hours of community service.

“I think being of service is a true example of good teamwork,” says Levien. “I could go on and on, but this isn’t an Oscars speech.”

Multiple other recently developed or under-construction apartments and hotels dot West Main.

Since the 2010 census, Charlottesville has grown 13 percent, more than any other Virginia city, according to Chris Engel, the city’s director of economic development. And the city has set aside $31 million for a West Main Street facelift.

“People are coming to Charlottesville like they’re going to other big cities,” says Engel says. “The point of cities is multiplicity of choice.”

The skinny

Looking for a place to live? Six Hundred West Main offers:

  • 65,000 square feet of residential space
  • 53 rental residences
  • 6 floors
  • Studios, one- and two-bedroom units
  • Private terraces
  • 8-foot windows
  • High ceilings
  • Meditative courtyard
  • Outdoor fireplace
  • A private art gallery with resident lounge
  • Parking and bike storage
  • Bikeshare
  • 4,700 square feet of retail
Outdoor firesplace. Courtesy 600 West Main

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Blue Christmas: Diner not ready to reopen

Six Hundred West Main, an apartment complex being constructed behind Blue Moon Diner, is also running behind schedule. Courtesy of Six Hundred West Main

When we last heard from the owner of Blue Moon Diner in May, she said she was closing the West Main Street institution for renovations until early 2018. Now, as the new year is upon us, Laura Galgano says it could be fall before the lights come back on at the beloved home of the huevos bluemoonos.

Not surprisingly, diner regulars are upset.

“The diner is Charlottesville’s living room,” says Dolly Joseph, who has worked as a hostess during weekend brunch at Blue Moon for the past couple years. When her mom came to town last week, the former employee says they talked about how much they missed Blue Moon for its affordable food and good company. “The diner was where I knew I could always find a familiar face,” she adds.

Joseph, Galgano and Ellen Krag run a nonprofit called Building Experiences, and Joseph says the diner is their home base for mentoring young adults. While Rapture on the Downtown Mall has served them well as a temporary location, the team is eager to go back home, she says.

“All my favorite people are waiting for the diner to open again so we can see each other for Wednesdays with Jim Waive, or a weekend brunch or a study group with BE,” says Joseph.

Likewise, local country-blues-rock musician Susan Munson says she misses her regular gigs at the diner.

“I was so bummed when it closed,” Munson says. “I don’t play as much now during the week, just mainly on the weekends. It actually became one of my favorite places to play, even though it was a tight fit.”

Galgano, who has held several Blue Moon pop-up brunches since the diner closed, says its reopening is “somewhat” dependent on the construction of a six-story mixed-use apartment complex going up behind it, which is also taking longer than expected.

“We have had several approval delays that, quite frankly, are the boring parts of complex development,” says developer Jeff Levien. His team anticipates that construction on the project called Six Hundred West Main will begin next spring, and will be completed by mid-2019.

The apartment complex “merges two historically significant street-front buildings with new construction in the form of a mixed-use, distinctly modern, luxury rental residence,” Levien says in a press release. “It is being purposefully integrated into the most vital, diverse and connected neighborhood in Charlottesville.”

The 65,000-square-foot building will have 53 studio, one- and two-bedroom spaces for rent, with private terraces, eight-foot windows, high ceilings and a “meditative courtyard,” according to the release. It’ll also have retail spaces, and Levien says he may lease some offices above Blue Moon.

The developer describes his project as “upscale, without having lost its edge,” and says it’s the “creative result of the old economy raising itself up with new favor to become an urbane playground.”

He compares it to composing a song, where the team is the band and the music is the building they’ve created.

Says Levien’s wife, Ivy, who’s had a hand in designing the project, “Is it a little rock ‘n’ roll? Definitely. But it’s where rock ‘n’ roll goes to kick back.”

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Old and new: West Main complex keeps Blue Moon Diner

A new apartment complex will wend between two hidden historic houses behind Blue Moon Diner. Photo courtesy of Neighborhood Development Services

A new apartment complex is in the works for West Main, but the Board of Architectural Review has already ruled out tearing down some of the street’s oldest buildings to accommodate the building.

Developer Jeff Levien says he would prefer to demolish Blue Moon Diner and the next-door convenience store and rebuild them, adding that Blue Moon tenant Laura Galgano has publicly supported the plan, and the diner and store are not historical by nature or registered landmarks.

Blue Moon, built in 1951 at 512 West Main and originally operated as the Waffle Shop, is an addition on the facade of a two-story duplex called the Hartnagle-Witt House, which was built in 1884.

Beside the Hartnagle-Witt House sits the Hawkins-Perry House, which was built in 1873 by Ridge Street resident James Hawkins. Cecil Perry added a store, called Midway Cash Grocery, to the front of the house in 1931 and operated it for 30 years while his family lived above the store. That space at 600 West Main is now a convenience store.

“They’ve seen their better days,” Levien says about the old buildings, but the Board of Architectural Review insists that the structures remain standing, citing that the properties are the only two remaining dwellings built along West Main in the last half of the 19th century. Levien calls the BAR’s November decision to preserve them putting “history over function.”

In its reasoning for not permitting demolition, the BAR also says, “Both houses could be reproduced, but would not be old” and “the public purpose is to save tangible evidence and reminders of the people of Charlottesville, their stories and their buildings.”

Blue Moon2
Photo courtesy of Neighborhood Development Services

Staff requested both houses be incorporated into the new development proposal, so that’s what Levien and his architect Jeff Dreyfus, are planning to do.

In preliminary site plans, the four-story mixed-use building can be seen to the left of and behind both historic houses, which include the diner and convenience store. Levien says the ground floor will be used for retail and higher levels will include rental apartments.

“It won’t be like The Flats,” Levien says. The Flats @ West Village was highly criticized for its height, which required a 101-foot special use permit and “turned everyone off to these big-box buildings,” he says. Levien has addressed height by planning for a 35-foot-tall street wall along West Main and setting the remaining three stories of the complex back.

Proposed zoning plans for West Main will eventually allow four-story buildings, so Levien says he isn’t asking to add any extra height. He also says he hopes to rent to young professionals, hospital employees, professors or even graduate students rather than undergrads.

Design-wise, Levien looks to Oakhart Social, a restaurant across the street from his complex’s proposed site that has taken over a renovated building, but used its historic character in its aesthetic by featuring the space’s original exposed brick walls and showcasing “old and new,” he says.