Developer plans to build on Iowa City parking lots OKed by Planning Zoning Commission

IOWA CITY - The city's Planning and Zoning Commission last night agreed to amend the city's comprehensive plan, clearing the way for city council consideration of developer plans to build two multiuse buildings on city parking lots.

The vote was unanimous, with commission member Phoebe Martin absent.

Commission Chairwoman Ann Freerks said the amendment comes with positives.

'I can see it really expanding and becoming something different,” she said. 'I think there are ways that this can work as a public/private partnership and also bring tax dollars to the community.”

The Iowa City Council is set to take up the proposal next.

The amendment adds three near-downtown blocks to the Downtown District in the Riverfront Crossings Plan.

It is tied to developer proposals for two multiuse buildings - one near the Unitarian Universalist church, 10 S. Gilbert St., and the other next to the Robert A. Lee Recreation Center, 220 S. Gilbert St.

The buildings would go on the city-owned parking lots within a three-block area - east of Gilbert Street and between Burlington Street and Iowa Avenue - often referred to as the Civic District.

The planning commission earlier this month asked staff for more information on the amendment, particularly on whether the private development would limit future growth for city departments - specifically police, fire and city hall and parking for those departments.

Staffers reported long-term police station needs will require five acres and that nearby parking structures would not suffice. Needs at City Hall could be addressed through remodeling, staffers said.

As for the space constraints and the need for parking at the fire station, the potential development projects - primarily the building proposed for the north lot near the Unitarian church - would add parking and provide an opportunity for a public/private partnership to add to the fire station.

'We are very comfortable with the proposal before you,” said Geoff Fruin, assistant to the city manager. 'We try to be very long-term thinking about our facility needs and how our workforce is going to grow and change, and we see no hindrance to that when we look at both these surface parking lots.”

The development near the church calls for a multiuse structure on the parking lot, trading roughly 100 surface parking spaces for more than 200 in a parking structure. It would allow firetrucks for the nearby station to enter the structure from the Van Buren Street side, creating better traffic flow.

The amendment would allow a building four to six stories high on that lot, with additional height available if historic preservation and/or affordable housing is pursued.

At the recreation center's parking lot, New Pioneer Cooperative officials have been in talks with developers to create a multiuse building above the parking lot.

Jake Christensen, one of the developers for that project, has said that building would go no higher than six stories.