We recently updated the proposed parking lot plan for the Denver Montclair International School.  Our original design provided 58 spaces (plus 3 accessible spaces), with generous 63’ modules and 32’ aisles.  Between each module were 10’ wide pedestrian walks leading to 30’ crosswalks to the existing island.  Although the layout works well for vehicle circulation, DMIS is in need of more spaces to accommodate the increase in student population.

In the new layout, we narrowed the modules down to the required minimum 52’ (for 60 degree angle spots), and slimmed down the pedestrian walks to 5’.  We also minimized the crosswalks and drives to 13’ widths which added room for quite a few more parking spaces.  We were able to add 26 spaces to the proposed plan, bringing the total to 84 which required an additional accessible space (4 total).  We also added a curb at the 4th Avenue entrance to enforce the right turn into the parking loop.

"Now Posted Online: Planning Board Public Hearing Draft of the New Denver Zoning Code and Map

Jefferson County Colorado requires a Defensible Space Permit, (wildfire thinning), for all new developments in the Wildfire Overlay Zone District above 6,400 feet in elevation.  This permit must be issued before submitting for a building permit.  Jeffco Planning and Zoning will provide you with a list of approved Forester contractors that offer the service.  They will come to the site and mark the trees to be removed.  Once this is done, the homeowner needs to remove the marked trees and set up a second appointment with the Forester for a final inspection.  After the final inspection, a notice will be sent to the Zoning Department to close the Defensible Space Permit.

Additions over 400 square feet also require a Defensible Space Permit, unless it is a detached garage with no living space above the structure.  Keep in mind, a recreation room, study or private office above a storage space in the garage will be considered living space and will most likely require a Defensible Space Permit if it falls within a Wildfire Overlay Zone District.

The 4th and Final Review Draft of the New Zoning Code and map will be published on www.NewCodeDenver.Org Wednesday, January 20th, instead of Monday, January 18th as originally scheduled. The remainder of the New Code Adoption Schedule (see below) does not change.

This schedule provides a full month for public review leading up to the Denver Planning Board’s formal public hearing on Draft #4 February 17th.  The location and time of the hearing will be posted on NewCodeDenver.org once they are determined.

Prior to the Planning Board hearing, staff from Denver Community Planning and Development will hold a fourth round of “New Code Office Hours” to answer questions about Draft #4 of the proposed new code.  These sessions offer the opportunity for one-on-one meetings tailored to specific questions from residents and property owners. They will be held Tuesday, February 9, from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m., and Thursday, February 11, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.  Both sessions will be held in the Webb Municipal Building, 201 W. Colfax Avenue, in the 4th floor conference room 4.I.4.  If you plan to attend the New Code Office Hours, please register at the following link so that we may schedule adequate staffing: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/MXCCQLN.

Thank you for your ongoing interest and involvement in the New Code Denver effort.  As always, we are thrilled at the level of participation we’ve received from our residential and commercial communities throughout this process.  We have engaged more than 35,000 people through public meetings and association gatherings, e-mails, phone calls, letters and Website interactions.  This input has helped us improve each successive draft of the new code so that we can meet our community’s goal of having a clear, predictable zoning code that creates value and economic opportunity for homeowners and other property owners and preserves Denver’s economic vitality and outstanding quality of life.

The remainder of the New Zoning Code process is as follows:

New Code Denver Adoption Schedule
Feb. 17, 2010            Planning Board public hearing, after which the Board will forward a recommendation to City Council

Mar. 10, 2010            Blueprint Denver Committee of Denver City Council considers new code and whether to approve filing a bill for adoption by the full City Council

Mar. 16, 2010            Mayor and Council review and discuss Blueprint Denver recommendation

Mar. 18, 2010            Community Planning and Development files a bill for an ordinance adopting the new code to be considered by
City Council

Mar. 22, 2010            City Council – first reading of new code ordinance proposal

April 19, 2010            City Council – public hearing and final consideration of proposed ordinance adopting the new code.

The Santa Fe-style home we designed for Paul & Judy Albers in Roxborough State Park provided us with a challenging site.  Due to the deep drainage ditch in the rear portion our building envelope was very shallow and we submitted to Douglas County Zoning for an administrative variance to decrease the front setback.

An administrative variance is allowed when the request is 35% or less. A larger request has to go through the Board of Adjustment.

In this case, a 35% decrease in the front setback gave us 7' of encroachment from Douglas County’s 20’ front setback requirement.  Roxborough’s front setback is 25’, and we were able to get a 12’ encroachment from the Roxborough Design Review Committee, putting us at exactly 13’ from the property line.  This bought us a lot more room to fit the house on the site and still stay 5’ from the rear ditch.

Douglas County liked our detailed Site Plan so much they requested to use it as an example for their public outreach documents to help guide people through the variance process. We spoke to the client and are very happy that our work is now being used as an example for other owners, architects and engineers.

"Back by Popular Demand!

City schedules third round of “New Code Office Hours” January 6-7 to answer questions on Denver’s proposed new Zoning Code

Still have a question on Denver’s proposed new Zoning Code? Staff from Denver Community Planning and Development will hold another round of “New Code Office Hours” on Wednesday, January 6 and Thursday, January 7 to walk you through your remaining questions on the City’s proposed new code.

These sessions follow our heavily attended November and December office hours and the November City Council/Planning Board Listening Sessions, at which nearly 500 citizens asked questions and shared opinions on the New Code.  This input is being used to inform the final version of the New Code that will be sent to City Council early this year.

The January New Code Office Hours are scheduled as follows:

• Wednesday, Jan. 6th, 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. in Room 4.I.4 of the Wellington E. Webb Municipal Office Building, 201 West Colfax Ave.
• Thursday, Jan. 7th, 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. in Room 1.D.1 of the Wellington E. Webb Municipal Office Building, 201 West Colfax Ave.

IF YOU PLAN TO ATTEND please register at the following link so that we may schedule adequate staffing: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/MXCCQLN

The remainder of the New Zoning Code process is outlined below. Thank you for your ongoing interest and involvement in the New Code Denver effort. We are thrilled at the level of participation we’ve received from our residential and commercial communities through public meetings, e-mails, phone calls, letters and website interactions – all of which will help Denver deliver a new zoning code that offers clarity and predictability, promotes economic opportunity and preserves Denver’s economic vitality and outstanding quality of life.

New Denver Zoning Code Adoption Schedule:
Jan. 18, 2010 -- Posting of fourth and final draft of the new code on the Internet at http://www.newcodedenver.org

Feb. 17, 2010 -- Planning Board public hearing, after which the Board will forward a recommendation to City Council

Mar. 10, 2010 -- Blueprint Denver Committee of Denver City Council considers new code and whether to approve filing a bill for adoption by the full City Council

Mar. 16, 2010 -- Mayor and Council review and discuss Blueprint Denver recommendation

Mar. 18, 2010 -- Community Planning and Development files a bill for an ordinance adopting the new code to be considered by City Council

Mar. 22, 2010 -- City Council – first reading of new code ordinance proposal"

As several articles on this website have pointed out in recent weeks, many local building departments (including Jefferson County) will be switching to the 2009 Versions of the International Codes over the next few months. Jefferson County, in fact, will be switching as of January 1^st, tomorrow. While we only learned that Jefferson County would be one of the very first jurisdictions in Colorado to make this switch little more than a month ago, we make a constant effort to assure that we are on top of all of the current regulations in any of the many jurisdictions that we do work in. We have spent much of the last month training on the code changes and making sure that we understand and inform all of our current clients on the ramifications that the code changes would have on projects in the works that haven't submitted for permit yet. In addition, we have had to expedite the design and construction documentation process over the last month for several projects that the impending code changes would require costly redesign or make infeasible.

It created the critical situation where the necessary construction documents and permit application for a couple of our commercial tenant finish projects must be accepted into the logs of the Building Department before the deadline causes them to become subject to the modified code.

The speculative nature of commercial leasable tenant spaces causes something of an "exploration of the possibilities" at the beginning of the design process. This involves completing a thorough Code Analysis for the space itself and the building (whether new construction or existing) that the space is in. The Code Analysis then becomes a Code Review that is included in the construction documents, outlining all of the different codes that the space is subject to and carefully analyzing how those codes affect what is possible in the space. One space may be subject to a long list of various Codes including the building code, accessibility codes, Zoning Codes and many more. The Code Analysis also happens in conjunction with balancing the needs of the building Owner for the overall building and property, the program requirements of the particular tenants interested in the spaces within the building, the concurrent design of all of the building systems (mechanical, electrical, plumbing, structural, etc.), the existing conditions and the needs of the contractors involved. The ability to understand and then weave together and manage all of these different pieces of the puzzle into a design that becomes a whole, fully functioning building or space (and yet make it look nice too!) is what the real function of an Architect is all about. In addition, the Codes themselves are often ambiguous and open to some degree of interpretation. Throughout this "exploratory process", there are many questions that must be raised, including asking the jurisdiction itself (and different departments within the Jurisdiction) how they might interpret a portion of code, which may be vastly different than how you or another member of the design team has interpreted it. A plan will go through many evolutions and iterations as the exploration process unfolds, until it is settled upon by the stakeholders involved (owner, design team, tenant, etc.), and the construction documents are completed and coordinated in preparation for submittal to the Jurisdiction.

Because of the critical timeline over the past month on the projects that we determined would benefit by being submitted prior to the code change, we spent some extra due diligence time with the county and other individuals going over our interpretations of the Code and making sure that we had a stable understanding of how they would look at the projects when they were submitted. Prior to our involvement in the design team, similar conversations had taken place between the Owner and the Planning & Zoning Department during the “exploration process” early in the planning process. The early comments of the Planning & Zoning Dept. were incorporated into the evolutions of the plans, along with the subsequent comments of the Building Department, the Fire Marshall and other individuals. However, because of the conversations with the Owner early in the process, the Planning & Zoning Dept. had a preconceived idea of what the project was going to be that turned out to be quite a bit different than what it became after the various evolutions in the plan. This caused the Planner reviewing the submittal for permit and then the Zoning Administrator to have some concerns about the intended uses for the space and thus causing them to delay acceptance of the application. The Zoning Administrator wanted to avoid having to issue violations after the space was occupied for uses that were not allowed according to the Zoning Resolution. This is normally an issue that would be resolved over the course of a day or two with conversations between the Zoning Administrator and the Building Owner, allowing the Zoning Administrator to assure that the Building Owner is aware of what is (and what is not) an allowed use of the building and avoiding the need to issue violations in the future. The changes in the Building Code (and impending deadline for submittal), however, do not necessarily affect the Planning & Zoning Department (they are subject to the County Zoning Resolution) and yet the application must first be submitted to the Planning & Zoning Department before proceeding to the Building Department for processing.

Thus a somewhat small Planning & Zoning issue became a major hurdle impeding the critical timeline for having the application logged with the Building Department prior to the deadline!

These types of issues can be frustrating when so much hard work and diligence has gone into creating a well put together set of construction documents and the attempt to avoid issues in the submittal process but we were able to quickly throw on that “Diplomat Hat” and go to bat in behalf of the client in order to help the Zoning Administrator understand the process of evolution that the design had gone through and the critical nature of getting the plans into the Building Department in time. We were able to successfully expedite the process through conversations with the Zoning Administrator allowing him to accept the plans and forward them on to the Building Department in time!!!

Example Code Review

New Denver Zoning Code Adoption Schedule
Jan. 18, 2010
Posting of fourth and final draft of the new code on the Internet at http://www.newcodedenver.org.

Feb. 17, 2010
Planning Board public hearing, after which the Board will forward a recommendation to City Council

Mar. 10, 2010
Blueprint Denver Committee of Denver City Council considers new code and whether to approve filing a bill for adoption by the full City Council

Mar. 16, 2010
Mayor and Council review and discuss Blueprint Denver recommendation

Mar. 18, 2010
Community Planning & Development files a bill for an ordinance adopting the new code to be considered by City Council

Mar. 22, 2010
City Council – first reading of new code ordinance proposal

Apr. 19, 2010
City Council – public hearing and final consideration of proposed ordinance adopting the new code

- Public comment on Draft 3 will continue until January 14, 2010

- Final draft of code: January 18th, 2010

- Planning Board: February 17th, 2010

- Blueprint Denver: March 10, 2010

* Note: Council Bill filed after Blueprint Denver Committee.  Changes, while maybe not encouraged, can be made b/t the 1/18 finalization date and the bill filing date after Blueprint.

- Final Consideration/Public Hearing April 19, 2010

- The transition period will likely change from 4 to 6 months.

There will either be another Council Resolution coming forward, or a press release issued shortly to this note.

The Third Draft of the new Denver zoning code is available for download. There are quite a number of changes both to the map and to the code language. If you need help in interpreting what it means for your site, we can help.