City misses opportunity to find the middle ground in the Heritage Row/City Place debate
Ann Arbor has a penchant for zero sum games. “I can’t win if you don’t lose” seems to be the de facto strategy for addressing community problems and creating (or avoiding) sustainable solutions.
A case in point is the drama swirling around the historic designation-Heritage Row-City Place opportunity. I say “opportunity” deliberately, because, in my experience, an opportunity is being squandered in this winner-take-all environment.
Historic designations do not freeze a district in some point in the historical past, they rarely impede the ability of an owner to profit from her/his real estate investment (they most often enhance property value), and they don’t stop progress.
In a zero-sum-game culture, however, they can and have been used to allow NIMBYs to try to prevent any change at all. With or without a historic district designation, such attempts always fail: change in a community cannot be forestalled any more than you can will your children to stop growing just before puberty. Change just is.
Cooperative, intelligent communities find ways to use tools like historic district designation to guide change and to help weave change in one district with the changes in its surrounding areas.
Ann Arbor is certainly an intelligent community. But cooperative? Committed to finding the middle way, one that ties its past with a robust, sustainable future? Not so much, I’m sorry to say.
And the outcome, in this instance could result in an all-too-typical zero-zero sum game, with no winners standing at the end. Because of the construct and motivation of the historic district effort, the neighborhood will possibly be saddled with precisely the wrong form of development - a form that could have been avoided if the players agreed that (1) historic fabric matters, (2) change happens, and it’s better to be in control of it than rolled over by it, and (3) that there is no future without a past … knowing where we’ve been is the only way to assess and guide where we are going.
There are no “victors valiant” in a zero-sum scenario.
Betsy Jackson is the president of The Urban Agenda, Inc., an urban development consulting firm located in Ann Arbor that specializes in strategic planning and community problem solving.
Comments
Rasputin
Mon, Jul 12, 2010 : 7:27 a.m.
@ JMA2Y, I think De Parry would never consider this approach because it would decrease his profit margins too much. The idea for developers is to minimize the footprint (costs) of their developments while maximizing the salable square footage (profits). Buildings like PUDS are no longer designed by real architects, but by engineers working with accountants.
Rasputin
Mon, Jul 12, 2010 : 7:20 a.m.
@ JMA2Y, I think De Parry would never considered this approach because it would have decrease his profit margins too much. The idea for developers is to minimize the footprint (costs) of their developments while maximizing the salable square footage (profits). Buildings aka. PUDS are no longer designed by real architects, but by engineers working with accountants.
JMA2Y
Sun, Jul 11, 2010 : 7:43 p.m.
Heritage Row was better than City Place but not perfect. Why can't deParry build on the site by adding a normal addition to the back of the house which would match the house? This is already being done to a house on Packard near Hill and it looks perfect for the site.
townie
Sun, Jul 11, 2010 : 1:35 p.m.
Heritage Row was no where near the middle ground. It was huge: three times the number of bedrooms currently onsite; would have blocked sunlight and views from neighboring houses; and used up setback space that is supposed to be shared with neighbors. Council turned down the first City Place PUD 0-10, yet Heritage Row had almost as many bedrooms, had fewer parking spaces, and was closer to neighboring houses. Regardless of where one stands on historic districts, Heritage Row did not meet the requirements for a PUD. The City needs to step up and enforce the master plans and PUD ordinances, one way or another. It could start by correcting problems and loopholes in the zoning that allow terrible projects to be approved as a "matter of right." Neighboring property owners should not have their rights trounced because the City has done a poor job in the area of planning and zoning. Property owners across the City should be concerned with what has taken place here. Why has the City left itself and neighboring property owners so vulnerable? There is no doubt that a significantly smaller version of Heritage Row, one that preserved the houses without putting a "Motel 6" behind them, would be readily accepted by most, if not all opposing parties. Will a leader step forward and help facilitate a compromise or will Council be content to sit back and allow the neighbors and developer to go at each other for another two years?
blahblahblah
Sun, Jul 11, 2010 : 10:26 a.m.
@James - Well said. Allowing the minority to rule, especially with critical no votes coming from council members not up for reelection (anglin, kunselman) makes absolutely no sense.
James
Sun, Jul 11, 2010 : 9:57 a.m.
Mr. deParrys first proposal for City Place (referred to by some as the brownstone project) had no element of historic preservation although the proposed architectural style had traditional aesthetics. His second proposal (the by right barns), the one approved by council, also had no element of historic preservation. In response to concerns of some neighbors, a few city council members and a small minority of the citys population (with clear biases for historic preservation and a myopic view of what constitutes down-town) Mr. DeParry tried to do the right thing find the middle ground. Heritage Row balanced historic preservation interests with a creative solution for redevelopment on the site. The latter had plenty of other benefits beyond historic preservation in that it included permanently affordable dwelling units, environmentally responsible energy conserving design, and a diverse mix of unit sizes and pricing, just to name a few. City staff recognized it as an innovative solution which deserved approval and the planning commission agreed wholeheartedly. Even a clear majority of the City Council agreed that Heritage Row was the acceptable middle ground that balanced community interests in historic preservation with desirable redevelopment. It seams to me that those with clear heads and rational, unbiased, thought processes recognized that Mr. De Parry had indeed, at last, put forward a middle ground proposal worthy of construction. It was the miscalculations of a few NIMBY neighbors and unscrupulous council people that tanked what would have been an acceptable project, Heritage Row, and left Mr. de Parry with the only approved path forward to be to demolish the old homes and build his two student barns. Council person Honke should be voted out of office for his role in this debacle disseminating false & misleading information about Heritage Row at the council meeting where it was under consideration was unconscionable and dishonest. Council person Kunselman couldnt even be bothered do his home work to investigate what the council had already approved for the site? And where was council person Anglins supposed balanced viewpoint gained with age & experience? He stated during the council hearing on the Moravian that what we needed were more 1 & 2 bedroom apartments in & near down-town (not 4 bedroom & more units) and that is exactly the type of units that predominated in Heritage Row. Clearly it was political catering to special interest, political cowardice and general incompetence that left us in this mess. I feel the NIMBY neighbors,, the political cowards and the other narrow minded historic preservationist type special interests deserve to see the approved City Place barns built the sad thing is that the rest of us deserve better, namely the middle ground - Heritage Row.
Rasputin
Sun, Jul 11, 2010 : 7:54 a.m.
Quote: "Committed to finding the middle way, one that ties its past with a robust, sustainable future? " While well written, I take issue that Ann Arbor residents and local politicians have seldom reached compromises that have not been to the greater good of the community at large. Ann Arbor is not nearly as divisive as she alludes to in her blog and while the city has changed considerably over the last 30 years, it has done so in the spirit of bi-partisanship and compromise. Yes, we have to live with a few eyesores along West Huron street, Liberty Street, and Fifth Avenue, but for the most part we have avoided some real colossal mistakes as well thanks to compromise. The last few publicly reviewed PUDS and other development proposals are counter to the notion, which she claims, will: "Tie [A2 to] its past with a robust, sustainable future?" They, the proposals, promise to alter the landscape permanently in a destructive and unsustainable manner that will only further erode the quality of life in the near downtown neighborhoods. Thanks.
Steven Tutino
Sun, Jul 11, 2010 : 7:17 a.m.
This article reflects consistently with my own observation living in Ann Arbor over the past 20 years. How can we be so smart, have such a great mix of residents and not understand that what we have is due to generations that were willing to change? We need to change both to survive and maintain what we all love about Ann Arbor. Thanks for saying what many aren't willing to acknowledge about Ann Arbor.