After nearly two years of study, a long-simmering plan to rezone one and a half miles of Grand Avenue, arguably St. Paul’s most fashionable business corridor, will come to a head Wednesday before the St. Paul City Council.
The goal, in light of years of limited development activity, is to increase the allowable real estate density along 11 blocks of Grand from Ayd Mill Road, which crosses Grand west of Lexington Parkway, to Oakland Avenue, east of Dale Street.
Likely as a result of added zoning restrictions, those blocks have experienced little real estate development since a zoning “overlay district” was created in the early 2000s, according to city staff.
“Clearly that’s not working,” said senior city planner Spencer Miller-Johnson on Monday. “It’s been almost 20 years, and we’ve seen very little construction.”
At the corner of Grand Ave and Dale St. in St. Paul, there is a steady flow of cars and pedestrians on Monday, July 15, 2024. (Devanie Andre / Pioneer Press)
Overlay district
Established in 2006, the existing zoning within the overlay district limits building heights to three stories, building footprints to 25,000 square feet and total building sizes to 75,000 square feet.
The district officially spans a mix of zoning types, most of it residential (“RM2”) or business (“B”), but the overlay district is even more restrictive than its base zoning when it comes to height and density.
Without the overlay district in place, for instance, development on “RM2” lots would ordinarily allow heights up to 50 feet, or even higher with a conditional use permit.
While retail corridors everywhere have experienced changes and challenges in the era of online shopping and remote work, “the Planning Commission believes that the overlay has been restricting reinvestment along Grand Avenue,” said Miller-Johnson, addressing the St. Paul City Council during a public hearing on June 26. “Since the pandemic, Grand has seen some struggles that are well publicized.”
A wedding cake approach and no more three-story limits
The proposed zoning amendments were crafted with the assistance of a city task force assembled hand in hand with the Summit Hill Association.
They call for a bit of a tiered wedding cake approach to new construction, allowing added stories provided that the building steps back above the first 40 feet of vertical construction to reduce its presence over the sidewalk. With the step-backs in place, height limits would default to the underlying zoning, just like in the rest of the city, while still adhering to “traditional neighborhood” or “T2” design standards for building massing, as currently required.
The amendments also call for a defined construction line along the sidewalk, as well as new frontage requirements, from windows and doors to storefront patios and awnings to activate the sidewalk. Corners and alleys neighboring residential lots would have different requirements.
To support the city’s business corridors, “the most important thing that we can do comes down to making it possible for more people to live on them and for more people to open retail on them,” said St. Paul City Council Member Rebecca Noecker, who represents a long portion of Grand Avenue.
Noecker, who chairs the city’s Housing and Redevelopment Authority, said she will likely introduce additional amendments on Wednesday.
In keeping with goals laid out in the city’s 2040 Comprehensive Plan, a 63-page city study of the East Grand Avenue Overlay District calls for encouraging “transit-supportive density and zoning flexibility,” as well as “high-quality urban design that supports pedestrian friendliness” and “streetscapes with active first-floor uses.”
It also calls for encouraging new housing with creative building design and site layouts.
The zoning study was initiated through a city-driven advisory committee in September 2022 and gained the approval on May 10 of the St. Paul Planning Commission, 13-0.
Pedestrians stroll across the crosswalk at the intersection of Grand Ave and Lexington Parkway S in St. Paul, on Monday, July 15, 2024. (Devanie Andre / Pioneer Press)
Proposed changes
Among the changes proposed to the existing zoning:
• Building heights: After 40 feet in height, a building must be stepped back a distance equal to the additional height. In other words, 10 extra feet of construction would require a 10-foot step-back at that level.
• Step-backs: Buildings less than 40 feet in height would not require front- and side-yard step-backs. Front or side street building facades within 15 feet of the building corner would not need to be stepped back. Buildings would still have to be no more than 30 feet high along property lines abutting residential lots at an alley, unless stepped back from rear property lines a distance equal to the additional height.
• Frontage: The base 30 feet of building sides “facing abutting public streets must include elements that relate to the human scale at grade.” Elements could include doors, windows, projections, awnings, canopies, porches, stoops, etc.
• Building line: The maximum front and side street setback would be 10 feet, establishing a building line along the sidewalk. If an interior lot is on or abutting residential zoning, it may have a setback of up to 25 feet along the existing building façade line. Up to 40% of the building façade on any lot may exceed the maximum setback to create outdoor seating or gathering areas.
A key business corridor
Real estate developer Ari Parritz, who recently opened the Kenton House housing development by St. Alban’s Street, on the site of Dixie’s on Grand, has called for capping the step-back requirement at 10 feet, and loosening the step-back exception at corners from 15 feet to 50 feet.
Sustain St. Paul, a coalition of density and housing advocates, has been generally supportive of the proposed amendments, with some exceptions. Notably, they’ve called for making the step-back requirement in back alley areas, where properties meet neighboring residential lots, uniform with the front facades. In a letter to the council, Sustain St. Paul said installing tiered housing, at different levels on both sides of a building, would be complicated to design and likely require switching from wood to concrete, “something which is almost never done because of the extremely high cost.”
Dan Marshall, proprietor of the Mischief Toys store on Grand, urged the city council during a public hearing last week to embrace the opportunity to invite even greater density. Marshall, who participated in the overlay district citizen’s advisory committee, asked the council to ditch the proposed amendments and simply repeal the overlay district entirely.
“When a zoning policy has failed so thoroughly by stifling investment in one of the city’s key business corridors for nearly two decades … with a redundant layer of rules that do not apply in other areas of the city, it should be repealed, not amended,” he said.
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