Portsmouth rejects 5-story hotel and Starbucks: Can project be reworked and revived?
PORTSMOUTH — A proposal to build a five-story hotel and Starbucks restaurant with a drive-through failed to receive the multiple variances it needed to move the project forward.
The city's Zoning Board of Adjustment voted unanimously to deny the five variances developers were seeking for the project, which called for demolishing a 1950s-era motel and replacing it with a new 124-room hotel at 505 Route 1 Bypass.
The site is the current location of the Port Inn and Suites, which is owned and operated by the developers of the proposed new hotel and Starbucks project, Giri Hotel Management LLC.
The developers were seeking a variance to allow parking spaces between the principal building and a street; a second variance for parking located 1 foot from the lot line where 40 feet is required; a third variance to allow dumpsters to be located 1 foot from the lot line where 10 feet is required; a fourth variance to allow 1 foot between the lot line and drive-through and a fifth variance to allow 37 feet between the menu and speaker board and the front lot line where 50 feet is required, according to city documents.
Why the proposal was rejected by Portsmouth board
Board member David Rheaume made the motion to deny the variances requested.
Rheaume said he understood that developers were making “an economic argument for the need of what they are proposing.” But he stated economic need is not one of the criteria the Board of Adjustment considers when addressing requests for variances.
“We’re trying to force a lot of stuff into a small parcel,” he said about the proposal for Route 1 Bypass, at the intersection of Coakley Road.
He stressed the city’s zoning for such projects doesn’t call for “parking between the building and the street, and we certainly don’t want it pressed right up against the street.”
He pointed several times to the developer’s proposal to locate parking right up against Coakley Road.
A reworked project could gain approval in Portsmouth
While he made the successful motion to deny all the variances, Rheaume said he believes “there’s some opportunities here to rework this, maybe even some way to keep the coffee shop in there somewhere.”
He also said the variances requested were “too much” in his opinion.
“ (The) variances in my mind are not approvable,” he said.
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No Starbucks, no project, developer says
Earlier in Tuesday night’s meeting, Rheaume stated that “Starbucks seems to be driving this request.”
He asked developers if there’s been “any consideration to eliminating that aspect of the project, so you can bring this more into compliance with what the zoning ordinance is looking for out of new structures on properties like this.”
Ankur Patel, the principal of Giri Hotels, acknowledged that “there’s no project without the Starbucks.”
“It’s a feasibility analysis. Cost of construction is considered, having Starbucks as a tenant is factored in to offsetting some of those costs,” Patel said.
The board voted to continue its consideration of the developer’s request for a special exception for the project until February’s meeting.
They voted for the continuance to give the developers more time to address concerns about traffic and traffic congestion that could be caused by the development.
'A very crowded area'
Resident Jim Lee spoke against the development during the public comment portion of the hearing.
He pointed to recent changes near the site, which is already “a very crowded area” of Portsmouth.
Liberty Mutual recently reactivated its Borthwick Avenue location and Portsmouth Hospital finished an expansion recently, he said.
Those actions, Lee said, “cannot help but increase the traffic on Borthwick Avenue.”
Lee said during summer months he has seen traffic backed up at the portion of the Route 1 Bypass where the project is proposed “almost to Portsmouth Toyota.”
“Having a triple size motel plus a Starbucks can only exacerbate the traffic problems that already exist,” he said.
Developer calls it a unique property
Attorney John Bosen, who represents the developers, said the “property has unique site constraints in that it is a corner lot bound by two streets to the front and Hodgson Brook to the rear.”
As it has been proposed to this point, the redevelopment project called for demolishing the existing motel and replacing it with a 124-room Cambria hotel, Bosen said, with parking on the first floor and around the site.
The project called for two driveways off Coakley Road, with the main driveway being a two-way access that is approximately 415 feet west of the Coakley Road/Route 1 Bypass intersection,” Bosen said in documents filed with the city.
A second driveway would have been a one-way exit off the site to help move Starbucks customers off the property, according to the developers and their representatives.
The developers also touted the positive environmental impact of the project.
“The proposed parking and buildings have been sited in a manner such that all impervious surfaces will be removed within 25 feet of (the adjacent) Hodgson Brook and all buildings will be removed within 50 feet of Hodgson Brook,” they said.
Bosen stated during Tuesday’s meeting that the proposed project “fits well into the mix of hotels, and other commercial uses in this neighborhood.”
“A new modern code compliant hotel will improve the health, safety and welfare of the public,” he said. “The improvements to Hodgson Brook also support this conclusion.”
Bosen added “the existing motel already violates many of the sections of the zoning ordinance we seek relief from.”
Developers can come back to the board to seek variances for their redevelopment project, but it must be “substantially different” than the current plan, according to city planning staff.
The property was most recently assessed at $2.7 million, according to the city assessor’s department.
This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Portsmouth NH board rejects 5-story hotel and Starbucks
