At their April 25 meeting, the City Council tabled an ordinance that would have revised the maximum height for one and two-family homes being built in the city from 2.5 stories to 3.
The city’s Planning Division found that builders were attempting to construct houses with three full stories in a small space, causing cramped conditions. By raising the height, the builders will have more room to include three stories. The change is a concession to the builders and property owners.
The ordinance also called for the revision of standards for garage sizes for those homes. Garages would be constructed up to 13 feet wide and 44 feet long, and would take up at least 50 percent of the ground floor of the house.
The matter is scheduled to be heard again on May 9.
Also at the meeting, the council gave the go-ahead to a plan to revitalize a forgotten shopping area of the city located near the old Jersey City Medical Center on Baldwin and Montgomery Streets.
The Monticello Avenue Redevelopment Plan passed by a 6-0 vote with an abstention by City Council President Mariano Vega.Heights of homes
At the meeting, City Planner Claire Davis mentioned there would be more changes to the height ordinance it is heard again.
The changes calls for the maximum height of one- and two-family homes to be three stories, with 12 feet from each floor to ceiling and the total height of the house to be no more than 44 feet.
There was some debate on the ordinance. Becky Hoffman, president of the Riverview Neighborhood Association, which represents a part of the Heights section of the city, commended the ordinance for the increase from 2.5 stories to 3, but disagreed with allowing any parking garages at all to be built in new houses.
She said it would create more curb cuts for driveways leading into the garages, thus cutting on-street parking for those who do not have garages.
The ordinance states that garages constructed would be at 13 feet wide and 44 feet long and would take up at least 50 percent of the ground floor of the house.
Davis said that the ordinance changes the garage configurations so cars will not be side by side, but one car in front of the other. She also said that building a garage with a greater emphasis on depth will cut down the ground floor being turned into an illegal apartment.
And she said that having a garage with less width will take up less space from the entire house itself, creating smaller driveways with shorter curb cuts.
City Councilman Michael Sottolano asked Davis, “Do you think this will really work?” and inquired if this setup was being done anyplace else.
Davis said she didn’t know of any specific instances in New Jersey, but had seen the issue presented at planning conferences she has attended.
City resident Catherine Grimm asked if how enforcement will be done to ensure that the garages are used solely for parking and not converted into illegal apartments. Changing a blighted shopping district
The council also approved an amended version of a redevelopment plan for a forgotten section of the city.
They gave the go-ahead to the Monticello Avenue Redevelopment Plan by a 6-0 vote, with an abstention by City Council President Mariano Vega.
The plan was approved by the City Council in 1987 to encourage new commercial development on a once-prominent shopping district in Jersey City that has fallen on hard times. But in recent years, there have been further changes to the plan to strengthen the commercial development element while respecting the property owners’ rights.
The council voted on the amended plan to allow for future development on Monticello Avenue to go forward.
But before approving the plan, the council agreed to remove a list of properties designated for city acquisition until they can determine whether the properties qualify as blighted or not, and until there is notification to property owners.
The plan actually doesn’t require notification because it is an amended plan and not a new plan. Thus, the city can attempt to seize private properties if they think it will be necessary to revitalize the area.
Michael Kazer, a property owner on Monticello Avenue, asked that the vote be postponed until all property owners are contacted. He said he was unaware that the plan was up for a vote until he spoke to someone who knew about the plan being on the agenda.
Kazer pointed out that properties should not be placed on the list, but rather, owners should get the chance to improve their properties.
“The property owners on Monticello Avenue are very interested in their properties and in improving Jersey City, and they want to be able to benefit,” Kazer said. “My concern is that the whole purpose of the redevelopment plan is that large developers are going to come in and they are going to declare the district blighted and they are going to ask you, members of the council, to exercise your powers of eminent domain, to let them grab the properties and then they will benefit.”
Carol Harrison Arnold, president of the Monticello Avenue Redevelopment Corporation that helped rewrite the redevelopment plan, assured Kazer and other property owners within the plan that there would not be the displacement of longtime businesses and owners who have invested on Monticello Avenue over the years.
But Davis pointed out that property owners are notified before a redevelopment plan is created, not when the plan is amended, as there is “no defined policy to do so.”
The city’s business administrator, Brian O’Reilly, said that government should “take that extra step” and notify property owners that the area may be revitalized soon.
The council agreed and approved the amended plan with the properties taken out, by a vote of 6-0, with an abstention by Vega.
Vega had wanted the plan tabled at least until the next council meeting, until there was “a better picture” of what future changes would be made to the ordinance by the city’s Planning Division. Ricardo Kaulessar can be reached at rkaulessar@hudsonreporter.com