Quesnel City Council has now approved the development permit for a 32-unit supportive housing project on Elliott Street.
Tanya Turner, the Director of Development Services, went over the details at Tuesday night’s Council meeting…
“The development permit is for a three storey, 644 meter squared supportive housing building. The variances will include a parking requirement variance as well as a setback requirement from the entire front of the building.”
While an apartment building of this size would require 53 parking spaces, this project has been approved with only 14, which concerned City Councillor Ron Paull…
“I have a concern about the small footprint of the entire project, for the building and the parking, and the fact that we’re only requiring 14 parking spaces. I feel they should have flipped the building around so the parking would be on the south side, so they could have picked up that lot for more parking down the road.”
Mayor Bob Simpson noted however, that it is the nature of this project that requires less parking…
“The way that this is established as supportive housing, the clients there are actually precluded from owning vehicles if they are on income assistance, so that is part of what we’re taking into consideration in we’re determining the parking. You re really determining staff parking and the potential for some visitor parking.”
Simpson also noted that there is a fallback that the parking isn’t working, as they can then compel the developer to remedy the situation with off-street parking.
Council’s approval is subject to some other conditions, such as approval of a subdivision, approval of final servicing plans, entering into a service agreement with the city prior to building permit approval, obtaining a landscape bond, and paving of required off-street parking areas as described in the parking plan.
Council also gave final approval last night to Official Community Plan and Zoning amendments that were necessary for this project to proceed.
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