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Show Snow Creek project is closer to approval ' rr "TT Z:- . - . k, - ' " ' -yy -V" ' - -jf s- In developer's model Snow Creek motel (terraced building on right) rests against the hill facing Kearns Boulevard and parking area of Holiday Village Mall. Road leaving to left is Utah Highway 224. .- : X '- :-'.: - - , ' ;' by Rick Brough Stalemated talks between city planners and Snow Creek n planners quickly moved off dead center after developers presented a revised master plan for a 12-story hotel convention con-vention center. The change was presented at a joint planning commission city council work session ses-sion Wednesday, Oct. 10. Developers said the plan showed substantial changes. Among other things, they said, the building footprint has been cut 61 percent from the original proposal. The project received strong support at the meeting from a virtual cross-section of Park City's business community. Supporters said the Snow Creek convention center would make Park City a year-round resort center, and the building's present mass and height wasn't a concern to Jhem, , ,. . " ''vthenotel, set back against the hill north of the U-224Kearns Boulevard intersection, is part of a proposed project that also includes an office complex, support commercial commer-cial area, stream corridor and internal traffic circulation, and other parcels as yet undesignated. ) Planning Chairman Cal Cowher recommended the work session be moved to Wednesday night, Oct. 17, since the staff only received the changes that afternoon and had no time to review them. Council and the commission agreed to the change. (At press time, senior planner John Eskelin said his staff was still reviewing the plans, but said the changes brought out in the past two weeks have made Snow Creek substantially different from the original proposal. ) But the meeting postponement brought an exasperated response from Merle Tourney, Snow Creek's managing general partner, who asked when he could get a decision on the project's master plan. City Councilman Jim Doilney replied, "You're not getting any worse treatment than anyone else." Tourney said. "Is it asking for special treatment to get a decision?" Doilney said the city shouldn't make a decision now because the general public has not spoken yet. "It's inappropriate to have a meeting that only the proponents know about. Half the people who spoke here are participants." When Chairman Cowher called for public input, 14 people asked to speak for the project. Only one person, Marianne Cone, expressed opposition. Planning Commissioner Dean Berrett said, "I don't think Marianne stands alone. But the public has been notified of these meetings." It was clear the residents who did come supported Snow Creek. The meeting included comments from: Debby Symonds, executive director dir-ector of the Park City Chamber Bureau. ("I've spent six years trying to promote Park City as a year-round convention center destination. We need major space for groups over 1000. ) Business owner Jan Peterson. ("I have 50 employees who go away every summer. I can't run on five months a year. We have to have this or face an unemployment problem.") prob-lem.") ' Banker Dick Wilde. ("Do you want a year-round or a winter resort? I don't see how much you can hurt a sagebrush hill.") Real estate broker Richard Dudley. ("The only place you see the ridgeline broken is if you're standing in the parking lot of the Alpha Beta.") Ray Robinson, co-chairman of the Chamber's Economic Development Develop-ment Committee. ("A convention center hotel is something we want to see. Sometimes there's a conflict with residents who have individual or selfish goais . . . Maybe it is time for us to get something this big. We need something nice, and what I see is nice.") Jim Rhead, a Snow Creek general partner, said he has had a long-time association with Park City. The project has taken an initial investment invest-ment of $50 million, he said. "I'm not willing to put that in and not do it right." Of the major issues to be resolved in Snow Creek, most discussion was on height. Lone dissenter Marianne Cone said she was ready to trade open space to curb the height, and contended other Parkites opposed a building that tall. Senior planner John Eskelin said the original proposal suggested a maximum roof height 90 feet above the limit, a figure that was later dropped to 60 feet. The latest change Hronned the variance to 50 feet, Eskelin estimated. The hotel would break the ridgeline as seen from the north parking area of the Holiday Village, he said. In size, the building has been chopped from 400 to 350 rooms; the overall square footage has been cut from 370,000 to 300,000 and the footprint reduced from 280,000 square feet to 109,300. The 12 levels include one story for a restaurant and one for storage. Several council and commission members said they weren't concerned con-cerned over the current height and mass. Said Tom Shellenberger, "I'm not on record as totally supporting, but I have no objections." Commissioner Com-missioner Ruth Gezelius said the location near the highway is logical. However, Commissioners Ron Whaley and Steve Deckert expressed concern about the height. City Councilman Al Horrigan agreed, "I would rather not see the ridgeline violated." And Commissioner Brad Olch suggested the city could trade greater mass for reducing the height. (In earlier discussions, Snow Creek cut their mass in return for height. But Eskelin said that didn't commit the city to a particular variance. ) Another area, the support commercial detached from the hotel, has provoked comments that it might attract business off the highway, rather than from Snow Creek. "I've given up the idea that's support commercial," said Dean Berrett. "It is General Commercial square footage." John Eskelin said the city and developers are approaching agreement agree-ment on parking issues. The city is calling for around 700 spaces total. The project has proposed 625. The staff has proposed at least 50 percent of the parking be put underground. Currently, developers plan to have 47 percent of the parking underground. under-ground. The Snow Creek changes were not made overnight, said staff planner Dave Boesch. They have been made bit by bit over several weeks. But the staff, in a seeming paradox, reported they had seen no changes in the basic project. That's because all the changes were never brought together to show the impact they made on the project. This was first done a few hours before the meeting of the 10th, said Boesch. The City also asked the builders to look at other alternatives, he said, but developers said they had already considered and eliminated other concepts. |