The Denver City Council took a major step Monday toward clearing the way for Denver Nuggets and Colorado Avalanche owner Stan Kroenke to build new skyscrapers on the expanse of parking lots around Ball Arena where those teams play.
The ability to construct buildings as tall as 30 or 40 stories on those lots is a critical component of plans to greatly expand downtown Denver and add 6,000 new apartments and condos to the city desperate need of more housing, Kroenke employees say.
The first in a series of six bills related to the future of the 70-acre Ball property that the council voted on Monday amended the city code to provide an exemption to the Old City Hall view plane.
That view plane is essentially an invisible triangle the caps building heights on the properties that fall within it. It’s a legal mechanism to protect westward views from a specific point on the ground at the intersection of 14th and Larimer streets where the city’s original city hall once stood.
City planning and legal staff informed council members that the view plane is already largely defunct. The Auraria Higher Education Center campus buildings along Speer Boulevard — built by a state agency exempt from city rules — have already blocked it out. That was rationale enough for some council members to vote for the exemption Kroenke and company were seeking even if they have concerns about the broader impact on mountain views from other places that would be impacted by the changes.
“I’ve come to the conclusion that I am going to vote yes on this exemption … because of the fact that this view plane no longer exists,” Councilman Kevin Flynn said. “I would have actually preferred the (Community Planning and Development) had come to us and just said repeal this view plane.”
Flynn voted with the majority in a 10-1 decision to allow properties with a specialized zoning to pierce the plane.
The council also approved rezoning the 70-acre arena property. The land was already zoned for buildings as tall as eight stories in places, according to city planning staff, but the specialty zoning the that council unanimously signed off on Monday allows for buildings that are much taller in exchange for the inclusion of more affordable housing on site.
While the view plane vote allows the sports and real estate mogul and his company Kroenke Sports and Entertainment to move closer to their goals, some neighbors from the Lower Downtown neighborhood had their hopes of preserving their largely unobstructed views of the Rocky Mountains dashed.
Casey Pitinga was among the residents of Larimer Place condo tower at 1551 Larimer St. that urged council members to vote no on the view plane changes. She argued that it was not just her building that would be impacted by the appearance of new skyscrapers west of downtown. Businesses that tout rooftop views –including the recently expanded Colorado Convention Center which added a terrace as part of its $233 million expansion completed last year —could also be hurt, she said.
“Most importantly, the unique beauty of Denver will be compromised forever,” Pitinga said.
Amanda Sawyer was the one councilmember who sided with those neighbors. She noted that residents of her eastern Denver district benefit from a view plane that protects westward views from Cranmer Park.
“It’s not a precedent I am willing to set,” she said of amending those legal protections even for a development she acknowledged may be something that could benefit the city.
An overwhelming majority of speakers who testified during a public hearing covering the rezoning spoke in favor of allowing dense development on the land and the new housing that it is expected to bring.
“Its exactly the type of project we need as a city,” Denver resident Matthew Larsen said. “It’s dense, it’s infill development. We need projects like this to meet our greenhouse gas goals in the state.”
Beyond the rezoning bill, the council was scheduled to consider four other bills related to Kroenke’s ball arena plans before calling it a night on Monday.
One of those bills would amend an existing arena agreement between the city and KSE tying the Nuggets and Avalanche to the property until 2050.
Another bill would extend the timelines for a development agreement governing the neighboring River Mile property, also owned in part by Kroenke, through 2050 to match with the Ball Arena timeline.
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A fifth bill would codify a development agreement between the city and KSE that would set legal requirement for future construction and operations on the arena lots. Those requirements include requiring that 18% of all new housing be income-restricted affordable housing. That figure exceeds the city’s existing affordable housing requirements by at least 3% and could result in 1,080 new units of affordable housing, according to city planners and KSE officials.
Finally, one bill would establish special taxing districts with the power to take on $1.2 billion in debt to pay for infrastructure around the arena including roads and parks.