PROVIDENCE – A zoning change paving the way for construction of a 17-story hotel and apartment tower on Federal Hill may be wiped off the map even faster than it was granted.
Several hours after Providence Mayor Angel Taveras signed the city’s first comprehensive zoning re-write in 20 years Monday afternoon, a City Council committee recommended reversing a provision within it that would allow a 200-foot building on West Exchange Street
The original zoning change, included in the city’s comprehensive zoning overhaul, was requested by West X Capital LLC, owner of 210 West Exchange St., a two-story brick industrial building just west of the Interstate 95 overpass.
West X plans to tear the exiting building down and construct a mixed-use tower in its place that would include a 136-room Starwood-affiliated hotel with 198 apartments in the floors above it.
Derek Mesolella, principal of West X, said he first reached out to Providence planning officials in July about including a 210 West Exchange zoning change that would essentially grant it the rules for nearby downtown in the citywide rewrite that had been in the works for more than a year. Mesolella is the son of developer and former state representative Vincent Mesollela, who is also part of West X Capital, and the chairman of the Narragansett Bay Commission.
“There has not been any development of this scale in city for many years while Boston, Washington, New York and Miami are undergoing a construction boom,” Mesolella said in a phone interview Tuesday. “We believe it is a good economic generator, but we have a lot going on and are not willing to fight the political winds. If the city wants to partner with us on this to get something built, it is a major development in the heart of the city.”
But Ward 13 City Councilor Bryan Principe – who represents Federal Hill and initially advocated for including the West Exchange zoning in the citywide rewrite this fall – changed his mind about it.
Last month he filed a new ordinance that would bring 210 West Exchange back within the “mixed-use industrial” zoning that covers the rest of the street and has maximum building height of 90 feet, or 114 with certain design bonuses, instead of 200 feet plus bonuses. (According to a study for the project conducted by Solus4 architects and published by Greater City Providence, the tallest point on the proposed 210 building would be 206 feet and most of it 185 feet.)
Principe said the reversal on the zoning change was a result of concerns about how quickly the West Exchange measure went through and the fact that the community did not get a full opportunity to debate it.
“Ultimately what I am supporting is a complete process that goes through what would be a typical request to change zoning,” Principe said. “I am looking for an opportunity for public discourse and dialogue. My ears are open and I have not made a decision to say I would be against any variance or zoning change if there is a public dialogue.”
The ordinance committee passed the new 90-foot zoning for West Exchange unanimously and it will now go on to the full council.
Home Economy Economic Activity City Council committee nixes zone change for 17-story hotel, apartments in Federal...
In a geographic footprint where the construction industry is smaller, more depressed than any other section of the country and where investment, a key driver of wealth creation, is also at low levels, the decision to opposed this project on its height is absolutely ludicrous. Where are the big thinkers around here.? And we wonder why our unemployment level has been near the top of all states for almost seven years!!
Build something in this city already! We’re tired, broke and struggling. Enough!