Issue link: https://newsleader.uberflip.com/i/239386
Sarasota News Leader January 10, 2014 Page 46 Trail to alter existing zoning rules in a defined Avenue. The area of the "R-ROD" would be area. much larger than Weiner's property alone. On Tuesday, Jan. 7, a required neighborhood meeting was held in Sarasota City Hall to begin the process to change the city's Future Land Use Map and Comprehensive Plan for the Rosemary District. It was a standingroom-only crowd in the meeting room. The scheme would work in a similar fashion to that of the now defunct "DROD" or Downtown Residential Overlay District, which offered quadruple density to developers in a defined area of downtown. It bumped the density to 200 units per acre from the 50 allowed under the Downtown Core zoning The event was conducted by Weiner's lawdesignation, but by the time the DROD was yer, Bill Merrill, and planning consultant on the books, the economic bloom had faded Joel Freedman. The area they propose for and there were no takers. the "Rosemary Residential Overlay District" — inevitable acronym, "ARE-rod" — would In both cases, the overall number of units in be bounded on the north by 10th Street, on the overlay district remains constant. The the west by Cocoanut Avenue, on the south roughly 70 acres in the Rosemary area would by Fruitville Road and on the east by Orange allow approximately 1,700 units, and that The area proposed for the 3X density bonus (highlighted above in yellow) is bound by 10th Street on the North, Cocoanut Avenue on the west, Fruitville Road on the south and Orange Avenue on the east. Bruce Weiner is requesting the density change to build a 450-unit, market-rate apartment complex. Image courtesy City of Sarasota