QUESTION
How did Gilbane Development Company adjust square footage in housing units?
0:48:38
·
3 min
Gilbane Development Company adjusted square footage in housing units by moving walls, especially in living rooms, and reallocating space from studio apartments to expand other units.
- The adjustments aim to expand living room spaces beyond Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) standards.
- By reconfiguring the walls, space is shifted from studio apartments to expand other unit types.
- This resulted in diversified unit layouts between floors, with floors 2 to 5 and 6 to 9 having different configurations.
- The reconfiguration allowed for more spacious two-bedroom, one-bedroom, or three-bedroom units, depending on their layout and position.
Sandy Nurse
0:48:38
I always have a gripe about the studios and one bedrooms being the bulk of projects, but I would like to just just in honoring the council member's concerns, understand if you could just give a quick breakdown of the square footage that you added into what type of unit.
0:48:57
So just for because I walked in late, so I might have missed it, but where you did respond previously to the request for increased square footage.
0:49:08
And in what unit?
0:49:09
So was it only because you had the three bedroom on here, and I wasn't clear in that slide.
0:49:14
It said on one side, 961.
0:49:16
The other side was 1041 square foot.
0:49:18
Was that the is that what was increased?
0:49:22
Or and was it only in the three bedrooms or was in the other?
0:49:25
So if you could just break down where you did increase square footage.
Aleena Farishta
0:49:34
Thank you, Gaspar.
0:49:36
Before I'm just gonna start by just further record reading into what the HP design guidelines are for each of these units.
0:49:43
So for a studio, ranges from 350 to 400.
0:49:47
No.
Sandy Nurse
0:49:47
I I know.
0:49:48
I know.
0:49:48
I know that I know the guidelines.
0:49:50
It it don't read them to me because I know them.
Aleena Farishta
0:49:52
And Yeah.
0:49:53
We just wanna put it in context to what we're providing.
Sandy Nurse
0:49:55
I know the context.
0:49:56
You know, you could just tell me what you adjusted.
Katherine Gray
0:49:59
So in general, We looked at the existing layouts, and we moved the walls.
0:50:09
Specifically related to the living rooms first to expand those beyond the the standard night I'm sorry, HPD guidelines.
0:50:21
And then as we moved those walls, we then took from apartments on either side to then shift the bedrooms out.
0:50:33
So depending each the floors from 2 to 5 have one set of layouts.
0:50:38
And then at the setback, we have another set of layouts from 6 to 9.
0:50:44
So generally, we carved, tookaways, studio apartments to stretch out the remaining units.
Sandy Nurse
0:50:55
And the ones that you stretched, you were able to stretch out by reduction of the studios.
0:51:01
Were those twos, ones, or threes?
Katherine Gray
0:51:03
So it depended on the proximity.
0:51:05
It wasn't as wasn't based on proximity related to the other apartments, which was housing.
0:51:13
Understood.
Sandy Nurse
0:51:14
Okay.
0:51:15
Did so you wouldn't be able to provide.
0:51:17
I think it's just really important because if this is gonna be a sticking point for moving forward a project that I think is personally great.
0:51:26
I would love to be able to have those receipts of where did you make improvements, which units were improved, if you could if we could request that in the follow-up so that the body can have that when we deliberate.
0:51:38
I think it's really important to be able to honor if there are specific gripes about the project.
0:51:43
I would love to see what you did to address those so we can at least say there was some action taken.
Arvind Sindhwani
0:51:49
Appreciate that.
0:51:50
Thank you.
0:51:50
You can you can create a follow-up report to share with the committee.
Kamillah Hanks
0:51:56
Thank you, council member nurse, and I echo those sentiments.
0:51:59
You know, it's it's really interesting that penciling out means something different from whether you sit on that side or whether you sit on this side.
0:52:08
And you know, you can't pencil out a community.
0:52:11
It has to be equitable on both sides of that.
0:52:14
And so there is some space in the middle.
0:52:16
And so I want to acknowledge the request of my colleagues.
0:52:22
And so we would like a letter explaining the design guidelines lines just for the record.
0:52:27
What was changed, we wanna see them both sides.
0:52:30
I we would like to see what it would look like with parking, and what was the other piece.