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not in good condition, some that have been hacked and pruned are asymmetrical and <br />not in balance. She concluded that, all in all, there will be a lot more greenery and a lot <br />more healthy vegetation than what is there now. <br />Ms. Hardy then addressed the question of the pedestrian walkway, noting that they had <br />previously shown it on the plan; however, the Planning Commission, back in November, <br />had indicated that there really was not a great deal of support for that, and as they did <br />not have support for it either, they eliminated it from the site plan. She noted that they <br />recently learned from staff that there was a change of course and that the walkway was <br />added in a response to the Climate Action Plan (CAP); but they remain opposed to the <br />walkway. She indicated that she did take a look at it, and with all respect to staff, she <br />thinks the connectivity portion of the CAP is really intended to provide pedestrians and <br />bicyclists connections in more conventional subdivisions where really the intersections <br />and blocks are a lot bigger, an average, per the CAP plan, of nine intersections per <br />square mile, which is double that in the Downtown area. <br />Ms. Hardy continued that she wanted to address the "why" of the pedestrian issue. She <br />noted that Ponderosa is conditioned to build a sidewalk on Stanley Boulevard on the <br />site's frontage to the west to connect to the existing sidewalk located one lot over from <br />the site, and that lot does not have anything. She indicated that they still remain <br />opposed to the pedestrian walkway because, first, they think it is not necessary; and <br />second, they think it presents a safety and security element for their buyers. She added <br />that should the Planning Commission disagree with them on that, they would at the <br />least say that it should be gated and should be limited to the exclusive use of only the <br />residents and not be a public use connection. <br />Commissioner Ritter thanked Ms. Hardy for showing him the property. He asked her to <br />reiterate what she told him regarding the analysis of moving the house or retrofitting the <br />house, what challenges that presents, and what could happen with that existing house. <br />Ms. Hardy replied that they had Ward Hill perform his analysis of the project in addition <br />to a cultural analysis. She indicated that there was some discussion about picking up <br />the house and moving it forward, or what would it take to make the house stable. She <br />noted that two teams of specialists in moving and restoration of historic or older homes <br />came out and did an exhaustive review, looking at the structural integrity of the building, <br />the foundation, termites, mold, water damage, and a whole host of elements; they also <br />looked at code upgrade requirements. She indicated that the cost of picking up the <br />house and moving it is just cost - prohibitive, and the degree of which the improvements <br />to the house would need to be made to bring it up to basic safety and code is also very <br />great. She added that it is a relatively small house, about 1,900 square feet: one room <br />at the entrance, the bedrooms off to the side, with an add -on old bathroom, kitchen, and <br />the porch circa 1950, and an illegal unit upstairs. She noted that anybody today who <br />would want to live in that house today would probably want to gut the entirety of the <br />house; the floor plan is just not conducive to today's lifestyle, the floor of the back half of <br />the house is lurching and is about ready to fall off; they would probably want to do an <br />addition in addition to remodeling the house. She further noted that all told, it would <br />PLANNING COMMISSION MINUTES, July 10, 2013 Page 13 of 21 <br />