Powers Ferry Restaurant Row project

Powers Ferry Restaurant Row project gets Cobb Planning Commission OK

by
Powers Ferry Restaurant Row project
The Rose and Crown Tavern is the only existing business on “Restaurant Row” on Powers Ferry Road. (East Cobb News photos by Wendy Parker)

A rezoning to allow a Powers Ferry Restaurant Row project that would raze mostly empty commercial property was recommended for approval Tuesday by the Cobb Planning Commission.

The board voted 4-1 to recommend a request by Powers Ferry Road Investors, LLC, to rezone 8.8 acres to regional retail commercial (RRC) from the current general commercial (GC) category.

Related stories

Most of the land includes vacant restaurant space, with the exception of the Rose and Crown Tavern at 1931 Powers Ferry Road. The rezoning plans call for that restaurant to be part of the multi-use complex, which would include 290 apartments and 181 senior living units.

Rose and Crown would be expanded from 4,400 square feet to 6,000 square feet in a 10,000-square-foot restaurant/retail building.

“It stays and it gets better,” said Marietta zoning attorney James Balli, who represents the applicant.

The land along Powers Ferry sits between Windy Hill Road and Windy Ridge Parkway and is next to the Wildwood Office Park.

Famous Daves, Powers Ferry Restaurant Row
Window signage for the long-departed Famous Dave’s restaurant remains.

Three other free-standing buildings have been empty for years, and once housed the Sal Grosso, TGI Friday’s and Famous Dave’s restaurants.

Balli told the planning board that under the current GC category, the land could be used for adult entertainment businesses, nightclubs, tattoo parlors and even a homeless shelter.

While some nearby residents support redeveloping the property, they objected to the parking density and were upset that no crash data information was provided in the application.

The developer is calling for 711 total parking spaces for the development, far less than the minimum of 783 required by the county code.

Balli said that by comparison, the adjoining Horizons at Wildwood, an 18-story condominium complex, has 442 spaces for 273 units.

Eric Meadows, who lives in the Horizons, said his building has 454 parking spaces (two under code), for a ratio of 1.82, and calculated that the Restaurant Row parking density would come to 1.38 spaces per each apartment unit and 1.08 for the senior building.

The Horizons at Wildwood condos overlook Restaurant Row.

“That’s unacceptable,” Meadows said. “I do not believe it’s a suitable solution.”

He also objected to the front and rear setbacks being reduced from the minimum 50 feet to 15 feet, saying there’s nothing else like that around Wildwood.

Meadows also said Horizons residents and their pets have come close to being hit by cars while walking along Windy Ridge Parkway.

Planning commissioner Andy Smith of East Cobb, who represents District 2, supported the application and requested that a stipulation be included for crash data figures to be prepared when the Cobb Board of Commissioners takes up the request Aug. 21.

“This is head and shoulders above anything I’ve seen for this proposed site,” Smith said.

The only opposing vote came from Thea Powell of East Cobb, and it was her final vote. She said she was being replaced by commission chairman Mike Boyce for publicly opposing his property tax increase.

 

Get Our Free E-Mail Newsletter!

Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!

Powers Ferry Restaurant Row project update: Renderings, response from citizens group

by
Powers Ferry Restaurant Row project
A rendering of a proposed six-story, 290-unit apartment building that would occupy long-vacant restaurant space on Powers Ferry Road.

Here’s an update to the Powers Ferry Restaurant Row project proposal we posted about on Friday, which are plans to redevelop 8.8 acres of mostly empty eatery space for a very dense, mostly rental residential complex with some retail, and that’s getting an initial hearing Tuesday before the Cobb Planning Commission:

Powers Ferry Road Investors, LLC, the developer, has provided revised and conceptual landscaping plans and its attorney, James Balli, has filed a stipulation letter (you can read the whole thing here) that would increase the proposed parking from 510 spaces to 711 spaces.

The parking situation was among the concerns expressed by the Cobb Zoning Office analysis, which recommends approval of the nearly 500,000-square foot mixed-use project to regional retail commercial (RRC).

The 471 apartment units (290 multi-family, 181 senior active adult living) are still proposed, with the former (see rendering at top) taking up six stories, and the latter (see below) encompassing a five-story building.

The 10,000 square feet of mostly restaurant and retail space is still proposed for the center of the property, and would include the expansion of the current Rose and Crown Tavern from 4,400 to 6,000 square feet.

Most of the apartments will be studio, or one-bedroom units, and some will have two bedrooms.

Powers Ferry Restaurant Row project
The proposed 181-unit senior living building adjacent to the Sage Woodfire Tavern on Powers Ferry Road.

The Powers Ferry Corridor Alliance, a civic group, has filed a response to the proposal, and has expressed concern over a growing and overwhelming trend in the area toward rental housing.

While eager for “Restaurant Row” redevelopment, the group suggested a moratorium for more apartment construction: “Is there REALLY no market at all for owner-occupied units in a truly mixed-use development that could go on this site?”

The citizens group noted the development would be located next to a premium condominium high-rise complex on Powers Ferry.

The PFCA was strongly in support of the MarketPlace Terrell Mill project approved earlier this year that includes 298 apartments. But the group has estimated that since 2015, a total of 1,152 apartment units have been approved for the corridor, as opposed to only 155 owner-occupied dwellings.

If the Restaurant Row project is approved as presented, that would add up to 1,623 rental units, a ratio of 10.43 multi-family units to one owner-occupied unit.

A conceptual landscaping plan filed by the developer and that was submitted on Thursday.

The PFCA also wants to see the development reconfigured to include more retail, since more than half of the proposed space for that part of the project would be taken up by Rose and Crown, an existing business.

The civic group also has made numerous landscaping, parking, lighting and walkability suggestions: “The residents of each building should not have to exit from the parking lot or parking garage to go to the restaurant or out to the street at Powers Ferry Road. There should be attractively lit and maintained footpaths going from the buildings to the sidewalk on Powers Ferry Road.”

 

Get Our Free E-Mail Newsletter!

Every Sunday we round up the week’s top headlines and preview the upcoming week in the East Cobb News Digest. Click here to sign up, and you’re good to go!