Brookside Gardens project delayed another month

By Cindy Landrum  

MAY 20, 2010 3:34 p.m. (0)

The developer of the controversial Brookside Gardens senior citizen apartment complex just off Wade Hampton Boulevard will have to wait another month to find out if the project will be allowed to move forward.

The city issued a stop-work order for the project after it said the removal of five heritage trees from the site violated Douglas Development’s conditional use permit.

David Douglas, the developer’s manager, appealed the stop-work order, calling it a “disproportionate” sanction.

In the appeal, the developer said the city did not allow him due opportunity to present complete information concerning alternate means of landscaping the site to mitigate the removal of the trees.

The appeal was pulled from Thursday’s Board of Zoning Appeals meeting agenda because one of the two public hearing signs the developer was required to post on the street frontage of the property was hung behind black screening on a fence, said Bryan Wood, zoning administrator.

The appeal will be heard instead on June 17.

Douglas told the Greenville Journal the city knew, or should have known, the trees would be coming down.

The project’s landscape architect consistently listed five trees along the perimeter of the site as needing to be removed. She said the trees’ removal was a conscious decision because they would not have survived the construction process.

The city said, however, the trees were essential to the project.

Douglas offered two alternatives for the appeals board to consider. One would keep the building three stories with additional landscaping, while the second reduces the building to two stories with a larger footprint and less green space.

The board can uphold the city’s revocation of the permit, can overturn the revocation and allow construction to proceed, or it can modify the permit.

Neighbors have been pushing for a two-story building.

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