City board grants parking exception for redevelopment of commercial strip in Five Points

The owners of two long-vacant buildings in the pedestrian-sparse 900 block of Harden Street got the city’s go-ahead Tuesday to renovate the buildings without providing parking for businesses they hope to introduce there.

Four members of Columbia’s Board of Zoning Appeals voted unanimously to approve the parking variance after the architect of the plans told them the exception was necessary to bring in new businesses and “invigorate that part of Harden Street.”

Plans presented to the zoning board include renovating the brick buildings at 948 and 950 Harden St. — vacant more than a decade — with the option of adding a second story of office, studio or residential space, plus a patio.

The buildings are part of a commercial strip across Harden Street from a shopping center anchored by Office Depot and Food Lion, a block from a $50 million private student dormitory under construction at Harden and Gervais streets.

City law normally would require the buildings’ owners, former S.C. Secretary of Commerce Joe Taylor and Columbia real estate developer Bill Owen, to provide 35 parking spaces for the mixed-used development.

But Scott Lambert of Lambert Architecture, speaking for the owners on Tuesday, told the zoning board the building would stay vacant without the parking exception.

With the exception, Lambert said, Taylor and Owen could start to recruit businesses to the space and work with other developers on the commercial strip on a long-term parking solution.

Two possible solutions are pooling together money to purchase nearby land for a parking lot or working out a deal to use the lot at the shopping center across Harden Street, developers have said.

“The variance will facilitate the project to really kick off,” Lambert said.

The board’s pre-vote discussion lasted less than a minute.

“I think all of us are well aware of the unique parking challenges in Five Points,” board member Preston Young said.

The board in January approved a nearly identical request from developers Richard Burts and Elizabeth Ward, who own the two buildings in the center of that block.

Burts and Ward also plan to add a second story of office, studio or residential space and have pledged to bring at least three new businesses to the commercial strip.

Taylor said last week it is too early to know what types of businesses could be attracted to 948 and 950 Harden St., or to estimate the project’s cost.

“It’s very exciting to add another revitalization project in Five Points,” Lambert said after the decision. “It’ll be a good project.”

This story was originally published March 8, 2016 at 2:17 PM.