The owner of the Double Diamond restaurant in Copper’s East Village is searching for to convert his industrial space to residential use, citing the restaurant’s declining monetary viability.
Through a May well 23 Board of County Commissioners summit, restaurant owner David Luthi mentioned the landscape of Copper has changed significantly in the roughly 3 decades considering that he opened the Double Diamond. These consist of significantly less access to parking and a decline in enterprise activity in the location.
“With that adjust, I guess I really feel like it really is time for me to adjust,” Luthi mentioned. “I really feel like I’ve carried out my ideal with a viable enterprise that I no longer consider is viable.”
Commissioners voted to approve Luthi’s request to amend land use suggestions to let for a slight improve in residential density.
The restaurant is at the moment situated in the Fox Pine Inn creating, which involves 31 apartments. The adjust enables the restaurant owner to proceed with the conversion of about three,000 square feet of the restaurant into 3 further residences, bringing the quantity of residential units to 34. The web-site will also have 44 parking spaces.
The adjust authorized by commissioners does not completely give Luthie the green light for the project, according to county senior planner Sid Rivers, who mentioned any new unit building would nonetheless have to go by way of a multi-step procedure for county approval. What the adjust does, Rivers mentioned, is let the industrial space to be made use of for residential use.
The commissioners received numerous written public comments from citizens each for and against the proposal. Some who reside in the creating mentioned they are concerned that new building would lead to issues such as disruption of building solutions and doable harm to the creating.
They also mentioned the restaurant in the creating is a advantage to residents.
“We look at a restaurant in our creating to be an asset, and when the Double Diamond restaurant was in enterprise, it was an asset to the complete East Village,” wrote Fox Pine residents Jeff and Karen Molina. “This project would take away this house.”
But the vast majority of residents supported the proposal, with 87% of homeowner association members voting in favor of it, according to Luthi and other public comment writers.
“The restaurant has been closed for some time. Numerous modest companies have not recovered from the hardships of COVID,” wrote residents Maria Insalata and Eric Zehnpfennig. “We would considerably rather see the space converted into desirable residential units, good and new, to replace unused industrial space that is of no use to the owners or our guests.”