A concept for a new, eight-story apartment building in ‘Beaver Canyon’ got a lukewarm reception Thursday night from the State College Planning Commission. Members said they need more information and analysis before they can endorse or pan the idea.
‘I have to tell you: I’m very concerned about extending Beaver Canyon one more building over,’ said commission member Michael Roeckel. ‘It’s the way it keeps expanding.’
The concept, proposed by the State College-based HFL Corporation, would put the new building at 254 E. Beaver Ave., the former home of Kappa Sigma fraternity. The three-story former fraternity house has sat mostly vacant since the local Kappa Sig chapter temporarily disbanded in 2006, though Canyon Pizza, Grillers take-out restaurant and a couple community groups remain there.
Borough Council rejected an earlier HFL proposal to build an 11-story apartment building on the site. Neighbors in the adjacent Highlands had worried about how such a large, Penn State-student-oriented complex would affect noise and other disruptions in their neighborhood.
But HFL founder and Chairman Henry Sahakian told the Planning Commission Thursday that his fresh, smaller proposal would improve aesthetics and the image in the often-raucous Beaver Canyon. (Locals know the canyon as 200 and 300 blocks of East Beaver Avenue, where tall student apartment buildings already line the street.)
‘I probably am the cause for this Beaver Canyon,’ Sahakian said, recalling his downtown apartment projects that date to the 1960s. He said the HFL vision for the new project ‘is to create a mixed-use building that will become an asset to the community and appropriate to that location.’
With design features and other controls, Sahakian said, ‘I think we can control all (the tenants’) activities.’
Those features would include windows that open only four inches, designed to prevent tenants from throwing items outside; a closed-circuit television system, meant to deter misbehavior; an in-house resident manager, charged with monitoring activity; and an electronic card-access system, to limit accessibility. Lease provisions would enable HFL to evict tenants immediately for disorderly behavior on the site.
The first floor of the building, facing Beaver Avenue, would be available as commercial space, and the second level would provide parking. The six floors above would house 42 four-bedroom apartments and as many as 168 tenants overall, Sahakian said.
To enable the project as proposed, the Borough Council would need to rezone the property from its current, lower-density use to a higher-density category. Council also would need to enact a new student-housing zoning proposal, which has been advocated by HFL and advanced by the borough planning staff.
That proposal, known as the Student Housing Overlay District, would allow student-housing developers to build slightly more dense apartment complexes in narrowly targeted areas of town, but only if the developers meet specific criteria. The criteria could include mandatory resident managers, security systems, lease provisions against loud parties, and the eviction of disorderly tenants.
Borough Council in April asked the Planning Commission to study the zoning concept and the HFL building plan. In a preliminary analysis Thursday, some planning commissioners said they want to know how many students already live in Beaver Canyon. They also want to know how many disturbances the newer HFL buildings on Garner Street have seen.
Those multi-level apartment buildings, on the east side of Garner Street between East Beaver Avenue and East Calder Way, are less than 10 years old. They already incorporate some of the tenant-control features that Sahakian has suggested for 254 E. Beaver Ave.
‘There does seem to be interest to continue to look at this’ subject, ‘but we need more information to understand it,’ Planning Commission Chairman Evan Myers said.
Likewise, commissioner Cindy Carpenter said she wants to hear police Chief Tom King’s perspective on the matter.
Already, the neighboring Phi Kappa Sigma fraternity, 234 E. Beaver Ave., has voiced objections to the HFL rezoning request. Its attorney, James Rayback, said Phi Kappa Sigma does not want to see any extension of Beaver Canyon.
The Planning Commission is expected to address the subject again in June, when more information should be available for consideration.
