The character and look of Denver's Sunnyside neighborhood will not drastically change after the Denver City Council approved the creation of two conservation districts outlining design standards for the neighborhood.
After a brief public hearing in which seven people addressed the council, two bills establishing the conservation overlays and zoning changes were passed unanimously.
The Sunnyside neighborhood, bounded by Interstate 70 to the north, Federal Boulevard to the west, 38th Avenue to the south and Inca Street to the east, is described as one of Denver's first neighborhoods.
But as the city evolves, preserving the character of neighborhoods like Sunnyside has become increasingly important to residents.
The new conservation overlay districts impose requirements to ensure construction remains faithful to existing structures. This includes a limit on home sizes in lots 7,500 square feet or less and reduces massing effects that bother many residents, according to the city staff report.
"The purpose of a conservation overlay is to tweak the design standards that are in the zoning ordinance for this area so they are more visually compatible with existing patterns in the neighborhood," said Brad Johnson, the principal city planner at the city.
New buildings constructed in Sunnyside have been built to maximize bulk plane utilization. The bulk plane is a very basic three dimensional shape that guides the creation of a building, according to city documentation. The new overlay "incrementally reduces or compresses" the bulk plane, according to Johnson.
One of the two conservation overlays requires front porches for homes. One resident who opposes the overlays, David Sabados, argued nobody on his block sits on their front porch. He also said the overlays do little to meet the goals of encouraging adaptive reuse and long term occupancy.
"Our character is diverse and there's a demand for all housing styles. We don't live in the burbs and don't want everything to look the same," he said. "No one's saying to tear down homes they don't want. But why not? If people want to preserve, they can preserve an older style home."
The new overlays will only apply to new developments, Johnson said during his presentation.
Sabados said he'd been involved with the proposals since their inception. Councilwoman Sandoval questioned this. Sandoval also encouraged residents to hang out on their porches, saying she did it all the time during the COVID-19 pandemic and connected with her neighbors in a different way.
Sandoval fully supported the overlay, complimenting the community effort that she had been a part of even before she became a councilwoman.
"We want to maintain the affordable, attainable, working class housing stock that we have in Northwest Denver by incentivizing adaptive reuse," she said. "This was community driven, this was community made."
