The Park City Planning Commission spent three months discussing the merits of a program that would allow certain landowners to shift development rights from their land to another spot in the city, a way, supporters of such a program say, to preserve prized ground like the Sweeney family’s Treasure acreage.
the middle of February, the panel was ready to make its recommendation to the Park City Council, deciding to endorse four places where development rights could be shifted from, with Treasure being the most important. They are known as sending zones. The recommendation also pinpoints two places where the rights could be shifted toward, known as receiving zones, with the Bonanza Park district being the crucial one.
Throughout the Planning Commission discussions, it was the panel’s chairman, Charlie Wintzer, who refereed the meetings. Wintzer and his wife, Mary, hold a 50 percent stake in Wintzer-Wolfe Properties, a major landowner in the receiving zone put under the Bonanza Park moniker.
If the City Council agrees with the lower panel’s recommendation, the Wintzer-Wolfe Properties land would be a spot where development rights could be shifted toward. Some landowners would see the prospects of additional development rights as a potential boon for business.
The City Council, should it want a program created, must finalize the details, including the locations of the sending and receiving zones as well as the values that will be attached to development rights that will be shifted. The sending and receiving zones could later be tinkered with as well. Insiders use the labels ‘transfers of development rights’ or ‘transfers of density rights,’ with the acronym TDR commonly invoked, to refer to programs like the one under consideration.
Wintzer publicly acknowledged his holdings in the area during the discussions. The chairman of the Planning Commission does not hold a vote other than to break a tie. The recommendation passed on a 4-2 vote, not requiring Wintzer to say ‘Yea’ or ‘Nay.’
Wintzer-Wolfe Properties acquired a patchwork of properties over about a decade starting in the 1980s, Wintzer said. The holdings are off Iron Horse Drive. Some of the businesses occupying the properties include Windy Ridge Cafe and Mercer Automotive.
The firm holds approximately nine acres of land in the Bonanza Park receiving zone, according to Wintzer. All of the land is developed. Wintzer said Wintzer-Wolfe Properties does not plan to redevelop the land. He said he and his wife do not intend to sell their 50 percent stake in the firm.
“If I’m not going to develop it, I’m not going to ask for TDRs,” Wintzer said.
The Wintzer-Wolfe Properties holdings have long been seen as a spot for more utilitarian businesses than they have been for places critical to the tourism industry. But there has been some gentrification in recent years as restaurants and art galleries have opened in either Wintzer-Wolfe Properties holdings or in nearby properties held by others.
If the Wintzer-Wolfe Properties holdings someday change hands, and a new owner wants to redevelop, being within a zone where development rights could be shifted toward could present an opportune situation.
The Planning Commission recommendation allows approximately 10 percent of the long-standing Treasure development rights to be shifted, a smaller amount than City Hall staffers had suggested.
Although the Wintzer-Wolfe Properties holdings are within a receiving zone, they have not been seen as being important to the discussions. Another figure with significant land in the Bonanza Park district, Mark J. Fischer, has said he is interested in having a large amount of the Treasure development rights shifted toward his properties if a program is created.
The City Council is tentatively scheduled to begin its discussions about a program allowing the shifts on March 3. The Planning Commission, meanwhile, is set to receive an update about the program at a Wednesday meeting starting at 5:30 p.m. at the Marsac Building.