09-27-1995 Council Agenda - Laserfiche WebLink

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b. Without the variance, the applicant would be deprived of rights commonly enjoyed by other properties in the same district (R -1 in the Morelan case). c. The special conditions must not result from the actions of the applicant. d. Granting of the variance will not confer a special privilege on the applicant which other properties are deprived of. e. A genuine hardship exists in complying with the literal terms of the Ordinance. The Morelans are requesting a variance of approximately 7.5 feet, the extent to which the proposed cul -de -sac encroaches on the setback which would be required under existing conditions. Without the variance, a house on the future northerly lot would either have to be set back an additional 12 feet from Australian in order to take full advantage of the lot width, or would require an "L- shaped" house. Applying the criteria from the Zoning Ordinance which are listed above, the special condition would be considered to be the City - initiated purchase of right -of -way for the Australian Avenue cul -de -sac. The acts of the City or the State of Minnesota have been considered as special conditions in past variance requests, such as sign setbacks on Rice Street. The cul -de -sac option was initiated by the City in response to the Tima subdivision and street width variance request. The Morelans had not proposed the street project(s). The fourth criteria would not be considered a special privilege, assuming that the City would take the same action in other similar circumstances. The last criteria is more difficult to show. The lot created after the cul -de -sac would still be buildable, but with one less option. Instead of a full rectangular- shaped buildable area of 56 feet by 53 feet, a rectangular building could be 56 by 41 or 47 by 53. These would result in buildings of approximately 2,300 to 2,500 square feet. Or, an L- shaped building, as noted above, could be built which takes advantage of all but about 100 square feet of the available 3,000 square feet on the lot. The issue is whether the reduction of the buildable area by 25 % constitutes a "genuine hardship ". Following is the definition of hardship from the Zoning Ordinance: Hardship A situation where property in question cannot be put to a reasonable use under the conditions allowed by the official controls; the plight of the landowner is due to circumstances unique to his property, not created by the landowner; and the variance, if granted, will not alter the essential character of the locality. In most cases, this has been interpreted to mean that the failure to grant a variance would result in almost no possible use of the property. However in others, it has meant only that the lack of a variance would leave the property out of character with the neighborhood. Page 20