Anchorage planners urge denial of Girdwood stream setback variances

A Girdwood landowner wants to build a house, a garage with a rental unit, or accessory dwelling unit (ADU), and an enclosed bridge inside the protected 25-foot buffer along a stream at 158 Northland Road. Anchorage planning staff recommend rejecting the parts of the project that reach into that buffer.

The Anchorage Zoning Board of Examiners and Appeals will hear the request Thursday, Oct. 8, at 6:30 p.m. at the Z.J. Loussac Library. The board may grant a variance, an exception to zoning rules, only if all eight code standards are substantially met. Anchorage's stream protections guard against erosion, flooding, water pollution and damage to fish and wildlife habitat.

Staff recommend denying two of three variances. One would let the rebuilt house reach 4.5 feet and the new garage 14 feet into the stream setback. The other would allow a footbridge across the stream. Both only partially meet the standard requiring the smallest variance allowing reasonable use. Staff back a third variance letting the garage sit 5 feet into the front and side setbacks, required gaps from property lines. Smaller or relocated buildings could ease stream impacts, the report says, but utility easements and Chugach Electric Association power lines make that "not feasible in practice."

The petitioner, Alyeska Serendipity, LLC, is represented by Richard Todd Kasteler and Wendy Moe. Its application says stream and yard setbacks cover 86 percent of the 12,265-square-foot lot, leaving 325 square feet, or 2.65 percent, buildable without crossing the stream. The owners say a 2021 storm pushed the stream over its bank and undermined the old house. Staff recommended denial of a similar request in 2024.

In a July 10 email, watershed hydrologist Kyle Cunningham told the applicant's architect that "the only way we can come to a point of non-objection is if the garage/ADU building is completely within the existing gravel pad or further out of the stream setback." A Sept. 10 Watershed Management Services memo did not object to the garage on the pad if native vegetation stays, but it warned that bridge pilings near the east bank "may impact the integrity of the stream bank and lead to erosion and instability over time." Traffic Engineering and the Anchorage Water and Wastewater Utility raised no objections. The state transportation department had no comments.

Neighbors filed formal objections. Nancy Elrod, who owns downstream property on Megeve Road, emailed senior planner Shawn Odell: "My property will flood. I know this because it already has from the recent fill at 172 Northland for a new development." Will and Adrienne Brennan, across the street, cited parking, lost snow storage and the risk the bridge could act as a dam, calling the plan "a ten pound home on an eight pound lot." Four other neighbors also objected.

Phone testimony requires emailing [email protected] by 2 p.m. the day of the hearing.