Fairbanks planners take up request to rezone 10 Hamilton Acres lots for duplexes

The Fairbanks North Star Borough Planning Commission holds a public hearing at 6 pm Tuesday on whether to recommend rezoning ten lots on Craig Avenue from single-family to two-family housing, according to the agenda. Borough planning staff recommend approval. The commission's recommendation goes to the Borough Assembly, which has final say on rezonings.

The half-block sits in the Hamilton Acres neighborhood, on the south side of Craig Avenue between B and C streets. Its 1.7 acres hold five single-family homes, four duplexes and a fourplex. Switching to Two-Family Residential zoning would make the duplexes a permitted use, though the zoning would not allow the fourplex.

Every lot measures about 7,427 square feet, below the current 10,000-square-foot minimum for a single-family lot. Two-family zoning would lower that minimum to 5,000 square feet for one home and 7,000 for a duplex.

The subdivision was platted in 1952. When the City of Fairbanks annexed it in 1965, zoning allowed two units on a 5,000-square-foot lot. Three years later, the borough cut that to one unit per 10,000 square feet, a limit its 1988 single-family zoning kept in place.

Borough assessors count five lots with more than one dwelling today. Three have affirmed grandfather rights, which let an owner keep a use that predates current rules. One request for those rights was denied, and one has no determination yet.

Jason Lee filed the rezone request on behalf of the owners. Owners of six of the ten lots, representing 60% of the area, signed the petition, and the four who did not sign raised no objection, according to the staff report. Lee's application for his own lot says the goal is to allow two-family use so the property can be brought into compliance, arguing that "the existing zoning is unsatisfactory because it does not accurately reflect the established residential development pattern in this area."

Planner Anduin K. McElroy wrote in the staff report that "this neighborhood appears to be comfortable with a mix of renter-occupied and owner-occupied units."

Rezones of lots under 3 acres are almost always found to be spot zoning, the staff report says, but staff concluded this one likely is not. They gave three reasons: the borough's long-range land plan marks the area Urban, meaning it is meant for places served by community water and sewer, and the rezone fits that designation; the change would add only duplexes, not larger buildings; and it borders land already zoned for two-family homes.

Borough transportation planner Donald C. Galligan Jr. estimated a full build-out of 20 units would add 38 vehicle trips a day. "Craig Avenue can easily accommodate this additional level of traffic," Galligan wrote.

The borough mailed 269 notices to the area on Oct. 9. Staff had received no public comment or inquiry by the time the meeting packet was published.

The request follows another Hamilton Acres rezone a few blocks away. On Sept. 22, the commission voted 6-1 to recommend rezoning 19 lots on Farewell Avenue from single-family to multiple-family housing, and the Assembly's Committee of the Whole took that rezone up Nov. 5.