Features

With the annual August recess approaching, the city’s land use panels will be voting this week on several major hot button planning issues and development projects. 

When it meets Wednesday, the Planning Commission will ponder condominiums, the proposed new Berkeley Bowl in West Berkeley, the Gilman Street Playing Fields and the Downtown Area Plan mandated in the settlement of the city’s lawsuit against UC Berkeley. 

The meeting, which begins at 7:30 p.m. in the North Berkeley Senior Center, 1901 Hearst Ave., features: 

• action on the Housing Department’s proposed revision to the city’s condominium ordinance; 

• a scoping session to gather the commission’s comments for the Environmental Impact Report on the proposal to build a new Berkeley Bowl in West Berkeley, plus a decision on scheduling the commission’s hearing on the General Plan and rezoning changes needed to build the project; 

• a hearing on Waterfront Plan and zoning ordinance changes needed to build the Gilman Street Playing Fields, a cooperative effort of the East Bay Regional Parks District and East Bay cities led by Berkeley; 

• A hearing on adoption of a condominium tract map for a planned 30-unit condominium project at 2025 Channing Way. 

• A discussion of the anticipated planning process and timeline for the Downtown Area Plan agreed on by the city and UC Berkeley as part of the settlement of the city’s lawsuit against the University’s Long Range Development Plan. 

The Zoning Adjustments Board, which meets Thursday, faces its own burgeoning agenda, which includes: 

• Modification of the use permit for the David Brower Center. If all goes well, construction could begin next summer. 

• An update on plans to move the historic Blood House at 2526 Durant Ave. to make way for a 44-unit, five-story mixed use apartment complex on the site. 

That meeting gets underway at the unusual hour of 6 p.m. in City Council Chambers in Old City Hall, 2134 Martin Luther King Jr. Way. 

The opening one-hour session begins with an appeal by four neighbors of ZAB’s decision to allow construction of a 608-square-foot addition to a home at 2750 Buena Vista Way and the Blood House update.  

The use-permit modification for the Brower Center is logged as an item for the consent calendar. 

The regular meeting begins when the special session ends and features hearings on the installation of four ATM machines in the Telegraph Avenue area, with one each at 2200 and 2519 Durant Ave. and 1823 and 1879 Euclid Ave. 

Also on the agenda is a hearing on plans to demolish a single family home at 1532 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. and replace it with a two-story duplex and a single story cottage. 

Another single-family home demolition proposal will also be heard which would result in the building of a two-story, 2846-square-foot home on a lot at 1638 Carleton St. following the demolition of the 1,158-square-foot one-story home now on the lot. 

Also scheduled are hearings on plans to add a second story addition to a home at 1323 Kains Ave., a permit application to open a quick service restaurant with outdoor seating at 81 Shattuck Square and a permit application to transform an existing commercially zoned building at 1827 Fifth St. into a combined light manufacturing and commercial use.›