G.S. may allow employee dormitories in certain parts of city

G.S. may allow employee dormitories in certain parts of city
At its Aug. 10 regular session, Gulf Shores City Council discussed an amendment to the zoning ordinance that would allow for employee dormitories in certain parts of the city but also limit condos and multi-family buildings in general business areas to help with burgeoning traffic issues.
On the zoning change, Mayor Robert Craft said the city is working hard to reign in traffic but without reigning the growth coming to the city traffic will just become a bigger problem.
“Building new roads especially a north-south road is impossible,” Craft said. “We’ve been working hard over the last eight years really trying to get grant monies and we’ve got $80 million more to spend than the $25 million we’ve already committed to this.
“So, it’s taken a lot of money to improve the roads we have. But that’s not enough to get traffic control. We’ve got to look at growth management and everything that means.
“A lot of that is density and location and improvements required to be able to have allow by-right opportunities where there’s no adjustment to what they can build,’’ he added. “Otherwise we’ll continue to fall behind on traffic.”
According to Community Development Director Lee Jones, an employment dormitory is a residential building that contains temporary living quarter for employees but does not include separate dwelling units and may include common dining, cooking and recreation or bathing facilities.
“We’re right sizing zoning to match the infrastructure,” Jones said. “Today the multi-family permitted by right will overly impact our infrastructure. It is too much for our infrastructure to handle over time. This amendment will allow council and planning commission more oversight in order to make sure that with multi-family use permits we are making accommodations for infrastructure and improvements and impact on adjacent properties to go along with it.”
The ordinance change is expected to come before the council at the Aug. 24 meeting.
During the meeting, the council also heard details of a zoning ordinance amendment that would allow nonconforming condos to be rebuilt. Under current rules if a 170-unit building was destroyed in a hurricane only the 90 permitted in the ordinance as it currently reads could be rebuilt. The development was built when that much density was allowed but the rules have now changed. This amendment would allow for all 170 units to be rebuilt. The ordinance change came before council at the Aug. 24 meeting.