MARIETTA — Faced with the option to accept or reject a developer’s design for a seven-story residential building downtown, the City Council opted for detente.
The council voted unanimously Wednesday night to give Bridger Properties four months to tweak its proposal for an 84-foot, 135-unit building a few blocks off Marietta Square.
Bridger’s application to the city remains pending. The council asked the developer to hold town halls to collect input from residents before coming back with new plans.
Bridger has 120 days to do so, and will again go before the city’s Historic Board of Review. The historic board, which advises the council on applications for building changes within Marietta’s downtown historic district, voted 6-3 last week to recommend the council deny Bridger’s design.
“We’re very pleased by the outcome,” said Marietta attorney Chuck Clay, a former state senator who lobbied on Bridger’s behalf. “We came here with the intent of defusing. … Rightfully so, emotions were pretty high on all sides, and amongst the citizens, and that’s fine. But our hope was to do exactly this, which is to have time to negotiate in good will.”
Mayor Steve “Thunder” Tumlin said he wants to work with Bridger, but that whatever they build must abide by city code. During the council’s public hearing on the item, he took issue with the height of the building.
“I think talk is cheap,” Tumlin said after the meeting. “I want to see a plan that’s in compliance with our code.”
The 1.25-acre site of the proposed building, 25 Polk Street, is just west of the pedestrian bridge which spans the railroad tracks, and north of the Marietta Square Market food hall.
Bridger’s plan calls for a seven-story building — five stories of residences above two stories of parking. The building would have 135 units and replace a surface…
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