Burbank City's Response

In response to my query about the monster-sized house (see post below), here's the response I received from Burbank city senior planner Patrick Prescott: "I did not receive the photos you attached, but I have spoken with Tom Zartl and reviewed the plans for 1053 East Elmwood. The home in question is built at a four foot side yard setback. This setback meets the minimum requirement for side yards, which is 10% of the width of the lot. The average width of the lot is 45 feet; therefore, the required side yard setback is four feet. The lot size is 12,940 square feet and the floor area (including the 34 square foot portion of the garage over 600 square feet) is 5,162 square feet. The floor area ratio for this property is 40%, which is the maximum lot coverage allowed. The maximum height in the R1 zone is 30 feet. The highest point of the home at 1053 East Elmwood is 29’-10”, which complies with code." I still say this violates the spirit, if not the letter, of the anti-mansionization codes.

Just in Time for Halloween: a Monster (-Sized) House!

It's a Walmart!...It's an apartment building!...no, it's the side and front views of a single family home being built smack in the middle of a residential street in Burbank. How did something this big make it past Burbank City's Planning Department or the permitting people? And what's become of our vaunted anti-mansionization laws? How'd the builder manage to encroach on the neighbor's property? Are Burbank lots subdividable after all? If you know the answers to any of these questions, please blog back.

NBC

Okay, so it's true, but not so bad. We've got 'em for 3 more years. And the property is to be sold to media companies. For a second, I was worried that there might be a huge expansion of Forest Lawn or another Grove-type mall coming to those 34 acres.

Price drop already?!

Regarding The Collection, la.curbed.com reports that prices have dropped already and are now slightly under $700,000.

Shootings in our Little Burbank!

There was a triple murder-suicide on my block this past Thursday. It was a neighbor-against-neighbor dispute, in a large apartment building, and at least one victim had nothing to do with the dispute. Family members were witnesses. Putting aside the issue of gun control, what does this say about urban density? In particular, the growing density in my neighborhood? (Okay, I'm a NIMBY.) Sure, this could be looked at as an isolated incident. But each week the police log in the Burbank Leader lists at least one crime "incident" on San Jose, a block away. As we all know, San Jose has become extremely overbuilt in the last two years and the number of people living in the neighborhood has soared. But the City planning staff member that I spoke to in April insisted at the time that there's no statistical correlation between density and crime. Oh, really? Tell this to the other neighbors who were in the bullets' paths. This shooting is just more fuel for my developing anti-growth sentiments. Incidentally, most of my co-Realtors are pro-growth.