Currently, developers looking to build townhomes in the City of Fredericksburg can build one townhouse per lot or two if stacked.
But that limit, part of the “principal use” standards in the city’s Unified Development Ordinance, isn’t working in practice, Planning and Historic Resources Manager Kate Schwartz told City Council during a work session Tuesday night.
“They [developers] think of them more like multi-family or condo buildings,” Schwartz said. “The way that we’re defining it right now doesn’t really work.”
Among changes to the UDO Schwartz proposed on Tuesday night is a plan to allow 16 units — or two stacks of eight — per lot.
The proposed changes also include reducing the minimum lot size for single-family attached dwellings. The minimum lot size for R8 is proposed to go from 2,250 to 1,620 square feet; R12 from 1,875 to 1,620 feet; FBC Building Type 4 and FBC Character Structures from 1,875 to 1,620 feet.
Other updates concern the form-based code. For example, a park is added to the permitted types of formal open spaces.
“These can be characterized as an incremental step toward diversification of our housing types, and a first step toward the commercial corridors we’ve been talking about,” Schwartz said.
According to Schwartz, the UDO changes will be the subject of a planning commission public hearing in August. They would then go before City Council for approval in the fall.
City to solicit proposals for Renwick Complex
The city is moving forward with soliciting proposals for the adaptive reuse project for the Renwick Complex, which consists of the Renwick Courthouse, Old Jail and Wallace Library.
“Each one is its own little puzzle,” Schwartz said of the buildings.
Any project that the city accepts would adhere to guidelines set forth by the state Public-Private Education Facilities Act. PPEA allows for projects such as: education facilities; recreational facilities; and communications infrastructure.
Back in 2023, the city council formed a Renwick working group to help shape the future of the property. According to Schwartz, that group settled on a few key priorities. They include: continuing critical maintenance projects (such as the bell tower replacement last year); pursuing a public-private partnership; utilization of historical rehabilitation tax credits; public use of or access to the buildings; and preservation of all three buildings.
The courthouse, explained Schwartz, “is the most significant of the three buildings, and within that, the courtroom is the most important space.”
Schwartz said the city distributed the final draft to the working group and has received feedback.
“We’re really grateful for the continued engagement from those folks,” she said.
In a June 22 email to Schwartz, Danae Peckler, who represents Historic Fredericksburg Foundation, Inc. questioned the “confusing message about the courthouse’s level of historic significance”. Peckler noted that one of the working group’s recommendations was the completion of a National Register of Historic Places evaluation of the property’s historic significance.
“This intensive study of its history and historic fabric would greatly assist in the identification of physical architectural features determined to be of greatest historic value and worthy of greater sensitivity and preservation,” Peckler wrote. “But of equal importance for the rehab project would be the doors that open for grants beyond Historic Tax Credits.”
At-large councilor Will Mackintosh asked whether the working group came up with a rough cost estimate for the project.
“We carried through a ‘vanilla shell,’” said Schwartz, “and it would depend on the use, but one number was $20 million.”
