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>> you can read the analysis the planning staff has prepared which took far more work and time on the city side and it should have but i commend the

planning staff for the patience they exercised and just would like to request approval of the project as endorsing the planning staff. thank you. >> president fong and commissioners, my nave is stephanie, i'm the girlfriend of martin shwarizon, and i have enjoy add wonderful life with martin, in recent year, we have discussed raising a family and we don't want to raise a family anywhere else, our dream to take our home and to make it into a family home. what you see in the drawings today is a family home, it's created through the addition of a family home and it's been a long evolution to get to this point. it's been shaped to create beautiful architecture and to

integrate the neighborhood and city feedback that we've received over this past year. we have made numerous changes to accommodate neighborhood and city requests and i believe that working and integrating these aspects created a better project that we had started off with, something that is balanced and beautiful and integrates seamlessly into the neighborhood, i base this not only my own belief but we have letters of support of the design as well as the fact that the city's department recommends this project, the letters that support and the city analysis just documents the knowledge that we have from our neighborhood, from the day we contacted our architect is the day we acted our neighbors, we wanted them to know all along what was happening to get feedback and include them in the process. we have gone so far as to offer the neighbors to select exterior colors, repeatedly offering one on one meetings

and accepting comments at any time. we have made adjustments and many, many, many people have been happy with the adjustments that we made, the only accommodation we haven't made is the one that was requested that if we want to raise a family in the city, we should sell our home and move. and in part, it's been impossible to meet all the demands of the neighborhoods because they've stated themselves in neighborhood meetings, if we would create a victorian replica, we would fight this, we have not just been neighbors, but friends, pet sitting, going to their children's school performances, calling when house alarms go off when they're out of town and we've always done that, but we still love our neighborhood, we love our city, if you grant

this, you would be granting us a second bathroom, a second bedroom, something that would make a bachelor pad a home, the effort and care we have put into this year-long process has created a structure that fits into the neighborhood, creates ak -- architecture into the neighborhood and there's an urban park across the street, as a biologist who does restoration in the bay area, i'm happy to have a native habitat in my own root, please deny the dr and please accept this project as it is. thank you. >> any other speakers in support of the project sponsor? if not, dr requester, you have a two minute rebuttal.

>> thank you, president fong, vice-president wu, i want to be really clear about this. there are three storeys of occupancy in the house now. it was converted to three storeys in 2003, it's visible clearly when viewed from the rear. the neighbors are opposed to any expansion beyond the existing three storeys of occupancy, whether it's called a habitable basement or a storey of occupancy is a subtlety beyond the neighbors who are going to be impacted by this, the original 900 square foot house was over 1400 square

feet were added, so we've gotten more than 2500 square feet were created in 2003, the idea that that's not adequate family housing just doesn't make a lot of sense to me. i raised my family in san francisco on a 1700 square foot house on a 25 foot lot. this is a 20 foot lot and you see from this picture, the impact that a vertical addition and a roof deck and a stair penthouse is going to have to the historical roof lines here, this is really a mistake. it should not be permitted to proceed. this is going to be a historic district, it should already be a historic district. this portion of buena vista park regarding siting and balance in the neighborhood are

clearly not complied with here. i would ask you to deny any vertical addition at this house. thank you. >> project sponsor, you have a two minute rebuttal. >> just a couple of things and i'm going to let mr. smith speak. again, there was no agreement in 2002, they can't produce one because there wasn't one, and if the third floor is so object nabl, then why in the dr requests do they say that a solution to the issue is to limit the project to three floors, they completely backtracked and didn't address that issue at all, and just in general, if this project at this size in this space is so acceptable and extraordinary to warrant the dr, nothing can be built in the city, there are 20

foot wide lots throughout the city, this is not alamo square, this is a mixed architectural area. thank you. >> i'd like to add something, i know people are saying this is a mistake, this is how you develop project ins cities, look at am stam, paris, london, there are buildings about today versus about yesterday, you get a rhythm, you get a counter point and you get honesty and various scales and all that, to rebut a couple of comments, i feel like i'm at the rnc listening to paul in fiction, the square foot added to the previous project was like 100 square feet. i don't know where 1400 square feet comes from, we've added about, i don't know, 50% to that with more one floor. i don't know where that square

footage comes from, thank you very much. >> okay. public portion is closed. moving to commissioner comments, commission near antonini. >> well, thank you, i'm usually very sympathetic to families trying to expand their existing space to be able to accommodate their needs, however, i think in this case, we have an extraordinary exceptional situation and i'll tell you why. i think i remember 2002 when i was first on the commission, maybe it's a different project, but i remember when i was first there, there was a project that had been proposed on and it was to go down the hill rather than to go up, i don't think it ever came before us, i think there was a compromise that was reached, that's the increase that occurred up to 2500 square feet so it's not a tiny house, it's 20 feet in width and i think it's all a question of proportion because we have to

have diversity in san francisco, we can't have all 20 and 25 foot frontages, and the earlier, our ancestors even in the late part of the 19th century realized there did have to be wider lots to accommodate people who could afford to do that or had those needs or for whatever reason, maybe because it was higher on a hill and less accessible, they decided that we needed lots that were 50 and 60 feet in width and one of them actually included a carriage house which was part of that and it's much akin to situations that saint francis would and other areas where garages were built separate from the house as part of the lot and this was the same kind of thing that was built there, and i don't really know why they separated out the carriage house and made it a separate property some years back because i think that might have been somewhat of a mistake because it is an anomaly on

that particular block and it does not look great, i went in the neighbor's house, i looked out at the views and looked at the intending -- light and i understand what will happen and i think it will have an impact particularly an uphill and downhill house, and what else is the design itself, i mean, there is a case to be made in my mind that you have to sort of honor the dominant architectural style of a neighborhood and not be so much at odds with it, i noticed that we have an 11th hour rendering here where we changed the colorings but we still don't have a pitch on the roof, there's no attempt to be con tech churl with the adjoining

properties, not that that makes a difference because we have a size problem here anyway, but it would have been a lot better if we had at least tried to be somewhat con tex khaourl to the structures along there, people come from all over the world to look at san francisco architecture, some people move here specifically because of the architecture, so we want to be like every place else and throw a bunch of structures that don't fit. there is a place for more contemporary architecture for other parts in the city but not in our historic areas where we should have something that fits in and i think to some degree, we have gone through a reverse evolution in architecture, if you look at these place that is were built in 1895 and 1909 and we don't seem to be able to do anything that has the same symmetry and balance and the grace were were able to do or we don't choose to do it, whether speed yens si or other

things why we can't builtfinger i was in the adjacent house, the light was beautiful, if you put the window ins the right place and you design a house properly, you don't need all this glazing and just square boxes, you can make things work really well, that's what they did for a few thousand years until recently, so anyway, i am definitely in favor of dr, whether there's a way that this could go back and be designed in such a way that there should be an additional floor, i don't know, i have my doubts, it would probably have to be redesigned quite a bit to be able to be, but i just don't think it fits on this particular lot given the fact that the size is so small. we'll see what the other commissioners have to say. >> commissioner hillis?

>> i mean, i too like commissioner antonini are generally supportive of expanding the envelopes of buildings and development but i agree with him on a lot of the points and i think what's wrong is the size of the lots and the size of the lots compared -- the existing lot here, the 20 foot lot here compare today the 50 foot lots of the adjacent buildings, the building that's there now and the design that's there now is great, it's an example of how you can put a modern building in this context as to older buildings, i think it works and i think it works contextually with the size of the lot and with the size of the lot adjacent to it but it goes a little too far in the expansion on that size of a lot for this building, so i would agree in taking up dr, i think the design of the new structure is great, it could work

elsewhere, i don't think it works on this 20 foot lot adjacent to these buildings. could an addition work, sure, i think it probably could but i don't think what's before us could. >> commissioner sugaya. >> i have a question, on the upper floor that's being questioned, you have a master bedroom, to the rear of the bedroom, the ceiling drops and -- but it still has enough head height, is that right. >> it's a code minimum but it drops and fits under the planning envelope. >> so, it is usable as bedroom space? >> yes. >> mr. moore? >> while i'm very concerned as well as sympathetic to the

specialness to the setting, i'm looking at what staff is analyzing for us to look at. this is a code compliant project, it doesn't ask for exceptions or for variances or for any other things which would trigger it to be exceptional or extraordinary and there is no restriction on a 20 foot lot in terms of far [inaudible] which are exceeded in what is proposed here, and i'm not even commenting as to whether or not or like this contempt rarely piece of architecture and i have to bite my tongue that i am completely enamored of it but that is not in front of me, it is a code compliant project which goes under a question of taste because we're not talking about the type of architecture we discussed a few weeks ago at pacific heights. having said that, i really need

to look at circumstance, we have a building designed by the same architects which was approved. there's apparently nothing which documents that a future addition could not take place, so what is actually a rather modest addition is not really that much of concern to me. unfortunately, i could say that the view from v*is ta park to the city which is a very significant view, it is not a protected view, it is not a protected view, and even when we have documented protective views in the city which are there few, unfortunately not enough, we have a hard time enforcing them or not making concessions when a building in order to be a building expansion comes in and asks us to consider what it means or doesn't mean. so, i have a very hard time dinging the project just based on the fact that i am not so enamored but it.

i believe that the two buildings on either side and bonn na v*is ta park is one of the most spectacular settings of historic san francisco neighborhoods, and i think they are tourist destinations, i love seeing the buildings, i commend anybody who has the energy and ability to live and maintain these buildings, but that does not put me on a bind to do something other than what i'm asked to do here. and i just want to leave with that and hear what my fellow other commissioners have to say. >> commissioner borden. >> commissioner moore, i completely agree with your sentiments, and hearing people, i was confused what project they were discussing, when you see the context and the dr requesters put on the screen of the two other buildings adjacent to this property you can see how modest this property is in comparison to

these much larger building, it doesn't mean somebody else can't build up their building a bit. i really had a hard time understanding what the concern was, to me, there seems to be something personal about what happened years ago with what people think should or should not have happened and that's not for me to judge, the personal issues that went on between neighbors or agreements that did or did not happen, but when i look at the context, i have a hard time understanding what the problem is other than there seems to be a disagreement that goes back several years and has come to a head again. commissioner moore's right, it's a code compliant project, it's a modest addition to a building that's already modern in context that sits in nicely, i've been in this property i know that this -- i mean, i just have a hard time understanding what's exceptional or extraordinary, the two buildings next door