Railyard Baca District condo project clears initial hurdle
Planning commission approves demolition of two buildings despite objections from some residents
Aplan to demolish two historic but dilapidated buildings in a section of Santa Fe Railyard property near Baca Street to make room for a 26-unit condominium project cleared its first hurdle Thursday night, despite objections from some nearby residents to the latest effort to add moderately priced housing near the city’s downtown area.
In a 5-1 vote, the Santa Fe Planning Commission endorsed a request by the Santa Fe Railyard Community Corp., which manages the city-owned land, to demolish an adobe office building and a small warehouse with corrugated metal sheathing that were once associated with the Monte Vista Fuel and Feed Co.
Some planning commissioners worried that the build-
ings would be demolished without any guarantees that the condo project would materialize. But as part of their motion, they recommended approval only “if and when a viable proposal is put forward for the use of that land.”
Nearly a dozen people waited several hours to voice their objections to the request, including area residents who expressed concerns about the impact of the proposed residential development that would replace the old buildings.
And they will have another chance to fight the project. Mayor Javier Gonzales and city councilors will have the final say. “Anytime we want to demolish a building, because the city owns these buildings, we have to go to the City Council,” said Richard Czoski, executive director of the Santa Fe Railyard Community Corp.
“Nobody argues, I don’t think, that these buildings are old and in poor [condition] and their commercial value is close to zero,” said Bruce Adams, who has lived in the neighborhood for 43 years. “They represent a story, however, about our community.”
Andres Paglayan, a developer who is repurposing an old warehouse adjacent to the two structures, urged planning commissioners to recommend denial of the demolition request. “Our development demonstrates that there is a possibility to integrate the old with the new,” he said.
But Rosemary Romero, a former Santa Fe city councilor who serves on the board of the Santa Fe Railyard Community Corp., said the buildings are nothing more than sheds. “They really have no significance,” she said, adding that the city envisioned redevelopment when it acquired the Santa Fe Railyard property.
The two buildings are identified as “historic structures” within the Baca area of the Railyard Master Plan. But they were deemed unworthy of preservation by the railyard corporation and by the city’s Historic Preservation Division.
“We wholeheartedly support the preservation of buildings worthy of preservation, and I think we’ve exhibited that throughout the Railyard where there are actual historic buildings,” Czoski said before Thursday’s meeting. “We just don’t feel like these buildings meet the standards for preservation.”
David Rasch, head of the city’s Historic Preservation Division, agreed. In a memo to planning commissioners, he said the buildings “are in a state of disrepair” and aren’t eligible to be designated as landmarks in the city’s register of historic structures.
While the buildings are “associated with local businesses operating in the locality of the historic railyard, [they] cannot be described as having important cultural associations,” Rasch wrote in the memo.
Czoski said denial of the demolition would block the proposed condo project. The small warehouse “would be in the footprint of one of the new residential buildings” and the adobe office building “is right in the middle of the access to the back of the project and the backyard of one of the condos,” he said.
Czoski said the proposed 26-unit condo project would be considered separately by city decision-makers. Czoski declined to identify the potential developer.
“It’s not public at this point, but it will be when he goes to the Planning Commission because he will be the applicant,” Czoski said. “He wishes to remain anonymous until the outcome of [the demolition request] is known. But he is a very local developer.”
The 10-acre Baca District is about a mile south of the main Railyard and once served as a coal and fuel storage yard for the Denver & Rio Grande and New Mexico Central railways, according to railyardsantafe.com.
“It’s very mixed-use in nature,” Czoski said of already redeveloped sections of the Baca District. “It has everything from a stone yard to a high end artist’s studio to an architect’s office to some residential. Of course, there’s the retail that faces Cerrillos Road because that’s got great exposure.”
Czoski said rental prices in the Baca District are “a lot less” than those in the main Railyard.
“The land is cheaper, so when you build a building on this land, you can charge less rent,” he said.