IHBC Yearbook 2015

R E V I E W 23 highly valued by many long-standing resident families as well as by those who moved there specifically for its neighbourhood character. The Yalecrest neighbourhood has been the inspirational template for residential designs for the new town of Daybreak to the south west of Salt Lake City. It is widely recognised as the best concentration of period revival residential development in Utah, and across much of the American West. Yalecrest was designated as a historic district of over 1,400 properties on the National Register of Historic Places in 2007 in recognition of this architectural integrity, character and importance. Development pressure Today, Yalecrest is threatened by incompatible infill, including ‘teardowns’ (demolitions), ‘pop-tops’ (2nd storey additions to single storey houses), and ‘McMansions’ (grossly over-scaled new development). The neighbourhood’s historic residential character has been attracting a different ‘residential’ interest, based on the potential of the site rather than the existing architecture. Over several years, specific developers have been capitalising and trading on the desirable residential ‘location’ that derives from the historic residential character, which they then proceed to destroy. The result is the incremental demolition of individual houses and their replacement with much larger dwellings maximising the potential volume achievable within the zoning standards (zoning which in most cases is far from custom-tailored). While Yalecrest has long been recognised as an urban cultural asset worthy of protection and preservation, and is identified as such in city planning policy documents going back to the 1980s, providing that protection has been neither rapid nor easy. Eventually, with its honorary recognition and tax credit preservation incentives of the National Register in 2007, pressure increased to seek Local Historic District status and protection to preserve the neighbourhood. City intervention In 2010, with an increase in actual and prospective demolitions, overscaled rebuilds and out of character remodels and additions, the city decided to intervene by adopting a six month moratorium (the maximum permitted within state law) on demolition and insensitive external alteration, requiring all proposals to go through a historic review process as if the area were a designated Local Historic District (LHD). This interim protection was intended to enable the city and community to proceed with LHD designation, with time invested in public education and discussion, as well as the designation process. Although the moratorium halted the demolitions and inappropriate alterations, it also caught a number of people in the middle of proposals to extend or remodel, requiring all such proposals to go through a process none had anticipated or designed for and which only a minority understood. Reaction from those inconvenienced was understandably negative and the climate was used effectively by those who had made a living from ‘modernising’ the neighbourhood to play on uninformed public concerns and anxieties. State intervention Despite extensive negative reaction, the proponents of designation and neighbourhood protection duly applied to designate Yalecrest as a LHD. The application to designate proceeded through its first hearings, and received the support of the Historic Landmark Commission in late 2010. Public support for designation Yalecrest: ‘Pop-Top’ second storey incompatible infill Yalecrest: period revival cottages

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