Zoning requests: STEAM nonprofit in Los Altos, metal salvage facility on Singleton

Newly added zoning applications

Z245-157: A new STEAM nonprofit for school-aged children, Launchpad, has signed a lease for 1018 Gallagher Street, owned by Vickery Meadow Learning Center, or Literacy Achieves. Their West Dallas satellite campus opened in 2009 after they purchased the property from Trinity River Mission, an outgrowth of Lovers Lane United Methodist Church, which had owned the property since at least 1970, according to Dallas Central Appraisal District records.

Launchpad is asking the City for a special-use permit (SUP) that would allow it to operate Sunday to Saturday from 9 a.m.-9 p.m. to “allow homeschool kids to utilize the center during the school days and allow time for kids that attend a campus to use the center after school hours.” The application notes the nonprofit’s offerings in the 4,000-plus square foot space will include “3D printing tools, machining and woodworking tools, science lab, digital media studio, and a creative/fiber arts studio.”

Z245-159: MetalX, based in Fort Wayne, Ind., is requesting a new special use permit to operate a metal salvage facility on the north side of Singleton across from American Concrete Products of Texas. A community meeting will take place at Jaycee Zaragoza Recreation Center on Tuesday, March 18 at 6 p.m. The owner has noted that all activities will occur inside a building with no outdoor storage.

Z245-118: The six-story Westerly apartments on Commerce at Pittman is asking to expand from 331 to 354 units, and eliminate 10,000 square feet of its required mixed-use ground floor retail space. “Due to market conditions,” the application states, “the applicant has been unable to lease any of the required ground floor retail space since purchasing the property in 2021.” Some of the retail space would be live-work units, and the applicant says the ground floor spaces currently required to be retail would be “designed in such a way to allow them to be converted back to retail uses in the future.”

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Coming soon to a City Plan Commission hearing

Z234-195: A vacant site across Hampton from Uplift Charter Preparatory could become a duplex. Currently zoned for office buildings, staff is recommending approval of the site’s change to residential. The owner originally wanted to build three 2-bedroom townhomes fronting Calypso, but at a community meeting on Monday, Jan. 27, at Nash-Davis Recreation Center, the owner told West Dallas residents the plan was to build a duplex, live on one side and lease the other. Neighbors raised concerns about short-term rentals, the secluded design of the model with the front doors on the sides, and the garage doors and driveway being too wide, which doesn’t match the other homes in the neighborhood.

The request is on the City Plan Commission’s March 6 agenda after being held under advisement several times since Oct. 24.

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Future Dallas City Council dockets and decisions

Z245-106: A boarding house, a closed restaurant and a barbershop are among the four buildings at this half-acre site at Singleton and Navaro, just east of Jerry’s Supermarket. The owner is asking for zoning that would allow her to convert the boarding house on Navaro into three multi-family units, and add a mix of multifamily, retail and restaurants along Singleton.

A community meeting on Monday, Feb. 10 held at Wesley-Rankin’s youth center had fewer than 10 attendees. City staff is recommending approval of the zoning change, which includes deed restrictions volunteered by the owner that would prohibit certain uses. Community members asked for the addition of affordable housing in the deed restrictions, which the owner was open to, but the City was not.

City Plan Commissioners unanimously approved the request on Feb. 20, subject to the deed restrictions volunteered by the owner. It hasn’t yet been placed on an upcoming City Council agenda.