Protecting the View Plane at Coors Field Through Transfer of Development Rights

As a native Coloradan, its been exciting watching the Colorado Rockies catch fire and roll through the the end of the baseball regular season and beginning of the playoffs. My vantage point in the New York Metro Area is particularly interesting because baseball is so socially and culturally important here.

During this same time period, I have also been following the intense debate about protecting the views of the Rocky Mountains seen from Coors Field. Given that the title of this blog is "A View of the Rockies," I feel compelled to comment on this issue.

From Denver media accounts, I understand that Bill and Paula Leak, long-time owners of the Light Bulb Supply Company at 2010 Delgany Street want to sell their property to a real estate developer. Much of the value of their property to a developer derives from its location and the fact that it could be zoned for a 14 story building. However, if a building that tall is built on the property, it could seriously degrade views of the Rocky Mountains from from parts of Coors Field such as the view beyond the left field wall above the third base line from Section 22 on the club level. (See, for example this story from the Rocky Mountain News, http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/real_estate/article/0,1299,DRMN_414_5717928,00.html


Figures 1: View of Coors Field at Sunset with the Rocky Mountains in the Background (note this photograph is for illustrative purposes only and is not intended to reproduce the view plane being discussed in this blog entry).

Photograph from http://www.baseballpilgrimages.com/national/colorado.html

The views from Coors Field create a unique sense of place in the stadium and are an important amenity for the Denver Metro Area, helping to define and communicate what is unique and wonderful about region --a thriving urban scene in close proximity to one of the most spectacular mountain ranges in the world. As the baseball Rockies make their run through the playoffs this year and national telecasts show views of the mountains from Coors Field, it provides enormous promotional value for the Metro Denver Area.

This is a classic conflict between private property rights and the public interest. These issues can be very thorny and difficult to resolve in a way that is fair to both parties and is consistent with legal and economic principles. My guiding framework for resolving these types of conflicts is to use the minimum of amount of government power needed to resolve the issue and to establish market-based solutions whenever possible.

One solution, advocated by some neighborhood residents, would be for the City of Denver to establish a view plane ordinance which restricts the height of buildings near Coors Field. The problem with this idea is that it is unfair to the Leaks who have been present at this location for many years before Coors Field was built, running a business that generated economic value for the city when the neighborhood was extremely underutilized. The Leaks have a legitimate right to profit from the area's increase in property values and a simple view plane ordinance by itself could be construed as an unconstitutional "taking" of their property without providing just compensation.

Alternatively, the Denver Metropolitan Major League Baseball Stadium District, a public entity, could purchase the Leaks' land and would then control future development there. The problem with this idea is there are other properties which could also be developed which might cause view obstructions at Coors Field and this precedent could encourage private interests to attempt to coerce metro area tax payers into buying their property at inflated prices, even when there are no near-term development prospects.

However, there is a clear and obvious compromise to resolve this issue --the combination of a view plane ordinance with the use of Transfer of Development Rights (TDRs) also referred to as Transferable Development Rights. This idea was mentioned in a very thoughtful article by Bob Reuteman in the October 13, 2007, Rocky Mountain News (http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/business_columnists/article/0,1299,DRMN_82_5721588,00.html).
TDRs, commonly known as "air rights," allow the owners of a low-rise property, built shorter than maximum zoning would normally allow for, to sell the right to build additional stories to a developer who wants to build a structure at another location that is taller than is permitted by that site's zoning.

TDRs can be a powerful tool for historic preservation and economic development. For example in New York City where TDRs are commonly bought and sold, the sale of air rights from a near-by church, allowed the 55 story Millennium Hotel to be built across the Street from the World Trade Center, bolstering the church's endowment and ensuring its survival in the high cost environment of the lower Manhattan commercial district near Wall Street. Additionally, Broadway Theatres in Manhattan have sold their TDRs, for use in near-by high-rise developments, preserving the theaters' economic viability as low rise, special use buildings in a neighborhood with some of the highest land prices in the world (See Figure 2).

Figure 2: In 2006, Developer SJP Residential Agreed to Purchase the Air Rights from the Al Hirschfeld Theatre in New York, Pictured Below, to Increase the Permitted Height of its 42 Story Condominium Project in Manhattan.

Photograph from Al Hirschfeld Theater entry in Wikepdia.

In the case of protecting the view plane from Coors Field, buildings in the view plane could be limited to six stories or less and property owners could be granted TDRs for the additional eight stories which they normally would have been entitled to build. Then owners like the Leaks could sell those TDRs to other developers in Denver who want to construct taller building in parts of town where view planes are less important.

According to Bob Reuteman, there is already an allowance for TDRs in the Platte Valley in the Denver Municipal Code. This code should be carefully examined and, if necessary, modified to create enough economic value for the Leaks and other property holders near Coors Field to be able to recover the full economic loss they suffer from having their properties height restricted to protect the Coors Field views. For example, in some jurisdictions, TDRs have limited value because they can only be sold to neighboring or adjacent sites and can not be marketed to developers across town. In the Coors Field case, the City of Denver needs to permit the TDRs to be marketed to a wide enough area in downtown Denver and streamline the approval process to ensure that their value is high enough to adequately compensate impacted landowners.

This is a winning, taxpayer friendly, compromise solution which balances individual private property rights with the public interest and minimizes harmful government interference in the workings of the private market.

Lets hope the baseball Rockies can also find a winning solution.