Today's Washington Business Journal print edition (available online to subscribers only) addresses Monday's Zoning Commission decision to request large-scale changes to the Florida Rock development plan (which the WBJ had trumpeted merely a week ago as being on the cusp of approval), saying that the recommendations for a redesign "were news to the developer and the Anacostia Waterfront Corp., which has been involved in the project-planning process. 'We were astounded,' says David Briggs, FRP's representative and land-use attorney at Holland + Knight. FRP plans to meet with the District's Office of Planning to determine its next course of action. The Office of Planning is expected to reconnect [JD: recommend?] incorporating the commission's suggestions unless the developer wants to leave the site as is -- a concrete mixing and gravel storage area."

Today's DC Register has published the final version of the text amendment (case 05-10) to the Capitol Gateway Overlay District zoning regulations that has been winding through the process since early 2005. From the order: "The amendments place limits on density transferred through combined deployments, extend the Zoning Commission review and approval process and design guidelines to additional properties within the boundaries of the Capitol Gateway ("GC") Overlay, and establish preferred retail and entertainment use requirements and regulations along First and Half Streets S.E. within the area. In addition, the rules impose, within the Overlay, a 15-foot setback and a 1:1 upper story step-back above a height of 110 feet for buildings fronting South Capitol Street; an upper stories set-back for building[s] fronting Half Street S.E.; and a 1:1 upper story step-back above a height of 110 feet for buildings fronting Potomave Avenue S.E. and S.W. The rules also provide for referral to the National Capital Planning Commission of all applications for the review of buildings and uses on lots that abut South Capitol Street." Whew! The CG Overlay has yet to be posted in its entirety on the Zoning Commission web site (see that "Reserved" for Chapter 11?), but in the interim I've cobbled together the various ZC orders and other documents (we're still waiting on the publication of the final order for ZC case 06-25, which extended the CG Overlay boundary across South Capitol Street) into a single sleep-inducing document. You can also read my explanatory treatise from a few months back on this Overlay and its companion, the Southeast Federal Center Overlay.