Injunction in works to stop Charles Ave. changes?

Neighbors on Charles Avenue, the oldest street in the Grove, are concerned about the zoning change request for Charles Avenue. We brought up the subject before.

It was thought that the PointeGroup was behind the zoning change request. They are responsible for the Grand Avenue project to be in Village West. But the zoning change for Charles Avenue is a request of the Aries Development Group, the people that own Calamari and the Taurus restaurants. They would like the zoning change for the Stirrup house, at 3242 Charles Avenue, which was built in 1888 by Grove pioneer Ebenezer Woodbury Franklin Stirrup. Their plan is to put a bed and breakfast, with a restaurant, in the historic house. But there are many concerns.


To begin with, the house butts up against the condo which is above Calamari, is the plan to extend the condo into the lot you see here, attached to the Stirrup House? Once the zoning is changed from residential to commercial, what is to stop that, although the condos would be residential anyway. But the street is not zones for high rises -- yet. Across the street are empty lots that abut the Coconut Grove Playhouse. It's assumed that those lots will become part of the new structure that is to be the future playhouse, if that ever gets underway. A parking garage and retail space is supposed to be part of the new playhouse. There is an injunction to stop the zoning changes on Grand Avenue and now another is being talked about to stop any changes from residential to commercial on Charles Avenue.


Residents want to keep the history of the Grove at the place where the Grove stared. It reminds us of this -- St. Stephen's church. This old 1912 church, you may remember, was knocked down a couple of years ago to build a replica, shown below. Laws were actually changed to protect our history due to this atrocity. And this is what residents on Charles Avenue are trying to avoid. A bed and breakfast is nice, especially in an historic house, but once the "door is opened" to zoning changes, what's to stop an atrocity like the St. Stephen's mess? Maybe not by the Aries Development Group, but someone else with bigger ideas. And therein lies the rub.