Applicant Penny Young said she wants to improve Faubourg Marigny by operating a business that would emphasize food and music.
A proposal for a new music club on Frenchmen Street ran into opposition at a New Orleans City Planning Commission hearing this week, with Faubourg Marigny residents and a handful of club owners saying they fear the popular live music strip is getting too congested. After a lengthy discussion, the commission deferred action for two weeks to let applicant Penny Young revise her proposal and try to reach some agreement with neighbors.
Young's original proposal called for renovating the former Laborde Printing Co. building at 516 Frenchmen St. into a club called Bamboula's, with two stages, three bars and kitchen facilities. The two-story, 7,000-square-foot building has been vacant for several years.
Despite the terms of her first submission, Young insisted she does not want to open a nightclub or a cocktail lounge. Rather, her business would emphasize food and music, with more than 50 percent of sales coming from food, she said.
Under the terms of a special Arts and Cultural Overlay District created for Frenchmen Street in 2004 as a way to legalize many of the music clubs already operating there in violation of zoning rules, no more than 20 percent of the buildings on the three blocks between Esplanade Avenue and Royal Street are supposed to be clubs offering live entertainment.
Penny Young is looking to open a 7,000-square-foot music club called Bamboula's in the former Laborde Printing Co. building on Frenchmen Street, pictured here. The planning commission staff said city records indicate that about 38 percent of the 34 properties on the three blocks are now offering live music, and representatives of the Faubourg Marigny Improvement Association and other clubs on the street said the actual ratio is about 50-50.
Miles Swanson of the FMIA said the district is "maxed out" on live music and is threatening to turn into another Bourbon Street. Saying that Marigny is primarily a residential district and the Arts and Cultural District zoning was put in place to protect the neighborhood, he said the former printing company should be put to some use that would benefit residents, not converted into another club for tourists.
Another problem for Young is that the building is far larger than the 4,000-square-foot limit for live music venues on Frenchmen allowed by law. Even if the second floor is excluded, the building still is 1,200 square feet larger than the limit.
Young said she does not want to create a giant music club and is not wedded to her original proposal, but she offered no specifics on how she might revise it.
Besides neighborhood residents, operators of the Blue Nile and Spotted Cat also opposed Young's request, saying that no more clubs should be allowed on the street.
The commission voted 7-0 Tuesday to defer action until its Jan. 22 meeting to let Young and her partners, including building owner Andre Laborde, try to come up with revised plans that might win approval from the neighborhood association.
The site is in Councilwoman Kristin Gisleson Palmer's district.