A development team that earlier this year proposed the largest housing development ever in San Francisco’s West Portal neighborhood is more than doubling the number of homes it’s planning at the site and adding three stories to the project.
The dramatic super-sizing of the plan — from 64 to 172 units and from 9 to 12 stories— for the shuttered Empire Theater at 85 West Portal Ave. was made possible by Mayor Daniel Lurie’s recent “Family Zoning” changes as well as the acquisition of an adjacent property.
Local merchants and residents had already complained that the smaller project was out of character in the low-slung commercial strip. The much bigger revision is likely to spark greater pushback…