started construction this week on a new Chase bank branch in Southwest Portland.

Located at 2121 S.W. Fourth Ave., the 7,457-square-foot space composes the entire ground floor of the building. previously occupied the space.

Jon Thornburg, senior project manager for Chase, said the bank was completely remodeling the space’s interior to reflect standard Chase finishes, furniture and equipment. The project’s general contractor is Vancouver, Wash.-based Robertson Olson Construction and the project architect is Seattle-based .

In addition, Josh Schlesinger, vice president and asset manager for , said his company would also be doing a complete renovation of the HVAC system. He said the space was on the market for six months prior to the lease agreement with Chase and that the bank was an excellent long-term tenant.

Construction began on Jan. 9 and Thornburg said the branch is expected to open for business in April.

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Southwest Portland residents and JPMorgan Chase have spent several months debating the design for a proposed bank branch at 6361 S.W. Capitol Highway, in the Hillsdale neighborhood.

Now it looks like the bank may be able to circumvent much of the controversy by enlarging the branch’s building-to-parking-lot ratio with a canopy that would cover part of the lot. The “building” would not be enclosed, but it would still count toward the minimum building square footage required by city zoning code for the lot.

Though Chase may be able to go forward with its plan, the Hillsdale Neighborhood Association says it will continue to oppose it. Its concern for the site relates to a greater desire to increase density and multiuse buildings on the neighborhood’s main drag.

The design of Chase’s proposed Hillsdale branch initially called for a footprint occupying just 21 percent of the lot. But Hillsdale’s Main Street area has commercial storefront zoning, which requires that a building take up at least 50 percent of a lot.

Chase stuck with its proposal until it was informed by senior planner Douglas Hardy that the city was unlikely to approve its request for a zoning variance.

After returning to the drawing board, Chase proposed constructing a similar branch building with an additional community room for neighborhood use and a large canopy. The number of parking spaces wouldn’t change.

The strategy is OK, technically, Hardy said.

“The way the zoning code defines building coverage … it doesn’t have to literally be a building with four walls and a roof. It can be one of these canopies,” Hardy said.

“There’s some quirky things in the zoning code,” he added.

Hardy advised the bank that its proposal would eliminate the need for a variance, and that its plan wouldn’t need to be reviewed until the building permit stage. The bank hasn’t submitted a final plan to the city, according to Hardy, but alterations are not required.

Nevertheless, residents have resisted the canopy proposal. At a neighborhood association meeting on Wednesday, Hillsdale Main Street Design Committee co-chairman and neighborhood resident Richard Garfinkle said that the bank was doing the least amount possible to meet the site’s zoning requirements.

“The canopy is embarrassing,” Garfinkle said.

For residents present at the meeting, the proposed Chase bank branch – a single-tenant building on Main Street’s only vacant lot – symbolizes a missed opportunity.

“What we need most of all is apartments,” Hillsdale resident John Gould said at the meeting. “We don’t need another bank that minimizes the use (of the land).”

Residents are hoping for an eventual light-rail stop in Hillsdale, but they fear that light density could ruin those chances, Gould said.

The property is owned by Ardys Braidwood, whose family has owned the land since 1908. Braidwood is a managing partner at Wardin Investments. The company has studied the site’s potential for a two-story building with ground-floor retail and either office space or housing upstairs, she said, but “it just didn’t pencil out.”

The site isn’t deep enough to accommodate parking that would be necessary for so many tenants, she said.

Prior to the economic collapse in 2008, Braidwood helped design a four-tenant, one-story retail development for the site. After the downturn, however, interest in that project dried up, she said.

“So I sat on it, and Chase Bank came to me and asked about a long-term land lease,” Braidwood said.

If Chase can move forward with its proposed footprint despite residents’ concerns about density, the bank will still need to go through a city design review process. At the Wednesday meeting, architects from Seattle-based presented a Northwest-inspired Chase branch design that features brick, metal materials and lots of pedestrian-oriented windows – better than the “off-the-shelf” design Chase had initially proposed, according to residents.

While residents such as Garfinkle hope that Chase will change its mind about the project, the bank does not need their approval.

“Frankly, what Chase has to do is meet the code requirements,” Chase’s attorney, Gregory Hathaway of Portland-based , said at Wednesday night’s meeting. “This technically meets those requirements.”

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Chase representatives have requested, again, that the city of Portland delay its decision about the bank’s application to build a branch in the Hillsdale neighborhood in Southwest Portland.

“We made this decision in an effort to continue to try to work with the neighborhood association to find a solution that will work for everyone,” Chase spokeswoman Darcy Donahoe-Wilmot wrote in an email.

Douglas Hardy, a planner with the city’s Bureau of Development Services, said he called Chase officials at the end of last week to “give them a heads-up” that the city would likely not approve the application.

Chase is seeking an adjustment request, to build a branch building that occupies only 21 percent of the site, instead of the 50 percent required by the commercial storefront zoning in place in the Hillsdale Neighborhood Town Center.

“It’s just too far from the minimum building coverage standard,” Hardy said.

The Hillsdale Neighborhood Association last week submitted a letter to the city expressing its opposition to the request. Association President Mikal Apenes told the 91��Ƶ previously that the organization opposed the application because it had not been able to discuss it with Chase representatives.

Chase representatives met with residents in early August; however, after initial concerns were raised, residents’ requests to meet with Chase officials to discuss an alternate “design plan” did not result in meetings, according to HNA member Robert Hamilton, who was tasked with setting up the meetings.

The comment period for the application was set to end Sept. 19, but it was extended an additional 30 days, with the city slated to issue a decision around Oct. 26. Chase will have the option to change its proposal in the interim, but if the application is significantly different, then it may need to start over, Hardy said.

“(Chase officials) are re-evaluating their alternatives for the proposal,” he said. “They’ll be getting back to me.”

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A disagreement about the format of a proposed new Chase bank branch in Southwest Portland’s Hillsdale neighborhood seemed to be moving toward a potential compromise. After meeting with multiple groups of stakeholders, Chase had extended the deadline for public comment on its application by a month.

As the comment period comes to a close, however, Hillsdale Neighborhood Association members say their requests for meetings with the bank were denied, and that the HNA plans to oppose the bank’s application.

Now city staffers will decide whether to approve or deny Chase’s request for adjustment. And neighborhood representatives say approval would undo years of work to shape their town center.

The “storefront commercial” zoning that governs Hillsdale Town Center requires that buildings occupy at least 50 percent of their lots. But in Chase’s proposal, the building would take up only 21 percent of the lot; 44 percent would be used for vehicle parking and 35 percent would be dedicated to landscaping and pedestrian circulation.

Ray Lindley, a Chase market manager, said the adjustment is needed to provide “adequate parking and easy access” to the branch, but residents strongly object to the idea.

“People in the neighborhood have worked long and hard to establish the commercial storefront zoning and to develop the Hillsdale neighborhood town center,” HNA President Mikal Apenes said. “(The bank’s adjustment) would be a giant step back from the whole process.”

HNA member Robert Hamilton said the proposed size of the parking lot contradicts the neighborhood’s goals to achieve greater density and encourage use of public transit in the town center.

Hamilton tried to set up meetings with Chase to discuss the issue, and delay the bank’s application further, until the neighborhood and the bank could agree on a footprint that was “satisfactory, if not acceptable” to both parties, he said. Though multiple emails were exchanged between Hamilton and the bank, that meeting didn’t happen.

Lindley acknowledged that residents tried to set up a meeting, but added that Chase believes they were primarily concerned with “design elements,” and not the zoning issue.

“We are not even at the point of design,” Lindley said.

In his requests for meetings with Chase, Hamilton said he wanted to discuss a “design plan.” In his mind, the property would ideally hold a multistory structure to house multiple retail businesses and condominiums, to help meet density goals.

“The adjustment was the primary concern of the neighborhood association,” Apenes said. “I thought we had been pretty clear on that with Chase bank.”

The Hillsdale Neighborhood Association is drafting a letter of opposition to the adjustment application, Apenes said.

City staffers will make a decision about the adjustment application around Sept. 26, according to Bureau of Development Services spokesman Ross Caron. An appeal would go before the city’s adjustment committee.

Caron could not speak about the details of the Chase case, but said that staffers decide whether to approve applications based on whether applicants “meet the intent or the purpose of the regulation they’re asking to modify.” Comments from the neighborhood association and the public would be taken into consideration as they apply to the approval criteria, he said.

Lindley said that Chase is eager to move forward with the project. The new location would serve Chase customers who don’t have a local branch, he said. The closest one to the proposed Hillsdale site is approximately one mile away, inside the Burlingame Fred Meyer store.

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A 5,300-square-foot space that formerly housed a copy center at the corner of Northwest Lovejoy Street and 23rd Avenue is being transformed into a Chase bank. The exterior will be updated with stone veneer, clear aluminum and extensive glass, and the interior will include offices, conference spaces and teller windows. James E. John Construction Co. is the general contractor and Callison Architecture is the designer of the renovation project.

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A former copy center at the corner of Northwest Lovejoy Street and 23rd Avenue will be a Chase bank by mid-summer. The 5,300-square-foot space will have teller windows, offices and new ADA-accessible restrooms. The exterior will have extensive glass with stone veneer and clear aluminum. James E. John Construction Co. is the general contractor and Callison Architecture is the designer of the renovation.

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