It took persuasion, diplomacy and plenty of patience, but Michael Dorricott's dream of opening a gym in downtown Palo Alto is now on the cusp of becoming reality.

The gym, called Training Space, is set to take over the building at 999 Alma St. that was occupied by Anthropologie before the store moved to Stanford Shopping Center in 2015. Though city planners had signed off on the conditional use permit that the gym required, official approval was deferred because of two separate appeals from neighbors, who worried about the noise and parking impacts of the new facility.


Because of these appeals, the project was required to go through public hearings in front of the Planning and Transportation Commission, which voted on June 27 to support the application, and the City Council, which was slated to review the proposal after it returns from its July break.

Now, it looks like that review won't be necessary after all. Both of the resident groups who challenged the project had withdrawn their appeals, allowing the gym to move ahead, the Weekly has learned. Neilson Buchanan, who represented one of the appellant groups, informed city officials on Saturday that his neighborhood group no longer wishes to pursue its challenge. Dena Mossar, who co-signed the other appeal, had earlier agreed to withdraw it.

The decision by both appellants to drop their respective challenges means that Training Space can open in September, barring unforeseen complications, Dorricott said.

The decision by Buchanan's and Mossar's groups to withdraw their appeals means that Training Space will be the first business that is allowed to open downtown under the council's new rule on ground-retail protections. Last year, the council responded to concerns from the property owner about the difficulty of attracting retail to the corner of Alma and Addison, at downtown's southern periphery, by relaxing the requirement for ground-floor retail. The council specified that a gym (as well as several other "retail-like" uses) can open on downtown's periphery, provided they receive a conditional use permit.

Buchanan told the Weekly that after speaking to other neighbors, they decided not to challenge the city on this project. The group had argued in the appeal that the new gym -- along with two medical offices that are set to occupy the other half of the building on Alma Street -- would exacerbate the neighborhood's parking shortage, an assertion that Dorricott's team pushed back against. Because the building is "grandfathered" and because the parking demand for the gym is expected to be below Anthropologie's, Dorricott is not required to provide any additional parking.

On Monday, Buchanan told the Weekly that members of his group weren't clear on the precise impacts of the new businesses. As such, they agreed not to dispute the city over the application, he said.

"All we have is experience from the past and no real experience with three businesses coming online." Buchanan told the Weekly.

For Dorricott, the withdrawal is a welcome surprise after months of delays, which he said had cost him more than $60,000. He said Mossar had withdrawn her appeal earlier, after he had agreed to inform his customers about the neighborhood's parking situation and to encourage them to park on Alma Street, rather than on the residential streets in the South of Forest Avenue neighborhood.

His project team did not expect the second appeal, from Buchanan's group, to be rescinded. Dorricott said he had met with Buchanan at the Chamber of Commerce but that the conference did not lead to any resolution.

At the same time, Dorricott said he was hopeful throughout the process that his business and the residents will find a way to amicably work things out. He noted that his gym will have a membership cap.

"The way I saw it, if we as a business and the community members can't come to some sort of agreement on our own, how strong is our community, really?" Dorricott said. "That was my perspective going into it. I believe people can come to some sort of a conclusion most of the time, as long as people are willing to be fair and to give in for the greater good. That's what I tried to do."