Saratoga Hospital seeks zoning OK for garage in Saratoga Springs

A three-level parking garage with about 390 spaces could rise on Myrtle Street in Saratoga Springs under a plan from Saratoga Hospital, which would replace an 81-space surface lot and fold two neighboring parcels at 31 and 35 Myrtle St. into the hospital campus. The City Council must amend the zoning rules for the hospital campus before work can start, and the city’s Design Review Board took up that request on Wednesday, Oct. 21, 2026. The Planning Board voted 6-0 the next day to send the council a favorable advisory opinion, according to its draft minutes.

The site is on the west side of Myrtle Street, across from the hospital’s emergency room and next to the Saratoga Golf and Polo Club, the Daily Gazette reported Oct. 26. Part of the land comes with the medical office building at 31 Myrtle St., which the hospital bought in March 2025 for $2 million, according to the Gazette. That building will stay for now, the hospital’s application says.

The campus is governed by a planned unit development, or PUD, a custom zoning district the council created on Sept. 8, 1987. It covers 29.23 acres on both sides of Myrtle Street, with the main hospital building facing Church Street, and the council has amended it seven times, most recently on Dec. 9, 2024. The new request would add the two Myrtle Street parcels to that district and write a parking garage into the rules.

Here are the key facts from the filings and the Gazette.

• The hospital’s environmental assessment form describes a three-level structure with more than 390 spaces replacing a lot for 81 vehicles, and Saratoga TODAY put the count at 391.
• The form lists the structure at about 125 feet wide and says 1.6 acres of ground would be disturbed.
• Construction would take about 10 months in a single phase, and the garage would operate 24 hours a day.
• Bonacio Construction is expected to be the lead contractor if the zoning change passes, the Gazette reported.
• The LA Group drew the site plans, and Syvertsen Rigosu Architects drew the garage renderings filed with the city.

Where the garage would go

A map dated Sept. 2 in the application file the city has posted shows the two parcels being added at the corner of Myrtle Street and Church Street, which carries Route 9N there. They measure 0.37 and 0.22 acres.

The LA Group’s Oct. 5 site sketch puts one driveway on Myrtle Street and adds two marked crosswalks with warning systems across Myrtle toward the hospital. It also shows a new sidewalk with benches and shrubs, a stormwater bioretention area and relocated entrance columns for the neighboring club. Renderings dated the same day show a pale structure with a glass-walled stair tower behind the existing office building at the corner.

Ken Syvertsen said the garage would resemble a city parking garage his firm designed, looking more like a building than a parking deck, the Gazette reported. The property is in the city’s architectural review district, so the design falls under the Design Review Board.

Why the hospital wants more parking

The application narrative says added offices and hospital space have pushed up demand for parking. The narrative expects that demand to climb as medical practices ramp up at the planned Center for Successful Aging on Myrtle Street. The hospital’s website lists more than 3,000 employees and 200 physicians at more than 30 locations.

Parking at the main campus at 211 Church St. is free for patients and visitors, according to the hospital’s parking page. The main doors lock at 8 p.m., after which people enter through the emergency department, and Campus Access staff help with parking weekdays from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. The parking page lists 518-583-8366 for questions.

The hospital floated a similar garage about two years ago, the Gazette reported. In December 2024, the council found no significant environmental impact from a PUD amendment that allowed a 60,000-square-foot medical office building west of Myrtle Street and a parking structure for up to 250 vehicles with two above-ground decks, according to a state Department of Environmental Conservation notice. Michael Ingersoll, who leads design services at The LA Group, said the current plan “emerged in a more serious fashion” once the neighboring property became available, the Gazette reported.

What the boards have said so far

On Sept. 15 the council voted 5-0 that the request merited review and 5-0 to start a coordinated environmental review, with the council seeking the lead role. The city classified the project as a Type I action under state environmental rules because the site is substantially contiguous to a National Register historic district, according to a Sept. 23 city letter to state historic preservation officials.

The Design Review Board voted 5-0 on Oct. 7 to let the council lead that review. The Saratoga County Planning Board took up the referral Oct. 15 and approved it with comments. The county said the legislation left out one of the parcels and that an updated sketch plan showing the garage zone should be part of the review.

At the Oct. 21 meeting, Design Review Board members said the garage’s mass and scale were appropriate and in proportion to the hospital, the Gazette reported. On Thursday, Oct. 22, the Planning Board voted 6-0 to give the council a favorable advisory opinion, according to draft minutes the city posted Oct. 28. A written Design Review Board decision had not been posted by Oct. 29.

No comments from neighbors appear in the application file. On Oct. 27, the hospital’s lawyers mailed notices to nearby property owners, and the city file now includes photos of signs on Myrtle Street announcing a City Council public hearing. The signs, as photographed for the file, give no hearing date.

Approvals still needed

The hospital’s environmental form and the draft PUD text lay out the steps that remain.

• The City Council must finish the environmental review and decide whether the garage would have a significant adverse impact.
• The council must hold a public hearing and then vote on the map and text changes to the PUD.
• The Planning Board must grant final site plan approval, which the PUD requires before any building permit.
• The Design Review Board must grant architectural review approval for the garage design.
• The form also lists a state Health Department certificate of need, followed by a question mark.

The council’s Oct. 20 agenda included items to accept lead agency status and to set a public hearing on the amendment. The posted minutes record no motions for that whole block of agenda items and look incomplete, but Ingersoll told the Planning Board on Oct. 22 that the council had declared itself lead agency and would hold a public hearing in a few weeks. The Gazette reported Oct. 26 that no hearing had been scheduled, and no date had been published by Oct. 29.

Upcoming meetings and the construction timeline

City meetings are held at City Hall, 474 Broadway, and these dates are next.

• The City Council’s next meeting was rescheduled for Wednesday, Nov. 4, at 7 p.m., and no agenda for it had been published as of Oct. 29.
• The Planning Board meets Nov. 5, Nov. 19 and Dec. 10, with workshops Nov. 12 and Dec. 3.
• Written comments for land use boards go through the Public Comment form on the Planning Department page, until noon on the day of the meeting.

If the council approves the zoning change, construction could begin in summer or early fall 2027, depending on the city’s review, Ingersoll said, according to the Gazette. Saratoga TODAY reported Oct. 1 a construction window of December 2026 to December 2027.

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