WASHINGTON– President Donald Trump’s plans to build a skyline-altering arch in the nation’s capital are getting another federal commission review that needs approval, but agency staff say the project must be reviewed before it gets the go-ahead.

The National Capital Planning Commission will meet Thursday and the Republican president’s proposed 250-foot (76-meter) arch is one of the items on the agenda.

In a report, agency staff recommend that the commission approve the arch’s preliminary site and construction plans. But staff also recommends that the design be modified to comply with a federal law that limits the height of buildings in downtown Washington to preserve the city’s famous skyline. The planning commission applies the law during its approval process.

“Staff suggests that the Commission ask the applicant to revise the project design to comply with the Building Height Act and return it to the NCPC for final approval,” the 185-page report says.

Implementation of the law “would require design revisions to redistribute height between the main structure, the habitable roof structure, and the statues,” according to the report. But even with the recommended revisions, the arch, a public viewing platform and three golden statues on top would still reach Trump’s desired height of 250 feet, according to the report.

Staff also recommends that commissioners seek additional information about vehicle traffic around the arch, the proposed granite exterior and other aspects of the project before the Department of the Interior, which oversees the park service, returns for final approval. Trump wants to build the arch at a roundabout on the Virginia side of the District of Columbia’s Memorial Bridge.

The U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, an independent federal agency, approved the arch’s design in May. The National Capital Planning Commission oversees construction on federal land in the city and began reviewing the arch plan in June.

Opponents of the project argue that the arch is too large for the skyline and would disrupt carefully designed views between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery that were meant to symbolize the reunification of the North and South after the Civil War.

But the opposition has done little to influence members of either commission, which includes some of Trump’s closest allies. Trump named Will Scharf, a senior White House adviser, to lead the planning commission.

A veterans group and a historian sued the Trump administration in federal court to block construction of the arch over concerns about line-of-sight disruptions.

The arch would be more than twice as tall as the Lincoln Memorial, which is 30 meters (99 feet) tall, and about half the height of the Washington Monument, which is about 169 meters (555 feet) tall.

Trump had said last year that the arch could be paid for with unspent funds from the hundreds of millions of dollars he said he raised from corporations, donors and other wealthy people to pay for construction of a new $400 million White House ballroom.

But it turns out that some of the public money will be used for the ballroom project, as well as the arch. The White House has not released an estimate for the cost of the arch.