Longmont Planning & Zoning Meeting - February 17 2021

6:16AM Feb 19, 2021

Speakers:

Keywords:

grand avenue

transparency

commissioner

south

applicant

question

building

commissioners

variance

site

conditional

roadmap

next slide

property

code

put

pratt

add

area

traffic

To the February 17 2021 planning and zoning commission meeting first item on our agenda is roll call Jane Madrid Chairman chernykh here

I'm a snowflake here Goldberg hear

Kristen our height

frozen listener on our on

here.

Mr. Napoleon

here missioner teta. Councilmember Rodriguez.

Here.

Chairman, you have a quorum.

All right. Thank you, Jane. Anyone wishing to speak during the public invited to be heard items which are agenda items four and nine. Tonight, or during any public hearing items, which is agenda item seven, will need to watch the livestream of the meeting for instructions about how to call in to provide public comment at the appropriate times. instructions will be given during the meeting and displayed on the screen then it is time to call in to provide comments. Comments are limited to five minutes per person. And each speaker will be asked to state their name and address for the record prior to proceeding with their comments. Please remember to mute the live stream when you're called upon to speak. You see what the instructions are? Those are on our screen right now. But Now's not the time to call in. We're not there yet. So next item on our agenda is item number three communications from our planning manager. Glenn venema. Morgan.

Glen.

Yeah. Good evening, Mr. Chairman. Thank you planning commissioners. I just have a few things I want to give you some updates on. One is the staff recently put together a survey that we put on engaged last month regarding ad use. Council want us to touch base on hyperbola accepting folks are have accessory dwelling units. So if you get a chance, go to the front page of the website, go to the community section, and then you'll find it on engage Longmont. The planning commission probably realizes that back in, I believe it was August of 2020, the Urban Land Institute put together a a technical advisory panel that came out and did kind of a charette planning process regarding the sugar mill development. We are close to getting the final report on that. And we are trying to schedule them to make a presentation to the city council. So we'll make sure to get you an invite as well. So you can watch that presentation and give you a link to the report. Last night, myself and Tony Cong talked about the sub area plan that we're proposing to do, which would be an amendment to the comprehensive plan. It includes the area that's called gathering steam, potential redevelopment area and the first and main transit station and then also includes the sugar mill. So we expect to be starting that planning process. And we hope to get the Planning Commission engaged in that process. Well, probably starting in May. So that should be fun. And then we talked about the census, I think at our last meeting and we are hoping we would see some results in March. That has been kicked down the road to the end of September. So we're not going to see any of our housing data

or demographics from the 2020 census until next fall. So that is all I wanted to update the Planning Commission on.

Great. Thank you very much, Glen. Appreciate that.

You bet.

Okay, item four on our agenda is our first public invited to be heard section. This is for anybody who would like to call him with comments on anything that is not on the agenda tonight. So not item seven on the agenda. If you want to make comments on please dial 1888780099. When prompted, enter the meeting id 88261442748. When we're ready to hear your public comment we will call on you to speak based on the last three digits of your phone number. Each speaker must state their name and address for the record and will be allowed five minutes to speak. Please remember to mute the live stream when you're called upon to speak. Instructions are on the screen. It takes us five minutes to bring anybody and everybody in to the meeting who wants to speak so we will take a five minute break

All right, share I'm going to go ahead and stop sharing and then we'll give our stream about 2030 seconds to catch up to

us. Okay. It looks like we had nobody call in.

Not as of yet. I usually don't lock it until we get cleared off the live stream here. Okay. All right, it looks like we are back on the live stream and current. So that slide is down and no there are no colors this evening for this item.

Thank you, Susan. So we had no colors for the public invited to be heard. So we will close the public invited to be heard. Next on the agenda is approval of the remote meeting policy. At last month's meeting. We were approving our bylaws for the year and question arose about what policies Gov govern remote meetings. Deputy city attorney Teresa Tate Do you wish to give us a quick overview or a summary of this just to make sure it's in the record as to what we're looking at

what we cherish her neck commissioners This is a policy modeled after the city council remote access policy if permits remote participation by members during an instance of the month so this would not authorize remote participation. For example, if someone is traveling or for you know for some other reason we would wish to participate remotely and that's not an option rather. And what this does is allow us to get our current bylaws and hold an old meeting on a remote or electronic or telephonic Yes ma'am.

We're having a hard time with your audio. It's crackly Can you speak up perhaps

Absolutely can thank you for letting me know Susan. Yes, that better? Yes. Right. It does also provide for remote participation by the public and by Apple. So that's the nutshell. Good.

Thank you, Teresa.

Um, is there any discussion amongst the commission? Any questions? Commissioner height?

course I have questions, um, two things, one of which I had raised earlier in section five. And I think it's because this protocol had been adapted from a telephonic procedure, which is now expanded to an electronic communication procedure. But nonetheless, in Section four, I think it is Roman numeral four, still refers to telephonic procedures, I think we need to update it to make sure to be consistent that it's electronic participation that we're talking about, that I wanted to point out. In Section two, five, this policy requires roll call vote voting. And we typically haven't been following roll call, per se or strictly, we just kind of are going yea and nay. So I don't know if you want to address that chair shirt.

In your bicycle forward or not. I figured that that if this is approved that, um, the next item on our agenda after this would be done by roll call vote. And actually this item, we might as well do by roll call vote to.

Okay. So I just want to point that out and then suggested in subsection four, we change it to be consistent that it's electronic participation we're talking about,

if I may suggest, I believe part of why it said telephonic was that early on in that pandemic. We did allow the members to participate by telephone while the rest of them members of the city council work in. That is probably not a terrible thing to adopt, as we're thinking about people who might be in vulnerable population, people who might still be under some kind of public order. Then once we're able to get back to the thought.

From my point of view, electronic participation included telephonic participation. It just was broader because it included video participation. subsection four deals with establishing a quorum. And it I think, regardless of what the if it's telephonic or electronic participation, unless there is deemed to be a pandemic emergency, any participation by phone or electronic shall not count towards establishing a quorum. So I think it still needs to be electronic participation in subsection four.

So Commissioner height, I think, if you were to bring a motion, you could make your motion such that that subsection should be amended.

What a great, what a great suggestion. I'll do so I guess I would move to approve. This is called sorry, electronic participation policy during city board and commission meetings to govern, as it stated there in with a proposed revision with a revision to subsection four, to make clear that it's the effect of electronic participation, not just telephonic participation, for purposes of constituting a beautiful revised to reflect that. It's electronic participation. Okay,

thank you. We have a motion on the floor Commissioner flag.

I would second to that motion.

Okay. Seconded by Commissioner flake. Any further discussion or questions? Seeing none, let's take a roll call vote. Commissioner height. High. Commissioner owner on high. Commissioner Goldberg. All right. Commissioner Bolin. Aye. Commissioner teta high. Commissioner flag. Aye. Aye as well that passes unanimously. By the way, I'm just taking you in the order that I see you on the screen. It's it's no different. particular order. So, last passes. Um, next is approval of our minutes from the January 20 2021. Meeting. Do we have any discussion about the minutes? Any motion to possibly approve them? Commissioner Goldberg?

Yeah, Chairman, I move to approve the minutes from the January 2020. Meeting. Okay.

Do we have a second? Commissioner height?

I will second that motion.

Okay. So, motion to approve the January 2021. Meeting Minutes. Commissioner height high. Commissioner on high. Commissioner Goldberg.

High. Commissioner polen.

Aye. Commissioner teta high.

Commissioner flag.

I,

I go to good eye as well. Jane that passes unanimously seven to zero. And next is our public hearing item, which is south more retail Plaza conditional use site plan and variances from building design standards. And Code Section 1505 120. In landscaping standards and Code Section 15. Oh, PCR 2021 dash one with principal planner Eva paradiski. Eva, would you like to give us your presentation, please? Good evening,

Chair asuran.

Again, commissioners, Eva, Jeff ski. Susan,

would you be able to pull up the presentation?

One second. I was ready to go. And it gave me an error said didn't want to do that. So hang on. Let's try again.

I can sit here and talk but it looks better with pictures.

There we go. All righty. Thank

you so much. Yes. So this is this first item is a conditional use site plan and variants application for the South more retail Plaza. Next slide, please. So I'm going to just give you some background on my slides, and then the applicant will do a presentation and kind of go over the review criteria and what they're requesting. So just to give you background, in this red square, this is the property the subject property. It is on the south side of Ken Pratt Boulevard, highway 118. It is west of Main Street slash highway 287. And east of Pratt Parkway, and its distinction is that it's in the middle of a very busy commercial area. And it's developed with a single family ranch house, which is pretty rare out there. And so the there's it's presently three lots, and is zoned mixed use commercial. And so I don't have my mouse here. But what I will tell you is that it's currently three lots and the way it is currently configured is if you see on the top right corner where it says snarf sandwich, which is not really in this property, it's next door. But if you will, in this top right corner, there's like a little rectangle or a little square in the corner where snarf says, and that's one lot legally loaded property in Boulder County. And then the second lot consists of this middle piece here where the house is, and then this vacant land south of Grand Avenue that you see there on the on the bottom of the slide. And that's currently the second lot. And the third lot is a sliver on the west side, right next to where the 711 property is. And so the applicant is processing a minor subdivision with this in conjunction with this site plan that's administratively being reviewed by city staff. It's essentially reconfiguring this so that that rectangle, that little square in the corner that says snarf sandwich goes away, and this all becomes one larger lot. And then on the left side, it's gonna be planted off into another separate commercial lot. And you'll kind of see it better as we go through the site plan. And then this part that's south of Grand Avenue, it's actually zoned differently. This is a unique property that is has two zonings on one lot is the property or the piece south of Grand Avenue is actually zoned residential. And so that's being planted off as a separate lot so that it can be developed residentially, which makes sense. And so if we go to the next slide. Thank you. So

I'm just going to briefly go over this proposal. Tonight. So again, there's a minor subdivision process that's going administratively on the side with staff. This is if you can see on your left side, there's a vertical line, there's kind of like a square seated area with dots on the left, that's going to be the other commercial lot. That's not part of this application. But that's being planted as a separate lot. And it's really here on your screen just for illustrative purposes. So we're not approving anything on the left side, where that line is, that's that's a separate lot. And so this project in and of itself is this big piece, this big rectangle here on the right. And so it's a conditional use site plan there they came in, they're proposing to do a one story about 15,000. And some change square feet, commercial building, very typical for this area of town. they're proposing to do a retail and a couple sit down restaurants. But on the east side of the building, they're proposing to have a restaurant with a drive thru component as a tenant. And while these other the retail and the sit down are uses by right of which you know, this would have gone through administratively. The drive thru piece is what is driving us here tonight, because drive throughs are a conditional use in the mixed use commercial zone. So this is also proposing 81 parking spaces meets code. This project was reviewed by city staff and it met all of the development standards with the exception of two items. One related to building design, which is on the south side of this property at the if you look on the bottom, that's the South Side be facing Grand Avenue. And then some landscaping standards, which I'll get into in the next slide. But as you can see from the red arrows of vehicular access, there's three access points. Or you can come in and go out from Ken Pratt Boulevard, but it's a right in right out. There's also an additional access on the east, as you can see that diagonal arrow on the right and that would take you into the existing shopping center right next door that's at the corner of Main and camp rat right now. And so they have cross access easements in their subdivision plats. And so people coming out of here could also shoot across, you know, where the Smurfs parking lot is, you would shoot across in there. And then you could continue on and visit the other stores in that shopping center, or exit camera or you can, you know, shoot across East on that other property next door and exit onto main if you wanted to go southbound. And then the third access, and I think you saw this in the aerial map, there's Grand Avenue and it's not built out in this location. It is built out to the west, where it goes to Pratt Parkway. And so this project will build out Grand Avenue up to this access point where traffic could then go back West Excuse me, I think I said he's so traffic he goes back west toward Pratt Parkway, if you want it to go in that direction. So next slide.

So the first variance requests and again, the applicants going to sort of give you more detail. I'm just here to sort of give you the basics of it. But it's Code Section 1505 120 C, we have building design standards. This project met all of the design standards except this one area, and that is it says that ground floor street frontage is and again this this only pertains to the south part facing Grand Avenue which really isn't a built out street but would be its plan to be. But it says facades with frontage is on the streets need to have arcades, windows, entry areas, awnings, etc, on 60% of the horizontal length, and that was subsection five a. And in addition, subsection six a says the ground floor of each facade facing a street should provide 50% windows and doors. And their calculations are in your site plan set. It's it's actually in these elevations. It's just that the font was so smaller, I didn't I didn't put it in but they're requesting to do 8% on the south side as you can see this, the one at the top. The elevation here is actually the portion that's facing Ken Pratt Boulevard. This meets city codes. I just wanted to show it to you for illustration, the differences and so the one at the top is not the one that needs the variance. It's the one at the bottom. And this is the facade that would be facing Grand Avenue again, it's not built out if you go out there there is no Grand Avenue is just ground. So when it gets built out, this would be the side facing it. And the applicant will go into why they're requesting it. But essentially, the gist of the request is that you know, the way the floor plan is laid out, this property, unfortunately has two street frontage is front and back. So they had to meet it on both ends. But when you do a one storey, you know, a commercial building your front, as you can see from the top part, that's for the customers, right, so that's where your display area is your dining room, etc. So you got to have a back. And so the back is this bottom piece. And so this is where they would have their deliveries, this is where the kitchen space would be and their stock rooms and the employee restrooms. And so, you know to that in having windows in the restroom and the kitchen area in the stockroom doesn't it's not very secure and safe. So that is why it is designed this way. We looked at it a little bit further, we had one recommendation, which is in your resolution. And we thought maybe just to give it a little bit more dress up to meet the standard, perhaps they could put some awnings over those doorways. So that's one recommendation, you don't have to accept it. But that was one that staff had contemplated to kind of bump them up just a little bit more on that variance. The next slide, please.

So the second variance is from Code Section 15 Oh, and this relates to tree planting requirements. So in our landscaping standards, all commercial properties, but commercial properties particular have to have a landscape buffer facing all the street frontage is and so as you can see at the top, and on the bottom, the top part is Ken Pratt Boulevard, the bottom part of your screen is facing Grand Avenue. And in those areas, you know, there's a calculation sheet in our code. And it's based on how many feet is required in your buffer and how wide your property is. And then that brings you the area. And then within that amount of area, there's a certain amount of trees that need to be planted and shrubs. And so in this case, they have some challenges because they also had to put some water quality devices. And there are also a lot of existing utilities on here. And as you guys may recall on Ken Pratt Boulevard, that was a big street beautification project. You can see here, the sidewalk path, it's all been very nicely done and nicely landscaped. The city invested a lot of money there. And so the utilities were placed on this property right here on the north side. And also on the south side, there's some existing utilities and and also on Grand Avenue, they weren't able to provide some trees that would normally be required on the streetscape and the right of way. And that's due to the fact that there wasn't enough width in the right of way to to provide a viable space for tree planting. And so in this case, they're asking for some variances on the north landscape buffer and the South landscape buffer. And in their water quality, but again, their water quality is kind of overlapped because the water quality stuff is, is in the north side buffer and in the south side buffer. So it's kind of overlap because they stuck their detention. This is unique, usually a detention pond is like kind of off to the side. But in this case, they put it in the landscape buffer. So in this case, what the applicant did to mitigate was, they provided three times the amount of required shrubbery that would be required by code to sort of enhance that area because trees could not be planted in the utility easements because of you know, the issues with encroachment into the utilities. So that was their mitigation effort. Next slide please. And so again, this is a conditional use in code set, and they use regulations in code section 15. Oh, retail again, retail and sit down restaurant uses these are allowed by right in the mixed use corridor zone. So you could just do this with a site plan review with staff. However, when you do a restaurant with drive thru, these are conditional secondary uses. And so they have to meet certain standards. And these are the ones bulleted in orange here. One is the drive thru has to meet vehicle stacking requirements. And it does it meets code it's got to be like 180 feet long and so our staff verified that they had the appropriate amount of vehicle stacking. The code also says if the drive thru is within 250 feet of a residential lot residential zone, it's got to be meet the compatibility standards in the code. And so I just listed the main compatibility standards below real quickly for you. If you're going to have a drive thru within 250 feet of residential, the height shouldn't be taller than 35 feet. You should have appropriate buffering and screening such as landscaping and fences and walls. And on this applicants site plan, you should see on the I think on the elevations, but also on the site plan sheet, we had them put in a screen wall for the drive thru on the south side where it faces Grand Avenue. And so, um, there is a screen while they actually put it more toward the property line, just so it would buffer it from the residential that's currently developed kind of Northwest, southwest of this property right now. And lastly, parameters for outdoor lighting, maximum height for light poles, etc. And so they are conditions. And if you look on the cover page of the site plan set, that was part of your package, we did ask them to put restrictions on hours of operation restriction on hours of delivery and outdoor areas. And in particular, we said we don't want any late deliveries on the south side facing Grand Avenue after a certain time

of the cover page.

But yeah, so it's in your cover page. But there are limitations out there more strict on the south side. So we're telling them in here that you know, if you're going to have a delivery like after 7pm, you need to do it on the camp rat side. And they have to figure it out their traffic and circulation if they have to do it that way. Next slide, please. So just real briefly, in terms of input, so we had a neighborhood meeting in December of 2019. There were seven attendees, generally speaking, from the seven people that were there the questions were, you know, from the residents who live south of this kind of the South Moorpark neighborhood, they were concerned about, if there be any impacts, if people are now allowed to have vehicle access out into Grand Avenue, would they cut down Kaufman street there? Or are they going to divert to the side and get down Pratt Parkway? There were questions about, you know, why are you building more retail there's a lot of vacancies in the city. Their requests questions about who are the tenants and concerns that there would be impacts with noise and late night activity, which was why we have this conditional use requirement to put all these standards on the cover page that we can use to enforce with code enforcement. And lastly, they were questions about how they were going to make the drainage work. And then again, the applicant submitted their materials in February of 2020. So we sent out a notice of application to 1000 foot radius, I got two phone calls, from people who said they were neighbors south of this and they didn't like it because they were concerned about cut through traffic from this business. And then secondly, I got a letter was an email. And again, that was it was also also concerns about traffic impacts to the residential. I sent a notice out two weeks before the hearing on February 2, again to 1000 foot radius. And as of tonight, I had not received any phone calls or emails. Next slide, please. So staffs recommending a conditional approval, we added a couple of conditions in there. Again, you can add more, you can take some out. But we asked, we thought maybe the South building facade could provide some awnings over the doorways to give sort of just a little more articulation on the Grand Avenue frontage. And then, again, I think a commissioner had asked previously that when we asked the customers to or we condition something to say, meet all of the remaining comments from city staff on the on the review, that you do that. And so that's our other. That's our kind of a generic condition, if you will, if we still have remaining staff comments, we say this isn't final approved until city staffs, comments are addressed. And next slide, please. And so with that, I'm happy to take questions. I'm thinking maybe the applicant might want to do a presentation first. And maybe some of your questions will be answered. And then when the applicants done if you still have questions, of course, I'm happy to answer questions as well the applicant. And so with that, I will turn it over to Tom Davis from pw and architects. And Susan, whenever you're ready, you can queue up Tom's PowerPoint. Thank you, Eva.

Can everybody hear me?

We can hear you.

Oh, you can't hear me. Okay. Thanks. Well, good evening, members of the Commission. Thank you for your time. My name is Tom Davis with pw architects and planners and we are presenting on behalf of TiVo properties. For this conditional use site plan in two variants requests. The Eva did a really Great job of discussing what the issues are and have been in our work together over the last year as somewhat of a complicated site with the extension of grand and the replanting of the land. But next slide please. We really have three goals to discuss with you tonight. The first is to show compliance of the criteria review for the drive thru window for the land development code. And then the next two are to demonstrate why are requesting the variances the landscape in the building design and discuss those issues with you a little bit more detail. Next slide. So we'll start with the conditional use approval for the drive thru. Out Imagine you're well aware of what they are but we just like to walk you through how we're in compliance in as much detail as we can and answer any questions. Next slide. So we're just gonna go down through 1505 Oh Ay, ay one item by item with each slide. So the first requirement is to have a minimum of 10 foot radius for the turn on the drive thru we have 20 feet. So that's that's in compliance. Next slide. Next is vehicle stacking. The code requests minimum of 180 feet to stack approximately nine cars. From the front of the drive thru to where the drive thru meets the 24 foot drive is 184 feet so we're in compliance with that. Next slide. The drive thru aisles. Each drive thru aisle should have directional signage and difference differentiation. So there'll be a paved markings to delineate the drive from the drive thru. And they'll be directional arrows as shown. Next slide. The aisles should be separated from the main drive aisle. So we'll use markings on the pavement to stripe that and we will have ample 12 foot width for the drive thru with the compliant radius in the two way traffic 24 foot drive outside of it. Next slide. The second issue is pedestrian access and crossings. The project's tried to connect with existing circulation on the site from Grand Avenue from the adjacent sites and from Kim Pratt. And the requirement requests that there are pedestrian crossings in the drive thru which we've been able to avoid and they will be painted. So people be able to see them where they are located to connect to the pad site building. Next slide. Yeah, a is similar to what we just discussed that there's a separation Mark separation between the drive thru and the drive which we have for the design and layout, and the second is that it'd be on the side or back of the building. So the pickup window is at the East elevation. So least intrusive to Grand Avenue or camera. Next slide. And then under the landscape code calls for landscape buffers, and we're gonna talk about this little bit more but we're meeting compliance on the east with the 10 foot buffer and the required landscape quantities. And on the south you can see it's also very generous. But we have issues with our water quality, the sand filters that we're going to talk about in a little minute. And then also the required six foot opaque barrier to block the view of the drive thru from residential lot within 250 feet and the zone lot to the south is currently residential. Next slide. So this goes a little more detail about that fence requirement.

So we've designed in opaque six foot precast concrete fence to screen the drive thru from Grand Avenue. If you go to the next slide, it zooms out. So you can see how it's being screened. We needed to allow access To the sand filters per code, but you can see with the residential zone lot to the south at the screen wall will block the drive thru for the criteria requirement.

Next slide. And this is an elevation to show how the screening will,

will work from Grand Avenue and kind of paste it into the back elevation of the building in some of the landscape elements. Next slide. So that concludes our presentation on the conditional use for the drive thru. And the next slides talk about the variances I think we even presented them we haven't backwards, but I tried to use these colors to illustrate the issues of where we're deficient and why. So starting at the top with the ulterior ulterior buffer on Ken Pratt. And as David mentioned, it's complete utility easements and the sand filters for water quality. So we were able to get some of the trees, but not all. So that's why we're asking for the variance. And there's also as you can see, the, you know, the city's developed the sidewalk with the tree screen as well, which kind of functions for our site, I think it can be interpreted. Then in the yellow, the non arterial buffer 20 feet off Grand Avenue, same same kind of issues there with easements, existing easements for water, power gas, and also the sand filters. For the water quality, we did request with public works alternative methods for water quality surfaces, what they were preferring, and that's how we got to the solution. Next is the right away on Grand Avenue, which you can see, oh, wait two more to go. The very thin blue at the bottom, it's an attached sidewalk, curb and sidewalk. So we don't have the space to put the tree lines there. And as you can see, everything's kind of compacted on that south part of the site. Lastly is the sand filters, which I discussed before they're in the purple and the yellow. So we have some of our trees, but not enough per code. But the design intent is that there's a generous landscape buffer on all sides of the site with the exception of the site, the west side, which isn't developed yet and will in the future, upon its development. Next slide. And then I think Ava did a really good job of kind of describing where we are with the transparency issue, kind of having two arterials for retail building that as a typology kind of has a front and a back. So trying to work with the city and the Planning Commission to come up with a solution that'll help meet the intent of the code. So this is kind of is taken from the land development code. And next slide. So here you can see, you know, the ken Pratt and the requirements up to the underside of structure. So that's the transparency that we're calculating. So very high transparency on cam Pratt. But for the reasons I even listed, and we wrote in our written variants, kind of the functionality of the building doesn't lend itself to be transparent in the back security issues, loading functionality. In addition to that, we've now constructed a six foot screen wall to block the drive through, but that would also block transparency. What we did do was introduce some transparency to get next level of scale and maybe interest to the Grand Avenue elevation. And then if you kind of see the projecting masonry elements, I think that's the suggestion of staff would be maybe incorporate awnings over these double exits and give a little more texture to the Grand street elevation. But that's why we're asking for the variances that were well below the required transparency for four Grand Avenue for the reasons that retail building just can't really have two transparent sides and plan per tenant. I think that's the last slide.

Thank you, Mr. Davis. Do we have any questions right now for just clarification from either Mr. Davis or from Eva from the commission.

Okay,

um, let's go ahead and say none let's go ahead and open up the the public hearing part of this. Um, so we'll dispense Play the call in information on our screen. Susan, we'll get that displayed here. Thank you Susan. If you'd like to call out about this project and let us know your thoughts, please do so please call 1-888-788-0099. When prompted, enter the meeting id 88261442748. When we're ready to hear public comment, we will call you on to speak based on the last three digits of your phone number. Each speaker must state their name and address for the record and will be allowed five minutes to speak. Please remember to mute the live stream when you're called upon to speak. To do this, we need five minutes so we will now take a five minute break.

Alright chair, I'm gonna drop the screen share and we will wait for our live stream to catch up with us. Okay, we do we do have one caller at this moment. All right. And it does look like we are caught up on the live stream. So I just locked our meeting. Let me know when you're ready to begin.

Okay, we're ready to go. So looks like our caller is number two to five, if you'd like to unmute and let us know your thoughts.

two to five, I'm going to ask you to unmute make sure that you have muted the live stream. So you can listen for instructions through the telephone.

So I'm prompting you to unmute. You can hit star six. Color that ends in two to five. Can you hear me? There you go. That is it is.

I have one concern and one question.

Sure. Yes. Before you begin, please state your name and address for the record. Thank you.

This is Doug Geiger. And I live at 701. South Terry, I'm actually on the I'm probably the closest residents to this construction proposed. We're on the corner of grand and South Terry. Okay, we live on that residence. My concern is I've lived here for many, many years, that intersection of grande and South Terry always floods. Okay, so my question to the commission and everyone else is what will be done to prevent that, to mitigate that flooding? It always floods there. All the water runs down south Terry, it all runs down grand in a pools right there at that intersection. And if if this goes into effect, I'm assuming it'll probably be at least at the area that the elevation that it is now. And if it is then that that area will probably even flood more. So that's my concern. And my question is the original one that I had the original plan that this came up with way back when a year and a half ago or so it was to punch Grand Avenue all the way over to Maine. And my question is, is that still going to be? Or are they going to just stop it at the entrance to the facility? So that's my two questions.

Great, thank you, Mr. Geiger, really appreciate you taking the time to raise those thoughts with us. And, Susan, that was our only color. I take it.

Chair. That is correct.

Okay. So we will close the public hearing part of the meeting. And I'm going to make this suggestion to the commissioners that since we have a conditional use, and also two variances, that we try to keep our conversation about one item at a time rather than bouncing all over the place just to try to keep things straight. But um, I would like to kick things off on actually just asking questions of Eva and the applicant to answer Mr. draggers, questions for us. Eva, um, in terms of flooding of grand and Terry, how does that all work? I know we have Chris huffer here from public and natural resources. How does the city deal with that? Sure.

Thank you, Commissioner of chair Sharon hake. Yes, I failed to mention I apologize during my presentation. I do have the engineering administrator Christopher here who will answer the questions about the drainage but I also have traffic engineer Caroline, Michael, I did touch on it in my staff report that the traffic study indicated there wasn't enough traffic to warrant moving Grand Avenue all the way east to Main Street. And that's why it's going to step out into a cul de sac at the east side of this property. But I will defer to Caroline to talk further about the traffic and Chris is already on camera and he'll talk about the drainage.

Great. Chris, would you walk us through how the drainage works and would terian grand flood more and what will be done to mitigate any flooding that's that might come from the site.

Certainly Thank you, Eva. And thank you, Chairman sure neck. Yes, the city is aware of the drainage issues that are happening out there. There there is a floodplain associated through this area associated with dry creek. And the intent is for the curb and gutter to be extended on Grand Avenue. And there will be inlets on grant that will pick up water and take it out to kin came Pratt Boulevard. Part of the project that Eva had mentioned earlier on Kim Pratt Boulevard. There was a beautification, there was a widening to add a lane. And with that, also, there was a large box culvert that was installed on the south side of Kimbrough Boulevard north side of this property to intercept drainage and take it out to the same brain. So this project will be improving the the drainage in this area, as well as taking care of some of those issues that we know that are out there now.

And Chris, just so I understand correctly. Um, so is this part of the reason why the the African has a detention area on the north side of their plan.

So, chairs cerknica the ponds that they're providing our water quality ponds, being that they are in a floodplain area, staff has worked with them that they do not need to detain and control the 10 year and 100 years, we do on many of the other properties that develop. So these are water quality ponds, that are basically taking runoff from the parking lots and from the roof structure and those types of things, slowing it down, letting sediment drop out before it gets put into the storm sewer system. And those are requirements from our end PDS permit for that is granted by the state. And you'll see more and more of these types of things happening. As development goes on. Our direction from the state is getting more and more strict. The city is becoming more and more liable for keeping track of water quality and meeting water quality requirements from the state. So that's the purpose of those ponds that are on both the south and north side.

And then if I understand correctly from the from our packet, the applicant is currently in the process of receiving a letter of approval from FEMA, because they are in the floodplain.

Yes, charter neck, it's my understanding that they have conditional letter of map amendment based upon fill. And that's been submitted our floodplain development or floodplain administrator, Monica bertolini, is working on their floodplain development permit at this point in time. The conditional letter I believe, has been approved, actually. And so they would need to construct the improvements on the site, bring it to grade, they'll survey that at the end, turn that into FEMA, and then they'll get their final letter of map revision based on fill for that.

Okay, thank you. Thank you very much. I'm going to also call on Caroline Michael, from traffic so that she can walk us through Mr. Geiger is concerned about Grand Avenue connecting to Maine and how the traffic works for this project.

Hello, chernick. So looking at the traffic study for this development, so I think there's kind of two components. So there's both Grand Avenue on the segment east of South Parkway. And then I believe there's also South Terry Street. So is traffic going to some Grand Avenue East of self prep Parkway? Yes, it's not based on preliminary calculations, it's going to be pretty comparable in volume to what exists on Grand Avenue to the west of South prep Parkway so the street can handle that volume. As for volume on South Terry. I don't believe Matt Delicias on this call he did the traffic study for the applicant here. He did not assign any traffic going down on South Cherry Street either approaching or leaving the site. And he assigned all that traffic to self prep Parkway. And even then, the traffic assigned to South prep Parkway is pretty small. So only about 10%. Coming and going to the site from South prep Parkway south of grand as opposed to like 70% The arterial system, and that 10% is theoretically What? My cut through one South Cherry Street. Okay.

And as Eva mentioned, right now, if this project, you know, draws to being fully built and completed by Grand Avenue will be stubbed out. So there would not be a connection from this project to Main Street along Grand Avenue. That's my understanding.

No. So that is correct. There would be a turn around. Get maybe this is I don't know if Chris has some more insight on the situation. I do believe there is potential to do that in the future. But correct me if I'm wrong, Chris.

Yes, you're correct, Caroline, the issue that we've run up against normally? Well, it is the desire of the city to extend Grand Avenue out to Maine at some point in the future, as indicated in the packet, I believe, the properties to the east of this development. So behind the existing shopping center there, the city only has 30 feet of right away on the north side of what would be Grand Avenue. We do not have the South 30 feet. So we're not able to construct a full right away at this point in time. If you've been out in that location, you'll see that the property to the south and east of the subject property we're talking about now. They're using that as for parking. There is pavement out there. But it's not actual right of way that's dedicated to the city at this point in time.

Thank you, Chris. On. Commissioner honor on you had a question for Carolina. Yeah, I'm

looking at the package to site plans. The Grand Avenue AR is shown on the side of the property. And when I see that area, the road is coming. There's a payment there. And if the pipeline is right, there's a connection there. So it may not be the city right away. It may not be the standard of the street, but that will be a connection right? Am I misunderstanding that? And even physically, practically, if you put the asphalt all the way to the property line, then that connects. Am I missing anything?

Can I interject

that Mr. Busa from TiVo? It is. Um, yes, please, if you want to enlighten us, that'd be great.

Sure. So the Grand Avenue portion that's going to be developed during this project will stop at the property line and there'll be a curb there. So unless you want to drive over curb with your car, it really won't be much access to get through. The other. The other thing I just wanted to bring up that we granted the city that Northern 30 feet of Grand Avenue in the hopes that they would be able to connect in the future. But the southern owner has not done that as of yet. So but there should be no connection at this point. And certainly we're not presenting one with this development.

Okay, thank you Mr. Busa? I'm Caroline, thank you for your help on explaining the traffic on. Do we have any further comments or questions from commissioners? Regarding Mr. guiders Commissioner flag

i, this is traffic more or less into the site. So you have two way traffic from brand. And then you have traffic in from Pratt, South Pratt Boulevard right. And then you have traffic traffic coming in from three different ways. As I understand you're I'm on mute. And I'm confused as to what the traffic is expected to flow how it's expected to flow on the site. From the access points. Can you give me some kind of understanding of that?

Do you want me to pull up that slide again, Carolyn?

In my commission, arrows Yeah, so

Commissioner flag there is the site of an access to Ken Pratt, that is limited to right in right out to the median, but it also has a cross connection over to the property to the east in that is a full movement access.

And that's through an easement rather than a street. Yes,

that's a cross access easement. Okay,

yeah, it's a cross axis,

and then the southern one

that there is access out to and that connects to an app.

Okay, so then, my question is that, leading from that, thank you. What are the uses for the Is it one use for the building? Or is it two uses? What are we trying to do with the building? So

in the traffic study, it was assumed. Remember, the users assumed were sort of general retail space, a coffee, like a coffee shop with a drive thru. And, and he also included the pad site to the west there as a sit down restaurant. So I guess the applicant could maybe provide some commentary on whether or not that's still, if they're really sure that's going to be the use, but um, if they did change, use dramatically at the time of development require a traffic update.

Thank you, Carolyn. So the question then, I guess, to the applicant is what are the uses to which the building will be put?

So either Mr. Davis or Mr. abuso? Yeah, I

can't answer that. So yeah, it was assumed right. Now. There'll be mercantile, retail and assembly, for restaurants.

Okay, so three different entities,

a mercantile retailer, kind of same sorry, mercantile and assembly for restaurants.

Okay. And they would, then a coffee shop in addition.

Yeah, that would fall under the assembly occupancy. If you're talking about the building code occupancy?

Yeah, still trying to get back to you how many divisions inside the building? Are you looking to do? Or do you know?

Yeah, it's, it's, you know, spec building. So I don't know if Dana can pop on with the latest update. But obviously, the drive drive thru tenant will probably go first. And if you look at the articulation on the elevations, the far western space is designed with the garage door for potentially, you know, a tap room or, you know, that's style of restaurant with, you know, access to outdoor patio.

Okay, so then I'm wondering, how does that relate to this treatment of your facade on the south side of the building?

Not at all, I mean, the south side was just always designed to be the back of the building, and doesn't reflect the functions on the front. In fact, the water entry room is also on the back on the far western part of the building.

Okay, and so of course, you wouldn't want a window there. But for since this is a building, obviously, place with two fronts, essentially, I don't understand why there couldn't be more articulation of some actual transparent windows there on the back side, which you're calling the back is really a second front.

Well, you could just look at the building next to it that's developed as retail there's, you know, there's typically no windows on any rear of a strip retail building because of security, and that's where the restrooms are in the stock rooms. And it's, it's really a a hiccup in the code more than, you know, a requirement for two sides of transparency. It doesn't really fit the retail building.

As we, as we have known it, but not right, in terms of pedestrian access, because people conceivably could be coming from the south. walking to the building, correct?

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. But, you know, typical retail has, you know, entrance from the, from one side, which is, you know, the front and that's the side it's articulated with the glazing, no transparency.

And so, so there's no possibility that you would look at that and a little different kind of a take on it since that is the west side. conceivably, I don't know are their views. You could have, if you're talking about outside seating, then perhaps having something transparent. For those businesses on that corner, perhaps even, even though there's the water room, you might want to have a little more transparency. Is that possible to do that? Or are you locked in?

Well, we tried to do that. We added transom glass. And we added a sidelight glass, which will have to be, you know, had glazing film from actual, but there will be that additional transparency, that's we tried to do, but I mean, the gas meters are back there, you know, all the utilities are back there to clean the building. It's, it's not by topology, a part of a building for strip retail, you're trying to enhance it. So what we're trying to do to meet the intent of the code is add some transparency and some articulation to the back of the building. So it has a little more interest in, you know, the version one, which is the one next to it, that's just, you know, painted cinderblock wall,

I guess I'm not worried about the one next to it, I'm worrying about colors.

Yeah, I can, I might be able to add some color, if I may. You know, that the space when you're designing entrances from both sides, it takes away from the usable space on the inside. So, to Tom's point, most of the utilities, most of the storage rooms, the bathrooms, and all that, to shift those from the center, or from the rear to the center would make the usable space for retail, very awkward, and very difficult to use from a function standpoint. And so what that would then do would make it, you know, more difficult for a retail tenant to look at the space and say, Well, this is a workable space, because that's not the typical design that used and so you know, this was designed as a matter of fact, if I'm Tom, was this also designed with the original code, and then in the middle of the submittal process, the code changed for this. Was this also part of that code change as well. Do you recall?

If I may interject, our zoning code update went into effect in September of 2018. And this was

admitted it was afterwards

grade 20.

Okay, so in any event, I hope that Janell answers your question about putting different types of egress from the front end the back.

I guess, I wonder, you know, I understand the restrooms to be on that side. But not all windows have to be full length, some of them say can be at the top area and still show that there's an active side there.

It's not active from a standpoint of other shopping

area.

Well, I eat grass, right, so you don't have people entering that side of the building. And so while it does, coincidentally, now front Grand Avenue that's not currently there. It's just not a functioning side of the building other than for services. Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner flag. So looks like she has segwayed us into talking about the variance for transparency. So if, if we can let's continue on that. If I have a question for you about the code. If we look at Um Is it 1505 120 dot c dot six transparency paragraph a the ground floor of each facade facing a public street or other public area shall contain a minimum of 50% windows or doorways? How does the city to find other public area? Hmm,

good question. It's usually something facing something in a public right of way typically is vaguely worded there. Yeah.

So so the south side of of this building faces onto a parking lot. Um, so is that a public area?

Well, when we talk about what the building faces, we're talking about the streetscape. And so in this case, if it were just another a budding commercial lot with a strip center, this would not be an issue, but because it abuts planned right of way in our comprehensive plan and the plan is to extend Grand Avenue you know, going from east to west between Pratt Parkway in Maine. That's the reason why they got stuck in with this standard because it is a planned right of way. Okay.

So because there was I thought I saw a comment somewhere in our packet suggesting that by building the screening wall for the drive thru that, therefore reduce the need for transparency on the south side of the building. But that screening wall, as we saw in Mr. Davis's presentation only goes for, you know, just part of the building not not the entire length, and so on something like two thirds of the building still would be visible from the streetscape from the street and public area. So transparency, according to our code still applies. So I'm one thing that I've also been thinking about, I understand Mr. Davis's point about topologies. But topologies, by definition, are just what's typical, not what's required. You know, topologies are by way of style, once society accepts on you know, the topology of our housing has changed over over decades, over centuries, even. So, typology of retail establishments, in my opinion can also change. I was just going through whole reading our packet on thinking about there are restaurants in town that have double sided 50% transparency, you have Wahoos and Cold Stone Creamery over on hoever Street. They have the kind of transparency on both sides, which we're asking for in in our code. First watch restaurant on Ken Pratt also has 50% transparency probably on all three sides there about I know I've seen it in in Boulder there's yet again another wall who's on but also Starbucks in Boulder on on 28th and Pearl on the southwest corner. Um, so, in my mind, there are enough examples that I can come up with just you know, without even driving around to to understand that it is possible to design a building with restaurants in it using 50% transparency on both sides of the building and therefore meet our code. Mr. Busa wanted to make a comment Mr. Busa

up You're still muted.

Okay, thank you.

Yeah, just I think each one of the buildings you referred to or single tenant use buildings. And so the ability to design something for a specific use is a lot easier. Plus, with a single tenant use building, you have a greater opportunity to hide your services and so forth. But in a strip Center, which I think is what Tom was referring to, you know, you're you're sort of confined to these long, narrow type settings unless somebody comes in and takes up four, you know, spaces by themselves, which is really unusual. And so as a result when you've got these long, narrow type settings, which typically you find in this type of building structure, that's where you become challenged with, you know, where to put utilities and services and so forth. And look, if it were possible, we would put as much glass in is as we can, I mean, there's no there's no downside for us to do that. It's it's really just a matter of practicality and what's in functionality so you know, we're we do do single tenant use buildings all the time and we do have those buildings that have multiple sides of glass. I mean, you look at at the restaurant, they're good fellows right next door and they certainly have multiple sides with glazing and so forth. So and they don't need to have it but they do have it just because it's a single use tenant. So so so

actually, Mr. Busa everything I mentioned is stripped development. It's not single. single tenant development. And there's one that I forgot, which is over on airport, Nelson, there's a strip development on the south side of airport, Nelson includes a protos, and a Japanese restaurant and, and a and a liquor store. And they all have transparency on their north side as well. And their south side. See, um, the another suggestion that was in our packet that I saw that, that the would make the screening of the drive thru on would make the transparency on the south side not necessary, is that it would basically, it would screen not only the drive to thru, but that part of the building from the future residential, which will be across the street on one sack that's developed. However, according to our packet, it appears that that residential will be multifamily. So it could be multiple storeys, and therefore the view from the top stories of the northernmost units, and whatever that development would have, would be looking on the backs or the back the Grand Avenue side facade of this building. And I would posit that part of the reason our code exists, the way it does is so that in these conditions where you have retail next to residential, especially if you have two story residential, that somebody from our second story is not looking at the back of a retail building, especially when it faces onto the street. I'm making comments on not asking questions here. I

know that

other commissioners questions, discussion about the transparency Commissioner. Hi.

Thank you, Mr. Boss, if I'm struggling or confused or want to delve further into the ownership of what I understand, I think are three parcels. This main parcel, which I think is lot one, which Eva has identified is what has been under consideration today. But something that I think is lot two, but when I look at the site planning, lat two is a major part of what I look at what I see for utilities are how streets are being laid out. And I'm trying to figure out what lap three is. And I think it's that residential property or the future residential property to the south. A question for you, Mr. bosa. Is are all three of those owned by Mr. Kiba? Okay, so the statement that you indicated that the dedication of the North 30 feet of Grand Avenue by the applicant has been made in connection with this process, but the owner of the property to the south has not as the same person, correct? No. It's not Mr. Kibo who he just said own the property to the south.

No, the staff was referring to the the part of Grand Avenue that is closest to 87. So we're talking about the existing strip center. And we previously granted that portion of the 30 feet of right of way to the city for the long term goal of the city being able to break through to 287. But it's the south side of the property.

The property to the west. To the east, I believe I'm sorry. Yeah. The East. Yeah. All right. So that's the section of Grand Avenue. Between lots one and three, if I could call the property to the south lot, three. That's all in common ownership.

It is. And that's why that's why this development will be part of Grand Avenue will be part of this development as a whole. On the north

end, so

Grand Avenue with this development goes all the way to the east property line of the correct. Okay. So then when I see an emergency turnout, that looks like it cut but doesn't go far, but it's for emergency vehicles to turn around at the East End on the south side of the street. That's part of what this development encompasses.

Well, the this developments proposal includes the development of Grand Avenue which also includes the Hammerhead turn around, okay, it's either that or to put a full culdesac, which is not practical in So this takes into consideration the future development of Grand Avenue where the Hammerhead could then be removed and development of that Southern site for future development of whatever.

Okay, but my main question was that these three lights are under common ownership, which gives me two, kind of the main issue that I have, which is that last one and two, which are adjacent to one another, we're only looking at a lot one lot one is geographically constrained, to get all that it needs within the size that is being proposed here, including these sand detention basins. The layout of the building, you know, 1500 square feet with a traditional storefront and store back. But that's imposed upon the fact that you've created like two, flat two, we're still part of lot one, possibly. Your building could be longer, and it could have a middle ioway roadway for which access could be made. And it could have fronts, and backs on both sides, with access through a middle driveway going down the middle of it, it seems to me that possibly some of your problems are self imposed, because you're creating two lots here are three lights here, but two lights that are you know, commercially being developed. One now, one, maybe in the future. If you combine them together, some of your problems go away, I think,

Tom, you can probably comment, but I'm not sure that those lots have been created. I think the lots are already there. So you would have to combine the lots, which is a whole nother process, but is lot one and a lot. Two is a separate lot already, isn't it?

Oh, there's a minor plat associated with this, then part of that is the extension of Grand Avenue is is what the city had wanted. I mean, we've been working with the city for a year on this to meet everyone's wishes. So that that's kind of how it's unfolded.

If I may, I gave a brief presentation at the at the beginning. And I talked about the existing lots and how they're being reconfigured. And I don't know if Susan, you're able to pull up that aerial map again. But I did mention that the way this is configured with Boulder County right now the way the lots are planted. There we go. Thank you, Susan, in the top right corner where it kind of says snarf sandwich, there's a little square here. And that's currently just a random standalone lot right now. Then there's on the left side where it says Dry Creek. There's a small lot there. And then there's currently a lot in the middle. And that's where the house is. And it goes south past where Grand Avenue is into that other vacant lot. So the applicants reconfiguring this and they're actually kind of combining because they're combining that that random corner lot where it says snarf sandwich into this slot. And then it's taking the residentially zoned watt and making it a separate lot which makes sense. We frown upon having one lot with two zoning districts. So this works out for us. And then there's a third lot and it's similar in size to the one that's already on the west side. I think it's just a little bit wider so that it could be developed. I hope that clarifies it. Thank you, Susan. Permission, no

further comments.

No Eva does. So the minor Amendment, which is removing a lot in the northeast, corner, combining it with what is being proposed as lot one. that's being done. But that fall back to you're saying is a modification of this current sliver. As I understand it, to make it a little wider. So it can be developed in future in my mind, that all be turned into one line that could accommodate a bigger, more robust less variance requiring project is that correct?

Are you asking me the question, Are you asking Eva

Well, good answer, Eva.

Even you're still muted. Thank you. Sorry

about that. I think that is an opinion. You know, property owners can request, they have their rights to require us to request a subdivision and we lay that subdivision against our subdivision standards. So in this case, it qualified for a minor subdivision plat, as an opinion, whether keeping all of this north part is one lot would mitigate a variance. I don't know that, that that's true, to be honest.

It may also cause other issues as far as curb cuts, you know, do you lose curb cuts when you add them together? I mean, there are a lot of varying factors, not not the least of which is cost, and, and so forth. So it's a lot to take into it. Other than, you know, you know, just trying to combine lots and try to make something a different style. But, you know, we like Tom mentioned, and Eva, we've been working with the city for over a year to try to make this as amicable and workable as possible. So I think we've gone through many iterations that you probably haven't seen, that may or may or may not included other alternatives or thoughts for the for the rear glazing. But we certainly did what we believe would be the best possible project. And then at the end of the day, whatever was left over were this a request for a couple of variances and so forth. And so that's what brought us to where we are today.

All right. And I can appreciate that I can appreciate there's probably a lot of work that's gone into this to get myself and the other commissioners to understand. The other commissioners that myself though, are charged with granting a variance kind of as a last ditch resolution for something that's a not self imposed, be required because of the uniqueness of the property. And in both of those criterion, I'm kind of seeing a property that's being created. And, and be ends up making some of these problems self created in my mind. I'll leave it at that.

Other questions from the commission? Mr. flake?

So one of the variances that you're asking for is the variance on landscaping. And because of the system for draining the property, we can't have enough trees. So I have a question. If Eva, can you refresh my memory on how many parking spaces are required for the site, versus how many that they have proposed?

Certainly. So again, under it's been several years now that we've had different parking standards, but we don't have a minimum parking requirement

for commercial.

We only have maximums. Okay, that to the private sector to determine how much parking they want, or need, they just can't exceed a certain amount. In this case, the maximum allowed parking is 87 spaces, and they're at 81.

So conceivably, not all of those parking spaces have to be

and they could choose to do less, yes.

Okay. So if there aren't, isn't enough room on the right of way, or in some of the what they would term landscape beds, they could actually transfer some of those trees by using one of the winter two or three or whatever it takes of the parking spaces to put the trees so that they are at least within the sight area. So we don't lose any trees. That could be done.

Commissioner flag potentially as a mitigation, again, the buffer width is taken from the property line and then it goes in. You know, for example, on Grand Avenue, it's 20 feet. So they've got 20 feet of landscaping already in there. And then they've got the parking behind that. And so unfortunately, there's a lot of utilities in that 20 feet, which is why they're deficient on some The tree requirements on the buffer and Grand Avenue. So what you're suggesting is that the applicant could go above and beyond the 20 feet and encroach into additional, well, standard parking stalls, nine feet deep. So you're suggesting they could go in additional nine feet deeper, make it a 29 foot landscape buffer to try and get some trees into where the parking spaces would go.

I think that's what,

no, I'm not asking, I'm not suggesting even that the whole buffer would go up. But that in order to plant the trees, they are deficient in that that setback area, they could utilize some of the parking spaces. I don't want to have them lose whole bunches of them along whatever edge. But they could conceivably turn a couple of the parking spaces into essentially pre planting areas to make up for the deficient area that they don't have due to the utilities, because they're very close to the maximum number of parking spaces allowed. conceivably, theoretically. Thank you, Eva.

I have a question for our deputy city attorney Teresa Tate just want to clarify something on variances if I could please. My understanding is that simply because something has been built in the past in a certain way. Such as was suggested in our packet from the applicant. They said, well, the the neighboring properties that were developed in strip malls have a front and a back. And therefore this one should as well. But prior ways in which other properties were were developed is not grounds on on which we can issue a variance. Am I correct about that? In other words, it's not a valid reason for a variance

Srna commissioners, I believe that would go to the compatibilities for Curia. And so the compatibility with the surrounding area. And I believe that the consideration would would fall under that category. Okay, that answer a question?

Um,

let me let me ask a different question. Um, we're under no obligation to grant a variance simply because of what's come before, correct.

That chair commissioners, that's correct you this body will be looking at the criteria for granting a variance and meaning whether those criteria are met or not. As you know, certainly making findings about whether those criteria are met or not. And that criteria does not include prior variances of similar nature. Okay, that is not one of the factors.

Right, that's that's the wording that I was trying to remember. So thank you. Appreciate that. Okay, we've got a conditional use request, and the two variances in front of us. We've talked a little bit about the transparency. We've talked a little bit about the landscaping variance, any discussion about the conditional use of the drive thru conditioner on or off?

Do you hear me?

Yes.

Okay, good. It's a very tough context. You know, you go to East, yes, there's a strip mall, and there's a very strong back and front. However, when you come to West, you have residential properties. And this particular project really turns its back completely to the residential. And that's why the transparency requirement is a very critical requirement, because that itself, I can turn this around. Then what I'm seeing here is that when combined with the conditional use of drive thru, that makes the matters even worse, because it doesn't make sense to have more transparency in front of the drive thru lay. But what I see here can be a compromise, is that, okay? You know, when you look at the east of the back, South facade, you have the drive thru, and maybe you have less transparency, but there's a really good opportunity to open up this building towards out on the southwest corner of the building, maybe even put a patio, that will be a very respectful gesture to the residential. I mean, right now, even when you look at Atari, and Grand Avenue corner is a residential building, and they're going to see this building right corner, it's going to be right on their face. So turning the whole thing back and putting just the utilities is not that respectful. And it's not compatible, either. Because this is not the east side of the property. If you go to the close to the Main Street, yes, that condition is a very different. But here, we since we have some of these natural views, there's an opportunity that this building itself can appreciate as well. It's not just, you know, punishment, it's something that this building can invest in, to make the south south facing is very valuable, especially nowadays, we know that, you know, it's like, if you have a south facing patio, that's the really valuable thing. And this building has that opportunity right now.

So

I would really, you know, the only tool I as a commissioner have right now is the transparency. And I'm willing to not grant this variance just because there's that opportunity. And just because you can really work on that. That is to say, it doesn't have to be the whole facade back facade doesn't have to have that same kind of transparency and same kind of attitude. But as you get rolled to the southwest corner, all of a sudden, you may create something very different there. And that will be very respectful to the presidential to the south. And you would appreciate that you would, you know, that would be a value added to the amenity added to this building. Otherwise, all the facades are facing not. And you know, that's always problematic in this, especially nowadays. We're living through the cold and outdoor seating is so valuable. So that's my two cents.

are on on. That is actually one thing that I was a little surprised. And I like the way you phrased it, that there's an opportunity. Right now with the current plan for this building. There's lost opportunity both to have South patios and North patios and to have people be able to choose which one they want according to the season according to the time of day, etc. Some of the previous examples that I mentioned have other restaurant designs in town, they actually have patios on both sides. And you can choose you know if it's cool in the morning or hot in the evening or whatever. So I'm back to the commissioner heights earlier point. Is this partly as self created problem, I certainly see his point about the decision to to divide the lot on the way they did. But as Eva pointed out, we have no proof that that having a larger lot would resolve the variance issues in front of us. The and I also appreciate why Commissioner flag has been saying about on there are more ways to mitigate the the landscaping to get more trees in on they are very close to the maximum on parking. Again, a little surprised that parking spaces are being placed next to the building rather than spaces for people to use and to enjoy especially when these are sit down restaurants. dine in, etc. I'm also questioning whether it's a self imposed hardship by putting a drive thru on one end of the building that then basically locks them into needing to have cars going past that part of the building and therefore not having other opportunities to open up the the south side of the building to more use and more transparency. Might have another question for Teresa Tate. In terms of process, since we actually have three items in front of us, Theresa, and if a commissioner wanted to make a motion, that say was in favor of one or two of the three things, but not the third, or not, you know, some some partial amount of the three things that are how do we do that with our peasy art?

For sure, and I you would do that by introducing an amendment to the most appropriate PVR. And so, you know, you would find the one that lines up best and amended accordingly.

Okay. Thank you. Questions, discussion? Crusher, Goldberg?

You know, thanks, Chairman. I want I don't know if I have any wisdom to bring to the table here. Admittedly, this has been a challenging project to review. For me as well, I think others have I think that sentiment in general, I weigh heavily the guidance and recommendation from the city recognize that they work on these projects day in and day out and have, you know, sometimes a year long discussions with the applicant and work through them and have a better idea of where they started and where they vetted out and you come to the table with us with a recommendation I so I respect that very much. Additionally, I we historically anyways, have looked favorably upon the applicants who do their best to meet our criteria who looked for solutions, even when they're hard to find those who, you know, bring in agility to the projects that we can see and feel and they can help us kind of grease the approval of the variance. As it relates to this project, specifically, I'm not holding any concerns around the drive thru condition itself, I'd be favorable towards approving the condition for the drive thru, I recognize the applicant has brought three times the amount of shrubs required, and I could see that working in this space to you know, as a goodwill, to meet the the landscaping issues. So that leaves the transparency problem and taking Commissioner heights you know, attitude towards, you know, really reading these variances true to the code and really evaluating making decisions based off of whether they fit or don't fit the review criteria is important to me. So I've heard some great solutions from my peers. Commissioner honor on suggesting we can be we can remove the transparency on the drive thru side, but let's have you up on the other side of the fantastic solution that is respectful to the residents and yet accommodate the needs of the applicant. So I don't know if I'm ready to make a recommendation. I just think that this is a tricky project before us before to making a decision here in a sec

crusher polling

Yes, I am of a similar opinion is Commissioner Goldberg. Um, when I look at this, the conditional approval because of the drive thru, I do not have an issue with that and they have pretty Given that they have met the criteria for that, also in regard to the landscape buffer, I do agree with them. They have tried being a little creative and adding two more plants and shrubs to make up for the trees. Also, noting that part of this is because of the right away, and the utilities that were put on the borders, which is something that they really can't control. And it takes away part of their, the place where they could have put trees. Because of that, I can see I can see and appreciate and would be willing to approve the variance for the landscaping. The one that I'm having trouble, though, is the one I think we all are is the transparency. I do believe that knowing what the code is that they could have taken more time to come up with a a solution to meet that there really isn't a solution that that they have for this. They are relying on the fact that it appears as a back end, it's not fronting the street. But as it's been pointed out, there are residences over there. And we have to go ahead and we do have to help protect those neighbors there on the other side of the street there. And that's where I have a problem with the third part, the third part, the barians, for the transparency. So that's where I'm currently have thought.

Thank you, Commissioner pullin, um, Deputy city attorney tape.

Yes, chair. Sure. And commissioners. I also wanted to mention that going back to your previous question about what to do with a PVR. If one doesn't exactly fit, certainly submission photos, it could decide to adopt the conditional er, operating as many or as few of the variances as the condition sees fit. And for those variances in the event that the Commission determines that a particular variance will not be granted language saying that there is a condition that the applicant meet the code with respect to that element. But suffice.

Okay, thank you. Your Honor.

I like to make a motion. But I need a bit help. Because Let me explain my intention. First, you know, I'm willing to grant the landscaping and conditional use variances. But when it comes to transparency, I want to grant I would like to grant a modified version. That is to say, rather than getting rid of the 60%, and getting all the way to the 8%, maybe we can suggest 30%, which is kind of half and half. And since there is a way that can be achieved by design. I think that's a fair middle ground. And I'm willing to do that. So with that, I'd like to make a motion to approve PCR 2021 and grant landscaping and dry to conditional use variances, however, grant the design standard transparency variants without modification that we would grant 30%, not 8%.

Okay.

So well, we'll need to work on the language a little bit, too, to make that clear. So first off, the PCR would be 2021 dash one, B, because that's

correct. That's correct.

It would be a conditional saying yes to the conditional use site plan. It is not a variance. You just happen to say that it was a variance but it's not a variance. It's a conditional use. You would say yes to the variance for the landscaping. But here's where we need to work is your idea about the variance for the transparency so you would be a problem. proving the variance, but modifying it. But putting a condition on on that, that the requirement is now at 30%. transparency. And is that across the entire facade?

I think that's the way the rule is written. But you know, the way I see it, there are ways to provide that. You know, I don't know, that's my personal opinion, it doesn't make sense to provide a lot of transparency by the drive thru lane. But the other side of the building west side of the Southwest can accommodate a lot of transparency. So in the average, if that comes 30%, I think that's fair. But at the end of the day, it's up to the designer how to distribute that 30%?

Well, let's, let's ask Eva. Eva, in terms of determining the 50% variance requirement in the code, is that an average across the entire facade, which you're looking at, usually, or is that unit by unit, but we don't know how many units are in this, etc?

Yes, chair, schoeneck. And commissioners. So we take it as an aggregate because we don't know how the building would be chopped up from so it's ground floor. And of course, you may have some buildings have clearstory right above it. So we don't count that it's not really ground for you. So what we do is we say, take the whole width of the property, multiply it by the height to the top of plate, that's your area. And then we say 50% of that area needs to be transparent. And so the way you may want to, so it would be p z are the B, it would still be approving the variance for the design standard. But you would add an additional condition to say the applicant must provide at least 30% transparency along the southern facade.

That's your honor on does that make sense to you? The 30% transparency would be calculated by the city across the entire South facade.

Yes, question. Is the requirement 60% or 50%?

Well, there's two things going on here. There's 50% transparency. There's a 60% building articulation section that talks about, you need awnings and arcades, and it says no other features, we could be anything to achieve the 60. But in terms of the transparency, yeah, that's 50%. Again, the number the way we derive it is from the height times width. Yeah. 50%. And then they can distribute it however, they want to do their tenant layout.

In that case, I would say 25%, not 30. I misunderstood that percentage thing. Yeah. That is half 25% would be the number.

Okay. And if I have a question for you on the other requirement about the 60% articulation, because you had included that in your recommendation, that awnings would be part of the conditional PCR. Is that because the cell facade does not meet the code of 60%? articulation?

Correct. So we thought that the added even minimal area of putting awnings over the doorways, each awnings area as an aggregate you add it up at least bumps them up a little bit and dresses up the back of the property a little more for the residents south of it.

So but if they're not meeting the 60% code for articulation, does the condition of adding in the awnings made them the 60% code for that articulation?

chair? Sure, Nick, I doubt that they're at eight. So I doubt highly, but at least it'll bump it up to some attempt at dressing up the back of the building, which was the intent of that design standard.

So back to Commissioner honor on your crafting your motion. Would you continue to include Eva's suggestion suggested condition of including the awnings? Correct? Yes. And would you also include the suggested condition that all DRC revisions be completed before final approval? Yes, yes. Okay, should we try to restate this Yeah,

I move to approve PCR 2021 will be approved the conditional use and approve the design standard and landscaping variances with three conditions, modification of the design standard transparency into 25%.

And

two conditions recommended by the staff the earnings and approval missing. They're almost the final approval after the month after the improvements. Okay.

So I will restate it myself, because we have a motion. Thank you. Okay. We have a motion on the floor to approve a PCR 2021 dash one B, which is conditional approval, this motion would approve the conditional use site plan amendment. It would approve the landscaping variance. It would approve the transparency variance but require that the transparency meet 25%. It would include the staff provided suggestions of awnings need to be provided across this South facade. And it would include the staff staff suggestion that the DRC requirements be completed. Before final approval. Commissioner Goldberg?

Yes. I just wanted to confirm Chairman, the 25% transparency is only speaking to the south facade based off of Commissioner honor and emotion, as I've heard in a way in agreement there.

pressure on Iran.

Yes, sir. My follow up on that before we proceed, although maybe I'm not supposed to ask this right now. Keep me in check. Just as a devil's advocate here with this, I appreciate very much where Commissioner Brown has taken us. Would this be a scenario that where we had that we have utilized in the past where we have used worrying something along the lines of the applicant will work with city staff towards increasing the transparency along the south facade, meaning we we Is it better for us as a commission to dictate a certain percentage? Or is it better for us to the offer the applicant and city staff to go back and find that sweet spot for transparency recognizing the interest of the commission? I'm not sure the right answer. I just wanted to put that by the team.

Commercial poll.

I think in this case, it's better if we actually do put a percentage on this. Because of our concern about the transparency, I think that might be giving a little bit too much leeway. I agree with Commissioner honor on I would like to go ahead and keep the percent there.

I would tend to agree as well. My opinion is that it would be hard for staff to know what mental condition if there is not a strict percentage Commissioner height.

So I appreciate the creativity going in to try to solve this problem. But I'm afraid that we are abusing our discretion. We are charged with looking at the law, the facts making a decision. Commissioner Orion's solution, though laudable is hopeless cloth. We've made our own thing up 25%. That's not the law. It's a solution. But it's not what we're charged with doing taking the law and applying it to these facts. So I can't get there. And I think it's dangerous grounds that solution as well intended. It's offered and rational as it seems, it's not within our authority to do this.

Thank you. Hi, um, I actually have concerns about the about the motion about the statement of the percentage, I personally would stick to what's in the code 50%. Because when we start trying to redesign an applicant's project, we don't really know what the right percentage is on, you know, when we start, divert, divert, moving away from what's written in the code. So how do we know that 25% is actually the right amount? You know, maybe it's 37 and a half. But right, so I would opt, personally, if we vote, assuming that this gets a second, and and if we vote on this, I would vote no on this, because I would actually be looking for the transparency variance to remain at a 50% requirement. In other words, I would be expecting them to meet that completely, because I don't want to redesign the project form. I don't know, you know, what the final best way to do it is for them, but I know that that I believe that the 50% transparency, to your point Commissioner owner on being respectful and compatible, it's a compatibility issue with the residential area across the street. That's what's most important to me. Any, do we have a second on this motion? And somebody like to move move this forward? for a vote? Commissioner Honor,

I just want to make a comment. I mean, variance is a safety valve, it's asked when the special conditions of the particular context, create hardship. And in this particular case, the side is a very challenging side, there's a street, but it doesn't go through. And even though adjacent to the south, there's a residential property right next to it is a commercial property that turns its back in the East that is, and there's a really large parking lot. So there is a base, there is a reason. And I see that reason as a legitimate legal reason to issue a variance. But then again, that wouldn't be fair for the other side. So it's kind of like a in the middle kind of a situation. That's why, you know, my approach is, because 8%, which is asked is not a magical number. 60% is not a magical number, either it's 60% works in certain contexts really well. But the variance in front of us is asking that this particular case is unique. And personally, I see the uniqueness of the site and hardship of this side. But at the same time, I feel like requiring 60% for disparate particle location is not to be fair. So that's why I'm kind of split up and that's why I'm trying to find a middle ground. And I see that not dangerous legally because you know, at the end of the day design is not a very strict science. We really need to use our common sense and really understand what's going on in that particular context and why this is being asked.

Okay commissure tetteh then we'll go to Mr. Busa i'd,

I think I'd like to second Commissioner on Ron's motion, it seems to me like we're probably either going to go with this or we're going to reject it and we're going to come back with not wanting any kind of areas with regard to the transparency so I mean, I'd be okay with that if this failed, but I'd like to second it.

Okay, so we have a second on this motion from Commissioner teta. Mr. bucer you want to have your hand raised. You wanted to make some Comment, this review. So

one moment chair.

And by the way, I apologize. Am I pronouncing your last name? Right? I hope I'm getting your last name right

is pronouncing any way you like it's not a big deal. buce is fine. Tom Davis, I think one of the chime in but his hand raising didn't work. So I just wanted to raise it for his purposes. So as a way to unmute Tom, then

that'd be okay. All right, Mr. Davis.

If we could just, you know, respond to some of the discussion. So, you know, I would say it's not self imposed, because there's two streets that we find. So yeah, we did take the position that just just to clarify the topology, I mean, we can't change the way that the history of retail planning has been. And that has been a building type like this, that we're presenting down to, you know, the rear walls, the shear wall for the building. So if you start putting 60 50% transparency, it's a completely different building, it's going to cost a different amount. And this is very different. I also just want to point out, you know, if we get this transparency, and we come to agreement, and you know, addresses Grand Avenue, and that's great. But I think the reality is, is that a lot of that transparency would be covered up if there's going to be a kitchen there. Because, you know, you got your, you know, you're saying senior greasy stuff, and your refrigerators. And there's a traditional structure to these, and, you know, there is a way to innovate it, and we would support that, but it doesn't really make it a workable building, to have 50% transparency on both sides, it's just not a project. So I just kind of wanted to, you know, if we had the opportunity to have the tenants and be able to look at opportunities for both sides, that would certainly be something viable, and certainly, you know, producing counterpoints. And that's true, but right now, we kind of have a wall, and a drive thru that we're asking for transparency on. And then the other end of the building is about a 30 foot water entry building, which we could move the water entry building, but the way that the building's design now is asking for transparency. It would just be spandrel glass, and we couldn't have visual transparency would be the image of transparency. So there's some real architectural challenges to it, while I applaud the the zoning rule, it's just not really possible to create the building that functions for this function with two sides of 50%. transparency, so I guess that's really where we're coming from and out of the way that the building structurally designed and kind of history of planning of these things. Could it be different in the future? Sure. And we support that but it doesn't really make a building that can be leased, and we just want to kind of throw out and add that to the discussion if that's possible.

Thank you, Mr. Davis. Okay, any further discussion amongst the commission? We have Commissioner Owens motion on the floor. It's been seconded by Commissioner teta. Let's do a roll call vote starting with Commissioner flag.

Name.

Okay. Commissioner gulberg.

Name

Okay, Commissioner Polin.

Now nay

okay Commissioner teta?

Yeah,

okay. Commissioner high.

Commissioner honor on Yay.

And I will vote may I'm so Jane that is a no. On that motion. Um, I counted five nays. And two yeas with teta. In honor on voting. Yes. And the rest of us voting now. So the motion does. The motion fails on just for those who are attending and watching and wondering how our procedure works. If a motion fails, it does not mean that any decision has been made. We have to have a motion that passes before a decision by the Commission has been made. So we continue with our discussion and whether there are further motions. Commissioner hate you have your microphone on. Were you wishing to speak?

Yeah, it wasn't but I will. It is completely inadvertent. I would move propose approval p zero 21 2021. One c should be denial of this application. My reason being, I can't get to approval of the variances. I think the conditional site use for the drive thru, if it were a coffee shop or some other food purveyor, I think would work. But the variance has been requested, in my mind have not been demonstrated that to be based upon the uniqueness of this property, or otherwise self imposed. So I would deny and Move for approval of 2021 one seat denial with this application.

Okay, so we have a motion on the floor to approve pieces, PCR 2021 dash one C, which is a denial of all three items, which is the conditional use site plan, and the two variances on and

I think it's got to be a point of clarification. Because I wouldn't deny all three of them just two of the three, the two variances, I would approve the conditional site use plant, so maybe it's not see. But again, I look at C as a denial of the application in the application, including all three things, I would move to deny two of the three, therefore denying the entire application. I didn't know that we could split it up in parcels. I'm just denying the whole application.

So So Commissioner, hi, might I suggest a friendly amendment to what you're saying which is that you might choose to do PCR 2021 dash one B and approve the conditional use site plan deny both variances and then you would need to make a decision about the suggested conditions that staff gave us

sorry, city attorney Kate, do you have many

Hi,

can we do it that way? Can we partially approve their application or is it in our nothing situation?

Yeah, but chair cernak missioners it is not an all or nothing situation, you may you may take each part and make a decision. So you would make a decision about the conditional use you would make a decision about each question and that would be

alright. Then I will move to a boil I would ask if I could amend my motion which would be approval of PCR 2021 one B two provide for approval of the conditional site plan application to approve the drive thru food facility but denial of the to various requests for the landscaping and visibility standards.

And what about the staff suggested amendments or conditions? completing DRC requirements and the awnings.

So the approval of the redline yes with with with the additional staff recommendations, prove up the redline the DRC review process and that the awnings be I don't like that but at least over the doors, which is what guess what the proposal is from staff. Always open the exit doors okay.

We have a motion on the floor a PCR to approve PCR 2021 dash one B, which is a conditional approval, and it would approve the conditional use site plan. It would deny both variances and it would include the condition that the DRC redlines be completed and that the awnings be provided. Commissioner flag

a second that motion

Commissioner flaig seconds the motion on we can discuss this motion. Is there any discussion about this? Um, I myself have a question for Commissioner height. Um, what is the reasoning for denying the landscaping variance?

Again, back to my overall view of how this project comes together. And the mix and match of three different lives. I see that the landscape, the tree issue is comes out of the fact that personal last one that we're looking at, is small and confined, which I think is self imposed. If it were bigger, it could possibly get around that problem. I don't know if it could or couldn't, but the applicant hasn't demonstrated to me that it can't be done, that there aren't another that there isn't another way that they could meet this problem.

Other than a barrier. Okay.

The applicants consultants, Scott Oh, Mr. Ohm has raised his hand. Go ahead, Mr. Pope, you're still muted.

Thank you, I haven't had a chance to speak it. So some of these encumbrances are existing, some are self imposed. Some were imposed by others. So just for I'll be quick. On the south side, one thing that was not mentioned is that there is an existing overhead power lines. Typically any utility will tell you that thou shall not plant any trees underneath those power power poles or the power lines. And so I have to keep at least 15 feet away from that power line with a maximum of 15 foot tall tree. This is the I've worked with staff and they've they've said the same thing, let you know you cannot put any mature trees on that kind of south side of that same filter. The sand filter self imposed. I've talked to staff that in through the civil engineer with our app gets civil engineer, and that that was something that the city of Longmont imposed onto this project was the sand filter. There's also an imposed by LPC the Walmart power company, they're imposing, also an underground power lines underneath that and they have dictated they want at least a six foot horizontal separation from that underground power line. And so that's just on that small cell side then we also have an imposed by LBC I have a seven foot LPC easement. I can't plant a tree there. I go to the north side, I'm just looking at grant Avenue I go to the north side. And because we have the drive thru, we have an imposed screen wall that I can't plant a tree. And so I'm not left with very many options. Like I said, some of the encumbrances are existing Some are self imposed as far as like the water that we have there are there is a proposed storm there is proposed water there is proposed gas those are all proposed. And that you know I heard from one of the other commissioners that you know perhaps you know taking out parking Island you know you could plant more trees I did a quick look and it's like I need to stay at least 10 feet away horizontal separation from water horse and storm. And so those are the proposed conferences but definitely in that Grand Avenue. There are a lot of existing encumbrances and then the proposed utilities on that south side of grand Davis and then we get to the north side. And it's similar. I have the LPC easement that they are requiring and to be honest, they're not even putting any as far as I can tell they're not even putting any utilities in there. That's just what they require. And so I I've tried to put trees where I'm allowed which is outside of their proposed easements on the north side and I need to stay out of the easements on along Grand Avenue. I need to stay away from the you know the the existing power pole LPC so I just I just wanted to bring that to everybody's attention that this is this is kind of where I'm at. Does anybody have any questions?

I don't see any Mr. Um, thank you very much for your explanation. Appreciate that.

Thank you. I appreciate that. Thank you.

Any further discussion amongst the commissioners, um, it did occur to me just now that I'm, in one sense, the applicant has imposed upon themselves at the highest level, a self imposed need for variances by choosing on their own to make this restaurants and a drive thru. And to choose this use to choose this type of building. This is multi use corridor. There's any number of uses that they could, I mean, they could be building up smaller footprint. They, you know, there's, in one sense, I realized that I just lost sight of the fact that oh, you know, we keep talking about this as restaurants and a drive thru. But that was their choice as well. Okay, um, Any further discussion? Let's take a roll call vote on this motion. Commissioner flake.

Yay.

Mr. Goldberg

nay.

Commissioner polen

nay.

Commissioner teta nay.

Commissioner height. Yay. Commissioner honor. Yay.

And I will also vote Yay. On so that passes for two three with commissioners, flayed height on Iran and myself voting yes. Commercially with Goldberg Poland and teta voting now. I want to thank the applicants for coming tonight and sharing with us the project. Eva, thank you for stepping us through all of that. And we will move on with our agenda.

Do you have to cheer shirt? Do you have to follow up with your normal statement?

Yes. Oh, um, oh, I have a appeal. Notice I have to read. Sorry. Yes, Commissioner. Hi. Go ahead. Was that what you meant? Okay. Thank you for the reminder. Yes, there's an appeal notice that I need to read this item now enters a seven day appeal period. During this time, any aggrieved party may appeal the Commission's decision by submitting a written appeal letter, stating why the planning and zoning Commission's decision should be amended or reversed by city council. All appeals must be in writing and must be received in the City Clerk's Office and the planning office. Within the seven day appeal period. The appeal period begins Thursday, February 18, at 8am and ends Wednesday, February 24. At 5pm. Okay, thank you again, for everybody who helped us get through this project. Thanks also to Caroline Michael and to Chris huffer. for being here. Tonight from the city. Let's see where are we?

Okay.

Let's, we've been going for a while now. So, um, let's go ahead and take a quick five minute break. That'll give. Our next presenter is Phil Greenwald and Francine Jaffe. Time to set up and prepare, but let's reconvene at 937

Okay, I think we are back on. So, next item on our agenda is a discussion item about equitable carbon free transportation roadmap was Phil Greenwald and francy. Jaffe, hopefully I'm saying your last name, right? Correct me if I'm wrong. So

evening, Cheshire neck and the commissioners, thanks for hanging in there with us. We'd like to take this opportunity to present to you with Francine Jaffe, who, also, she's our water conservation sustainability specialist with the city. I'm the transportation planning manager with the city. So the two of us would like to present to you tonight The equitable carbon free transportation roadmap here in front of you. Hopefully, if you had time to see that in your and read through it in your packet, we're going to kind of briefly do an overview and get to the question as quickly as possible. As you can see, we have six slides. And just to let you know, we did start this, this roadmap has been going through the process for quite some time, we did start with these consulting groups that you'll see on the bottom of the slide number one here. And so they started, they started the workout, we had them doing most of the most of the heavy lifting, and then got the product back. And we just kind of weren't, it wasn't where we wanted it to be, quite frankly. And so we did take it back, and worked internally on really trying to refine it to something that you'll see tonight. So next slide, please, Susan. And thanks to Susan for being so flexible on this. So we did send her a late presentation that had some some changes. So I'm really appreciate Susan's help with getting us together. But you'll see the guiding plans here. And this just shows a few of the plans that we have, that we've just we've kind of taken from and really distill them down into what you're seeing tonight in this roadmap plan. So this is one of the more detailed pieces was taking that equitable piece, that carbon free piece, and the transportation solutions piece, and really distilling them down into this roadmap to get us to, to meeting the goals and in a number of these plans. Next slide, please. And again, the goals when we really distill them down from all of those plans. So you take a look at what we're really trying to do with a lot of the transportation work that we've done lately, and the sustainability plan work that we've done lately. And it really does boil down to reducing those emissions, increase vehicle electrification, but also that means any zero emission kind of vehicle fleet, not just electrification, but that's what we are trying to work toward initially, and then reduce those single occupancy, vehicle miles traveled, and really try to get people into alternative modes to overall improve that air quality piece. So those are the things we've kind of distilled again, from these plans and goes into this planning work. Next slide, please. And then the guiding principles, really are talking about how we, you know how this whole thing is shaped, you can see on the base on the bottom, we really have those are called the blocking here, but the equity priorities on the bottom piece. And so that's really the equity piece of this. And it's really the foundation of everything that we're trying to do with this plan. And it's really about making those connections, allowing the connections to happen, the inclusion piece of it, the removal of barriers, and the safety aspect of that. And, you know, kind of one of the good definition of equity that I've heard lately is, is distributing resources proportional to need. And so that's really, again, that foundational piece of that most people say lands, but we're really trying to use the idea that it's more of a foundation. And it really props up that those base strategies of return and reduce the number of trips, shifting modes and reducing direct vehicle emissions. So that really gets us to those some of those goals that you'll see in our in the 18 page plan that's with your with your packet tonight. And you can see that we've distilled it down to 18 pages. I think that's pretty amazing for any kind of planning work that we've ever done in the past to get something that's an 18 page plan. So next slide, please. And so this is really the, you know, when we talk about the roadmap, this is really a so this roadmap, talks about how we are already doing things right now, obviously, our plans that you saw earlier, all those different plans had different elements that were already happening. So those are those Eevee charging stations, the street safety piece of it, obviously financial incentives to get people into other modes or into electric vehicles and that Evie education piece. And the next two years we'd really like to get back into the idea of embedding more equity into what we're trying to accomplish here so that you know, we can really proportionally allocate the resources based on those needs. That's zero emissions First Fleet. So we're really getting back to the point of, you know, our trash trucks have already been converted to renewable natural gas, which is considered a zero emission piece of it, but we really trying to get to those electric vehicles to into households.

We have a go Eevee resolution and I'll turn it over to Francine here, I've been probably talking a little too much, but fancy has some information off the go Eevee resolution that's going to be critical in the next year or two. frenzy.

Hey, thank you, Phil. As Good evening, commissioners, as Phil mentioned on the water conservation sustainability specialists for this city, the NGO EV resolution is a resolution that is has been brought to many different communities across Colorado. And we wanted to create the opportunity to create a more long one specific as Phil was mentioning, a lot of our focus is not just in electric vehicles, but on how can we encourage the emission fleet. So this is an opportunities to set some goals around, not just internally, but for our community around zero emission vehicles. But that also makes sense for a long line, instead of having a go either the resolution that might work really well in another community kind of creating one that works well for long one, and maybe set some goals when we currently don't have specific community wide goals for when we might want to reach certain zero emission targets.

Thanks, fancy. And I won't read all these different bullet points, because you've got them all in your packet as well. So just to give you that sense that these are the things we're going to try to do in the next two years. And then you'll see what we're trying to do in the next then five years after, you know, the next five years. And that's more of our capital improvement program, kind of timeframe, you'll see that that ties to some capital projects that we want to try to get done. The biggest one there is really that transit hub and bus rapid transit facility, first and main. And we'll be talking more about that in the future as well. And then going to kind of a midway point that 2035 point that's you know, 15 years, 14 years now down the road. And really trying to get more of our enhanced multi use corridor pieces done that's really, really complete streets is really the codename there that's getting our complete streets, work done, where we're converting lanes to promote all modes, not just the automobile. And then we talk about getting to 2015. And that's what 2015 is our goal. And so we've got some major things that happened in that next 15 years as well that Susan's pointing out they're interconnected bicycle system that's really trying to make sure that we have a bicycle system that's completely great separated in that timeframe. And then replace your ride program is kind of like a cash for clunkers program, but more city wide. So trying to try to be equitable about how we take care of people's cars and maybe buy them from folks so that they can afford to get into an Eevee. But there's there's a lot of nuance to that. You'll see that in the packet. So and those are kind of the things that are going on right now. So tonight, in the next slide, we're asking you a couple questions, or to take a Take, take some action and basically that's recommend that the city council accept this equitable carbon free transportation roadmap as written. Or also, there's the second possibility of recommend that city council accept that this plan or this roadmap, I should say not plan but a roadmap with additional feedback or direction. We're very much open. And we know that you've only seen this for the first time. So we're very much open to any kind of edits or or or other direction that you'd like to give to us on those or just recommend that the city council not take action at this time. It's not really ready for primetime. And we could certainly accept that as well. So right now we just like to turn it over to you for any questions that you might have for fancier myself. Thank you for your time tonight.

Thank you, Phil, really appreciate and francy Thank you for the presentation. Um, before we go much further since you you did ask for a recommendation to Council on I want to double check with Theresa Tate. We usually do recommendations via PC Rs. Um, but Teresa, how would we handle a recommendation to council as Phil is asking for

a chair sharna missioner.

You could make a motion that incorporated your position and and then set up the minutes would be

Oh,

I didn't catch the last part you broke up.

Oh, sorry about that. Um, the minutes would then be communicated to city council as the official recommendation of the planning and zoning commission.

Okay, fair enough. Okay, thank you maliciously,

though, and ramsi I think it's a good starting point, lots of discussion needed, the closest approximate station that I can see that I could get behind would be number two, I'm always concerned about the fact that there are going to be some people that are never going to ride those bikes. Because they have balance issues or other kinds of things, and they're just not going to do it. And then there are the people that really do like to have the privacy and the individuality of their own vehicles. I know that they there has been on production, something called an elf vehicle, that sort of operate operates between a moped and a bicycle. And it's all enclosed, may not be good for winter. But it's kind of stylish looking. I've thought about getting one, I don't know if it would fit on the trails. But I think discussion is always a good thing. And the more widespread the discussion, the more input, I always get concerned that trails don't have enough benches. For those of us that, you know, would like to sit and look around at what we're walking through

this besides

just a follow on some of the commissioner flakes comments, I also have seen the elf, bike enclosed bike thing. I believe it is too wide for for most striped bike lanes and, and for most trails. So it is things like that are problematic. In terms of Yeah, the furthest I could get as well as is making recommendation to city council, but with, you know, condition on. Like, for example, one of our alternate commissioners is Commissioner, the couch whose ex has an expertise in pedestrian issues, you know, so I would hate to see, you know, the other alternate commissioners left out of this conversation with you both? I think our alternates have a lot of good input to give you as well. So, you know, maybe we could, I don't know what kind of timeline you're on, but maybe we could gather their input to one thing that I noticed, you know, you have in your chart, that things are broken down by what's, you know, easy to implement what doesn't cost much. And you also have the moving towards zero deaths, which I am glad to see read about that, that Helsinki recently hit that standard. And but I believe part of that standard is to reduce the speed limit on all streets to 20 miles an hour. And I think Longmont is currently at 25. I know there'll be some expense to change overs or street signs or speed limit signs. But on it that's not that's not a hard thing to implement. Is it though?

That's a great question. I mean, we've been struggling with this quite a bit, because we've seen boulder going to take this tact of changing speed limits on on stretches of local, local and collector streets, quite frankly, and and when we look at our crash data, most all of our crashes are happening in the intersections. We have, we obviously have some pedestrians who are crossing at midblock locations on arterials. They're getting hurt, but not on collectors and not on locals at all, really. So to make a local street, go down to you know, 15 or, you know, we've seen different different, different numbers there. It's, it's been really difficult. And I don't want to get too far into the weeds. But I think what we're really trying to say is the system needs to be safer for all users. And so we need to make it safe for people to bicycle and walk and feel comfortable like that. And so the vision, the Vision Zero piece of it or the or the move to zero deaths piece of it is one tool in that toolbox to kind of get us to that point. So we're not sure what that means right now. And I don't again, I don't want to get into arguments about should we Shouldn't we need to change the speed limits on all the roads at this point, but that's certainly something that's part of this. That's part of the plans that we distilled into this. So that's kind of the bigger picture. Look at it, if we can look at the, and I didn't mention this in my discussion was we really are trying to reduce carbon emissions or, you know, carbon emissions city wide by 69% by 2050. So, that's one of the goals that's in our plan. And, you know, the whole purpose of the roadmap is to show a way for us to do that, within the current planning practices, and maybe adding some other elements. But the big picture here is really, the roadmap is leading us to this to this and we'd have to follow up pretty strictly to get to that reduction level.

Okay. Well, yeah, I agree. I don't want to get into the into the weeds. But what I had read last time about a 20 mile an hour speed limit was at higher speeds than that the human body is more likely to, to break severely or for somebody to die on 20 miles an hour. collision with a person is more survivable. I'm definitely, I mean, if you don't mind, I'll just run down some things that I made note of, um, the adoption of the 2021 ICC codes to definitely add car charging ready, wiring and garages? Two thumbs up on that, you know, I mean, there's there I've read that there's a push by the National Home Builders Association to get cities to not adopt that. Because it'll make it more expensive to build houses. So I say yes to it. One big question I have, you know, I'm sure you're aware of Boulder County and evaluated the use of electric bikes on on on paths. They approved it for down here on the plains, but not on the mountains. Great. But are we doing any sort of evaluate? Or where do we stand with use of electric bikes on all the paths and all the streets in the city of Longmont?

Great question. Sure. Sure. Like, we really approve our we really allow all electric bicycles, currently on all of our all our paths and routes and bike lanes. That was really an element that was more about that rural rural character of a mountain biking trail and Boulder County. And I think, by them saying, and they did, they did talk to us about it, and kind of got our sense of what more urban conditions are, like for electric vehicle or electric bicycles. And I think we all agreed that electric bicycles work really well in the urban piece of this, but not probably on the on the single tracks in mountain quarters.

Okay. Um, then sort of related to that is on what about the city of Longmont? allowing electrified, micro cars or micro delivery trucks on you know, say like a Kubota sized, little little truck on, there's also people who've been building electrified, hauling bicycles. That might be again, like Commissioner flake said that it might be wider than than what you would normally see on a on a trail or a path. But, um, is there? I mean, in my neighborhood, I've seen somebody driving around on a golf cart. I mean, I'm not, I'm not that close to a golf course, on so and I don't know if that I mean, I don't I don't know if that's legal. I mean, some some municipalities golf carts aren't allowed. But there's, there's a lot of like, very small vehicles that people have a high interest in using. Do we have anything moving toward that?

Yeah, Cheshire neck while we are working, the city is working toward trying to figure out all these different conditions. In fact, we've been approached by a scooter company to come in and, and drop the electric scooters in the city, but they're at least asking for our approval of that. So we're gonna take that to city council and in April, early April to ask if they want to move forward on that or not. But it is all these different types of vehicles and what you mentioned with the bicycling. And even I think the elf piece, I need to look into it more. I was trying to find it online when you're talking about it. So I could actually see the exact exact example. But the idea is that some of those golf carts really aren't allowed on street because they're not licensed properly. And that's kind of the that's kind of the break point. Anything less than that where it's a bicycle Has has the opportunity tunity to use any street in Longmont that it wants to be currently legal, electric or otherwise, to take a lane on any street in Longmont. So if it's an electric, oversize bicycle, those those are even if it's a pedal, oversized, you know, bicycle we allow, those are allowed to be on streets, per the model traffic codes. So it's just those golf carts that kind of get to this funny little gray area that we need to maybe write those into code or, or be more more direct about those.

So um, yeah, definitely, as you do more research, look at I'm gonna slaughter the pronunciation of Japanese kei cars Kti. On, it's a entire type of cars that are that are used quite a bit in Japan. They're very, very small. They're not great. They're certainly not like driving around in a BMW or anything. But, um, but they are very, very efficient. Now, I have just one more question. And then I'll let the other commissioners talk. I'm so big question. So recent headline. General Motors announced it plans to sell only electric cars by 2035. Okay. This plan this roadmap, you're going all the way out? 2050. If GM, one of the most conservative companies in the world is already beating your target by 15 years? How does How will you build into this roadmap, ways to speed up all of these these targets all these projections, because also the climate science is changing so fast. Our needs are changing so fast. How do you build that kind of flexibility into this roadmap?

As you fancy I'm not sure if you want to take that. But I I would just put out there that it's great that these car companies are making these efforts to change, you know, in 15 or 16 years to completely change their fleet. But that doesn't mean that the people driving in the city of Walmart will be 100%. Electric at that same time. So we need to, those are those those financial incentives, and maybe fancy if you want to talk more about that, but the financial incentives and different things to move people who don't want to take bicycles, you know, as Commissioner flake said, not everybody wants to ride a bicycle, people want their personal vehicles. So we need to find a way to somehow at least work with people who want to convert their vehicles, so we can meet our emission standards or mission goals. By that timeframe.

I just want to add that the purpose of this roadmap was to be a compile ation of all the next steps that we have from across multiple plans, add some areas where there may be gaps. And that just how we update our envision multi modal plan as well as the sustainability plan this would, what we're hoping these can help guide that our next update, but also that this, like as technology develops, as you mentioned, things will develop more. And also, as Phil mentioned. Like that's why some of our longer out goals like that the cash for clunkers would be not everyone buys a new vehicle. So if all vehicle new vehicles are being sold, and after 2035, and they're all electric, what about people who buy us and at that point, there could be like so many different models that we don't expect. So that's why I think are longer the 2035 2050 I think we're more both I would say there's two different categories for them. There's some like the the bike, building out the bike lane project that just takes that amount of time. There's going to take that many years like we're starting that now it's going to take them in years but then there's others like that kind of replaced your ride program or Evie workforce development that could happen on or even the the residential Evie charging program. I actually we put that on a larger timeline because our long run parent communications wasn't sure. But then I got a message today from some of our communications. And actually, we may be able to shift that up on a faster timeline conversations are happening earlier than expected. So it's a mixture of those. It's some unknowns on those timelines and with staff capacity. But this isn't. This is like the hard set. This is what we're doing. We're just more trying to compile some next steps and get things on people's radars.

Okay, as you stated what we'll have to update this plan or this roadmap quite frequently. Based on new science, and based on new planning, so expect to see us in another two years probably.

Okay, great. Commissioner. Hi.

Thank you very much for putting this together and I guess spearheading the efforts of others to bring it together and refining it. In my mind, I think the science is clear, reducing carbon necessary now. I think that you've married this equitable component to it so that it becomes available to as much of our population as we can make it available to is a fantastic addition to it. So my recommendation would be yet take this to Council, council to keep talking about it. I don't have more to add to it. myself right now. But I think council should be encouraged by all means, to follow this roadmap. Thanks.

Other commissioners? Commissioner onra.

takes a moment to unmute. I repeat, height comments, I really appreciate this. Thank you for your Thank you, Francine. There's a great effort. I mean, there's always something to add. Right. And maybe what I'd like to add is, you know, the, I agree with chairman's chernick, that, you know, the speed is really important and 20 miles per hour is very important. And there are ways, you know, changing the speed limit is one thing and making that speed limit to be encouraged by the road design is another thing. Unfortunately, there are a lot of really wide roads, downtown and surrounding areas, maybe we can start a program where you know, you start adding to the street, putting some bike racks in the middle of the street so that you can slow down the traffic. I mean, we have all sorts of, you know, creative ideas, we can look around, but maybe there's a program about addressing the wide streets and kind of traffic calming. Yeah, it may be it doesn't need to be really expensive, you know, you can involve the citizens to go and put art, you know, there's a lot of the tactical urbanism, exactly examples you can put, even putting a, you know, a chalk art in the middle of the road slows down the traffic. But, you know, we can start thinking about those kinds of things as well. Maybe that's one of the items in your roadmap to add. That's, but this is a great initiative. And I would definitely if you need any recommendation, yeah. You know, as a commissioner, I'll support

others. I

just like to address the commissioners comment and do highlight it was kind of the last one in our two year timeline. But we did have the recommendation from our traffic engineers, two minutes under street safety, develop a baseline survey on existing existing traffic calming tools and their effectiveness, and so on, we can try to call that out more in that section. But I, I believe that was kind of behind the tent of looking into alternative traffic calming methods, besides just decreasing the speed.

just just just to kind of tag on to that we do have that enhanced multi use corridor plan. That really is it really is again, code for complete streets. And that is where we try to take some of that space that's out there. Some of that additional, like you said, it's very wide. And we actually have a program for ninth Avenue West ninth Avenue coming this summer. So look forward to that, as far as probably taking some Wayne's making it a three lane instead of a four lane and then providing some bicycle lanes that are buffered, and that creates some space for the pedestrians that have a very narrow sidewalk.

Phil, just just one idea. You know, I mentioned earlier that our alternate commissioners would be good to get feedback from I'm going to suggest that that you and planning director Van inwagen just work together to reach out to them. You know, because if we make a recommendation to send this forward to city council, I don't want that kind of communication process with our alternates too slow. That whole thing down. Um, so I think you could do those in parallel. Okay,

right, we, the three of us can certainly cherish your neck reach out to those alternates, as you mentioned, we'll work with francy on that as well. So we'll all work together to try to get that input. I'm assuming they got the packet as well. So we'll just, we'll we'll check and make sure that they got a copy and see if they had any comments. Okay.

Great. Thanks, Glenn. From the commissioners, Any further comments, anything for fullfil and fancy, somebody want to make a motion as to what kind of recommendation we could make to city council, that would be in our minutes? Commissioner flake?

It doesn't have to be real fancy, right? We could just simply say, planning and zoning commission supports the notion of having further discussions and contemplations over multimodal issues, or however you want to have it specific to the and we put the name of the process that they're doing right now.

So Commissioner flag is that basically saying that we recommend city council accept this? Or, or that we recommend that city council? So what was your level two?

level two was to recommend that city council accept the roadmap with additional feedback or direction. So I think that would fall under what you are requesting that we could, we could make sure that we get all the feedback that you've talked to us tonight about from this commission, and then reach out to the alternates as well and get their

feedback.

Okay, so so your level two would mean, incorporating our feedback. And I

don't know, Susan, if you can put that slide up again, for the for the motions or the recommendations.

I mean, it wouldn't be like us recommending that city council go into some long drawn out, you know, feedback process or something. Right.

Right. What we're trying to do is just get comments to incorporate into this roadmap. And make sure it's as you know, as as really tight as it can be, as far as what we bring up to city council. So you've you've given us some things tonight to think about and to amend into the plan. We'll also do the same with what we hear from the from the alternates. Okay.

So, Commissioner flake, your motion is to is number two there. Well, you're you're muted. I'm sorry.

Yes, to go ahead and accept number two, because that is the to me the most open ended. Okay, I

guess we'll do this as a commissioner. Hi, go ahead. I'll second that. Oh, yes, that's right. We have a motion. We need a second. Thank you, Commissioner hype. So we have a motion to send this to city council with further recommendations. As stated. Let's take a roll call vote. Commissioner height?

Yes.

Commissioner polen?

Yes.

commercia. Goldberg?

Yes.

Commissioner otter on. Yes. Mr. teta? Yes. Commissioner flag.

Yes.

And I will also say yes. Jane that passes unanimously on and that's seven to zero. On. Phil and Francine. I echo what Commissioner Hyde said two really nice to see the equity component being you know, woven throughout this. I think it's it's great that that you've done that too. So, appreciate it. appreciate all your work on this.

Thank you for your time tonight. Please really appreciate it. Good to see you guys. All again. All right.

Okay, we will move on to our next agenda item which is our final call for the public invited to be heard on something somebody is out there and wants to speak to the commission. Now's the time. please dial 1887880099 toll free here in the US When prompted, enter the meeting id 8261442748. When you're ready to hear your public comment, we will call on you to speak based on the last three digits of your phone number each speaker state their name and address for the record and will be allowed five minutes to speak. Please remember to mute the live stream when you are called upon to speak. So to do this, we need five minutes. I will take a break for five minutes and be back at 1017.

Chair will give our livestream just a few seconds here to get caught up. We have no one in the queue at this moment.

Okay, thank you, Susan.

Alright, looks like we're, we're back. Okay,

so nobody called in for the public invited to be heard. So we will close that item 10 on the agenda items from the commission. As always, I want to thank Jane Madrid and Susan will act for their inimitable help getting us through all the technicalities of these meetings. So thank you both items from council representative Aaron Rodriguez.

Obviously

Hey, remember

Aaron, your your Can you speak up in your question? Breaking up a little bit. Sorry. Oh,

nothing else. Thank you so much.

Okay, sorry about that. Um, let's see items from Planning and Development Services Director, Glen Vandenberg.

Mr. Chairman and commissioners, I kind of jumped the gun. And I gave you my report at the Communications at the very beginning. But unfortunately, it's given me time to think of one other thing. And we would love to have as many commissioners join us at the Rocky Mountain land use Institute. It's a great conference that's put on by the Sturm college a lot, the University of Denver, they are doing it all online, and they're only doing it on Fridays through the month of March. So you're not going to get burned out by a bunch of zoom meeting. So if you want to let me or J. Madrid No, we would gladly sign you up.

All right. Thank you, Glen. Um, and I know, quite a few of us have gone to that and can vouch for how good that is. So great opportunity. Teresa Tate. I have a technical question for you. In the past, we have done a German simply by acclamation. But now, our electronic meeting requires roll call votes. Do I have to do that even on an on a German?

everything? Everything. Just kidding, chair? No, no. You know, really, the purpose of that provision is so. So the public, so there's transparency for the public on how individual commissioners are voting in the same way that we would have in chambers where you have the display up on the screen. I don't think there's the same compelling public interest and the adjournment votes.

Okay. Great. Thank you, Teresa. So next item on the agenda is a German if I see nobody opposing will be adjourned. Stay safe and warm, everybody. Take care.

Thank you, commission.