Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutErik and Carole Gabrielson 12-1Date: December 1, 2017 To: Mayor Tammy de Weerd City Council Members: Anne Little Roberts, Joe Borton, Ty Palmer, Keith Bird, Genesis Milam and Luke Cavener From: Erik and Carole Gabrielson 4231 E. Easy Jet Drive Meridian, ID 83642 Re: Public Hearing for Movado Greens Subdivision (H-2017-0104) by DevCo, LLC We are requesting that our written comments on this matter be placed in the administrative record. We have spent many hours reading through the information regarding the Movado development. We have no objections to the development itself except for the traffic flow. We feel very strongly that there has not been adequate planning to deal with the traffic that is generated. The developer is coming before the city council on Tuesday, Dec. 5, to significantly change certain aspects of the project. He is asking to move 96 residential units from Movado Greens to Movado Estates. This will bring the total number of residential lots in Movado Estates from 430 to 526. The Silverstone Apartments, in Movado Greens, are being reduced in size from 312 apartments to 112 apartments and the commercial lots have increased from 3 to 6. Currently there are only three exits and entrances for this development: 1) Movado Way — access and egress from Overland. There is no traffic signal. 2) Pewter Falls — street within Silverstone Business Park. Multiple large commercial building parking lots also exit out onto Pewter Falls. This street dead ends at Cobalt Point. Turning north on Cobalt Point, then right onto Jade, you can exit out to Overland. There is no traffic light. Turning north on Cobalt Point you can jog over to Silverstone and exit out on Overland. There is a traffic signal here, but you also have Silverstone exiting out on the north side of Overland and this is the only exit for the new NORCO building that is under construction. NORCO will generate a substantial amount of traffic. Instead of heading out to Overland on Silverstone, you can head south and wind back through the business park to Goldstone and then out to Eagle with a traffic signal. 3) E. Copper Point Drive — street within Silverstone Business Park. If you are heading east, this street currently dead ends at Knapp, at the point where a bridge over the Ridenbaugh Canal connects into Sutherland Farm. E. Copper Point Drive will eventually be built out eastbound and connect with another residential street in Movado. Currently, if you exit westbound on Copper Point you have to turn -2 - right on Cobalt Point, go down about a half block and turn onto another section of E. Copper Point Drive. Multiple business parking lots also exit out to this section of Copper Point. It intersects with Eagle Road right below the Ridenbaugh Canal. It is a difficult intersection, with no traffic signal. There is a downhill slope from Victory Road to just below the intersection. Drivers often speed because of the downhill slope and there is limited visibility of oncoming traffic. You also have a continuation of Copper Point that exits out onto Eagle from the business park on the west side of Eagle Road. There is no route from E. Copper Point to access the signalized street (Goldstone) that enters and exits Silverstone Business Park unless you cut through the parking lot of T -Mobile. This is not a street that was meant to handle large amounts of traffic. In addition, Meridian's Planning and Zoning Commission has a hearing set for Dec. 21St, to discuss the Harper Ridge Subdivision, consisting of 124 multi -family dwelling units, located at 3885 E. Copper Point Drive (adjacent to Sutherland Farm). Obviously, this is a project that will generate considerable traffic and they will be using the same roads in the business park as Movado. I wish that the City Council members, Mayor de Weerd, and the Planning and Zoning staff would all come out to Silverstone Business Park and spend some time driving these streets (especially at 5:00 p.m. at a peak traffic hour). I have tried to be very specific in my descriptions, but it's difficult to visualize unless you are familiar with the streets. I think if you did this, you would understand why we feel so strongly that the access and egress from Movado is not sufficient. Because of the way the E. Copper Point Drive connects with the Movado development, we know that Sutherland Farm and Muir Woods are going to experience an enormous increase in traffic through our subdivisions. When you add Harper Ridge into the mix it will make the problem even worse. It is human nature (I have done it myself) to choose the fastest route from point A to point B. Our subdivisions offer access to a signalized light at Eagle (E. Easy Jet Drive), several ways to get to Victory Road (both through Sutherland Farm and Muir Woods) and the most direct access to Cloverdale Road (through Sutherland Farm then Muir Woods). There is enough evidence to show that we will see hundreds of additional cars through our subdivisions once Movado is fully built. That increase significantly affects the safety of our residents, our quality of life and our property values. I understand that the approval has already been given, but our City Council needs to rethink this and take action. THERE NEEDS TO BE AN OUTLET FROM MOVADO TO CLOVERDALE. I have enclosed pg. 28 of the Planning and Zoning hearing minutes for Movado subdivision on Nov. 17, 2016. Josh Beach, Associate City Planner for Meridian, states that ACRD indicated "that they would be okay with the connection (to Cloverdale) but they are not going to push for it and they are going to leave it up to the city staff to determine whether or not we think we need that. We have gone back and forth as a staff. I don't think it's something that we need as part of the project. We have plenty of connectivity. " Unless routing large amounts of traffic through subdivisions is "plenty of connectivity", we think the city of Meridian needs to rethink -3 - this. I also included pg. 34 of the Planning and Zoning meeting minutes and I refer to the remarks of Mr. Conger, who represents the developer of Movado. In his remarks he states that if the developer has to put a road out to Cloverdale, he will not be able to reroute the canal, thus eliminating the need for the two bridges on Cloverdale. ACHD should be willing to work with the developer to reach a compromise on this issue. Rerouting the canal will save millions of dollars in future bridge building and maintenance. The developer needs to be responsible for building an access to Cloverdale. He knew full well what the issues were when he purchased the land. The adjacent subdivisions shouldn't have to carry the burden of additional traffic to save costs for the developer. During the City Council meeting on December 20, 2016, Council member Milam asked during a discussion of Movado "So, If we — it does obviously make a lot of sense for there to be Cloverdale access. It puts a lot of pressure on these subdivisions. Is it —I don't know if I missed something. Was it the applicant's decision or the ACHD's decision to not have access to Cloverdale?" (pg. 53 of the 12-20-16 council meeting minutes — copy attached.) Mayor de Weerd referred this question to Josh Beach. His response was: "My understanding from the applicant is that ACHD did not require the connection, so it's the applicant's preference based on logistics of constructing it to not provide that. " I refer back to pg. 28 of the Planning and Zoning meeting minutes. Mr. Beach makes no mention of the Meridian City Planning and Zoning staff making the determination that a Cloverdale access was not necessary. He had several more opportunities to clarify his answer when the lack of a Cloverdale access was questioned by Council member Cavener (pg.59), Mayor de Weerd (pg. 60), and Council member Bird (pg. 65). We ask two things of the City Council: 1). To be accountable for the decisions made by the Meridian Planning and Zoning staff and 2). To revisit the Cloverdale access for Movado. There is an opportunity to vastly improve the traffic flow from this development. If you don't choose to do this, the land will be developed and it will be too late. The adjacent subdivisions will forever be left to deal with the increased traffic. We understand that a Cloverdale access will add to the dilemma of too much traffic on Cloverdale, but there are plans to eventually widen it. At that point, the additional traffic won't be an issue. Muir Woods and Sutherland Farm shouldn't be forced to deal with the additional traffic from Movado because ACHD is so far behind in updating our infrastructure. Thank you for taking this into consideration. Erik and Carole Gabrielson Meridian Planning & Zoning November 17, 2016 Page 28 of 43 McCarvel: Yeah. I mean -- said there is complications of having a road going -- you know, having an exit out to Cloverdale, just because nothing else -- are there too many streets already coming in and out there? Conger: Sure. Yeah. Mr. President, Commissioner McCarvel, yeah, that has been, again, months of meetings with the highway district, your staff at the city and Nampa -Meridian as well. So, there is several things that play a component into this. Your UDC, trying to minimize points into major arterials as your staff indicated in their staff report. Then we go with the highway district, who with — with the removal — their whole goal in the Cloverdale — it currently is over capacity and putting more road systems into Cloverdale makes no sense to them. We also spent tens of thousands of dollars on a traffic study that before everybody could make their decision of no connection point proved out that -- because ACHD's goal was actually to get all the traffic to migrate west to get the collector inside of Silverstone that will either take you to Overland where the signal is or take you to Eagle Road on the east -west collector to Eagle Road. Tens of thousands of dollars in a traffic study was -- was needed before ACHD would accept that the internal streets were clearly designed for this amount of homes and that let them get their goal of alleviating -- or not putting more pressure onto Cloverdale Road. Yearsley: And, then, also if you see the little jog on the Ridenbaugh Canal, that's going to get moved over to the west side and, then, they are going to have to move the Five Mile Creek as well at the same time. So, there is a lot that they would have to cross to get that to work. Conger: Yeah. That's correct. Beach: Commissioner McCarvel, I will say that, again, we don't have a staff report from the highway district, so I don't have a lot of that analysis right now. We have reached out to them, because we wanted some answers prior to coming to the Commission hearing. They had indicated that they would be okay with the connection, but they are not going to push for it and they are going to leave it up to the city staff to determine whether or not we think we need that. We have gone back and forth as staff. I don't think it's something that we necessarily need as part of the project. We have got plenty of connectivity. With the complications of moving a very major lateral to the other side of the road, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense, in our opinion, to do that. McCarvel: It was just something that stuck out in my mind. I just wanted the details on the record, because it's just been their complications with it. Conger: No. That was a great question. Meridian Planning & Zoning November 17, 2016 Page 34 of 43 It, actually, is too close to Cloverdale to meet ACHD standards. The collector road that is signalized is inside the Silverstone commercial, which is the whole migration pattern to the west of anything that's running east -west out of this property is still designed to get to the collector road that's inside of Silverstone. Yearsley: So, just so I understand that, your collector road coming out will not have a signal? Conger: Correct. It will not, Yearsley: Okay. Conger: Yeah. I think touching -- touching base on Cloverdale one more time and I -- this possibly is as good a screen as any to look at. What we have been working with for the last 12 months in -- in forging a partnership with the irrigation districts and the Ada County Highway District, is to relocate the canal, which, for the record, is on our property, we are giving up land that we have had to pay for to get it there. That's part of our partnership. Relocating the canal would be at our expense, because Nampa -Meridian will probably provide the labor -- to answer the question of an earlier gentleman, the canal is not leaking, we -- we kind of pride ourselves in almost having a full-time partnership with Nampa - Meridian Irrigation District. We deal with them all over the valley and very much value them. There is no lining or concrete tiling required. We have left sufficient distance to stay out of it and that access road that the lady did have a question on, will stay. I mean your staff has already talked to Nampa -Meridian. There is no pathway opportunities there, so that -- that part is out, because that is their maintenance road and that is -- the way they built the homes on the south side, that's the only way they can access. So, moving -- moving back into our partnership, why we are not having a Cloverdale access is we are giving up the land -- ACHD is in partnership with this, because they are going to eliminate two bridges. If we do a road out to Cloverdale we are not able to relocate the canal, we are not able to eliminate two bridges to the public taxpayers when they eventually widen this, which is not in the five year work plan. For the record we would love it to be, but it's not. They simply don't have the funds and -- so, with us not being able to relocate the canal, we would put one bridge in for an access out, they would still have to widen the two bridges at the time that that off-site happened with the highway district. So, that is why you see the -- you see the culmination of many meetings with your staff and the highway district, that there is no connection to Cloverdale. It is a dominoing effect. So, the -- the end result of many, many meetings was to eliminate the Cloverdale access and that is a public benefit of several million dollars of cost of the widening of this bridge and maintenance over years and, again, that's what forged this land plan in this corner. So, we have been a team player giving up land and both agencies have worked very hard to figure out what is best for the public taxpayers for the next hundred years and -- and no connection is the right answer to that question. Meridian City Council December 20, 2016 Page 53 of 73 Christmas, and it was -- I was surprised -- I'm sort of surprised to many of us that this happened, because we were not notified, because we are a distance from this development. It doesn't look like we would be impacted, but the impacts will be huge. The only reasons I can see that we wouldn't do this is -- is the cost of the access to Cloverdale and the additional entry onto Cloverdale, because Cloverdale is becoming a much more traveled road. Something needs to be done about that, but that's not our issue here. The other one would be simply to say that the -- it would wipe out a few lots and the developer would be able to do fewer things. Well, this size -- ultimately 550 homes in there and the only kind of access you're going to have -- and to do this later you're going to have to remove some houses to get access to Cloverdale. The time to do this is now, not when there would be a huge impact in the future. So, I would ask you to -- whatever. To table this, to go back and reconsider it, give a chance for more people from the area to give input, because we were not notified ahead of time, because we are outside the range of people who were notified, but we are the ones who will be impacted. I appreciate your time. I hope you will give this very strong consideration and I do appreciate what you did last time for us. It was wonderful. Thank you. De Weerd: Thank you. Milam: Madam Mayor? De Weerd: Mrs. Milam. Milam: So, if we -- it does, obviously, make a lot of sense for there to be a Cloverdale access. It puts a lot of pressure on these subdivisions. Is it -- I don't know if I missed something. Was it the applicant's decision or the ACHD's decision to not have access to Cloverdale? Beach: Are you asking staff or the applicant? Milam: I'm asking staff. De Weerd: I think it's staff for now. Beach: Very good. My understanding from the applicant is that ACHD did not require the connection, so it's the applicant's preference based on logistics of constructing it to not provide that. Again, the applicant can -- I think could further clarify. De Weerd: Yeah. We will ask him when he comes up. Milam: And Justin maybe. Bird: Madam Mayor?