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HomeMy WebLinkAboutFebruary 15, 2007 PZ Comm Meridian Planning & Zoning February 15, 2007 Page 7 of 80 any problems with. The one condition would be the five foot landscaping, so we'd extend that a little bit and make it a little wider there, instead of the back out, and we will make the back out area, the drive area, 25 feet. We don't have any problem with those two conditions. And with that I will leave it to you for asking questions. Rohm: Thanks very much. Any questions of this applicant? Thank you. Cynthia Russ. Would you like to speak to -- Okay. Thank you. From the audience she said she was only hear to answer questions if there were from the Commission and I don't believe there are any. Is there anybody else that would like to speak to this applicant? Seeing none, could I get a motion to close the Public Hearing? Siddoway: So moved. Mae: Second. Rohm: It's been moved and seconded close the Public Hearing on CUP 06-041. All those in favor say aye. Opposed same sign? Motion carried. MOTION CARRIED: FOUR AYES. ONE ABSENT. Borup: Mr. Chairman, after considering staff and applicant testimony, I move to recommend approval to City Council of file number PP 06-060 as presented in the staff report for the hearing date of February 15th, 2007. Mae: Second. Rohm: It's been moved and seconded to approve CUP 06-041. All those in favor say aye. Opposed same sign? Motion carried. Thank you. MOTION CARRIED: FOUR AYES. ONE ABSENT. Lucas: Mr. Chairman, Members of the Commission, just listening to the motion I believe it was said approve -- recommend approval to the City Council. I just want to clarify that this is the deciding body on this. Rohm: And I modified that in my statement. Lucas: Thank you very much. I just wanted to make that clear for the record that this is the final decision. Item 8: Public Hearing: RZ 07-001 Request for a Rezone of 1.59 acres from an R-4 to an R-8 zone for Oeklan Subdivision by Heritage Development, LLC - east of the NEC of W. 4th Street and Maple Street: Public Hearing: PP 07-002 Request for Preliminary Plat approval of 6 single-family building lots and 2 common lots on 1.59 acres in a proposed Item 9: Meridian Planning & Zoning February 15, 2007 Page 8 of 80 R-8 zone for Deklan Subdivision by Heritage Development, LLC - east of the NEC of W. 4th Street and Maple Street: Rohm: Yes. Thank you. And you're absolutely right. Okay. At this time I'd like to open the public hearings on RZ 07-001 and PP 07-002 and begin with the staff report. Lucas: Thank you, Chairman Rohm, Members of the Commission. This application is called the Deklan Subdivision. The applicant Heritage Development has apply for rezoning from R-4 to R-8, which is medium density residential, for 1.59 acres and preliminary plat approval of six single family residential building lots and two common lots in the proposed R-8 zone. This site is located on the east side of west -- on the east side of West 4th Street -- right here. This is West 4th. Near the northeast corner of the intersection of West 4th Street and Maple Street. Maple Street runs east to west right here. The surrounding area -- let me give you a little bit of context here. To the north you have some -- a single family home located right here and this is the LDS church property, which is located off of Cherry Lane right there. There is an older LDS church with some ball fields in the rear. To the east there is some single family homes zoned R-4. To the south also single family homes zoned R-4. And to the west are some single family homes zoned R-8. As was stated -- move on to the aerial photograph here. You can see that existing home and this area of that lot has been vacant for some time. This is the preliminary plat. This gives us an idea of what kind of subdivision the applicant is proposing. They are proposing a -- regarding their street system, an approximately 300 foot long cul-de-sac with the six lots taking access off of that proposed street. Along with that the total gross density of the project is approximately 3.77 units per acre. The applicant is providing some landscaping as you can see here. There will be a landscape strip on the north side of the proposed street and approximately ten foot wide landscape strip along this south side, which will help to avoid the double fronted lots that can be undesirable. So, they are proposing that ten foot strip. And as I understand it -- the applicant will probably touch on this also -- due to a fire department requirement to widen this cul-de-sac a little bit -- I think it's this area down here. They are going to have to go to five feet, which staff views as definitely possible. There really are no UDC requirements regarding double fronted lots, it's something that staff looks at definitely and we usually recommend ten feet, but it's really up to the discretion of the Commission to see if, indeed, that five foot meets the needs of these neighbors. Approximately.1 acres or 6.3 percent of the site is being set aside four open space in those areas I have designated. And this su.bdivision and a rezone request complies with the UDC and also with the Comprehensive Plan. Other than that, there are no special considerations, except for the fact that the applicant is requesting a waiver of the pressurized irrigation requirement due to the fact that the water, as stated by -- as stated by the Nampa-Meridian Irrigation District, the water crossing this site is not reliable enough to provide pressure irrigation to this area. However, city code allows for City Council to waive this requirement only if the property does not have any water rights. Therefore -- and this was a comment from our Public Works Department The Public Works staff is not supportive of waiving the requirement and would require a pressurized system that utilizes existing surface water and is supplemented by city water. That was one of the issues that came up regarding irrigation water on this site Meridian Planning & Zoning February 15. 2007 Page 9 of 80 and something that should be considered by the Commission. Other than that, staff is recommending approval of this rezone and subdivision application and I will stand for any questions. Rohm: Thank you. Any questions of staff? Would the applicant like to come forward, please? Johnson: Good evening, Chairman Rohm, Commissioners. My name is Megan Johnson with WRG Design, 1173 East Winding Creek Drive, Eagle, Idaho. 83616. And I'm here to represent Mr. Wayne Stacy, the applicant on the project, and Justin basically covered everything that I wanted to touch on. We are in agreement with the staff report. I do have our engineer here to discuss the pressurized irrigation system if you have questions. Our concern is that there is just not any water -- reliable source of water on that property for a pressurized irrigation system and the applicant is more than willing to connect to city water and have an irrigation system hooked up, but we just don't feel a pressurized irrigation system is appropriate on this site due to the lack of water and Justin also did touch on the other thing that I was going to talk about, which was increasing that cul-de-sac radius from 45 feet to 48 feet and that does -- and he did point to the right spot earlier. I don't have my little -- Rohm: There is a pointer up there. Johnson: Oh, is there? Okay. So, right in this area the cul-de-sac will come out just a little bit more to accommodate the Meridian Fire Department's request for a 48 foot radius, leaving a five foot buffer right there. And this is a private lot, so they will be landscaped. And it should be -- it should be nice. We wanted to make sure that the lots on the south weren't double fronted and try to make a nice entry for our project as well. The only other thing that I wanted to bring up was a request by the sanitary service to have a turning radius of 50 feet and we feel that a 48 foot radius is plenty in conformance with the Meridian Fire Department standard. So, if you have any questions about the pressurized irrigation system or anything else, myself or the engineer Ryan Morgan, is happy to answer. Rohm: I guess my question would be is -- are any of the neighbors to the south or the north, are any of them on pressurized irrigation systems that are provided outside of the city water? Johnson: I do not know the question to that -- Ryan? Or the answer. Cole: Mr. Chair? Rohm: That's fine. Cole: Mr. Chair? Rohm: Mr. Cole. Meridian Planning & Zoning February 15, 2007 Page 1 0 of 80 Cole: Members of the Commission. When I saw this application first come through requesting the waiver for pressurized irrigation, the first thing I did was check to see if there were any pressurized irrigation systems adjacent that they could tie into and there were not. All this was platted prior to the city's requirement for the pressurized irrigation system. I could speak a little bit about the Public Works' comment about the PI system if you so choose at this time. Rohm: Yeah. I'd like to -- I'd like to hear a little bit more about that, Mike. Cole: The city code requires a pressurized irrigation system, so that you're not using the potable water to basically drain the aquifer to throw right back on the ground. You know, drinking water is treated to a level so that it's drinkable and just to throw it back on the ground is wasted resources. So, there is a requirement for pressurized irrigation. Justin touched on the fact that Council can waive this requirement if it's proved that there are no existing irrigation rights, is how the code reads. The letter from Nampa- Meridian on this site said that there is spotty irrigation delivery, that it's not reliable enough to feed a pressurized irrigation system, and so our -- internally we talked about this a bit and we thought the -- the prudent thing to do may not be the easiest or the most cost effective for the applicant -- would be to put in a pressurized irrigation system with a wet well that could hold the surface water when it's available, but be -- use city water on top of that to supplement it when there is not enough water from the surface. So, you're using the surface water that's available to put on the ground, instead of just using potable city water. The requirement can be waived by Council, it cannot be waived by this Commission, but you can definitely send your recommendation on. And I'd stand for any other questions if I haven't described it adequately. Rohm: No. That makes perfect sense. Thank you. Morgan: My name is Ryan Morgan, WRG Design, also at 1117 -- no. 1173 East Winding Creek Drive, Eagle, Idaho. 83616. Right? Yeah. In regards to the pressure irrigation system, as you can see we have that letter from Nampa-Meridian Irrigation District, but we also did do some research, as Public Works did, and there are no systems within probably a half mile of this location due to the existing nature of this being an older part of town. As stated, we have spotty water delivery. With discussions from the neighbors in the area and with the irrigation district, we are talking about water delivery less than once a week for only a few hours during that time frame. We have water rights of 1.21 shares, which is equivalent to about 11 gallons per minute. So, we are not talking about a whole lot of water and we just -- we feel that it would be not only not cost effective, but to create a pump station -- and to be honest with you, cost is not the overall factor on this, it's creating a pump station in the location that would probably sit in this general area, which would not be pleasing to the entrance. You could probably do something architecturally that would be acceptable, but we are talking about, again, a small amount of water, we are talking a one or a two horse pump that you get water once a week, if that, and so the other six days out of the week you're going to be using the city water anyway, so we just -- we feel -- and we have talked with Meridian Planning & Zoning February 15, 2007 Page 11 of 80 our client, we just feel that because of this little amount of water delivery that you're not really gaining anything, you're going to be using mostly city water anyway and only about five to ten percent of the water that you are using will actually come from this surface water right. Rohm: Thank you. I suspect that that's a very accurate assessment. Any additional questions of this applicant? Siddoway: One, Mr. Chairman. Rohm: Commissioner Siddoway. Siddoway: I'd just like to confirm that the remainder of Oeklan Court, the buffer on the south, will remain at ten feet and only the area necessary at the east end is what's going to be reduced to the five foot. Johnson: That is correct. Siddoway: Okay. Borup: And I just want to reiterate that we are planning on installing a drip irrigation system and using plants to conserve as much water as we can. We know water conservation is a big issue and so we will do everything we can to lessen our use of potable water. Rohm: Thank you. Any additional questions of this applicant? Okay. At this time I'd like to ask Bud Larsen if he'd like to come forward. If you want to speak. You don't have to come forward. Oh. Oh. Okay. Well, from the audience he said that his signing up was a mistake. And Janet Larsen same answer? Same answer from Janet Larsen. Okay. We will go through the list -- you will get your chance to -- okay. John Fernandes. They are waiving their -- and Kay Fernandes. And they are both waiving their -- okay. And Megan Johnson -- oh. Excuse me. Okay. Now, anybody else that would like to speak may come forward. Lentz: I'm the unofficial spokesman for the waived people. Is there any way we could zip back to the slide where we see the subdivision to the west? Yes. We are the R-8 zone. Rohm: Oh, I'm sorry, we need your name and address. Lentz: I'm Laura Lentz. It's at 1420 North Cresmont Drive in Meridian. 83642. And it's L-e-n-t-z. Meridian Town Square is the subdivision right to the left. It's the loop in yellow. We are only 48 houses and so our prime concern with this subdivision, as nice as it sounds, especially in the area, it will look great, is the traffic increase on our streets. We are the main thoroughfare to Cherry Lane from 4th. 4th stops. You drive into the church -- 4th stops right by the new proposed -- you can't drive all the way into Meridian Planning & Zoning February 15, 2007 Page 12 of 80 4th to Cherry, so you're going to take a left on Maple and go right into our subdivision or you're going to take a right on Maple and go through a very crowded -- I'm a little nervous. I'm sorry. Group of people, too. So, our worry is the traffic of these houses. Now, six houses isn't a lot of cars, maybe 12, but when we only have 48 houses, you're adding a lot of traffic to our streets. So, we have got about 55 kids in our subdivision. My main worry is that this subdivision also is a prime walkway for kids going all the way south of 4th crossing and walking to the middle school and walking to Meridian Elementary, so we are adding all the traffic through our subdivision and kids walking there. Basically, just adding the 12 cars back and forth. We have had some traffic issues and we are just adding more people, it just seems extremely unsafe and unfair, basically, to our two roads that we have. So, we only ask that you don't approve it, so -- and, unfortunately, I noticed in the staff presentation nobody addressed traffic at all, so that might be something, if we can see why 4th can't be -- I'm sure there is some logical reason why 4th can't be extended, but it seems like every single person is going to end up driving right by my house, so that's -- Rohm: Okay. I have a question for you, ma'am. Lentz: Yes, please. Rohm: Okay. Just out of curiosity, what would you suggest the development for this property -- what would be appropriate? Lentz: I'd love -- I'd love 4th to go through. Rohm: No. No. No. No. For the application that's before us tonight, what do you think is appropriate? Lentz: In lieu -- basically, I know the alternative is -- I would rather not have the development, if we can't do 4th. So, that -- I mean I guess that's what -- you got to remember, I'm not zoning and planning, so I don't -- you know. And I know maybe it's not possible, but all of that traffic is going on to, you know, a hundred people. Okay. So, that's not -- it doesn't seem like much. But, you know, we just have a lot of kids walking to school and so I know that people zip in and out of there and so that's what makes me worried. What I have them do? I don't know. Punch 4th. That's the only thing I'd want to do and I don't -- it's probably not possible. And you know what, we have actually talked -- if we could figure out how to do a testing for speed bumps going in and out of -- that would make us feel better, because people in and out come zipping around 4th, which is not solely their responsibility, I understand that, but with the added -- with the added traffic maybe we could at least stick that on the traffic's side to see if we could get the speed bumps to slow the traffic down. Rohm: Really, I thank you for your testimony. 1-- Lentz: I know it might not be probable. Meridian Planning & Zoning February 15, 2007 Page 13 of 80 Rohm: I suspect that 4th would -- the extension of 4th wouldn't ever be a part of this development, but I can certainly see how -- why you would like to see 4th extended all the way to Cherry and thanks for your comments. Lentz: You bet. Rohm: There is not anybody else signed up, but at this time if there is additional comments, please -- and you will get -- seeing no additional -- anybody coming forward, if the applicant would, please, come back to the podium. Johnson: I just would like to respond to Mrs. Lentz's comments. Always traffic is a concern with any new development and we would love to see 4th punch through as well, but there is, obviously, some existing conditions that aren't part of this project. ACHD did do a study for this project and I just want to say that the last traffic count on 4th Street was at 576 trips per day and the acceptable threshold for a street of this classification, a residential local street, is 2,000 trips per day. We will be adding 60 trips per day, that's ten trips per household is the standard calculation for this type of residence, so we will still be far below and we also will be -- part of our conditions are to add sidewalk along 4th Street in front of our development, which helps somewhat with the safety for children, having them to walk on a sidewalk, instead of the street and we certainly do sympathize with the neighbors, but we feel that this development is -- really it's the best development for this piece of land at this time. Thank you. Rohm: Thank you very much. Keith, did you have something that -- Borup: Yeah. Just a quick -- just a clarification on traffic a little bit. There is -- there is no impediment for -- on Maple and 2nd, is there? Johnson: I don't believe so. Borup: So-- Johnson: It goes through. Borup: So, someone traveling -- traveling east would most likely go that way. It looks to me like most -- the only reason to go through this subdivision is someone going to the west, which most of our retail development is to the east from here. Johnson: Correct. Correct. Borup: All right. Thank you. Johnson: Yes. That would be my guess, too. Siddoway: Mr. Chairman? Meridian Planning & Zoning February 15, 2007 Page 14 of 80 Rohm: Yeah. Siddoway: One additional question for the applicant. Will -- are you being required by ACHD to improve West 4th Street in -- with the frontage that you do have along 4th Street? Johnson: Yes. We will be installing sidewalks. You can see it on our preliminary plat It's not a whole lot and we will be doing additional right of way as well. Siddoway: Will you be adding asphalt in the right of way in this area or where does the existing 4th end? I'm assuming it's in this area. Johnson: Let me -- yes. Along our frontage we will be adding streets and sidewalks and -- Morgan: We will be adding about five to ten feet of additional asphalt along our frontage. Siddoway: Okay. Johnson: Thank you. Morgan: That's all. Siddoway: Thank you. Rohm: Okay. At this time could I get a motion to close the Public Hearing? Moe: So moved. Siddoway: Second. Rohm: It's been moved and seconded to close the Public Hearing on RZ 07-001 and PP 07-002. All those in favor say aye. Opposed same sign? Motion carried. MOTION CARRIED: FOUR AYES. ONE ABSENT. Rohm: Any closing comments before we move forward with this application? Moe: Mr. Chairman? Rohm: Commissioner Mae. Mae: To staff. You stated that Council may waive the pressurized irrigation beyond that, but that's not something that we have to deal with, but we can make a recommendation if we so choose this evening? Okay. Meridian Planning & Zoning February 15, 2007 Page 15 of 80 Rohm: And just speaking for myself, I would recommend that we waive that requirement. I think that to install a pressurized system that will never be used is asking a bit much of this applicant and it would certainly be my recommendation to waive that to Council. Commissioner Siddoway, do you have any comments? Commissioner Borup? Borup: None. Rohm: Okay. Could we get a motion? Borup: Mr. Chairman, after considering all staff, applicant, and public testimony, I move to recommend approval to the City Council of file numbers RZ 07-001 and PP 07-002, as presented in the staff report for the hearing date of February 15th, 2007. End of motion. Does the Commission want that added? I mean we don't -- it's going to be up to the City Council anyway. Rohm: I think they are going to hear -- they are going to see the minutes and that will be requested in the minutes, so I don't think the motion has to include any recommendation. Moe: Second. Rohm: It's been moved and seconded to forward onto City Council recommending approval of RZ 07-001 and PP 07-002. All those in favor say aye. Opposed same sign? Motion carried. Thank you all for coming in. MOTION CARRIED: FOUR AYES. ONE ABSENT. Item 10: Public Hearing: PP 07-003 Request for Preliminary Plat approval of 6 commercial building lots on 8.06 acres in a C-G zone for Medina Subdivision by Ken Lenz - SWC of South Meridian Road and West Overland Road: Rohm: At this time I'd like to open the Public Hearing on PP 07-003 and begin with the staff report. Watters: Thank you, Chairman Rohm, Members of the Commission. The application before you is a preliminary plat request for Medina Subdivision. The property is 8.06 acres in size and is currently zoned C-G. The subject property is located there on the southwest corner of South Meridian Road and West Overland Road. The property is bordered on the east by Southern Springs commercial development, zoned C-G. On the west by vacant ground and it's in the process of developing, zoned C-G. On the north is Jackson's food store, the gas station there and the Sandman motel, zoned C-G. And on the south by Elk Run Subdivision, zoned R-8. The site is currently vacant. All buildings have been removed from the site. The property is zoned C-G, which complies with the Comprehensive Plan map designation of commercial. The applicant is