Jul 12, 2017 Planning and Zoning Commission on 2017-07-12 5:00 PM

Good afternoon and welcome to the City of Denton Planning and Zoning Commission work session for July the 12th 2017. This meeting has been duly posted and we do have a quorum present and I will call us to order at 5 o 2 and at this time I will turn us over to Ron for a clarification of our agenda items this evening. Thank you chair. The item of the agenda is that we have we don't have any platt so we're going to go straight into our public hearing items and the first one is going to be presented by our senior planner Julie Wyatt. Good evening I'm Julie Wyatt and I'm presenting 1711 Blue Beacon to you this evening. The item before you is a request to hold a public hearing and for initial zoning of employment center commercial on approximately 16 acres. The property is located on the northwest side of the city. It's adjacent to I-35 and Bartol Road. Current zoning is RD 5X. You might be familiar with this area. We saw a rezoning for the adjacent property earlier this year. As they were going through with their site planning process they realized they needed a little more room in order to make their turning radiuses for their trucks so they've they've they are proposing to also include the adjacent property with their commercial development. That property was in the ETJ so as part of the development they have annexed to that property and now they 're coming in for the initial zoning. When we annex property within the city of Denton they all come in as RD 5X which is that initial place holding zoning. It follows that RD 5 zoning within subchapter 5 of the Denton development code. So when we looked at the request we looked at the properties that were immediately adjacent to the to the subject property. Here we have the property next door that that was subject to that earlier is a rezoning case and that is zoned ECC and then has a proposed commercial development. To the south of that there's also ECC and that is currently under development as a travel center use. Also along I-35 is RCR 1 that property is undeveloped. To the north of the subject property is also RD 5X. To the west is in ETJ and that's undeveloped and to the south is RCCN and that has some commercial development on it. As we zoom out a little further we take in some property across I -35 and that has a zoning designation of RCCD and that is developed with the travel use as well. When we look at the mobility of the area we see that the the dominant feature is I-35 that corridor right here. We also have Elm and Barth old Road. Elm and Barthold will eventually connect. They will though it'll be realigned here at the at the intersection of I-35 and Barthold Road and that 's that's sometime in the near future. Commissioner Beck. So it's going to actually clip that corner lot that the love station. It will yes sir yes sir. That'll ease the connectivity between the two sides. Right now it's a little awkward. We also looked at the analysis and the compatibility of what all these these zoning districts and the uses mean. So the surrounding area is comprised of travel center commercial developments and also large undeveloped tracts of land particularly to the north and the west of the subject property. They have access from I-35 and the US 77 North El m. The adjacent RCCN and ECC districts they currently permit large-scale commercial and employment uses. An ECC district is appropriate in this location because it also permits similar employment and commercial uses at a scale that's typically found along I or long highway corridors and the adjacent zoning districts. ECC is also a logical extension of the existing ECC district to the east and the south of the subject property. We looked at the future land use designation didn't plan 2030. This is in a business innovation future land use designation. The intent of business innovation is to encourage the large-scale office development and employment centers and then those retail and commercial services that serve to provide adjacency and additional places for the workers to go places to eat and shop. The mix of commercial or the mix of commercial and light manufacturing uses in ECC meets the intent of that business innovation future land use designation. We sent out a public notification of this of the request. We received one letter and it was from and it you should have it on your desk it was from the the property owner to the south the loves and they were in support of the request. Due to the criteria in sub chapter 4 of the Denton Development Code and the adjacent character of the area staff does recommend approval of the request and I'll stand for any questions. Commissioner Reck. Thank you Chair. I just got a little nitpick about the semantics of this thing. In the comprehensive plan it points out that this the future land use designations is business innovation and I stress that word innovation and then it points out for well-planned larger scale office and employment parks with supporting use such as retails hotels and residential. I have no problem with this truck wash in the ECC designation. I just you know as a matter of sem antics so you know when somebody looks at business innovation I don't think truck wash would come to mind or truck stop or anything like that. So I mean just for future purposes when we say innovative we're talking about something new and different and that doesn't just quit quite fit that criteria. So I don't know do we need to keep it like that is this something that could probably be worked on with the DCC revision or would that even fall in into that purview? Chair if I can answer just that question. Absolutely. Comments you're absolutely correct Commissioner Beck. One of the goals of the DEN plan 2030 is to start looking at some areas in the city that can accommodate our business innovation you know business parks that sort of thing but as we look at this site and one thing that we discussed with staff is besides in this particular location it's a little narrow so we felt that this was okay but yes we will hopefully refine our we are refining our zoning districts as we move forward with our code update and that is something that we will make sure we're in line with our future land use designations. If I may follow up. I was looking for anything and I went through this list of permitted uses and about the only thing that came close to it was under commercial land use quick vehicle servicing so there 's a little element there that lets you squeeze in but I just again the idea of business innovative probably needs to change. Thank you. Any other questions for Julie? I think you have the next one too. I'm sorry Commissioner Ellis. Thank you Chair. Hey Julie just I guess a quick question and I guess just more for clarification for me it says that the site includes some frontage along the newly aligned Bartold Road and it contains a gas pipeline. Is that an issue with what is being developed? What's being developed is not considered a protected use but they would have to meet all setback requirements for any industrial use or any production facility. This isn't this isn't necessarily a gas well but they would have to meet all requirements and we'll look at that a little more deeply when we get to the site plan and any platting. Anybody else? Thank you. You got the next one too. [inaudible] Now I'm presenting S17-4 McDonald's. The item before you is to hold a public hearing and consider a request for a specific use permit to allow a drive-through facility. The subject property is located north of I-35 adjacent to North Texas Boulevard. We're gonna go we're gonna do a little bit of a dive into the the background of the property because the property boundaries don't necessarily match with what we're used to seeing on that site so we're gonna kind of jump back and forth. So I got this this more updated aerial photograph from from Google Maps and it shows more accurately what's on the site now. So the subject property was originally developed as a McDonald's with the drive-through. As we all know I-35 is under an expansion project and so there TextDOT acquired some frontage from the subject property in order to accommodate that expansion. Within that acquisition the the if you remember the gas station that was right here and the McDonald's were were taken out as well as the parking. McDonald's would like to rebuild but the amount of property left on that original site is not sufficient to accommodate the building in the parking. So they've actually taken in in their subject property this IHOP lot. So now we'll go over the site plan and hopefully it'll make sense if it doesn't tell me to back up and we'll we'll we'll go over it and try to point out all of the landmarks. So here's the the site plan that McDonald's is proposing. If you can kind of visually see this was the original McDonald's lot, the gas station was right here and then this is the the IHOP lot. So the area and in yellow is the building, the proposed building. They're also proposing two signs, two pole signs, one on I-35 and one on North Texas Boulevard and we're going to talk about that sign a little more when we get to the recommendations. They're also proposing within their site plan package two drive-throughs in order to accommodate enough vehicle storage to get through the drive -through efficiently. Some pedestrian crosswalks across the the driveways. They're proposing a bike rack and then there's also going to be some sidewalk improvements associated with the development. There will be there are proposed four driveways, one off of I-35, one off of Kind orf, one off of Wilshire and one off of North Texas Boulevard. And then we'll look at the landscape plan. Currently there's not a whole lot of landscaping or trees on the site. They will be adding trees and landscaping in accordance with the Denton Development Code requirements which includes a 20% canopy in the DCG district. Also parking lot screening. They do have enhanced landscaping along the menu boards as well. Here are the proposed elevations for the subject property. They are proposing a masonry building with stone accents. Subchapter 6 of the Denton Development Code outlines the criteria for approval for SU Ps and I believe that the full criteria is in your backup but in general it requires consistency with the zoning regulations, conformity with the Denton plan and also consistency with the surrounding development in terms of access, nuisance and scale of development. Let's talk about the zoning just for a minute. The subject property is zoned DCG. The proposed site plan does comply with the requirements within the DCG zoning district. Restaurants are permitted but drive- throughs do require an SUP and that is intended because often we find DCG in our downtown areas or university areas where we often have a lot of pedestrian oriented development. We want to ensure that any drive- throughs that come in those areas are sensitive to the pedestrian oriented nature. Question. Yes sir. Did the previous McDonald's that was located on that site have an SUP? They did not. It was it was pre Denton Development Code, pre 2002. And so TechStop took them out and they want to rebuild the business on the same side and now they were required to get an SUP? They are. They are. I'm gonna listen a little. The site's proximity to I-35 does suggest that an auto oriented use is appropriate in this location. Although we typically see pedestrian oriented development in university areas because of that I-35 access , because of the location of a lot of the UNT parking lots in this area, it is it does lean more toward the auto oriented uses. We also just in general drive-throughs are typical development that you see along highways. Let's look let's talk about the area and first the properties that are adjacent to the site. The subject property is in a DCG zoning district. There is a little bit of DR2 to the north. What's surrounding them to the north and the east and the west are UNT facilities and also some UNT parking areas. You can see there's a commuter lot here, commuter lot here. Across the highway in R3, there's an R3 district with single-family. There's a little bit in R2 here and I believe that is the football stadium. As we zoom out a little bit we see more UNT facilities coming into focus. There's a dormitory here. There's once again some more commuter lots. There's some commercial development here with with parking and then the UNT performance. There's a performance facility in this location. And then the general area. You see more of the UNT campus. There's residential near the subject property and then the I-35 corridor in this case as well is a real dominant feature in this area. The future land use for the subject property is commercial and this is not really a mixed use future land use designation. It is to be concentrated commercial development and auto oriented uses such as drive-throughs are appropriate in this future land use. The mobility of the area, once again I-35, a really dominant feature provides a lot of access to the site as well as the North Texas Boulevard that is a secondary arterial and then the hatched black lines are collectors that run through the area. Commissioner Ellison. Thank you Chair. I guess why you have that up one of my questions has to do with if you're coming from let's say campus or coming down North Texas Boulevard. I didn't see where there was a way into this site. I'm assuming you'd have to go Eagle to Kendoff to get there? You're right. There are there is some limit there is some control access and engineering will be here to answer questions. There is some control access and I believe this is just a ride-in ride-out here. Jim is okay there'll be a median here so it'll just be a ride-in ride-out in this location so they would have to turn and come in from a different angle. Can they come in off a wheelchair? Should I call Jim up? I'm gonna call Jim. Good evening everyone. Jim Jenks from the Engineering Department. Looking at TexDOT's ultimate schematic there will be a median along North Texas Boulevard from the service road up north of Wil shire. So their southbound traffic on North Texas Boulevard would not be able to turn into this site directly or via Wilshire. They would I don't have a map handy that shows the area farther out. They'd have to go Eagle. Currently there are median cuts that would allow access to Wilshire but not in their ultimate schematic. How far out is the ultimate schematic? Is that in this phase or we time? I don't think it's I would have to get back to you on that. Julie can you go back to that satellite image? Yeah. Because Google Maps looks like it shows that there is a median currently there. Currently in the you had one that yes there is a there is a cut right there in the median though. It didn't look like it. Maybe my eyes are failing me but it looks like grass all the way over Wilshire. Yeah it looks like Wilshire is blocked but maybe the parking lot entrance isn't. There are cones but there isn't grass it looks like. It's a little further south you're talking about right? Gotcha. I wish I could project mine on the screen here. I'll just show you. I can have an answer for you on the timing by the regular meeting. Okay great thank you. Sure. Commissioner Beck. Thank you chair. The area we're talking about where there's a medium and we need a cut through is that that's not text dots property is it? That's not there right away. Is it the universities? It is not text dots. I mean it's the city's it's a city street North Texas Boulevard is. So the city could do a cut through couldn't it? And the reason I'm even bringing this up is if you get traffic coming off going to McDonald's they have to kind of look back around and get on the interstate and deal with that traffic like before they can get back onto the interstate again where if they could cross over you know North Texas and then hang a right there on the service road they would have to deal with that traffic signal. It is a city street text dot has as part of their schematic they show improving it all the way up to the next street intersection beyond Wilshire. I think it's basically the transition to their improvements. That next one I can't tell from that. They're not showing a medium but that's the end of their project. Commissioner Tyler has a follow-up. Thank you chair. So I guess just to continue on this the next one is Eagle and I think because of the shortness of the blocks and the radius they would probably never put a cut there. So you'd have to turn on Eagle and come down Kindle. That's how it is now with all the construction. So I don't think it's really out of the ordinary. My question is more pertaining to the little rem nant lot. I don't know if this is a good view or if the site plan might be a better view of the small remnant lot of the old gas station. Right now there's indicated a curb cut and you can see there's actually a driveway but it seems is that a text dot property or is that still owned by some private owner? They acquired, text dot acquired so much of that lot. Yeah I wonder if they just acquired the whole thing because there's just such a small remnant left. I think that may be the case. Can we tell on there? Yeah. Are you talking about that little small to the left of the monument sign? On the DCAD map that shows that little sliver shows to be North Texas. Oh so UNTO owns it? The little bitty piece right there. Okay. Okay. Yeah I was just trying to see if that that driveway to nowhere, that curb cut to nowhere very close to the intersection had any plans but not related to this I guess. No not related to this. I can't see it being related to anything actually. I mean it's with as small as that remnant is. There'd be nothing much to drive into and there's this site would not be using it. In fact there are the we are still we've reviewed a final replant submittal. I don't think it's been approved yet and we still have the site plan phase yet to go so we're still reviewing and commenting on the site but there will be some driveways that are going away as a result of this project along the 35 service road and then going north just north of the intersection along North Texas Boulevard. There'll be a net reduction in driveways here especially near that intersection. And I guess maybe UNT could build a sign on that corner. Who knows that may be what they have in mind I don't know. Nothing that could I don't see anything that can be driven into though. Any other questions for Jim? Thank you Jim. I don't have much left to add I just want to go over one or a couple more things. I did put a letter on your desks from I received from UNT last night. I wasn't able to get the opposition percentage calculated today. Our GIS was in a meeting so but we anticipate that the 20% opposition has threshold has been met and so a super majority would be required at City Council but we're still we're still making sure that they do that that is the case. Commissioner Roseau. Did they provide any elaboration of their reason? No sir. Based upon the criteria we discussed the character of the area the access to the area staff does recommend approval of the request with two conditions. One that it's substantially comply with the site plan landscape plan and building elevations that were submitted with the with the SUP and then also the signage on North Texas Boulevard. Right now they are proposing two pole signs in accordance with the sign regulations within the city of Denton. Staff felt like that reducing the size of the sign on North Texas Boulevard to a monument sign that is that is architecturally compatible with the primary structure that is a maximum of height of five feet and a maximum effective area of 40 feet would be more in keeping with the character of the of the street of North Texas Boulevard. We understand the need for the pole sign on I-35 because you want that visibility to the motoring public but we felt like that that monument side on North Texas Boulevard met the character of the general area so those are the two conditions that staff has recommended. So based upon that I'll answer any questions. What was the applicant 's response to that having it reduced to monument sign? They do not agree with staff's recommendation. They... What did they have previously? Previous well they did not I you know I don't know what was at that location previously it's a good question I'm not quite sure if there was a pole sign at that location. They are proposing that I believe a 20-foot pole sign in that spot. I believe on their old building they had four points of access as well just like they have with the new one that they're proposing and I don't know if they I don't recall if they had a sign over on North Texas on that access point or not. Commissioner Ellis . Thank you chair if I can chime into that because I was there a lot with kids dancing at UNT. They did have a small like driveway sign off of UNT there or North Texas Boulevard. I don't I don't remember the necessarily the size it was not a big huge pole sign. Commissioner Beck. Thank you chair. Well I don't understand why they want the two pole signs. What would be the distance between the two? It's got to be a small gap. Well within the city of Denton you can have two ground signs provided that they're on on two different arterial roads that they meet the height and and those requirements so that that would those two pole signs would meet the the minimum sign requirements within the city of Denton. I don't know I don't know as far as what their spacing is between the two. And I understand that it meets that criteria but what purpose does it serve to have them so close together? I mean the visual it seems like they would get from the one on I- 35. I'm not sure how they're served with one on North Texas Boulevard. But you don't know what the gap is. No sir. Commissioner Roselle. Julie can you walk me through the standards for monument signs is the the recommendation from staff the standard monument qualifications or is that something that was created for this project? It was created for this project if you have I believe I'll have to check make sure I'm quoting correctly but I believe a monument sign within the city of Denton does not have a maximum effective area so that it can be any any size if it's a monument sign so it goes all the way down to the ground. Pole signs do have a maximum height. And when the the 40 square feet that means it can what you're recommending it cannot take up more than a 4 by 10 or the sign portion the yes the correct face of the sign like if you're looking at it. Let me get my code and maybe I can get you a definition for it. I'll make sure I give you good information. Chair well Julie's looking that up I just wanted to clarify your comment question earlier regarding the SUP. There was no SUP required I guess for the McDonald's back prior to 2002 however this site that their proposal extends past that parcel so since they're extending onto another property we felt that the SUP would be required for this particular site plan. That answers your question. I'm gonna bite my tongue for a little longer before I respond. Okay. I'll let get to the monument sign. Commissioner Roselle effective area is the the shape or combination of regular shapes that will encompass the extreme limits of the riding representation emblem or other display. So it would be the display area wouldn't it wouldn 't be the base of the structure. And then let me check. Monument sign effective area is there is no maximum effective area for monument sign. Maximum height would still be 20 feet from what I can tell on the sign code. For a monument sign? It doesn't give a maximum height for the monument sign it just gives a map for other primary arterials which North Texas Boulevard would be another primary primary I'm sorry it would be in all other streets it wouldn't because it's a secondary arterial. It'd be a maximum height of six feet all signs are maximum height of six feet and then the monument effective area would be they could have it as big effective area there's no there's no maximum for that for monument sign. That's because we were making it upon monument sign versus a pole sign. Yes sir. Okay. Did your questions get answered before I ask? They did thank you. I was gonna follow up on the pole sign. So in our standard code you can have two pole signs. Yes sir. Well staff is recommending that they only have one in a monument even though our code says that they can have two . Yes sir. And we're making that recommendation because? Because of the size of and the character of North Texas Boulevard. It's a less you know people don't travel it's fast down it so they have more opportunity to see a monument sign. You know I understand that the necessity of a pole sign on a highway because you need the visibility and people are traveling at a high rate of speed so you need to you need to be able to to reach your customer base. We felt like a monument sign on North Texas Boulevard was sufficient for them to advertise. We want them to be able to advertise our businesses but still meet the character of the area. I don't know their reasoning other than when they come to a stop sign on the other side of 35 to turn and go north on North Texas Boulevard it may be hard to see that if you're at a angle and with North Texas owning that corner if they decide to put a sign or screening then you may not even be able to see too much of their building and that may be why they want a larger sign there to be able to give some visibility to their site for people that are coming from west and turning and going north on there. So any other questions on the pole sign? Commissioner Taylor. Thank you chair. I'm just trying to understand that you said the secondary arterials there's limits of six foot height on monument signs? Well the table and our sign code doesn't really doesn't give a monument sign maximum height so I would just apply the maximum height. It does give the monument sign effective area it doesn't they can have a monument sign as large as they would like in terms of effective area. Okay and so but then the other that's and this is the other streets category all other streets category or something like that what did you what did you call it? Well there are there are other primary arterials and then all other streets. And so in all other streets they allow a 20-foot pole sign? Yes. No they would allow a six foot pole sign. Okay. They would still need to keep it they would still need to at a minimum they would need to meet the sign code so. So the biggest thing they could have there is a six foot pole sign with a maximum effective area of how big? Six foot or a 20 foot? It's a pole sign not a monument sign . Yeah there's no there's no height limit on monument but there's a six foot height limit on pole signs. I thought they were wanting a 20 foot pole sign and a 40 foot pole sign on the interstate and we were not gonna recommend a pole sign on North Texas the requirement for a monument the maximum height was six foot. Maybe I misheard the explanation but I thought that was where we were. If I can try to clear it up. We can I want to clear it up and do in presentation in public that's fine. We can yeah we can pull up the chart that's in our municipal code and share that with the Commission during the public hearing and present it that way. Commissioner Sullivan. Thank you Chair. Are there any other signs in the area I mean I know there's anjo's and other places other businesses in the area are there other signs that are not monument signs on Avenue C for example or any other place in that area? We didn't really do a study on on existing signs we really just looked at this at this specific side and as it redevelops the type of signage that we that you know we think would be appropriate on North Texas Boulevard. Okay thank you. Sure. Anybody else questions? I'm gonna come back to this UP then. I'm gonna go back several years Commissioner Taylor would probably remember this he and I guess are the two old-tim ers here. There was a lot of discussion years ago about when I-35 was going to be improved and we knew all these things were going to happen that they were going to be some concessions made for existing properties along I-35 and their businesses were affected as to how we were going to work with them and there were going to be things that were going to be non-conforming and issues that were going to come up and this seems like a prime example of that to me. It is and and we looked at this because the McDonald's fell under the Denton Development Code has a provision called special exception and because the McDonald's was developed under a previous code it it was considered a special exception much like for that I-35 redevelopment of the corridor. Where the difference is on this side is they have to they're expanding to the IHOP lot and in order to... Can I pause there? Sure. The only reason they're doing that is because their business got taken out by I-35 in the first place. Correct. Is that correct? But the code, yes you are correct, but the code says that... Otherwise they'd still we could still be going through there and getting McDonald's right now. They wouldn't wouldn't be doing this. But the code in sub chapter 11 the code says a land use under the special exceptions a land use may expand within the same lot expansion of a special exception to an adjoining lot will require approval of the City Council using the zoning of members procedure. So we talked about it we talked about it in the planning division and they were going to have to either do an SUP or do a zoning amendment procedure to expand the special exception. So we felt like the SUP was the way to go. We have criteria for approval. We we can look at the site plan. They would have had to follow the same process regardless of whether they had expanded their special exception or whether they went forward with the SUP. Commissioner Sullivan. Thank you Chair. Is it beyond the realm of possibility to go back and see what they were approved for to begin with and since it's the same business in basically the same position same place and just let them have what they had to begin with? We couldn't do that because of the expansion onto the IHOP lot. That's really what triggered this whole process. I mean I understand that that's sort of the legal issue but reality is if they were there before they enjoyed being there they enjoyed it so much made so much money they want to go back because of all the students that live to the northeast of them and that's where they get their business not coming down to North Texas necessarily but whatever sign they had there that was approved before just let it put the same kind of sign. Oh in terms of the sign. Oh yeah we could go back and do the research on the sign I don't know if we could permit what was approved at that time because the sign code may have changed but the problem is is that it's destroyed now so it's a rebuild and that means that it's not non-conforming at the time that the DDC was adopted in 2002 it had a different zoning than what was given to it in 2002 and before that is when the sign was created so it lost any kind of non-conforming rights it became one of those special exceptions that aren't typical zoning special exceptions but it was our own creation where they're able to maintain those rights they really are but because they expanded when you expand a special exception our code requires us to go through a certain procedure like Julie said and it would go to counsel in order to make that determination so I believe the applicant is the one didn't they decide that they'd rather do the SUP procedure so yes they do have they have the ability to put the driveway back but because they're expanding it onto another lot the code actually requires them to go under this procedure in order to get permission to do that in order to expand their special exception over so we were a little bit put into a difficult spot because of that code provision well even with the staff recommendation center you have a monument size sign of a certain size can you go back and say look this is what you had to begin with so will allow you to have the same thing if they're not gonna have two pole signs which is allowed instead you're gonna recommend that they have a second sign that's a different size and shape why not just offer them the same size and shape that they had to begin with I don't know what they had to begin with so that's why I'm asking maybe this is a bigger side that y 'all are recommending I don't know and I don't know what was there before it wasn 't something that they asked there was no pole sign there there was no pole sign there yeah so they're getting basically what they had before yeah Commissioner back thank you chair just a question for the staff here I'm usually don't have a problem with the SUP says but I agree with the chair in this case is this in this particular case this SUP is a technical thing is there any way the administrator could make a call on this or do we have to go is there a leeway for the administrator to make a specific call on this rather than go through the SUP process well if it was a normal case then and it required an SAP of course you have to go through the SUP process but if there was room for a sign variance they could do that not referring to the sign now just strictly SUP no no no okay well I'm gonna thank you for that I'm gonna follow up my guess and looking at the site plan is the reason that they've expanded to the north is for parking requirements because they lost as I recall they had a lot of parking over there long on the East property line and so they probably are meeting our code now having to expand to get the additional parking so it's kind of they're in a box wherever they try to go and push we make them do something else and now we're another requirement they were I guess willing to go with an SUP and now we have this nice letter that popped up last night by their neighbor who's gonna throw them into supermajority vote which I don 't know where that ends up going that's beyond us here tonight but I've enjoyed the discussion I'm discouraged or disappointed that this is the place that they are and trying to go back and do their business right back where they were and I don't know where it goes with the vote on the supermajority on getting SUP but it seems like it's a lot that they've had to go through to try to rebuild a business that they didn't want to have to do in the first place so is there any other questions for staff on this we've spent probably more time than we were allotted on this but I think it was an important and good discussion anybody else questions for Julie thank you great job presentation thank you yes we can have Haley present the last public human item for the Commission good evening I'm Haley Zagorski with the Planning Department this is case s 16 7 for the Riney Road Apartments so this request is to hold a public hearing and consider a request for a specific use permit to allow for a multifamily use on a property that's approximately 0.9 acres as you can see here the property is outlined in yellow and it has frontage on Riney Court R iney Road and North Elm Street so it's kind of a unique configuration I 'll start by walking you through their site plan what they're proposing is a 10 unit apartment complex total so it would feature two buildings you can see them outlined on the screen in yellow each of these buildings would feature five apartment units the proposal is for all of those to be three-bedroom two and a half bathrooms and they're kind of uniquely designed and that they're more like individual townhomes each unit would have a rear yard that would be fenced in with a wrought-iron fence and you can see outlined in green the area that would be devoted to the rear yards for each of these the property would also feature a storage building that's outlined in red and this would be just to provide extra storage for each unit it's designed to have one exterior entrance into a hallway that would have then 10 separate rooms off of it the site would also feature 23 parking spaces the code requirement for a three-bed for three-bedroom apartments would get them to 20 spaces so the three additional spaces that they're proposing would be pervious pavers looking at the landscape plan you can see that the property would meet the intent of the DDC in terms of providing street trees they 're also preserving existing trees in this area shown in green those trees are pretty much the only trees that are on the site today and their intent is to preserve all of those along Rainy Court the site it was also required to provide a type B buffer because there is a single-family residence adjoining the property so they're providing the required ratio of five trees and 30 shrubs per 100 linear feet in addition to the required plantings they're also proposing an eight-foot tall cedar fence to provide an additional buffer there for that single-family residence one of the other key landscape features is here at the front of the property outlined in yellow they have an area that would be a patio open space for the residents that is well landscaped and there would also be a monument sign with the apartment complex name located here along the front of that area overall the property meets the landscape requirements of the development code it exceeds the 40% landscaping that's required there at approximately 48% overall looking at the proposed building elevations this is building one which is the building located on the southern side of the property you can see it's a two-story building each of the units has a their own exterior front entry and rear exit into their backyard you'll notice the front doors aren't visible on here they are kind of to the side in little alcoves so there's no front door strictly visible in the front of the building so this building would be five units and it would be composed of brick and stucco materials building two on the north side of the property fairly similar again two-story design with each unit having its own exterior front and rear exit again brick and stucco materials and just so you know this is the design for their storage building so it's just a little over 700 square feet as I mentioned it does just have one exterior entry so it doesn 't have ten separate entrances on the outside they're accessed by this interior hallway and it is intended to be a brick construction as well so our SUP criteria are outlined in subchapter 6 of the Denton development code there's many criteria there in summary that they ensure that we provide consistency with the zoning regulations conformity with the goals of our Denton plan 2030 and consistency with surrounding development in terms of access nuisance prevention and the scale of development so now we'll go through each of those criteria briefly this property is zoned neighborhood residential mixed-use 12 so this zoning designation allows for many types of residential development single-family duplex and townhomes are all permitted by right multifamily does require has a limitation that requires it either be approved through an SUP or as part of a mixed-use development or a small area plan so just some brief outline of the NRMU 12 regulations they do meet their minimum lot size the maximum density for the property is 12 units per acre so at 10 units they come in under that density maximum they are allowed a maximum of 60% lot coverage with 40% landscaping and their buildings maximum height would be 40 feet looking at what's within about 200 feet of the subject property we have a mixture of NRMU 12 district and neighborhood residential to within the NR 2 district to the north and to the southwest of the property are single-family homes within the NRMU 12 district we have the subject property here which is vacant some other undeveloped property to the east across rhynie road and then this area to the south and west is all a North Lakes Park. Zooming out a little bit more you see continuation across Elm Street we get start to get a little bit higher density here with some duplexes a continuation North Lakes Park here you can see better to the south now the animal shelter is just further to the northwest there and then zooming out to give you a better idea of where this is at and this part of town we have UNT's Discovery Park here just north of there along Elm Street again North Lakes Park as much of this area we've recently seen an SUP request for apartments up here on this parcel and then you can see just a mixture of residential type developments here single-family duplexes and apartments in this area. Looking at the future land use map this property kind of splits between the neighborhood mixed use and moderate residential future land use designations it's right there on the buffer zone between those two districts the use of the property that they're proposing does fit within each of these neighborhood mixed use is intended for residents residential areas with a mixture of housing types along with supporting retail and service uses and then moderate residential promotes protection of existing neighborhoods as well as development of residential uses between 4 and 12 dwelling units per acre so this fits comfortably within that designation as well. To give you an idea of the mobility plan in this area Elm Street is a text dot roadway that's a primary arterial. Riney Road is a collector street and then Riney Court is just a neighborhood street. There are some bus routes that run along North Elm Street that would provide other means of access to the property. Just to give you an idea of what the property looks like today as I mentioned it's primarily vacant you can't see there is some well there are well-established trees here along Riney Court. So notifications were sent about this we received four opposition responses that were all included in your backup the when you look at the total land area within 200 feet they were at about 33% of that land area in opposition so that would also trigger that super majority vote that we spoke about at City Council. The applicant did hold a neighborhood meeting back in May there were approximately 11 people in attendance at that meeting and believe many of those are the ones that submitted the opposition notices you have before you. Given all the criteria we looked at in the mixed-use nature of this area staff is recommending approval of the request it's generally compatible with the surrounding development in this area it's consistent with the goals and objectives of the Denton plan 2030 and we are recommending one criteria that they substantially comply with the site plan landscape plan and building elevations that were attached with the SUP request and with that I can stand for any questions. Commissioner Ellis. Thank you chair. Hey Haley I noticed in one of the responses they mentioned that there is a current drainage problem there do we know it is there one? And what is the do we know the problem? As I heard expressed there's a concern with some flooding along Riney Court I believe and with the one quarter of this property that stays kind of marshy in the wet season when I was out there it hadn't rained in a while so I didn't observe the problem directly but I know when they get to the site plan process their drainage will be analyzed in terms of existing conditions and their developed conditions to ensure that there's no negative impact to adjoining properties. Commissioner Rose lle. Thank you chair. I want to talk or try to figure out the differences between a duplex townhome and multifamily especially if a multifamily is five units. So I have a couple questions. By right could someone build four duplex es on this for eight units? If there were to be duplexes they would have to be subdivided into at least four separate lots with one duplex per lot. I believe the applicant considered some other residential options but given that unique configuration it's kind of triangular there with three frontages they found challenges and figuring out how to subdivide the property. Is that the same with townhomes? Those are each different plots? Yes so if it's anything three between three and eight units and they're all on their own separate lot but share an attached wall we would consider that a townhome. And do you know if they looked into that? It was this configuration of property? I think it again was yeah figuring out how to you know provide because each of those lots would have to have frontage so they would have probably had to provide some sort of interior street within the lot and then let the townhomes access off of that and I think they just face challenges trying to figure out how to subdivide the property. Okay. I believe the applicant is intending to be here tonight so he could address that a little more in terms of what he considered. Thanks. Can you go back to the site plan that shows the streets on it? What's the parking or allowance for parking on either Riney Road or Riney Court? Is that permitted or not permitted? Jim would you mind addressing that? In the ultimate configuration of those streets parking would be committed, would be permitted. Riney Road being a collector and Riney Court being a residential street but with the width that they have now it 's really not feasible at this point. Riney Court is I mean functionally it's it's maybe 20 feet wide it's more like a residential lane which we would not allow parking along. Riney Road is really not much wider than that so ultimately there would be but I would say at this point I mean there's not no parking signs up that I know of but we would not consider it a street that's wide enough. It's not even 28 foot wide I don't think. Riney Road so we wouldn't consider it wide enough to park along. Well I went by there and I looked at Riney Road and it has curb and gutter on the west side right on this side perimeter street paving. On the east side that's the side that is unimproved essentially it has no curb and gutter. I don't remember looking at Riney Court whether it has curb and gutter on it or it does not at all because that's been the biggest concern that's been addressed to me is parking. I know the applicant said that they have added some parking places I think they are above what is required. Three spaces more than is required right? Yes the three spaces that are in gray here are pervious paving those are above what's required by code. So they have responded as best they can with a tough site to I think the neighbors to put even more spaces in them what they're required and then the overflow parking that you would normally be able to have on sites like this along public streets which they're allowed to have because the streets are not improved that impedes the project even more as far as overflow parking but when they are improved as they should be at some point then if there is overflow parking they could park on both Riney Road and Riney Court if necessary is that correct? Yes the ultimate sections would allow for that. Commissioner Ellis. Thank you chair I 'm kind of piggybacking on this is Riney Road even in on the radar at all about you know in the back of it says that it needs to be brought up even to current full right of way and do we anywhere on anyone's plan? Not that I'm aware of ma' am. No. Commissioner Tyler. Thank you chair. I have a question regarding the lot directly north on Riney Court the lots directly north on Riney Court is there a map like maybe the Google Maps view or the parcel map view that would be able to see those so there are two. Yeah the gray outline shows the parcel boundaries there. Yeah so right there there are two small lots and one with a house and one even smaller that looks like it's got a part of a cul-de-sac on it. Those are also zoned NRMU 12. Could they feasibly be developed and with any kind of multifamily or attached or whatever commercial look the NRMU 12 they probably can't have a driveway on to Elm because of text dot regulations so they'd have to have a driveway on to Riney. I'm just trying to like I said look at logical progression of development here is this is this a reasonable. Yeah and based on the zoning those lots could be developed with any of those uses you mentioned but the logistics of it would probably be challenging much like we see with this site in terms of access and configuration there. So maybe like if you removed the house you could build a duplex there or something you wouldn't fit an apartment building on those two lots put together. Most likely not I'm not sure of their size but it would be challenging. Yeah okay thank you. Commissioner Beck. I went out and visited two and I actually the two houses up Riney Court there one 's up for sale currently and the other ones are rental property. My concern and then I never did I knocked on the door of the other one down there no one was home but something dawned on me later that access to this new development is not gonna be possible for Riney Court is that correct? I mean that's because it's gonna be blocked off with trees and everything there's no inlet no sidewalk for people to park on Riney Court and then okay but I would be concerned that a long haul driver rented one of the townhouses there and parked his rig in that court up there so I could see neighbors being concerned about the use of that cul-de-sac for something like that so just throwing that out there to consider maybe to allay those concerns we address that with you know prohibited parking or something like that so they don't get stuck with something like that and people start making a path through there. Jennifer correct me if I'm wrong but I mean the city does have a procedure in which a resident or a developer could appeal to our traffic engineer to post no parking signage and I think they would have to get they have to get signatures from a certain amount of neighbors I believe I mean that's that's an option available am I right? I'm not familiar with the appeal and the parking regulations but we can look that out for you. Thank you. Any other questions for staff? Thank you Jim. Thank you Haley. Okay I believe that's all the items that we have on our work session this evening so at 6.02 I will close our work session and we will recon vene in a minute. [inaudible] [inaudible] [inaudible] Good evening and welcome to the City of Denton Planning and Zoning Commission meeting for July the 12th 2017. This meeting has been duly posted and we do have a quorum present and I will call us to order at 634. Our first order of business will be to stand and give the pledge to the US of the Texas flag. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all. I pledge allegiance to the Texas one state under God one indivisible. Our next order of business will be the Planning and Zoning Commission meeting minutes for June the 28th. The chair will entertain a motion. Commissioner Taylor. I move we approve our minutes for June 20th meeting. Commissioner Beck. Second. We have a first and a second for approval any discussion? Seeing none call for a vote on the board. Motion carries five zero. We'll move us to our public hearing section. At this time I'm going to open the public hearing for item A which is Z 17-0011A and call on Julie Wyatt for presentation. I'm Julie Wyatt senior planner with the City of Denton. Would you like for me to go through the whole presentation or just the summary slide ? I think summary we had a great presentation earlier thank you. All right so the item before you is Z 17-11 blue beacon. As we discussed in the work session the request is to rezone or actually initially zone 16 acres from RD 5X district to ECC district. The subject property is in the northwest part of the city. It's adjacent or near to I-35 north of Barthol road. Staff did analyze the request and has found that DCC district conforms with the future land use designation and is compatible with the surrounding properties at designations and uses and therefore we recommend approval of the request. The applicant is here and I'll be happy to answer any questions. Any questions for staff? Thank you Julie. Thank you. This is a public hearing and I do have a card from Dana Morse as applicant. Would you like to come forward? Mr. Chairman, Commissioners, again it's Dana Morse 500 Graves excuse me Boulevard, Sal ina Kansas. We could have made this simpler I think. When we started this process we went under contract by the whole 21 acres. We really thought we could fit on that property that was already in the city limits and so we rez oned it and then as we worked with TechStat and with the city we found we really needed with Barthol being realigned we needed to move our access point to the west so that aligned with Lowe's truck stop entrance and exit and so that's why we're asking for this to be rezoned and it's already been annexed and try and wrap this thing up so we can get started construction. We don't have any plans really for the remainder of this. Approximately 10 acres after we're done. I'm sure we'll sell to someone who has an interest for that related truck stop type business. So if you have any questions that's really all I have. Okay any questions for the applicant? Thank you. Thank you sir. I have one other comment or email from Rick Shuffield and he has no objection to L owe's truck stop so I'll read that into the record as well. This is a public hearing anyone else? Commissioner Beck. I do. Never mind it's not this one. Sorry. Okay this is a public hearing anyone who would like to speak on this item please come forward at this time. Seeing none I will close the public hearing and open the floor for discussion or motion. Commissioner Taylor. Thank you chair. So I first I want to piggyback on some comments that Commissioner Beck made in the in the work session. This is in our future land use map identified as a business innovation district which we are aiming to fill this district with large offices, research centers, office parks that type of thing. However this is also at the conf luence of the furthest most primary arterial and I-35 in Denton and it's obviously a logical place for for truck services. There's a truck stop, two truck stops you know at the at different corners of the intersection. This is obviously compatible and I think this is so while this area I believe is very appropriate for you know heavy equipment servicing I do want us to keep in mind in the future that the business innovation district it should be reserved generally for office parks but because of the I guess the effect of I-35 this this is a logical use and I think this also plays into some of our later cases where we have this almost a conflict between what is generally planned and then we have this area affected by 35 further south as well. So with that said I move we approve this initial zoning. Commissioner Ells. Thank you chair and I will second that. Okay I have a first and a second for approval any discussion or comments? Seeing none I'll call for a vote on the board. Motion carries six to zero. That will move us to item B and at this time I'm going to open the public hearing for S 17 - 0004 and we'll call on Julie Wyatt for presentation of that item as well. Would you like for me to quickly go through the presentation again or would you like the summary how would you like for me to move forward? I think probably on this one and I think we have a number of interested parties here let's go ahead and have the full presentation. Okay so this is S 17 - 0004 McDonald's. The item before you is a public hearing to consider a request for a specific use permit for a drive-through facility. The subject property is north of I-35. It is adjacent to North Texas Boulevard. The current lot configuration doesn't exactly match this existing aerial so we're going to go through a little bit of a background of the site and I'm going to use this this this aerial from Google Maps. It shows what is what more what is more accurate on the on the property right now. So up until recently there was a McDonald's on the site. It did have a drive-through as I-35 as the I-35 expansion project has progressed. TxDOT has acquired the front or acquired the frontage of the McDonald's property and that required that the building be removed as well excuse me as well some parking. There was also if you recall a gas station at the corner as well so that property most of that property was acquired with the I-35 widening as well. So in order for McDonald's to rebuild they would need in order for to have sufficient parking and the building they needed additional space so their proposal is to take in the lot that currently has the IHOP on it so so that's where we get this current configuration here and we'll see that more clearly on the site plan. So here's the proposed site plan for the project. If you can see that this this area was once the the existing McDonald's and then this part here is that that IHOP. The area in yellow is the proposed building. They're also proposing to drive-through menus to be located approximately here in order to provide sufficient vehicle storage and stacking for that drive-through. In addition within their site plan they're proposing bike racks, some pedestrian crossings at some of the drive ways as well as through the parking lot, sidewalk improvements along Wilshire and Kendoff will be required as part of the development of the site and then they're also proposing two signs. We'll talk more about this sign in just a few minutes just to let you know I know we talked about it in work session regarding what is actually required or what are the requirements for signs on. Commissioner Vett. Thank you Chair. While you've got this illustration up there can you show us the path that the drive-through will take coming off of 35? Certainly so the path that drive-through if you if you drove in here you would have to get actually go around the building and then come through to the drive-through in this location. This is a one-way circulation pattern. Where 's the point where they place their order is it at the... They would place their orders in these in that location there. Yes sir and then the cars would filter down through to the window here. Okay okay okay thank you. Sure so there was discussion of work session regarding that sign and I talked to the applicant and we consulted with the sign code and it is has been determined that because North Texas Boulevard is not a primary arterial it is a secondary arter ial it's considered in all other streets classification in terms of signs and in that case any ground signs in that location cannot exceed six feet. Now pole signs in that location you could have a pole sign as long as it didn't exceed six feet the maximum effective area which is just the writing for the sign would be 60 feet. A monument sign in that location there's no maximum effective area so as long as they did not exceed that six feet in height they could have you know any size effective area that they that they would apply for. So hopefully that clears it up a little bit I know we had some confusion and work session so. I'm gonna ask a question while we're on that subject did you say the pole sign can't be taller than six feet? Correct yes sir no matter what no sign can be taller than six feet in that location yes sir. Okay. Per the current sign code. Commissioner Rizzo. There was a maximum effective size for the pole sign what was that? 60 feet. 60 square feet yes sir. Thank you. Commissioner Taylor. Sorry to stop you now. No that's okay. Thank you I guess we're since we're sitting on the site plan and we're asking a bunch of questions I thought I'd jump in with mine . What is the what is the total stacking of the drive-thru? It does meet our requirements I believe our requirements are five and that is from and Jim may jump in here but I believe our stacking is from the window back and they do meet the stacking. I we did talk a lot about the dual window and whether or not it would would be sufficient and and so part of that having that dual window is to make sure that they have that sufficient stacking. Okay so. Menu board rather. So dual menu board. I'm not familiar with dual menu boards how does that work? Dual menu boards coming to a single lane so is this you jump into the closest line and try and cut in front of the other guy as you go in? I will let the applicant I'm not sure I mean I've been through one and it seemed to work out but but the applicant is here and they can probably they can probably answer maybe how their research on the functioning of it. And then I'm also trying to see if there were completely stacking to the point it hit the street. So there's 13 cars in the little diagram here and then you have the entire south side of the property so about another six cars seven cars and then you hit the west side of the property which is another four cars and then three more would get you maybe out onto North Texas Boulevard. So 27 or 28 vehicles stacked could eventually hinder the right lane of North Texas Boulevard but then I- 35 it looks like is this black line some kind of curb or barrier? That's the property line? No I'm at the the curved black line right around the car the drive through. That's a painted line? Is it painted it's not a no barrier? It is not a barrier because you do have to have that that exit. Okay yeah so I'm just trying to see if you actually stacked all the way to the 35 entrance you'd have 40 cars or something you go around the building twice basically. Okay thank you. Commissioner Sullivan. Thank you I pulled up a picture of this location on to that taken on 2005 showing the McDonald's regarding the signage that we talked about and at that point there was IHOP, Exxon and McDonald's the McDonald's sign was at the corner of the the front of the building and so on the property that we're talking about here where you've got the the blue outline at the bottom just below that one between that area and at the top of the property line there were actually three pole signs in that area and so it goes back to my question earlier and that is why can't we just give them what they had before since then there were three signs three pole signs the Exxon was a huge sign and now we're we're getting down to is one sign and so it looks like from a signage standpoint we're actually improving the situation by doing doing that and not putting the the owners who again must like this place because of rebuilding after it been you know demolished so well at this point we're applying the current code requirements to to that application to the proposal and then when staff looks at an SUP we also look at the character of the area and so that was the reason for the condition and I know we'll go over the condition about about a monument sign in this location was was in order to meet the SUP criteria for to meet the character of the area and the the surrounding development pattern and scale so thank you I'm also with within this site there are four four points of access one on I 35 one on Kindle one on Wilshire and one on North Texas Boulevard and they have also proposed a landscape plan it does meet the Denton development code requirements in terms of providing tree canopy parking lot screening and and parking lot tree canopy and landscaping they've also got some additional landscaping around the menu boards there that's enhanced these are the proposed elevations of the building they are proposing a masonry building with stone accents so sub chapter 6 of the Denton development code outlines the SUP criteria and I know that the full listings in your backup but just in general the SUP criteria is it needs to be consistent with the zoning regulations needs to conform with the Denton plan 2030 and it should be consistent with the surrounding development pattern in terms of access nu isance prevention and scale let's look at the zoning of the area first so the subject property has a DCG zoning district the proposed site plan and landscape plan conformed to the requirements of the DCG zoning district restaurants are permitted in DCG however drive-through uses do require a specific use permit did DCG is often found in our downtown areas and near our universities and those are it can often be pedestrian oriented places so we want to take a little harder look at specific projects in terms of drive-through uses to make sure that they're compatible with pedestrian oriented areas this site's location with its proximity to I 35 lends itself to more auto oriented uses however it's right there on I 35 this is the type of development you typically see on I 35 there's also several parking lots and commuter parking lots in the area which sort of lend itself to the more commuter side of this of this area we looked at the surrounding property so the property adjacent to the subject site so within about 200 feet we have nearby DCG zoning and dr2 zoning this has UNT facilities as well as some UNT parking areas across the highway is an nr3 zoning district with single-family development when we zoom out a little bit to about 500 feet within the subject property we see a lot more of the UNT campus coming into view with there's a UNT facility off to the in this location there's a dormitory to the north as well as parking some offices there's also commercial development in this area with with that's associated parking the UNT stadium is in this location and then the general area we see now residential areas around UNT to the north and to the east here this you can see from from this view the the prominence of the I 35 corridor that that is a pretty substantial feature of this map the future land use of this subject property is commercial this is not one of our mixed-use future land uses this is it this really is intended for areas of commercial concentration and auto oriented uses and drive-throughs are are meet the goals of this area and and meet the intent of the commercial future land use the mobility in the area once again I 35 is a dominant feature and that is this red here North Texas Boulevard is a secondary arterial that's intended to move people efficiently through the city is the intent of a secondary arterial and then you also have collector streets throughout this UNT area in order to move vehicular traffic public notification was sent out on the subject property we did receive one letter of opposition and I provided to that to you during work session our GIS department did not have an opportunity to calculate the percentage of opposition today but we suspect it will be because of the of the amount of property around it we suspect it is going to exceed 20% which would require super majority approval by City Council so based upon the criteria for approval staff recommends approval of the request with two conditions that the proposed use must substantially comply with the attached site plan landscape plan and building elevations and that signage on North Texas Boulevard be limited to one monument sign with a maximum fight height of five feet a maximum effective area of 40 square feet and to be constructed of masonry or stone to complement the primary structure and I will stand for any questions and the applicant is here to answer any questions got a question Commissioner Roselle this is more addressing I guess the question I might have for Commissioner Sullivan you had an image from 2005 that showed a pole sign on North Texas Boulevard yes 2005 had three pole signs I'm looking at I'm looking at an image from 2005 and there's one pole sign from McDonald's one from McDonald's but also Exxon and then I hop but the McDonald's one is on the I-35 not North Texas Boulevard was that at the same location same basic location when you're looking at it coming from the highway you see all three signs you would see all three signs when you were coming from the service road and then turning on the North Texas Boulevard you'd see all three and so they're proposing to have two pole signs not just one well but the I think the McDonald's sign was was not on the service road it was really next to the building it was off the service road in fact it was really almost behind the Exxon station that's not a small one it was a pole sign okay I'm not sure if that added clarity I apologize for that what is the height of the pole sign that they are being approved to put on the North Texas side 40 feet well they've asked for 20 feet but that doesn't meet the sign request so no matter I mean they would have to meet the sign requirement so and what is the sign requirements for a pole sign on the 35 a pole sign on I-35 can be 40 feet above the travel lanes of the highway so depending on the height of the highway some if the highway were elevated they had it has to be 40 it can only be 40 feet above the travel lanes of the highway okay and that's making assumptions is the 20 feet within the 40 feet above is that why they're saying 20 feet above a 20- foot sign is that a total of 40 feet above the travel height of the road the 40 -foot sign would be on I-35 right on North Texas Boulevard they they're proposing in their site plan they have a 20-foot sign per the sign code they could only have a 6-foot sign right but on 35 they're also proposing a 20-foot that could be well I mean it could be 20 feet from the ground level or 20 feet from the travel lanes depending on how I-35 is designed at that site I got you thank you Commissioner Beck thank you just raised something interesting did you say that height for the sign on the I-35 side had to be maximum 40 feet from the level of the travel the travel lanes yes sir okay well that's gonna sit down 35 goes under North Texas there so it drops down quite a bit so it would be so they couldn't have they have to take that distance in consideration no no it would be let me get let me get to that part of the sign code that way I'll I can quote it exactly okay I-35 measurement along I I-35 the height may be measured from the principal lanes the frontage road or the ground whichever allows the greater height frontage road okay all right thanks I guess the only clarification I want to make from work session we had discussion about the North Texas Boulevard could have a 20- foot pole sign and the clarification that you're coming back after doing the research is the maximum height whether it's a pole or whether it's a monument sign on North Texas Boulevard per our sign code is 6 foot period yes the only variance is how much area or size the sign can be whether it's a pole sign I think there's a limitation on that if it's a monument sign there's not a limitation in the square footage amount of the sign correct but it's six foot regardless based on the clarification okay Commissioner Taylor thank you chair sorry just lost my train of thought let's see if I can figure out where I what I was looking at just a second ago oh so yeah actually the the letter that we received does indicate that they're they disagree with the parking calculations is there is there they're saying that they should be 47 or 49 instead of 40 is that because it's a different use restaurants are calculated differently than commercial or restaurants have two ways before we get started discussion will you clarify which letter we're discussing here okay so we received a letter objection from I believe from UNT doesn't actually have a from on the header regarding this project and their criteria a in bold third paragraph says 49 spaces are required one per hundred square feet of leasable area however only 40 are provided so I just wanted to address that make sure that we are calculating parking spaces correctly we are restaurants can be calculated in one of in one of two ways they can be calculated by gross square footage or they can be calculated by seating so it does it does provide so so the the proposal meets the the parking requirements based upon seating so that's that's the discre pancy in the square footage Commissioner Ellis thank you chair Julie when you mentioned reaching the 20% opposition is that one property owner it is one property owner isn't it one final question on the SUP if this is approved image forward to City Council has proved and it's under an SUP anytime they make any kind of modifications or changes remodeling can you share that they will have to come back and apply for another issue P or we do try to provide some flexibility and are because when we look at an SUP we often recommend that they tie the site plan the landscape plan in the elevations to that SUP to ensure that that any that the criteria for the SUP approval is met but we do try to we understand that when when you get to site plan or possibly building permit there could be variations that have to be built into the project so we add the words substantially comply to that recommendation that it with the site plan landscape plan elevation so that way if there are minor changes they wouldn't have to go back through the public hearing process they could just those changes could be made at the staff level but down the road say ten years from now if they want to do a facelift to this building they'll have to probably come back potentially yes sir okay okay any other questions for staff thank you Julie good job this is a public hearing and I'm going to call on I believe this is the applicant first I've got a card here that says in support and it's got Greg Massey Beneguire Jimmy Lopez Sigeon Brooks and Sandy Phillips I don't know if any of you all were requesting to speak or who on the card please as you come forward give us your name and address and you'll have ten minutes okay good evening my name is Greg Massey I'm with Red Plains professional the engineering consultant for McDonald's on this site 2933 East Bryant Avenue Edmond Oklahoma I don't want to rehash everything that Julie has already done she did a wonderful job for us as far as the monument signage on North Texas Boulevard we are in agreement with staff on the five foot height and 40 square foot of face area on that sign again we we do still want to request the 40 foot pole sign on the I-35 frontage but again overall when you look at the combined tracks for the McDonald's and the IHOP we are reducing overall signage I guess just a brief history and the original McDonald's was constructed in 1973 so it was an operation here over 40 years we have the owner operator present if you'd like to ask questions that was question earlier concerning you know use of the students and pedestrian versus vehicle traffic she can give you the numbers on that and let you know what kind of traffic they did with the students in the area versus you know local traffic on the interstate as Julie stated the original restaurant was slightly smaller than than this footprint that we're proposing but with the taking of the additional right-of-way it wasn't able to continue operating and with the right-of- way taking text dot did the demolition on the site it was always intended to rebuild that site initially we thought it would be allowed to be rebuilt under a special exception because it was an existing use however we needed the additional property which was next door which extended the drive-through use onto an adjacent property so that's why we're here asking for the special use permit to allow the drive through to be reconstructed with the restaurant I'll be happy to answer any questions got one to start with Commissioner Roselle thank you chair mr. Massey if there was not a requirement for a five foot high monument sign with 40 square feet effective area would it be your preference to make a larger one if there wasn't a condition what size would you build we would comply with the city code and the 20 foot sign that was originally planned came from I guess some I don't want to say misinformation misclassification of North Texas Boulevard as a major arterial it's actually a minor arterial and that maximum height is six foot so if bottom line if staff didn't say five foot and 40 square feet we'd be a maximum six foot and 60 square feet okay thank you you're welcome Commissioner Beck thank you chair thank you mr. Massey for coming down speaking personally I'm glad you're gonna go along with the the smaller sign I just the idea of two pole signs close together is distracting to me but let me ask you this convey some or alleviate some concern for me here and I think the the one opponent to this stacking coming off of the service road you're you're you began ordering just almost as soon as you turn into McDonald's there what if on a busy day you start having people starting to pile out back on to 35 there the other thing that bothers me too is they they pretty much have to come all the way around the other side because they 're gonna get their food order at the other end of it and it doesn't give them they pretty much have to exit if they want to get back on 35 through the same area they came in on alleviate some concern here how they could be a problem on a busy day yes and keep in mind before we go to site plan approval on this it runs through McDonald's operations group and they look at those particular items making determination as to whether or not additional cur bing is required on that outside lane to prevent what you were talking about the intent is to have or force that traffic coming off the I-35 frontage road to have to circulate the building to get to the drive-through lane rather than coming straight off the interstate and into it that alleviates a concern thank you yes commissioner Taylor thank you chair I guess I'll ask my question about this double double order single lane thing how does how does that work I'm gonna allow mr. Ben Aguirre and or Jimmy Lopez they handle the operation side all right good evening my name is Ben Aguirre I'm an area construction manager for McDonald's corporation and can you give us your address also oh yes address is 1204 129th Street Oklahoma City Oklahoma thank you so to answer the question the way the we internally we call that design a 1 2 1 so you enter in one lane you split to two order points and you merge back to one lane in fact most of our restaurants nowadays are being constructed with that or have been over the last you know 18 24 months and and really what that does is it allows more throughput is what we're finding out is what it handles quick arrival rates better so that we prevent long stacking out into the streets and so forth so there's also some internal efficiencies that happen for us with operations and serving customers quicker but from from a planning perspective it allows us to handle the car stack right at the pinch point and then I guess you just it's one side is waiting to order so the other side pulls forward the the coordination you don't have any coordination problems there with yeah some of you have been to one of our double lane drive-through restaurants you'll you 'll be familiar with the sign that says any lane at any time we also have some proprietary software that can be as sophisticated as taking a picture of the vehicle so that when they get to the order point we know which order goes with which vehicle thank you good evening my name is Jimmy Lopez I reside at 2020 Lower Valley Drive Keller Texas I'm the regional construction manager but one of the things is Ben is talking about the software but at the same time our order takers are set up to where they stagger each other so if you get to lane number one and they're taking your order the the second order take will actually ask you to pull up to the second lane but won't be taking your orders at the same time thus you get alternating vehicles taking orders and all that so it is a huge not only all the software inside of our buildings but also we train our our staff inside the restaurants to make sure we stagger the order so you'll never have one what you know you'll never have to order take is taken to order at the same time so you don't have that it's my term type scenario thank you Commissioner Beck thank you chair maybe y'all can answer this for me I'm not trying to tell you how to design your product here but the exit rim coming off 35 does it sit back do you know if it sits back considerably before you get to Kendall there which would be because you 've got an entrance point on that side and I'll defer to our engineer okay because if it's it what I'm thinking if it sits back far enough seems like you could put a sign at the corner there making that your entrance instead of having people come in off the service road and circle all the way around it where if they could come off Kindle off there and then just have that and then make that that opening there on the service road and exit that seems like it would eliminate a lot of stacking comment yes I understand what you're saying and the gore of the ramp exiting I-35 onto the frontage road does sit considerably further back unfortunately Kindle is a dead-end street at this point and to my knowledge unless that's changed recently dead-end doesn't come into the service road will not be reopened for access so the only access from the I-35 frontage into this track has to come either from this drive or off of North Texas Boulevard did not know that thank you you're welcome Commissioner Ellis thank you chair can we can we check with engineering is that true that kind of is not going to be reopened because then the only way back on to 35 once they visit McDonald's is is to go back out that one drive on 35 right they would either have to exit the drive on 35 or go north to Wilshire right but where do and how did they get back to 35 well from I believe from Wilshire there's a Wil shire there's a median cut that you like that you turn my understanding is as Greg alluded to is that yes Kindle will be closed at there at the service road but I believe there has been correct me if I'm wrong you all have had some correspondence with text dot in which they have indicated that being that can also be closed they would be okay with their your drive being preserved there that is correct the ultimate text dot schematic shows a median that goes across the Wilshire intersection but as far as their the current condition I have an aerial at least showing that there is not one currently and Greg correct me if I'm wrong I think that the thought is that even in this ultimate condition to get back on to 35 they would take the they would use the drive approach on the service road directly that is correct any other questions for the applicant thank you and this is a public hearing have a card requesting to speak Amy Armstrong from UNT in opposition good evening I am Amy Armstrong I'm the interim news manager at the University of North Texas the address is 2310 North Interstate 35 East the University of North Texas and University of North Texas systems as the sole owner of all adjacent property is opposed to a request for a specific use permit for a drive-through facility at this location we have reviewed the criteria for approval for a specific use permit the proposed project plan does not meet the criteria a criteria B conditions four and seven and criteria D conditions one two three and six criteria a requires that the proposed project must be in conformance with all standards within the zoning district in which the use is proposed as noted in the application materials on sheet C 6 .0 49 parking spaces are required one per 100 square feet of leasable area however only 40 spaces are provided failure to meet the zoning requirement means that the proposed project plan cannot be found in compliance with all current standards and therefore cannot be approved in its current form criteria be identify several conditions that must be met in order for the Commission to recommend approval the proposed development does not meet two of these conditions numbers four and seven condition before requires that the proposed arrangement of vehicular and pedestrian traffic not adversely affect the general public or adjacent uses the work by the Texas Department of Transportation on I-35 and associated intersections has caused changes to the traffic conditions in this area that make a drive-through in this location harmful to surrounding property owners the proposed layout of driveways is also fundamentally different than the earlier development with the addition of the North Texas Boulevard median second drive-through lane and an additional driveway on Wilshire vehicular and pedestrian traffic will be impacted in three specific ways I-35 frontage road traffic traveling north on I-35 frontage road will be negatively impacted by peak hour trips to the restaurant for both entering and exiting traffic at this driveway location if entering traffic is backed up into the frontage road access to the right turn stacking lane will be negatively impacted additionally exiting traffic from the same drive-through has no restrictions on unsafe lane changes to reach the left turn or you turn lanes to return south on I-35 adversely affecting the general public as well as access to the University especially during peak hours North Texas Boulevard due to the installation of the median on North Texas Boulevard exiting traffic will be forced to turn right on Wilshire Eagle or further into UNT campus which will have a negative impact on pedestrian and vehicular movements on these streets Wilshire Drive new access on Wilshire Drive will introduce significant increased traffic to UNT property adversely affecting University uses these new traffic patterns exasperate existing difficult conditions for pedestrian crossings on North Texas Boulevard and Eagle Drive and traffic circulation in the southern end of campus a traffic impact analysis by the developer is needed to fully evaluate these adverse impacts and understand how this new traffic circulation will impact the surrounding property owners however it is clear that as currently presented the proposed project does not meet this criteria condition B7 requires that landscaping and screening be harmonious and compatible with adjacent uses the proposed landscaping and screening is not compatible with its location as adjacent to the University's primary vehicular entry point the property is located directly across from the North Texas Boulevard from a site on which the University has recently invested approximately five hundred and forty thousand dollars in landscaping improvements and a relocated monument sign the code minimum approach taken in the proposed project is not compatible with this adjacent use significant improvements would be needed to address this criteria and more compatible with the city's comprehensive plan specifically the community community character chapter as proposed we do have your letter thank you for reading some of it and we'll make sure that the rest of it gets into our record okay thank you have some questions for you Commissioner back thank you chair thank you miss Armstrong for your presentation let me pick at you a little bit here you've heard comments about the parking situation how it can be rated in a couple different ways and we've obviously used the city's looked at it from one way where 40 parking spaces is allowed so does that eliminate that argument in your in your opinion I would have to run that by people at campus and get get you I'm happy to get you an answer for that okay and some of your comments are understandably concerned but they're not really backed up by facts you say it's clear that it's currently presented proposed project does not meet this criteria and that it it's going to create excessive traffic but you don't have any information to back that up now I don't disagree that maybe we do need a TIA here and I guess I could ask staff is that forthcoming are we going to be doing that can anybody know I guess we wait on Jim to come down or if it's required by just to see if we're gonna have that TIA but I just if miss Armstrong can hang on to we have not we have not stated that our TIA is required given that there was a McDonald's there already as well as a gas station which has gone away and an IHOP which is going away okay okay again are you still concerned that with the analysis that we've done here that it's going to create a problem for traffic flow for North Texas and when you talk about surrounding property owners who's there really besides the universe you've got other businesses over off of Avenue C I'm not sure how they 're adversely affected by it and the houses are on the other side of I-35 I don't see them impacted being impacted at all well the statement is the information that I have tonight as I said I'm happy to get answers in your convey ance okay I got you thank you sorry I didn't put you in this thank you Commissioner Roselle I have several questions with this letter but I fear that there's not going to be many responses to it so I don't know how to handle my concerns except just ask them and we'll see what responses we get the section under condition before where it says it's negatively impacting the traffic way three ways the first one is stated as the I-35 fronted road frontage road and you talk about stacking onto the front of the road and then the exiting issues and so I 'm wondering how that is any different than the McDonald's that was there for 40 years so not to be a broken record but the statement is the information I have yeah I'm happy to to get answers to yeah that might that might be the answer to a couple more questions let's just get the questions on the record then we can get them back I guess my other question is maybe it's maybe it 's just a statement so this is better I find it interesting that based on a investment that North Texas voluntarily put into redoing landscaping and the relocation of a monument sign that they're holding their neighbors to a higher standard than the landscaping requirement by the city which is noted here that it's implied that University of North Texas spent half a million dollars on a sign which I have other concerns about that but that doesn't necessarily necessitate the neighbors to it's implied that they should spend five hundred forty thousand dollars on landscaping I'm not sure the implication here but I'm necessarily agree with what I'm inferring it and it seems as though if I could just understand this the McDonald's was not torn down by choice can someone confirm this they didn't have a choice who can confirm this for me they made their owner can can I get confirmation could did you have a choice to tear down your building yes my name is Sajan Brooks I'm from the law firm in baron other cloth and Odo I represented of address 808 new aces Austin Texas seven eight seven zero one I represent McDonald's corporation and our operator in the condemnation of this matter this combination was a bisection by the Texas Department of Transportation meaning the Texas Department of Transportation as you heard actually performed the demolition which means the property line was cutting the building back and textile went on and on its own volition to cut the building back from every move to suck was it possible for McDonald's to continue operations after that was done no no text department transportation went in and demolished the building on their own okay I appreciate that clarification thank you back to miss Armstrong I it seems as though you know Texas is taking advantage of a situation that McDonald's had no control over there I 'd love to see the traffic study but it's reducing there's not a gas station there any longer so I'm I'm curious as the actual traffic increasing with this McDonald's to the extent which you're saying if you reduce the exon traffic and anecdotally that seemed to have more traffic continually than McDonald's when I when I saw it and so I just take a little bit of issue that North Texas based on nothing that this company did or the property owners did is now coming in and denying or wanting to deny the rebuilding of a building that's been there for 40 years and so though I appreciate the the diligence and this letter being drafted I just have a lot of issues with with the position that North Texas has decided to take on this and again I understand I appreciate you coming here and presenting this to you but those are my concerns with this letter commissioner Ellis thank you chair I'm sure you may not have an answer to this without your group but maybe you do ideally what would the owners surrounding UNT as the sole owner in opposition here what would you like to see developed on this site the same information I have tonight I'm happy to you can answer us for you to that I would yeah for an existing McDonald's that was by no fault of their own torn down I mean you could have a great relationship McDonald's does a great job at community building UNT and McDonald's it could I mean could do great things together and it's I'm just curious as to you know with this two page letter where you're going and what would be the ideal development for this site if it can't be this commissioner Taylor thank you chair I believe my questions are going to be along the same lines I I appreciate the detail in the letter we often have extremely vague concerns so you you are extremely detailed and you do tight even tie it back to criteria for SUP approval I I do have a concern that many of these items are very narrowly cherry-picked the the traffic conditions two years ago there was a McDonald's a gas station in IHOP you had there were seven I think driveways total now we're going to four driveways total one restaurant instead of two restaurants in a gas station so to say that traffic will be adversely impacted once the constructions done the this area will have much lower traffic than it used to it 'll have better circulation that McDonald's was a kind of a pain to get to before especially with Kindle often that really sharp exit ramp all of those issues have been alleviated because of text dots improvements die 35 just moving down the list on the condition D criteria floor area ratio is referenced to a single lot to the north which just happens to be the densest thing in probably half a mile and saying that this is this lot's gonna be less dense but then if you just go west there's an open field of 20 or 30 acres of open field if you go east there's the what used to be the second save which is now I believe a UNT office space which is a very low floor area ratio you go northeast you hit an impound lot that's zero for area ratio so to critique the floor area ratio based on one single parcel out of ten surrounding parcels isn't really representative the the same thing on the pedestrian requirements this might not be the perfect pedestrian pathway across the North Texas bridge and I know especially with apogee stadium this is going to become a major pedestrian thoroughfare the design does accommodate pedestrian use UNT's own property at Wilshire and Kindle that they've owned for at least 15 years they've never bothered to put a sidewalk in on the south side of Wilshire or on either side of Kindle the north side of Wilshire they don't have ADA curb cuts in the sidewalk it also that doesn't continue the entire length of Wilshire so if they really wanted to increase the pedestrian access to the for this area say from Avenue C to apogee stadium they would have built sidewalks on their own property so to to criticize a five-foot sidewalk and a couple of crosswalk s at McDonald's when you don't even have a sidewalk like the McDonald's sidewalk is going to end when the UNT property starts so that's it's not a fair criticism to say that they're not doing enough when you haven't done anything so unfortunately you you undermine your own your own arguments by by your own behavior in the area those are my comments okay any other questions for this particular speaker thank you for your comments and your letter we'll make sure that the rest of it's in the record I did have one other sheet from James McGuire representing UNT systems 1901 Main Street in Dallas Texas he is also opposed the request again this is a public hearing anyone who would like to speak on this item please come forward at this time seeing none I will close the public hearing and open the floor for discussion and emotion Commissioner Sullivan can I ask you a question of the applicant absolutely could y'all answer or give me an idea of how many she be how many UNT students were employed at the old restaurant and how many you anticipate employing at the new restaurant so bear with us we're giving you a little bit state your name again so we'll have Jimmy Lopez 2020 Laurel Valley, Keller, Texas 76248 the data we have is a couple of years old we've been shut down a bit as I was talking to the franchisee miss Sandy Phillips has actually owned this restaurant 43 of the 44 years that it's been there she said any we would have anywhere between 50 and 60 employees at the restaurant and half of them would be UNT students roughly half of them 45 50 percent she said so roughly 20 25 of the folks working in the McDonald's restaurants were students at UNT again that's a couple of years old understand thank you very much Commissioner back thank you chair just for the record I'd like to state I'm sorely disappointed in UNT throwing miss Armstrong in the phrase sending somebody that isn't prepared to answer a lot of questions we had here that being said I make a motion that we recommend approval of this SAP subject to the condition stated okay Commissioner Roselle thank you chair I too would like to approve this but I would like to see the motion not include a signage restriction I just I don't understand why in all reality this should just be a simple rebuild of something that's been there for 43 years but yet because of some weird nuances forced upon the applicant by text dot they're having to come to the SAP and like we've seen very many times before it often feels like when there's an SAP on the floor the city feels like there 's it's like that's the start of a negotiation and I don't know if that always has to be the case that if they asked for an SAP then we get to ask for something and it's a matter of a foot less in height and it just feels like we 're fighting for a win or something on our end and so I would prefer to see this motion carry force to council with just condition one that it would remain in compliance with the attached site plan landscape plan and building elevations and not include the sign restriction set up friendly amendment the motioner would like to entertain no I just wanted to make comment to the Commissioner Roselle's concern about the sign and I understand the wish to let the party builder McDonald's the way it was before I'm not sure I see a need for two pull signs that's the only thing I'm not sure they're gonna lose out by having a monarch sign on one side and their pull sign on the other so that was reason I just the idea of pull signs are distracted anyway in my opinion so if I can't get a second emotion then I'll make a comment I think we clarified that there's not going to be a pole sign regardless on North Texas Boulevard I think there were some misunderstandings in our original work session okay and due to the street classification the only thing that's allowed over on North Texas Boulevard is going to be a monument sign and the question is going to be whether it's a six foot height or a five and I think that's the issue that is before so there will not be a pole sign regardless because of our city code and the applicant has stated that they're going to follow our code okay so the only condition then is that they abide by the site plans and everything like that and I'm okay with that okay so we want to do we need to restate our motion or just go with that staff I believe you agree to the friendly amendment did you not so just condition more yes just condition just condition one can we have a first and second for approval with only the first condition being required okay any further discussion I'm sorry Commissioner Roselle was a second on that I apologize yes I do second the motion by Commissioner Beck okay now we have a first and a second for approval with only the first item as a condition on this any other comments or discussion I'll make a comment I'm gonna support the motion as it is proposed and I'm too I'm a little surprised by the response from North Texas I'm sure the amount of money that's been spent on the monument sign you may not want a McDonald's they're sharing the entrance on North Texas Boulevard and I'm hopeful that if that's something that's that important to North Texas they can reach some type of an arrangement with the owner of McDonald's to rectify that but I don't think it's in at least in my opinion this purview of my vote to help North Texas accomplish that at the expense of the owner I think the owner should be able to rebuild their business they didn't have an option to do that text dot tore it down they did not and I think it's at least from my vote is going to give them the option to put back their business and if North Texas wants to purchase it they certainly can do it as a business versus a piece of property that can't have a McDonald's back on it and the financial implications that that might have so I'm going to support the motion and with no other comments or discussion I will call for a vote on the board that motion is going to carry six to zero is everybody okay to continue do need to take a break before we start our next item okay and we'll move us to our item C thank you all best luck on your project at this time I'm going to open the public hearing for item s 16 - 0 0 0 7 B we'll call on Haley for presentation give us a minute to warm up okay all right so my name is H aley's aggressive with the planning division and this is case s 16 7 for the rainy road apartments and I'll run through this pretty quickly since we do have a few people in the audience so the request was to hold a public hearing and consider a request for a specific use permit to allow a multifamily use on a property that's approximately point nine acres the property is located at the rainy road and rainy court intersection and is uniquely configured having frontage on Elm Street rainy road and rainy court a look at what the proposal is our site plan shows that this would be two apartment buildings each one would be comprised of five units the units are each proposed as the three bedroom two and a half bathroom configuration and as you can see outlined in green each of these units would feature a rear yard that would be fenced there's also a storage building proposed on the site it is shown here in red and buildings a little over 700 square feet would feature a storage unit for each of the apartments and the site is required to have 20 parking spaces by code they're proposing 23 spaces and the three spaces that are shown in gray would be pervy's make constructed a pervious papers to comply with the development code their landscape plan as you can see here shows that they are complying with the provisions of our development code for landscaping they exceed the required 40% by approximately 8% extra landscape area some of the key features of the site would be the type B buffer that's required to the adjoining single-family residence this buffer requires five trees and 30 shrubs for every 100 linear feet in addition to that the applicants also proposing an eight-foot tall cedar fence along that property line they are proposing to maintain the existing tree line along reiney court it's outlined in green on the site plan and then in orange you can see one of their other features will be a patio and trellis area that also features some landsca ping that would be open space for the residents the building elevations this is building one which would be on the southern side of the property this building would have five units as I mentioned they would each have an exterior front and rear entrance and the materials are primarily brick and stucco building two would be located on the northern side you can see a very similar configuration here with five units each with the exterior front and rear entrances also brick and stucco materials here is the proposed elevation for the storage building you can see it has one exterior entrance point that would open to a hallway that would then have the ten separate storage areas off of that and this building is proposed as brick construction as well our criteria for approval for an issue peer outlined in detail in subchapter 6 of the Denton Development Code just in summary they generally provide considerations that would require consistency with the zoning regulations conformity with the goals of the Denton plan 2030 as well as consistency and compatibility with the surrounding area in terms of the scale of the development so to look at each of those in turn at the existing zoning for the property is in our MU 12 that's neighborhood residential mixed use this zoning district allows for a variety of residential uses the multifamily use is required to either have an SUP or be part of an approved small area plan or as part of a mixed use development some of the general regulations as I mentioned they had a 40% minimum landscaping that they are complying with which then in turn means they're in compliance with their maximum lot coverage the maximum density they could reach is 12 units with this being approximately one acre with 10 units they're just under that to look at the surrounding area within approximately 200 feet we have some single-family homes within a neighborhood residential to zoning district and then the subject property as well as some of the surrounding residences and vacant property are within the NRMU 12 district zooming out a little bit further we see across Elm Street more single-family residences we do start to get into a mixture of higher densities with some duplexes here North Lakes Park is located just to the south of the property within an NRMU 12 district and then this general area of town you see as a wide array of uses on North Elm Street on the north side as well as the south there's a mixture of residential uses single-family duplexes apartments we also have North Lakes Park to the south UNT's Discovery Park you can see in purple there on the north side so they are near a UNT property as well the future land use designation for this property is it's kind of on the buffer between two designations that are neighborhood mixed use and moderate residential the proposed use is in conformity with both of those designations neighborhood mixed use allows for a mixture of housing types with supporting retail services and moderate residential encourages the protection of existing neighborhoods as well as development with a density in the range of 4 to 12 units per acre so this fits within that range the mobility for this area as I mentioned it has frontage on three different roads North Elm Street is a text out roadway and a primary arterial Re iny Road is a collector Street and Reiny Court is a neighborhood Street subject property as you can see is primarily vacant there is the existing tree line along Reiny Court that they intend to preserve notifications were sent for this request we received four opposition letters that are in your backup and our GIS team did run the calculations and within the 200 foot buffer they were at approximately 33% of the land area expressing opposition so that would require the super majority vote at council a neighborhood meeting was held back in May and there were 11 people in attendance at that meeting given all these criteria we've discussed staff is staff is recommending approval of the request it's generally compatible with the surrounding land use pattern and is consistent with the goals and objectives of our Denton plan 2030 we do recommend one condition and that be that the use substantially comply with the site plan landscape plan and building elevations that were included here and with that I can stand for any questions Commissioner Tyler thank you chair could you return to the site plan certainly so I'm assuming rental property this close to research park is probably aiming at students to some degree I'm not sure what their target audience is I know they're designed a little bit more like townhomes that could encourage you know family use but I believe the applicant is here and he could speak more to what their target audience would be okay my question is I don't notice any bike parking here and I do know that the city is just put in an 8-foot multi-use path maybe a couple hundred yards from here and again I there's going to be some amount of students probably in this so I was wondering am I missing it or is it not on the plan as far as I can tell I don't believe there is bike parking incorporated like something most of the applicant perhaps thank you any other questions for staff there's one Commissioner Ellis like camera thank you chair Haley that that parking lot I notice on the site plan it looks really tight I assume that where the dumpster is located on this site plan that that waste management can get in there and empty and turn out appropriately or back up appropriately I mean I assume that's been looked at or will be looked at yes it was looked at with this request it will be looked at in further detail with their site plan submittal but I believe they did have a proper stacking distance and the width of the dry bottle was appropriate for fire access as well as solid waste okay thank you thank you Jim is coming up to add something yes Commissioner we did look at that on on sites with a short a dry vial is this one we don't require turnaround provisions for the trucks they can they can back up any other questions for him thank you thank you can this is a public hearing anyone who would like to speak please come forward at this time you'll state your name and address and then I don't have a card for me so if you'll fill out a card for us when you before you leave okay well I got here so my name is Brad Andrus I'm with the applicant I live at 8855 FM 1173 in crumb appreciate your consideration this item this evening the as I know is in your background material my brother and I purchased this lot a couple of years ago with a different use in mind and and after really an unfortunate event of our business partner that we were going to do an assisted living project with she suddenly passed away of cancer and so we kind of had to Brock and I looked at each other like we don't know how to run assisted living facility this is she was going to do that for us we looked at other options on doing that and in the end we just became uncomfortable with that particular use so started to explore other options and what what other uses could be done in that that property and the I'm I do commercial real estate for a living and develop office buildings and some other small retail type projects as well as lease a variety of commercial properties and as I considered based on my experience what type of properties would work there I really didn't see a good fit other than some sort of residential use and so the we started looking at okay well within the zoning what's allowed we looked at configurations for duplexes or townhomes which are allowed within the zoning and based on this very odd site configuration this triangular lot with streets on on three sides we just were having a heck of a time coming up with a layout and it really initially was working with Julie on this and it was kind of at her suggestion that we look at an SUP and so that's why we're presenting that that 's kind of the history of it and what I've really tried to do is is focus design this in a way that would look similar to a townhome development and so while there's not garages on the buildings everything short of that I think it looks and feels very much like a townhome project which is what is a use that would be allowed without an SUP and so the reason we couldn't really consider the SU or the townhome use in and of itself is the way again the lot was configured and with the lot the platting of the lots and the way that would have to be set up it just wasn't working and so trying to do something that essentially would look like something that would be already approved we've we've gone we've tried to go above and beyond on our landscape not only are we 8% more in landscape area but we're we've we're actually 78% have a 78% tree canopy versus a 45% canopy that's required per code so and of course done that that trellis and that kind of park area over there trying to add and to the aesthetics of the project as well I would like to address your question Mr. Taylor about the bike or really kind of wanted to get back to the what our intentions are as far as our demographic or target market we really see it as more family could students live there certainly but the the the three bedroom two and a half bath was really more kind of designed with with families in mind so hadn't even thought about a park bike rack to be honest with wide open to putting one on there we've got no problem with doing that we'd welcome that if that were become a part of the the SUP provision so and with the storage you know when we when we met with the neighbors a couple of months ago and discussed you know primary concerns for them that I heard were well generally we don't want this use here and that's something I don't have other than saying well we 'll just leave it as an empty lot I didn't have a lot to kind of come back with on that but parking was an overall concern so we went back to the drawing board added three additional parking spaces that of course those three will be pervious spaces we talked about whether they prefer you know a wall all the way around you know a screening wall all the way around or leave this natural barrier here on Riney Court and it was kind of mixed but I heard more of let's leave it as much like it is as possible and so that's kind of why we don't have you know we only have that screen 8-foot screening wall on that west west side we did consider that on the Riney Court side as well so tried to be you know work with the neighbors as much as possible and addressing some of their concerns throughout the project so that if you have any questions for me I'd love to address them. Commissioner Back. Thank you Chair and thank you Brad for your presentation I personally I like the design I think you've done well in trying to accommodate the neighbors I like the fact that you've kept all those trees on the Riney Court side and with ten units to direct attention to some of the concerns of local residents I'm not sure traffic is going to be anything of an increased traffic flow because I mean we're dealing with ten units here Riney is a connector road between 35 and Windsor I believe it is so the fact that apartments are coming in to residential neighborhood that's not a good thing that's that's an argument that I don't always buy into because that's not an automatic one concern was mentioned about drainage though so can you tell us share with us on grading this lot how is it going to be graded is most of it going to go out towards Riney Road and Elmer's are we going to get a considerable amount back on Riney Court? I appreciate the question unfortunately I don't have a good answer for you because I have not gone to the point of having a topo survey done to know exactly what the fall is that some of the neighbors concerned is mine too I want as much as the neighbors wanted I want to keep that that natural tree barrier there on on R iney Court there is some concern that that maybe the drainage will have to be worked in such a way that some of that would have to be removed there's Jim probably could answer better where where the inlets are for that side I think it goes towards Riney Road doesn't it or will it go towards Elm but again don't know the exact topography of it so probably gonna struggle answering that. It goes towards Riney Court. Can I put this down here for display? Eye in the sky. Okay. Thank you. I've got the topographic map here and I've added some flow arrows where you can see the site itself and this is all current topography and this is with our GIS so it's sort of high level it's not topo survey but it it basically drains right now towards Riney Court and towards the park really there's an existing swale along the east side of Riney Road that appears to collect the area I've shown in red the runoff from that area and then there's a couple of culverts crossing Riney Road and the first driveway there in that first house going on a ditch along the south or west side of Riney Court towards the park. Jim let me ask you this in your opinion if the applicant is able to develop this with altering that flow at least on that lot back out the other way is that going to create some negative impact just outside the property? Well we would not allow development that creates negative development negative drainage impact on neighboring property. I mean there would be it's a very small site it's like 0.9 of an acre I think so even when they develop it there will be some increased runoff but not much we we still have yet to I think receive and review the site plan cemental that will have a grading plan to have the drainage calculations and routing we will check it all for that one this is just an idea I have this is subject to change but looking at seeing how the drainage currently runs I'm wondering if it would make sense it almost seems like it wants to go towards that green area which is actually a sort of a finger of the park property one thing I mean you can always detain we're not talking about much in the way of additional runoff here on this site one thing we have allowed in certain situations is if you have like a pipe you may have I don't know if there's a culvert across for any court there if not you may have to put one in if you have a sort of concentrated discharge there under the park property we require you to get a little easement at that discharge point and a letter from them acknowledging the additional runoff that's just a thought to me that's looking at this that seems to be what how it wants to work okay well we can look at it down the road been when the site plan comes in and discuss it then thank you any other questions for the applicant strange may I just make one comment the of course as Jim says you know we'll have to get full civil and approved by the by the city and in that drainage concern would exist whether we're an office building or any you know any other type of use that were allowed in in the in the current zoning we I this is not soft story but I've thought about going to that point because I knew it was a concern some of the neighbors were about 10,000 into just getting to this point on what we've done and so I feel like well until I get it know whether I've got something approved here what will cross that bridge when we need to we know we recognize we'll need to address that so thank you thank you again this is a public hearing anyone who would like to speak on this item please come forward at this time please give us your name and your address and then before you go if you'll fill out a card for us I see no appreciate it my name is Janice JAN I S Cunningham 3501 Northam didn't Texas thank you and we live on that north side if you can pull up where there's the one house is there okay and if you pull it up can we get a little bit closer okay that's our house right there at the top that long white thing is our travel trailer and we have it behind the fence what we're concerned with is parking if there's ten apartments and everybody has two cars that's 20 okay now you've got three extra places the Christmas birthdays for kids when grandma grandpa come what where they gonna park well they on the other side of Ronnie Road there that belongs to Tom Nelson and you can't get down in there between those houses on on Ronnie Court then you've got the cul-de-sac which is where people aren't parking now but if you let people park along the back of our fence and we want out to go camping I'm afraid we can't and when we come in that's when we worry because my husband and I have enough trouble getting in there anyway so the parking is the main thing and the water now there is a little drainage that goes under there and they put that in for us because we had so much water in our backyard at one time several years ago they put that drainage in but we still have water okay thank you I have a question for you Commissioner Roselle thank you miss C unningham for for being here and providing your perspective on that I have a question you enter your house off Elm correct so Ronnie Court is in your backyard right and you have two neighbors across your back fence yes has Christmas or birthday party at their house ever blocked your trailer in no okay but when they the YMCA was down there on Ronnie Road yes they blocked in our trailer that's where they parked is YMCA still there no okay thank you thank you ma'am again this is a public hearing anyone else with wishing to speak on this item please come forward at this time seeing none or close the public hearing and Commissioner Taylor thank you chair I was curious if I don't know if this would be a question for for staff or engineering what would it take to get parking limitations on Ronnie Court yeah I think this was discussed earlier typical is a petition and goes through the Traffic Safety Commission and ultimately City Council would have to prove a no parking zone by ordinance and that's something that we can afford but it goes through that process okay I and so that would have to be I guess neighborhood initiated like the residents of the street would probably have to request it is that typically yes and there has to be some sort of reason of course to back that petition up okay review of these development projects one of the parties I meet with every week is our traffic engineer and I will make a point of relaying these concerns to him and also seek his his guidance or suggestions about the process of applying for and possibly having agreed to no parking sign age I'll see what the process is I'll make him aware of the concern for sure we will still see the I mean I'll do it next week when I see him but also we still have yet to see we will receive a site plan permit application for this site which we can revisit it thank you so I there's a lot of opposition in the neighborhood there's surprising amount actually it's rare to get a large block of neighbors to all come out opposed to a project and I and I definitely understand the concern of you know apartments in a residential area there's a challenge along Elm Elm has a mix of some residences there are quite a few directly north of here and then it has a bunch of maybe two to five acre lots of many triangular some are already developed commercially and many and most of them are zoned to some commercial development either NRM you NRM you 12 or something more intense and there isn't really a feasible way to develop the the three acre lot that's 500 or 800 feet further south on Elm here or the you know the the eight acre triangle up near Reini or Reini goes east west or you know the one across from that were behind the Jehovah's Witness Hall or the funny trapezoidal one down by the dollar general in the residential pattern you know that doesn't like just having single-family homes there doesn't work and so I look at this and I'm in my initial concern was is this going to be like dramatically altering the neighborhood are we going to be bringing a you know multif amily in across on the side of the street and you know frankly low density multif amily or small neighborhood commercial strip centers which would be challenging to make work here are are the only things that can go on about ten of these lots along Elm and so then we come to mitigating the concerns in the neighborhood this is ten units it you know if it was in duplexes you might get four duplexes about eight units in there and so it's not dramatically more dense it's not a three-story student housing project and so and with the with the vegetative buffers and I think especially with the parking concerns there's maybe a 24 foot wide Reini Road and then Reini Court with with no curbs and maybe 20 feet of pavement that's not an appropriate place to park you know if you had six or eight cars lined up they'd be kind of in the ditch or blocking driveways and so I think if we can if we can alleviate those parking concerns and just realize that there isn't much other option for this or the several other small kind of irregular lots along Elm except for NRM you type uses kind of low density apartments or commercial strip so with all that I am going to move we recommend approval to City Council with staffs recommendation and with the added requirement that there be secure bike parking provided for at a one bike to ten car ratio so three three bike spots one small bike rack basically Commissioner Roselle I certainly echo what Commissioner Taylor saying about the obstacles in this property and I think I'm encouraged to see at least the design and site plan by the applicant when I first saw it I actually asked this in work session the difference between this in a town home because just looking at it looks like a townhome type development which I think not not just to pick lesser of evils but it's certainly a way to develop this in the least obtrusive way and so I actually hope that this sets the standard going south and those other areas in which we can kind of transition these residential areas without making super dense or maybe insignificant strip centers so with all that said if I if I could there's the button Devin hasn 't motioned Devin can you click that I'll second this motion with the addition of the required one to ten ratio for bikes Commissioner Beck thank you chair I'm gonna go along as to just wanted to comment I don't want to seem unsympath etic to the local residents and additional traffic or anything like that but I think as mentioned here this is an NRMU 12 zone there it's not like we're rezoning it for this type of thing by right this can go there and this seems like a good fit as opposed to strip a little strip commercial area or something even heavier so on holidays I suspect half those apartments may be empty - they may be going to grandma's and grandpa's so not sure how big a problem that is but I don't I understand the concern there too but hopefully this will all work out so thank you yeah comments Commissioner Ellis thank you chair I'll just say a couple of words I do understand the neighborhood opposition but I but I will support this but I think it's an excellent design for a really tough lot and I think you know from what the applicant has shown us this site plan and I look forward to it going forward it is is great- looking I think it will actually add to that corner and I think if we can get engineering behind maybe posting no parking down the road in that court and as we move forward with what these roads are going to be in the future I think we alleviate parking issues I'm gonna echo as well I must support this this evening as well for a lot of the same reasons I felt commissioners have is by right they could do duplexes or town homes there and because they have designed a two-story design versus a very tall design and they are less dense what they could be and they provided additional parking I think it is a difficult site something ultimately will get built there that may be denser it may not have some of the extra amenities that this particular applicant is proposing and it's always difficult to try to balance existing neighbors and then also look at what can go there in the future I think it is a good use for the property and with that I'm going to support the SUP request there are no other comments and we will call for a vote on the board and motion is going to carry six to zero that will move us to our final item on our agenda this evening the project matrix Commissioner Roselle I have nothing to add us want to follow up on Commissioner Beck's request on the tree code it says staff waiting results of legislation scheduled for special session just a clarification that's the one that starts next week for 30 days so after mid-august we'll have more clarification when we can talk about tree code and it's maybe I should look up the agenda for the special session but what is the state talking about that would impact our tree code there was a bill that was introduced that restricts the ability to or how we issue credits basically and paying into the tree fund so it may or may not have an impact on the tree code as written and the proposed tree code we won't know into I believe it's in committee where they're trying to hammer out some differences between the houses is that right you guys have been following that well that's correct the special session has a lot of agenda items and one of it is the tree preservation requirements that the cities can apply and so that's going to be discussed in roughly 30 days starting next week on the 18th and after that we'll know better as to what the bills are okay thank you Commissioner Taylor okay I was trying not to drag you into it Bob there have been a couple bills that entered in this special session and two of them would basically wipe out local tree ordinances it would also take away the right of homeowners HOA's from being able to restrict people from cutting their own their trees down as well so it's not just reaching into cities but it's reaching into HOA's thank you Commissioner Taylor thank you chair I was curious if we could get our iPads updated I'm I don't have the password for the admin account so my I legislate is like two years old I know we've talked about this before I don't know if somebody knows the password the admin password okay any other updates on the project matrix what will be coming before same time soon or well there's a couple that I know what it here we noted here one hopefully we'll bring at our next meeting or at least in April I'm sorry August a small area plan that we're working on as well as the results of the notification discussion that we had several months ago we've had some direction from Council so I'll bring that up as a work session item in August question for that there's the the code rewrite that's going on the ongoing long project over the next year is going to address some small area plan issues as well as a lot of other things how do we as a commission best navigate we just we go with what is on books now and just know that it could be changing or do we do we start to have a little more vision going forward in terms of some of these things commission ers are you referring to as a the planning zoning Commission or as the sub committee no as the Commission Commission as as is as obviously what's in the books now okay so the small area plan discussion will be beneficial for the time in which it's current and then maybe we'll have to correct we're working with the consultants both consultants if when we get to that point we'll be coordinating those efforts so there hopefully won't be too much of the conflict the guys that make sense thank you okay thank you for the update and with that I will close this this evening at 814 thank you everyone