Good afternoon and welcome to the City of Denton's Planning and Zoning Commission meeting for Wednesday, January 12, 2022. With a quorum present, I will call us to order at 5.08 PM.
First item on our agenda is citizen comment for a consent agenda items. I do not show that we have a consent agenda tonight so we will move on to clarification of agenda items listed on the agenda.
We are going slightly out of typical order because we do have some extensive work session reports.
So our first item on our agenda is the Planning and Zoning Commission minutes for December 15.
There was one correction that I noticed and Selena did send that out in email. Does anyone else have anything on those minutes?
Okay, then let's move on to our one public hearing item for today.
That is PD 210004A. Hi Julie, are you presenting something here in work session?
Yes, ma'am. I just have one quick slide so let me go ahead and share my screen. Okay, thank you.
Okay, I'm Julie Wyatt, Senior Planner with the City of Denton and this is PD 210004A Vintage Multifamily.
The request before you is a PD amendment for a development plan for one of our legacy PDs. This is a PD that was approved in 1991.
It predates the 2002 Denton Development Code and so it kind of follows. It's followed some different procedures over the years.
But in this instance, it is following our plan development amendment standards within Denton Plan 2019.
They are proposing a multifamily use, which is a permitted use under PD 139. So this really is just a request for those site details.
Denton Plan 2030 designates the property as low density residential. That's one to four dwelling units per acre.
The proposal is not consistent with this future land use designation. However, it is consistent with other goals and objectives within the Denton Plan 2030.
Specifically, the preferred growth concept and also our housing goals.
Based upon the criteria for approval in the Denton Development Code, as well as the standards set forth in PD 139, staff does recommend approval and I will be happy to answer any questions.
Thank you, Julie. Commissioner Anderson.
Thanks, Commissioner. Hey, Julie, I do have a quick question. With the highway, eventually it's going to be expanded.
Is there going to be issues with right of ways with them being too close to the highway with the service road being moved and all that stuff?
We've actually been working with them regarding those text dot conceptual plans, those schematics, and we'll be going over those. We'll be talking about those tonight.
And we provided those schematics to them early in this process so they could marry up their present their project with those changes to I-35W because you're correct.
That interchange will change to what you see as a more standard diamond pattern for the entrance and exit ramps, as well as Loop 288 is actually going to come in from the west and connect there.
So it's actually going to be an intersection of two highways. So we have been working with them to make sure that their plans marry up with text dot plans as they're drawn today.
Okay, anybody else question for Julie?
Okay, I do not see any unless I can't see somebody in council chambers.
Okay, seeing that.
No one spoke up. Okay, thank you very much, Julie.
Okay, then. That is all we have on our regular agenda today in our public meeting so we will go to our work session reports. Staff has requested that we flip the two. So we are going to open up with what was on the agenda as 3B, and that is PZ21-247 and that is our comprehensive plan update.
And I believe Ron is going to take it from here.
Thank you, Madam Chair, members of the commission. Hopefully you all can hear me. Let me go ahead and start my presentation.
And Ron if I could just interrupt super quick being that some of us are on zoom some of us are in chambers let's let Ron get through his presentation if we could, because I won't necessarily be able to see who's holding up their hand during the presentation.
If you could jot down your questions and same for the end of that would be fantastic.
Okay.
Give me a second here while I switch it over.
Alright, hopefully you all can see the title slide.
Before we begin on the presentation I just wanted to, I'm sorry, Ron Magida, Principal Planner with Development Services. I'm excited to present with Ed Boyk, who is with Matrix Design Group.
And he'll be joining us, he'll be doing the second part of this presentation. Again excited to share the draft plan of the DEN plan 2030. We've been working on this for over a year, close to a year actually we started this back in January 2021.
But before we begin with the presentation, Ed's presentation on what's covered under the conference plan update. I wanted to take a few minutes to help inform the commission.
This may be a refresher to some, but to some of our new members, this will be new information, really just to cover the purpose of the comprehensive plan, as well as some key components of the comprehensive plan.
I'm going to go ahead and start with the purpose. The purpose of the comprehensive plan is an overarching guiding document.
This document, as you all know, is used in our development applications. It helps guide policy decisions as well as budget related topics and decisions.
It also sets priorities, you know, where do you want to see, you know, our growth happen, as well as address challenges and opportunities that's out there.
Again, I mentioned growth earlier, managing growth, not only in the periphery of the city, but also in the core of the city. So, in-field development, redevelopment in general, that is all part of our growth and how we want to manage the city moving forward.
Promote reinvestment. There are areas that we want to promote reinvestment in areas that, you know, are more commercial related or industrial. But overall, the comprehensive plan on the purpose is to improve the quality of life for our citizens.
So, this is the first slide of key components. But before we get to the vision statement, I know that when we discuss the comprehensive plan with the commission, it's always the future land use map. And I just want to express that the future land use map is just one key component of the comprehensive plan.
There are a number of different components, and I'll go over that in my presentation. The first one, a key component that I believe is an important one, is the community vision statement. This vision statement basically outlines what we, the city, what we want the city to be in the next 15 to 20 years.
What's our aspiration? What is our goal? What do we want to see, you know, again, in 15 to 20 years, the city be? Now, there's a lot of information in the community vision statement. In fact, it is made up of multiple pages, because there's different perspectives.
There's different, you know, key stakeholders, and we want to make sure we capture all that in our vision. With that being said, we have it broken down into four strategic directions.
That is the character of den, our people, institutions, government, the strength of our economy, and sound growth, our form and function. And that's how it's broken down or broken up into the community vision statement.
Now the community vision statement is at the beginning of the comprehensive plan. And there's a reason for that. It's in the beginning because it sets the tone, right? It's our vision. So from there, we then develop goals, policies, and actions.
And these goals and positive actions are back and go back to the vision of the city or the vision statement. So the next key component is the goals, policies, and actions. And these are are located throughout the conference plan, and I'll go over how they're organized.
I just wanted to share what our goals, policies, and actions. Obviously, the goals are what we want to see our general direction of what we want to see the cities, our goal of what the future should be.
The policies are actually specific statements that help guides the goal in achieving that, and they're more specific than goals themselves. And lastly, actions. Actions are those implementation tasks.
The actions or the tasks that we need to achieve in order to, you know, implementing and complete the goals and policies that we set forward. So again, those are the goals, policies, and actions.
And these goals, policies, and actions are throughout the comprehensive plan. I have here the first five elements of the comprehensive plan. You see we have the plan framework, which is really the introduction element.
We have land use, fiscal and economic vitality, community character, and urban design, as well as parks and conservation. These are the first five elements.
The items that you see bolded there, preferred growth concept, future land use map, and the focused area concept map, are also important. I highlighted them because they are key components to the comprehensive plan.
And again, as I mentioned earlier, we often refer to the future land use map. But again, there are other maps and there are other components of the comprehensive plan that also serve as part of what needs to be reviewed under any decision that the city does, including development applications.
The other five elements are mobility, housing, community health, infrastructure, and implementation. Number 10, element 10, is also an important element. It is where the action plan, the implementation framework in which we set forward the goals, policies, and actions in the next 15 or 20 years.
So this is an important element. Again, it covers the implementation and also provides how we measure progress from this update and moving forward.
That action plan that I referenced is shown here in this table. As you can tell, there are a number of key actions. In fact, we have approximately 285 actions in total.
We have 35 goals in the comprehensive plan, 129 policies, and again, close to 300 actions. So to organize them, we have this action plan. This action plan lists the key action.
It has the reference in which the element is where it is in the elements. And in some cases, they are located in multiple elements. So that's why you see those multiple references.
It also has the action type, as well as the timeframe in which we want to see these actions completed or implemented, short, medium, and long-term periods.
And then the responsible parties, those responsible parties who are responsible for taking those actions forward.
And again, I wanted to highlight, again, goals and policies, and then back to the community vision statement, because again, it's important that we often refer back to the community vision statement, because that is what we heard from the community.
This is what they want to see our community be, again, where we want to be in the next 15, 20 years. So our goals, policies, and actions need to follow that.
This is my last slide before I turn it over to Ed to present his portion of the presentation. I just want to just transition it from here.
He, being Ed, will present to you all where we are in the update, provide an assessment of the previous comprehensive plan, go over the process in which we updated the plan throughout 2021, highlight some of the goals, policies, and actions that we have accomplished,
what we feel is still relevant, and what we feel are needed to be added to the comprehensive plan.
And then the last two bullets there is to, you know, identify some of the priorities that we should start thinking of when I say we, the Planning and Zoning Commission as well as City Council, how we want to move forward after the comprehensive plan is adopted.
And then next steps really just covers between now and adoption, what needs to happen. So with that, I'm going to turn it over to Ed and I'm going to stop sharing.
So, right here. Thank you, Ron. Well, members of the Commission Chair, Ron and other city staff, my name is Ed Boyk, I'm with Matrix Design Group and we are very happy to be the consultants that got to assist with the development of the Denton Plan 24 update.
So, what I'm going to do is I'm going to share my screen and the presentation as well and Ron, I believe you have a copy of this presentation. So, if we have any hiccups with technology, hopefully you can jump on and put that PowerPoint up just in case we have a problem and with the internet connections.
You never know.
Okay, so let me get my screen share. And Ron, thank you again, you did a wonderful job setting me up and getting us prepared for the presentation. So, again, members of the Commission, thank you very much for having me.
I want to give you a rundown of an outline of the comprehensive plan update that's been accomplished so far. And there's a couple objectives that I want to touch on. I want to let you know again where we are in the process and Ron can use that a little bit.
I want to talk about some of the accomplishments that Denton Plan 2030 had, because I think that it's important to know, we all agree that it's important to recognize those accomplishments and realize that the plan is not something that is static, it's something that is useful, it helps move the city forward towards its goals and towards its vision.
After that we'll get into the update approach for the 2040 comprehensive plan update. We'll talk a little bit about what's in the update and then some of the next steps as Ron had alluded to.
The overall goal today, because this is the first step in many different work sessions that you will be involved in, is to give you that high level introduction to what has occurred, what some of the elements are, what some of the changes are, and allow you to digest that information until the next opportunity arises later in the month and into February for work session discussion.
So as Ron had noted, we are moved through a substantial part of this project and we've reached the point where we are giving updates to the Commission and Council and introducing to them the comprehensive plan update for review, final comment, and then incorporate those changes that might come forward.
So let's talk about those accomplishments from the 2030 plan. So as Ron had noted, the plan structure of the 2030 plan has the goals, the policies, actions, and then the action table or the implementation piece that found common themes between the different actions and policies, and instructed the city to pursue some of those goals.
Pursue certain planning or implementation goals. That could be through plans, codes, and standards, or programs. And on the screen I have highlighted some of the plans that have been implemented since the adoption of the previous comprehensive plan, such as the economic development strategic plan,
real-life area plan, the simply sustainable update plan, which took place in 2020, as well as some codes and standards such as the Denton development code update, some gas well reverse setback standards that were implemented, light criteria that updated the public right away
for dark sky compliant lighting, as well as programs such as the 100% renewable power and the loop 288 building or otherwise known as the junction, which is that one stop for nonprofits and also a shelter that's being developed.
So the ones in pink though, mobility plan update, parks, recreation, and trails systems master plan update, those are plans that are being aligned and moving on the same path as this comprehensive plan update so that there is a common sharing of information and goals, policies,
implementation strategies so that this plan is immediately relevant and the plans that are being adopted alongside it remain relevant and consistent with this overarching comprehensive plan.
So a little bit about the update approach.
Denton plan 2040 is a strategic update. It's an update. It's not a rewrite and the comprehensive plan had prescribed that the plan would be reviewed and updated on approximately every five year schedule and that's exactly what we are doing at this point.
We're updating it on that five to six year period, recognizing those accomplishments that have been completed through the previous comprehensive plan, and then refining, updating, seeing what changes have occurred to the community,
either through vision, actual demographics, development and growth, or priorities, and making that, making those aspects become part of the plan and useful to the plan, and not just a plan that becomes a document on a shelf.
This plan, this update will carry forward the community vision and those strategies to implement that forward to 2040.
It also included a policy and goal analysis.
The City of Denton staff, along with City of Denton staff, spent a lot of time early on in the process, examining all the policy goals, the strategies and implementation tasks for continued relevancy to the community and status.
If there was something new that needed to be added, we created that and added it to the table.
We also went to the community and received their input on some of those aspects as well during our online charrette that was held in May of 2021.
The other part of the approach was to confirm the community vision and identify those opportunities that Denton could seize upon in its next planning period.
Confirming that community vision is critical, as Ron said, it's the first thing that we talk about in the comprehensive plan, and it's very important because it sets the table for everything else that occurs.
So we did that community vision confirmation from stakeholder and focus group interviews, updated work sessions with the Planning and Zoning Commission and City Council as public engagement concluded.
We also conducted several virtual workshops and in-person open houses, as was discussed before, questionnaires online and in person to engage with the widest variety of people as possible, as well as using an interactive issues and opportunities map,
which we have called ID Places. It gave people an opportunity to make comments on a map that was dynamic and sharing of the information so that other community members could review and even respond to those comments that were made on that map on the project website.
So Denton Plan 2040.
Again, we reviewed and confirmed the community vision for this update.
Another major aspect was to update the future land use map because a lot of growth has occurred in Denton and a lot of growth is expected to continue into the future.
And we also examined the land use designations and made updates and changes and added a couple new designations accordingly.
Policies were developed to strengthen that relationship between the land use map and the land use designations and zoning.
And there was updates to policies in response to this existing, the recent growth and also the future growth that's expected.
There were four particular focus areas that were examined by the community and gathered a lot of the focus or a lot of the attention as we developed and reviewed policies for this document.
That was the downtown area, continuing to enhance downtown, take advantage of its cultural aspects, its historical aspects, and the unique character that makes it the heart of Denton.
Looking at economic development strategies, reflecting upon the economic development strategic plan that was recently adopted and validating that information of the community to make sure that the information in this comprehensive plan was supportive of the conclusions in that strategic plan.
We looked at growth management opportunities, growth is inevitable growth will happen. But what the community, how the community approaches that is up to the vision.
And there are strategies that are in this plan to address growth in a way that hopefully can balance fiscal needs, community needs, affordable housing needs, and a number of other aspects that are important to the community.
And lastly, we focused on infrastructure to make sure that whether it is downtown development, infill development or new development on the fringe, or just maintaining the quality of the streets and other infrastructure is that there's a plan and approach for that.
We reviewed those policies associated with that to make sure that it was useful for the community moving forward.
And lastly, all of this information helps to revise and identify those implementation tasks or those actions that need to be pursued to make this plan an active plan for the community.
Some of the aspects of the update, a future land use map. One of the most unique changes is that it's now establishing a land use policy for the entirety of all the ETJs.
And this was deliberate, because it provides policy direction for the community. And while the community doesn't have a full jurisdiction over the development that occurs in that area, it can help to influence or encourage development to be reconsidered
and in line with the community's vision. In particular, much of the ETJ was designated either agricultural, open space, or rural. And that was done through an analysis of the existing built conditions, so that we did not put a land use policy or designation was not put on the wrong spots.
So that you decreased or potentially negatively influenced development of existing properties, but it's strategically placed so that it retains that rural open space heritage of the periphery of them.
There was also some changes by adding a master plan community designation, and that will create efficiencies and respect the other planning processes that occur to develop those master plan communities.
There was some refinement of land uses such as residential to encourage opportunities for neighborhood scale commercial mixed use. We look at the parks and open space, as well as the business innovation and light industrial districts light industrial being a new one, and you can see that illustrated in light blue on this map.
I'm not going to go into the intense detail of what these are but I just wanted to introduce to you that through the community outreach and through the engagement with the city. This was the approach taken to develop the 2040 future land use map.
On the left is the existing future land use map which, and on the right is the new one, and these are both scaled to the same scale so what's important to show here is how much additional land has been included with a land use policy or a land use designation.
There are some changes that have taken place and I have some slides that will follow that have detailed descriptions or detailed illustrations of where those changes have taken place, and I'll speak briefly to that as well.
On the left, the larger circles illustrating an area along I 35 and north of the loop, which was largely business innovation in the past and now has been divided.
I 35 has been shown as light industrial on the east side, and along the loop between the business innovation. Why that happens because the city staff, the community, as well as with our recommendations we examine the context of the area the infrastructure
that was available, the opportunities that were available for different types of development, and also work with economic development on this to make sure that they had a land use designation that could support some of the opportunities that may be coming their way along that area.
And on the right, the smaller circle also reflects some of the existing built conditions that are in the area, as well as a policy direction for new development that would occur in that area, related to light industrial land uses.
On the south detail, you can see on the left, the four different circles and on the right you can see where the heavy industrial designation the dark purple around the Denton Airport has been expanded as well some of the designation of the quasi
land uses that are related to the airport to reflect land that is owned or pursued by the city, or other governmental agencies for, you know, public tasks, whatever they might be the circle below that is illustrating area that is
where Hunter and coal ranches master plan communities. So again that has been simplified on this map downtown Denton has been reexamined for its opportunities to better interface with the neighborhoods and transition and gateway opportunities so that's been expanded slightly
on this future land use map for 2040. And as well on the east side of Denton. There's been some adjustments made to land uses to reflect some of the development trends that are occurring that area for low residential uses rather than the rural uses that was previously
modified.
So, some of the existing actions or new actions, I've given you some examples I wanted to just highlight a couple. And as Ron said there are hundreds of them so I didn't want to run through hundreds of slides to show you all those but I thought it was important to
illustrate that there are new land use or new actions that have been created to give more specificity to the approach for implementing the community vision such as creating smaller plans and overlay districts to implement the zoning districts and standards.
We revised some of them, such as the some of the standards related to project revenues and expenditures and making sure development pays for itself and it does not become an undue burden to the community that's related to fiscal and economic vitality, and then
other policies are retained because they were valid before and they still remain valid today and it's things that the community still desires to have accomplished through the plan horizon, such as acquiring additional land for park dedication and preserving those
sensitive lands and finding recreation opportunities in those sensitive areas of floodways. And that's aligned also with the actions that are identified in that parks
recreation and trail system master plan update.
The implementation table or the implementation table as Ron had described as the actions.
And some of the particular actions that have come out of the outreach and review of the plan for this update is to really focus in the short term horizon on developing and implementing a small area plan specifically for downtown Denton
planning opportunities to have complete approaches to those plan developments master plan communities, honing in on those corridors centers and neighborhoods that might need a special planning touch to preserve character or identity, or create a special
place in the community or preserve that special place.
And that can also be accomplished by having an overall urban design plan this was something that was identified in the 2030 plan. It still remains relevant today as something that can become a guiding document to help implement these many different
different area plans that are necessary to help the community move forward towards its vision, as always, and it's just bears repeating. It's always good to continue to regularly regularly update those codes standard design guidelines and plans, and that actions
related to that have been preserved and remain in the implementation table. The horizon for many of those may have changed and some of the specifics related to those have changed but the overall intent.
From the 20 of the previous plan to the current proposed plan remains intact.
So those are those priorities, as Ron had identified these are in short term or zero to three years tasks that should be pursued to become those new accomplishments for the plan update, such as adopting the mobility plan and the parks and recreation trail system
projects, starting to implement that parks and open space plan by preserving land and acquiring land and space that's retained for the public's use.
Moving on to those area plans and starting to implement that. And importantly, directing and managing growth, because growth is inevitable growth is happening and growth will continue to happen, and is forecasted to continue at a fairly significant
consistent rate through the 2040 plan horizon. There's on over 80,000 people that may be coming to Denton by the 2040 horizon, and there needs to be strategies identified for how that growth is accommodating, and that could be handled through vacant
infill such as those vacant lands that are surrounded by an existing development, intensifying them, providing for diverse housing options, apartments and townhomes, and utilizing using other mechanisms to diversify the housing base and create
price points that address all types of residents in the community.
Redevelopment adaptive reuse is critical to helping with some of this management of growth as well as balancing the growth, making sure that there's still adequate growth occurring in the green field areas around the fringe, as well as balanced with
improvement or enhancement of the existing areas of the community. Creating connected developments, so the master plan areas or area plans are not just islands unto themselves, but they're connected through transit and trails and bikes, as well as
development characteristics, and making sure that strategies are in place and actions are in place to align that capital improvement program with all this growth that's going to occur. It all needs to be tied together, so these are some of the high level priorities that
you can find throughout that implementation or action table in Chapter 10 of the plan.
So let's briefly talk about some of those next steps.
As I noted, there'll be several different opportunities for the planning and zoning commission to provide additional comment regarding the comprehensive plan through the next two months.
There is a commission work session scheduled on the 26th of January.
There's another one that will be a longer one that's anticipated in early February on the 9th, as well as a joint work session with the City Council in the following week. These are going to be those last two work sessions will be longer to allow for deeper discussion, more in-depth conversation, and more substantial
discussions about the plan, and make sure this plan is accurately reflecting the community's vision, the decision maker's vision, and then also something that can be implemented and be successful, just as the previous plan was.
The plan is available on the project website. It's available for the public to review, and they can provide feedback online through a form, and there's a couple guided questions also included to give them a little
insight with how they can consider a plan as comprehensive and detailed as the comprehensive plan. Public hearings will take place as this plan has completed its refinement.
Planning and zoning commission will consider it for recommendation to the council and then council make that adoption.
We're shooting for March 1st, or city staff is shooting for March 1st for that, and that includes my update to you, and I'm happy to take any questions you might have, or if Ron has anything you'd like to add, please do so.
Let me know if there's anything you'd like to enhance that I might have lost over a bit high, but I really do thank you for the opportunity to bring this to you today, introduce the update, and then give you the anticipation of continued
opportunities to provide comment and conduct an in-depth review of this document.
Outstanding, Ed. Thank you very much.
Okay, with that, are there any questions currently for Ed and Ron on what we just heard?
I think that's Commissioner Pruitt. Thank you, Chair. Sure. I look forward to the future discussions. Is there any direction from staff on how we want to handle that?
You know, which are we going to break it up by topics? Are there initial things that you need some feedback on early on in order to complete this process?
Because, you know, there's several meetings there, and I see, and I'm just not sure exactly how to be most efficient.
Ed, if you want me to go ahead and take that question. Commissioner Pruitt, I think the best way to look at this is to actually go through the elements, you know, with blank use first and then work your way through.
We want to be, you know, high level as far as the goals and policies, and that's what we want to really focus on.
You may be able to touch base or touch on the actions, specifically if you had a question related to that, but I really just want to, we want your help in confirming that our goals and our policies are in line of what you feel that the city should be pursuing.
So that is what I would recommend is to, again, to start with those goals and policies from the first element, which is the language element and then work your way through. Between now and the 26th, if you have key questions or comments, it would be good to get them in advance so that we can prepare for that and then address them at that meeting and be as productive as possible.
Now, since if I could, Commissioner Ellis, I would concur with Ron. I think really to help us be able to formulate those agendas and discussion topics for any of these meetings, if you can send any items that you want us to do a deeper dive on, questions, comments, happy to take those in advance so that we can be prepared for that discussion.
Also, as we work through this calendar of items, if we get to a point where we feel like we no longer need to meet, we can always suspend any of those meetings and remove them. We just wanted to make sure that we have placeholders on your calendars so that we have adequate time to be able to work through any items.
And the last thing I would add is also in the event we receive any public comment related to the document, or if there's any questions that are raised from the from the public that we have the opportunity to vet through any of those questions, comments, concerns with the commission and the council as well.
Commissioner Pruitt, did you have follow up to that?
Sure, thank you. I guess I appreciate that and I will try to conform to that as much as possible. On the, just from a really high level, one of the things that I hope we can focus on is the implementation plan for it.
And I think, you know, I was doing a lot of reading over the weekend. And I read a few things from some of our plans and I'll just quote a few of them says, encourage a variety of housing type styles sizes and price prices within the same neighborhood.
Street costs should be based on consideration of lifestyle costs, and a few others. The interesting thing is that those actually came from the plan passed in 1999.
And, and so what I see is that there's a lot of community desires that are still held constant.
In some cases, there are applications where it seems like we haven't gotten there yet. And so I'm really interested in seeing, are there practices that we can take advantage of, be it, you know, periodic metrics or actions that we need to take in order to get more frequent
What are we actually doing, what's going in on the ground. There's a lot of development activity that happens in the city that we never actually see, because it's it's by right development that's handled within the development services.
So getting an update along the lines of, you know, the, the permitted units of different types, independent of which ones had to get zoning changes, right.
I'm sure there's a lot of other things that staff could think through. But, but I'm really interested to see how do we move the needle to go to the future so that we're not sitting here 20 years later with the, the similar goals that haven't yet been realized.
Thank you.
Thank you. Commission crew.
Anybody else.
With regard, Ron Tina with to getting public comment online, how are we going about trying to get that from the public.
Well, I'll let you take that. Yes. So, I think Ed mentioned it on the dedicated project website.
We're going to be able to click on a PDF version of the comprehensive plan from there there's a form that they can fill out and provide comments and those comments entries are then collected and then forwarded to staff.
And ultimately what we propose to do is share that with the planning zoning commission, as well as the city council because I think that's important to understand what comments are.
And if there are things that we need to address based on those comments, we will also respond accordingly.
And my question let me refine that a little bit how are we getting them to the website, because I get the website and where the card is and all of that is fantastic and I've no doubt that that's well and actually I've been there so it is very tricky.
How are we getting them to that to that okay gotcha gotcha know, working with our PIO, our public information office.
Working through social media through email blast through the day to our through our city website, every opportunity we can get it out there I know that sometimes it's difficult for for us to solicit that information but we're we're doing what we can as far as our ability
to reach out and again hopefully it's easy to access and easy to navigate through and then hopefully provide input.
And after that. Yeah, I think the access is great I think it's just we got to get people to it is is the most important thing.
Every opportunity we can with our public outreach to say hey we're doing this, you know, kind of maybe similar how we did with the development code you know I mean, not that we can have that many public meetings for that but you know we did postcards and it was just
it was on the front page of the website all the time and it was always kind of in in the face so this is probably another one of those things that we probably need to do the same.
Yeah, you know with with just thinking back with the with the development code of course that was a different time but certainly that doesn't mean that we can't still do that, you know, reach out to the community.
And I think, as community leaders as well I would encourage you to help us, you know, spread the word and so whatever you all can do as well and we will continue to, again, let people know about the conference plan draft that's available in life.
Yeah. Yeah, I mean it's super exciting I love that we're getting an update to the future land use map because we definitely needed that so that that's wonderful.
I have a question as it regards the economic development partnership board I know that that's listed many times in the action plan as a partner in in getting things done.
You know, it was put together in 2003 is like a different you know because that needed to go in a different direction and I'm still a little bit confused on how that whole thing operates.
I assume that because seemingly the city relies on that so much that that they've been brought into this.
Is that reviewed or can someone even explain to me how we still use it in 2022.
Are you referring to the board itself and what their responsibilities are correct. I don't have that readily available I can certainly have that ready for our next meeting and kind of provide a summary of their roles and responsibility.
Yeah, I think it's important because you know part of our whole planning, and especially a big chunk of this as our vision statement obviously is in development right and I know.
We've had some shortcomings with economic development in certain areas we didn't develop things necessarily quite right to where we were almost forced to change future land use in some areas.
So, I just think it's super important that we still understand what that board is, and and that it is, if we're going to rely on it as much as it's in your chart, as far as the partner in the action plan that we, we, we make sure that everybody's
on the same page you know I've always thought it was a little bit odd when you're on the city website and you click on the economic development partnership board and it completely takes you out of the city website altogether, and it almost looks
like it's, it's, it's not even the same thing. And while I understand that it's. It is a partnership.
It drives the huge part of what we're talking about right now. So, I'm going to throw that out there just for some, you know, future discussion.
But that's great, great work for sure that no that's that's a great comment in that sort of stuff that we're looking for so at our next planning zoning committee I was trying to think, we will make sure that we will have a response to your
comment, and if need be what we may have someone from economic development, participate in that discussion. Fabulous.
Margie if I could add one question or clarification on that and I'm going to turn to Ron for some assistance here. So the economic development partnership board.
I presume it works in tandem with our chamber.
I know we had a, is that correct wrong. That's correct. Okay, so for the benefit of the commission, I know as part of our update process, we had several meetings with them, and to discuss our future land use map in addition to our
development policies to get an understanding of their direction in types of businesses that they are trying to bring to Denton, and then how to those types of businesses fit in with our future land use map areas of the city as they develop and had
multiple conversations with them so that they were involved in that that conversation and I know that was mainly with the staff representatives from that team.
I know we were starting the board, but we can definitely prepare that information if we've had any past conversations with them but I just want to let you know that I know we were proactive and meeting with them because we understand that if they are pursuing certain businesses to our community, and we see that as being a tremendous benefit,
we want to make sure that there are either areas in town that could accommodate the businesses but also then being. Where do we want to direct that growth if we were to have that.
Thank you.
Anybody else.
Okay, I do not see any I look forward to more discussion on this. Great. Thank you. Thank you, Ron. Thank you, Ed.
Okay, so we will move on to our next work session report, which on the agenda was three a PZ 22001. That is our mobility plan draft for 2022. Becky that's you correct.
Yes ma'am it sure is. Thank you. Take it away. All righty.
Let's get to sharing the screen.
All right.
Thank you all so very much for allowing myself Becky Divini I'm the city engineer and director of capital projects, and Nathan George who is our senior planner bicycle ADA pedestrian coordinator that's a mouthful present today on the draft
2020 mobility plan update. I appreciate the commission allowing us to talk about a very exciting topic for our team.
We're going to walk through. I know you've heard us talk about the fact that of course we had the 2015 mobility plan much like the comp plan, and it's time for that much needed update.
And so I know all of you received a copy of the draft 2022 mobility plan, and we're going to just walk through and kind of talk about some key areas, show you some of the map areas and then talk specifically about some of the goals that were established
as a part of the plan.
So the progress that's been made I know we made a presentation to the council in late September, really talking about the progress that had been made at that time.
Since then we really worked with the folks that just made the presentation about the Denton 2040 comprehensive plan to work really in concert with each other.
The first thing that we really worked on focusing and finalizing was addressing the community input things that we had received. That was a really a crucial part of the stakeholder engagement.
When there were quite a few things that happened before myself and Nathan were in this department in 2019, and then we worked through late part of 2020.
When Nathan came on board in 2021 was some additional community feedback and input. I'm really working through making sure we address those comments.
Like I mentioned, we worked in concert with that Denton 2040 comprehensive plan.
The most important thing really out of the plan for the mobility plan specifically or those land use assumptions.
I know you're all aware and I'm sure you saw on council last night there's also the ADA transition plan. That's very important to make sure that we're working together on.
And then of course that Denton parks trails master plan. So these are quite a few plan documents that really require working together to really reach that common goal.
We've also reviewed and updated many of the goals objectives and strategies that are listed within the plan, and I'll go through those goals at a high level here in just a few minutes.
But wanted to let you know that with every single goal there's at least two objectives and then multiple strategies as to how we're going to be moving forward.
And we can thank our friends and development services for really working on that together with us to work together to make sure that we're taking into consideration.
Really those transportation planning elements that are so critical to the development and growth of the of the city. We also made sure that we reviewed the plan elements for all modes of travel.
You know it's really something we've been trying to get the message out there when you talk about the mobility plan everyone thinks about the thoroughfare plan and there's actually three components to the plan.
The thoroughfare plan, the bicycle plan and then of course the pedestrian plan so very important that we spent a lot of time, we're so grateful to have Nathan on board who really had that opportunity to look through the bicycle and pedestrian plan and he'll present on those
here in just a bit.
And then of course, we'll talk at the very end about a few next steps and then ask for any questions that you might have.
I wanted to begin by talking about the goal, the goal specifically that were established. I'm really the first goal that you saw in the plan was that implementation of complete streets.
And that strategy is something that we're looking at doing amongst all roadways in the city of Denton, so that we can work to plan develop and implement really a comprehensive transportation system for like I mentioned all modes of travel.
The word streets I know is a buzzword that's used I know it's a topic of discussion and many types of conversations. It's something that we also in the engineering community look at and evaluate, making sure when we're looking at an overall roadway we're looking at sidewalk
bicycle.
And of course, you know the overall roadway perspective and then looking at how how do we implement all of those different items. The second goal that was established was effectively managing and improving the roadway system.
So, obviously we really want to look at the vehicular circulation and the network to get folks from point A to point B. Many people travel or traverse through our community didn't is unique that it has six specific text out roadways that go through the
community and so working with our partners at text. And then of course the two universities DCTA, you know, looking at how we improve that overall road network system.
The next goal really kind of expands into that to talk about enhancing the goal of regional mobility and coordination.
And I will tell you that there's many committees that our team serves on that really talk about regional goals for the entire community and one of the things you'll see and I know you're all aware of it because you watch it happen every day.
But growth is either going east or west or due north or due south of, you know, the Metroplex and so making sure that we have all those roadway networks to allow for folks to commute from one place to another.
The next goal was to promote transportation demand management and transit efficiency. That's really talking about the demand and the maximum available capacity that specifically related to obviously growth and demand models and really looking at winter folks
coming, what's the timeframe from there coming, are we planning for far enough in advance. Are we looking at what those future roadway networks will be and I'll focus in on this a little bit when we get to the actual thoroughfare plan.
So I can show you some key areas that were some of those updates that were made.
There's nine goals so it's fairly long. The fifth goal is to ensure coordination between land use and circulation systems.
I've described that a little bit but obviously it makes sense, depending on what the land use map assumptions and I will tell you this is really one of the things that we focused in on looking at the overall land use making sure that if we thought that it needed to be a collector in this
area, that a collector needed to be there specifically because of the land use. And so that's something that's always very important. And we're so pleased that we were able to have that great land use map really to use as that guiding tool.
The sixth goal is to really explore those opportunities for securing funding for enhanced circulation, myself and several others on our team work with the North Texas, or North Central Texas Council of Governments, along with the county and text
to really look at those funding needs and where those areas where we can do capital programs like Ed mentioned that look at the future projects and future roadway networks that we want to work to construct.
We're currently working through the capital improvement plan right now, and really working on where some of those additional networks that are shown on the mobility plan that we need to start programming into that overall five year plan.
The seventh item I know we've spoken, I'm sure, about before.
It's a specific item that I know is, is an item that we are really working on and something that I've made updates to council on is really implementing that overall Vision Zero plan. I know that's something that many individuals are very interested in.
And we're working with transportation planning to really work through that, but wanting to to set up ourselves with the objectives and strategies appropriate to work towards that Vision Zero plan which really is a multi year approach.
And the eighth goal is to promote a friendly active transportation system. We call it the five ease, you may see sometimes the police department, and Nathan myself pretend Deshmukh other folks talk about the five ease, which is the education, encouragement
and enforcement engineering and then of course the evaluation. And that really helps not only with the overall roadway network but it creates really that bicycle and pedestrian friendly environment.
And really that's what we're working is to make sure that we have the environment of which folks want to use all modes of transportation.
And the ninth and final goal, which I know is Nathan's probably one of his favorite goals is to create a safer place to walk and ride a bicycle. We want to make sure we have that safe and convenient attractive bicycle network and pedestrian network.
We have standards, enforcements, criteria, codes, standard details that we really work on and then work on teaching and educating folks about the safety and awareness, along with, you know, maintenance that has to be done and incorporate with different
communities. Nathan serves on one of the bicycle committees through the cog, just seeing what other folks are doing in the neighborhood and neighboring communities so those are the goals that were established as a part of the mobility plan.
And the next item I really wanted to focus in on is the overall mobility plan thoroughfare plan map. You know its primary purpose really is to determine alignment, obviously all of you know that we want to really try to determine where those future roadway
networks going to move and where do we need to expand.
Of course with that comes the specific type of roadway network. And with that comes the specific right away that's needed. Obviously the right away requirements for a primary arterial are different than a secondary arterial or a proposed collector.
And that's where we coordinate with those specific design standards.
What I really wanted to focus in on on the specific mobility plan is, you'll see most of the dashed lines which are the proposed lines are really on the southwestern portion of town, and on kind of the north to northeastern portion of town.
I really focused in on those areas, particularly because there's, you know, some really specific networks of roadways that are being constructed, one being the loop 288 West is that proposed freeway that's currently in the works to go through the
eastern side of the city connect to what we call the paperclip at the end we're loop 288 dead ends, and go all the way down and connect back to 35 W. And the other specific freeway connection is from 380.
They're looking at having a connection, text audio is I'm sorry, having a connection from 380 to bypass the direct intersection of 380 in the loop, and then connect on to the loop 288 area where they're actually looking at right now, looking to construct
some frontage roads and move forward with that assessment to build that roadway network.
There are a couple of areas, and I do apologize there are a couple of errors on the map with the numbering and so thank goodness it's a draft and I can still have the opportunity to make those updates.
But also, one of the roadway networks that's been talked about in the past is that outer loop type situation. So there is some future roadway networks that are evaluated.
There's an additional roadway that was kind of in the middle between 380 and that outer loop area. And it was called the integrated corridor that's since been changed it's really still kind of in the works but looking to be more of a primary or secondary arterial.
If you can see my cursor it's this red line right in this area that crosses for 28. So, focusing in on that, you know, really in this network there's a lot of connections that are being made.
We're all aware that 35 is going to be widened but there's a lot of connections that we're looking at from a primary arterial secondary arterial location in some of these areas that will depend on how the, the land grows and what developments happen
in those areas. And that's the great thing about a plan is it's helping to preserve some of those corridors and look at what types of roadways need to be built there.
But then ultimately when someone comes to make that design of that area we can make sure that it aligns with really what that use of that land is in that area.
And then in this far southern area, really south of 380, west of 35. I know you're all aware of the hunter and coal developments, and what we've done in this area is really work on what are those networks that they're proposing with their master, their
community type information, really talking about, you know, what is it going to look like in this area and so we've had several conversations with them.
The alignments could slightly change. We're really looking at those undeveloped areas and a lot of that roadway network is based on those agreements that were made prior to me coming into this role but also through the city with many individuals
that are still here at the city so just wanted to highlight that the most the majority of the changes and updates that were made are specifically related to the hunter coal area, and then of course this northeastern quadrant, specifically related to some of those
changes that text dots looking to make. I will mention there's a few here and there that you'll see right in the middle of downtown.
The updates were made there's a couple along the Lake Louisville kind of area that were updates that were made but you know ultimately our overall goal was to add additional roadway network, so that we could move people from point A to point B and still have
an ability to get the traffic circulation in the areas of which where we see growth which, like I mentioned is typically southwest of town and then northeast of town.
I'm going to turn it over to Nathan and let him talk about the bicycle map. Thanks, Becky.
So I'm a new face at the city for probably most of you, but I am the city's new bike pet ADA coordinator, Nathan George, and I'll walk you through the bike and pedestrian elements of the plan, starting with the bicycle map which is up on the screen.
One big highlight that I want to touch on immediately. Just to set a little bit of the groundworks when I joined the city text that had just recently released information about their new bicycle policy for how they will accommodate bicyclists
on our roads of formerly, you know, a lot of the goals for how bicyclists were accommodated in Texas and then a lot of cities and towns was not what I would call a very friendly environment by outside lanes.
Not really, but we would call low stress facilities, and that was one of my ambitions coming to the city was to focus on these bicycle connections being low stress that's the trend that our industry has been moving in to make sure that as you ride a bike you are not
in mixed traffic, big vehicles, fast speeds, high volumes all of those things make it really challenging to travel around by bike comfortably actually on my way into the office I saw a young lady riding on McKinney headed into downtown, and you know, it's not the most pleasant
environment to be on a four lane street with a lot of cars in rush hour traffic.
So, you know, the, what we've really tried to do with this update, because we did have a 2012 bike plan was really focused on how we can improve that level of comfort for bicyclists.
Where can we outline a network of connected facilities. And so, you know, the first step for me reviewing this plan was to outline what are those key facilities that would allow folks to travel through and around the city of Denton, where what are the key barriers that we have and so that's where I highlighted a lot of challenges,
specifically crossing over or through my 35 both I 35 specifically I 35 e because that's a real major barrier between downtown and the communities on the south side of the city.
And ultimately that will then become a barrier to folks who are attempting to, you know, as they move into these new emerging neighborhoods, it'll be a challenge for them to not drive their car into downtown.
So, this network intentionally tries to identify what those key routes would be so we can then in our capital projects focus on delivering those network of facilities and where we have the opportunity to capture, you know, to build new things or to incorporate
new network improvements into our current capital projects that's a great opportunity. But if we're focused on mobility. Those are the key portions of the network that we would want to focus our energy on.
And that's specifically of interest because as we're looking for opportunities to submit for grant applications, we want to make sure that we're focused where that will have the maximum benefit to our community.
And as we branch out from downtown. That's where I think we'll, we'll start to see, you know, maybe some more opportunities and some of those lower hanging fruit, but certainly want to want to maintain that focus on the main part of the network.
Anything else I want to highlight on here we have the goals listed on the right. Again, my, my goals are primarily as I'm looking at facilities, providing that low stress network, making sure that we're, we're making sure that it's connected so we're trying to
expand off of the existing network as much as we can drive our projects in that direction. That's how we'll look to make those improvements.
And I think with that. Oh, and the one last point I wanted to make here is just, you know, this, the thoroughfare plan is our transportation network or transportation facilities but it is really important to acknowledge that parks through their
park trail master plan is also developing portions of what I consider our core network so the concrete trail is going to be a major connection into downtown. So where we have those opportunities for overlapping benefits between what parks has envisioned in their master plan
and mobility plan. We have ongoing dialogue Gary back and I have a lot of conversations on a very regular basis about the overlap between mobility plan and the trails master plan and projects we want to bring forward so that's a very important acknowledgement
that there are mobility benefits within that trails plan as well.
With that, we can jump over to pedestrian.
So pedestrian is really exciting to get to the city and find out how much information we have about our pedestrian facilities, because of the ADA transition plan.
So, when the ADA transition plan was developed they inventory to our existing network of facilities, what their conditions were. So I have a really good understanding of what's out there, what needs to be repaired.
And that was great, but they also inventory to everything that was missing. And that's something that in a lot of cases you don't have that level of detail to be able to screen, you know, a community where our sidewalks missing and start to identify where you
prioritize, and we presented our sidewalk work plan that helps you know identify where people are located, so we can, we can look at where we would make those investments, based on where they will provide the most benefit to our community.
And we can, you know, build a very robust plan around where we're going to to improve sidewalks, the mobility plan and the ADA transition plan were sort of parallel effort so there's a bit of duplicate information between those two, between that plan
but there are a lot of mutual benefits that, you know, effectively I would point everybody to our sidewalk work plan because there's even more detailed information presented there than you see just on this plan itself that's that's linked in in several
presentations that I've given mobility committee committee on persons with disabilities and we just presented that a couple weeks ago to, or week and a half ago I guess to counsel.
But the goal here is that we know where we have sidewalks that need repair, we know where we have missing sidewalks we have a work plan in place that helps us identify where to make those improvements.
We have now policy objectives outlined in the mobility plan that will reinforce where we're making those investments and staff is working diligently to deliver the sidewalk network, same themes as what I expressed in the bike and pet area.
Our focus is on low stress so some of the, some of the sidewalk work plan measure measures, if you will, that help identify where the priorities need to be are based on stress and high volume traffic high speed that sort of thing so there.
There are a lot of a lot of ways that we can play around with that information to identify where these projects need to be located but effectively we we have some really good planning and efforts in place to start delivering these projects in a very targeted fashion.
On both the bicycle and pedestrian elements. I'll touch on a couple of other points. We know that there's a lot of additional opportunity to seek funding, or there will be a lot of additional opportunity to seek funding through the federal government through the
adjacent surface reauthorization transportation funding that was that just went through Congress. So, you know, these goals and objectives are intended to align with what the federal government is looking for in applications and the types of projects that
these municipalities are putting forward. So, just wanted to make sure that we touch on that point specifically, we're focused very intentionally on making sure that we're wisely spending our own public dollars but we're also setting ourselves up to be well positioned
to compete for those federal dollars, and our goals and visions align with what the federal government is outlined, and we're in line with, you know, industry best practices so that's all very good.
And I also wanted to touch on transit because that is an aspect of this pedestrian component transit is probably one of the more significant challenges because of, you know, shifting within DCTA of how they're delivering their transit model.
So, I'll say there are positive, I'm not going to say it's a bad thing. There are positives with how they've gone to an on demand transit model because that does blanket the entire city, at least in the, the go zone served area that we have opportunities
to use our trip funding in those locations where they were not previously transit serve. So that's a really big benefit to us. One of the biggest challenges is just understanding where the fixed route transit is going to be located that would typically be
a tool to help us focus in on specific areas and right now there's just a lot of uncertainty. So you'll notice in the sidewalk work plan, that's not addressed, or it wasn't a measure that we use to screen potential for pedestrian activity.
And that's going to be a limitation until we understand how DCTA is going to move forward. But it's really important to acknowledge the transit the critical component, and specifically in this pedestrian area.
With that, conclude my remarks and turn it back over to Becky.
Awesome. Thank you so much, Nathan. So really the last portion of this presentation is just the next steps.
As a part of the overall plan once the mobility plan is adopted is best practice for us to look at updating those roadway impact fees, which are collected based on those roadway classifications and locations that are set on the mobility plan.
So we're going to be working on an update within the 2022 timeframe, and we anticipate to take that actual roadway impact fee overall kind of conversation to council, early February, to start kind of talking about the percentages of roadway impact
fees that are actually collected. And then once the mobility plan is adopted then we'll work on the next steps to actually get that roadway impact fee plan adopted we want to make sure we have all of those roadway alignments collected
and shown accurately and reflected on all of the maps.
And with that, I am going to stop sharing so Nathan and myself can answer any questions you might have.
Outstanding Becky Nathan thank you very much.
Sure, questions.
I know I have one with regard to bikes and pedestrians is that we work with solid waste to get some of their bins out of the way that impede sidewalks that are actually there that can be used.
I'll say I haven't had any conversations with solid waste. I know that is a specific challenge. You know, one of the other challenges with that I've heard a lot about, because it's, it's a common challenge everywhere is mailboxes and sidewalks.
And we've had a number of conversations about that as well, you know these constrained conditions that exist, truly because of design that you know so that's that's one that I'm specifically working on trying to address from a design perspective how we can eliminate that barrier.
I'll take down a note to add solid waste.
Yeah, I think it's important I mean one of our, our, our most used area as far as walking and biking is in that university area and of course it's so impeded by these large bins that are there to accommodate obviously the multifamily that's there but I think
the conversation is would be a great idea. I mean it certainly fits right into what we're talking about which is making it easier to navigate on foot and on bike.
I'll express that I've had, you know, I've experienced similar challenges walking around neighborhoods with my kids, where people park their cars across the sidewalk or where where
that's always going to be there but if we as a city can can do something about, you know, about something that is ours that that that can be improved if that's possible with that if that's something that they're thinking about.
I mean, I think we should.
Anybody else.
Commissioner Pruitt. Thank you. Just asking I'll wave bigger.
First of all, just a great work, everybody on on both of these plans it's it's a ton of work and and it's amazing how you've been able to pull, pull it together in these last couple years with all the challenges we've had so thank you.
In the spirit of trying to look at the high level things especially as, as the comp plan and the mobility plan work together. I just have a few short things I'll share.
One, thank you, Becky very much for sharing how important it is for our future land use map to align with our planned roadways. I keep looking for some sort of codification that future traffic studies will by default use that future land use map land use haven't seen
me yet but maybe I just haven't gotten there. And then a few other things. Seems like there's a lot of mobility plan goals in this document that might impact our development code.
So, I imagine that may trigger some actions after adoption.
I didn't see anything in the mobility plan about are considering the cost of the roadway projects.
There's an action in our comprehensive plan that talks about, you know, including the cost of regular maintenance and rehabilitation and estimating the cost of building and widening roads and and looking at lower cost ways of doing that so I just didn't know if maybe that would trigger
some, some more detailed thoughts in the mobility plan about how to actually do these projects if that would be appropriate within the plan.
And then lastly,
the.
There was a mention about ensuring adequate funding so thank you, Nathan about bringing up the parts of possibilities for for federal funding. And I guess I would just ask staff if if there's any other things from a development side and code side that we could consider.
You know perhaps to some funding opportunities for, you know, building out that core multimodal network that benefits downtown like parking benefit districts, or some sort of multi multimodal impact fee or something.
I really don't know what the possibilities are, or what the right answers are. But it'd be interesting to think through those lines. So, thank you, Chair.
Thank you, Commissioner.
Anybody else.
I do not see any other hands up. Becky Nathan Thank you very much. Yes, as Commissioner Pruitt said, a ton of work.
But, wow, it's great to see it all coming together. It's awesome.
Awesome. Thank you very much. The future looks bright.
Appreciate it. Thank you.
Okay.
Thank you.
With that, I'm going to go ahead and close our work session at 627. Obviously we have a public meeting to begin.
Why don't we at least give everybody a quick break, and we will meet back do you think we can do 635.
That enough of a break. All right, let's do 635. Thank you.
Good evening and welcome to the city of Denton's planning and zoning Commission meeting for Wednesday, January 12 2022.
With a quorum present I will call us to order at 640pm. Sorry for the delay and thank you for your patience.
Our first item on the agenda is the Pledge of Allegiance to the US and Texas flags.
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 flag. I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one state under God, one indivisible.
Our next item on the agenda is the approval of the planning and zoning Commission minutes for December 15 2021.
We can have a discussion or chair can entertain a motion.
Commissioner Villarreal is it your hand up.
It is now.
I moved to accept the minutes from the previous meeting.
Okay, we've got a first Commissioner Smith.
You might be muted.
Second.
Okay, thank you. We've got a first and a second for approval of the minutes. Is there any discussion.
Okay, let's vote via roll call Commissioner Cole.
I Commissioner Villarreal.
I Commissioner McDade.
I Commissioner Pruitt.
I Commissioner Smith.
Commissioner Anderson.
Commissioner Anderson you're muted.
Okay, and the chair is also an eye that motion carries seven zero.
That will take us to our public hearing item for today that is PD 21 0004 a.
The public hearing was opened on 1215 and remained open.
I will call up Julie Wyatt for presentation.
Good afternoon. I'm Julie Wyatt senior planner with the city of Denton, and let me pull up my presentation.
Okay.
This is PD 21 0004 a vintage multifamily so request before you is for approval of a development plan for plan development 139 to develop the site with multifamily dwellings.
This PD 139 is actually, I consider these kind of our legacy PDs.
These are the ones that predated our 2002 didn't development code this one was actually approved in 1991. And so it is it is continued on since then the subject property is located at at vintage and I 35 in the southeast corner of that intersection.
Just to kind of give you some background of how we address these PDs. So, the the implementation of the 2019 development code provided for processes associated with these legacy PDs in particular, the permitted uses and development standards that were established
with those original PDs can state can remain the same so they they stay good and legal for those PDs, however the processes associated with any amendments to those PDs, or how to address them from that standpoint, that follows current standards.
So in this instance, a detail plan or a development plan for this particular use was not ever approved for the site. The use was permitted under the PDs development standards, but a development plan was never approved and so now that follows to the plan
development amendment process within our current development code so that's why we're here today really, it's related to those details associated with this.
Just some background on PD 139. It was as I mentioned established in 1991 it was originally 450 acres and it was considered a business village. It includes it included a variety of uses, a lot of employment uses and commercial uses but it also included
residential uses and in particular multifamily which is what they're proposing.
You've got the original concept plan shown on your screen as well as an aerial is showing that entire 450 acre site, the subject property is outlined kind of in purple on your screen that the general outline of it.
The PD was revised with a revised plan in 1999 that ordinance refine the mix of land uses and phasing as well as infrastructure. Within that plan, it did include a phasing schedule, which, which allowed for a an expiration of that of that ordinance.
So, while it did come up with a that mixed refined, refined mix of uses that did expire and so that's why we're here today to talk again about those details of the site.
One thing I did want to mention related to that ordinance from 1999, it did include a provision regarding transportation in the area. So if I could draw your attention to what is now vintage Boulevard at the time it was actually Ponder Road, I believe.
That road was was was not expanded to what it is today.
But that ordinance talked about that prior to development of anything other than single family uses within the PD on that road either needed to be expanded, or the I 35 intersection at Ponder Road needed to have an a diamond intersection, not what we see today.
As you're probably familiar vintage road has been under construction for some time with the expansion, it's nearing completion now so that condition of that ordinance has been satisfied.
And additionally, just want to let you know that about 213 acres have actually been zoned out of the PD and into base zoning districts, particularly that property a lot of the property south of vintage and east of the subject site.
So the current proposal is that multifamily development.
It is it's proposing 207 dwelling units that is consistent with the maximum density within the plan development, the maximum density under this PD is 20 dwelling units per acre.
As I mentioned the uses permitted. It does include three access points just want to point those out. One of one of those access points is is to vintage Boulevard through that a kind of a shared drive aisle with the adjacent property.
Also, a vehicular access point to the, the remainder lot north of the subject property. When that comes into develop it will also require a similar PD amendment process, and then a connection point to I 35 just want to talk through this one just briefly.
As you know, anything that connects to I 35 does require text dot approval, they do have a note on the plan that that is that is subject to text dot approval. We have discussed it briefly with text out to get kind of their temperature on that connection.
They don't love direct connections to text out facilities. They are generally will probably be okay with a an emergency access point only there.
Just to let you know, if, if for some reason in the future that did not get approved by text out the applicant would have to seek other means of a secondary access, particularly for emergency access.
One thing I failed to mention on that access point text out likely will ask to have it be reoriented oriented toward the north of it to get it a little further away from the ramp off of I 35 W.
So, during the platting stage the applicant may have to see will have to seek and access easement through the adjacent lot and and and kind of make sure that this is designed in accordance with text dots requirements.
And then also the site does include open space about 16.9% open space on the lot, and that includes a variety of amenities pool clubhouse playground, and then some gathering areas like a gazebo and a dog park.
Also, just, there are pedestrian pathways through that open space to to connecting to those buildings to allow for the residents to access it easily.
The criteria for approval for plan developments is in sub chapter two of the Denton Development Code. I won't read all of these I'll just, we'll talk about them as we go through the remainder of the presentation.
But just in summary the project is consistent with the overall goals of Denton plan 2030 and consistent with the permitted uses in PD 139.
We also have a deeper dive into the comprehensive plan. So the subject property as you can see on your screen is in a low residential future land use designation and as, as you know that is typically something we see a more of a suburban development
pattern, one to four dwelling units per acre.
With its 17.7 dwelling units per acre is not consistent with the future land use. And so in instances like that we look to the overall comprehensive plan and see how a proposal would conform to to the overall goals.
And in this instance, there were two areas we looked at one was the center focus area and then the other would be our housing goals.
And as we talked about in the work session, there will be some substantial mobility plan or some mobility changes in the area in the future.
One being that loop 288 will complete that loop, coming from the north side of town, north of university where loop 288 currently dead ends at 35. And, and then swing to the west and then down to the south connecting near the subject property there at vintage and I 35.
So, so this intersection will look a lot different in the future and that it will be the intersection of two highways.
And that mobility change and, and the expansion of those mobility options in the area, indicate that probably low, low density residential may not be appropriating the site, and especially for that's what we see in our center focus area that the intended.
The intensity may be more appropriate for something like commercial or mixed use or moderate to higher density so the comprehensive plan designates this area as a center focus area, indicating that those mobility changes will will facilitate additional
development. Furthermore housing and neighborhoods by a multifamily development would allow for a different housing type within the southwest part of Denton, introducing a multifamily in the area so it'll just expand that choice which is consistent with our housing
and neighborhoods element.
And then finally, given the center focus area the mobility changes in the area and this existing PD that allowed for more employment and higher density housing. We wanted to look to see kind of how we got here and so we looked back at the comprehensive plan from
1999. And in that plan, it actually designated the property is a community mixed use center. And in fact that entire intersection you can see on your screen here, that yellow area was the mixed use or community mixed use center, and that is intended for a mix
of uses and that includes that high to moderate density housing.
So, designing compatibility. So, not only did we look at the comprehensive plan we also looked at what they are proposing and how that meets the context of the area, and how that impacts the surrounding property.
So as, as I mentioned, consistent with the uses and development standards in PD 139, except for one exception which we're going to talk about in the recommendation.
The design. So you can see how they're in, and I'm sorry it's kind of small on your screen, but the property is primarily accessed through a kind of a flag off of vintage setting the multifamily back off of vintage Boulevard, allowing for some
future commercial development at that hard corner so it kind of sets it back off the road.
Furthermore, it's then vehicles maneuver through the site through a ring road that sort of surrounds the subject property. And given this context at at the intersection of to future highways, and then an arterial roadway.
This vehicular pattern and movement is kind of makes sense in this area because it does set the residential portion back off the street kind of moves it away from the highway allows the residential portion to to be centered in the site next to those
space amenities and allowing the cars to be adjacent to those highways so it's kind of that inwardly focus, which really makes sense in this context.
As I mentioned they've got those communities within the center of the site, allowing for the living spaces and then those open space recreation areas.
So that's important in this area, we do have park property within the general area but it development of that park property is is not quite there yet so while there will be a substantial active recreation park.
These outside amenities will be important for the time being.
And then finally it is compatibility with the compatible with the mobility and surrounding future uses.
The park property doesn't have a lot of development adjacent to it just yet.
It is, it's this area is kind of an emerging area within the city of Denton. So we looked at what the surrounding zoning was and then what potential uses would be associated with that zoning.
As well as north of a vintage that is within this existing PD so we would anticipate that any uses that would develop north of the site would be consistent with the PD, as well as you may remember a charter school.
That detail plan was approved for just east of this subject property and so that sort of educational use and that community service would be appropriate adjacent to residential.
So we looked at the master plan community that that is, is going to be moving forward south of the subject property, and that's this map right here so we can see that we have the subject sites this red star, and then this is the, the hunter ranch plan map,
mixed use regional as well as mixed use neighborhoods south of the subject property, both of those zoning districts do permit multifamily so we do and as well as commercial and some employment uses so we would anticipate that any development adjacent to the property
would be consistent with this use. And then finally in terms of mobility. We talked about vintage and the expansion of that roadway.
We have also John Payne road that will eventually extend in this area, providing a parallel facility to I 35 in the 37 and Bonnie brain 377.
I want to go a little deeper into mobility briefly.
We've got the future loop connection here as well as a redesign of I 35 that interchange as part of that frontage roads will also be constructed, which will allow the property to potentially have a full access point to those frontage roads,
as well as other properties in the area so that will will definitely open up more mobility options for for the surrounding area.
And then finally, I learned this today I knew there was a signal in our plan for the intersection here at vintage and 377. I believe it has been installed I don't think it's operational yet, I haven't driven that way in a while, but that will definitely
help the maneuvering of vehicles within the surrounding area to allow that vehicles to to make left hand turns onto 377 more safely.
So notification was sent out related to the request. We have received 15 responses in opposition and that was prior to today's white cards that we received so that was it, what was included in your backup material as well as to two letters in favor of the request.
The event has held, I believe for your virtual neighborhood meetings and they are here or they're in the chamber to answer questions for you today.
The first two neighborhood meetings were held in the fall, and those were just just included those property owners that were within the notification boundary so it really didn't capture very many based upon the, the, the response that we heard at the December
meeting, they went ahead and scheduled two more virtual meetings, one was held Friday.
At lunchtime, and then one was held Monday night. They had 15 to 20 participants with each meeting, and the primary concern included concerns about dense housing, as well as traffic in the area.
And so based upon the criteria for approval within the development code as well as the development standards within the PD staff does recommend approval. We are requesting one condition and that really is related to the, the measurement of lot width within the
original PD. The original PD measured lot with at the front setback line and and given, given how this site is is laid out and that it is set back off of vintage, it would not comply with that minimum lot with so we are requesting that that be more consistent
with our 2019 development code definition of lot with in that the flagpole portion of that lot would be ignored when when measuring lot with.
And that concludes my presentation, and I will be happy to answer any questions.
Thank you, Julie. Any questions for Julie.
I don't believe I see any. Does the applicant have a presentation, or just simply there to answer questions.
And Haley may want to chime in here but I believe the applicant is just there to answer questions if you have any, but Haley may have more recent information.
No, that's correct, Julie, the applicant is here in the chambers if you do have questions that can come down to the podium to address those.
Okay, thank you Haley to add to what Julie had said about comments I can add that we did get 12 online comments on all in opposition since what Julie had shared so far.
Does anyone have any questions for the applicant.
I don't think I see any hands. Haley, we do have people wishing to speak who are there correct.
Yes, we do have one speaker signed up here in the chambers.
Okay, why don't we go ahead and call that speaker up so we can get their comments. All right, Glenn Jensen.
Can you hear me. Okay, sorry. My name is Glenn Jensen I live at 4700 Napa Valley Drive in the vintage development. We are the neighborhood adjacent to kind of the kitty corner of this project, but this development.
And just based on what we've as our neighbors have been discussing and a lot of people on our online groups and in next door been talking about we are.
And I'm not in support of this personally the comments that have come in, are aligned with the discussions of me and my neighbors have our primary concern is low income high density housing could have a negative economic impact on our property.
I am in the oldest most diverse neighborhood in this area, and our property gains even through the last uptick in property values have been somewhat modest.
So, you know, we're really concerned about dent is growing this area, it's kind of a gateway area. There might be better choices that would add more to the community in the way of amenities.
We have traffic concerns, and it looks like that 35 access might only be an emergency access which means all of the traffic from this development is going to come and go right at the entrances of our neighborhood, and that roads already been redesigned to be.
Active in the cycling community, and we would consider that roadway fast and somewhat dangerous for pedestrians. There is some sidewalk infrastructure and trail infrastructure going in.
But that's a link road between two highways now and it's going to be the end of 288 so traffic is already going to be really busy and they're adding more traffic that doesn't bring more amenities or services to the neighborhood.
In our opinion seems like a poor choice we know developments coming. We've been out there for a very long time.
We sat through the construction we've got the fire station a lot of traffic at it. I believe there's a police gun range in going in across the street substation, that's going to be a lot of traffic it's already going to be a loud busy area.
And this we feel is just going to make that even more challenging for the residents.
So you know those are the two big concerns we have also feel like early on, the developer hasn't been transparent with us, I've been dealing with Amy their consultant, who is telling people in my neighborhood it wasn't going to be a low income housing when we were communicating with her
but then on the development meeting Friday that I attended which the developer was really straightforward answered all the questions for us.
We were some of us were led to believe it was going to be a mixed market like some some market rate housing and then some low income housing, but it is going to be 100% low income.
The first two meetings they didn't really, I know they just had to go for their 200 feet but then to imply that nobody attended the meetings because it was the firemen and the squirrels and the people selling the land.
So, we kind of had concerns that, you know, we weren't, you know, I found out about this by accident in December and so I started talking to my neighbors and that's how we got the initial comments in those first 15 comments I think there was a dozen more today.
When I came in but so those are my feelings and I think I'm hearing a lot of my residents are my neighbors, hopefully they're watching online I know some have commented online but I just wanted to share my opinion.
Thank you Mr Johnson for your comments.
Anybody have any questions.
If the applicant is there.
Did you want to address the.
Some of those comments like, particularly, many of them are revolving around the low income housing discussion. Are there any comments you want to make towards that.
Excuse me I can. Can you guys hear me. Okay. Yeah, I can do that. I'm happy to do it. Yeah, so just if you could state. Yeah, just say your name. I'm sorry. Yep, Jake Brown with ldg development.
Thank you. Yeah, I'm happy to speak on that, you know, we are, it is a, what we're proposing is an affordable housing project.
I think what was references, it's references low income or using low income housing tax credit to finance that finance the project.
And so, that's, that's probably where the low income comment came from.
As far as communication with, with Amy who's not here with us tonight versus me and all that good stuff.
I think maybe there was some lost in translation sometimes affordable housing is referred to affordable housing sometimes it's referred to as workforce housing sometimes it's referred to as low income housing.
So, you know, it's possible that that's kind of where the disconnect was but I just want to be clear that we were not at any point, certainly trying to misrepresent what we're trying to do are very open and very transparent about that so if it, if folks feel that it was misrepresented I apologize that was certainly not my intent on this at all.
As far as the community meetings go, you know, I think Julie did a really good job of detailing and her presentation, kind of the timeline of events and we were supposed to come before you guys in public hearing back on December 15.
And we had previously held two community meetings virtual community meetings and, you know, the notification zone doesn't exactly encompass a lot of residences it's mostly property owners and a fire station I've been sure the fire stations in it but when we got the feedback from
folks ahead of the meeting on the 15th.
I felt that it was important that folks are reaching out with concerns that we take time to visit with them so subsequently scheduled two more community meetings we had one this past Friday the seventh, and then one this past Monday.
And we had some good participation in both of those meetings but give us an opportunity to for folks to ask questions and us, me, mainly I guess really to have an open dialogue with them and answer any questions comments concerns that they had but that's really all
that I had just to clarify and clear it up but and that's kind of the process that we've been through but again Julie did a good job of detailing that but if there are any questions I'm here, more than happy to answer them.
Thank you. I appreciate that. Thank you very much.
Does anyone have any questions.
I do not see any Haley is there anyone else in chambers wishing to speak.
No, there is not.
Okay, and do we know if we have anyone on the phone wishing to speak.
No, we don't have anyone on the phone.
Okay, thank you, Vanessa.
Okay, with that I will go ahead and close the public hearing at this time, and I will open the floor for discussion or motion.
Commissioner Villarreal.
Yes, although I have some concerns about the lack of amenities and public transportation and grocery stores in the area. I do think we need more affordable housing and affordable housing developments in the area.
So I will move to approve the development with the staff recommendations.
Thank you. We've got a first for approval.
I see your hands.
Okay, we've got a first and a second.
Is there any discussion.
Commissioner Pruitt, is that your hand. Thank you, Chair.
If we can play the hypothetical game a little bit, if we were back in 2018 and or the 2019 code was not yet passed, what would the procedure be given that the proposed development is a single use, you know, a fairly big departure from the original concept plan in the 1991 concept.
It would actually look very similar today. That was a great question that the 1991 code, which was the code that we used to to process these old PDs because if you recall the 2002 debt and development code did not have PDs as a as a project type within it so it, it had a remainder 15 PDs that continued on, but it did not outline any processes with how to deal with those PDs.
So we always look to that 1991 code to process those PDs and in the 1991 code PDs were a two step process. That first step was the concept plan and that included setting out the boundaries of the PD, the permitted uses within the PD, and the development standards within the PD.
Sometimes it also included maybe some sort of general, maybe bubble plan or some other type of map that showed generally where those particular uses would go but it didn't have a lot of detail.
So that was always the first step. The second step was the detail plan and the detail plan really laid out kind of where where the buildings, what the exact exact use would be on any particular property, where the buildings would go where the parking lots would be.
So really kind of what you see as a site plan. So it did allow PDs to be established and maybe a more iterative process to allow those uses to be established, and then and then step two was really kind of laying out how it would then develop.
Our current process flattens that out a bit in that when a new PD is established, you really see the development standards, the permitted uses, and the details moved forward at the same time, often in a parallel fashion.
And then, and then if there are any changes to that PD, then those changes would be processed as either a major or a minor amendment, depending on the intensity of that change.
So, so it's it's very similar. The detail plan did require a public hearing so you, if it were processed prior to 2019 we'd still be kind of at the same public hearing, talking about those site details.
Yeah, I guess, you know, this is this plan probably started when I was in grade school, but the thing that's confusing to me about it is that, again that initial concept plan that you described just seems like a very big departure from what we're seeing today.
And so, as I look at it in the lens of if this was sort of the second step, ignoring the fact that we're 25 years later.
You know what, how would the reaction to that be.
You know, I looked at the comp plan and the, this is one of those centers in the, the preferred concept or preferred growth map, right.
And it talks about hey these centers are really one of those locations where ideally you should have a small area plan, right, obviously we don't have that tonight.
I'm not sure whether that wasn't prioritized because they already had this concept plan from this PD, or I guess it was a PD that that sort of fit that purpose.
And then this is a big departure from that so it's, it's a, it's an interesting application, I'll say that.
Commissioner fruit Are you finished. Yes, thank you. Sorry. Okay, okay. No, that's okay.
Anyone else in discussion.
Yeah, I will just say I mean, it is a unique circumstance. It is a, you know, a part of our city that has not developed quickly, namely, infrastructure has been a huge problem there.
It's on the map now for development. This particular development is probably a little bit ahead of that, obviously it's ahead of that because the amenities and whatnot are not there, but they will be coming as far as grocery stores and better roadways
and whatnot, being that multifamily is an allowed use in the PD that we're dealing with. We really are dealing with the plan, as it was presented here to see if that conforms to code, which it does.
So, those are my comments on it but it is a unique circumstance as commissioner prove it has already stated.
Anybody else wishing to add to the discussion.
Okay, we've got a first and a second for approval I will take a vote by roll call Commissioner Cole.
Commissioner Villarreal. Aye. Commissioner McDade. Aye.
Commissioner Pruitt reluctantly Aye.
Commissioner Smith. Aye. Commissioner Anderson. Aye.
And the chair is an I that motion carries seven zero.
That will take us to our planning and zoning Commission project matrix, I will turn that over to Tina, if there is something she would like to add there.
Good evening commissioners Tina Ferguson, excuse me, Deputy Director Development Services. So just a couple things with respect to the matrix. So, one of the items about midway down that was a result of a request of Commissioner Smith, or Vice Chairman Smith back on November 2 was discussing prioritizing a future area plans.
And so, given our conversation earlier this evening with respect to the conference of plan, and I know Commissioner Pruitt you requested that we have some discussion on implementation.
This will be a good component related to that discussion because we really feel with moving out of the adoption phase into the conference of plan that area plans will be a more significant part of our next steps.
So I anticipate that we'll have some of that type of conversation occurring when we do the subsequent work sessions with the planning and zoning Commission and even Council on the conference of plan.
The one item I would request for some clarification on would be the next one on the list and I know Chairman Ellis you had requested this back in November as well.
And that was with respect to the E comment feature for the planning and zoning Commission meetings being placed in a more visible location. Do you feel that we've taken care of this item, and where residents are able to find that E comment feature.
I will be honest with you I haven't gone back exactly how I did when I brought it up. We have had a good amount of comments on some items on our agenda, and I have not gotten any emails as I did before, with people who are confused, so I'm going to go ahead
and say yes and I will definitely go back through there, and as I did the first time, and, and I'll have a better answer for you.
That's fine that's fine well I was going to say, I'll tell you what we'll go ahead and leave this one on the list if you want to do your homework, and let us know with the next meeting then.
Then we can revisit that if need be. One of the things I did notice on them when I go to the city of Denton public meetings page. It typically has the the meetings that are more relevant based upon what day it is that you know so like today, it had the planning
and zoning Commission meeting. I identified in my opinion a more prominent location. I mean it does have a comment. I think it has agenda video and comment so if someone goes to that homepage and sees the planning and zoning Commission
there, but I'll allow you to do your homework on on that particular item. And just as we move forward and on our subsequent meetings and I know we talked earlier about the the conference of plan work sessions and that we have coming up.
Just a reminder to the commissioners to regularly check your city email address and confirm your attendance and especially with us being in this unique COVID situation obviously we've been able to host our meeting hybrid.
But what is very essential for us when we're in these hybrid situation is making sure that we have a physical core in presence so you may find that Selena especially is trying to track you all down and especially if we have someone who we were anticipating
being in person has to then shift to being remote. I know that's the primary email that she does communicate with you so we would just ask that maybe you check that a little more often than not if you don't mind just to help us in in these challenging times when we're having to seem to be pivoting and flexible on a regular basis.
Otherwise, as it relates to any council updates that I typically provide you as part of this. We have not had anything on council's agenda lately. And so we will be populating their agenda quite frequently moving forward with the adoption of the conference of plan and even the
mobility plan in that regard. So, other than that, I do not have anything else to address the commission with if there's any questions that you have of staff or anything that you feel that needs to be added to the matrix happy to entertain that right now.
Great. Is there anything to be added to the matrix.
I do not see any hands.
Thank you, Tina.
Any, any concluding items for anyone.
I do not see any hands once again. All right, well thank you everyone with that I will go ahead and close our meeting at 720pm. See y'all next time. Thanks.