Oct 10, 2018 Planning and Zoning Commission on 2018-10-10 4:30 PM

Welcome to the work session meeting of planning and zoning commission for October 10th 2018. It is 439. We'll open up the work session at this time. Start out with clarification of agenda items for the meeting. There is no consent agenda, is that correct? No. Perfect. So the first item 3a is actually being postponed to a future date not determined yet. So the first item we can walk through will be 3b which is Julie z 18-14. Good evening. Evening Julie. All right I'm Julie Wyatt senior planner with the city and I am presenting z 18-14. It's a commercial rezoning to you tonight. So request before you is to hold a public hearing and consider making a recommendation regarding the rezoning from a pd 115 district to an rcc district. The subject property is in the vicinity of loop 288 highway 77 also known as north elm and then bonnie bray and it's about nine acres. More specifically pd 115 a detail plan was approved for this pd back in 2004 for a church as well as the accessory daycare or school and that was approved and but it was never built. So now the applicant is coming forward. They're requesting a rezoning to develop the site with a mixed use center. Commissioner Ellis. Thank you chair. Hey Julie was that like brought into the pd after the fact or with the pd at the time? It's just so weird that the pd is nicely kind of carved out and then you've got that little piece. I was just curious. That is a good question. The pd actually included a lot more property. I think the property as it's gone forward has been zoned out of the pd. So now that I say that I'm questioning myself. Yeah I do think that was the I think that was the and I can I could verify that before the the meeting because it's a good question but that that I believe that there it was larger but it has has zoned out. I've got those documents. I'll just have to reference them. So it's a good question. I'll find out for you. So as with. Commissioner Beck. I'm thoroughly confused and I think it was just a misprint. I've got this one that says z1814 and then the actual background information it says z180011. Was that a typo or something? It is a typo. I apologize. Okay all right so I've got the right stuff. You have the right thing. I have the wrong project number at the front. I got a little excited about a different project. So no you're correct. So it's z1814. Yes. So as with all rezoning cases we look at the criteria for approval in sub chapter 3 of the debt and development code. First does it comply with the future land use and then second does it is there adequate provision of the transportation water sewer those public infrastructure items. So first we'll look at the debt and plan 2030. This property is located in a business innovation designation future land use. As you know the intent is to provide for well-planned large scale employment parks as well as those accessory uses such as retail restaurant, higher density residential. RCCD in this instance is appropriate and in that business innovation because it would allow the property to develop with those complementary uses like those retail and and the commercial uses. RCC district is a primarily commercial district so it would allow those accessory use or those supporting uses. And that's important because this property is near more residential areas more institutional areas. You probably don't want to see large scale like industrial type uses so those supporting uses would be appropriate in this location. Additionally it's near the 377 or I'm sorry 77 and loop 288 corridors so that those access and the roadways are the types of roadways you want to see near commercial areas to help them be successful. We also looked at the mobility for the area. Now on the screen is a concept plan. I just want to caution you that this is a straight rezoning. This is a concept plan that the applicant has provided as part of a trip generation analysis but this is an approval of this concept plan so that if if this zoning district was approved any of the uses that would be permitted in RCCD as well as the development scale would be permitted. Commissioner Ellis. Thank you chair. Julie that's for obviously outside of the scope of what we 're looking at site wise right? Yes. Because they obviously own the land to the left. Yes yes and we'll talk about that. So so we did ask them to do a trip generation analysis as part of this request and and as part of that they actually looked at the entire 32 acres that is at this corner of loop 288 and highway 77 because that is adjacent RCCD zoning so it would develop in a complementary way and I believe they are looking at developing that entire corner so they wanted to look at it comprehensively. However the request is only for this nine acres in in black so does that make sense? Okay. Commissioner Bec. Thank you chair. Just for fill me in a little bit I believe the new high school is going in this area too. We're gonna get there. Okay good thanks. If I don't answer your question let me know. Okay so so as part of a trip generation analysis they're they're using some land use assumptions and as part of that they they assumed 400 multifamily dwellings and 122,000 square feet of retail. Based upon those assumptions the ITE trip generation manual anticipates a generated 9,800 trips for this property or for the entire 32 acres. The am peak hour trips of 391 and the pm peak hour of 833 and that's a lot of trips. When you combine that with Commissioner Beck's point about the Denton High School that is is anticipated to come in in this area and in about this location down here. You have the UNT Discovery Center already in place in this area. There is a townhome development coming in in this location. Multifamily. You have a regional park and then in in the near future you're also going to be seeing potentially a single-family development in this area. There's a lot going on and and because of that our city staff has already looked at some mobility improvements for for this general area and and particularly for Bonnie Bray. So you might be aware that Bonnie Bray is being improved on the south side of town between university and vintage. However because especially because of the Denton High School improvements it's now on the radar to go ahead and improve the north side of Bonnie Bray. So they are they are already working on the capacity and safety improvements storm water and utility locations for this area. The anticipated Bonnie Bray will be four lane divided arterial. Currently it's under design so the final alignment hasn't been determined. So you'll see there's a lot of green lines on this map. So here's Bonnie Bray now. The mobility plan shows it tracking in this location to the west. However after our engineering department has looked at it they feel like maybe tracking to the east is actually a better alignment. So they're they're actually looking at this. What they really want to do is hit three seven hit 77 at a right angle. Engineering doesn't like to see skews at intersections. It 's less safe. So whatever the alignment it would need to hit 77 at a right angle and then and then track north. They're working with the North Central Texas Council of Governments. So COG is involved in this because it's a regional transportation issue. So it is on the radar and it is moving forward. We do anticipate that the alignment's going to go in this direction but we don't know for certain and we won't know until the beginning of next year. The target construction is to begin in late 2019 and then the completion is to coincide with the Denton High School. They really want to make sure that these are improvements are in place before that high school opens up and so that's anticipated for late 2021. Any questions on the mobility? Commissioner Smith. Thank you Chair. So the if engineering decides that the alignment needs to be off you know left or right or east or west however you want to look at this. They could essentially start using imminent domain to claim land that's outside of the right of way already to be able to realign the road. Is that what you're looking at and seeing? They might use several tools in their toolbox. So if properties along this alignment are platting there may be right of way dedication as part of a plat and as part of just the typical development process. This property here I believe is UNT property so they may work with UNT. To get a piece. And then and then Richard sounds like he wants to weigh in here. I guess I should ask not silly because I'm not really I don't really care about the I guess what I'm saying is that in in relation to specifically the case that we're hearing tonight we could be we could be voting on a zoning case that could end up having if the city engineers feel like the west alignment's better than the east alignment it could end up with a zoning case. We rezone this area but there's going to be a road through the middle of it and the applicant who's asking for this rezone their entire conceptual plan doesn't matter anymore and because now they got a road running right through the middle of there. I would say it's it's it's highly unlikely at at this point. We did have we did have a discussion earlier this week that I was in with with UNT on that on that coming through that parcel. In addition where that apartment complex is one of the meetings we had with UNT recently there was a concern from from their police department about the crossing of students back and forth from that apartment complex to to their facility there and the necessity for for a light. This would would help alleviate some of that. In addition if it was tracking west it was like we're talking about a hurricane there were there were two I believe there were two spots where they were going to have to install a bridge two different bridges. Okay so it's pretty stupid and and so the just the cost and maintenance associated with it so that's that's where it kind of shifted to this. I just I would hate to see us be like well we could go we can go east we can go west here it's like well why would we want to just go through and have this applicant go through all the trouble getting this rezone just for the city to say hey by the way we're gonna blow our road through the middle of your plot now. Yeah and we've kind of have have had this applicant bringing this forward we've kind of have it have had it on hold okay for that for that very reason we don't want to get down the line and all of a sudden got ruined their dream. Commissioner Beck. Thank you chair. The green line on the other side of 77 that's supposed to be a continuation of body ground? Well I drew that so it's definitely very conceptual. Okay but the intent is to go is to go north and and and but it doesn't connect you'd have to go up and down. I don't know where they're okay got cha. Julie real fast can you go back to their site plan? Sure. Okay I I know it's conceptual but I just want to make sure that they weren't dependent on the Bonnie Bray access if it potentially gets moved but it looks like they're gonna have theoretically access directly from 77 so if that if Bonnie Bray gets shifted to the right they're not going to necessarily lose traffic to their their spot. They would have to work with engineering regarding but regarding any access but probably their main access would be from 77. I think that's probably the most logical place it's the largest road. And then back on the slide that you were you were on to the mobility plan none of the three I want to go with cone of uncertainty. None of those three options the west the existing or the east hit at a 90 degree so it seemed like you'd come up to the highway and and make it a 90 degree if that is the case for all three options why are we moving Bonnie Bray east or west why don't we just leave it where it is? Well I think they're trying to get it closer to that 90 degree. It may not be perfectly unskewed but to have to have it closer to that 90 degree right now if you've driven Bonnie Bray you pretty much have to turn around to look to see if cars are coming so I think they're trying to improve the safety at that intersection by getting it by getting it as close to that 90 degree as possible. Okay thank you. And I think that's also the case at loop 28 8 that they want a 90 degree intersection there as well as it goes north. All right so we also looked as part of the analysis at the current zoning pattern as well as the development pattern. The development pattern is you know there's not a lot of development out here yet. It's coming but it's not out here yet. So we look mainly at the zoning pattern and RCCD is a logical extension of that existing zoning pattern. You can see along north loop 288 that there is that RCC. It's pretty consistent RCCD. So by approval of this of this request you could ensure consistent development both in permitted uses as well as development scale so that you'd have a harmonious development pattern along that area as the the parcels do develop. As it moves forward development would have to comply with all DDC requirements. That would include any tree preservation, buffer screening, tree canopy, site design, and lighting requirements. Right now this is this is kind of new frontier in the city of Denton so water and sewer aren't available so extensions would be required with any development. Notification was sent out. We haven't received any any responses. So based upon the criteria for approval and staff's analysis we do recommend approval of the request and I'll stand for any questions. I don't see any thank you Julie. All right thanks. Next item is 3C Z18-18A and Cindy Jackson will be presenting. Thank you. Let me bring up the presentation. Okay Z18-18 is a rezoning request. The applicant is requesting to rezone approximately 20.7 acres of property from the NR4 zoning district to the NRMU 12 zoning district. As you can see the property is actually south of McKinney and north of Trailhead and west of Lane. Just for reference here's the loop right here and here's McKinney right here. The request the the current site is zoned NR4 as you can see in this map. If the if this request is approved the proposed zoning NRMU 12 is an extension of the NRMU 12 that is located to the north of the site and you can also see there's NRMU 12 located to the east of the site. The applicant has prepared a concept plan. The concept plan takes into account the topography as well as tree preservation on the site. The topography is this is kind of has some pretty interesting topography where there's a 28 foot difference between the area right in here and the perimeter area so it kind of goes up. The applicant is proposing townhouse development with a density of six dwelling units per acre that's approximately 120 townhouse units. The applicant is also proposing to preserve as many trees as possible. The minimum preservation requirement for the for this site is 12.5 percent of protected trees. The purpose of the NRMU district is the the request is to facilitate the development of this townhouse. It's kind of different from regular townhouses that we you know other townhouses we've seen they're not platted on their own lot. This is going to be platted all on one lot. The units are going to be sold individually and the whole development will be considered common area. So it's kind of condo style. According to our code it's also multifamily so an SUP will be required after they have completed the zoning process. Cindy I realize this is the concept plan we're dealing with zoning but I did notice there's a contingency access to McKinney. Yes. That is being worked on or that is actually a concept plan. So the concept plan is going to be emergency service only EMS access only. The primary access will be from trailhead and then they would go down to Dutchess to get to the loop. And then just help me if you go back one slide if you went back yeah this later development here would that come back for separate SUP if they wanted to develop later on something down there. Right the applicant right now he's not he's not proposing anything on this this part of the property here. The applicant is waiting for the citywide rezoning and the new zoning code to see what's going to be permitted there and just then then we'll decide what to do there. Thank you. Okay. Mr. Cole. Quick question. Yeah. To the due north of that are those apartments being built? Yes. Right over here there are apartments are called I believe Majestic on McKinney and then over here is an electrical transmission site. Right here is a church and affiliated school and then over here are single family homes. This down here is a duplex subdivision and all of this over here is undeveloped. Just making sure I was at the right place. Okay. This is planning and zoning. Commissioner Sanchez. Yeah. On Lane Street what eventually is the city looking at to do with that particular street there? Well it 's a private street so right now the city's not looking at doing anything to it. I mean as far as trying to utilize it in the future if it's a private street I mean I guess when I was looking at it I know okay so it's a private is there any way of the city getting access to that and trying to utilize it for eventual because you you don't have I just I was just wondering if you could extend that all the way into into this subdivision here so that you could be able to have more access or well exits out of that area. If you look at the concept plan we do have I mean the aerial map there is a dead end street right here that is city owned. Mockingbird? Yes. Is that going to be extended all the way too? I haven't I did not see anything on the the mobility plan for that to be extended. It is? Okay. But Lane it's been it's a private street it's always been a private street and it's privately maintained so the city does not have any vested interest in it right now. Okay okay. Commissioner Smith. Thank you chair. So you're just to go off what Commissioner Sanchez was saying a second ago. The uh he said is Trailhead there that's that's that's private or is that? No that's a public street. Okay so the connectivity the connectivity well so okay gotcha I know it's stubbed out I thought you were saying that that whole area down there is all private street. Oh no no no just Lane right here. You said if you want to go back one slide to the conceptual I'm not really looking at the no yeah there you go the I'm not really looking at the conceptual but the top left so the the northwest plot above it that's actually between the applicant and McKinney. What that plot of land is that happen to be owned by the applicant or is that just yeah? No this this is actually um this is actually going to be an apartment complex. It's almost done. Is it? Yeah. Okay I guess I yeah right and right here is the electrical transformer. Okay got it all right so there 's apartment complex in front of it. Yep and and church right here. Church right there okay. That works thank you. We got a little bit of line but Commissioner Ellis. Thank you Chair real quick I assume there's plans to extend Dutchess at some point as well correct? Oh yes there that is on the mobility plan to extend. Commissioner Beck. Thank you Chair. So Lane isn't a part of this no project at all I got the indication even by his narrative that that was going to be so they're making a separate means of egress only between their development and McKinney and as an emergency. That's correct. That's it okay so otherwise the only way they can get in there is through Dutchess. That's correct. Until Mockingbird comes through. The applicant had a neighborhood meeting and at the neighborhood meeting there was concern expressed about the use of this area as a access way into the site by all of the residents because of the fact that it's going to go through the church parking lot. Therefore it is going to be EMS only. Say that again that last part. It's only going to be EMS emergency medical service. Okay thanks. Commissioner Sanchez. It was the same question she had about extending Dutchess so over the long period when Dutchess is extended they'll be able to go either east or west. That's correct. And that's that's basically where they'll be able to move more traffic out of that area. We're good. Okay as Julie mentioned we the criteria for approval of a zoning case is does the site request does the request conform to the future land use plan and would there be adequate provision of transportation water sewer infrastructure. The site is actually designated as moderate residential on the future land use map. The intent of moderate residential is to promote single family housing in small lots and it encourages town homes with a density of between four and twelve units per acre. As proposed the site does meet that requirement and it does comply with the future land use map. Here's a little bit of my analysis. It's consistent with the future land use element. The NRMU 12 district permits 12 dwelling units per acre max which is also consistent with that element and the thing that the NR MU 12 also does is provide a transition between the single family duplexes to the south and the more commercial and institutional uses that are along McKinney street to the north. The requested NRMU 12 district as I mentioned earlier is a continuation of the NRMU 12 that is located to the north of the site. The use is permitted in the NRMU 12 district are consistent with the uses that are permitted in the area today. Moder ate density residential uses with some light commercial. The applicant is only proposing town homes with no commercial. Um I just covered that. We sent out notices to uh by certified mail to 52 property owners and uh we received one response back which I handed out if I put it at your place tonight in favor which represents a half of one percent of the property located in the 200 foot buffer. Three signs were posted on the site at trailhead right here and at lane. Staff recommends approval of this request with the condition that a mixed use overlay is placed on the site. The mixed use overlay would limit the use of the site to townhouse development with a maximum density of six dwelling units per acre and it would limit that proposed northern access to emergency medical service only. Commissioner Smith. Have you discussed those recommendations with applicant? Um well we we did discuss them yes. Okay so any applicant will be there tonight to ask let us ask. Oh the applicant's right here. Well I guess I know we're not going to ask the applicant. I saw you look at him. I just uh don't don't see it's how the sausages are made. You can't can't let it all go away. We don't like to we don 't like to do this without okay we'll ask this. We don't want to surprise the applicant. I'll ask the applicant tonight to make sure that he's okay with that the recommendations before me. Thank you. That concludes my my presentation. Commissioner Sanchez. I've got a question. Um when we usually develop when there's a development there's usually two exits if I remember correctly we usually try to have two exits. Now one of them is being designated as an emergency so in reality they only have one exit. Well you need to remember this is a concept plan. Okay okay. It's not it's not a full blown site plan. Okay okay. Which we will have a full blown site plan when he comes forward with the SUP application. Okay okay okay. I see what you're saying but I guess I my my idea is using that to make sure that they have two exits rather than even if it's a concept plan I would imagine you you would consider your other exit not just a concept plan that okay we're going to use this in emergency when in reality we have to have two primary exits not one. Yes yes. I do not see any other questions. Thank you Cindy. Great. With that the agenda for the public hearing has been complete. Move on to work session reports. The first one is from Haley about tree preservation and landscape standards. All right I've actually made it through the hard part with tree preservation so very brief presentation now with the landscape code update. All right so I'm sure you're all familiar through the ADPs and site plans that you've seen that sub chapter 13 of the development code does have landscape standards that dictate new plantings and where those go on a site and what form they should take. So with the comprehensive landscape plan and kind of this conservation code that we're hoping to adopt with our new DDC we are rewriting those landscaping standards to try to provide more flexibility in how a site is designed. So what we've proposed are new standards for compatibility buffers right-of-way screening and parking lot landscaping which are the chief elements that our code dictates on a site. As part of this we are looking to maintain the minimum landscape area and tree canopy area requirements that are currently in the code. As we shift to the new DDC and adopt new zoning districts of course these numbers would be adjusted to fit those new districts. We are tweaking this a little bit to require some biodiversity within the plantings on a site. So for example if a site has to have 50% tree canopy that would be broken down into numerous plantings all over the site and we would encourage that if you're planting over 10 trees to meet that requirement that no more than 20% of them be from the same genus so that there is biodiversity within a site and if something such as the you know ash borer beetle comes in it wouldn't wipe out all of the landscaping on a site. So just yes. Commissioner Sanchez. Yeah when you say no 20% now is there is there anything asking that a certain percent of those be native trees or trees local to north central Texas? Currently there's not anything that would require that. There the site design criteria manual has a listing of approved trees and the majority of the trees on there are considered native. So those that's the kind of the list that you could pick from so just by nature of that we do have a requirement but there's nothing spelled out in the code. We could certainly add something like that if you all were interested. When you say native you're talking about Texas or are you talking about north central Texas this area? I'm not sure how that list was derived to know where those those trees came from but that's that's definitely something we could look into and if you all would like us to add something like that to the code we could. I mean we're always talking about um what do you call it this is you know we're in order to talk about uh excuse me cross timbers and and how we want to mimic that ecosystem or what what you know we're keeping areas uh protecting areas because of those particular type trees then we should also extend it to protect as many of those trees as possible for this central for cross timbers area at least that's my opinion. Okay yeah. For clarification these tree tend trees is that like landscape trees? Correct. We're not talking about like the tree preservation of like the massive oaks necessarily we're talking about like great murals putting putting in for like landscape type. Yeah not necessarily the preferred species but certainly yeah new plantings on a side within the development area. Okay I got you. Also different from any required um mitigation tree that would be. Correct in addition to mitigation trees. I got you. So uh one of the key pieces of our landscape code is the compatibility buffer between uses um so our code currently has four types of buffers type A, B, and C or I'm sorry A, B, C, and D um and it dictates where those apply and it has very strict requirements for how wide those buff ers are how many trees and shrubs have to be within those buffers. Um we we often get you know concerns expressed by developers who find that those requirements are just a little too strict sometimes they need to be able to uh to fluctuate what goes in that buffer space. So this table is intended to help provide that flexibility so we're maintaining the same um you know the same spirit of what we have now in the code where the uses are are separate or the the development is separated by what type of use is being developed and what use is adjoining and then if you follow the table it would tell you how many points you would have to attain within your buffer . So we're trying to go to a more flexible system where we say you need this number of points here's a menu of options that can get you to that number. Um and then in many cases we do still specify a minimum width to ensure that there's adequate spacing between say an industrial and a single family use. Hayley? Correct. Uh where the uses line up there's none so agriculture and agricultural none single family single finger none single family single family but multifamily multif amily we put a buffer in for the same use can you wouldn't I think logically it'd be none just like the diagonal would suggest on this bingo chart but um can you help why is there a required buffer for the same use? I I believe that is an error in the table um but we can look into that the intent may have been if it's multifamily versus townhome uh this was recommended by our consultant Clarion with our code update um but I I see your point there that that um seems a little counter intuitive as to the agricultural the intent there is to if someone's doing agriculture on their land to not require them to buffer. I totally understand that one I was more worried about the yeah certainly we can I'll make a note of that and and we can look into that a little bit more I'm I'm not sure what the logic was there may just be a an error on the table. Okay thanks. So uh speaking of the the required points here is that kind of menu of choices that um that you would have to to get you to that required number of buffer points um and like I said the intent here is to add more flexibility so if if a wall suits your site better than a you know a certain number of trees and shrubs you know that that could be worked in as well as providing options for different sizes of trees um different you know spacing of trees and things of that nature. Are there any questions on this before we jump? All right um so just give you an example um so a multifamily developing and joining single family current code would be a type b buffer which has to be a 10 foot wide area with five trees and 30 shrubs for every 100 linear feet. If you go back to that table and kind of play with the options there are multiple ways to get to the required number of points that we would like to see in that buffer moving forward so that could be a masonry wall it could be a double-sided wood fence with trees or it could be some combination of trees and shrubs similar to the current code requirements so again just the goal here is to provide more flexibility. Some of the other changes we're looking for or looking to make in the code are applying a similar point system to all required site landscaping. Again the goal being to provide flexibility but ensure that a minimum quality of landscaping and a minimum amount of landscaping is provided. So what we've developed is a similar table to what we just looked at for buffers. If you read through the draft code you see that we require a minimum of 30 points on every landscape plan so every site has to meet this minimum and that minimum is attained by selecting elements from different sections on the menu board so there would be right-of-way screening, parking lot landscaping, and then a variety of other elements that could be incorporated throughout the site wherever works for their development. So looking at that table the first section as I mentioned would be right-of-way screening so the goal here is if you have parking in front of your building you would choose two of these options. If you don't have front parking you just have say a drive aisle or something in front of your building and that could be reduced to one. So kind of keeping with the spirit of our current code the options include berms, combination of trees, and then shrubs as well as low walls that could provide screening for the parking lot. Commissioner Beck. Thank you. How high are those berms? Three feet? It's it's they can vary it's typically like a one to three side slope maximum but it would be whatever height that's as low as one foot high. Yeah some of them are very low but okay yeah and typically you'll see the the low berm with the landscaping shrubs or something like that on top of it that provides a little extra height there. The second component of the table would be internal parking lot elements so you see here where the current code has very minimal standards for that only if you have a large front parking lot does our current code require internal landscaping. We have a minimum percentage of parking lot landscaping but it doesn't dictate that that should be spread throughout to provide shade over the parking lot so we want to encourage that concept but provide options and how you can do that so it could be a combination of end caps and internal landscape islands it could be landscape medians between rows of parking allowing the developer to choose whatever works best for their site but still attain landscaping dispersed throughout a parking lot. And then finally the the other landscape elements that we're proposing could be used on a site does include some some things such as encouraging drought tolerant plants, encouraging a minimum of turf grass usage on a site. Some of the newer things that we've added based on the committee on the environment's recommendations were things such as living walls and green roofs which we currently don't have addressed in our code at all so when someone proposes that it's kind of hard to see how it would apply. So allowing that to be a use and then the newest we've added is this butterfly pollinator garden you may have noticed that Dent on became a monarch city USA designation so to try to encourage that we've worked that into the code is one of the options. Commissioner Beck. Thank you chair. On the grass swells for surface water is the grass going to be drought resistant type grass or can it be Berm uda? It could be any grass. Certainly if you wanted us to encourage one way or the other we could work something like that in. Okay thanks. Finally the last piece of landscaping that we 're still working on is open space requirements. Our code currently has these for multifamily uses only so we're looking into as we move forward and try to encourage cluster development as an option minimum landscape or minimum open space areas for that as well as maintaining our minimum open space for multifamily and kind of the overarching piece of this as I mentioned is our end goal is a combined conservation code that would include tree preservation landscaping and ESA. So with this draft landscape code we're also still working through how to apply credits for tree preservation and things like that and as well as credits for ESA and see how all of these pieces work together. So the end goal is not to be overly onerous but to encourage a high quality development with a multi-age tree canopy throughout the city. But that's all I had for you. I promise this would be the brief portion so unless there's any other questions we can move on to the next item. I think we're good. Thank you very much Haley. Thank you. Next up is Julie with a presentation on the comprehensive planning. All right. Third time's a charm. That's right. All right I also brought show and tell items. We've got some old comp plans over here if anybody's interested in looking at them they're pretty funny to look at so but you have to give them back. Okay so continuing on with our planning boot camp. We're talking about comprehensive planning tonight. So on our agenda is to first talk about how the Texas Local Government Code treats comprehensive planning. What is a comprehensive plan? What does the planning literature say about comprehensive plans? A brief history of comprehensive planning in Denton and then we're gonna we're gonna get into the Denton plan 2030. The parts of it, how to read it, places to look for information. So here we go. First we're going to talk about the Texas Local Government Code. So chapter 213 outlines municipal comprehensive plans. They're intended to promote health safety and welfare. A municipality can adopt a comprehensive plan but they're not required to do so. The content and design are fairly open-ended. Cities can talk about land use, transportation, other public facilities. They can organize it by subject or by geographical area and it can be used to coordinate and guide regulations. A municipality may define the relationship between the comprehensive plan and development regulations and comprehensive plans are adopted and amended by ordinance. So as we talked the last time comprehensive plans are our comprehensive plan is amended in the same way a zoning case would be amended in that it would require the public hearing and then a recommendation by peonzy and approval by council. So what does the planning literature say about comprehensive plans? So a little bit of history. One of the the fathers of planning, Daniel Burnham, he was a Chicago architect. He was the one who designed the 1893 Colombian, World Colombian Exposition. If you've heard of the white city where the buildings were all white and the waterways. So he designed that and then he also did the first comprehensive plan. It was the Chicago, the 1909 Chicago plan. So this was his quote. It's a little cliched in the planning profession but I love it. I think it's inspiring. They don't know if he actually said it. They think maybe one of his associates said it but I'm gonna I'm gonna let him have it. So make no little plans. There's Mr. Burnham himself. He had quite the mustache and there is a photo of the white city. So you might want to google it. There's there's lots of photos on the internet. It's no longer there and then here is one of the plates from the 1909 plan of Chicago. It talked, it looked at the park lands, it looked at transportation. It actually was a plan that included the central part of Chicago and extended out 60 miles. So it was it was quite something. It took years to develop and he became the toast of the town and it was internationally known after it was adopted and then he died three years later. So it killed him I guess but so so there it is. So generally what is a comprehensive plan? John Levy defines it as a guide to the development of a community. The citizen's guide to planning says it is a way for the community to find where it has been, where it is, and where it wants to go. The Texas APA has six purposes of comprehensive planning process. First to improve the physical environment of the community as a setting for human activities. Second to promote the public interest. So not just special interests but the entire public. Third to facilitate the democratic determination and implementation of community policies on physical development. Four to affect political and technical coordination of community development. Five to inject long-range considerations in the in the determination of short-range actions. And finally to prove to bring professional and technical knowledge to bear in the making of political decisions. So it's pretty good pretty good list there. The citizen's guide to planning outlines what the different parts are or the typical parts are in a comprehensive plan. As the Texas Local Government Code says it could really be anything you want it to be but the planning literature kind of has these general parts. Some of them have them some of them don't but we'll go over them briefly. First the vision. It's the community's description of its future. In the past the vision was just maybe a couple of sentences . Our current comp plan is two pages of vision. So they've they've run the gamut. Research and analysis. There's several data points that planners look at and that communities look at when planning their comprehensive plans. First of all to look at the population characteristics. Who lives in our city? How old are they? Or what is what are their education level ? What how much money do people make? Where do they live? And then how do those demographics affect how do they relate to the built environment particularly the housing market? That's that's important. And then economic trends. You know how does the internet affect retail development and where should retail go? So all of those elements can go into a comprehensive plan. Growth forecasts. Where where where do we think we're going to grow and and and how many? Environmental analysis. Where are natural features? Public facilities and infrastructure. Where are our fire stations and our police stations in our schools? And if we grow the way we think we're going to grow how many will we need and where should we put them? Land use capacity. How much undeveloped land do we have and how many people do we think are going to live in it? Community character analysis. These are the intangibles. When we think of Denton we think of arts and culture, music , the square, those intangibles that define our community. And the fiscal analysis. What are the implications of new growth? If we plan a community 10 miles away from the city center what will it cost to maintain the roads to get there and the water and the sewer? So all of those factors come into play. Goals, objectives, and policies are discussed in comprehensive plans. We they 're all these three elements are typically in comprehensive plans but they name them different things and in fact our plan names it something different. But but generally the goals. What is the desired end state? Where do we want to go? What what do we want to be? Objectives. What are the benchmarks? How do we know we're getting there? And then the policies. What what action items do we have to take to get to our goal? All comprehensive well not all comprehensive plans but most comprehensive plans we see today have lots of maps and those are my favorite parts. Particularly our future land use map. And then implementation and monitoring. Other factors to consider in comp plans typically or I'm sorry comprehensive plans are a policy document. They they are different than the zoning code. The zoning code is our regulations. Our comp plan is our policy document that that informs our zoning code. Typically there's a 20 year horizon. We we plan 20 years out but they should be updated every five years. Plan effects on the ground change and you want to continually update it. Planning documents and I'm going to say this later but planning the comprehensive planning is is not only a document it's not only a product it is a process and it's a continuous process. A brief history of comprehensive planning in Denton this is where it's going to get fun. So um in doing a little bit of research I don't know if this is a comprehensive list of comprehensive plans but it's what I could find. So the first one I found for the city of Denton was in 1960 and it's a pretty robust plan. Then there was another one in 1974. The 1999 plan was was what we used when I came to the city of Denton and then in 2015 we adopted the Denton plan 2030. So in 1960 comprehensive plans are really good time caps ules of the zeitgeist of an area. They really talk about like how people feel about themselves and where they want to be so they're fascinating. This is a quote from the plan. "If some method of measuring intellectual level of a city were known Denton would be listed among the leaders in the nation." I love that. So um so that is the basis of that plan. So this is their land use plan. As you could see Denton was a lot smaller in 1960. There wasn't as much development on the south side of town and certainly the preserve wasn't there. The the um the zoning ordinance that followed that comprehensive plan was in 1963 and um and it it kind of followed the the the planning principles of the day. We we had fair very few zoning districts and they were um they weren 't mixed use districts. They were pretty Euclidean and we'll talk about that in our next um our next boot camp session is uh they really separated a lot of the uses. They had a thoroughfare plan too. This is pretty interesting. Denton had it one had a planned inner loop and it was right here and then here was the proposed outer loop. 35W wasn't there and the plan talks about it is at the southern end of the brand new I-35. So um I think the highway the federal highway was in 1956 am I right? The that act. So I would imagine that 35 was was just about finished then . So um and then here there was a 1960 downtown plan and this is so cool. They they proposed a pedestrian um mall right here. So this was going to be the pedestrian loop. Um they uh so here's City Hall West if y'all if y'all are familiar with that. This seems to be the city buildings um McKinney was going to dead in here. I believe this is the inner loop from what I can tell and so McKinney was going to dead in here. There's going to be all the city offices. There's going to be the pedestrian center. They they advocated for a facelift of the architecture. They felt that the buildings were too drab so they thought they should be modernized. So just looking at some of those buildings on the square that got the facelift in the 60s you kind of see what they were talking about. They really wanted those modern facades. And um City Hall West according to that plan did not have air conditioning. So we could be having these meetings in an air conditioned environment. So luckily they did update some of it. The 1974 plan didn't have as many maps but I did want to pull a couple of the goals. I like the land use goal that wanted to provide adequate but not excessive amounts of all types of land for community needs. They they talked about the environment but they talked about they they defined it a little differently than we define it now. They talk about plan protect and preserve the natural and man-made environment. So they defined it a little differently. At that time they were still talking about affordable housing. So some of those deal issues that we deal with today were still were still things were things that we dealt with even back then. And and one phrase that I really liked in this one it talks about maintaining constant surveillance of different of different things. It's uh. Isn't that funny like that's an odd phrase to use but that 's what they used. Once again Zeitgeist. Um and then 1999 uh we updated the plan. The plan won an award. It was it was um it it and there's a copy of it over there if you want to flip through it. It was adopted in December on December 7th of 1999. It's actually the basis of our current Denton Development Code. So um where we had those those just few zoning districts in 1963. We had the residential. We had apartment. We had business and we had industrial. Um that that new code brought in mixed use districts and we talked about development scale and neighborhood scale versus regional scale and you can see that reflected in our current code. So so this plan really informed our code that we see today. This was the land use plan by the way. I can you can see that it's um you know it's still it's still pretty compact in in in Denton. Denton didn't pushing those boundaries ever ever more every year. So now let's look at the current comprehensive plan that we use. So at a glance uh the the update was initiated in 2012 and it was an update of that 1999 plan. It was developed in five phases. They had significant community involvement throughout. There were three guiding groups. The Citizens Advisory Committee, Technical Advisory Committee, Denton and then um Denton 2030. Then plan 2030 Ambassadors. Um they also did surveys. They had kickoff meetings. Um they did uh outreach to stakeholders. So there they they really worked on a robust um public outreach. It was adopted by ordinance in February of 2015 and just to give you a little um a little taste of of their projections. They they uh projected that the population in Denton would increase to over 200,000 people by 2030. So that that's a pretty substantial increase. So we've talked about the planning literature and what the what the standards are for comprehensive plans. But now let's talk about how to read our plan. So our community vision statement. Before I say that, does everyone here have a copy of the comprehensive plan? If you do not, we can get you one. Okay. How many have read the vision statement? All right. Good. If you haven't, if you haven't had an opportunity yet, it's on pages 14 and 15 of of the um comprehensive plan. The comprehensive plan also includes 10 elements. Those are chapters and those include things like the framework of the plan, the land use, housing, the mobility, infrastructure. So it it includes a lot of elements as it comes to to what the city is and what what we want it to be. Um each element contains some of those some of those points that we talked about earlier. The research and analysis, which are the basis for the conclusions. And then those goals, it has goals, policies, and actions. But those are those three elements we talked about earlier. The goals, objectives, and policies. So we call them goals, policies, and actions. And then earlier in the presentation, I called them goals, objectives, and policies. So they do the same thing. It also includes maps like the preferred growth map, existing land uses, future land use map. So let's talk about the vision first. So the vision statement, it was the result of all of that community outreach that I talked about. The surveys, the the meetings, the discussions with citizens, with policy makers, with with political leaders. And it's organized around four strategic directions, which include the character of Denton, our people, institutions, and government, the strength of the economy, and sound growth. Now we'll take at this is just a sample of of a chapter. What we'll talk about are the parts of the chapter. And this so this can go throughout the plan. As you read through it, you can you can pull out these these parts. So you kind of give you a roadmap to read it. So first of all, you know what chapter you're in, because it it talks about it here. So we're going to be looking at element two, which is land use. At the beginning of every chapter in this blue box will be the parts of the vision statement that are are reflected in the chapter. So in the land use chapter, of course, that those parts that the sound growth that that really is where that vision statement comes into play. There's research and analysis, there's tables and graphs throughout the the plan, which which give valuable information and also give you get wants to give you give you that supporting evidence for the conclusions. The goals are in the dark blue boxes. The plan states that they set a general direction and ideal future long range and comprehensive in nature and used to describe the desired result or outcome. policies are in the dark or in the bold. And they are a specific statement guiding decision makers a commitment to a particular course of action. They describe context and rationale of a desired outcome, and they're more specific than the goals. And then finally, the action statements are then underneath the policy statements. And those are those are specific steps to achieve those policy goals. So so as you're looking through through the comp plan, it flows first from the vision statement that sets the tone for every everything that we want to do within our community. Our goals relate to that vision statement in some capacity. And on this particular goal, it's to promote development, which enhances community character and functionality. The policies support the goals in this one, it's to set a high standard of quality design, equality in the design in the public realm to enhance the appearance and functionality. And then finally, those action items enhance design standards pertaining to aesthetics and complete streets for future construction of public rights of way and thoroughfares. So you can find this trail throughout our comprehensive plan in every element. One one part of the comp plan we look at a lot is the future land use map. But I thought we'd talk about how it was created because it didn't just spring from from nowhere, there was actually a process to create it. And it is the basis for the land use element for what we do. It was developed from public input, and it was derived from the preferred growth concept. So just to if you look on page 20 of your comprehensive plan, within part of the public outreach, they had they had alternative growth scenarios. One being if we did nothing, if we just kept going as usual, one if we only grew on the corridors, another if we grew at the centers, and then if we grew compactly. So as part of the public outreach, the public provided feedback on these on these gross scenarios. Richard and I were talking about it was interesting about what the land use assumptions were back in 2012. When this first started, was that the city was going to grow toward ropes and ranch, it was going to grow toward the southwest. And and really, that's not what we've seen. We've seen it really growing to the northeast and the east. So so even those assumptions that we used back then are have have changed. So so the this future land use map was derived from the preferred growth concept, which was based upon these alternative growth scenarios, the existing conditions, capacity studies, you know, where we had capacity to grow, community priorities, including things like walkability and trails that we wanted a mix of uses that we wanted jobs close to home, our community character, and then fiscal impact analysis, you know, compact growth is more fiscally sound because you have fewer roads and water and sewer to maintain. So so this is this is the future land use map that was created as as result of all of that input. I know we talk about a lot, we don't often see the entire future land use map. We usually just look at it in a more zoomed in point. But it's it's a it's a good exercise to kind of look at it because it really does reflect what that vision is of the city. Other items to keep in mind regarding comprehensive planning and our plan. The plan is comprehensive. So it is easy to get done all vision on that future land use map that is is really what we look at most on a day to day basis. But other goals, policies and actions can provide us direction. And it's in particularly when we're talking about design design items. So for instance, on page 183, it talks about it talks about to encourage new development to create pedestrian and bicycle friendly places. That's not necessarily a policy that we talk about when we're talking about straight zoning. But when you're talking about an SUP or an ADP, that certainly comes into play. So that's really vital information that we shouldn't ignore. And you know, Richard and I were talking about this. And when he first came, he got a copy of the comp plan, and he read through it, and he marked it up. And he teased out those policy directives, he teased out all that text, because that does, it does give context as to what we're doing. So it's important to, to look throughout to look at the plan as a whole and not just that future land use map. As I said before, comprehensive planning is as much a process as it is a product. Although we have these this document, we want to continue the process. And comp plans should be updated on a fairly regular basis. And just in terms of what we've seen in the in the city, Karen in our office did a land use analysis and rezoning cases from October 2016 to 2018 could result top line if they if they developed at their maximum density with over 1400, or 14,000 new dwelling units within the city of Denton. But they're not always in the areas that we anticipated the growth in terms of that, those those future growth scenarios. So, so how do we address that? How do we address when the when the future land use map is not reflecting the the direction in which growth is going within the city of Denton? So and that's a question we'll we'll have to answer. Texas Local Government codes chapter 211 says that zoning regulations must be adopted in accordance with the comprehensive plan. So how does that factor into that when we're seeing a lot of growth in areas we didn't anticipate and faster than we anticipated? Now how do how do we deal with that with our comprehensive plan? Julie, not that it applies to us. But if a comprehensive plan is optional, how does that code apply universally? If you adopt one, your zoning should follow your comp plan. If you don't adopt a comp plan, then free for all. Yep, whatever you want. Did you say Houston? So and Richard, I don't know if you want to add anything. No, one thing I just wanted to add because we've we've had this conversation as part of the the development code review committee. When we do have those inconsistencies with the with the rezone, you know, with the zoning and the land use. And where it gets particularly challenging is when we have a rural designation on the land use plan, you know, that's looked at it, you know, it's being planned at a density of one unit per five acres. Right. So that's point what point two units per per acre. And then we're, you know, we're rez oning those parcels, you know, four units an acre or six units an acre, which is a substantial increase. And so luckily, what we've done lately, as we're looking at at least some of these city initiated traffic studies, is still look at, you know, use that as the guide, but also step it back because we do have instances where there is that inconsistency. And so I think what's happened previously is, of course, everyone goes to the comp plan, because that's supposed to be your right, your guiding map. But the problem is, we have those we have those inconsisten cies. And so part of the discussion that we had is should we have those or should should the land use be consistent with the zoning prior? Should the land use change prior to the zoning? I know there are some cities in the Metroplex that require it. I think the example that we got as part of that meeting from from the outside our outside Land Use Council, she had referenced, I guess, a project she was involved with in Prosper, where they wanted to change the zoning on a parcel. However, the land use had it as rural. So prior to the, I guess it's a town, not the cities prior to the town, reviewing that rezoning application, they required them to change the land use plan and go and go through that process. And so I think that's just something to consider as we as we're, you know, thinking about all of this, as well as as how the new DDC functions, but again, also looking at this, because once once we move forward with that DDC, this will be right on its right on its heels, looking at sort of updating that, particularly the map, but also even some of the policies. Commissioner Smith. Thank you, Chair. So Richard and Julie as well, whenever we get cases that are like that, that is a I mean, I can't remember any off top my head. So I know they don't come often. But I think there's one I can think of specifically that was a part of the razor plot that was that was that was right there off Oak and 35 E and it was rez oning to build student housing, to build multifamily. I could see that in 2012, there could be a citizen who's involved in that in the comprehensive planning for the 2030 plan to see, well, that 's all farmland, it's going to be farmland, there's not really a whole lot of thought that needs to be worried about multifamily going there. But then we rezone it. And it's, I guess the last time I saw I think we think we did the final plot already on it, it's built out there. You know, the concerns that are brought up of hey, this was thought of, and then the 30 plan, this was a rural district, this is a rural area. And we're going from drastic change and shift of use. I know that's brought up to say, this is not consistent with the didn't 2030 plan, it goes through, we have our presentations, because I've sat through enough of those. But I'd almost like to encourage as a commissioner to you, Julie, the rest of the planning staff of really making that a very strong point of saying that, no, no, not only is this not consistent, this is really not consistent. So do realize what you as a planning and zoning commission are about to do is going against something that we voted on, you know, three years ago, really, an idea that we put forth, because we sometimes may say, well, this seems like a good development, a good thing. And really, it's kind of goes back to I think what Andrew was asking, which was, how do we make sure that we don't, we as a commission, don't don't push the city to growing too fast, because cities can grow too fast, i.e. Houston, it can happen that way. And, and I think I think getting that getting almost that that that warning light that red flag saying, it's not that it's an inconsistent, you know, some mixed use and now it's residential or whatever else we're resigning it to, it's really inconsistent, just to really make sure it's being stressed to us, we know it's a big decision we 're about to make. I'll get off my soapbox now. Yeah, supernata. Thanks. I just have a question on this. So when we talk about comprehensive planning, and everything and looking at the things that have come through in the last, you know, a couple of years, we see about, you know, you know, for over 14,000 units possibly available. Yet one of the things that's becoming crisis in Denton is affordable housing. You know, increasingly, we have less housing that's available to a broad cross section of people. What, what is the city, what is it, you know, what do you what is, I guess, the approach in ensuring that as we grow, we create an environment in which we have a varied community that can live here and contribute to this. Well, we have a chapter for that. In our, in our comprehensive plan, in element seven talks about our housing policy and and and the the mix of housing that we need and then to make sure that not only we have the right mix, but that it's maintained and that we, you know, that and that our neighborhoods have good that we're any new neighborhoods are, you know, good quality. So you may want to take a look at that. I don't know if Richard wants to add to that. You know, it's a big discussion in the DCRC as well. No, and I think it just goes back to that, just not looking at the map in one chapter, really pulling out. And as we start to analyze this and talk about the, you know, is it consistent with the plan? Really looking at at the entire plan and how how it's either consistent or inconsistent, because there are there are a lot of other elements, particularly when we get into into utilities and level of service that that that starts to identify that and that's really what we what we should and how we should be using the plan, not just just one singular element, particularly particularly. It's different when there's a consistency. But when we have that that true inconsistency, I think that's where we really need to be a little bit more, you know, resourceful and staff and look at look at that whole that whole the whole plan, every element related to that. So I have a question that kind of piggybacks Commissioner Smith and Pernetta. We do a whole lot of zoning on the PNZ. We don't do a whole lot of planning, typically, just like the tasks that we're challenged with. It's more zoning than than planning. In the past, the two past comprehensive plans, there has been planning done. So I'm curious to know, in both iterations, it seems like the plan was or the forecast was to have growth to the southeast of town. Now it's in the northeast. Was there a disconnect in our our enforcement of the planning? Or is that a bad forecast? But it seems like if we planned in two comprehensive plans, that the growth would be southwest, don't we have some control over that to Commissioner Smith's point? Like what I don't want to ramble, but did we not encourage that? Or what happened to not know that where we planned growth to be, it's not happening? I think it's a I think it's a couple of things. I think part of it is, you know, a lot of the data that was used when and I'm not faulting it, it's just that point in time when we grab that data, and we came out of the recession. So the growth that we're having now, I don't think was ever anticipated back in 2014. And so we had ropes and ranch and then there was a we had the one MPC I can't think of. Hunter? Is it Hunter Ranch? So we had some very large appro vals in that area. And so I think that's where it just kind of gravitated there, but also not not expecting the amount of growth that that that we're seeing. I mean, just a mere fact of 14, you know , the addition of 14,000 units just for rezoning, not saying they're going to be built over what was it? 2016? I mean, that is it's mind blowing, really. And just the amount of projects that we have ongoing, in addition to properties and annexing in. And so that's where it's kind of, hey, let's, let's make sure we're bringing as we bring this stuff forward. We're really, we're really analyzing this. Yeah. So I don't know if that answered the it certainly does. And I've brought it up before. And on other cases about how much do we look at the flume and stand by it. And it seems like conversations in the past couple years, it has been more of , I mean, it's pretty close to flume. But to Commissioner Smith's point, should it be hard and fast, like there was a vote, there was an approval, this is supposed to be low density, let's let 's keep it rural or low density. And so that'd be my only thought throughout there. I got to piggy back off. Okay, Commissioner Smith. Just I didn't know if possibly there's a way for us to, as we are adding 14,000 dwellings, you know, 14,000 units could sorry, could. And there was, we'll see, we'll go from there. Every two years building in some sort of parameter to just a benchmark, it doesn't seem like it's that hard to do just, but benchmarking, we project that by, I think it was, you know, they said project by 2030, we're gonna have, we're gonna be a population of 207,000 and change. But in the last two years, we've had four, we could add four, we've rezoned, Larry, don't punch me. We could add 14,000 new units, by the way, we rezoned it. Are we outpacing what their projection is? Because what I would hate to do as a planning and zoning commission, because we see it on such a microscopic level of does this make sense where it is now? Yeah, it's a little bit outside of the future land use map, but you know what? Seems like a good project. It's applicant seems like a nice guy. It's something we need. We need to get in there. Yeah, let's do it. But it's never, it's never the big things that kill you. It's the small hole in your boat that slowly drowns you and sinks you in your middle of the lake. And so I'd hate to be like, project by project, we start to outpace what our projected growth is. And then we have grown way too fast from what we projected or what we expected to. And we look back on it and we have a congested city and our utilities are, and it's not even the enjoyment of living, it's our utilities can't handle it. Our infrastructure hasn't caught up to it because our infrastructure and utilities are based off a 2030 plan. But the planning and zoning is in here looking at it and outpacing it by 30, 40%. That makes sense? It'd be nice to be able to get that benchmarking. So we know that we're not getting, and I'd hate to, once again , I have a soapbox, but I hate to get to the point where we're having to tell applicants, we're going to have to turn you down because we already approved somebody three weeks ago for something that could be really pushing us or pushing our dwellings. We should look at it on a case by case basis, but we as a planning and zoning commission need to be more abreast about this is, this could be pushing us faster growth than we need to go as a city because we're not truly able to settle into what we are. Sorry. Do you need a response or can we keep going? No, I don't need a response. I could, I could, Commissioner Sanchez. Commissioner Sanchez, you're up. I was just, I look at the comprehensive plan as a road map that doesn't necessarily have to be, you know, you're visiting every five years because you know there's things happening and things are changing and I don 't see it as, you know, written in stone. You want to follow it as close as you can, but in the long term you have to be, that's why you go back to it every five years and maybe even every two years. I think at one time they said when we talked about the, you can't visit it as often as two years or something like that. It depends on the growth or what's happening in the city and I think that 's the important thing is that it's, to me, it's a document that gives you direction but you don 't hold it as a, you know, it's not written in stone. So based on what's going on in the city then you have to look at it and say okay this is, this is where the growth is going. This is where we have to look at it and not just say well this is where we should have grown and so we're going to force it this way because you're not, we're not going to force it. The developers and the people, the citizens are the ones that actually, you know, where they want to build is, so we have to take that into, if we become so rigid that this is what the comprehensive plan is and we don't adjust then we're going to find ourselves in a lot of trouble. I think we have to, it's something, it's a live document to me. It has to be looked at on a regular basis based on what's happening at that point and if you don't look at it constantly you're, you're up a creek. Just, I'm going to interject real fast so I know two commissioners are here. Commissioner Sanchez, I think at some point we as commission do need to force the issue. I understand it's a living document and, but at some point there were people before us that said this is the way we feel our city needs to go and we can't just override that and throw that out. We can't say yeah but a lot of developers wanting to build here so let's just go do that in stark contrast to what intelligent thoughtful people have put forth to begin with. So I think there is an ongoing conversation and it could be living but I think we're charged here to more often than not force what the city has has put forth as their plan. And I agree but the thing is that decision was made five, ten years ago. Things have changed and we have to be realized that things change and, and that's why I think it's a living document. You have to be looking at it constantly because decisions that were made just like they made fight made that decision that all the growth is going to be on the south side and all of a sudden you have it on the north side. People had no clue what was going on so I mean they had a clue but it wasn't it wasn't what they thought it was going to happen. So now you have to readjust and say this is what's happening out there it's growing outside there's a lot of growth outside the loop something that wasn't probably thought of and now we have to readjust and that's what happens is as a city grows yes we you have certain things going on but at the same it's but at the same you have to adjust and I think I think you can't be I guess and the reason I say I'm in the middle of building some apartments and I've had to make some changes hey these were my plans when I started but then all of a sudden we get here and we say okay I got to make these adjustments these adjustments these adjustments or it's not going to work and I think one tool that the city has used we don't use it often but it is but it can be helpful is is things like small area plans as as an appendix to the comprehensive plans to allow you to look more deeply at specific areas to determine determine you know what the vision you know a smaller vision for a very localized area to take in the benchmarking and and and and and the the surrounding property owners and and and the community leaders and how that's going to move in that direction so I think I think we could use all of these tools to help us make really good decisions within the city I'm just going to point out also that our code already has a procedure for making amendments to the comprehensive plan if needed it kind of contains an internal governor to keep it from being abused I contemplates that that you know like say if a property owner initiates a plan amendment that it would be submitted 90 days prior to the first meeting of pnz in January April July or October and so I think kind of the intent of that is to keep it from being an ad hoc gee this is inconsistent with the future land use map let's let's quick amend it and run that simultaneously with a zoning amendment I I think that the intent here is to try to give some legitimacy because I think uh Commissioner Sanchez is absolutely right you know if if five years is an average if you're a fast growing city it might be more often than five years if you're a slow growing landlocked city then it may be that that could drag out even further but uh you know as an interim measure there is an there is an option to do that and we have done that before where necessary and I know that somebody mentioned uh master plan communities before I know that at least in a previous comprehensive plan we inserted a provision in there that said that because a master plan really is master planned it's like a mini comprehensive plan in and of itself and in in providing a variety of different uses that uh that that we will allow for that as as as part of our comprehensive plan uh great points jerry per now you've been waiting kusher um yeah so uh kind of uh along the lines of kind of combining both of what you guys said you know the point was raised at the uh you know the last plan saw greater you know uh growth out heading towards ropes and ranch and why didn't that happen and the first thing in my mind was uh because of 35 and the way it um basically clogs if you ever want to go to Dallas from there I wouldn't want to live that far out um I I know that we have some expansion on 35 uh you know which may provide a little bit of relief before bucky's gets here um but when it comes to the growth that we're going to see 200 000 people and everything and and I still see just 35 35 and everything um how much of this plan uh accommodates for you know high flow arteries to kind of help people get in and out and and make dent in a place that you know people don't get stuck in well in a mobility element it talks about um multimodal transportation so probably not going to out you're never going to build enough roads to not have traffic jams so what you have to do is ensure that there's multimodal and that and that there's a mix of uses and so you look at land use um in addition to roads land use can drive um can drive trips vehicle trips so you so part of the plan and part of our comprehensive development code is looking at a mix of uses and and um and the community said they wanted to live near jobs and have have um have more compact growth so but yes the growth is coming and then what road where are those roads and where are they where are they going to go and how are they going to move people around our comprehensive plan doesn't is not a full thoroughfare plan um I know our engineering department and I think we're going to have them come talk to you guys soon about the planning they're doing and in fact um they're and Richard may want to chime in here they're actually looking at some studies for very specific areas within the city particularly on the northeast and then also in I believe the Ryan road area because of so many developments coming in how are they going to move people through so they're they're they're trying to get ahead of that um it's it's not really addressed fully in this but with those smaller plans and the more local plans hopefully um we can address some of those mobility issues. Commissioner Smith. Thank you chair and to you know to commissioner Sanchez's point plans change you know you don't uh I'm I'm in the business world so you know any any business which should have a five-year vision a five-year plan put ahead of them if not longer but publicly traded companies get bought up in mergers and acquisitions all the time no one ever plans for those things and so you're right big things happen we can't predict that two years from now there might be another economic recession and if that happens our 2030 plan can be easily thrown out the window because every developer who went through and rezoned for those 14,000 units could say well I just went bankrupt or I'm not building right now because it doesn't economically make sense for me so you're right the plan has to be nimble it has to be living because it has to pivot but at the same time there are a lot of big projects in the city they get started and I'm not talking just to you commissioner Sanchez but the the the city seems like from what we've seen in planning and zoning is that the city comes in and says you know we're we're basing a lot of our 20 you know our our ideas for uh development of infrastructure development of utilities where we're diverting our tax our taxpayers money to be able to grow is based off the 2030 plan and so it's it's scary because there's these big long-term projects that are dependent upon this document that should be living but this is based off a static one point in time idea plan and so it's like if we don't if we almost don't allow for both the long-term projects and the plan itself to both be nimble enough to be moved we could get to the end where it's like well we were able to move around as a commission we were able to move around as a city council but the long-term plans and the funding and the money where that was all directed whenever was and and it could be a little bit scary of a deal but I just really wish you could push and encourage you know after the after the ddc update gets done that seeing a comprehensive plan in the future that has some sort of benchmarking provision in there I know jerry just mentioned that we can make edits to it within the code but some sort of you know some macro data some things like population growth dwelling growth city size some of these things that we can have as macro data and having two-year benchmarking that that not necessarily we're updating the comprehensive plan but planning and zoning and all the important commissions are being updated to say we're out pacing in these areas we're under pacing in these areas and so just because we don't want to get 10 years down the road and be looking at so we never did development in that area why well the 2030 plan said that we were going to be developing in the southwest but really you're the planning and zoning you guys developed it all in the northeast because plans came forward people had money and it's been it you know we we sort of deviated away from the future land use map it's like well I wish we would have known who wouldn't have done that so one thing I just wanted to add sort of the kind of a a preview what I've had Karen start to do is start to try to assemble these numbers of what exactly what are we doing and how do we look at this comprehensively and so what we've talked about is is putting out what I was calling it dentin by the numbers so almost exactly what what you're what you're speaking about is how many how many re zonings have have we've approved during this period of time of the projects that were approved what 's been built sort of what's what's kind of the state of the city in in in that regard and so maybe that's something that then we can just bring here also quarterly discuss but then put in as part of a work program is you know maybe it's just an annual you know maybe we start off at annual or even six months of hey let's take a look at here's the trends that we've seen and at least the projects that where things are moving let's take a look let's do our annual review of the comp plan and what and what what makes sense at least from from a future future land use map perspective yeah no no no marathon runner ever runs the race and doesn't know what their average mile time is that makes sense you know if we're saying i want to run i want 26 mile marathon i want to do it in two and a half hours which i don't think i'd make it 2.6 miles in 26 in two hours but whatever so you want to run this 26 mile race but you know what every single mile your time should be that's really important benchmarking and so even coming back saying didn't buy the numbers based off the 2030 plan we should be trending in these ways this year our trend was above or below or out of whack in these areas just so we get a pulse because otherwise we're just taking on a case- by-case basis and that's that can be it gives it lets us be nimble but also could be really dangerous so commissioner cole yeah some of this you know like 2006 southwest didn't was supposed to be developed but guess what happened the recession so all these moving parts that's why i like the living breathing part of this is because you don't know when the next one's going to be you know so what restricts west of 35 development where it all happened northeast well there's no services infrastructure west of 35 there's no sewer robson ranch has their own sewer system you know there's there's no sewer so there's not going to be any growth so where did it all have to go i had to go northeast because also all the developers out southwest got locked out in the recession i guess except he would you know but i'm sure you know we don't know when they're going to be ready to go but i'm sure that's that's not far i'm sure hunter ranch you know first phase is not that far away but what happens in two years if the we have another recession you know i mean that's because if 2006 seven eight hadn't happened southwest didn't probably be right now developed somewhat you know but there's all these unforeseen circumstances that happen and conditions you know like i said there's you know there's just the infrastructure doesn't exist out there so but it does up to the east but you know i do like revisiting it ever so often because you don't know what's coming around the corner you know because two years can be another recession we don't know that you know and that's going to scramble everything julie i don't know if your presentation was done but we went you were good awesome i have one more all right i don't have any cool further reading or blogs or podcasts for you but my homework is to read your debt and plan 2030 um you'll have some great questions particular questions about mobility and affordable housing if you'll have any other questions um boot camp topics that you want to go over in detail let us know and i'll i'm just i'm just throwing them in there so um feel free and then i could come back with a more robust presentation regarding those questions julie thank you so much presentation was awesome and thanks for city staff getting us in time to let us talk and breathe and not feel rushed so uh i appreciate everyone being here early and letting us do that tonight uh the last thing we have is the october 24th uh planning zoning commission is going to be a full schedule it looks like with uh potentially a lot on the agenda and for those who don't know the planning zoning commission uh members also serve on the capital improvements advisory committee that meets twice a year and we need to have a meeting so we need to talk about start time for the work session because we also have ps wanting to give a traffic transportation update so richard right now correctly wrong we're going to try to start at 4 30 but we're needing to see if four clocks possible for the ciac meeting correct and then also we have we have i think right now um 11 applications uh that would be under review um some of those are on on consent um but there is there is some there are some heavy lifting items uh with respect to some uh some of the rezoning's that are that are coming forward and sups on that on that agenda and so could start at three um but given that we we have to have that capital improvements advisory committee meeting does it make sense to move the discussion on traffic to the note to the first meeting in november so that that gives a little bit more time because i know we've been talking about it and i've i just didn't want to not have it on there and then you guys you know i just wanted to bring it bring it to everyone's attention yeah kishorel's thank you chair yeah i i'd be for moving it because we've waited a long time for that discussion it's going to end up being seven minutes long if that with an agenda like like what we have ahead of us so i think to be a worthy true work session discussion i think we need to move it so for for just helping get this done by a show of hands can everyone raise their hand if they're okay with pushing the transportation meeting from 1024 on the nove mber schedule is everyone okay with that pushing transportation update that was on the 24th to the first meeting in november if you're okay with that if you could raise your hand if not in nove mber first meeting in november 14th i'm good with 14 so are we okay so we'll push transportation to the next meeting and then with the ciac is it possible for p and z to start our meeting at four o'clock on the 24th so i'm getting nods four o'clock is doable fine with me would buy me too so if we can do it for perfect uh does that work on that item yep perfect uh so with that we will close the work session at 6 14 we'll meet in council chambers at 6 30 good evening and welcome to the planning zoning commission for october 10th 2018 we will start the meeting at 6 36 first order of business is to stand and give a pledge of allegiance to the u.s. and texas flag one nation texas one state the next item on the agenda will be consider approval of the planning and zoning minutes i open the floor to discussion or motion commissioner prun etta i'd like to request an adjustment to the meeting minutes on uh page six with regard to item five b my vote was actually an i and it's listed as a recused thank you for the notation is there any discussion or motion commissioner smith motion approved with uh commissioner pr unettas uh edits thank you commissioner beck second we have a first and a second any other discussion we'll call for a vote on the board motion passes seven zero that'll move us directly into our public hearings as a point of order item 3a s 18-008 b has been postponed the staff is working through some issues that have come up and so that will be reposted and brought before the p and z at a date in the future continuing on we'll move to item 3b item is z 18-0014 we can call upon julie for presentation i'll open the public hearing good evening i'm julie wyatt senior planner with the city of denton and i'm presenting z 18-14 commercial rezoning the request before you is to hold a public hearing and consider a recommendation regarding a rezoning from pd 115 district to rcc district on approximately nine acres the subject property is located on the north side of the city in the general area of loop 288 highway 77 and bonnie bray more specifically the request is to um well more specifically regarding the pd i guess i should say is is that it was uh the detail plan for the pd was approved in 2004 and that included a 10 000 square foot church along with the accessory school or daycare uses the applicant that it was never developed so the applicant would like to rezone the property in order to develop the site with a uh a mixed use development a question came up at work session is you know how did this small area of pd how is it still here i did a little a little looking around and this actually is is a part of the pd to the south so it was the northern most part of tracked of this pd and pd 115 then goes further to the south so as you can see here if if the rezoning was it would was approved then the map would be modified to look like this so our criteria for approval are in sub chapter three of the denton development code first does it comply with the future land use plan and then is their adequate provision of water sewer transportation and other public infrastructure so first we 'll look at the denton plan 2030 the subject property is located in the business innovation designation of the future land use map the intent is to provide for large employment centers and also supporting uses such as retail restaurant hotel and then higher density residential the the future land use is is intended to provide broad policy goals so that several zoning districts could fit within those and meet those goals rcc district in this instance and this location does beat it particularly because it's close to areas that will eventually develop with more lower density residential here to the south there's also some institutional uses around so it makes sense to have those supporting uses like retail and commercial uses less of those industrial type uses that you might typically see in a business innovation zone uh future land use designation so rccd does meet the intent of it also in addition that the access to the site the loop 288 as well as highway 77 provides the access and visibility necessary for retail development the concept plan in front of you was provided by the applicant as part of a trip generation analysis the the request tonight is not an approval of this concept plan to really approve or a recommendation for approval of the zoning district and the uses and development scale associated with it this concept plan really is a more of a discussion item to talk about trip generation so the subject property they looked at that as well as the adjacent property so an entire 32 acre that entire corner there at loop 288 and highway 77 and they developed some land use assumptions in which to base the trips on and that would include that included 400 multi-family dwell ings as well as 122 000 square feet of retail the it trip generation manual indicated that that would generate about 9800 trips 391 being in the am peak and then 833 in the evening peak which is a lot of trips in addition to future development in the area there's significant proposed and also in construction development in this general area just to look at those briefly first of all you may be aware that the the new dent in high school is proposed to be located in this general area you've got the unt discovery park here that's that's operational townhome development we've got multi-family development and a regional park there's also a single-family residential development that is is anticipated to come before you soon so there's a lot going on and and a lot of trips being generated by all of these uses and so our engineering department looked at that and felt like we we needed to get ahead of some of the mobility issues in this area and because of that they've they've determined they're going to extend some bonnie bray improvements north of university to this area and that would include capacity and safety improvements stormwater and utility relocations the intent is to to provide a four-lane divided arterial in this location and the it's currently under design the final alignment has not been determined but it is it is being studied and we'll know it in the beginning part of next year so it's either going to track to the west here shown here or it would track to the east so we just we just don't know what's going to be target construction is to begin in late 2019 and it's supposed to be completed in time for the high school to open sorry in addition to mobility and the future land use we also looked at the compatibility of the zoning request there's not a lot of development out here yet but there there is zoning that affects it and in particular the rccd there's quite a bit of it along north loop 288 so if this zoning is approved it would be a logical extension of that existing zoning pattern any development that then moves forward in this general area and on these corridors would be compatible both in use and development scale as they would all be in that same governing zoning district development must comply with all ddc requirements that includes tree preservation site design lighting tree canopy and screening water and sewer are not currently available so so this they'll have to be extended as part of any development here a notification was sent out of the property we haven't received any responses and based upon the criteria for approval and staff's analysis we do recommend approval of the request the applicant is here if you have any questions and i will stand for any questions christ opher beck thank you chair thanks julie i noticed that uh rccd on residential uses it does allow attached single-family dwellings does not allow single-family building so attached would be talking about like town homes things of that nature yes sir okay and it doesn't allow any manufacturing housing building but cedar okay the only reason i asked because this was a specific area i was looking at for tiny homes so that was my concern about that anyway thank you i don't see any other questions for you julie thank you for your presentation this is a public hearing anyone wishing to speak may do so if you do you just need to come down state your name and your address we can fill out a card later what i would ask the commission if you have questions for the applicant let's do that in the public hearing before i close it out so if there's anything that needs to be brought up from the public questioning that so if you have questions for the applicant let's do that before we close public hearing and i don't see any so with that i'll go ahead and close the public hearing open this for discussion or motion commissioner smith motion for approval commissioner sanchez we have a first and a second any discussion seeing none we call for a vote on the board okay motion carries seven zero that moves us to our last item for the public hearing item three c z 18 dash zero zero 18 a i will open the public hearing and call cindy jackson for presentation thank you so z 18 dash zero zero one eight is a request for approval of a rezoning of a 20.7 acre site from the nr4 neighborhood residential district to the nrmu neighborhood mixed use 12 zoning district site is located north of mckinney street which you can see along here east of the loop which is here and north of duchess which is along here current zoning as you can see is nr4 the request the proposed zoning nrmu 12 is an extension of the existing nrmu 12 that is located to the north of the site the applicant's proposed concept plan can be seen here the applicant is proposing a townhouse development that will be developed as a multi- family development in that the townhouses won't be on their own individual lots they'll be on one single lot and but however they will be sold a condo style the applicant is proposing no more than six dwelling units per acre and the development respects the topography of the area which is very high in the middle of the site and then goes down 28 feet around the perimeter as well as preserving as many trees as possible and i just want to note that the minimum preservation requirement for the site would be 12.5 percent of the existing tree canopy the purpose of the nr as i noted earlier the purpose for the nrmu 12 is to facilitate this development as well as a on one lot instead of them being on separate lots even though the proposed density is nr6 excuse me is six dwelling units per acre the multi-family concept would not be permitted in the nr4 nr6 zoning district an xup will be required once if the zoning is approved to move forward with this development when looking at rezon ings we we have some criteria that we need to follow per the dent development code the first question is does the request conform to the future land use plan and would there be adequate provision of transportation water sewer schools parks etc the the future land use designation of the site is moderate residential which promotes single family housing on small lots with a density of between four and twelve dwelling units per acre the types and uses and scale of development permitted in the nrmu 12 district do conform with the goals of the moderate residential designation and with regards to density use town homes are encouraged in this in this designation and it's also encouraged to be used as a buffer between residential which this is single family attached duplexes to the south and the more intense uses along mckinney street specifically a church a multi-proposed multi-family development and an electrical transformer site i already did that the requested nrmu 12 district is a continuation of the nrmu 12 district to the north as previously noted the use is permitted in the nrmu 12 district would be consistent with the uses that exist today which are moderate density residential uses the nrmu 12 district also permits some neighborhood scale commercial uses however we're proposing an overlay to restrict that those uses the development must comply with all esa tree vet preservation buffer screening tree canopy and lighting requirements water and wastewater are available to the site from trailhead lane and then there's also water available from lane lane drive and from muckingbird we sent out notices within 200 feet of the site via certified mail and postcard notices courtesy notices within 500 feet of the site we received one response back in favor which is just this right here this corner right here it's hard to see that little corner represents 0.5 percent of the land area within the 200 foot buffer three signs were also posted on the site and there's pictures of them in your backup staff recommends approval of this request with a mixed use protection overlay including the following conditions the use of the site is limited to multi-family townhouse to style style development with a maximum permitted density of six dwelling units per acre and the proposed northern access drive to mckinney street shall be utilized as an ems emergency medical service access only and that concludes my presentation and the applicant is present as well thank you cindy for the presentation i don't see any questions at this time oh commissioner sanchez are you okay let's see yeah right there okay you have mockingbird which is going to you said that earlier we were told that that was going to be extended all the way to mckinney mckinney has any discussion been talked about that in the future maybe having a road coming off mckinney and into that development as a second access to to that not yet not yet again as i noted previously this is a concept plan and we are still we're going to work out site details with the applicant when he comes forward with the specific use permit application and i know it's a concept plan but i was just throwing that out that might be a consideration because as at our work session i did mention that that was only one access that's correct right now and and the one that has been proposed which is the one uh by the church well that's just going to be an emergency so long term i'm just saying long term and that area will be developed and mockingbird will be developed all the way maybe provide that as a look plan a road there that will provide access sure the the applicant can probably speak to that right now better than i can as i said we're still in the conceptual stage okay thank you cindy i don't see any other questions okay this is a public hearing if you're wishing to speak you may do so by coming forward okay commissioner beck i'm hoping that the owner will come forward and i do have a few questions for you please just state your name and address for the record my name is rick barria i live here in denton at 51 12 edwards road okay did you have a presentation you wanted to give us or yes i do uh i didn't uh register i guess out front for it okay why don't you go ahead and do that and if my questions haven't been answered then i'll okay i'll do that uh let's see if i yeah i don't want to touch anyone else's presentation there you go thank you if i can just find that icon okay i want to talk about clustering because that's really the essence of this uh development i do want to mention that um i'm here with uh jack medcalf who was our engineer and also uh with nathan olson he's our engineer as well now what is cl ustering well i'll make a comment here if i can hit one of these buttons there we go it's more than just a better view that's one of the reasons why people do it now this is a typical linear development solution or dentons in our six rules and i believe these are four or five plexus i didn't count them all uh and the front facade looks pretty good there's no garage and but you have to have alleys with that and it requires quite a bit more concrete and generally unless somebody plants trees in the back there's no trees this uh five in a row uh concept requires that you have a straight street and a flat grade and i think that building is about 180 feet long now with the slope that we have on our site that doesn't work no trees here either maybe now and forever i don't really see a place to plant them and sometimes people don't do that now this is uh another configuration where you've got front driveways there's less concrete but there's more cars and then i asked the question can you count them all well i did there's 20 of them not counting the hood of my car now this is another linear concept it's in a row and it follows the roadway centerline whether it's curved or straight and there's no green space there's no commons and i ask the question what kind of community do you really have you're only going to meet somebody if you walk on the sidewalk this is the same property a little different configuration which i think is much more pleasing i did this in a seminar with rick harrison who i think is the greatest designer in the world by the way i hope to one day get as good as him uh these bedrooms there were two bedroom units that's what we thought these would be the walkways are pleasant and they're separated from the street it's much safer it's more fun to walk down and uh it's definitely an improvement for children and their safety now this is in houston there are row houses with alleys gee they almost look like dominoes now i don't know how many were in the row i had an area that looked like they were eight in a row generally and then there's some houses behind others in the cul-de-sac now in grape vine clustering here did save some trees and their units are smaller and they stair step them down the grade the grade drops going uh from top to bottom and on this site and this is spencer road in denton and this is a type of clustering and the units are pretty small i think it's one of the better looking rentals in denton now this is oak vista and the blue section is our residential part and then the other section where it says office park that's what we plan to do sometime later when d uchess is extended and we'll of course pay for part of that you'll notice the red line it's vertical uh that all of a sudden departs uh where we got the section that is divergent and it's a wider area that's bounded by the blue green that is the drainage ditch we made it wider in fact i did this long before we had this am i running out of time let me go back you're because you have 10 minutes okay all right that's why we widen the channel what would you put for the value here or this or that i'm a believer in saving trees that's my driveway this i'm not the only guy that wants to save trees another developer did it sometimes we have damage sometimes you have surprises like bees this is how it was developed we've got problem if we try to excavate like this the topography would hurt us we would have to dig a lot so in this version we made the drawing to where we followed the contours as same as this one is a little closer look in case you have questions later and we've done some floor plans they're pretty small have one for empty nesters this one you can come in the drive the garage in either direction this one is very small and this one is for singles so we know that we're going to observe the building code and fire code by the type of structure and that's one and two family building code if there's three it's a separate code so here 's what we need we we've got a density of nr6 the present design density is a little less than that we are looking at a gated with emergency only on the north now there's a little different some of definition there the open layout is multi-family the travel lanes radii is multi-family we 're going to have an hoa for maintenance and order but we need one thing more and i talked to cindy jack son earlier and i think we're of the same mind on this the parking rules would be multi-family because it is a multi-family arrangement i just want to make sure and that would be uh one parking space for each bedroom plus 10 percent okay did i make the 10 minutes or close you're good it was dinged on you if you went over thank you for the presentation thank you see if we have any questions for you christian or beck thank you chair thank you mr bria you did answer one question i think uh how are you going to control that emergency lane i believe you're going to put a gate a gate there yes there'll be a gate there and it'll have an opticon opener so that the fire department from the north which is naturally where they would come from uh they can get in that way now we would like to have an emergency opening if we have some type of fire if somebody uh maybe they have a car fire at the south gate or something so that we can get out that way but it would i would imagine almost never be used that way right okay good um i was pleased to read uh that you're looking for an opportunity to build affordable smaller homes uh and that's what it looks like you've got here because we were talking earlier the need for more affordable homes and so could you give us an idea what kind of price frames we're looking at it would that be two percent of me to certainly i'll tackle that now i'm not a builder and i don't know what current building prices are but i can tell you the size of the units the smallest one is about 1050 square feet okay and it does not have a garage some of the garages will be detached a garage costs more money and of course it seems that most people today don't use their garages as garages they just store things in them so we decided that you know if we put a little more storage in the units and we uh and we have carports that are covered that would probably work especially at the lower end of the market uh our largest unit would be 1700 square feet uh we have one unit that's 1300 square feet and that one is uh for empty nesters that's about the size that they prefer most of them will be two bedrooms a few will be three bedrooms uh we won't have any one bedrooms because i don't think we can get anyone to build one or buy one but as far as the pricing goes i guess you could multiply though that square footage by the price of what it costs to build today did i answer your question i think you did between you and commissioner smith here um i assume too to keep the price down there won't be a lot of bells and whistles in there as far as appliances and uh flooring and stuff like that or is that well i would i would think and and this is not my part of the project but it would seem logical to me that if you had uh folks that were retired and they wanted to retire there and it was their last home they might pick granite counters or something like that and expensive accoutrements but a lot of people who are single who we want to sell to uh because there's really no place to get anything buy anything like this in denton i think they would opt for something less expensive and i did talk to a local builder who builds uh houses that aren 't expensive to pick his brain a little and we'll try to follow his advice if we can okay okay i didn't mean to corny you there okay you also mentioned a shared backyard arrangement structure so no fencing at all or just no okay just just fences along the back line of the property we decided that with what we were trying to create that six foot wooden fences would not work but people need to feel that part of that space is theirs and it's defined so we thought of basically a white picket fence or something like that and at the corners where we would have a division we would probably put some type of marker on the ground as long as someone has a feeling of hey this space is mine and you're not going to come in and you're walking in through our backyard most people can live with that especially if your neighbors are okay i don't know what you would do in the case of a really cranky neighbor but i guess that would be for the hoa to handle later okay well i am please really based on your narrative you know your desire to observe trees keep open spaces green areas so this looks like a real good development to me thank you for answering my questions thank you any other questions yeah commissioner sanchez i have a question i just wanted to say it's sounds like a pretty interesting concept when i was reading the information here and you had biplex i was wondering what a biplex was well duplexes are usually are usually rented right and that's why i coined this other word biplex of course then if i try to use triplex it doesn't really work out i guess officially you might call them single family units right right but as i was looking at uh you know uh long- term access and and into that area i was just curious and i i've mentioned it before is that uh using um what is it mockingbird is there any long-term planning on maybe coming in through mockingbird as opposed to just having one exit for that for that area well we had oh because i was gonna i was just gonna say that emergency is is only for emergency so really you just have one exit that 's correct yes and what we've tried to do to mitigate that circumstance is we have chosen deliberately a lesser number of units we're not trying to put apartments there so that lessens the number of trips also we decided that if we had some people who are retired and we're trying to sell maybe 25 of the units to retirees or people who are 55 plus at least that they tend to get up a little later they don't go to work and they try to avoid traffic i remember my father's habits before he died he would leave about 10 and if he had to do something in the afternoon it was always in the mid-afternoon and he said i don't need the grief of being in the traffic so we think that will shave off the peak demand that you might normally have now as far as the access uh to the east we tried for years i've got a letter that goes back to i think 2010 where we tried to talk to uh the people who own that land now it's owned by trust and the trust does not want to sell just access they want to sell the whole piece which is not very usable and it snakes all around it's it's something that you really can't use we have heard though that in that area that there is a local investor who builds apartments and was looking to buy some of that property on lane street and also further to the east and to the south if he did that then he obviously could build something that would you know be worth his time and then uh with a simple s turn you would make mockingbird connect with mockingbird but that would run through mr tonic less property right through the middle so he would have to sell i think he probably would maybe that's why he favors this uh this development i don't know his reasons but i'll just say yes thank you very much okay okay thank you all right i do not see any other questions thank you mr barrio this is a public hearing anyone else wishing to speak we certainly do so seeing none i will close the public hearing and open up for discussion or motion commissioner beck i moved to approve this uh z 18018 i think it's an excellent plan i think it works well over in this area so i motion to approve and commissioner beck for clarification are you approving with the two conditions i'm sorry yes i am thank you commissioner smith second we have a first and a second any discussion seeing none i 'll call for a vote on the board okay motion carries seven zero congratulations that concludes the public hearing items for this evening we 'll move on to the plan and zoning project matrix and richard i'll let you take lead initially again just wanted to highlight some items that we had discussed in work session the item with respect to traffic engineering items instead of having that on the 10 24 work session we'll be moving that to 1114 we also had at the same time a discussion regarding the process for infrastructure updates since we will we will have water and sewer staff members at the next meeting with respect to the capital improvements i think we can also still have them address some of those concerns with respect to to those utilities and then but still have the same discussion as part of pre-tambing the traffic engineers on on the 14th on the historic preservation incentives we are working on that i also wanted to let everyone know that that the locota group has been in town they were at hlc on monday they're the consultant assisting with the historic preservation plan and so i think right around that time so that that'll be also an update on where we are with the historic preservation plan but i know that plan was also looking at including some of those incentives just to give a quick update tree code we are working as hailey mentioned earlier and kind of pulling pulling it all together we're just we're just going through kind of the refining process right now we're going back to the committee on the environment scheduled to go back on 11-5 and then we are going to have a work session with the city council i believe it's on 11-13 and so as soon as we get that draft i'll make sure that that everyone gets a copy and depending where we are on the on the 14th i'll be back just giving an update again keep just making sure everyone's in the loop and how we're progressing how we're progressing with that otherwise i think that was it thank you thank you for that update anyone have anything to add or all right nothing to be added with that we will close the planning zoning commission meeting at 7-12