Welcome to the City of Denton's Planning and Zoning Commission meeting for Wednesday,
November 1, 2023.
This is our special called work session, and with the quorum present, I will call us to
order at 4.08 p.m.
I'll let the record show that Commissioner Villarreal is absent from today's meeting.
We've got one item on our work session today, and it is 1A, receive a report, hold a discussion,
give staff direction regarding the draft goals, objectives, implementation strategies for
the Northeast Denton Area Plan.
We've got a lot of material to cover.
Angie's going to open this meeting.
We are going to get through presentation.
There are breaks in the presentation where we can have questions answered, but we've
got to get through the information before we can get any kind of discussion started.
So I will let Angie take it away, and go from there.
Thank you.
Thank you, Chair.
Good evening, members of the Planning and Zoning Commission, Angie Mangler, Senior Planner
Development Services.
This is a special called meeting to discuss the draft goals, objectives, recommendations,
implementation strategies for the Northeast Denton Area Plan.
Just to give you a little bit of recap as to why we're here at the August 1, 2023 joint
work session with the Northeast Denton Area Plan Steering Committee.
The Planning and Zoning Commission and City Council direction was given to move forward
with scenario two, or what was called the Balancing Act at the time.
From there, draft goals and recommended implementation strategies have been prepared, and that's
what we're here to discuss this afternoon.
So your task today is to get through a hefty amount of material.
As the Chair stated, we have 21 recommended implementation strategies that we will be
discussing.
They fall into five broad categories.
Land development, infrastructure development, economic development, environmental preservation,
and historic preservation.
So in each of those five categories, you're going to find several recommended implementation
strategies that tie back to the goals of the Northeast Denton Area Plan.
Our consultant, Shai, will be presenting the material.
There will be a set of slides for land development, and at the end of that section, we'll take
a brief pause for any questions that came up regarding the land development scenarios,
recommended strategies that were proposed, and then we'll move on to the next, and we'll
do the same with infrastructure, and we'll make our way through the presentation gradually.
It is a lengthy presentation.
At the end, what we would like from you all is we have a matrix of each of the strategies
that is proposed.
Do you generally agree with the strategy?
Do you not?
Does the strategy need some modification?
And the objective of this meeting is at the end of the presentation, and after discussing
through all of the strategies, to receive some form of consensus on each of them, whether
that be agree that this is appropriate for the plan, agree that it's not appropriate
for the plan, or agree that it's okay to move forward, but you have some modifications for
it.
With that, I believe that's all I have.
Tina, did you want to add anything?
There it goes.
Tina Fargans, Deputy Director of Development Services and Planning Director.
Just wanted to add, I know that there may be some questions with respect to the scenario
two plan.
Our purpose here is not to rehash that this evening.
Council gave us direction on that scenario two plan, and so that's what we're moving
forward with.
I would like for you to then focus your discussion, as Angie put it, on the strategies that will
be presented this evening.
Keep in mind, all of this work builds upon itself, based upon past direction that we've
received, and then eventually gets formulated and put into the final plan.
With that, I'll turn it over to the Chair.
If you have anything additional, otherwise we can start with our presentation.
No, I'm good.
I'm ready for it.
All right.
We'll turn it over to Shai, and we will start our presentation.
Thank you all.
Thank you, Angie.
Good afternoon, Chair, members of the Planning and Zoning Commission.
Thank you all so much for your time.
I know your time is very short, so I'm going to just start with our presentation.
So, again, reiterating what Angie said, today we are hoping to receive direction from you
all on the draft goals, objectives, and strategies for the plan, and also any advice you all
have for us on these draft goals and objectives and strategies.
In the end, like she said, we'd like to know which strategies you'd like to keep, remove,
modify, or recommend any changes to.
So, today's agenda, we'll start with a quick little background, and then what the framework
is for these, talk about the goals, objectives, and then go through those recommended strategies,
and then have the direction and discussion at the end.
So, really quick on the background, when we started working on this plan, we received
a lot of the previous planning materials from staff and from the city, and what we did was
we looked at all those previous effort, planning efforts, we've reviewed the comprehensive
plan, we looked at the North Denton Neighborhood Association plan, and a lot of this comes
from that.
Our next step was to go through public engagement to make sure what out of those previous planning
efforts was valid, what still worked, what was still needed and wanted.
All the details about this public engagement are in another presentation on the website
for people who want to know what was the purpose behind each of these and what the results
of each of these were in detail around the website, so I won't go through all of this
again, but summary, we really talked to a lot of people, we talked to the residents,
we talked to the developers, we talked to the landowners, we even talked to people from
all over the city of each age group to make sure that they were all involved in the plan,
and what came out of this was, in short, there were many more that you can see in the presentation,
but in short, people wanted to preserve rural character, wanted to preserve open space,
did not want apartments, wanted a walkable outdoor recreation family place, they did
want to turn this into some kind of a showcase or a legacy area for the region also.
So that's the short summary we did go through, and I've highlighted the main points of the
vision statement so we don't go through the whole long thing, but as you can see, people
wanted rural housing, two to five acre lots, they wanted to look at the standards that
were outlined in the 2040 comp plan, conservation development to retain rural character, protect
open space was main point, another was make the space available for all of Denton to enjoy.
So going forward, August 1st, you all were there at the meeting, we were given the direction
to proceed with scenario two, the next two maps kind of recap what the scenario two land
use and zoning was, the main thing we wanted to point out is there was a gateway land use
description in scenario two, and it caused a little confusion because there's north side
the gateway had recommended multifamily, but the areas of gateway that were shown south
of hardly field did not have multifamily, so because it caused confusion, we divided
it into two and now we're calling it gateway north and gateway south.
So as you can see, we also have hashed the area that is not within the city limits and
therefore not under any city control.
It's in the county, the reason I just want to reiterate that there are proposed recommendations
in this area is so that if anybody in the future wants to annex into the city, the city
will know what zoning or what kind of standards to apply to that property and it will be clear
to the property owner what standards they can expect to have applied to the property.
As mentioned, can you all see the, yeah.
So these two are the gateway north, the pink at the south here and here are gateway south.
One quick thought here, the rural village center which at this point is shown in the
county area.
The purpose of this land use category is so that it can also be applied if needed within
the residential transition or between the residential and rural transition.
The purpose of this is to provide neighborhood type retail uses that people can walk to and
bike to and reduce the car trips.
This is the mobility plan that was being recommended.
We'll talk more in detail about how it differs from the others.
As you can see, there are some roadways recommended in the county area and the reason for that
is not to go building everything right now.
The reason is that we can still do platting in the county and so when we do plat, we can
ask for the right of way.
We don't have to build the roadways if there is no development but at least you'll have
the right of way in case development happens there, we can at least build the roadways
and that's the main purpose for it.
Going forward, the plan or the strategies are framed in five different categories.
Angie went through those so we'll start with the goals.
These goals are exactly the same taken from Denton 2040 comp plan and the North Denton
neighborhood area plan.
It is to have stage growth which is fiscally and environmentally sound and then conservation
development to retain rural character, protect open space and greenways.
So objectives, again, the ones, the highlighted yellow part tells you what text has been exactly
taken from the North Denton area plan.
As you can see, a lot of what they had was really good work.
We've just taken it, enhanced it, and added a way to make it implementable.
And so it's environmental preservation, health safety quality of life, rural character, preserving
historic assets, turning this area into a regional asset and then to foster economic
stability.
Looking at those two goals and these five objectives is how we'd like you to listen
to the strategies moving forward.
So the first strategy is, of course, conservation development and to promote it for all future
developments in this area regardless of what the development is, where it is.
And you can see from these three ideas that the idea is higher the density, more open
space you get for conservation.
The one thing to note is when we say that's open space, that is public open space in addition
to areas like the flood plain, areas that cannot be developed.
This is land that can be developed that we are saying if we give them more density, they
can actually give you the land that they would have otherwise developed to put in a conservation
easement or dedicated as open space, which is public open space.
So all these three scenarios, density is three units per acre.
It's just how it's laid out.
This we'll go through, hopefully you've all read the details of how, why we can come back
to it if you all have questions.
We'll move on to strategy two, that is retail commercial and three units per acre development
being closer to the major roadways on the sides as you can see.
And that way the lower density development towards the big green space conservation area
flood plain to preserve it.
And that is exactly following the plan and the idea that comes out of North Denton Neighborhood
Association plan.
And that's more about how to do it, why to do it.
The third strategy is neighborhood level commercial development at specific nodes, I just talked
about it.
This is kind of a hypothetical rendering, but the idea is to preserve that rural character,
create this little node so people can walk to and not have to drive all over for their
everyday needs to still feel like they're in a rural area, but not have to get in their
car for getting to basic retail or a restaurant or something.
And then strategy four is design standards, and design standards that can enhance the
rural character of the area.
We're recommending that a set of standards be developed that are specific to Northeast
Denton area so the development can add and enhance the rural character that is there.
The fifth strategy is development agreements, and as we've talked about it a lot before,
the majority of the study area is in the ETJ, really not much land user zoning control on
this land.
And if you have development agreements, this would be a way to protect this area, so it
would mean that the property owners would voluntarily enter into a development agreement
with the city, which would say that they can develop it as it is a little bit more, but
keep the land use as what it is.
But if in the future they sell it to a developer or they want to do a higher density development,
something different, it would voluntarily come into city limits, and then this plan
and all the other city regulations would apply.
So that would protect all the neighbors around, because then there would be some control on
what goes on to that property.
So that's the whole purpose of development agreement is people who are there, people
who want to keep it open, want to just live there, can stay as is, if at all they plan
to sell it, or in the future their heirs sell it, then the city would have some control,
and the people would have some security of knowing that there will be some control.
So those are the five land use strategies.
I know I rushed through it, but do you all have any questions or clarifications on that
one?
Commissioner Smith.
Thank you, Chair.
On the development agreements, the last piece, how does that done?
Is it done through deed restrictions?
Is it, and essentially the point of my question is how legally binding is that?
So they are done as development agreements, much like we've done development agreements
with some of the municipal utility districts, also we've done non-annexation agreements.
So they would be similar in that regard, where they're entered into, negotiated with the
property owner in the city.
And then there are, typically development agreements are approved by council, and then
we can have them filed a record, so that way they also show up any time a title search
is done.
But it's negotiated between the city and the property owner.
So filed with the title, so I mean this is the most likely scenario.
So this is what's happened in the past when we've seen developments on the north side.
Original landowner, either in older age or in death, a state or inheritors are dealing
with the sale of that land, and they're trying to get rid of it.
They sell it to whoever a developer is looking to buy it, the developer should be doing their
research and pulling and checking title records.
If they don't, they just buy it anyway, so when they go pull title records to be able
to go through and start the development process, they would find that, correct?
Correct.
And then we, the city, also would keep track of those, much like what we do right now with
the non-annexation agreements that we have.
We've got them mapped, and then we're able to, you know, as people come in and raise
questions regarding what they might be able to do with their property longer term, then
we're able to also advise them that the property is subject to this agreement.
Okay.
That's question 1A.
Question 1B.
Who solicits these?
I understand who maintains, but who's going in soliciting these development agreements?
Is it city staff that's going after the landowners over there?
Is it, we hope the neighborhood goes and talks to these owners and say, "Hey, you need to
voluntarily go to the city and ask about a development agreement and do that."
Who's soliciting these?
So typically it would be the property owner, the property owner coming in and having conversations
with city staff about, "Hey, we're interested in developing the property.
What's our longer term options associated with this?"
And we would engage in that conversation, you know, with, particularly with it being
property within the ETJ.
As Shy pointed out, we do have limited regulatory authority within the ETJ when it comes to
regulating land uses.
So it would be, if someone is interested in doing something with their property longer
term, then us engaging in that conversation with them.
How often is the landowner, I mean, this is, that's a step.
It's more than a step.
It's a mile before it comes to our viewpoint.
How often do landowners come in and talk to city staff before they even get into conversations
with the developer or get into conversations with what they want to do?
I mean, I understand a landowner as the developer who bought the land then comes in and talks,
but, you know, Joe Blow Rancher, who's got 300 acres, who comes in and talks that often
about that forehand?
You know, that's really difficult to quantify.
So it's, you know, I believe when we did the non annexation agreements and Scott and Hailey,
correct me if I'm wrong.
I believe the city initiated some of that with respect to the non annexation agreements
to particular to address the donut holes within our city limits.
So maybe we were a little proactive in that regard, but Scott, do you have anything else
to add?
Yeah, I would say over the past five years, we've probably had a half dozen people that
have approached the city to get into an agreement for a variety of reasons.
So it's infrequent, so had a conversation today, actually.
And infrequency doesn't necessarily mean it doesn't, it doesn't happen, right?
Infrequency just means that it wasn't necessarily a necessity earlier on or it wasn't on the
front of the line.
Correct, it's another tool in the toolbox for a property owner and/or staff to be able
to use.
And if it's put out there, if it's advertised, I know this is too early, but one thing that
I think I got a modification I have to come back to on that strategy.
So I don't know if I share it now or...
Nope, we're not there yet.
Got it.
I would just add, you know, one of the other things that's going to drive that conversation
with landowners and is the availability of infrastructure.
Because in many cases, water and sewer is not available, and so they're looking to how
do they get water and sewer extended, and it's not uncommon that development community
is also looking to the city to see if there's any financial resources to be able to contribute
towards that extension of utilities.
So that also helps in being able to solicit and having that conversation, much like with
some of the developments that we're having happen on our west side of town.
They've got an infrastructure cost associated with it, and so they're looking to us to see
if we might be willing to participate in that.
And so the lack of utilities in an area can help with initiating that conversation to
begin with.
And Commissioner, I can later on give you some case studies where we have recommended
this strategy specifically to protect open space and land in two cities in the Metroplex
and how that was done.
We plan to put that in the action steps.
For the sake of time, I don't think I'll necessarily need it if the other commissioners want to
hear it, but I think that if it's been used in the past, I'll trust the experts in the
historical side of things.
I think just maybe for me, it's coming down to a point of notification and awareness,
and so we'll come back to that in modifications.
So thanks.
Thank you.
Commissioner Cole.
Thank you, Chair.
Real quick, Tina, you know, we talked about ETJ1 being able to get brought into the city,
but can't the opposite now work, where ETJ1 can punch out and go the other way?
That is true.
Given the recent changes in the state statute earlier this year, that is true.
Property owners can petition to be removed from the ETJ.
That makes it even more difficult, because when they have removed themselves from the
ETJ, then our subdivision regulations even come into question being able to be applied.
Commissioner Prout.
Yeah, just a question on the, I guess, the overall land development strategies.
I'm trying to remember exactly, early on, there was some development of a projected
growth and therefore amount of homes that we expected in this area.
Would you expect the development pressure within this area to be influenced by the amount
of development that is allowed elsewhere in the city?
In this area, though, not elsewhere in the city.
So let me restate.
Would you expect the development pressure as far as how, yeah, within Northeast Denton
to be increased or decreased, depending on how much development is allowed in the rest
of the city?
How much supply is coming online in other areas?
It's difficult to say, but probably not, because development is locational.
And so, rest of the city, maybe their supply, but with outer looping here, development coming
from Aubrey, 380, 428, those are the factors that the developers really like and the market
likes for development.
And so, that's what's going to drive development here, is people are going to want to live
here, people are going to want to get around the metroplex from here, because this will
be the new area, this will be the fast connecting area, this is where the new things are going
to come because of all the development that's coming from south as well as the east towards
here.
And Shai, if I could add to that also, I think the size of the tracts of land that are available
for development are going to play into that as well, right?
Because some of the larger tracts of land are available more on the periphery areas
of the city compared to the interior.
So I know your email that you had sent to the staff in some past conversations that
we've had, I know you've been interested in trying to focus development more inward
into the city, providing increased densities within the city, but the land inside the loop,
if you will, at least, those are smaller tracts, those larger tracts have already been developed,
and so for developers who are interested in doing larger tract development, particularly
single family residential neighborhoods, hence why they look beyond the loop.
Okay, I understand all that, I'm surprised by the response.
I think what I'm hearing is that staff doesn't believe that will actually happen, that there
will be more development within the core of Denton in the next 20 years, and therefore
we have to plan for this amount of growth out there.
Because certainly, I mean, if in an imaginary situation, 50,000 homes were built in other
areas of Denton, I don't see how that doesn't affect the demand for additional homes in
Northeastern, I just don't understand.
And what we would do, though, is where there are tracts available, try to steer developers
towards that, there may not be as large tracts development that are more into the city.
The other thing is the city would have to have a conversation, and I know our comprehensive
plan addresses this to some extent, regarding if we are going to allow for densification
of development, where does that occur?
As you're well aware of, we're going on the downtown plan, if we're looking at trying
to attract higher density development to be able to support businesses that are within
the downtown area, then is it appropriate to increase the density?
It possibly is.
But we would have to look at other areas of the city to see where does it make sense to
be able to add those housing options, and what do those housing options look like?
Because the housing options that are offered more towards the interior of the city, especially
if they're greater density and development, are likely going to be different compared
to where you may see in other areas of the city, such as in Northeast Dunton.
And there's future strategies here to do what you are alluding to, so the city would have
to take certain actions to drive a lot of it towards there.
Completely understand that there's a whole bunch of stuff that's out of scope of the
Northeast area.
I'm just trying to understand what are the trade-offs and push-pull situations.
Thank you.
Anybody else at this break?
No?
Okay.
Go ahead.
So, infrastructure development strategies.
The first one is complete streets, context-sensitive street designs.
Complete streets just means all modes, not just the car, but walking, biking, maybe even
transit.
Street-sensitive usually has been used in an urban context, but this is a rural context,
so as you can see, all it means is what is the area wanting to be, and let's design our
roadways and cross-sections to be compatible with it.
Three-lane divided or undivided with curb and gutter is not going to give you the feel
of a rural area, whereas maybe travel lanes with bioswales in between trees, larger open
spaces next to the walking paths, those are the kind of things that will create that context
of a rural environment, so that's to maintain that character and then also to promote safety
in biking and walking in the area.
People have told us that that's what they would love to do in the area, and they're
already very upset about not being safe.
They remember being kids and riding their bikes, and so this is a strategy to help with
that.
Just a connected strategy to this is to amend the traditional cross-section, street cross-sections
that are all over Denton and frankly all over the Metroplex into creating that rural character
and context-sensitive area that is compatible with the feel and the vision that people have,
and that just means, again, adding bioswales.
You can see what the street looks like now, and then if you just, you've got the right
of way, if you just added bioswales instead of that curb and gutter and just flat land
and put trees, it'll give you the feeling of being nestled in this natural tree line,
things like that.
So that's your strategy seven is to amend that transportation manual.
And then strategy eight is to develop a network of trails to connect people and places in
the community to create safety, to provide opportunities for outdoor recreation, and
of course, healthy lifestyles and site impact is increased value for the nearby properties.
So we've all seen that the value of property next to these off-street trails is quite higher
than ones that are not close to it.
Again, you can see in every strategy we're putting what page of the North Denton Neighborhood
Association plan, these ideas were mentioned, and we're just talking about how you can actually
get it done.
And so strategy nine, we have to expand transit options both in the employment centers in
the southern portion, but also if we are trying to turn this into a legacy regional asset
or a legacy for the outdoor community, then you're going to have a lot of those weekend
visitors to the nature center or the mountain bike trail or any other open spaces that are
created in this area, at which time you're going to have cars inundating this area.
So having public transit and making sure that people do get to the area, but don't bring
the negative impact of coming to the area.
So that's the reason behind this strategy is to provide for that.
So strategy 10, this is where we'll talk a little bit about that plan.
This is to ensure that traffic does not negatively impact existing residential.
Whatever the future developments happen in the area, we want to take care of the development.
So one of the things, this is the on your left side is the existing thoroughfare plan.
Right side is what we're proposing.
So first thing is we've taken down the primary arterials and turned them into secondary arterials.
So we're taking down the classification for 28 has been moved from freeway classification
to the primary arterial classification.
And then you can see this east west roadway has just been stopped.
It's not continuing on and connecting.
We do have up here, we've added more streets.
The idea is not to go start building them.
The idea is depending on what the proposed outer loop alignment's going to be and then
when it is going to be built and then what type of developments coming in, that's when
you would want to build those.
Right now, same here, if this big tract here does develop, well then you're going to need
a connection here.
But we would recommend that you build this little network right next to say loop 288
and 428 because right now already there's a traffic issue right here and this is the
roadways that will help ease that traffic congestion there.
So down here in the employment area, industrial area, making these few connections is going
to make it a little easier for those trucks to move around and not idle around on the
roadways.
So that's the ten strategies, five strategies for infrastructure.
Commissioner Smith.
Thank you, Chair.
How does changing 428 from being a highway classification, a primary, I should say how,
does changing it and this change how TxDOT might view that road?
They're the ones that have given us that direction.
So shortly, you know, when we went through the mobility update in 2022 and adopted our
mobility plan, at that time we were advised that they were going to make it freeway status.
So we reflected that on our mobility plan and less than a year after having our mobility
plan adopted, they came back and informed us that they decided that that would be primary
arterial status.
So hence the primary arterial status on this plan recommendation to get that updated.
Is that a harbinger for how they feel that road should be improved in the future?
From our indications, it's yes, that's what they're anticipating, is that it would be
that primary arterial, which is typically that six lane divided roadway status.
And David is on our consultant team and on the transportation aspect and may have more
to add.
Before David answers, I'll just say I'll stop beating around the bush and just say what
it is.
If it's called a highway and it's exact same status it is today, two lane undivided and
it goes from being highway classification in TxDOT's mind and now on our mobility plan
to being primary arterial and still the exact same as it is today.
Is that making it less likely that they will come in with a capital improvement project
sooner to improve that roadway?
I guess we do need to classify, the classification is different here.
We've got the city of Denton classification and then you have the classification from
TxDOT.
So TxDOT already identifies 428 as an arterial, not necessarily as a freeway or a other highway
which would be kind of a higher magnitude.
So that's one item and just to note, the TxDOT, at least Dallas district policy on FM roads
has been more proactive where they are looking at any future improvements, they're looking
at how can we make sure that it is a six lane facility and not just a four lane facility
so they're trying to maximize the amount of right of way footprint and that preclude future
improvements in these areas and they're doing that for all the FM roads within the Collin
County and Denton area as we speak now.
But the fact that it's not, the fact that it's a two lane undivided road now, and they
originally said it's highway, it's not a highway.
If it's now a primary arterial in their mind, does that make it less likely that there would
be addressing the expansion of 428 sooner?
Does that make sense that if it's, hey we think that's a highway and the highway I'm
guessing, I'm just going to make it up, is an eight lane divided road and right now it's
freeway sorry, and right now it's two lane undivided, therefore it's so far out of compliance
for their mobility plan, we need to address that sooner, but now they reclassify it as
being a primary arterial which is a three lane divided and it's right now it's two
lane undivided because we changed it from being a freeway down to being primary arterial,
they're deprioritizing the improvement of that road, does that make sense?
I would say not necessarily, you know we work extensively with TechStop regarding roadways
that are in need of attention and working with them on which areas are priorities for
the community.
So it's, I mean we meet with them regularly, they do seek our feedback, I mean we're working
with them extensively on the 380 direct connector, also we've been influential in working with
them on what we believe our needs are as it relates to loop 288 and the need for frontage
roads there, so the timing of the growth that happens within an area also influences the
timing of highway improvements being completed or freeway improvements or even improvements
probably to you know FM roads that TechStop has.
So it's you know they're taken into consideration regional growth that happens and then also
funding sources that are available in another community that I worked in.
The phase two widening of I-35 was escalated about 20 years because the voters of Texas
approved additional funding in a previous election many years ago that accelerated funding
being available and then because of the amount of traffic, the significance of the road within
the area there were all these various different factors that went into them moving that expansion
to the forefront and a road that we thought wasn't going to be touched until the year
2030 all of a sudden is getting addressed in the year 2020.
Yeah I think the bottom line is the classification isn't the only driving factor, correct?
Yeah originally TechStop didn't have funding for 428 and to my knowledge they haven't
added or changed any added funding to 428 when it got put down to an arterial.
Okay thank you.
And the only reason to have this in the plan is so that the property owners along the site
know what to expect so the type of development they would have planned for if it was a freeway
versus if it's an arterial then that gets different.
Thank you.
Anybody else on this round of strategies, questions or clarification?
Commissioner Pruitt?
Thank you Chair.
First just in general on the infrastructure strategies I didn't see anything in here
about some of the utility things that are sort of non-road infrastructure.
Help me understand why that's not a big concern for this area.
So it is and we've looked at well you cannot answer too but let me quickly answer we looked
at it and we've looked at the city's five-year capital plan there are water sewer lines planned
but they're way far off so if the idea is to preserve this area then you don't want
to recommend water sewer being provided.
The only reason this area has not exploded like Aubrey has is because there's no water
sewer.
So that's one of the reasons we did not go there.
People are still driving so we had to talk about the roads.
It wasn't shown on the typicals but typically the typical section allows for those utility
corridors to run adjacent to those facilities so that would be incorporated as well in there.
Sure from a right-of-way availability perspective I'm thinking more from a capital improvement
perspective right near this area there's been a you know proposed project of an additional
water treatment plant or sewage treatment plant sorry to mix my terms and I'm not a
civil engineer here but the I guess I'm trying to understand I don't want to go into detail.
It seems to me like the decisions that we make going forward for this area there may
be certain step sizes of amount of intensity or homes in certain areas that would trigger
additional lift stations additional sewage treatment plants that would be helpful to
understand just from a optimization perspective if that makes sense so I was I was just surprised
to not see it.
So the strategy here is to discourage development okay so if the city's not planning anything
then people know that okay if you're going to develop oh sorry if you're going to develop
then you're going to spend that kind of money to build that infrastructure or at least to
know that it's not planned so okay that was a typical strategy to prevent okay sorry and
Eric if I can add to that also one of the things that our water wastewater utility team
is doing is they are working on a water and wastewater master plan they work very closely
with us to understand development conditions that are happening within the area and to
be able to plan accordingly so you know we continue to work with them and advise them
of you know here's what we're seeing happening within the ETJ where we can't control the
land use but this is what we're seeing happen within the areas of the city limits here the
land uses that are being recommended or in this case you know strong preservation of
environmental resources and preservation of land and so they're able to factor that into
their assumptions and then they continue to monitor that over time as well okay and as
you can see all the city land here is pretty close to the existing utilities and so we
didn't want to actually provide reason for people to yeah so I think now that I'm parsing
the words a little bit better the right way to message it correct me if I'm wrong is that
we have things on our long-term plans but we have no funded projects to go out ourselves
and build that infrastructure such that as development occurs in different areas we have
a tool to require connection through a particular route and and size of pipe and that sort of
thing but we we're not actively looking at going out and preemptively putting in that
infrastructure so correct okay thank you and then quick question to staff the the transit
thing seems a little bit out of place from a rural thing but then I see employment centers
I understand there's an area you know south of the railroad tracks just north of 380 I
my question is does the staff feel that having that sorry terminology a strategy thank you
within this plan is is beneficial rather than distractive from transit discussions that
might be more near term and and higher priority does that make sense I don't want to dilute
the amount of effort that we have to spend on improving transit citywide by adding stuff
in places where it might not be needed for 20 years does that make sense I think so and
I think I understand what you're getting at I guess and I know we had several discussions
internally about transit and hence why we were more inclined to think about the employment
centers more on the southern end and so you know if you feel that this is a strategy that
does not need to be included then would be looking for that direction at that time let's
circle back to that discussion given direction yeah yeah I'm good thank you okay anybody
else we got an or the next list of strategies at the moment okay so the next list is economic
development strategies that are four of those we heard a lot about how Denton is unique
and we wanted small businesses that were unique mom and pop kind of businesses in this area
and also in Denton and if we are giving it wanting a rural character that's more in line
with it so this strategy is to create economic development programs and incentives to promote
that small business development in the city and and in the implementation action steps
we will put in how to do that in the different steps but that's why this strategy is here
proactive approach instead of just sitting around and thinking people will open small
business if we have a small business office and incentives it's more likely to get those
kind of businesses this is one of those strategies that we were talking about Commissioner Pruitt
where you said how can we move development somewhere else instead of here so economic
development policies to promote open space conservation and management in this area so
we've got this whole transfer of development rights there are many other ways to do it
like tax incentives for landowners to preserve taxes transfer of development rights land
banking public acquisition but this one we're talking about transfer of development rights
here where you can designate selling areas and you can designate buying area so for example
if this was to be your buying area well it's in the city limits it's got three any any
like this one sorry is three units an acre is your buying area your selling area is can
now sell that for example if everything for example we just say this whole area you can
have three units an acre but we don't want a certain area to develop so we say you can
sell your density to that property up there now they can do five units an acre but you
then put your land in conservation easement so now they cannot develop that land so we're
trying to see if first we start with land in the etj because that we have no control
over so if that can get the selling area that will be good you could do the land around
288 as the buying area and then this northeast ending could be the selling area so then you
can give more density along the loop and then leave this area into a conservation so that's
kind of the concept of transfer development rights this is just a concept we have not
developed this this will need a lot more work to decide what's your base density where are
those selling areas where are those buying areas do we want to do this within this area
or you know some property maybe more you're going to have to look at property values you're
gonna have to look at which property has access to infrastructure which does not all of those
things will have to be taken into consideration when you create this program but this is one
program where you can put this as an example of the selling area you can keep this land
open if this area would buy that in lieu of say landscaping they don't have enough space
to landscape they've they can buy that use the mic oh i'm sorry that's okay because we're
streaming so oh sorry so that's the idea here is to give incentives to people to not develop
their property mostly we do incentives to develop and this is a strategy to give incentives
to people to not develop their property that way you're not taking their property by letting
them not develop you're still letting them get use out of their property and then strategy 13 is
the design standards so each if we can have economic development policies for each of these
land use character areas that is specific to that character area what we want to see in that area
and then we can basically say here's an incentive in return for meeting all these design standards
so as you all know texas legislation has taken away a lot of city's rights to do a lot of things
but you can always give incentives and encourage people to do a development that matches what
you all want to see so that's the strategy here and then strategy 14 is right now especially after
covid we've got a lot of nomadic workforce people can work from anywhere they're looking for open
space and this is a specific demographic that is younger demographic that are very environmentally
conscious they volunteer a lot and they like working and living in rural environments and so
if we actually go looking for them create certain developments for them solicit that recruit those
businesses and amenities that these people like you'll find that they'll be volunteering to take
care of the floodplain and cleaning things up and making sure that they're volunteering to keep the
open space open and preserving the environment so that's the only reason for this is this area look
like a perfect area to if if people are going to move into this area then let's recruit people who
appreciate the area and that was it commissioner smith can i just get clarification on strategy 12
if you can go back to the first second so i know it's not a fully fleshed out policy or standard
within there but just so i can understand what you're trying to say within that
i thought it was more of as i was read through this before the meeting i thought it was more of
we're going to incentivize people to buy in the area something like a you know a tax improvement
district or something like that and then we're going to de-incentivize the selling area from
whatever development agreements things like that we've already talked about what you're saying is
that if somebody exists in the buying area and they can't meet the landscape requirements that
are laid out or density they want more density they want more density or something like that
they have to go talk to a totally separate owner and buy the land and then put into a conservation
easement so what they would do is they would buy the units so that's how you would define it you
know certain units so they would buy a certain amount of units from that buying person and that
much land that buying person would have to put into a conservation easement that they can no longer
develop that land because they've sold the development but they are physically buying the
land from a they're so it's more like it's more like our our park dedication fund piece things
right where it's like you have to dedicate a certain amount of units some amount of acres per
unit you're developing or in lieu give us money somewhat similar but it's different because it's
dealing with the land use right so maybe another way to explain this would be is if i own a piece
of property and let's say i can put a thousand units on it given its existing zoning or if it
was out in the etj and i wanted to bring it in and the city's plan says residential you know this
density recommendation but bottom line i've figured out i could put a thousand units on the property
but i am open to conserving my property and putting a conservation easement on it because
let's say i've got some cool feature on my property right that would be really neat to
preserve but i know you tim you know neighbor down the street has a piece of property you're
wanting to develop and you would love to have additional units you'd love to have my thousand
units right then we would enter into an agreement i believe the city would be this is where i'm a
little unknown on this the city would probably be involved because there would probably be some sort
of development agreement especially if we're involving land in etj but there would be some
sort of agreement in addition to any conservation easement put on my property but that would speak
to you being able to receive my thousand units and being able to develop that on your property
but then protections being put in place that my property continues to have that conservation
easement and or whatever what other strategy might have been used to ensure that my property
doesn't develop transfer of development rights in my experience is not something that has been
necessarily readily used probably throughout texas most of my experiences predominantly in the north
dallas area so i can't speak to some other areas of the state i know in other parts of the country
this is a popular strategy that's used especially in much more urban densities shy might know some
other examples but this this is a a tool that's out there it's just not something that is probably
exercised regularly just because of the complexities but also needing to have finding
those two property owners that want to have that relationship because the other thing is if i'm
giving up some development rights on my property i'm probably looking to for you to pay me for those
as well so there's that component that comes into play okay so i understand it more like how i know
how um ev regulation is going in some states like california for example you have to sell a certain
amount of units amount of you if you sell 100 units from a dealership in one month 50 of those
units have to be electric vehicles have to be evs if you don't have evs as a dealer you can buy ev
credits from another dealership so you can go buy those ev a lot of times they're buying it from
tesla and that's how tesla makes a bunch of money so it sounds like it's very similar to that where
it's like we have a commodity in the sense of units of conservation and i can buy and trade my
units of conservation in exchange for units of density back and forth to be able to fall into
regulations is that is that a good summation of understanding what that is i'm going to defer to
shy on this one does that the only the only only concern i have on that or understanding is that
how does that fall into zoning regulation you i won't use a thousand let's say there's 100 acres
and the zoning on that land is five units per acre so technically you could do 500 units
but i want to do this exchange right i actually want to do 700 units you've got 200 units you're
willing to you know sell to me i buy it off of you in exchange for conservation units and cash
and that kind of stuff right i'm now going to be developing or have the right to develop them at a
seven unit per acre density even though my zoning is five units per acre i would anticipate that we
would change the zoning also to be able to address that but i'm going to defer to shy because she's
got more knowledge on this than i do so the way you would write the ordinance would be your base
zoning is this many units and if you were to be able because you're in a buying area you can max
buy up to these many units so you can go a low and a high and you say you can buy up to this much
and in the selling part the because they're selling it then we they have to put it into a conservation
easement that much area so we would define how much land equals how many units okay that's all
questions i have thank you chair okay you're welcome anyone else okay
so those were our economic development strategies uh michael will you take on the environmental
strategies thank you good evening commissioner chair
so with environmental preservation strategies we have five specific strategies that we'll review
get that up there there we go and we're going to start with strategy 15 which is adopt regulations
that provide for appropriate vegetative riparian buffers along all major streams and tributaries
this section is a nice illustration of what a healthy riparian corridor looks like where you have
essentially a natural condition within the main channel and then that gradually transitions out
to developed areas in between the creek and the development areas you're providing what we call
green infrastructure nature-based infrastructure that mitigates any of the impacts of development
adjacent to the creeks and so when we look at the northeast area most of the creeks have established
flood plains that are mapped through fema but many of the tributaries have not been mapped as
fema flood plain but those are also significant in terms of riparian corridors so this applies
to all the tributaries not just the major streams
so linked to that is also tying it to prioritizing bike pedestrian and equestrian transportation
corridors along and within the riparian buffers to create a connected greenway system so it kind
of lumps in stacks the functionality of your riparian corridors where the riparian buffers
are established now within the city of denton as environmentally sensitive areas it really just
designates a 50 foot or 100 foot width away from the banks but it doesn't get into the details about
what goes in that buffer so this strategy would be developing a more detailed structure you can
think of it like a like a roadway section so what is in your riparian corridor section
and that could include both paved and unpaved pedestrian trails equestrian trails but it would
be linked up with this nature-based infrastructure that would mitigate any impacts within that
corridor so you can look at the trail as that's development so you want to mitigate the water
that's coming off that new hardscape within the buffer this creates a large network of greenways
throughout northeast denton and keep in mind that this wouldn't be your only trails depending on
what development comes in you would want pedestrian connectivity into your major greenway system
so obviously you would probably have one along clear creek which is the larger riparian corridor
but you would also want that pedestrian connectivity along the roadways and within
the public open spaces that connect you to the creek so you don't just have the hike and bike
corridors in the floodplain and in the riparian corridors that expand and extends out into the
development so adding on to that and this is something that could exist within the riparian
corridors but it would also exist in any proposed development and it's prioritizing what I call
shared use and multi-benefit nature-based infrastructure that would include best
management practices such as bioswales bioretention enhanced swells enhanced stormwater detention and
retention and that could be located within the riparian buffers and it could also be located
within open spaces if you have a development that is draining to that open space that isn't
necessarily in a creek corridor you would have a shared open space that also provides the stormwater
management infrastructure but it also allows you to begin to look at restorative practices to
restore riparian vegetation increase canopy to start looking at and we'll talk about this in the
next strategy restoring the tall grass prairie and protecting the tall grass prairie that that already
exists so when you think about stormwater management I know many of you have seen
developments that have like a detention pond that generally is going to be off to the back of a
property those don't provide a lot of stacked functionality it serves the purpose of managing
the flood volumes it serves some purposes of treating the water quality of the development
runoff but it's not necessarily somewhere that you want to go recreate around so this strategy
would help the city develop a very detailed
section of when you're looking at these stormwater management facilities and prioritizing making
sure that they provide multiple benefits and they're not just there to manage stormwater
and shy I think you wanted to talk a little bit about this yes so you can see on the right hand
side is a example of tall grass prairie restoration this is a development in next to denver colorado
it's called central park neighborhood and I toured it recently just last month actually
and this was something I looked at and I thought this is amazing as a development because what they
did was it was twofold it's full of parks it's this is what every house sees from their front
door every house in that neighborhood sees this main central park area which is a restored prairie
tall grass prairie development they do have other parks in the area but this is how they have
been able to develop housing development with this and the fact was because the developer
got to be a got to develop the density of and it's all single-family homes in that neighborhood
but they're not five acres so they're small next to each other but because he got that they were
able to spend the money in developing this park system and making sure that that feel of the
rural environment where every door looks out into this as well as they maintain they built it and
gave it to the city the main park but then eight other parks they maintain the development does
and this is the part that Michael was talking about was that multiple function
all their parks have stormwater detention retention elements in it but they are
recreation elements they don't look like just developing the water so i just wanted to say
anybody who has a chance please go take a look at that central park neighborhood
and how it's been developed i think brookfield developers did that one
i think shy and both the tall grass prairie areas there are existing areas where it's
fairly healthy within northeastern area and there are areas where it's remnant tall grass prairie
and it's been impacted by agricultural processes over over time so you have opportunities to be
restorative throughout the area and that would be tied to developer agreements exchange of development
rights and all that but it would be dictated by the city for example let's say you had a property
that had two acres of remnant tall grass prairie as identified in the esa's you could have requirements
for that development to either preserve that existing tall grass prairie or restore it the
idea is we're trying to increase the amount of tall grass prairie and then bundle it into shared
public open spaces the final strategy is related to the many existing stock ponds
throughout the area stock ponds were initially constructed to provide irrigation water water
for livestock etc but also to manage sediment flowing downstream getting into the river
getting into lake louisville etc
they're not designed to mitigate impacts of development so they would require updates
a good example to look at locally would be looking at the nrcs lakes in the city of mckinney
they created requirements for development to upgrade those to provide more benefits
and enhance water quality
open up for questions commissioner brett thank you chair several of these strategies as well
as the transfer development rights and that sort of thing to my mind presupposes that
we have some method or rubric system point system to identify what areas specifically are high
priority targets and which areas are not is that something that you see
wrapped into the final plan and it would be incorporated within the given strategies or
is that something that that we need to have more focus on the strategy really directs for further
evaluation of all the natural systems so it would be like a stormwater master plan where
you look at all the creeks and the pipes and everything and you determine where do we have
issues where do we have flooding all that kind of thing this would be more it would be expanding
on the esa is that you you currently have and it's taking a more detailed look so you could look at
an area and you could say it let's say clear creek and there's you know erosion is natural
erosion is happening there in their areas where there are trees that are probably at risk so you
could evaluate that stream system on that property and determine you know what is the erosion
potential of it erosion hazard potential many cities across the metroplex have done this
fort worth for example they studied all their creeks citywide to determine what creeks are at
risk for erosion so going beyond just the flood portion of it so it's really getting a detailed
understanding of the health of all the systems within the northeast area okay and then prioritizing
those so you envision that would be part of the implementation phase of yeah a plan like this
yeah okay yeah and then secondly uh early this summer i think it was tim will hit me and remind
me um i think there was a supreme court case about wetland areas that are not wet all the time
and you can fill in the actual terms given that um do do we still have sufficient
protective capability on those smaller tributaries uh within this area so that you referred to the
waters of the u.s rule yes and that's something that's been in flux for the better part of a
decade if not longer um and there's still going to be back and forth about what constitutes a
high quality wetland is it connected to the main creek system is it not that probably isn't going
to change at the federal level for quite some time it's going to be in the courts most likely
already is actually but as part of the city of dentons development ordinance
the stormwater management plan for the city and stormwater regulations those could be you know
protected if they're identified you have to identify them first but then that would roll
into you know if you have what's considered let's say a medium quality wetland on your property
that you could potentially with the letter of the law the waters of the u.s you could
potentially fill that in as a developer the city could provide some incentives to protect that
and also require it as part of the development agreement okay thank you
commissioner colt thank you chair uh michael right yes okay great um could you go back to the
riparian buffer diagram please sir sorry i have a lot of slides to go through sorry about that
there we go that's better much easier
that one oh perfect thank you okay so it's clear creek that's clear creek
so it looks like we have 1575 95 feet of buffer on each side of the creek correct
that and this is free yeah but you can develop up to 90 feet away from that creek due to this diagram
correct it's it's going to be based on one it's going to be based on floodplain first floodplain
and floodway so in some cases the riparian buffer may extend out beyond what the floodplain is
in most cases it's probably going to be within the floodplain okay and the idea is that you know
that's providing you sufficient space we see the cowl on the right side there um just imagine that
being a development that you've got an adequate buffer between that development and the creek
system where you could also include your hike and bike trails or other public open spaces that are
activated um another way to look at buffers is that there's absolutely no build allowed at all
but that doesn't really provide any of the the opportunities to restore what may have already
been impacted in the buffer i mean we all have our different hot buttons on this on these very this
whole thing this is mine because i've spent a lot of time in clear creek fishing hunting camping
and i can tell you it is an i-35 for wildlife okay yep and 90 feet
that's not enough i i can promise you that and i i think that's part of that further evaluation
of all the creek systems uh from from a kind of a detailed detailed hydraulic and hydrologic
perspective which was not part of this um the 100 foot buffer and the 50 foot buffer
that's what's been established as the esas right now so that certainly could be further evaluated
i i with clear creek the floodplain is so wide and there's a lot of opportunities to bring back
riparian vegetation within that floodplain so you you could end up having a larger buffer
yeah i'm mostly worried about the impact of wildlife because there's such diverse wildlife
down there i mean you know what's going to happen with otters you know if they're only
it's just in in my mind it's not a big enough corridor for wildlife at all not even close
and that's my concern um well i assume that picture is an example right that's an example
it's not anything that's part of a plan or anything at this point yeah okay thank you all
appreciate it and further clarification the current esa is that 100 foot and the 50 foot
that's based on the amount of area draining to that particular point in the creek so as you get to
larger drainage area you're obviously going to have wider floodplains so that buffer becomes
larger uh and again right now that buffer is just essentially a no touch uh so this strategy that
we talked about would kind of advance that a little bit and get a little more uh opportunity
out of the buffer so you get the water quality benefits you maintaining that habitat connectivity
i think is going to be super important as well
anybody else okay thank you so we have two more strategies um we've got two historic
preservation strategies the first is to conduct a historic resource survey and seek the historic
designation of vital historic assets in the area so we heard from the people that there are a lot
of historic assets here culturally historic assets but whatever it is right now there is no
designation i will put in a plug for this uh strategy for the staff is you only have one
historic preservation officer in this city and to do something like this and to have a historic
designation program and manage your assets you will need more staff cameron cannot do this alone so
just putting it out there for the budget time second strategy is to seek cultural landscape status
for heartley airfield this is a different kind of designation heartley airfield seems to be
uh really very well loved in the area thought of it's got historic
even if it's not a building but it's got historic aspects to it that the people in the community
really love and so the one way to preserve this would be to seek that cultural landscape status
if you do there is some you can also get grants for it so one thing to keep in mind is that heartley
field is on private property owned by private individuals so those funds might be used to
incentivize to for them to seek this cultural landscape status but you would have to have the
property owners consent to do anything on their property and so but that's something we should
look for similar to you know do we want to go after development agreements in the etj so someone
has to take uh take that step who would be the person or the entity to do it similar to that
some entity has to take on negotiating with the property owner or giving them some incentives to
go seek this cultural landscape status but that's one way to preserve this historic asset in the area
so with that any other questions questions are on those last two strategies
okay
so direction and discussion um we are hoping to get some and i'll just make it this way
so i can do it in real time you put sorry commissioner smith thank you uh you put that
in like that's that's that's strategy one strategy two strategy you put them in order
yes okay that's just i was about to say you're making this hard i mean i gotta go back and look
at all the names of the strategies rather than just saying strategy one strategy two strategy three
i uh the only i think the easier uh i don't chair i don't know how you want to do this i've got just
like random stuff like strategy five okay let's not let's not do that that would be way too
confusing so i assume you've got these in order yes yeah so i think what we need to do is go
through them in order and we can get everybody's feedback if you have it if you don't have it that's
fine too um and then we'll go from there if you can keep your notes in order that way does that work
i guess like no comment does it keep well yeah or you can say keep yeah does that work shai does
that work for you yes okay okay so strategy one is uh conservation development patterns uh to
promote that for all future residential developments in the northeastern area
commissioner puett thank you chair um so i think this is crucial um you know our our purview based
on um staff's direction that you know council gave direction for for this basically amount of
homes up here right the the biggest change to me is that we've got about a thousand acres
that's re-identified as uh transition residential so that's about four thousand or sorry three
thousand homes um and and so the the question then is how do you develop those in a manner that
that achieves the other goals of this plan that are are very laudable um
i'm very concerned about the 30 number that it was in the slide maybe it got taken out in a
in an amendment i'm i didn't catch it as we were reading um i think that's far too low uh you know
as as we saw pictures of the example um development colorado i guarantee you they
were not at 30 percent they had to be probably 60 70 80 percent in order to get all the homes
fronting a place like that um so so my direction is to modify this up way up and the only
thing reason we started at 30 was to keep the density lower so the more you so base densities
three units per acre right so the more you want open space the higher you have to give the density
absolutely that's a trade-off i'll just say that all of all of the um examples of pds that we've
seen come in that used the provision in our code to do this have used it to basically preserve areas
that were already floodplain which i i understand that's that would be tweaked here so that it didn't
apply um and and lot sizes went from 6000 square feet to 5600 square feet and it was still basically
a subdivision and i don't think that's what anybody wants up there so i think that the
percentage needs to be considerably higher than 30 in order to achieve something that's
functionally unique so let me ask you this then but are you in agreement though with the strategy
we just need to look at refining the the amount of land set aside for preservation yeah and i just
think finding the right target and maybe a minimum is crucial to making sure that the implementation
is as the pretty pictures will portend and we can also require not to have it like a typical
subdivision we can put some design criteria in addition for that higher density
okay anyone else on strategy one
are we good to ask for that modification
okay let's move on
so second was to scale from higher density towards the freeways and
going towards lower density to the center of the area
yep uh third was to allow promote neighborhood level commercial development at specific
nodes that um and to allow that within residential transition or as a transition between rural
residential and okay yeah i think my only comment here as it relates to strategy three it also
relates to um strategy 13 um the whole gateway north thing to me is i have a big question mark
with that we have no idea what that looks like we don't even have an inner loop let alone to
an outer loop i mean so designating that as this north gateway with this commercial i'm really
just very apprehensive to do that at this point i just think it is an unknown and i know that
this plan is going to need to be looked at again i mean if it does get done and it does
get implemented i mean five years from now we're going to have to look at it again
because things will have happened and we will need to tweak things and to me to to designate
that north part as as it is presented um i just i would leave that honestly as a as a big question
mark would you be okay if we said if outer loop at this level oh tina's gonna answer that well
i was just saying i mean to that point you're right um this is something that we're gonna have
to monitor and update with the comprehensive plan so you know we're we're trying to
plan for growth and development based upon the known factors that we have today we're working
diligently with textile on the outer loop um you know it may be 20 years out when that thing is
built but we know we're planning for it and so we're trying to be smart in our land planning
if that project for whatever reason goes away then we would be revisiting the land use designations
that are out in this area so you know just shy's point into your point this will be something that
we'll have to monitor and we'll have to update our comprehensive plan every five to ten years to make
sure everything within the plan is still relevant true but that's why i don't want to designate it
now the way it is in this plan because it's going to be way harder to go backwards so if we if we
say hey this northern area we've got it we've got this section set up for this commercial development
whether the outer loop happens or i don't know if it's going to happen but i know that if it's
designated on this plan this plan is going to keep getting referred to just like our comprehensive
plan gets referred to and it's going to say well this area they all looked at this back in 2023
and they said this area is supposed to be commercial so it's just harder to go backwards
and suddenly say well it shouldn't be developed as commercial it should be
conserved so that's why i think it needs to be left out honestly because you know and not i
understand what you're saying but it's it's it's the area that we're dealing with right now
and and yes planning is is is a great idea and if we were inside the loop and and we had this
piece that was undeveloped we know that's coming it's such a question mark up there and it's it
i i don't even know how many of us will be on this planet when that actually happens
i mean we can't again we can't even get the loop finished and i lived here for 30 years
well and keep in mind so this is on the scenario two plan that council gave us direction to move
forward with so the the land use designation has our we've already been given that direction so
then we're looking at okay do these strategies make sense for implementing the plan so like this
strategy number three if you recall was back more towards the discussion on the rural village concept
and being able to apply that also within residential transition area in locations
where it's appropriate to do so so i understand your concern and where you're coming from but
that part of this project is not debatable i would say at this time because of the direction that
council had given us that that's on the the scenario i'm not debating the strategy i'm
debating that particular designation in this part of the the area period i'm not so no i don't think
it goes against council at all i think that and and they can they're obviously in the end going to do
what it is i'm giving my opinion as i see it in looking at what is presented in front of us today
um and i'm sorry i just i didn't mean to cut you but i actually have a solution to it the one
thing i will say is um we had the same issue in burleson uh many years ago when 121 was coming
through we did not want and we had the same conversation didn't want to designate it before
it came well right before it came people put in these really bad looking um storage unit kind of
things it was in the etj was uh some was in the city limits but then the etj built the storage
unit so the pnz and council could say nothing to the gentleman right next door and then came the
fancy looking 121 and today you will see the gateway into burleson off of 121 is this really
bad looking outdoors those storage climate control storage unit places but i understand your issue too
one thing we can do in the plan is to say until the loop is set this will be as is preservation
area and if that outer loop is uh whenever the outer loop alignment is set this is what it will
be when the alignment happens and that way we're covered if it doesn't happen for 20 years nothing
needs to change if it does come people know what they can build there you know another thing we
can also add as a strategy is something with respect of trying to minimize leapfrog development
because in in all reality there are other issues that are going to come into play such as availability
of utilities to be able to serve that area in in that that's going to be the greater cause i mean
we we've had conversations with property owners between the loop and out there and you know they're
looking for financial support from the city we had a property much farther north large track that
was looking for a potential pit or a tiff district in that area and the city was not interested in
supporting that so this i think there are other things that are going to be able to control your
concern i like shy suggestion that until the outer loop is more reaffirmed that this area would
continue in a preservation status let me get other this is just my opinion anyway let me just get
other commissioners involved in this commissioner cole thank you chair um i think the it's more
imminent than we think because collin county's already complete finished segments of the outer
loop already so i think it's closer than you know is is it's imminent and when you have that much
of it done in collin county it's just a matter of time i don't think it's that far off
because i do know they're negotiating right now with landowners on the west side of town
for the loop so it's it's more imminent and i think is being portrayed right and i might add
that the mpo also has funding associated for the outer loop and dentin so and you were mentioning
428 there's no funding associated 428 improvements for relative this glad to know
commissioner smith i'll be quick i'd rather have a vision for we want to see there than not have
a vision for it at all i like the idea of designating as conservation till a certain
point in time i even have the idea of saying it's going to be this vision and for the next
certain amount of years until this happens i'm cool with that for that modification i think that
that your modification recommendation makes sense we shouldn't just 100 lock down something but i
think having no vision for the area for that specific area is more dangerous than than not
having it so um or then having it yeah i think i would be okay with it if it was attached to
actual road development out there uh and not have it be part of it not connected so not attached to
that because again then we develop something out there and we just we we're just kind of we're
doing this and that's not what to me that's not what this should be okay anybody else commission
for it thank you yeah i'll just say i'm no fan of text dot planning our land use for us
and that's what it looks like um you know at the same time i i'm pessimistic maybe five percent
chance that if we say it's going to be conserved and then we want it to be this vision that that
would actually happen um but by setting something forward there's a five percent chance instead of
a zero percent chance so i'm okay with it commissioner smith do you want to run through
all your thoughts um no um yeah i think anything else here i have um i can email okay yeah i think
we'll be okay um okay so we are on so that's two are we good anybody else i'm sorry three yes
yes so do we add that little yes that modification yeah okay i got so we are on
uh number four create design standards to enhance uh for future developments uh to enhance rural
character of the area add design standards in northeast and specific to the area okay yes
and then development agreements number five i'd like to i'd like to see if we can make a
modification just to have some sort of notification to landowners on development agreements um in that
plan having something that's included within there that says in this strategy um maybe notifying land
owners and letting them know hey this is in the plan's been approved it's been done if you are
wanting to do a development agreement this is what development agreement is this is how you should
start that conversation uh really a better way to hear my recommendation for a modification is to
include a marketing plan so in the action steps for this will include uh send out a notification
to invite property owners cool that's all i got commissioner hole i want to follow up
with commissioner smith i i agree totally with that and i'd like to see it i retract my statement
okay we're good okay let's go to six
sorry
infrastructure complete streets and uh context-sensitive design for streets
so multimodal street design so to basically to change your thoroughfare plan to have
different cross-sections so six and seven are actually one uh strategy saying yes to six and
no to seven won't work right we have to say yes to both yeah commissioner perot yeah i'll just say
in sorry i'm eight keep going okay we're good with six and seven okay
well let's let's go to eight
eight was that's the trails yeah trails
wait strategy eight is develop a network trail that connects residential commercial
open spaces form an active transportation network
everybody everyone's good anything on that okay and then nine dcta yeah
yeah okay do we want to put it as long-term uh goal
in the action plan i i sorry go ahead commissioner go ahead i completely trust staff on how to
prioritize these things i just don't want people to get bogged down in action items
and that keep us from doing what staff knows is highest priority for the whole city from a transit
perspective so i'm okay with it yeah i mean i agree strategy nine to me it's certainly low priority
in this plan um i think i mean we we have we need so much more improvement within this
the loop of the city with when it comes to dcta that i don't i don't even see this happening in
any kind of near future so it just seems very very low priority and and we usually try to put it
because it's a 20-year plan just in case suddenly somebody has money and something happens then we
want to be able to grab it and say it was in the plan yeah sure and then this one is the mobility
plan the thoroughfare plan where we recommended different roadways the connectivity if you all
remember we will be putting in there again that it will go with the development and not
be built thank you chairs so my brief comment on this nine and ten i think um i understand and i
support both of them i get really scared when i see a four lane divided highway in the slides
i would just ask that as we go through the implementation of this we take a hard look at
you know it's a rural area if it's 600 cars per day we don't need a four lane road so and
we monitor that as part of our development projects right and we recognize that roads are
maybe in an interim state until they are in their full built-out condition i mean we do that today
as we're working on projects yeah so i mean i yeah enough said okay
okay we are on uh 12 i think i'm sorry 11 right yes 11 11 economic development
for small business unique that's a good strategy to keep for sure everyone
next is uh the open space conservation and management transfer of development rights
commissioner smith i'm a big hard no on this one as of right now um i just and i know this
is a 30 000 foot level view plan and this is a 30 000 foot level idea um maybe i shouldn't call it
an absolute remove but i i don't know how to modify it i don't know how to make a recommendation for
a modification i feel like it's the biggest issue for me is not about the idea of being able to
exchange units in exchange for density and conservation and encourage conservation through
economic development and i'm not a curmudgeon for a change i understand other states and other areas
probably do this and it's probably a well-developed plan elsewhere somewhere in the country it just
feels to me like there is too much risk to allowing flexibility in density on zoning which i think city
staff knows i'm a big huge proponent for flexibility and development code and flexibility in a lot of
areas but if it's approved as a base zoning of zone four of r4 but because of this unit plan idea
we can exchange it in somehow some way neighborhood looks up and it's really a density of you know not
even r7 it's a density of five or six it's like how did that happen oh this really complicated
indexing method that we used for exchange of conservation land for a piece of property you
can't see that's three miles behind us that you don't understand oh but i know how that happened
it seems too too complicated there's probably a simpler more clearly defined way in which we can
encourage conservation through economic development but i don't think this this is it yeah and i'm
gonna piggyback on that i'm a hard no on that too because i think it could absolutely invite
density to where it's unwanted i mean it's like it's supposed to be this but oh well with this
little transfer of stuff and oh now suddenly this one development is way bigger than anyone
anticipated and and it's from how i understand it and see it right now i see no reason for it
to be here other than to play games and shenanigans with with density that is zoned a certain way and
it's gonna be something else commissioner i'm gonna know on that as well yeah if if maybe it
could be brought forward to where it can be to where are the fears are are are not there but i
i don't i don't see it as being or to make it positive i mean as it's as it's currently sorry
as it's currently lined out it's it is general so i guess i i i get that because as programs and
policies can be created off our landlords have said not develop their property in return checked
up in spaces so it is vague um but it it once again i think there's maybe just a different way
in which that can be that can be reworded and re-revisioned to where it it isn't it is something
totally different than strategy 11 or totally different than even strategy 13 which both are
trying to address the same piece but this opens up some sort of as a result selling landowners can
generate income and keep partial parcels of land intact to possibly reduce the property tax without
developing their property it just it seems like it's this money-making strategy it's inside of
there that i don't think it's a shell game that needs to be included in the plan agreed are you
sorry i was gonna ask are you all uh only against if the density selling area and the buying area
was in northeast or are you okay with a northeast being the selling area and somewhere else in the
city being the buying area the thing is we want to make sure the property owners in northeast
can actually not say you're taking their property by not letting them develop they can at least use
their property make money off of their property but not develop their property that's the idea
yeah i understand the idea and i think i think part of that is there's a there's a there's a
certain flexibility that results in a finality that i don't agree with either that hey with
flexibility for current landowner to not develop this and turn it into a conservation easement
okay that's cool for now and it's cool for the next 20 years but those conservation easements are
forever they're for forever and i can remember if they were 100 they're 100 years or they're
perpetual it's like forever they're perpetual then i mean we are we're taking a flexibility for an
idea being thrown around now that locks it up for forever yeah and i'm not saying that we want to
turn that area into concrete city but i also don't want to speak for dentin 100 years from now
and who knows what's going to be needed at that time it just it's it's flexibility leading to
finality that scares me within that well and i think and that's fine and this is why we wanted
your feedback so i mean if the if the consensus of the group is to exclude especially the transfer
development rights and in the buying and selling we can still work towards trying to create policies
that incur the open space conservation and management i was looking back to our strategies
under the land development management so i think we can we can work to refine those other strategies
under the the land development but um but not invest time and effort on this transfer development
rights and buying and selling because it is complex right and and to your point um it
if if we're struggling with it here and and how we might navigate through it then i can understand
members of the public may also um to your point and concern so that that's okay and that's why
we want to have this conversation is to find out where your concerns lie so i'm gonna invite
commissioner pruett in because i know he's got a differing opinion i think thank you chair
you know i i'm just trying to imagine the future here um and i want to make sure we're not throwing
the baby out with the bath water to to borrow an analogy that's probably not quite right um
the part of me that loves simplicity and clarity is is 100 aligned with the three of you however
this is not a simple area the thing i worry about without some sort of tool like this maybe there
are other options that would be more amenable um is that then you see the type of piecemeal
development that we've seen in other areas of the city just because so and so did wanted to develop
their property and a different person did not um and and by not having some sort of tool like this
i worry that the the in in the presentation we were talking about prioritization and and
metrics of areas that we want to be preserved i could just see how easily this ends up being
a an area where we preserve places by accident just because of where the borders are drawn
between different landowners as opposed to preserving areas that are valuable to preserve
so i don't know if there's a different tool or not but there's got to be something that gets us
away from the lines on the platting map and toward the areas for ecological and and historical and
all the other reasons that the whole rest of the draft talks about says here's the areas we want
to focus and if you don't have a transfer flexible piece then there's no way to kind of you know
manage that preservation on a different owner's piece of land right yeah understood and yeah point
well taken i just i wonder if there's a different way to incentivize conservation versus
a slippery slope of possibly especially in the same area of of getting just way higher density
by doing this and it's this kind of smoke and mirrors kind of thing that just doesn't feel right
so i will say that during the presentation we heard that most of the time when something like
this is codified it's codified by a base uh you know um development right of of a gross density
with a cap of here's how much you can get above that through this mechanism so it's not
all bars loose we have an opportunity sorry yeah yes just to the point that what was heard very
clearly for me is the majority doesn't want this to be included to answer your specific question
that yes there are other tools and vehicles that we can achieve the same thing and it doesn't mean
that um it's dead because we kill it right here right now but the detail isn't there so for us
just to to take that and say okay we're going to remove this doesn't mean that it doesn't come back
in some other form or fashion when we can distill a little better so okay thank you commissioner
mcdave thank you chair yeah i was gonna say i'm also a no on this for the simple fact that it is
complicated but to uh piggyback on what tina said somewhere in the future if you get the wording
so it's not only understandable by the the property owner but by joe public
because if this happens and they go okay we have no idea you know explain it to us you want to make
everyone not just the property owners and and the buyer you want to make the whole city aware of how
this how this works instead of just leaving it to the property owners too so that's why right now
in a few years you know you reword it and make it easier to understand because that was a very
complicated uh strategy there so at the right now i i'm a no on this one and you do have to study it
in detail because somebody in the city is going to be upset even if you say oh we're going to put
apartments or higher density a long loop 288 the people that have homes backing up to 288 are not
going to like it so you have to really study where and how much density you're going to put it nobody
is going to be happy with it so you're right somebody's going to be upset that's my life
shall we go so we'll remove this transfer of development rights there were some other things
like conservation district will keep and then um incentives to ensure design standards are met by
character area is that something we are good with and then how about recruiting those uh
nomadic workforce do we want to do that now commissioner cole okay yeah okay oh
and i think i'm gonna pause you right there um and i know we've got a few more strategies that
that took us through 14 i think yes yep so i'm gonna pause i'm going to uh due to a prior
commitment i have to buy out about out of the meeting commissioner vice chair smith is going
to take over and run the meeting so we will um adjourn at 557 p.m and do you all want to
come right back or maybe get your food or whatever you decide do we have food there is oh okay yeah
why don't you all get your food and then you can reset yeah that works okay five minutes let's
adjourn at 558 p.m thank you very much for the recess and welcome back to the planning and zoning
special call work session i will re-convene our meeting at 605 and continue with presentation
from our consultant shy we are on strategy 15 good evening everyone again um starting strategy
15 environmental preservation so adopt regulations that provide for appropriate vegetative riparian
buffers along all major streams and tributaries i just want to point we said along all michael had
mentioned that every one of them does not have a floodplain studied floodplain but we're recommending
we do vegetative buffers along all
all right looks like we're all good to keep it
uh strategy 16 uh creating an active uh bike and pedestrian transportation corridors
within the riparian buffers right now nothing's allowed in it correct
commissioner prudit sorry i on the previous one um given the direction of the city in a city-wide
perspective and the discussion that we had earlier about habitats and that sort of thing maybe we
want to modify that to include um habitat widths based on the the local area in addition to just
the riparian distances for the flora and fauna or for the fauna in addition to the flora does
that make sense well and i was going to ask would that be more of an action item in support of this
strategy shy or would that be something that would be appropriate to include in the wording of this
strategy or michael do you mean like a like a new strategy in addition no i was talking about so um
the these strategies that have been identified they will have supporting action items to implement
the strategy so um so that's why i was asking i didn't know if that would be what your suggestion
especially taking into consideration the widths of these riparian buffers and depending upon the
condition of each of the creeks or streams um an action item would be to um you know study those
streams and evaluate the appropriate riparian buffer widths so that the action item becomes
more specific to support the strategy so that's the only reason why i was asking so because um
because if you get too specified on the strategy then that might inadvertently rule out some other
action items that could support that so that that's the only reason why i ask yeah definitely an
action item and it would expand to look at the habitat and the connectivity too so this would be
something that would be explored in detail with let's say an ecologist or environmental engineer
combined does that address your question yeah and commissioner cole are you okay with that okay
all right so we'll leave that strategy as worded then number 15 got it back to 16 um i think we
set set general consensus of a yes on this uh only thing i'd add in as an action item on this would
be uh to add in a sub trail master plan or a subsection to the trail master plan within there
that if we're adding those adding in it sounds like the way that strategy is worded is is to
create code for allow for pedestrian walkway and you know usage in riparian buffers i think
as an action item in that and that's and that 16 would be to then add that into our our master
plan our trails master plan we have for parks okay okay anything else is 16 good to go
okay 17 prioritized shared use and multi-benefit nature-based infrastructure including
best management practices such as bioswales bioretention enhanced swales um and the action
item would be which of the uh mass uh design criteria manuals you might need to change in the
city to add that in but the strategy is to prioritize that okay we're good looks like
we're a general consensus of yes that's good and then uh prioritize the protection restoration
expansion of the tall grass prairie and connected woodland spaces in the area okay everyone's good
there uh evaluate the efficacy of retrofitting existing stock bonds um to create i'm just going
to paraphrase it to create a overall stormwater quantity and quality mitigation system yep looks
good so one of the action items of this would be to look at a area wide uh stormwater management
plan and then two more historic preservation um strategies that's to conduct a historic resource
survey and seek historic designation of vital assets in the area is that a study everyone
i think we're on board for that oh commissioner prudit thank you chair i'm not against this but
i'm very sensitive to our capacity as a city to actually implement this plan um given the the
comments of the the staff needs and that sort of thing i would just ask that the action items be
drafted in a manner that gives us clear you know low effort high return items um
so that we make sure we with our limited capacity we make the most progress in this as possible
well and if i could add to that um and i didn't weigh on the comment previously but
you know that we have other resources that we may be able to utilize to accomplish this
so while i know shy put a plug for additional staff on my historic preservation team know that
we could potentially have resources available to utilize consultant services with to help us with
historic resource surveys we've done that in the past so that's not something that is foreign to us
that gives us that additional manpower to be able to be able to accomplish that objective so i think
the i think the strategy is important to keep um but we can focus on what the necessary action
items are to support that okay good we'll give more detail on in during the action items and then
seek cultural landscape status for hurtly field yeah i think we're all good there
thank you all so much we are thank you shy uh then uh next steps uh city staff you guys can give us
the next steps everyone who's watching at home uh what where we go from here right so when we
put these materials together we were anticipating that these strategies would also we would have a
discussion with council on the 14th um we've retooled our um task on that so we will not be
having that discussion with council on the 14th that's a decision that's been made by our director
instead council is going to be able to take all the feedback that we receive from the commission
and that's why we really wanted to focus and have this conversation with the commission because
to more the emphasis on the planning part of your planning and zoning commission title right
so i appreciate all your feedback and comments on that so we're going to be retooling our project
schedule we will not be having that discussion with council on the 14th the other aspect that
we've got is keep in mind is you know as i said earlier all of these tasks and efforts that we
work on they build upon each other based upon direction council's already given us so you know
ultimately council is the one that's going to be deciding whether or not this plan gets adopted so
these strategies really were to see and i appreciate getting your feedback on whether
you think that we're on target or if we were off base i thought we did pretty well we only
eliminated one strategy so um we will take these strategies we will continue working on this as a
project team on supplementing the action items some of those actions you already saw in this material
with all and you know if we had shy present that we'd be here till 11 o'clock this evening so we
we've got that information out to you in advance so you can see that's already formulating some of
those actions but the project team will refine those have those action items that support these
strategies and then we will update our discuss denton webpage as we always do when we make any
changes to the schedule associated with the project because i know we have several folks that are
interested in following this project along and be able to communicate that out so um that's our next
steps and we will again continue to push information out as well as to the steering committee
and as to what our next steps will be for the project awesome um christopher thank you chair i
i think there was a note about you know if there were any additional um strategies or goals yes i'm
sorry we should have asked was was there a strategy that you felt we left out so um
so based on some of the comments about the north area from other commissioners being kind of
separate and undetermined of when it will come in and very different from the area south of clear creek
i i understand that our our fiscal evaluation of this was included in the prior joint
session that we had with council um as i think through the implementation of of you know if
areas like this start to to develop uh and there are you know requests for rezoning to support
the plan and that sort of thing um i anticipate that we will get our fiscal evaluation for each
individual project and there may be comments of well this one doesn't pencil oh that's okay
because others will right and so i'm wondering whether it would be appropriate to kind of now
that the plan is a little bit more refined rerun that tool as a separate geographic section
south of clear creek from the north of clear creek future area in order to ensure that everybody's
kind of comfortable with um with the plan being fiscally sound as our comp plan asks does that
make sense i think i'm understanding your asks so basically you're wanting us to reevaluate the
fiscal impact analysis associated with the land use recommendations in the plan or did i miss that
yeah that's that's accurate and i think you know as we refine it through the implementation the goal
would be to balance those needs with other needs in in the area um just so that we we do the
implementation in a way that is least uh puts the least upward pressure on tax rates for for people
in the city does that make sense i think i'm following you um my i think let me let me just
say like as an example if if different zoning change applications come to us and we hear
here's the fiscal report for this one here's the one for this one here's the one for that one
i mean i i can envision a a future where it says oh well don't worry about this one because we
have others coming that are going to offset it or something right and and so having a basis for that
sort of claim as part of the outcome of the plan i think would help explain that once that that time
comes does that make sense i i think so i i guess i would look at this from a standpoint then uh you
know keep in mind that fiscal impact analysis tool that we developed was to be used for informational
purposes and not the sole determinant of all of our decisions um you know with this plan we did an
extensive amount of fiscal analysis above and beyond what we had scoped as a result of some of
the questions that we had received previously were to the point where if we want to do any additional
fiscal analysis associated with it then that either needs to be a recommended action item that is
included associated with or possibly a strategy we'll have to ruminate over that a little bit more
but um with the the land development and or the economic section of the strategy but i'm i don't
have the ability financially at this time related for this project to do that additional fiscal
analysis associated with it but that's not to say that you know if you feel that that's something
important that we need to include as a strategy and our action item within the plan we can always
we can always put that in the plan um in including you know monitoring decisions that have been made
as it relates to land development applications and to rezonings within the area that might influence
the outcome of the the fiscal impact does it would does that help address your need yeah and
i understand you can't commit to something that's not funded um i just i don't have the means under
my existing contract either right so that i just want to make sure the commission is is aware of
that so i'm i'm aware of that i i just think including it helps us keep that front and center
okay so so we can look at um possibly adding that as a strategy and our action item um
within the plan itself yeah okay okay any other items any other strategies anything else want to
be included okay uh before we adjourn i just want to say thank you to uh shy and our consultants
as well as a big thank you to staff now this has been a huge project you guys have undertaken
greatly appreciate it really appreciate your hard work and i hope that doesn't just sound like
smoke being blown um i don't want to just don't you know prolong our meeting just to say thank you
but thank you and thank you to the steering committee and the steering committee being here
i know it's been a lot of sweat and uh tears and hopefully not a lot of blood but uh plenty of
sweat and tears so uh thank you guys for your help and your assistance and being able to get this plan
down uh we're very appreciative of it so and uh hopefully you guys are appreciative too so uh with
that said no other comments uh there is no concluding items on the agenda uh so therefore
at 6 20 i'll convene our meeting thank you very much