Planning Commission Regular Meeting/Work Session

James FeatherOkay. A number of things that were on my mind have been said. Some I think are worth repeating. I will be a bit of a contrarian when it comes to non-residential uses along University Drive. You know that the requirement 75% ground floor that's in the zoning ordinance and one of our work sessions this evening later is how we bring our small area plan vision and our zoning ordinance together so that we can better reflect what the small area plans reflect. Small area plans do not reflect retail at all in this area and I think it's actually a bonus that you're providing some retail and other commercial space in building on Cambridge

Thank you, Mr. Sutton, and thank Mr. Frederick Porras, too, for his work. Okay, next item on our agenda is introduction and discussion of potential amendments to the City of Fairfax zoning ordinance related to the adopted small area plans, as we had just commented on. Mr. Dernapte.

Justin Wallaceover the background which you are very familiar with as far as the comp plan and small area plans we'll talk about the project timeline and what our goals are and then we'll give a snapshot of some of the issues that we've heard thus far. I will not spend too much time on the comprehensive plan, as you know. It was adopted in 2019. It's been amended since then. One of the key components of the comprehensive plan is its future land use map, which outlines the different character areas and place types for the city. we're going to be focused on the purple areas, the activity center areas. These are areas that are anticipated to expect mixed-use, walkable, pedestrian areas development over time.

And so that is kind of the scope of where our implementation will be focused on. After the adoption of the comprehensive plan, the city embarked on efforts to do more detailed analysis on a small area plan level focused on Camp Washington, Pickett and Main, or excuse me, Fairfax Circle, Old Town, and Northfax. And four out of the five activity centers, small area plans have been adopted. And so these are more nuanced investigation about what the future character of these small area plans will be like in the next decade. And so they go into more nuance with the types of uses, land uses and activities, what the desired density, intensity, and overall character and aesthetic, what the future street networks look like, what types of infrastructure improvements in terms of stormwater,

getting those access improvements in, and also considerations for parking and open space qualities. For those that may not be aware that are listening to the presentation, there is a difference between land use policy and zoning, and we are trying to align the two. And so when we talk about the comprehensive plan and the small area plans, those set the overall vision and goals outlining how the city wants to grow and what it wants to preserve. These are documents that our city officials use for decision-making, and these are updated from time to time, but they do not change the zoning. So therefore, we were brought to the table to look at the city's zoning ordinance and update it. And the zoning is regulation, it's the law, and it controls the physical characteristics

as we know with the allowed and permitted land uses, density, height, setbacks, landscaping, and all types of other physical characteristics on a parcel by parcel basis. looking at the city's zoning ordinance to make sure that it is up to date, which we frequently, it's a working document, so we need to consistently look at it and make sure that it's aligned with the policy documents. And so that is our goal and our task. So examples of those discrepancies and gaps between the policy documents and the zoning documents. things that were looked at in the small area plans such as as we heard tonight height what types of land uses and activities open space what does that look like feel like and what does the future transport rate rotation access

Our next phase will be strategy development. So we'll take what we've learned thus far and we'll begin putting our heads together and identifying strategies. and that will be included in a written report and we'll be back in front of you to prevent those findings and then ultimately we'll go into phase three with the overall drafting of the ordinance updates and then into adoption mode. So we're early on in the project and the overall objectives, what's in our scope is really implementing the small area plans. Ideally, this would improve the challenges that private developers are facing. In your case, how the public is investing in the community. We've been looking at recent trends in development,

understanding the issues through the different boards, planning commissioner, planning commission council, and understanding what those trends are in terms of city negotiations. And we're looking at what the gaps are, what the discrepancies are, and of course balancing community interests, what we've heard from the community with what the market is seeing. So ideally our outcomes, our goals is to align with the policy, the comprehensive plan, small area plans, and we'd like for this to be as clear and purposeful as possible. Mark likes to say make the right things easy. So we'll try to look at streamlining and creating an efficient development review process as part of this and just clarifying and supporting the community goals and objectives.

So I believe in your packet there's a issue summary and so what I have here on the screen are eight buckets that summarizes what we've heard so far and I'm going to go into a little bit of detail but there's a written description in your packet following each of these. Again, our goal is to align with the comprehensive plan. When there's misalignment, it leads to inconsistency and unpredictability. And so ideally, we'd want to build in that predictability into the zoning ordinance. We'd like to reinforce the distinctions of the small area plans. There are nuances with each of these plans. So we'd like to build inconsistency, but ideally find solutions that are tailored to the specific nuances of each of these areas.

Paul CunninghamSince then and it was predicted at that point we would start going through a series of amendments to the zoning ordinance that were designed to personalize it for the city if you would and it wasn't until 2019 that the small area plans actually were put on the table and came out of a comp plan review 2019 we have been developing the small area plans and recognize that They really didn't fit what we had done and that there were nuances as you have referenced them So what we're trying to do? I think is personalize The plan to those areas and then personalize the overall zoning ordinance to those peculiarities that are worth being codified in law or zoning and going with that. At this point, I think we have overcome most of the original challenges

Justin WallaceWell, I think in general, the city. But I think it's more nuanced. you know the small area plans are neighborhood specific more detailed and so I think you know when I was at the community meeting we had individuals talking specifically about Camp Washington area and you know the multimodal hub and others talking about resiliency and tree canopy and so as a whole I think it's we're hearing a lot of voices but I think each each small area their own nuance and characteristics and priorities I think it just has to I mean when you can't compare you know Old Town to Camp Washington they're just two different contexts so I think you know we're gonna hear different things from different activity centers and that will need to be ultimately reflected and in

Paul Cunninghamof what they are to to deal with the safety concern there and that falls back into those are the core priorities and then beyond that what do we have in the capability to reach out and make it better and the tax ability to fund those things should be balanced with the entire budget and kept in in an affordability standpoint recognizing that you know these may be the best of times but when you wake up and they turn out to be the worst of times you can and that's where we go so we keep it in balance and that was the operative word and you caught on with that so keep it balanced those are my essential priorities working down and then there are programs we've talked about roads and improving what's in the in the small area plans for the basic core things to