Planning Commission Regular Meeting/Work Session

Paul Naptystaffthoughts about supporting additional height potentially beyond what the recommendations of the smaller your plans are general density revisions in terms of how density is calculated and what the total development amount can be commercial incentives we've heard a lot about the desire for more commercial to be included in mixed-use development projects so we're looking at ways to improve that a general citywide reduction to requirements for office parking this is something we also mentioned to you before we now have a more specific standard that we're going to be recommending and then applicability of special exceptions this is something we have not discussed before but special exceptions are a tool in the zoning ordinance where

an applicant can request deviations from the general standards of the zoning ordinance. And so as we include these new provisions in the zoning ordinance, we'll be having to think about which ones of these we might want to accommodate special exceptions for. Certainly in most cases, we prefer to have development happen without special exceptions, but we need to be cognizant of situations where there might be unique factors that should be taken into consideration. So I'll go through each of these and then to explain them in more detail. we'll be seeking feedback from you in the end. So the first item related to changes to the relationships to overlay districts. As you may recall, the new activity center district can only be used in defined activity centers,

changes in the smaller plans themselves and then adjust the zoning ordinance accordingly however we did hear a lot of requests for this a lot of interest and so we're putting it out there There are alternatives for how this could work if we do not specifically include language that supports taller building heights. One is special exceptions. We will talk again more about special exceptions for all the provisions in this section later. But related to height, if we allow special exceptions for height, then an applicant could request a special exception if they are going beyond the height requirements. One of the concerns we've had, one of the reasons we're doing these amendments is because nearly every applicant for residential mixed use development in these areas is requesting

special exceptions because they have to really because our current structure does not accommodate the recommendations of the smaller plant including for things like height. And so what would be different with this is that we would be accommodating the height that's recommended in the smaller plant so if somebody were requesting a special exception that this is different from what's in the smaller plans and we should be looking for some kind of benefit. That being said, the special exception process does not specifically define what should be considered a benefit. There are very loose standards to it. And as the planning commission might be aware, this planning commission doesn't actually have a defined role

in providing recommendations for special exceptions. You can comment on them during the land use review process, but you're not providing a recommendation to city council on that. So there are some drawbacks as well to that. Another alternative shown here is if we do, if we don't accommodate either, we don't have special exceptions for height and we don't accommodate the language, there is still a path that applicants could use by rezoning to one of our planned development districts. These are districts that have loose standards that an applicant can essentially write their own standards for the development provided certain benefits are met. there is a structure to this process and it's intended to allow for development

as shown on the chart to the left, and that gets very close to what was observed in Old Town. And that's an average among all the properties that were looked at. So some of them have usage rates that were higher than that. So we felt that that was getting a little too close for comfort, and so we're recommending that we make the adjustment to 1 to 400 while allowing the additional reduction in the activity center district through incentives. And then the last thing I wanted to mention is special exceptions. So just for planning committee's knowledge, and I expect you have not memorized the zoning ordinance, but there are two sections where as we start to integrate these amendments into the zoning ordinance,

we're not just going to pick everything up and plop it in the middle of the ordinance. It gets kind of dispersed into appropriate locations to where it fits. And there are two sections where the majority of these recommendations are falling. one is an article 3 which has the general zoning districts and regulations this includes things like dimensional standards and uses the second is article 4 which are site development standards which include things like parking requirements signage standards landscaping standards and those types of things and so the way the ordinance is set up with special exceptions and again Special exceptions is a tool that applicants can use to request deviations from the ordinance

requirements. They are not applicable to all of the standards in the zoning ordinance, only specifically where the zoning ordinance says they can be used. The zoning ordinance says that special exceptions apply to all of the standards in Article 4, which again, this is the site development standards, landscaping, parking, and those types of things. You'll see at the bottom of this chart here where we have the different sections. Those last three are Article 4. And so we are recommending we allow special exceptions there just to be in line with what the zoning ordinance allows everywhere else. In Article 3, which are the uses and the density standards and those types of things, the zoning ordinance allows special exceptions for certain provisions, but not all.

And we have some flexibility with how we organize our standards within this section, whether we want to allow special exceptions or not. And so what we're proposing to you is that we do allow special exceptions for some provisions. I'll explain why and not for others. I want to see if you have thoughts on that. Based on that, that will help us inform where we locate some of these provisions within this article. So looking at those in Article 3, starting from the top, the approval process, this is where we say that this is only applicable in activity centers. You had to go through the rezoning process. We're proposing special exceptions there because those are the base standards. Obviously you want to stick with them.

The second one is development frontages. We have an example of the types of standards in here and the graphic to the right. We are proposing that we allow special exceptions here because this gets into some of the nitty-gritty about sidewalks, about the space between the front of the building and the sidewalk and those types of things. And things can come up such as utility poles and that can kind of create weird situations and we wouldn't want to hamper development to move forward just on something like that. The next two, density and building height, obviously are very important for these amendments. And we feel through the community benefits program that we are accommodating density, that there are ways for that to be flexible to an extent.

exceptions be permitted recreation and open space this is something that's very important the smaller plans very important to this district we would not recommend allowing special exceptions here we think that every development should be able to accommodate what was shown in the recommendations. Access is similar to development frontages. The standards in here discuss how new private streets should be laid out, how pedestrian pathways should be laid out, getting again into the more nitty-gritty details. And this is also the type of thing where, you know, strange things could come up with topography or utilities and those types of things that we wouldn't want to get in the way of development. So we support special exceptions

there. And lastly, community benefits. This is where the proposed amendments specifically say you can earn this by providing this, and we want to make sure we're getting what we want through this, and so we would not support special exceptions there. So we wanted to get those in front of you, make sure you're aware of them, hear your thoughts if there are some we think we should be more open to, or others you think we should be more tight-knit on. One thing I want to make clear though is with special exceptions we have heard throughout numerous conversations during this process a lot of people say you know development comes and it is a little bit taller than the development that came before or a little

bit more dense than the development came before and we keep heading in this directory in this trajectory how do we how do we do something about that and by limiting opportunities for special exceptions that's the tool we have to stop that from happening and kind of saying this is this is the standard and continue living with this standard. That being said, you should also be aware that when we don't allow special exceptions, then if there is a development that is dependent on any of these things, we do not have the ability to review it or even consider it for approval if they don't have the tool to have that special exception. So we need to be cautious of this. We have competing needs here, and so we want you to be aware

James FeatherOthers? Nothing more for me. One of the things you've achieved was one of my objectives is managing special exceptions that the Planning Commission doesn't get to weigh in on even though they're very important to the overall vision of activity center redevelopment. and I think this scratches a lot of that itch for me. So thank you.