 Call to order the July 6, 2020 meeting of the Arlington Redevelopment Board meeting is being held remotely. It's from my own camera. Be held remotely in accordance with Governor Baker's March 12, 2020 order suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law. General law chapter 30 a section 20 public comments will be accepted during the public comment period. Please keep your mutes on until you're called on as usual as we progress through these things. I think it's worked well so far. Raise your hand. I will call on you in the order you pop up on my screen. Because of the length of the agenda this evening. I'm going to strictly be limiting comments to three minutes as laid out in the ARB bylaws and rules and regulations. Jenny will be timing that and let you know when your three minutes are up. Because I expect a considerable amount of public comments on both public hearings this evening. I want to make sure that everyone gets a chance not only to speak their piece but to make sure that they are listened to by all the attendees here. We'll move right into business here. First up is docket 3,602. 12 oh seven 12 11 math that continue public hearing for the hotel Lexington. I see both Mary Lou and Stanley O'Connor and Jim Doherty are here this evening. So Mary, I will turn it over to you. Thank you, Andrew. The board is in receipt of my June 24, 2020 letter addressing a number of the points and the submissions. And what I will do is I am not going to repeat things that we have discussed in prior meetings, but just expand upon some others that we have provided you information with. With respect to the board had asked for renderings illustrations of how the project would look from east the east, the west and Clark Street we provided you those they were done by born illustration. I have given you my position with respect to the step back issue. As a matter of what Doug Heim has reported that the board in fact and the board knows has the ability to take into consideration all alternating using an alternative method of determining whether a step back is necessary. With respect to parking. The petitioner is proposing 24 parking spaces on site. And as the board knows the air is no requirement for the first 3000 square feet of non residential use then restaurant is 2800 square feet so we're talking at a maximum 50 spaces for the hotel and the board has the ability to reduce that to 25% of what's required. Mr. Dorothy is proposing 48% of the needed parking or 24 spaces and the ability to stack Parker tandem park eight additional vehicles this is going to be exclusively valet there will be no self parking. And the board has approved a stack parking at the Homewood Suites when it approved the 20 additional rooms several years ago. The board also requested that he procure off site parking for employees and he has done that. I have submitted those letters. He has obtained 11 spaces commitments for 11 spaces at several different locations. That does not include any spaces that he may lease from the town at the Odyssey Middle School parking lot parking on site would be restricted to overnight hotel guests. No self parking and no tour bus parking. Of the next thing is the traffic impact report we've provided you with an extensive traffic impact report and study. The data, the traffic counts were done on February 4 and February 5, which is a Tuesday and Wednesday of 2020. And the conclusions in the report indicate that the proposed project will have the minimum impact on the surrounding roadway network. Most most impact during off peak commuter hours which would be check in and check out for the hotel and the proposed restaurant use what have the highest impact weekday evening commuter hours dinner time hours. The is expected that 52 vehicle trips would occur during the weekday morning peak hour and 57 during the weekday afternoon peak hour, which is a net increase of 18 trips during the morning peak hour and 23 during the weekday evening peak. So it's essentially one additional trip every three minutes during the peak hours. These, the traffic engineer studied the area intersections and he has opined that they will operate at the same level of service. He also suggests that there's no additional mitigation or capacity enhancements necessary at the intersections. He has used a 2% annual growth rate for build conditions whereas the master plan has included a much lower traffic volume increase over the years. The proposed project is not expected to have any significant impact on delays or queuing. Now he does discuss the fatality the bicycle accident that occurred at Appleton Street massive at the end. He has opined that the flashing signal equipment and solar layer likely played a significant portion of a significant impact in the what happened there that tragic situation. As you know the board of select the select board put together a committee to study that area to make short term and long term improvements as well as other areas on mass air. The shadow study as I've said in my letter what Mr seltzer has submitted and he calls an extended shadow study is not competent evidence. He is not qualified to provide that type of report to the board. We have a shadow study that was provided by Lincoln architects, which clearly reveals the shadow from the proposed hotel is minimal. What the shadow study does show is that the mature trees that are there are what's causing the shadow. The only impact would be it's with 18 pier street and 18 pier street on the shadow study is too over from the right. Solar panels on the easterly side of 18 pier street. The hotel shadow will not impact 18 pier street, but it will have an impact at 3pm during the winter solstice. So it's the westerly side of that property that would be impacted. The hotel has no impact on 18 pier street solar panels. And then with respect and Mr Benson had asked that with respect to the public access space that I provide a draft easement agreement for the public access space which I did provide and I have also provided it to town council I have not heard from him in response. But the number of times per week and the hours of usage would be up to this board I would suggest to you we had recommended two days two times per week. We don't want this to be a nuisance to the neighborhood you don't want this as something that's used every day. The plants have been revised to reflect a number of the changes that the board requested. So if I think it's probably better if you have specific questions that you'd like to address and oh and finally the issue of contamination to the extent that they may they may be underground storage tanks there that would be revealed before in connection with the 21 E that would be done and the remediation would be done in accordance with federal and state law. Thank you Mary. I'll turn it over to the board for questions and begin with Jean. Thank you. Good evening everybody thank you for that little overview attorney. I know when Stanley. I have a few questions and then some comments. I wasn't clear when you were talking about the parking behind the building, whether restaurant patrons would ever be allowed to use that parking behind the building. They would not at any time. No, it was exclusively valet for overnight guests. Okay, thank you. You had said overnight and I didn't know whether that was meaning at other times of the day, other people can use it but it's only for people who be staying overnight at the hotel. That's correct. Okay, thank you. Where will the tour bus let off passengers and where will it park after it drops off the passengers. It's going to have to park somewhere outside of Arlington likely the in Lexington up along Route 128. And I believe that it will pull Jim I will defer to you where will the tour bus let off Jim. I apologize just trying to unmute it Mary. The tour bus will drop off under the cop what one of the earlier meeting someone had inquired as to the height and it was stated that it will be high enough and that is in fact the case to your point. The service center 128 just passed the junction of route 21128 is is location where buses and other vehicles such as that can can can park there overnight. There'd be no on site parking for the tour buses. That's correct. And no morning parking either. No. For the tour buses. No. Okay. Can you talk about how you calculate the gross floor area because I couldn't find I saw your final number but it felt to me like a black box so can you In how the gross floor area was calculated and it will be helpful to actually see those calculations if you haven't provided them already because I couldn't find them. Jim, I understand that they, they were provided previously. Prior submissions. Is that correct? So, so what what we tried to do, Jean was address the issue that was raised last at the last meeting. I believe when, when, when someone suggested that they couldn't calculate to verify the swift what numbers that we previously had on there. I think the planning department mentioned that they could not do it because the missing dimensions. So we included the dimensions this time around for someone to go forward, but we can certainly You know, augment that if you want in terms of will give both a grid with the exact floor areas, and then someone's more than welcome to do the math if that's what they choose to do. I think it would be good if you could do both if you could both give us the grid with floor area for each story, plus how you did the calculation to come up with the number that you came up with. The calculation I can tell you the calculation is simply inclusive of the four floors above grade. Okay, well, that's what we that's what I'd like to see how we'll provide it right. Okay, thank you. That would be very helpful. Let me get to what you were talking about. Attorney when Stanley O'Connor about the stepbacks. I carefully reread Town Council Himes memo of May 13. After we received your letter of the other day, and his memo doesn't mention stepbacks at all. It mentions that we have the authority to grant adjustments to required stepbacks under 5.3.16. But that provision is just for setbacks and not stepbacks. So if you can give me a citation to the bylaw that allows us to adjust the stepbacks. That would be very helpful because I will get that for you. Thank you. Let me talk about the setback now we're talking about the setback on Clark Street. The bylaw I think is pretty clear that because you're on a corner and your property about the art to zone that your setback on Clark Street is required to be whatever the front yard setback is required to be in the art to zone, which is a 20 foot setback. Now I understand and agree that the board does have the authority to adjust that for specific conditions unique to the hotel proposal, but you seem to say both in your letter you seem to say both that the side yard setback did not apply, but also that the hotel had specific conditions unique to the proposal. I wonder if you'd like to clarify were you really saying both or are you really just saying it had unique conditions. No, I was saying I'm arguing in the alternative. Well, can you explain to me the first part of the alternative why you're not subject to 5.3.8a, which says a corner lot shall have the minimum street yards with depths, which shall be the same as the required front yard depths for the adjoining lots. I think because the mixed use bylaw provides that there is no side yard setback. That's what I would And you don't think that 5.3.8a is intended to come into play for all of the later dimension setback side yard provisions and that's why it's there. I don't think it. I think that override. Okay, well, I think we're going to have to disagree about about that part of it. I should say that I'm not sure that the redevelopment board is the right entity to have the easement and I think that's something that I at least would have the board to be discussing with the town council. To see who's the right. What is the right entity in town to get the easement for the public access space. I'm sure you wouldn't have any objection to that. No, but I think Mr. Benson that the ARB would be the board that would make the determination as to the duration and use of it. Well, I think not necessarily. I think maybe but maybe not and similar to the naming. I sort of feel that the naming needs to be done by the select board if it's going to be an easement that the town has. So that's one thing that I think I'd like the redevelopment board to discuss sometime this evening, assuming we go ahead and approve this. Let me see if there's anything else I wanted to ask you. I think I have some other things, but there are more comments that I make rather than questions. So I'll save those for after all the questions are done. Thank you. Thanks, Jane. Quickly, I'm just going to interrupt. Just to get a roll call on the members so you can say here. Jean Benson here. David Watson here. Ken Lau. Can you have it on you? Sorry about that. Yeah. Okay, and Rachel and Barry. Thank you. Sorry about that. Well, thank you, Gene. Jenny, I think you can answer some of the questions. Gene has. Do you want to go ahead and do that? Yes. Thank you, Andrew. This is Jenny rate. I'm the director of planning and community development. And the first question is about the easement. So if it was going to be a permanent easement, yes, the board could certainly speak to the duration of the easement, but ultimately the select board accepts an easement. And then we believe that it would actually go to town meeting. So that that would be I've already spoken with council about this. So that that's one scenario. The other scenario is it's a special permit condition and to grant the easement to the town, but it still would have to go through the select board and then town meeting ultimately. So the alternative would be that it's simply an agreement that we are able to use this as as public space. And there's some time limitation on how long it's actually available to the public, which is sometimes the scenario and other for other hotels that have, you know, open space or other accommodations that are available to the general public. So that's something in terms of naming any sort of area with a plaque or some sort of memorial. That would be both the select board and then the memorials committee for the town. So it is not something that the air be does at all. And again, we could support these things as conditions in the special permit, but ultimately we are not the board to make those decisions. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Move on to David. I'm having a little bit of a technical problem, which I'm trying to resolve. So I have my notes. Okay, I've got it. All right. All right. First, I would like to just say a little something about the step back issue. I share Jean's concern about whether the provision of the bylaw and the town council's opinion regarding it actually applies to the step back on the upper stories in addition to setbacks around the perimeter of the property. But even if it does, I don't feel that you've made a particularly compelling case that we should exercise discretion if we have it. You know, certainly the economic viability of a project is an important consideration, but I feel like that argument could be made for pretty much any project where an upper story setback is required, that it's reducing the economic viability of the project by reducing the available gross floor area. So I don't feel that that's necessarily a winning argument in this situation. I wanted to focus primarily on the traffic study and would like to say I do appreciate getting all the new data and there's a lot of it. So one thing I would like to suggest to the board is that we asked the Transportation Advisory Committee to take a look at all this new traffic data and let us know if they have any thoughts on either the data or the conclusions that have been drawn from the data. With respect to what is in the report, I did appreciate that the data was taken from a significantly broader area than just the immediate vicinity of the hotel. It goes as far east, I think, as Pine Court and includes Forest Street and the Appleton intersection. I did notice that that the data from the consultant did not include data for the Lowell Street intersection, although there were several mass dot crash reports that were included in the report that did include some less detailed traffic count data for that intersection from it look like the same timeframe, which was February of this year. I was wondering whether the consultant had taken data for Lowell Street and just neglected to include it or whether the only data available is the mass dot data. I do not think he did traffic counts at Lowell Street. Okay. I do think Lowell Street is also a critical component of the traffic patterns in this area. I do see from the data that is available in the report that there is significant traffic coming off of Lowell Street at various times a day. So I'm not sure that we have enough data regarding that intersection, but I do appreciate that the study area has been significantly increased to include other intersections. I did want to point out that this data was taken by observation in February of this year. And I went back and looked at what the temperature was on the days that the observations were made. And it was in the 20s on the mornings that the observations were made. So I have significant concerns about the bicyclist and pedestrian numbers. Because their numbers would typically be reduced over the winter months and it was particularly cold on those mornings. So I'm not sure that these numbers really add much to the picture of what the bicycle and pedestrian traffic is like at those intersections. Another thing I noticed is I was looking at the data on turning movements and I looked at the Clark Street intersection in particular. And I didn't quite understand some of the data. And what I didn't understand was looking at the observed turning movements and then they did no build and build projections on the turning movements. The no build projections resulted in slight increases to both left and right turning movements over a five-year period. But the build projections projected just a handful of additional turning movements to the left and no additional right-hand turning movements over the no build option. And I didn't understand how that could be possible because presumably hotel guests would be leaving in the morning and some of them would be turning right. So I'm a little bit confused about the quality of those projections. And it's possible I'm misunderstanding them and that's why I want the Transportation Advisory Committee to take a look at this if they can do that. But I do have concerns about the data and any conclusions that might be drawn from it. I just want to respond in my correspondence to you. I also mentioned with respect to one of the reasons to adjust the step back is that you are taking a property that's a before use now and converting it to another use which is highly recommended by the bylaw. In fact, there's provisions in the bylaw that says when you have the opportunity to change a before use the ZBA and the ARB should attempt to do that. So that is another reason. I appreciate that. I think that is those are my main comments. Another thing I wanted to mention, I was having a really hard time understanding the driveway slopes at the back of the hotel and what that would mean for entering vehicles entering and exiting that rear parking lot. And there is an image in the presentation. I think maybe it's a garbage truck and how it would back into the property and it it looked a little bit scary because it looked like the front of the garbage truck was at an angle where it was almost on the property across the street from from the driveway entrance so I don't know whether there was something another sheet in here that showed the slopes of the whole back more more clearly or or or if it's just not in here. I'd have to defer to Jim on that. The real rear parking area is not it's not a whole. It's has a very modest extremely modest slope into that area. And the shadow highlighted area on that study is simply a demonstration of the entire street layout of the street where a truck could go down. The reason there was a decision made by the engineer to utilize a rubbish removal vehicle was because that demonstrated that that would be the largest vehicle that would enter that site. IE all delivery vehicles would not be that large or larger than that. I see. And does it show the slope right at at the driveway entrance and and into the parking area. It does Jean you can see if you look along the slide that someone nicely just put up the distance you will see where the arrows are going in the back corner just before the buffer space. I see that. It's cited 93. Yes. Okay. And then you can see the arrow showing down. I believe it's showing a 5% pitch there. I think that distance is somewhere approximately we'll say about 20 feet where it gets down to where it's 92, which is between the two arrows just in front of where the water retention system would be under the driveway. It's an extremely modest slope. So what's the 13.25% that's below the 93? I don't know. I would have to ask the engineer. Exactly. I'm not an engineer. But I think you can see where the numbers are laid out where the center where the middle of that is is probably the, you know, the best depiction. And it's 94 93 and 92. And that's right in the center. So I don't know if the pot right there that that wall is six feet high above that driveway area. And again, it's to create a buffer area there as well in more green space for the for the neighbors. I mean, at least we can certainly follow up with that for you. Yeah, I'd love to see maybe maybe an elevation that better displays exactly what the slope looks like. And my primary concern is, is visibility of pedestrians and oncoming traffic on Clark Street when vehicles are exiting the driveway. No slope like there, there will we certainly will, we'll get like kind of a cut through elevation of that angle there for you but nothing would rise remotely close to situation. It's not a situation similar to where the town just went through and had to deal with all of the parking garages under the two family duplex condos being built and things like that. This would this is the garrison is not even remotely close. I, I would just like to, to see, see that a little bit more clearly. Yeah, and I, and I think again, whoever if this is Jenny whoever's doing a good job, pulling the bottom of the plan up you can see the driveway detail there as well. But we can, we can certainly, we can certainly speak to the engineer about that and show Mary can address it. Yeah, because it does show on the right side of that slide it does. I am seeing it is showing a five to 15% slope. And that's a little bit unclear to me that it's got a variable slope. And what that actually looks like. And 15% would be pushing right up against the limits of what we would allow in, in the example that you gave with the houses with the garage under. Correct. But I don't, I don't do with Mary again I'll defer to you on it but I think that's certainly something we can follow up with those other items. Yes, we will. I think those were my main items for for now. Thank you, David. Thanks Mary and Jim. Jenny, my understanding is attack is meeting pretty infrequently. Could we have an analysis, how quickly could we have an analysis on maybe by your transportation planner and some staff members, if possible. I think that could be done by the next meeting, which is the 20th, I believe. And we're next, the board's next meeting on, yeah. And a July 20. And that potentially some members of tack may be able to participate in that we can see. Okay, I think that'd be helpful to understand some of the questions David has. And I think we could. That was something I was going to request as well. So thank you, David. Rachel, I'm going to go to you for questions unless David has anything else. Rachel. Great. Thank you. I concur with the questions that were asked previously by David and Jean. David one thought I had with regard to the question you had about the traffic study and the increased left turns out of Clark, but not right. The question is that if this truly is a valet only situation that you'd be bringing the car back to the entry, but not necessarily turning, turning right. So that's, that's just one, one thought I had there but obviously it would be great to have that clarified. That's a good point, but even if that's the case, the numbers don't seem to add up because it's a very small change. Sure, absolutely. Um, so, you know, as we're talking about that, that driveway entrance there on to from, from Clark, I share some of the same concerns about the truck diagram and its ability to truly make that make that turn to back into the driveway as it's illustrated. I think that's something we want to have studied further to make sure that that is in fact able to be navigated without going up onto the sidewalk there. And I believe that we had spoken at one point about signing that so that there, there was no right turn on to Clark to address some of the neighbors concerns about the increased traffic into the neighborhood out of the parking lot. So I think that's something I'd like to see or at least have addressed. In addition to the gross floor area calculation that Jean requested one of the other items that I didn't see and again there was a lot of information in this packet so if if I if it was included it I'd appreciate if you could point me in the right direction is the calculation for the open space requirement, which is something that I would want to take a look at and make sure that we have thoroughly addressed that was something that we had requested in the last. We will get that to you. Okay, great. I had a couple of things from a design perspective, which I can certainly send in more detail following the meeting I appreciate the, the attention that that you play paid to addressing the last round of design comments, I think that the the massing of the projections on the front facade of the building are feeling more in in scale. I do have some questions about the the railing itself that's proposed at the balcony level at the fourth floor. And I do have some concerns about the flatness of the the fight and again without the materials it's a little hard to to react to this I think in your note you mentioned that you are still waiting on samples to be able to to share a full sample package with us, but the the flatness of what I assume are fiber cement panels on the front facade compared to what I would prefer to see which is what you've actually used on the back of the building which is the clapboard which allows you to really articulate the cells and the aprons below the windows. That would be more in keeping with the style of the rest of the design that that you've shown us in this last few but I can certainly send those through to Jenny to send to you. Some of those more minute details there. Thank you. Andrew. Thanks Rachel. Kim, did you have any questions for Jenny go ahead first. Just real quickly. Actually, Jim was able to drop off the sample package to town hall and I picked it up. And I now have it. But I can also provide it to any board member by delivery perhaps so Rachel I could bring it over at some point or we can figure out some other arrangement, but I do have the samples also I think it would be helpful if you list out the specs of the samples so that just anybody can review them that's not been provided. And I don't have that listing. All that was provided to me was the physical sample in a bag. So I can drop them off but I think that the applicant needs to also provide just sort of the specs of each one of the samples that were provided. I think Jim I think you did that didn't you. Yes, yes. As part of the attachment it has the link to the websites for each manufacturer and each particular product. We can we can certainly augment it. It's not a problem. I don't know if that was in the bag. So you might need to provide that again. I think that was with the package Jenny, but we can certainly get in the package. Got it. Well, we'll forward it. It's easy enough. It's a little Excel. Thank you. You're welcome. If I could just make an additional request to that too. I, I didn't see where those were then keyed to the elevations. So if that's something to that, you could provide, you know, together as a as a total package that that would be very helpful. That's all I have Andrew. Thank you. Thank you Rachel. I can go ahead. Hi. Jim, thank you for the recent middle. It looks like we're getting there. I still have a few, I saw a few other comments. At the last meeting we had asked for elevations. Rounding neighborhood. Better understand the scale of how this building sits within a neighborhood. So if we can get an idea of some elevations of the building's adjacent to this hotel and across the street from hotel. That's across clock street. And then while you have the section started of the building, I would do it go across Mass Ave and see what's across the street from Mass Ave and showing the height of that building and elevation of that building because that's up a hill. So you understand what the scale, how this fits in there. These renderings look nice. And they, you know, it's really subjective to the architect who puts them in there. How, how it feels, but the elevations would truly tell how that's going to really truly work. Jenny, if you go to those photographs with the, with the model put into it, you see your building put in there relevant to all the rest of the buildings. It's, it's kind of hard to tell scale wise. So if we actually had an elevation of it, you, you can actually see much better how this thing fits or doesn't fit in the surrounding neighborhoods. I thought we had asked for that last at the last meeting. I'm just going to ask for it again. I'm not going to touch base on what some of my other board members said, I think I agree with them. I'm going to maybe hop on to what Rachel said a little bit about the elevations. You showed elevations of what was before and what is current. I think it's a better improvement. The only thing is that you chose a darker color siding there with an expressed grid. So the white grid is expressed a lot more than I guess the other ones is used to be like a metal reveal or something within a white grid, a white board. I think, you know, my opinion, I would, I like the white color better than the darker color that you have chosen on front elevation. And I would encourage you to maybe we look at that what the other members might say, but I just think having a dark massing up there is not helpful. I think it's better to have that light massing and not to express the grid as much. And I think Rachel's comments about using laps, you know, the siding there may bring a scale down a little more above is a good one. And looking at that way around in the back, if I think what your engineer is trying to do is keep a consistent opening below the building. So that's why it pins that elevation at one point and makes it almost like a 13% slope. If you were to just lift that up a little bit more and just say the opening that goes into that building there at that maybe one or two parking spots has a lower headroom, you would you would you would alleviate the steepness of the slope. And I would just have you engineer look at that and carry that 5%, you know, 58% all the way across the ramp. Right now, the right side of the ramp is almost a 13% slope, whereas the left side of it is only 5%. If you can blend that better and just extend the length of that ramp because it curves and spring the elevation up a little higher. I think you would alleviate a lot of that sloping. I also we also had talked about the front courtyard space. We were talking about a lot of potentials of us being some sort of public space and, and I thought we're going to look at having some blow up plans of that with the entry to the restaurant, and maybe the entry to the public gathering space we're proposing. Just so we have a better idea what you what you're trying to offer there. It's right now only seen in a in a sketch up model and a site plan. If we had a blown up version of that saying here's what potential activities could happen. I would be encouraging. That's what I have for now Andrew. Thank you Ken. I think those are the reasonable requests. Most of my concerns have been answered traffic question of the easements driveway slopes. Open space, I think the one thing that I would like to see and Jenny, this is more of a question for you than for the applicant. Is it possible to get your department to provide a shadow study, given that we have a couple of conflicting reports here. Certainly agree with attorney O'Connor's statement, but just for our own application purposes. And being sure that those homes on Pierce Street aren't impacted by the shadow is that something we could get done. Yes, I just would have to check on the timing and the availability of that staff person to do this in time for the meeting on the 20th. But yes, I think so. I would I would support that I was going to mention that later I think it's it's critical to get an independent look at what the shadows would be from the building. That was all all I had I echo the concerns of my colleagues. I think we're on the right track here. I think we're getting there. A set of elevations and a few things that we've asked for may put to bed all of the major concerns and questions that we have about the technical side of the project. Jenny, did you have anything before I open up public comment here. No, I think everything has been covered at this juncture. Okay, thank you. All right, so normal rules of public comment. I realized we're all dealing with individual issues. I'm used to technology still. But I would ask that everybody please be respectful. As I indicated at the beginning of the meeting, I'm going to have asked Jenny to keep time on public comments. You will each be given three minutes in which to speak consistent with the rules, regulations and bylaws and the ARB that we voted on. If anybody gets a chance to speak, please raise your hand. You'll note that I've left everyone's camera on this evening who wishes to have that left on turned off with your own, your own choice and option. So, raise your hand and we will go through the process and go through the list as necessary. There are a lot of people on and I will get to all of you. So, go ahead with the hand raising. Please. I see Adam Darlow first. Hi, yeah, my name is Adam Darlow. I live in six Clark Street, which is right across Clark Street from the proposed hotel and especially right across from the parking entrance and exit. And that parking situation is certainly the thing that concerns me the most. I'm, I echo the concerns that several board members have already mentioned. First of all around the slope and whether that can make it more difficult, especially for trucks going in and out of that driveway and how that impacts how they turn out into Clark Street. I'm also just very concerned about visibility, given that on one side, the building goes up to, if I understood the diagrams correctly, five and a half feet from the, from the edge of the sidewalk. On the other side, there is parking plus the privacy fence plus the trees all the way up to the sidewalk that doesn't leave great visibility for any cars or trucks exiting that driveway. And finally, I'm concerned about the turning radius. So delivery trucks require have an outer turn radius of 29 feet, which according to what we've measured is one foot less than the entire width of Clark Street. So that basically puts them right on our front lawn when they're when they're turning out of the out of the driveway and I'm not sure exactly how the backing in would work. So I'm really concerned about that. I also wonder how realistic it is that in fact there will not be any right turns onto Clark Street. And even if that is the guidance that the alternative is turning left on to Mass Ave and then what doing what is essentially a U turn on Mass Ave in order to enter the valet parking cut off. So that means wrestling with Mass Ave traffic twice in a row like two left turns. I worry that that's not going to be practical and that in in practice, the valet drivers will have no choice but to actually take those right turns that they're not supposed to and go through Pierce and forest. So I'm really concerned about the traffic that we've been concerned about. Okay, that's three minutes, but thank you. Yep. Thank you. All right, thank you. Things to keep in mind and Don Seltzer to see your hand up next go ahead. Thank you Don Seltzer Irving Street. I'm going to jump right in and answered Mr. Watson's question about soap on the driveway. The first slide up, Jenny. Clark Street and the sidewalk in that area slope down at an 8% grade to begin with that's a crosswise across the mouth of the driveway in the rear. And then the entrance ramp into the parking area. The slope varies considerably on the far end. I think it's possible to get my finger up. Hello, Andrew. You didn't submit them on time, but I'll allow it due to the holiday weekend. Our rules ask that you submit anything by Friday afternoon. Go ahead, Jenny. Don, please submit them on time the next time. Okay, it's rather difficult so then we only got the material posted publicly Wednesday evening. I remind you your time is running. Okay, so you can see there that the slope varies considerably. It's pretty easy to calculate it just Mr. Darny referred to for instance in the middle. It goes from 94 feet down to 92 feet elevation about 20 feet to do that in your head. That's a 10% grade. We go to the next slide. Okay, the real problems with this parking area. The road zones require a buffer in the rear of a fence and five foot buffer strip. However, two thirds of the parking lot is before that requires a seven and a half foot buffer strip. At the entrance of the driveway, the bios require that the privacy fence, not be there. And instead you have to have a 15 foot buffer strip sticking out so the entrance to your driveway is really only 10 feet wide. The parking space is there. The first one there is designated as handicapped handicapped on a ramp is not a particularly great idea. The garage openings appear to be eight feet or lower. There's no way any delivery truck is going to be able to back into them and use to turn around. Any truck that comes down there head first. That's more than 20 feet is not going to be able to turn around and is going to have to back out onto Clark Street. I'd like to address the remarks that attorney O'Connor made about me disparaging my shadow information and three minutes on that three minutes on. Thank you. We'll wait several minutes for you to put up my slides. Don't I get any additional time and don't I get time during the open forum at the end. And we're not going to get into a shouting match between you and attorney O'Connor about your qualification. Thank you. I do appreciate the work. We'll take a look at it. Certainly something we're considering Ben Rudick. That came up a bit faster. Hey Ben Rudick 40 Web Coward Road. Hopefully this is where it's screaming. Just generally like to say that I'm very excited to see the possibility of something new being built that will help bolster our commercial base. Although I know hotels are going to be a challenging business for the foreseeable future with COVID but you know maybe if this is successfully built and we're able to resolve the various objections and we'll have a new and productive asset that will contribute to our tax base. So I got build a hotel. All right. Thank you, Ben. Okay, and LaRoyer I think you're raising your hand and not using the hand raised feature so go ahead. Oh, sorry. Yes, I did. Yeah, thank you. I sent in some comments earlier that went in before we received all the information from attorney O'Connor and others. Some of those things have been addressed. I just want to accentuate a couple of things. The parking study parking and traffic study. It's already been mentioned that tack and perhaps the bicycle committee and others. There's another committee that the select boards started to look at this whole corridor, which is certainly very problematic. There's additional activity the liquor store the development of my rack is going to be in the same area, possibly other development in the area so it's really becoming a hot neighborhood and we're you know obviously all of us that live here are concerned about this. So I hope that you will definitely get tack and others involved in and looking at this traffic study and one of the things that I noticed or I did not notice in this report they did so far. There's no mention of children. I didn't see any kind of reference to the Odyssey school or the children's room, or the activities of the Greek church, which are all directly, you know, in this neighborhood and Odyssey school is not in session right now of course I know the study was done in February, but that's winter. You know, there's huge amounts of traffic that go around Pierce and Clark streets during the children during the delivery times for children at the Odyssey. It's huge traffic and that someone reflected in the studies that they did that I could try to figure out, you know, some of the turns and all that that Mr Watson referred to, but I really don't think that's been adequately addressed and I think that the pedestrian needs as well as the bicycle needs of this neighborhood really need to be looked at much more closely. I have a question about handicapped parking. There's one site allocated is that sufficient for the town's requirements for handicapped I don't know. I'm just asking about that. And also, what about the people that come to the restaurant where they were as a handicapped person going to park there. So, I want to know about parking in front of the hotel. I know there's the two entrants, you know, the arch entry way, but there's none of the plans show if if there's any designated parking on Mass Ave. There are some areas between the entrance ways, because that's that really is a visual impediment for people coming out of Clark at Clark Street, especially looking east the cars that park there really block the visibility, looking east. The only thing I really like is trees. I really, they keep showing trees in the back of the building there in their shadow studies and other studies but I want to know whether those trees that are there now are really going to be there when this thing is built. And thank you for the comments that you submitted. They've been included with tonight's package. So, some of those points that you mentioned, I will add to our request to tack to take a look at particularly the issue of the autism school. Thank you. That's worth considering concern about Carl Wagner, go ahead. Thank you. Can you hear me okay. I can. Thank you. My name is Carl Wagner. I'm at 30 Edge Hill Road in Arlington. I wanted to thank the board for the review of these large amount of documents that were just recently received last week. And it's clear that the board has taken a lot of time and put a lot of energy into looking at what I would consider are still serious insufficiencies in the project and I hope that the applicants will continue to work with the board. To fix issues that clearly go around or go around the laws such as the sat back, the issues with the frontage on Clark Street, the size of the building, the parking, the shading of residential areas nearby and in general, I'd like to see the applicants work better with the neighborhood. Mr. Seltzer's background image is what the property used to look like. I believe it was a disaster. The applicants really owe the people in the neighborhood a lot to to come up to where they should be with it. And I'd like to say that I think it still really should bother people that even though the town assessor is allowed to represent the applicants on this board, something doesn't look right when your town assessor is representing a client in front of a town board. Mr. Seltzer is legally allowed to do this but it just isn't right and I hope the town will change that rule. Finally, I'd like to criticize Mr. Bunnell for shutting down Don Seltzer's work. He's done a lot of really high quality work to find problems that the board has benefited from and the citizens on this call today have benefited from. So I hope you will let Mr. Seltzer continue to show what he's provided and if not, I encourage everyone to take a look at the website arfrr.org Arlington residents for responsible redevelopment where he's presented already seven different installments in the blog of things that can do better and ways that this hotel can go in and help our tax base. Thank you. Thanks, Mr. Wagner. Chris Loretty. Remind everyone to stay in scope, please. Mr. Loretty. Am I unmuted, Mr. Chairman? You are. Thank you. I'm going to proceed mainly through the comments in the letter that the applicants attorney submitted. And the first one I'd like to address is whether a hotel is a residential use. And indeed it is. Can I interrupt you for your name and address? Chris Loretty, 56 Adams Street. Thank you. And the applicants attorney correctly points out that residential use is not defined in the bylaw. The bylaw says if it's not defined in the bylaw, you go to the state building code. The state building code incorporates international building code 2015. And in residential group R1, section 310.3, you find hotels and motels as residential uses. So therefore it is a residential use. The applicant also says that mixed uses are allowed in B2 and B4 and that's correct. But she doesn't address the elephant in the room and that is that hotels are not allowed in B2. And as I expressed in my email to you today, the town council is really not the right person to address that since he represents the seller, which is the Board of Selectment. And the property doesn't sell unless the permit is granted. So you really need to get outside council on that. As far as the floor area bonus goes, because it's a residential use, it doesn't apply at all. And it doesn't apply in the B2 district in any case. And even if it did, the way the applicant is calculating it is completely wrong. They have to subtract off the amount of the amount, they have to subtract off the amount of land in the easement before they make that calculation. And they also have to subtract that land area from the landscaped open space. Now, there is a landscape plan in the documentation, but it's really unclear just what they're counting as landscaped. And hard-scape areas like paved patios do not count as landscaped area. They clearly don't meet the requirements of the bylaw. I think you've addressed the yard setback issue on Clark Street. I would say that the retaining wall is the operative structure that has to be set back. The bylaw requires that that is a structure that must meet the setback requirements. And right now it appears to be zero for that. The board correctly noted that the stepback in section 5.317 gives you no authority to reduce it. And I would also like to come back to this question of the calculation of the floor area or the presentation of it. I looked at the first floor, for example, and it gives the floor area for the restaurant use and the hotel use, and the total is 5,042 square feet. When I do a calculation, I come up with 5,500 square feet based on some of the length and width of the building. And so it's really not up to the board or your staff to do that calculation. It's up to the applicant to do it and submit it to you and document it and then for you to review it. So I don't know if you were around at the beginning earlier in the meeting, Chris, but we did request that information from the applicant. Well, and I heard the applicant say he would give it to you so you could calculate it. They need to calculate it. Now, I do have one final question for on the easement itself, because if I'm reading it correctly, it looks to me like it's a part-time easement and that the public will only have access on two occasions per week. Is that correct? I'm going to cut off your time there, but I'm going to allow attorney O'Connor to respond. Thank you, Mr. Lurie. That was the recommendation. That's just a negotiating document. Okay, that's outrageous. But thank you, Mr. Moderator. Tara Bradley. Hi, I'm Tara Bradley. I live at 28 Clark Street. And so I would like to just emphasize for the board that the gentleman stating his enthusiasm for building the hotel, if I heard correctly living on Cabot Road, lives in East Arlington. So I just want to note that. Second, I would like to know what the backup staffing plan is for the valet position or any contingency plan for parking should the valet call out sick. I am concerned that with such a small hotel, there's not going to be a lot of extra staff around. And if someone were to call out that the valet plan might be damaged just because, you know, they kind of run out of folks to take over that role if someone were to call out sick. Mary, would you like to respond to that or Jim? I would have to defer to Jim on that. This, this is a hotel operation. And pretty much every team member is a critical function. And it's run by professionals. We don't anticipate that being any more of a problem than did not have a concierge or a front desk clerk. Barbara Thornton. Barbara, I just unmated you. Yeah, I'm here. Go ahead. Okay, thank you very much. Let me get my. Okay. Now I'm here. Thank you very much. I just want to say I am, I am pretty excited about seeing this application come in and I know it's, there's a lot of things to be considered and a lot of things for the community to review for the community to review, and for the board to review. But from my perspective, oh, I'm sorry, 223 Park Avenue Arlington for my living in Arlington Heights. I've watched the heights kind of go down. And I'm very excited that this could help us turn the corner and and see the heights go up again to being a more vibrant neighborhood in the Arlington community and also contribute to the tax base of the town as a whole for the commercial property side. Thank you. Thank you. I have Aaron Holman next. Please state your name and address. As I call on you, I had to remind people of that. So go ahead, Aaron. Name and address. Test. Can you hear me clearly? I can. I'm Aaron Holman, 12 Whittemore Street. I am opposed to this. I'll try to avoid detail on points which have already been made. I am concerned about the conflict of interest whereby the developer used to live in the house that was owned by the now assessor, who was also a trustee of that house. Can we stick to the scope? Let's stick to the scope of this project. Thank you. I will stick to the scope, but I believe that is part of the scope. The interests of people have to be respected and acknowledged. This is to sum it up, too small a space, too tall a building, the wrong zoning and inappropriate use, and it is insufficient parking. I stand opposed. Thank you. Thank you. I have Andrea Dwyer next. Andrea, you're on mute. Yep. Thanks. I just muted myself. Sorry about that. Hi everyone. This is Andrea Dwyer. I am at 26 Pierce Street, which is the property directly behind the proposed hotel property. I just want to echo my neighbors concerns about variety of topics that have been covered. A couple things that are of highest interest to me is I would like to reinforce the discussion I heard a month's support earlier that I'd really like to see some further discussion of or another view of the shadow studies and outside perspective. If I understood the comments early in the call, it sounded as though there was a kind of a statement that properties would not be affected by shadows and I find that quite doubtful given the proposed size of the property and how much the character of my property expect to change with a large building right behind. And the other thing I'd like to echo that I heard discussed amongst the board is the desire for additional, a lot more additional elevations and views to see the scope of the building amongst the existing structures. So if I noticed correctly in the materials, there was kind of one image taken from Clark Street with a little rendering of the hotel in the corner. It really was not sufficient to give the board a real sense of I think how it would look in the neighborhood. Thank you. Thank you. Lisa Heinz. Go ahead. Thank you. Lisa Heinz 14 sunset road. I agree. Most almost completely with my neighbor from pier street who just spoke in supporting the board's requests for opinion from the traffic committee. Additional elevations to further describe the site, the project within the site. I do agree with my neighbors who are in support of the, the economic engine of the hotel in the town. If at all possible, I would love to see the public easement extend either in perpetuity or at greater length than is presently stipulated both temporally in terms of days of week and or duration. But that's that's everything I have. Thank you. Thank you. Marina Darlow. Name and address please and go ahead. Hi, my name is Marina Darlow. I'm at six Clark, right across from the street from the proposed hotel. So first of all, I echo most of the sentiment in here I am happy that Arlington is getting a commercial vehicle for enhancing our tax base. That's great. However, as somebody who is going to be one of the most impacted residents parking is one bit concerned to be more specific to add on what had been said before. 27 parking spots for 50 rooms sound really insufficient to me, which means we're going to get a lot of congestions. A congestion on the adjacent streets. And in addition, this traffic study is based on typical commute. I would like to point out specifically that typically, in my view, people bike and use public transport on their way to work far more than on their way to and from hotel in the heights we're not talking Kendall Square where everybody bikes or uses public transport, we're talking somewhere where they're barely two buses, and it's not really accessible by anything else. So, and, you know, if you come to Arlington from somewhere else, you're not likely to take a bike with you. So in practice, I believe there will be far more cars. One more concern that I want to address. Given the vehicle with flat tires that's been here since we moved in last year, right, you know, right on the lot, and the huge garbage container that's there. I would like to see a more detailed protocol about the construction process. Basically, I would really be interested to see the developers show us how they make it tolerable for those who live nearby. There are the noise levels that are acceptable, what hours people would be working, where the construction workers would park or if they come via some kind of bus or public transport. I don't know how would that look, because frankly, right now I'm concerned that the well being of the neighbors is not a top priority for the developers, and we have an evidence right across the street. That's all I have. Thank you. I have someone whose screen name is Rocky. Go ahead and state your name and address, please, so that we know who you are. Jim Rossi lives on Peer Street. They are still muted. Go ahead. Can you give me that? Yeah, name and address please. James Rossi at 3234 Peer Street. I'm in a butter directly across the street. I just wanted to share my appreciation for everything the board has done to help sort of standardize this and make it tolerable. Just for example, moving the garbage away from my driveway further down as far as possible. That stuff is very nice and it's appreciated, especially not studying and knowing all of these violence. That said, when this project initially got started, we were promised a boutique hotel, something that compares to the Inn at Hastings in Lexington, which is a beautiful Victorian hotel. It's modest, fits right into the layout of the area. To me, it sounds like they're trying to maximize everything with a space, which is fine. This is all business, but I just want to know if there's going to be anything to uphold all these promises we're being kept up front to tell us that buses are going to park over at 95. When everybody knows it's easier if they just park on Clark Street or there's not going to be any right hand turns. I mean, it's a perfect thing to say up front, but what is going to enforce these after this gets approved. So we have if this is approved, there will be a special permit with a number of conditions, the general and specific that hold the permit in place. If those are violated, the zoning enforcement officer who is not a member of this board, this board is not the zoning enforcement officer can come in and enforce the permit through fine. If the board does find that it's not being taken care of, it can call the applicant back in front of us and discuss revoking the special permit or taking other actions as necessary. It's very important to the business interest of the applicant that he had here to all the requirements in the special permit that's issued. Thank you. Very similar to losing your license, so to speak. Folks. Thank you. It was a good question. Appreciate it. There are other folks in the audience or on the phone who would like to speak. Joanne Preston, I think I see you raising your hand. Go ahead. I think we're on the phone. I would like to strongly recommend that this go before the entire tech transportation advisory committee. I'm sure they're meeting soon. I couldn't. I'm on with you so I couldn't look it up because I think it needs full consideration. I live at 42 Mystic Lake Drive, which is near Arlington center. And I spent the year, 10 months of it, five days a week going twice each day to the autism school. There's an enormous amount of traffic that that that the autism school generates, not just in the morning, but there's the after school program, which will be when people are going to the restaurant. People get out different times of the day. And I think that any traffic study should take that consideration because it's hard to say there are over 1000 students and staff who will be traveling there regularly. And I think that's a major consideration to me. Plus, some of the students walk after school and I'm wondering what they're doing about pedestrian safety in that area. Thank you. Thank you, Joanne. Steve Revolac, go ahead. Hello, Mr. Chair, Steven Revolac, 111 Sunny Side Avenue. I'll be brief. I'd like to express my appreciation to the board for your diligence, patience and attention to detail throughout this process. But I think this is a good commercial project and I encourage you to keep working with the applicant to move it forward. Thank you. Thank you. Is there anyone else on in the meeting that would like to speak to this matter. We've heard a lot of comments. Seeing none. I'm going to turn it back to the board. I think there are several things that we've asked for this evening, both from the town itself and from the applicant. Our next meeting is July 20. I'm hopeful but not optimistic that the things that we've asked for can be ready by July 20. Our next meeting after that is sometime in August, Jenny, I'm going to defer to you on that date. But we would like to have the applicant back and continue this hearing to a date soon. At this point, we need to make a decision on this one way or the other and have all of our questions answered. We have been going about this for almost a year at this point. I realized earlier today. And we've done a lot of hard work. We've done a lot of investigation. I think there are a few more things that we need to make a decision one way or the other. I'm going to ask the town, Jenny, in the applicant, how much time we might need to get all the things that we've asked for this evening, which by my list, any of the other board members can jump in here. And I feel free to do so is a shadow study by the town for the transportation planner or tack for some combination thereof to review the parking study to include Lowell street and middle school. Proper elevations. And answers to the driveway slope question. And there was one more thing to easement, which will need to be discussed and negotiated and I think we're waiting on town council to respond to that. Have it all there. I have to say that I more. Mary, do you want to respond first? Yeah, I think that it's two weeks away, but it isn't really two weeks because we have to get you the stuff in advance of the hearing so I don't think like 20th is sufficient. If you agree from your end. The shadow study and tack review. I am not. The shadow study, I cannot answer that this evening. I can also note the couple of other things that the board requested. Go ahead. The first one is the calculations of both the pretty much all of their dimensions and how they arrived at certain conclusions with regard to gross floor area. And then we have these various setbacks and making sure that those setbacks are compliant. Before they're asking for us to change any setbacks. And there were a couple of other sort of design issues that I wrote down as well, including a little more detail or perhaps changes to the railing at the balcony level on the fourth floor. The specifications of the materials being tied directly to building elevations and shown as such signage with regard to traffic exiting Clark Street. Much better detail on the turning radius that's I think you already said the building context in it with in a relationship to the adjacent properties, the elevation cut through for the driveway entry. I don't think I got everything else. I don't need to add the handicap parking was something mentioned. Greater explanation of the trees on the property. What is staying on the property. That was it. Okay, that's a lot. In addition to everything you said. Okay, so our next meeting is the 20th it sounds like that's not feasible. I think the meeting after that is a third but I don't think that's feasible either. Yeah, I think on Jean. So I think our meeting after that would be August 17, August 17. Go ahead, Jean. There are a few other issues I'd like to raise that came to me as people were speaking and also a couple I didn't get before. One is, it wasn't clear to me whether they would allow a left turn out of the traffic drop off area, or whether people would have to make a right turn on the massive. So I'd like the traffic study to look at those two options to see if there's any difference between them on the shadow study. I feel like if we don't have the expertise on your staff, Jenny, that we should get an outside independent expert and and initiate the process so that the applicant would pay for that. So I think it would be helpful maybe if you could report back to Andrew whether, you know, we, we have the staff who can do it and who have the time or not because if we don't. There's an alternative that I'd like us to implement to get the shadow study done by an independent party on the setback on Clark Street. I'm not sure what to do about that because I am I am not going to vote for this project with the current setback on Clark Street. And I just want to put that out now so that the applicants understand that so that they can determine whether they wish to show us another option in which they can meet the 20 foot setback. That's required in our two zones or get us part way there so that the board can determine whether exercise its authority, but I for one, I'm not going to vote for this with the present setbacks. And for the stepbacks, I do not think we have the authority to change those so I am, my vote is going to be contingent on it having the appropriate stepbacks on both the massive and the Clark Street side. So if they want to show how they would do that I think that would be helpful also. Okay. Thanks, Gene. Other comments from members of the board. Okay, I think what we would do is continue this meeting this hearing to August 17, just looking at my calendar here. That right, Jenny. And is that I see you nodding. Is that. August 17. I'm looking at my calendar at the same time. Yes. Is that fair to you, Mary and Jim. Yes, to get to get the things that we need. Okay. All right. And I don't want to spend too too much time more on asking questions and having you go back to the drawing board so if we could get as complete a package as well and enough of that, as possible. The members of this board would appreciate it. And then you can work with Jenny to get that in place. So with that, I'll take a motion to continue hearing on docket. Just make a clarification. Go ahead, Kim. I just died. I was trying to raise my hand. And Mary answered the question on the 17th. But anyone that knows me knows I'm a straightforward individual and I always deal above board. And I do appreciate your indulgence as well as your, your colleagues on the board. But as you know, there has been numerous delays on this. And I think that we will take responsibility for and much relates to various interjections of informations and directions and indications and then stepping back from those indications as a prime example of that. And I just wanted to make sure that we have the last, over the last couple of hearings to expend tens of thousands of dollars. And as I think it was explained and pretty clear, clearly made communicated to the department as a result of a couple of members in comments, which I do appreciate their frankness at a prior meeting. The setback issue was involved. So we went forward and we spent tens of thousands of dollars. So then to follow up at this meeting and have that totally retrenched. And then for the town of Ellington through these, these appointed individuals to then suggest that we continue to spend money. And both raise an issue that had been put to rest in their own words at a last meeting, I think is, is just unrealistic to request. And I think the town of Ellington really needs to come to grips with what that is. A couple of meetings ago, I raised to, to one of the members when he pushed back on the step back I asked him about 117 Broadway. That building is identical to this. It's also right down the street from Mr. Loretta's house. And there wasn't much focus. It got bonus space. There's a lot of other things. I happen to like that project. I think it was great. I think the use is good. And I think a lot, a lot of other things. So I think we, we, and I do appreciate people's comment, whether positive and negative, as long as there's sincerity in, in bringing a better product for the town, which I happen to love. And I've spent a lot of time and energy on this when I could have done cookie cutter condominiums or apartments on that site to not only give this town what they really wanted for in that mixed use, which was to have commercial development. The apartment house is something with the management office in it and calling that a mixed use, but a property that would contribute 100% to the commercial valuation and potential tax base if the town elected to classify. In addition, there's a tremendous amount of hotel revenue. I'm not sitting here crying poor mouth and I'm not sitting here asking the town to vote something through that they don't want solely on economics. What I am asking is to be treated like everyone else, and to be given consistent direction from meeting to meeting so we can all work collectively if we want it to go forward. And if it's something that we don't want, then we should all be honest with each other and say that it was proposed to me by the town a few years ago I should to do a 40B. I didn't want to do a 40B there because this is to me a legacy property and something for the town. So I don't want to go on. I've exceeded my three minutes and I do apologize for that. But I think you people have spent a tremendous amount of time. I've spent a tremendous amount of time. And I don't think it's fear to any of us. If we don't want to be honest and deal with these issues and respect the opinions of people in this town and who are qualified and I'm talking about Doug Hine. I'm talking about Mary Wynne Stanley O'Connor. I'm talking about my architect. I'm talking about an illustrator who teaches other architects about how to do this. When people want to come in as make believe experts and then drive people to go spend money create issues and then try to exploit them. I think we really got to buckle down and I know a lot of that's out of your control when you personally have done a great job to try to keep it focused and I do appreciate that but I just don't want to leave this conversation tonight misleading you that I think all of those things can be achieved for the 1717 because for me to go forward and expend that money when two members indicated within the last meeting that setback issue was resolved to now say they won't vote for it predicated on that just absolutely is crazy for me to go forward to do a lot of those things. So unless you know we're going to take the guidance from town council or someone else and not suggest that the man is conflicted because he happens to also represent another board in the town. Wow. And again, I'm sorry I've exceeded I appreciate your indulgence but I just I didn't want to leave the conversation misleading you that I think I can come back on the 17th but we will end here over the next week to refine that and get back to you if we can fulfill that commitment. Thank you Jim appreciate the candor. Thank you. And I know that I know this has been a long process. It's it's certainly a project that I personally like and would love to see in the town speaking from behalf of myself, not on behalf of the other members of the board. I know that that there are some neighborhood concerns that we've tried to listen to and account for and not just rubber stamp a project because it's good for the town and I think you know there is there a lot of things that are being asked and I hope I hope the things that are being asked if you don't dissuade you from coming back, but we'll get there. Jean, I see your hand raised. Let's not get into a back and forth but I'll let you make one final comment. Yeah, I agree with everything Andrew just said I don't think anybody on this board is opposed to the idea of having a hotel here. It's how does it fit in with the requirements of the bylaws and what needs to be done and meets the residents concerns as much as possible. I will say that what happened at the last meeting was the town council said to us, even though the bylaws say the step back is on the third floor. They had been a miss, miss publish, let's say, and the vote was the fourth floor so we all agreed that the step back should be on the fourth floor and nobody has gone back from that because that's what the town council advised us was necessary. On the other hand, at no time did I ever say that I would agree to the side street, the Clark Street setback and in fact that the last meeting Mr. Lau and I specifically said we didn't agree on that and we would see if we could work out our disagreements. So that's where I am. Thank you. All right, so we are getting late in the evening, I think all that has been said tonight has been said, we still have another hearing to open up I see Mr. Nessie waiting patiently there. So what I would like to do is have a motion to continue this hearing to August 17 2020. So moved. 7pm. Probably. All right, so motion by gene second by kin. I'll just go down the line do a roll call vote gene. Yes. Ken. Yes. David. I. Rachel. Yes. And I vote yes. So thank you, Mary and Jim. We do appreciate the work and hopefully we can get this resolved one way or the other. That's the next meeting. Appreciate it. Thank you both. All right, so that hearings continued to August 17th that's docket number 36 or two. It's closer this evening. Moving on to docket number 3625, which is a continued public hearing for 882 892 mass have Mr. Nessie. You have the floor. Thank you very much. I'm here with John Murphy, the project manager for the proposal. Also with Aaron Mackie, the severe with Adam from a market architects as well. And we didn't really make a presentation last time. But we came in at a point where I had asked to have a matter continued. And I did benefit and my clients did benefit greatly from the comments that were made, despite the fact that we had not really made a presentation. And one of the, the points that was made during the course of that hearing by Mr. Brunel was that it might make sense to have kin. In fact, meet with us with respect to our proposal, because quite frankly, my impression was that the proposal did not go over very well with the members on the board. Well, we have done that we have met with kin on a number of occasions. Kin has met with my team even more than he's met with me. And we have come up with a, what we think is a much better proposal than we had initially just to refresh, we're going to be to zone, which is a very, very unusual zone in that neighborhood. Everything around the B2 zone is either B2A, B3, B4, R6, okay. Matter of fact, there's an apartment house directly abutting us to the western part of the property that is above us. It has more stories than we're proposing. We're proposing to demolish the existing one story storefronts. And we're proposing to construct in place of the one story storefronts, a 21 one bedroom residential units and 1300 square feet of commercial space. One of the points that came across to me loudly and clearly that the last hearing was that there had to be a better invitation to commercial customers and the commercial environment on Massachusetts Avenue. I think we have done that. Again, meeting with kin, we had some very good suggestions in that regard. What we have done is, as you now look at our plans, you will see particularly if you look at the rendering, you'll see that the commercial property essentially is fronting on Mass Ev. To get to the residential property, you have to make the turn to the right off of Mass Ev under Laughlin Ev, and then you get to the residential property out back. Now we don't have commercial on the entire first floor, but we have commercial on the portion of the first floor that I believe does in fact front on Massachusetts Avenue. So the board needs to understand and John Murphy is going to address this shortly. The board needs to understand that this particular site is contaminated. John will tell you, I don't want to steal his thunder, but John is going to tell you that we're spent a quarter of a million dollars already on soil issues, and the anticipation is that we're going to spend another million dollars as well. Now if the Piscoto family is not the Myrack family, they're not in the same league as the Myrack family. They don't have the economic ability to do the things that the Myrack family could do. What they would like to do is develop this site, okay, and develop the site within their budgetary ability. John will talk to you about his efforts with respect to financing as well. I think those are all things you need to know. Another important point is that one of the reasons why I had asked that the matter be continued last time was there was a lot of discussion about the fact that there might be a right of way for either the MBTA or the town with respect to the sidewalk, the sidewalk was in close relation to, in fact, the bus shelter. Well, in fact, that never has occurred, okay. I have a 200 page title examination, which we performed, okay, and that shows that there never has been a taking by the town, by the state, by anyone with respect to enlarging the sidewalk. What we're proposing to do is to, despite the fact that we don't have to do it, we're proposing to move the building back two feet from where we proposed to construct it initially, so there would be more space between the front of our building and the bus shelter. We're prepared to do that, and I'm committing right now that the client will do that. Some of the zoning relief that we would need, and by the way, another change from the last time with respect to what the plans had shown was that we now have a five foot buffer in the back of the lot connecting the parking lot with the R2 zone. We are proposing, as I think you are aware, 25 parking spaces, which does comply with the parking requirements with respect to the parking lot. We didn't have a setback or a buffer in the last proposal. We now have a five foot setback buffer, which again is required by the zoning bylaw. The next issue is with respect to the setback. We're going, and I know that Gene has talked about the setbacks, and he's made a statement pretty clearly stating his position with respect to setbacks. If we don't get relief to setbacks, we're not going anywhere with this project, okay. We need a setback with respect to the seven and a half foot setback on the fourth story, okay, above the third on the fourth, okay, because of the fact that we're moving the building back two and a half feet or strike that two feet from where it was before. So we do need relief with respect to that setback. If in fact we're going to make this proposal work in terms of a number of units that we'd like to have in order to be able to get financing and in order to be able to comply with our budget. We also would need relief with respect to the fact that we do, in fact, about a residential zone, and I went to school on what occurred at the last meeting, and I noted in Jenny's memo to the board that the she had also brought to the attention of the board that on the mass have frontage, the adjoining lot is an apartment building in our sixth zone. And she mentioned that there would be a requirement there to have a setback. So we would be able to do that with that for that particular zone. On the Laughlin frontage, the two family is in an R2 zone with a setback of 20 feet. Jenny does indicate that in her memo that per section 5.3.16, you folks have the ability to vary that setback. We're asking you to vary that setback if we didn't think we were giving you something. And the architect will talk about the affordable housing units and the like. With respect to open space, if you look at the dimensional sheet with respect to open space, we have no open space basically, okay. So what we're proposing to do is to have a 60 feet of usable open space. And if you note, from looking at the dimensional form, the landscape open space is twice what it needs to be. It's 21, 20.1% where zoning requires 10%. We have trees in the landscape open space that we're proposing. If we needed to take some of those trees down to in fact use that space as usable open space. That's something we can certainly talk about. All right, what I'd like to do is let John Murphy tell you what his position is from the point of view of how the project is going. As far as environmental is concerned, and as far as the financing is concerned one more thing we have, and I have been talking with tenants, okay. I've been talking with John Leone Council for one of the tenants as well. And those discussions continue at this point, and nothing precipitous is happening at this point, as far as tenants are concerned. Thank you Bob and good evening members of the board. I wonder if Jenny for this part of it if we could get up the colored site plan, perhaps it's a it's a one page it kind of shows exactly what's going on and where you know just real quickly I think what I want to get across is that you know we as a team one this project to be successful from the start John could you just I'm sorry to interrupt you could you just state your full name and we are with your company. Sure. My name is John Murphy from Summit real estate strategies we are working directly with a pseudo family on the development of this project. Yep Alan and major civil engineers and market market square architects and the architect on the project. So, when we originally came in before we thought we were going down a path that was going to be received well, it didn't. And that's okay because we've been wanting this to be a collaboration, something that the town and the board and everyone could be proud of and I think what we came in today. Tonight with this something completely different which is echoes that. We've looked at a number of different options when it came to this project in terms of how we can get around and make it successful after dealing with environmental issue which I know a lot of people are curious about. We looked at numbers of stories units retail mix can we do podium parking to try and help absorb the cost of the environmental can we overhang the building. You know, none of these things really penciled out to the point where we can where we can make it work. What we did after the last meeting that was continued was, we took everything everyone said and tried to do the best that we could. So as Bob said when we brought the building, two feet back from where previously was proposed which we do have another one page plan on here showing the existing building, the property line, the previously proposed building, and where our current proposed building is so I know that's in the package. So when we bring this building back, we can't go directly all the way back with it foot for foot, but so actually shrunk the footprint a little bit. And what that did to those top story studios was with the top story step back was make them just a little bit too small, where they got a little bit uncomfortable to live in, in our opinion. And this is the main reason why we are asking for relief on that top story. When we bring that building back to turn those back into one bedrooms to make them more comfortable to live in. We've essentially almost doubled our retail space. We have, we're offering three affordable units which are labeled on the plan. I think overall we're helping this new building be a little bit more in compliance with the zoning and all step backs, where otherwise they weren't, and we're taking a property as existing zero green space and providing far more than what is required. And I do want to give credit for credit is due. We probably, we definitely not would not have gotten to this point if it weren't for Ken, he helped us get over a lot of hurdles and his experience was greatly appreciated and extremely valuable so we do just really want to thank him for collaborating with us on this. And I'll let the architect and civil engineer touch on some of these things but we have the shadow study we have how the building fits into the community you can see what the roof is going to look like from across the street. So we do want to touch on all those things. I would like to provide a quick background on the environmental before I turn it over to Alan the major. This goes all the way back to I think around 2013, where the issue was identified by the DP. You know the Pashuto family basically from that time till almost a year and a half ago tried everything they could to save the existing property and building through injections, monitoring, testing, more injections, and ended up, you know, spending a solid digit number on trying to save it to the point where the professionals who do this every day say this isn't working. So the only way to take care of this is to actually get to that material which happens to be located underneath the slab in the basement. So, you know, it's mandated that this be dealt with at this point, there's no way around it. We have to get that material out of there, irregardless so now we're left with we want to make put something in the place of this building that both can handle and absorb the, you know, the cost of this environmental and all the other things that we're And to be completely honest, it has not been easy. It's going to be an extra million dollars at from here on forward, depending on how much material actually needs to come out it could be more to deal with this issue. And the real problem is there's not a lot of units here to absorb that cost. So when we look at options, say, expanding the retail to all the first floor, you know, that's not very well received kind of given the current environment by financing institutions, you Know, unfortunately, we have been turned down, even with this current proposal from many lenders just because they're not confident that the amount of revenue the project brings in that they're going to get paid back. So that is kind of one that is our biggest hurdle that we were trying to address currently so we're trying to hear what everyone has to say, take it under consideration and kind of hopefully meet in the middle here somewhere where we can have a successful project that's at The end of the day that that everyone is a is proud of we will be we're getting many proposals on solar as well. That's something we'd like to incorporate here. We think we've done a good job with complying with bike laws and can help us through that as well. And I think at this point it would be great to have Alan a major and architects take you through a few things and get some feedback from from members of the board. Thank you. Thank you. So whoever's next, please announce your name and company and go ahead. Here. Thank you, John and Andrew. My name is Aaron Mackie. I'm with Alan and major associates with the civil engineers on this project. Jenny, if you could just navigate to the C 102 layout materials that was up previously the colored up plan. I think that would be a good place to start. Was the other one, the other plan. Yeah, yeah, they call it up site plan. Yep. Okay, great. Thank you very much. So I'll just run through a quick summary. I'll reiterate a few things that Bob and John have pointed on the existing conditions of the site. The site's located on the corner of Mass Ave in Loughland Ave. As you can see, the site consists of two parcels totaling 14,381 square feet. The site is zone B2 neighborhood business. There's B2 a major business across Mass Ave before a vehicular orientated business across Loughland and our two family to the south. Our six medium density apartments to the west. The existing building is a one story brick building that's approximately 5000 square feet. It's located. Actually, it's over the property line on Loughland Ave by approximately 1.7 feet, which you can see we have fixed that issue at that corner we pulled the building back. The existing lot is entirely covered with pavement and building. There's no landscaping existing. The site is serviced by municipal water sewer gas, telephone and electric. There's very little in the way of existing drainage infrastructure. There's only one existing catch basin that's in the existing parking lot. That receives surface runoff and roof runoff, which discharges to out to Loughland Ave. So the proposed site plan is what you're looking at here. The proposed building is 4,430 square feet four story building. There's 21 apartment units, one bedroom units proposed. I do apologize that this plan says 22 units. That is an error. We that'll be updated on future submissions. It was 22 before but through discussions with kin we had increased the the retail component and lost one unit in the program. So that will be updated. The building has been set back a minimum of 2.7 feet from the property line at the corner of Mass Ave and Loughland Ave. 3.4 feet from the eastern side yard setback and 63 feet from the rear yard setback. These dimensions shall meet the dimensional regulations listed within the B2 zone for a mixed use building with the front yard and side yards minimum of 0 in a rear yard of 20.3 feet required that's calculated based upon the length of the building. In this updated submission revised submission, we provided a five foot wide buffer strip with abravity plantings in a five foot fence. These are proposed along the southern property line with the R2 zone. This was achieved with the reduction of the dry vial and pulling we also pulled the building back from Mass Ave as well through this reiteration. The proposed parking lot, there's 25 parking spaces proposed where 25 are required. The proposed parking lot is proposed entirely within the existing constraints of the existing pavement. There will be approximately 2083 square feet of impervious surface being replaced with landscaping. As you can see on this plan, all the landscaping areas that we are now proposing. With that, I will touch on the open space proposed per section 5.3.21. 10% of the lot shall be landscaped open space and 20% shall be usable open space, which totals 30% open space. The existing site is non conforming and has 0% usable open space in 5.3% landscaped open space with the existing sidewalk area. The proposed plan has 20.1% lot landscape space with 5.6% sidewalk and 14.5% landscaping. There is a bike rack pad proposed along Loughland Ave, which is providing 0.4% usable open space. As Bob had mentioned in the beginning, the applicant is definitely willing to remove trees and shrubs on either side of the dumpster pad and convert some of that area for usable open space, which would propose a total of 10.5% usable open and 10% landscaping still meeting the landscaping minimum. However, we felt the plan as proposed with a total lot open space of 20.5% with the proposed landscaping as is was the best approach for the site. In a waiver would be requested from the usable requirement and we'd like to keep the landscaping as we show it here. The bike parking requirement for the town's bicycle parking guidelines. The long term bicycle parking requirement would be 33 spaces required. These are provided within the interior bike room. Market Square will touch on that shortly. The short term bicycle parking only three spaces would be required based on the units and the retail component. Three would be required and we're proposing 10 exterior spaces along Loughland Ave. The drainage proposed. Jenny, if you could navigate to the site plans possibly I'm just going to touch on the drainage in the utilities briefly. If possible, can you tell me what page you want me to start on, please? Sure. Drainage sheet would be C103. So that is the fifth sheet in working on it. Okay, yep. Just one more above this. Perfect. Okay. So this is the proposed drainage plan. As I mentioned before, there's very little in the way of the existing drainage system. There's only one existing catch basin on site that receives surface runoff and roof runoff, which discharges out to Loughland Ave. As you can see with the proposed plan here, we're going to replicate that with some improvements. The approximately 2000 square feet of impervious is being replaced with the landscaping space. With this reduction, the site will meet the stormwater requirements of the town of Arlington and the mass DEP stormwater standards. Because that will produce a reduction in the rate of volume of runoff rate rate and volume. The installation of this new catch basin with a hood will remove floatables and oils from the stormwater. Also the installation of the new manhole for clean roof runoff to bypass the catch basin. So the clean roof will just flow right through as the catch basin will collect any sediment and oils. These plans were sent in drainage summary was sent to the city engineer in March for his review and we've received no comments to date. Jenny, if you could just scroll down one more sheet to the utilities plan. The utility sheet is very straightforward. The site will be serviced by municipal water and sewer from Mass Ave. The site electrical and telecom will service the parcel underground. And this is consistent with the recommendations of the environmental design review to have these connections installed under underground. And lastly, I just wanted to touch on that. Diagram that was up earlier that compared the proposals, if you could just pull that up quickly. Thank you. Perfect. Yes, as you can see here, the property line is outlined in red bus shelter in yellow. The existing building is in blue. The previously proposed building is in the pink and the current proposed building is outlined in green. I just would like to note that this current proposal we've pulled the building back 2.4 feet from the existing proposal. While maintaining the separation we had from Lockland Ave of 2.9 feet. And also, yeah, still 2.9 feet from Lockland Ave. And we've also provided the five foot buffer with 14.7% green space over the entire parcel. So with that I'd like to pass it over to Market Square. And real quick Aaron real quick it's John Murphy how far is the new proposed building from the property line on Mass Ave say where the bus shelters. That's approximate it varies because of this the the skew, but I will say at I know at the corner that is would be completely to the west. That's about 5.5 feet. And as you make your way towards the bus shelter, you can see the dimension that's on there it's 8.2 feet at that first door. And then it's going to just increase as you head towards Lockland Ave. Thank you. Great. Yeah. And Adam you want to jump in. Certainly will and I want to hear me all right. We can hear you. Wonderful. Well, Mr. Chairman members of the board. Thank you for hearing us. I'm going to keep this as brief as possible. Do me a favor Adam just tell us even who you're with the record. Yeah, I was almost there. Adam Wagner partner with Market Square architects. Good night. I don't want to take a ton of your time because I know it's getting late in the evening. Jen, if you can go to the first architectural plan, which would be basement plan, what I'd like to do is walk you through what we've provided here. And certainly we are open to any questions that you have about the proposal before you. We can start with that basement floor plan. So here you have it because of the remediation. One of the advantages we get out of this is we're going to have a full basement in this building. The basement will be accessed by both staircases and the elevator. And because of that, it allows us to provide a lot of storage capacity for not only the residential units, but also for the commercial users. I want to note that here in the basement showing a substantial amount of bicycle storage based on the area calculations we have storage for up to 34 bicycles. And as I previously said, this is fully accessible from the elevator so people will be able to get their bicycles in and out of space very easily. And hopefully make this project a much more bicycle friendly building. And with that, if you could move up to the first floor, so ground level as previously mentioned, from the last proposal that was put before this board we removed one of the residential units that put us from 22 down to 21. And that residential unit was one of the ones that faced a long mass. The reason why we removed it is we really wanted to give that commercial hierarchy to Massachusetts Avenue, where we have retail slash office uses the tenants haven't been determined yet, and the main lobby coming into the residential space so from a public facade standpoint. It really appears as commercial, even though we do have a couple of residential units on the backside. As mentioned, all of the units are one bedroom apartment. And the designs are shown here in this package. So we have three of them there on the first floor, you get on the back of the building. And as we move up to the second and third floors. Here we would have the two staircases the elevator and the remain being the balance of the 22 excuse me 21 residential units. As part of this package the next page we have also provided you with a roof plan. At this stage of the game we certainly don't have a fully engineered mechanical system for this building, but we're already looking at and considering how we're going to be able to appropriately screen the mechanical units. The mechanical system for the apartment units themselves is still in question whether that's a gas fired or a an electric system, but in any instance, we will be having condenser units which we can locate on the roof. We can screen them via the parapet. They're pretty low units. They're no more than three feet tall. And then we're also showing here where we do have the elevator overrun and hatch access. So there's no deck up here. This is for mechanical access only. The next plans are to the elevation drawings. As mentioned already we worked with can really work to create a hierarchy and the design clean up the facade. Enhance the pedestrian scale of the building and really took a look at what's happening with this building as opposed to what what is happening with the neighboring buildings around it. The materials on the front facade materials on all facades really will include ever cement siding fiber cement handling. We're still working through the details of that. As you can see we've used a different window type on the first floor where we have commercial versus the residential units. I think the ultimate goal here was to create something that fit in better with the surrounding context, but also provided a pedestrian scale. And in general was just a good looking building that would enhance the community. The next page. We've done some elevations to show the context. So this one is looking straight down Massachusetts Avenue, I probably familiar with the building on the right that was a more recently constructed building. And then the large building that looms behind ours is the existing brick building. I'm sure you're also familiar with so in our building is intended to be kept very much in keeping with the scale of the neighboring properties. Here you see it straight on looking across Massachusetts Avenue in relation to the to the brick building. Next page of our package includes some shadow studies. So these are pulled from our three dimensional model of the building various times of day various times of year to show what the impacts of our real will be on the surrounding buildings surrounding properties. And then on the last page here to the last two pages we've provided you with two photo realistic renderings. These are drawn from our architectural model of the building and pasted into photographs that we have really showing you the context. The scale proportion and hopefully you will recognize that it's something in keeping with what you want to see developed there in Arlington. So we're more than willing to answer any questions you have but thank you. Bob anything else to add before we return to the board that does it for now. Yeah, that was that was an incredibly thorough presentation. I think all three of you for having that ready for us. I think that answer a lot of the questions. Many of us will have. I just wanted to ask you a question or two. And you mentioned you mentioned that you were in discussions with the tenants are those ongoing is that something that we're going to hear about during public comment tonight or I did not speak with John Leone with respect to the group that is going to the high school. I believe at the end of August, I believe, okay, I did speak with him earlier today. And if they speak they speak but my understanding is that they were not going to but if they do they. And part of the reason I asked that is because as I said in the last hearing that isn't something over which this board has any power or purview and it's really not appropriate for us to get into the details and get into public comment but I wanted to be sure that those things were being arranged and that we as a board can kind of put our own mind that he's sort of displacing tenants. As far as the commercial space goes talk to me about how that has changed substantially since the first proposal you put forth a month ago. It's changed because we've doubled the space essentially the commercial space and I, my memory is that one of the real concerns at the last hearing was that there really was no real commercial identity of the building on Massachusetts Avenue in that village that business village district. So we've tried to do is to give that to the members of the board. Okay, by doubling the commercial space. Our problem is, as John Murphy mentioned earlier, that we need to have this project be economically feasible as well. So we couldn't really devote the entire first floor to commercial space but what we have done is that portion of the building that fronts on mass have. And again, the business village district is now commercial and it's not residential. You don't get the residential until you make the turn on to Laughlin Avenue and you can see in that rendering the door to the residential under the sign 882. So that's what we've tried to do at this point. And Bob I can jump in here real quick on and talk a little bit more about that. John Murphy again so we did a little bit more research into this we had an independent brokerage firm do a study this is pre COVID-19 of how much vacant space there was in Arlington and as of February before all this happened there was right around 25,000 square feet of vacant retail commercial space in Arlington. We also looked across the street and that at the other new project to how long that building took to lease up and I believe that took a couple of years on the commercial front and you know the real issue for us as lenders at this point are saying we're not counting your commercial space that we're only going to base our commercial units because of what we've all just gone through is you don't really know so if you want to get this project done, we need to feel comfortable. And so we're discounting that essentially. So what we've done is say all right we're going to do the best we're going to offer all of Massachusetts Avenue but there's no other way to really chop up that first floor. There's a lot of sense you know if we got rid of another unit in the back corner and just made a commercial space longer. You know I'm not really sure that that it becomes a little bit of an awkward, awkward, either large space that's too large for a smaller retail tenant or a larger retail tenant it's too small for. You know I also want to touch on because a comment was made by the last presentation. There's no commitment by anyone at this point to take any of this commercial space there's as of right now there's no management office going in there not going in there. It is wide open for whoever we can attract to come into this as we are in the middle of construction and we will hopefully build it out for them. Okay, our plan with it as it is the marketing plan there for a restaurant for a preschool daycare issue or is it is it built a suit. It's honestly built a suit for whoever is interested we're not looking one way or another to be honest. It's kind of whoever we can. Yeah, I think I think I think down the road would be interested in seeing a marketing plan. And if there were discussions with some of the existing tenants about staying on if they could move that might not be a bad discussion to have but too far into that or. And we have had those discussions in the pursuit of family does have other properties that we will be sure to make sure that those tenants also know about about this based up the hard thing is and is just is asking someone to leave for say a year or so and then making that work for their business and then come back in. You know that's that's hard. And a lot of times to you'll see across the street, you'll finish entire this entire project and you don't even have anyone. So you're regardless of what your marketing plan is, you know, it's sometimes easier, easier said than done. Unfortunately, yeah I know I know from the building across the street was a learning experience in many ways. The commercial space of it was sticking points. But I know that we've done, or the department itself has done research and the typical time that they've discovered it's something like 18 months from completion to full tenancies. That's, I understand that. I also understand that you're facing some issues of commercial lenders right now. This is I'm in we're doing the same issue. So I can respect that to some degree. I'm going to hand it over to Ken Lau. Can I know you've had discussions with these folks and work tire on getting this to where it is. I do want to say that this is not necessarily perfect, but I really do appreciate the work that's been put in here and our responsive Bob and the rest of the team have been to the concerns you heard of the last hearing and they hope to keep that in mind. So go ahead, Kim. Thank you, Andrew. I do want to say that this is one of the better complete presentations we had in a long time. And I want to thank you for thank you them for that, making all those changes from what we had before to what is now, and the commitment to make a few more minor adjustments that we've talked about. I know that they are walking on a fine balancing of getting this building financed and built to some of the requirements that we have put upon them and I appreciate the effort in which they've done trying to mitigate that. I appreciate the fact that they pushed the building back. I think the things they're asking for right now, as far as relief from us, I'm in agreement with. One is, I believe the reduction in the driveline. Two is the reduction in the setbacks along Lakeland. I think they worked well with us in order to get some of those, and I much appreciate that. Some of the other comments I still like to add is along the elevation, I like to maybe minimize the signage that's on the front corner of the building 882. Maybe bring that down to someone near the door and make it less obvious and maybe add more windows on the lower floor on the retail side to make it a little bit more retail like. Maybe bring up the corners that's between the first floor and the second floor. Right now, it looks like the corners is aligned with the floor level. They may say, well, we do the same thing which you've done above and maybe elevate that floor, the corners to maybe just a little below the window. So you have more of a sign ban opportunity for the retail. So if you look at those windows along the retail side, if you look at the bottom right hand drawing that's shown right now. If we raise that course up a little higher so it gets up to maybe the bottom of the windows on the second floor. It gives you an opportunity to put a sign ban above the windows on the first floor for the retail and then increase the number of windows there. So it looks more retail like right now. It looks like punched openings in a wall. It could be office. It could be retail, but you're not sure if you do the other way. I think animal windows, you'll get that. I really like the fact that you created little small plazas out front of these retails. So if it was a small coffee shop or restaurant, you know, there's opportunities to have a little outdoor seating area out there to maybe activate the streetscape a little bit. I think that's or someplace to sit out and just enjoy yourself. I think having that front edge there would you would you've done and pull the building back and gave us those little plazas there. I think it could be very nice. I think that being on a bus stop is also very nice. Having some activity out there is great. So I'm encouraged that you did that and you still a few more minor stuff to it. And I think you're on your way there. I like what you did on the Lachlan side, even treated as a side of the building. And it's more of a front facade. So by adding more windows there, that's good. I think that's about it, Andrew. Rachel, I'm going to go to you next. I'll just echo to that. I appreciate the furnace of the package and the, the attention that you paid to the, to the comments that we provided last time. I will say that I'm, I'm still very disappointed with the quantity of the commercial space that's being provided to go from 5,000 square feet to a single retail space that's 500 square feet in an office space to me does not fill the intent of the mixed use development that we had hoped to see and express to you in our last meeting. 500 square foot retail spaces is very, very small and very difficult to, to lease. It's, it's next to useless, you know, when you think about, you have a 50 square foot bathroom shown. Typically you have a 20 to 80% stop to sales ratio. So now you're down to 360 square feet. I think a lot of the problems in the town that we have with our existing retail stock are that they are too small currently, and we're just exacerbating the problem by including to one of the two spaces, which, which I think is going to be very, very difficult to lease. So I would like to see efforts made to significantly increase the commercial space that you're providing on the first floor. I understand the challenges that you're going through, but I just don't see how we can approve this as the type of mixed use development that we're looking for in the town without addressing that. I also think that we need to relook at a lot of the materials and the articulation of the facade. It's very, very flat right now with the five or cement panels. I agree with Ken that the entire commercial space really needs to be looked at with the addition of more storefront friendly windows and a real true sign band. Right now there's very little opportunity for any type of retail or restaurant presence on the on the first floor, which again will make it more difficult for you to lease. And I really think that the corner, if you're going to be celebrating the corner and the entrance to the residential units in the way that that you are by pulling it out in terms of articulating the corner, chamfering the corner rather and changing the color that you really need a lot more variation in the depth of the facade. It's very, very flat right now I'd say all around but specifically at the corner. So I'd ask you to relook at the materials as well. Those are my, my two biggest, I'm sure that my colleagues will cover other items, but those are the two biggest items I wanted to cover. Thanks Rachel. David, I'll go to your next. I'll also echo my appreciation for the work that's been done and the responsiveness to our previous comments. The thoroughness of the presentation. I'm in agreement with Rachel's comments regarding the commercial space. I, I very much appreciate that you that you doubled what was proposed initially. And I, I hear you on the economic challenge of doing more. But as Rachel said, I don't think that this is really in the spirit of what we're trying to accomplish, particularly given the size of this building and number of residential units in it. I, I urge you to try to find a way to, to do significantly more on the first floor with commercial space. I won't have too many questions, comments about the design that's, that's not really my focus, except to say, I don't find it very appealing. What Rachel is saying about that corner being very flat. I don't feel that the, that the commercial frontage is very inviting at all. And whether that's more windows or other design elements, I don't know, but, but it doesn't look like a commercial retail structure. And, and I think you can do better there. I do really appreciate what you did with with the bike parking to meet our requirements. So I don't really have any further comments on that, except to say that as we proceed we'd like to see more detail on what kind of bike racks will be used and how they'll be laid out within the space. So I, I, what I, what I think I was hearing in the presentation is that from your perspective, you, you have pushed as far as you feel like you can economically on the commercial space, as well as open space setbacks and the upper story step back issues. And on those last three, that's where you're, you're seeking relief from, from the requirements of the zoning bylaw. And I, again, appreciate the challenges of this site. And that's even without the additional challenge and expense of the environmental contamination. Is that, is that really, is that what you're saying that it, that you've pushed as hard as you can, and if you can't get relief on those items, then this project is a no go. Bob, I can jump, I can jump in here on a couple of things. And in short, yes, that is correct. And to the point where we have submitted to lenders, other variations of this with all and what the numbers would look like with the entire first floor as commercial and retail. And it's just a no go because you're trying to spread out almost a million dollars. And make the bank feel comfortable that they're going to get their, you know, get paid their principal and interest. And I think on the commercial, that entire block we have reserved for commercial retail, we are not married to how that gets split up. I would say someone comes in and wants all 1300 and they want windows and glass the entire length of it with outdoor seating and say it's like a Starbucks, for example, just to use one on the top of my head. We would be fine with that just a lot of that gets figured out, you know, in the negotiation process with the leasing, in terms of how much someone wants or if we get to, and the spaces get split right down the middle or what you know whatever it is, but we just know that economically we can block that off. And even, you know, if we don't get any tenants for four years we at least can do the rest of the project. Is there anything that needs to be done, or, or, or hasn't already been done that would enable the flexibility of that space to be used for food service for instance. Can you give me a little. Well, I mean, particularly from a mechanical perspective, is there any additional engineering in in constructing the building that would be necessary in order to make it possible to run a food service operation how to get space. Erin I might direct that question to you if you're still there because it would depend on exactly what they do and how. If you were to put a restaurant in there you need to put a grease trap and prior to the sewer running out to mass abs so that's something. I mean that's typical that's something we could hash out down the line. If that was, if that was the route you were to go. I am running to the roof for your exhaust. This is Adam Wagner again. And Rachel's absolutely correct so it's grease trap and it's hood exhaust the hood exhaust, most likely you'd want running all the way up to the roof level, which means you've got a pretty sizable piece of stuff that's going to run through the walls and the layout of the residential units. It could certainly be done it's just something that hasn't been baked into this design at this point. But if it, if it isn't done at some point then then a restaurant use would essentially be precluded. Technically yes but you could still have any type of service industry where it's certain levels not cooked on site so you could have anything from you know depending on a sandwich shop or salad bars or depending on exactly how they operated you could have any type of restaurant in there. I see. Hey, David can I interrupt one quick second here. Sure. I see where you're going and it's kind of interesting. Is there a way maybe that we can grant relief somewhere else so that they can get a larger commercial space by like maybe decrease in number of parking spaces and sliding the back of the housing back back a little bit more by deleting some of the parking and then having a larger retail space down below. Do we have that is or maybe Bob that may be a question for you. I think I'll have Jenny answer that. Okay, better question for one of my experts. Is it something we can consider gentlemen that's what kin is asking. Okay. I mean the only thing too is having the ones almost I mean if we still had one parking space per unit for marketability of these units that's important to us. I know we have a couple of extra right now so I guess the difficult thing is reworking all the architectural layout design internally so where do those extra units come from and how many do actually gain is it just one. You know, or is it to I don't I just realistically I don't see it adding any more than one when it actually comes down to it at the end of the day. Well what if we just turned the parallel part the parking to parallel spaces along one side so it would be. Maybe they'll be like a parking spaces there and instead of what he got there 1213. We could, if we went up a whole another story we could do the whole first floor retail. Is it within zoning. Not quite sure I think the height restriction is 60. I can't quote it off the top of my head. Any something we can look into healthy skies out is that a way of something we can do. I don't think that that would work an extra an additional story. We can, we can explore it, but I don't think that that would be something that would work on that site based upon what they proposed, which I think is on I was just trying to find this, the maximum height is right here. And I don't think I don't think that they would actually make it if you added one more full story. But I'm glad to investigate it. I think there's probably other scenarios that would have to be explored. We have talked with them about reducing parking for other reasons, and this applicant is reluctant to do that. I think I think that's probably the bigger issue that needs to be talked about, not adding commercial space they want to keep their parking. So I think I'd put it back at the applicant to devise a plan to address these issues. Thank you, Jenny. I think that we need to provide parking for the residential units as John Murphy has indicated as well. Otherwise, we're going to have a problem of renting those units as well. And I think, you know, John made a good point. I've been in this town for many, many years. And the retail spaces. I know we're talking now about the possibility of a restaurant. I'm looking at Rachel when Rachel's image appears on the screen. And when we're talking about running that stack up through the residential units. I'm not seeing too much enthusiasm there. Okay. With respect to retail spaces on Mass Ave, we've all lived through this, okay, where retail spaces I've represented the Poulos family, Charlie Poulos who died at 93 own half of Allenton Center. Okay. Always had vacant spaces down there, had difficulty renting them, his daughter for a different reason. Okay. But I think what John Murphy is saying is maybe the banks are seeing that as well. Okay, from the point of view of do we want to lend money to a project where we don't think we're going to see a return on the amount of money we're putting into it. That's the problem. Okay. And I'm certainly open to suggestions. Okay. But I think they have to make sense for my client's point of view. And I know, you know, you're going to say, well, you know, your client has the obligation to work this thing out. The client is the one who has to spend the money. The client is the one who has to come up with the financing. Okay. And if a client cannot do that, then the client's not going to make this project happen. I think that there have been some good proposals here in terms of the what can be done as far as the exterior, the building is concerned and the like. And we certainly can consider doing that. Okay. But as John Murphy has indicated, I think we hit a roadblock with respect to again, and I talked about it earlier, the setbacks because we need the setbacks. If we need that certainly seven and a half foot setback on the fourth floor, if we're going to have make up an extra unit. So like that if we're going to be able to make up for the two feet, we have to move the building to two feet one four inches back from the lot line. So, I mean, we're open to suggestions, but you know, I'm pleading with you to listen to what we're saying. Okay. And again, the Pescudo family is not the MyRac family. We don't have the deep pockets that they have. Okay. So we're trying to do the best we can. Bob, I would seriously say that the message I really want to get across here is if this environmental issue did not exist, we wouldn't be having this conversation because we would just say yes to the retail on the first floor, it would not matter. It really wouldn't. But we are stuck in a corner here. We have an issue we have to deal with. And the only way to even get money to deal with that is to propose something to a lender that says we're going to give you the money to do everything, but it has to make sense for us. And, you know, I think there's other projects. I don't think it's the last time you're going to see us. I think there's other projects probably eventually that it's going to be a little bit different conversation that we're going to be in front of the ARB and you're going to be happier with some of these issues that you're bringing up. I would say we can add the windows on the retail and the commercial on the first floor. That's not a problem. We can add those windows. We can say yes to that right now. But getting rid of those back units is just I don't want to sit here and say we can look at that and make it work probably because that would just be a lie because we've already tried to make it work before we came in here and I would rather not mislead anyone. I hear and appreciate everything you're saying. I understand the challenges here. What I'm struggling with is whether this really feels like an appropriate application of mixed use as it's defined in Arlington. And, you know, it's clear you definitely done some good work here to push it further than was initially proposed. But it's I'm struggling with it. I'm going to be honest with you. And, I mean, other other things here, you know, I don't know if you were on when we were doing the hearing on the previous project tonight, but, you know, the seeking relief from the upper story step back which we had a lengthy discussion about in that hearing. And, and there was a reason that we that we implemented that by law to require the upper story step backs and now we're getting now two projects in a row that are seeking relief from that. And, and that concerns me. And I, with respect to the open space, you know, open space is is a big issue here in Arlington and are we, I know that we can generally grant relief on these dimensional requirements, but can can we actually grant a complete waiver of usable open space is that is that within our purview. Traditionally, it's always been a variance issue. Okay. I just want to say this, okay. The, with respect to the ARB jurisdiction was given to the ARB many years ago under environmental design review to deal with properties fronting on Massachusetts Avenue, Broadway, and the like okay the main thoroughfares through the town. So the intent was to give the ARB jurisdiction to deal with those properties. Okay. Traditionally over the years, whenever one needed relief with respect to open space, we were told you had to go to the zoning board why, because that required a variance. Does it even make sense that if you're going to give the ARB the jurisdiction to under environmental design review to deal with properties on massive the main thoroughfares through the town that you're only going to give them partial jurisdiction to do that. And you're not going to give them total jurisdiction to do that. Look, there is a statute that basically applies here, and that's 48 chapter nine. And if you look at chapter 48 chapter, chapter nine, that basically has a preamble in it that talks about what can be done with under section nine. I should say section nine, not chapter nine. And that reads special permits may be issued only for uses which are in harmony with the general purpose and intent of the ordinance or bylaw and shall be subject to general or specific provisions set forth therein. Okay, and such permits when issued may impose conditions safeguards and limitations on time or use. I'm suggesting to the members of the ARB that this authority there that has never been used. Okay, by the ARB. Why, because when the ARB first began to exercise its jurisdiction. Many years ago, it basically said and concluded, if it's open space or something akin to that, it has to be a variance. I'm suggesting to the members of the ARB that they need to look at section nine of chapter 40 a and see whether in fact they have the ability under special permit authority to grant relief for open space again, because when the ARB was established. The intent was that they would have the jurisdiction on these properties and not the zoning Board of Appeal. I can't go before the zoning Board of Appeal on anything on these main thoroughfares through the town. I have to go to the ARB. Does it make sense to make me do that twice to go to the ARB and then go to the zoning board for variance for something else. It does not to me. Well, I might ask if Jenny has anything to add on on this, or is this. Is there a question here, do we need to ask Council. I think is right something that I think I would like the ARB to look at. Okay, because traditionally, it's not been looked at. I think we can step back and look at that. I don't think we need to answer that right now. I think Bob is correct, but we certainly want to look into it. I don't think we're going to make a decision or take a vote on this issue tonight. Based on what we've heard, I do want to move on. We do still have a long agenda in front of us and we're getting bogged down here. It is an important question, but I think it's one that that is not going to be answered in this forum. We can go back and take a look at David, did you have anything else before I turn it over to Dean. I just want to make it clear I, I would love to find a way to make this project work. And, and I appreciate the work that's gone into this already. I'm just, it requires a substantial amount of relief on a number of things that I'm struggling with, but I'm, I'm not precluding finding a way to, to move forward on this. I just want to indicate a willingness to continue to work with the opponents on this. We'll take a look at that. Gene, go ahead. Please don't reiterate any, any issues that have already been raised, but I won't. I'll be as quick as I can. I just would say I agree with my colleagues about the good quality of the presentation, what was presented also how far the design went from the previous one to to this one. I am in a slightly different place than some of my colleagues on a few of these issues. I don't necessarily have a problem with the 1300 square feet on the building based upon what I've forgotten who just said that you're flexible about how they're used because it seemed when I looked at this initially that 500 was retail and 800 was commercial. And there was a wall between it. If you're flexible, rent it all to somebody for retail, rent it all somebody for commercial, split it up. I'm comfortable with that. I think it would be very nice if you found a way to put that chase in because you have two restaurants in there now. And it seems to me one possibility is to have maybe not one of those two restaurants where they're both gone. You did have two restaurants in there. Have one of the restaurants or another restaurant return and by not providing that exhaust, you're losing the opportunity to fill that space. So I think it would be nice if you could find a way to do that. Otherwise, unlike David and Rachel, I do respect what they say and understand it. I think this is a minimum amount I would find acceptable. You're at 42 points in lead, which is only certified. I know you can get to at least 50 for silver certification. And I think you should try to do that. I think you should have at least one electric charging station for cars in the parking lot in back. And I didn't see any indication of that. So now let me get back to the setback on Lockland Avenue and then the step back on the fourth floor. We do have the authority to adjust the setback. In other words, the setback on Lockland if there are specific conditions unique to the proposal. And it sort of seems to me the specific condition unique to this proposal is you're already in nonconformance with that along Lockland because you know we're close to 20 feet. So I'm comfortable with giving you less than 20 feet as long as you don't exceed the existing nonconformance on Lockland, which it looks like you're not going to do. So as long as you're not exceeding the existing nonconformance, I think you're okay from my perspective. Can't speak to my other colleagues. However, I believe and I've read this numerous times, I believe we do not have the authority to wave or mitigate the fourth story stepback that is bringing that back seven and a half feet on the fourth story. David talked about the reasons why that was instituted by town meeting. And my understanding is town meeting had some discussion about giving us the authority to wave or limit that and it's not in the regulations. So I, I would hate to sink the project for this reason, but I really feel like my hands are tied by the bylaw on that and with the other pieces. I am with you on all of the other pieces. I agree with basically what Ken and Rachel said about some of the view of the building, but they're much more expert than I am about that. But I can't go with you on the fourth story stepback. That's it. Alright, I'm going to open this up to public comment. I would ask that we move through this quickly and respectfully. I'm not going to get into arguments with anyone, please. Please state your name and address and I will allow for three minutes. Each please use the hand raised function through zoom. I don't always see you. There are a lot of people in here. I don't necessarily see you if you have your camera on or you're just waving at me. So the best way to get called on is to use the actual zoom chat function. Ben Rudick, go ahead. Yeah, Ben Rudick 40 web Cowat Road and also got my way Sarah in the background. First I'll say that I'm very sad to see Toraya go that was the only source of high quality affordable sushi in the greater Boston area so if you could replace all 1200, 1300 square feet of retail with the giant Toraya that'd be awesome. On a serious note, speaking for myself and on behalf of Arlington neighbors for more neighbors which is an advocacy group pushing for more housing and greater in Arlington and all greater Boston. It's wonderful to see housing being proposed. I think this is of all the various ways and places we could build housing to build smaller units right along NASA have right near a bus stop. This is about as straightforward as housing production gets in this area. And so I'm really excited to see this get built. I'm hoping that the board can resolve the issues around the mixed use intention of the area. I'm excited to see some discussion about giving other variances to allow that to happen without eating into the residential space. Yeah, and just to say that that we as Arlington historically have done a pretty poor job of producing more housing over the last 3040 years. And if we're going to tackle the deep housing crisis in our town and throughout the region we need to produce a lot of it we need a lot of affordable housing we need mixed affordable market rate we need market rate we need small units we big units we know sorts of things. But you know small units right on transit right on Mass Ave. This is about as straightforward as housing gets and I hope from the bottom my heart that that this gets done so thank you so much. Thank you Ben Christian Klein. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My name is Christian Klein I'm a resident at 54 Newport Street. I had submitted a letter in regards to the prior submittal. I must say I'm very glad on a lot of the changes that the that the applicant has made. The attention to the space around the butt shelter specifically moving the building back creating a little more of a buffer around that, and creating a better connection between the building and the sidewalk. I think that's a much more successful than it was shown originally. I also appreciate the changes to the basement level and the layout of the long term bicycle parking I think the parking is a much more accessible in the format it's shown now and moving the short term parking to the front of the building is also very well appreciated. I like the way it's cited. I don't know about the fourth floor setback but I do like that horizon line that sort of cut around the building I think that that does a very nice job of sort of making that delineation, even without the building necessarily moving backwards and playing. On the green on the landscaping in the front. I thought the renderings were very good. There's not a lot of very vertical greenery and so I was just curious if you would consider any sort of climbing plants for the front of the building that could help to sort of soften that edge so everything is not just knee height. As a possibility. In regards to the commercial spaces. My concern is just they're very shallow. And there's, I think a lot of the reason that the building across the street had difficulty attracting tenants was the shallowness of the space there's just nowhere to get out of being in front of the windows. If you're in front of a store and you want to have a back of house, you need to be able to get away from the front of the store and there just isn't that option here. And the two apartments that are on the parking lot there's no buffer between the parking lot and the side of the building. It's going to be very much like a motel with people driving in at night, you know right up to the side of your bedroom wall. I would encourage the applicant to think about, you know, could the project still be viable with two fewer residential spaces, if that would allow those two commercial spaces to go full depth. As a possibility. And then, since you said I don't know the full extent of the excavation that's going to be required for the hazard mitigation. But if that if the excavation is of such an extent would it make sense to consider doing any sorts of ground source heat pumps for the building where you're already doing the excavation to begin with. It may not be a viable at all. But as a possibility if you're already digging up the site to a certain depth, does it make any sense. That would certainly simplify your roof plan. The last, the last thing I have is in regards to the usable open space in the bylaw for a residential use in a mixed use development in the be to district it's supposed to be 20% of the gross floor area the residential portion of the building is usable open space and currently the building has zero usable open space as proposed. I understand the site currently has zero usable open space, however the site is being raised for this development. And so Mr chair I ask you does does leveling the site necessarily allow the current owner to maintain any of the pre existing non conformities in relation to the building, or the lot, because it seems to me that the zoning bylaws are very clear that it's supposed to be 20% of the gross floor area is usable open space on this site for mixed use building with residential, and I would just encourage the board to. That's something. Thank you Christian I let you go over a little bit that's something I'll look into and keep in mind as we work with the proponent here. I appreciate your indulgence. Thank you. Carl Wagner. You hear me okay. Yeah. Okay, Carl Wagner 30 Edge Hill Road Arlington. I want to thank the board for the useful questions and concerns that they raised to the applicant. I just should say as a person who lives in this town, not as a member of the board, that building just looks like it belongs in a city, not in a town. And I'm amazed that you managed to make me like the building, try and for other businesses that are getting kicked out used to be in that such dumpy little building. I can't believe I miss it now, but this building manages to make it look like that. In fact, this building's massive size four floors basically straight up, even makes the terrible building across the street 882 massive mall and not so bad by comparison. So I hope that the board will consider that they should uphold the the rules of the B2 business zone B2 stands for something like neighborhood business zone. And it means that the businesses should conform and work with the neighborhood or whatever they were at the time, they were supporting the neighborhood, this building and the applicant's plan doesn't yet support the neighborhood. So in 2016, people like me in town meeting voted for the mixed use building by law, and that allowed all sorts of open space to go away, it allowed buildings to get much larger less parking it allowed all sorts of nasty things that belong in an urban environment. If we allow businesses to be supported by some accessory apartments or residential and a lot of people were thinking of the capital district down in East Arlington. This building is not the capital district. This is not supporting business. This is misusing mixed use law to make accessory tiny business on top of a ton of residential. And I think it means we have to relook at the mixed use law and perhaps get rid of it or substantially change it. I thank the board again for holding this building to the letter of the already ridiculously large rules that are allowed for in the mixed use law until we can change that it makes use law and certainly consider maybe three floors that would get rid of all the problems of the parking and the ridiculous size. That's it. Thank you very much. Thank you. Don Seltzer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Is it possible to have the last of my slides put up. I want to go ahead. Let's move through this quickly. I don't want to argue about it with you. Next time please get it in. By Friday. Go ahead, Jenny. Go ahead, Don. Two and a half and 43. I like to call your attention to the parking situation. I don't see the slide. The parking lot, as it's presented there is greatly undersized. It does not meet the by law requirements for dimensions. One thing that's lacking is it requires a five foot landscape buffer between the parking lot and the building. You can't just have the cars come right up to the building as was shown. You also are required to have 24 feet in the middle for a drive aisle. The dimensions as we're shown here. That's the last one. Yeah. The last one. Thank you. It's seven feet short of what the bylaws require. The only way to really deal with that is reduce the amount of parking. The only way to really deal with that is reduce the amount of parking. The only way you would fit into this area is a three storey apartment building where the first floor was all commercial and you had 12 apartments in the two floors above. You'd have enough room for the parking. You'd have enough room for the usable open space. That is what the mixed law. Mix use by law was intending that type of usage. Thank you. Test. Can you hear me? Yes, please go ahead. Aram Holman, 12 Whittemore Street. I'll try to be respectful of your time and to get through things quickly. I want to address a couple of things. One is what I consider inappropriate use of the mixed business district. I think other people have said words to the effect that you're supposed to have a mix of business and residential. It was not intended to do a wholesale conversion of business areas into all residential or almost all residential, leaving only a token amount of business. That's not the way it was intended. What paved the way metaphorically for it was your removal of the 2,500 square foot per lot, 2,500 square foot of space per unit that is typical of residential Arlington. If for something that's 90% residential, you don't have that, you're really just cramming people in. This is not a good mix. One minor point before I forget it, a jump on your plans. If you look at the plans for the upper floors, if you look at the center apartment fronting Mass Ave, there is no stove. So I'd like to see your plans include a stove. Minor comment, digression. With regard to this building, I agree with all the people who say you really ought to expand the business use to include the entire first floor. That's what was envisioned. Right now you've only got 1,300 square feet and however you split it, that's not enough. And you're shoehorning in three other units. Part of the problem with Arlington businesses and why we have so much space is because too many of the units are holes in the wall. They're not big enough. And you're proposing two more units that are also not big enough and also have a high likelihood of failing. You need larger spaces and I will cite as examples of successful businesses that have lasted. Punjab and Asitron, both restaurants which took the enormous risk of combining two spaces. Tango did the same thing. Unfortunately it just closed due to the pandemic, but the business model is there. I'm citing evidence to say you need larger spaces and I would like to see the board require the applicant to create more business space and larger sizes. Finally, somebody referred to it, your question of whether you can waive jurisdiction. I'm seeing a lot of hearings where applicants are really pushing the limits. Just because the ARB has jurisdiction to waive certain requirements does not mean that it has to do so. I think it needs to send a message to applicants who are complaining of financial difficulty or financial hardship that that is their issue. They need to make it work with their banks, with their financiers rather than pushing and continually pushing at the edges of Arlington zoning. Thank you very much. Barbara Thorning. Yes, thank you very much. I am sitting here getting a tremendous sense of deja vu. We are quibbling about a lot of details of this project and the project before and I understand that you have to hear all the quibbling and weigh it out and be good arbitrators for the community. But I'm remembering way back when the Seaport was first being developed, when Dick Carpenter had the rights to develop the property and it was going to go forward and Anthony Athenas, who ran Anthony's Pier 4 was part of the deal and Anthony got greedy and he said he started quibbling and he said, we want a little bit more. Blew up the project and it was 25 years before the city of Boston had an opportunity to develop that area again. And I don't want to see that happening to Arlington because I live in the area that we're talking about right now. I drive by that property two or three times a day. I really would like to see something developed personally. Four stories sounds a little low. I'd like to see five or six, but we won't go there. Please, let's just make it happen. And remember the context that we're in. We're in the context where the economy is about to dive and we're not going to have developers coming to us for much longer. So let's make good use of them while we've got them. Thank you. Thanks, Barbara. Steve Revillac. I'm really glad to see a proposal coming before the board that adds housing, particularly some small apartments that adds them on a major thoroughfare right next to a public transit stop. I'm also glad to see something that actually triggers our inclusionary zoning by law and will add to our subsidized housing inventory. I have one question if I may ask it through you, Mr. Chair. Earlier, Mr. Anise discussed the environmental conditions on the site, and I get the sense that the property owner is going to be on the hook for remediating them, regardless. So what I'm kind of curious about is if this project were not to go forward for any reason for any reason, what would be likely alternatives. Thank you. Bob, I can jump in here and answer the question. So, and this is very quick, but the way that anyone who's not familiar with these environmental issues is when it gets flagged, you cannot ignore it. You are forced to deal with it or you face fines and other issues so you can't just push it off if we don't get a project that works, you're forced to deal with them. The reason why we're here is because we are going to be required to take the building down and remove that material. And we have looked at all their types of asset classes that we could build here that would try and make some financial sense, and this is the only thing that even squeaks through the finish line to be able to do something here. Otherwise, we essentially would have to wait until something else happens that we can redevelop the site even, you know, whenever that may be. So, that's the ground essentially. Yeah, you face fines and other issues like that. Thank you, Steve. Thank you, John. Any other members of the public wish to speak on this matter. Pam, go ahead. Hi, it's Pam. I'm Executive Director of the Housing Corporation of Arlington. I also live at one Gilboa Road. I'm also a town meeting member. I want to bring up a couple of points. First, to refute the fact that these are such tiny units in our wait list, which is about 400 households at this point. Our major demand is for one and two bedroom units. So the one bedrooms make all the sense in the world, particularly right on Mass App in front of a bus stop. I mean, it's perfect for people who are either young and just starting out and just want a small space or even for couples or singles who are downsizing. So I think that's a really smart move there. I was wondering, no one said how tall the building was. If it's less than 60 feet tall, I think that's what they need. Why couldn't they do a fifth floor? The building next to it is certainly significantly higher than that. And even if it's only a partial story that would give them a couple of additional units up on the upper level, they would have a magnificent view and could be great spaces. And could also have a frontage that if you allow that to be open space, that would be that could satisfy that piece as well. I think this is a great deal. I think it's wonderful that they're adding the affordable housing piece to it. We definitely need that as you all know. And I just we are very supportive of this as a proposal and we hope it moves forward. Thank you. Thanks, Pam. Is there anyone else who wishes to speak at the public comment? We'll continue to accept that via email post those with the agenda. Part of the record. Bob, I'm going to go to you. I know there are no. Sorry, sorry to interrupt. I think Joanne is waving her hand. Go ahead, Joanne. I didn't see your hand. I'm sorry. That's all right. I'm sorry. I didn't use the, the other device. I just want to remind people that at last spring's town meeting, the chair of the finance committee said, the greatest problem in Arlington is the very low ratio of commercial property to residential. Give us your name and address, please. Just for the record. We know who you are. We need it for the record. Thank you. Thank you. Next in. 42 mystic lake drive. Town meeting member precinct nine. Member of the board of the Arlington housing authority. Thank you. Go ahead. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. The finance committee got up and said the greatest problem in Arlington from his perspective, especially in terms of the tax rate, which has been going up so high that people have to leave their homes. Was that the very low ratio of commercial property to residential. Some residential and some commercial. And it just doesn't do that. And I think that a lot of people are in need of housing because they can't afford the taxes. So I think that that has to be a very important consideration. I've even known people to move in to the Arlington housing authority because they could no longer pay the taxes on their small condominiums. And they went through all their savings. So I think this should be part of the picture and, and I, I really do not support having such a very small commercial space that as people have said, it's very hard to rent out that we need the whole first floor. If it's going to be a truly mixed use building. Thank you. Thanks. Okay. Unless there's anyone else that wants to speak, I'm going to turn to Bob. I'm not saying Bob, you've heard some of the concerns here. How long. I think we need to take this back to with your team and address those either in the affirmative or in the negative. The meeting that you continued for the hotel was continued to what date, August 17. John, what do you think? Well, I think Jenny mentioned there's a meeting at the end of July, another meeting in July. That's easily that's July. 20. That's only two weeks away. That's fine for the things that we need to address. Is that enough time, John? Yes. All right. Got to rely on my team. Okay. Well, you can do. All right. So unless there's anything else from the board, I think we're going to take a motion to continue this hearing to July 20, 2020 at 7pm. Thank you all for your patience, your input and your responsiveness. Bob, if there's anything you need from the department, or if you think it would be wise to meet with kin again and upon the meeting, I think we're going to take a motion to continue this hearing. I think we're going to continue to July 20. Thank you all for your patience, your input and your responsiveness. Bob, if there's anything you need from the department, or if you think it would be wise to meet with kin again and possibly Rachel, please feel free to do so. I think that is a wise, productive way of going about things. And I think we saw the results of it tonight. You can get all the way there, but we saw some good results. Thank you very much for your time. Thank you. Thank you all. That concludes the public hearing portion of our meeting this evening. It's 1020. This is as late as we've gone in a while. Just has to happen. Next up on our agenda is the Thorndike plays comprehensive permit. I'm going to turn this over to Jenny in a minute. We are going to go on through this. This is not a public comment, public hearing portion for tonight. This is not anything necessarily for us to vote on, but I'll turn it over to Jenny to give us the rundown of what's happening with this project. This is a 40 B project, which does not lie within the purview of the ARB. Although we are certainly asked to make comments and apply it on things from time to time. Those are not binding. I think most of you were not on the board in 2016. And so may not have participated in the process that we went through last time. So for those purposes, I'll just explain what we're looking for, which is the comprehensive permit is reviewed and approved by the zoning board of appeals. My charge is to collect comment letters from various boards and commissions, including the redevelopment board and different departments who are reviewing the proposal because it is going back to resume the hearing on July 14. The deadline that we've set internally for getting comments is actually July 7 so timing wise. I'm looking to actually update the comment letter that we sent back in 2016 and send it on to the zoning board of appeals so that they have it in time for their hearing, essentially next week. So I am glad to answer questions about the permit process, but it is a 40 B. It does reside with the with the ZBA. It's not coming to the redevelopment board for any sort of review or approval. This is really just simply to weigh in, provide any feedback. You can kind of get a sense of the type of feedback that was provided in 2016 based upon the letter that I provided in the packet. I would be glad to take any sort of updated information from board members. Of course, many of you weren't participating in that letter so you might have very different perspectives. The ZBA is actually they've at the town rather has retained a consultant to do additional reviews through the beta group. Those reviews include stormwater wetlands delineation floodplain delineation design review, and then also traffic and engineering review so it is a fairly comprehensive third party review that we're going to be conducting. And they will also be going to the conservation commission eventually to pick up that hearing as well. But I guess I'll just pause and see what questions people have about the project or if you want to talk about the letter or how you just sort of want to want to handle this conversation. I know that it is late and we have other agenda items. So I want to be respectful of that as well. Go ahead, Gene. I thought it was a really nice letter from a few years ago. I just had one thought about it. I think it's interesting that in our inclusionary bylaw, the 15% of units that are rental have to be for people at 70% of AMI, but for 40B it's 80% of AMI. And I know we made some other recommendations in the letter about income ladders for the place, but I wondered if it made sense to also put in that 15% of the units, the first 15% of the 25% that are going to be affordable should be at 70% AMI, not 80% AMI. Because that's, you know, it doesn't, I think it might actually be sort of winnable on that issue. And it's not a lot of difference, but it sort of does respect that our bylaw does slightly better than 40B on where to set the income limit. That's it. Are you, could I just clarify something, Gene, are you asking to amend the, so in the letter that we wrote in 2016, I think you're looking at sort of the section four, when we talked about affordable housing. Do you want to amend that to talk a little bit more specifically about for a by giving a little bit more detail or are you suggesting that we encourage them to go lower. I think we should encourage them to go lower and specifically say, you know, in, in Arlington, it would be 70% AMI, and therefore it makes sense to at least do that for 15% of the units. Yeah, that's all. Okay, thank you. I'll just, I'll just say from a, you know, we made a couple of recommendations for things that we wanted the ZBA to ask for from a design perspective. It's very institutional looking currently. And again, I don't know what the design review process is with the consultant. But I think that there's a lot of opportunity still for improvement here. So, I'm happy to provide some specific feedback, or if, again, that's really being held by the consultant, and we don't have a lot of opportunity to provide input, then I will hold on those comments. It would be helpful if you based on what we wrote last time, if you think that there are certain things that we can amend more specific guidance that you would like to provide. If it's okay with Andrew and others, I would suggest that you draft something and send it to me because I'm not obviously we're not approving as an exact letter this evening I'm going to have to write something as a follow up to this. So, I, if it's okay Andrew, could we have board members individually submit any updated changes or suggestions that they would for things they would like to add. Yep, I'm okay with that. So, Rachel, if you want to think about suggestions for making it a little less institutional or other areas for improvement, it would be helpful to get a sense of what those might be. And that's feedback that we can also provide to the third party consultant but I think it's still useful to provide specific guidance. I can get that to you tomorrow morning because you, that's, that's your, when you need to send it. I'm going to start turning it over. Yeah, tomorrow. Got it. Thank you. Hey Jenny, can I ask you a quick, broader question on this. Okay. They go a 40 B, because we don't have enough affordable housing in Arlington. What is the criteria. We have to meet so they cannot so no other developer can do 40 B in Arlington. Well, there's different ways to meet the 10% or 40 B under general law 40 B, you either meet it through the 10%, which in our case we're at about 5.2 or 3% right now, and it has to be 10%. We would need hundreds of units in order to achieve 10%. That's one way. The other way is through the general land area minimum, which is what we, we were looking to do through the 1.5% of the land area that's devoted to housing. And we, that was part of the original denial by the zoning board of appeals in 2016, which then was went to the state through an appeal, a whole process, which was then appealed the decision. And then unfortunately delivered back to the town that we still have not met that 1.5%. So that's why the hearing is now resumed. So either we can meet the requirement through 10% or through the general land area minimum nut. There's not another community in the Commonwealth that's achieved 1.5% yet. But it's, if we did, it would be by adding to the affordable housing inventory and the land area with the affordable housing on it. This, so that's the reason why it's resuming and hearing is happening and because we have not achieved, we have not met the state law requiring 40 B. Okay, thank you, Jenny. You're welcome. So I was pretty happy with the transportation related section of this letter. I think the one other thing I might suggest is it would be nice if they could comply with our new bike parking. Yeah. We talked about bikes, but we didn't have it. Right. Which would make a big difference in such a large development. Yeah, and so close to a wife. Yeah. Yep. Okay, I can, I can, I can probably add us a new subsection. I think that makes sense. That's, that's fine with me. Okay. I think I have all I need at this point in time. So I will draft something. I'll send it to all of you for as a notice that I, it'll be submitted to Christian Klein from who's the chair of the ZBA. And I'm happy to report back at any point in time if you have questions about the hearing or anything of that nature or would like other updates. I just wanted to bring this back to you to get an updated letter back to the zoning board of appeals. Thank you. Thanks, Jenny. All right, moving on. Unless there's any objection, I am going to pass on the Woodamore Park update till our next meeting July 20th. All right, Jenny. Yes, yes. I have Ali Carter was participating. I think at this point we have decided we're going to move that to July 20th. We, the landscape architect will join us at that time. Good. I'm also going to continue the director's update and the meeting minutes. I'm bouncing around a little bit here. I apologize. I do have to do the appointment for the housing planning implementation committee. So Jenny lead us through the woman who has applied. She was with us earlier. I don't think she is anymore. I don't blame her. But Jenny, go ahead. I don't know if she's not on anymore. Let me see. One second. I guess she did drop off. I thought she was still on. Well, we have. Okay. She's not there anymore. Okay. The applicants resume is in the package. I'm glad to give an update about her if needed, but I was hoping to introduce her to you. We can also have her come back next time. If that makes you feel more comfortable, but we have. We have a number of openings on the housing plan implementation committee. I think we only had that one applicant at the time. So we've interviewed her and we think she would be a good fit on the committee. We also recently lost another person on that committee who resigned who had been with the committee actually since it was the housing plan advisory committee. So she actually helped us to create the housing production plan and unfortunately she has now left. I would like to really get another person appointed as soon as possible so that we can have a fuller committee. Are they meeting regularly during. They have had two meetings. We didn't have a meeting last week, but we intend to have another meeting in August. Okay. I suppose we could have her come back July 20th. I'd hate to waste her time again when she's the only person who's applied. She has an impressive resume. And anyone who's willing to serve on that committee, I guess. Should be thanked for their volunteer. She's not one of the normal faces we see around town. She's someone new. And I appreciate new input and new ideas on things. So, I guess I'll defer to the rest of the board with whether you would like to appoint her this evening or have her come back July 20th. I'm okay ruling on the papers so to speak. That's, that's where I am. I would, I would agree. I think that her resume is, it's excellent. And she certainly has had a series of experiences that I think will serve her well on the committee. Good. So either, would either one of you like to move to a point. Her name escapes me the moment. Michelle Michelle short sleeve. Michelle short sleeve. Yeah. All right, so someone please move to a point. Short sleeve to the housing planning implementation committee. We have Rachel's motion. We have a second from me, David. Gene. Yes. Hi, Rachel. Yes. David. Yes. I vote yes. Congratulations, Michelle. I look forward to hearing from you soon. In absentia. Okay. Thank you. So thanks, Jenny. So we're skipping. As I said, we're tabling the director's update. We will table meeting minutes, tackle those at the next hearing and move to open forum. Thank you. Thank you. And I'll be brief. Please be respectful. I will call on you. I will be slightly looser with the three minute rule as we've made it through the two public hearings this evening. Please use the raise hand feature so that I can see what you'd like to speak. And, uh, Don, go ahead. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Don Seltzer Irving street. I'm going to start with a question that I've been providing to this board about shadows and as told you, but that you should ignore me because I am not a licensed expert in the field. I've been very candid with this board about my background and the specific mathematical tools that I've been using. I have never disputed the shadow studies provided by our experts. I have refrained from pointing out to her experts that deciduous trees do not have leaves in late December or even by the spring equinox as shown in their expert analysis. Instead, I've tried to supplement these studies with useful information that these limited analyses do not convey, rather than simply show what homes might be affected. I also want to provide the board with the more useful metrics of exactly how many hours of sunlight will be lost to these homes and how many months of the year that these conditions will last. If the applicant disputes any of my numbers, I urge him to consult his experts to double check them. Thank you. Thank you, Don. Anyone else wish to speak during open forum? Seeing none, we'll take a motion to adjourn. So, motion? Second. Motion from Ken, second from Rachel. All right, done. See you all on July 20th. Thank you all for your patience. I vote yes on the motion. Gene? Yes. Ken? Yes. Rachel? Yes. David? Yes. Oh, yes. I jumped the gun. Ah, all right. Appreciate it. All of you, and we'll talk on July 20th. Thank you so much. Thank you. There was a, there was a, like, sorry, may I, there was like an announcement. Go ahead. No, by you. Yes, there is an announcement. I have already individually said this to the members of the board. I was going to sit on it since it's so late tonight. For family reasons during the pandemic, I have tendered my resignation from the board. Effective at the end of the summer. I've been very pleased to be here. I've been very happy to be here today. I've been, I've been spoken with Jenny and. Adam about this last week. It has been very rewarding and a pleasure to be on the board for the last several years. I did not come to this decision lightly, but the way. Things have gone in the last several months. My own personal circumstances require it. So. I will still be around to some degree. But we'll miss all of you in these meetings. at least through August, depending on when my replacement is chosen. So, you know, still have to live with me until then. But- Thank you, Andrew. Thank you all to all the members of the board, all the members I've served with in the past, to Jenny, especially, to Carol Kowalski, and to Adam Chaptelaine, and to the members of the select board as well. It's been a very good experience, and I've enjoyed it, and I will miss it. Thanks, Andrew. We'll all bring a drink to our last Zoom meeting and toast you at that time. Wish you the best of luck. Andrew. Thank you. Thank you, Andrew. You'll be very missed. Thank you. All right, with that, we can end the night and re-adjure. Thank you all. Thanks for your patience. Goodnight. Goodnight.