 All right, call to order the December 7th, 2015 meeting of the Arlington Redevelopment Board, recorded by ACMI. First on the agenda this evening are some appointments that were required to make, so I'll turn forward to Laura. Okay. So, the first one is a request from the Vision 2020 Advisory Board to appoint someone to represent the ARB. They have suggested nominated Elizabeth Carde-Jones, who I know for a long time because she was on the tack, and may have been on some other committees too, I'm not sure, but I invited Julie Brazil, the chair of Vision 2020, to come and talk a little bit about what they're doing these days and what our role is and some of the recent changes, and then also we can talk with Elizabeth who's on the right. This is Julie. Come up. Yes. Introduce yourselves. We know. That's right. Of course. So, yes, I'm Julie Brazil and I'm the current chair of the Vision 2020 Standing Committee, and this is... Elizabeth Carde-Jones. All right. I do want to clarify one thing that Laura said, which is that we are requesting your support of Laura's nomination of Elizabeth to the Vision 2020 Standing Committee, but I will bring up the Standing Committee's relationship to the advisory board as well, and there have been a number of changes that Town Meeting approved, and so I just want to be sure we're all on the same page, and then see if you have any questions. The changes that Town Meeting approved in May of this year were to the structure of the Standing Committee, which was originally formed as a committee of 22 named positions, and over time that had become a little unwieldy, so when I took over as chair a couple of years ago I recommended that we study that, and we had some conversations and decided that the Standing Committee has two important functions, and they are roughly to run the committee and do the reporting to Town Meeting and take the votes on the budget and manage the affairs of Vision 2020, and then there's the sort of visioning piece where we need the input, and the Vision 2020 is founded on the interactions and conversations and input from a wide range of people, volunteers, Standing Committee members, and then representatives from various boards and some elected officials, but it's very hard to have meetings where both of those things happen effectively. So we recommended that we split and create a nine-person Standing Committee and a ten-person advisory board, of which there would be a representative from the ARB, the School Committee's Selectment and Finance Committee, along with the moderator, the superintendent, the manager, and Town Council. If we can find a high school student, we've got a position open for that as well, which a couple of our task groups are interacting with high school students now, and we're very excited about their input as well. So that's really what we're doing. The smaller nine-person Standing Committee has two positions that are appointed by the moderator, two positions appointed by the Director of Planning with the support of the ARB, two by the manager with the support of the Selectment and two by the superintendent with the support of the School Committee. So there's a lot of input and chances to be sure that the Vision 2020 Standing Committee is sort of engaged and has a good mix of people. And then the chair is appointed through a somewhat more elaborate process that involves several more steps. So the chair is appointed specifically to be the chair. So that's really the changes and the input and the relationship as it stands now, and I just wanted to be sure that everybody understood that because we'll be coming back every few years with appointments that need to be made where now on a regular rotating three-year term for all of the members of the Standing Committee. So we'll be back more regularly going forward. I don't have a whole lot else to say, I mean our bigger projects are still the town survey and our current somewhat unexpected project is Vision 2020 is a lead partner with a local theater group that has gotten an NEA grant, National Endowment for the Art grant for two years specifically to use theater skills, theater and performance art to increase civic engagement. So there'll be public performances and then workshops for the participating committees to build skills. It's a very interesting project and, you know, an NEA grant, it's a substantial accomplishment. And for Arlington, I mean, Adam Chapter Lane had to write a letter of support because it really does require that it involve town committees and that it be going somewhere. So that started in October, so we're still getting that up and running, but it's a very interesting project and we're very excited. So that's pretty much the quick report from Vision 2020, and then would you like to talk a little bit about what you're jumping into? To the extent that I know what I'm jumping into, as Julie mentioned, the Vision 2020 Standing Committee is sort of being reformed and that's kind of exciting for me because I'm having enough difficulty trying to understand all of the aspects of the Vision 2020 and all the things that it touches in the town, which is really astonishing. And, you know, I have some familiarity with the way the town works. I was a member of the Transportation Advisory Committee with Laura for 12 years, stepped off a few years ago, served on the Sims Advisory Committee as the representative of the TAC. I have been involved with Robbins Farm Garden, which was a grassroots community cooperative garden that's been going for six years now. It's a wonderful, wonderful project. That's the big things that I've been involved with, but I have had some involvement with the Redevelopment Board through my work on the TAC periodically at Commune to work on different projects, the CVS and the Brigham's projects, things like that. So I don't really have a lot more to say, but I guess what I'd like to know is what sort of things would you see as connecting your committee to the Vision 2020 Standing Committee and see if there's any way that I can make that work for you? I do have a couple broader questions first. So Bruce was on this for years. And you did say that, so there are two that the Planning Department ends up nominating, so if Elizabeth is one who's the other, I don't... Joey Gluszko. Oh, Joe. Okay. Okay, so that's our other... Oh, yeah, no, I just didn't know who it was, especially with all the re-jiggering that's been done. Of course. Oh, that's great. And as far as, I think it's always one of those things. My own view is as far as Vision 2020 and the Redevelopment Board, it'd be great to hear what questions or what you want from us at certain different times. With Bruce on it, it was a little bit easier because he was here if something came up. So I think in my mind the only thing is you may have to make a little bit more of a concerted effort to kind of at least let the chair know anything that comes up or anything we should be aware of. If we were going to be our eyes and ears, obviously that would be helpful from our perspective is just to stay in touch with the chair pretty readily. So on any issues that might come up with respect to any kind of larger development projects, Mass Ave, obviously the master plan, any of those types of things, I think, so that might be of any way. I'm actually feeling new here so I'm still trying to find my own way here. I will probably say, I have nothing to say right now until I get a little more into this. I'm still understanding all the interactions of all the different committees. Harlington's a very committee-oriented place. And points. I'm not sure of the difference. I'm just trying to understand all the different visions all the committees have. And that's what I call Mike. And saying that if we're, at least know of what the visions are and share everybody's opinions, that's all I can add right now. What did Mike say? I'll second that. Just to learn how you are, what your interests are, the community, how you interact with the master planning group, the advisory board. It's very important. I have the same question you have when I started quite a while ago. I'm still having quite figured out what everybody, how everybody works. But I know they're doing great work too. It's now seeming to kind of be on a vortex, which is this master plan implementation. So this theater idea is fantastic. What a great mixed use idea. Oh, absolutely. If you want to find something great, it's a cultural thing like that. Would you be interacting with the existing performance venues that we have, like the theater groups and so forth? Well, it's a particular theater group who was awarded the grant. So it's their performances. And we, the participating committees, will work with the theater group to develop a theme for each performance. So the first performance was in October and the Disability Commission asked them to do one for, because the Disability Commission is participating on visible and invisible disabilities. And it gave people a chance to think about the fact that not all disabilities are visible. And there are issues around that. The horrible feeling of having a nasty note on your car, because you don't appear handicapped, even though you have a handicapped placard. So it's really important to give, the goal is to give the community a chance to talk about it. And to have their input and to see if how the committees, give the committees a new perspective on the way they think of their mission or their vision for service. The Public Art Initiative in East Arlington is doing a performance with True Story Theater, the 8th this week. So tomorrow night, I believe, to hear people in East Arlington's thoughts about the community so that artists can hear, can get ideas, inspiration for Public Art, based on what the community values about itself as a community. So some very interesting ideas are starting to form through this project. And certainly there's room to do work around elements of the master plan and how people want to, you know, envision interacting with their community in very in specific ways. So parks and recreation issues, there's a lot of different ways it could be done. So we can certainly explore that. I second what Mike is saying. It's great to know what you're up to. You can get it through Joey or Lola. Yes, absolutely. Joey will always know. Perhaps Elizabeth can come. Oh, absolutely. We'll get Elizabeth up to speed soon. We have no doubt. It's just a schedule that makes sense. I'd be glad to accommodate. I don't know whether that was part of Bruce's... You don't think it was anything that formal? I think the interaction with the chair, in my opinion, is the best thing just to kind of make sure that everyone's on the same page. Okay. Great. I'll move, do we want to make a motion on this? I'll move to appoint Elizabeth Carr Jones as the nominee, as the redevelopment board representative on the Vision 2020 Standing Committee. I'll second that. All in favor. Thank you very much. Thanks for serving. Next up is the Arlington Preservation Fund appointment. So Carol has been your representative on this committee. My understanding is that it's a twice a year obligation and they make loans for historic preservation for either properties in the historic district commission. I think in the historic districts primarily, I think, but may perhaps also historically designated properties. I was willing to do this, but David Fields on our staff has a lot of experience both with construction and with historic preservation and I thought that if it was all right with you, that I would suggest that David be your designee on that committee. I think that's a great suggestion. I'll move. Go ahead. I'll move to appoint David Fields or to recommend, or are we appointing? I'll move to appoint David Fields as our... the ARB's representative for the Arlington Preservation Fund. I'll second. All in favor. Aye. Good. And the Open Space Committee request. And I see that Ann LaBroy is here, the chair of the Open Space Committee. This came in very late in the week last week, so we didn't have much time to talk about it and I don't have a suggested nominee, but we can talk to Ann about what they're looking for and then we'll discuss it. Sure. Ann, do you want to come up and tell us what you're looking for? Please. Okay, I'll take it. I think some of you know about the Open Space Committee. It's a town committee that has a number of different appointments that go from the manager to the board of selection, but traditionally we've had an ARB representative on the committee. Rollie Chappett did it for a number of years when he was actually a member of the ARB until 2006, I guess he stepped down then. And then Lisa Decker was appointed as the representative from the ARB. She's a landscape architect and she had been suggested but she hasn't been able to be very active with us in the last couple of years, which we did come for quite a long time. And so we thought that we, you know, she's now officially resigned and so we wanted to come back to you to ask for a formal representative again because especially with the, we have a brand new Open Space Plan which was just approved by the state this fall. It's posted on the website. It's the plan that has been in place for since 1996 when the committee was first established and the plan has been, gets updated every five to seven years and so it was just updated in 2015 and it's good now through 2022. And it was fortunate that our plan was ready to be updated at the same time that the master plan was being developed because there was of course a lot of overlap in it. So, and I was on the master plan of the committee so there was, you know, lots of interchange on the goals and recommendations that related to Open Space and natural resources. So, you know, we have, there's a lot that's in place on paper and so now it's a question of for both plans to start some of the implementation process. But I think that because of that, it's, you know, we'd really like to have somebody that's a direct liaison to the ARB to be on the Open Space Committee to focus on that, you know, part of it. And we do have a candidate in mind. We have a meeting on Thursday this week and she's going to come to the meeting to kind of look us over and sort of see if she wants to do it. I don't want to say anything about, you know, so we don't have a formal request yet, but hopefully we will have maybe, you know, in a few weeks or something. And but also, but if you, you know, I think in the past, I think I talked with Carol and this may have been brought up to you in some months ago, but I know that, you know, there were a number of things going on. You have a new member, you're waiting for another new member and there were other appointments like Division 2020 and the master plan, you know, other things that you had to deal with. So Carol, when she was still here, had asked if we could just wait for a while to figure out about the open space appointment. But that's why I'm bringing it up again now because some things at least are kind of settled. And so I know that in the past, you didn't have anybody particularly in mind that you wanted to, that you identified. So you were kind of, previously, and they asked us to come up with some suggestions. That's what we've tried to do. So we do have somebody in mind, but we'll come back to you with that formal request. If that's okay. That's great. Good. Thank you. Okay. Thanks, thank you. Next is a discussion regarding zoning amendments for coming town meeting in 2016. Laura, if you wanted to get... Before we jump into the meaty ones, I wanted to tell you that the two women who came before you two months ago about the dog kennel, the overnight dog kennel, they've withdrawn their request because I think the space that they were thinking of is no longer available and they're looking elsewhere. I don't know whether anybody on the board wants to pursue this without them or if we should just drop it for now. So what happens in the future? Yeah, my own personal view is I don't know whether it's something I feel like tackling without something that... I think I agree. A little bit of a stopping horse. They were good advocates. Yeah. Without that it's... Okay. I agree. Yeah, so... I mean, there seems to be a fair amount of enthusiasm for it. So maybe it'll rise up again in the future. Okay. So then the next... The two and one primary things we want to talk about today are the residential, some residential changes and the mixed use in parking. I think we'll start with residential because I think most of the people in the audience are here for that. I'd like to invite both Ted and David up because they both have been working on this. Right. What we'll do is we'll have Ted do a presentation and then this is not a public hearing, but we'll take comments from you. Okay, fine. We'll do that. So Ted's the primary author, and we'll let Ted take the lead. Well, thank you. Thank you, board. You all have copies of the proposed changes in zoning language. Can everybody hear? Okay. Maybe we should come and move a little bit. Those... Laura, do you have these available? Do I have what? Do you have these available? Yes, we do. Up there are the memos and the... Great. Thank you. As you know, we've started reviewing these with you the last time we met, and we have discussed at Foto White with the Conspecial Services Division the proposed changes to residential zoning in R1, R0, and R2 zones to address some complaints we received in the master plan process about what some people felt was overly large development or inappropriate development in single-family zones that they've been seeing new construction as I detailed to the board at the last meeting. So we propose to make some refinements to the... to several parts of the zoning for residential density and the dimensional regulations in those zones R0, R1, and R2. Starting with an amended definition of story whereby in the case of a basement or a cellar we're going to lower the threshold for declaring a basement or a cellar a full story if it is above the average finished grade greater than 3 feet 6 inches. Now it's greater than 4 feet 6 inches. Can I ask a stupid question? So R1, R0, and R2. Yes. So we're only talking about those districts, those residential districts. Correct. And R1 is... Excuse me. Are you reading from something different than what we have? I don't see... I might be at the back pages. There's two memos. One is... We will set the next juice one. It might be... check the bottom. There was a lot of paper in there. I want to know the second. No, these are all business. Do we know the numbers on them? Yeah. I have X, Chris. What's that? R0, R1. It's a large lot. It's like 9,000 square foot long. It's single family 9,000 square feet. It's R0. How many do we need here? This is a single family 6,000 square foot long. No. And R2. No. I've never heard of that one. 6,000 square feet. That's about half the area. The yellow stuff. John, you want one? Yeah. That's fine. Thank you. Good point. Right. I've got no secrets. That's the R0. I mean, there's someone who knows too. R1 is the most of that. R0 is large lot. Single family. R1 is single family. And R2 is single family. All right. So as I said, we propose to amend the definition of story to reduce the threshold for determining a basement or cellar to be a story from the existing threshold of 4 feet 6 inches to 3 feet 6 inches. So in other words, you can't have a basement or a cellar jutting out of the average finished grade by more than 3 feet 6 inches to have it not determined to be a story. And we believe that that will help reduce somewhat excessive building heights in new construction and helps to kind of keep the overall height. Do you want us to ask questions as you go on or wait until you finish the whole thing and then ask at the end? Could you ask at the end? The only thing I might ask is the language itself as we kind of go through or just... It looks like maybe something was deleted that isn't showing as deleted here because it says a basement and then you've got those stuff in red or cellar shall be deemed to be a story. It seems like that maybe had something else there. No, that's... Because otherwise it says a basement period. A cellar shall not be moved. A basement cellar shall not be moved. But there's a... That's been deleted. I'll double check. Yeah, can you double check? Because I've got another one of those a little bit later. So I think maybe we just lost something in the transaction. But I got you. Double check, okay. So moving on from basements and cellars were also... There was no dimension before. Sorry about that. There was 4 feet 6 inches. It was 4 feet, okay. They were moving down to 3 feet 6 inches. Gotcha. And then moving on, we're saying that an attic shall not be deemed to be a story. If unfinished, not used for human occupancy and its height is less than 7 feet or more measured from subfloor to the bottom of the roof choice. Right now, the existing standard is 7 feet 3 inches. We're moving it to 7 feet to make it congruent with the existing Massachusetts building code. But right now you can have a space that's legal and legal under state building code at 7 feet or 7 feet 1 inch and still not be deemed a story. So it's a way of making our standards congruent with the state building codes. Moving on, we make the definition for half story similarly congruent with the state building code at 7 feet, not 7 feet 3 inches. And similarly moving on to the definition of basement, we again reiterate that a basement is not considered a story unless its ceiling is 3 feet 6 inches or more above the average finish grade. That is congruent with the first change. Right now you can have a basement that is 4 feet or 4 feet 5 inches and it's not considered a story. Under this change, if you had a basement with those dimensions it would be considered a story. Moving on to it, we propose to amend the definition of cellar similarly to say that if its ceiling is 3 feet 6 inches or more above the average finish grade, that would be considered a story as well. And then moving on to the definition of gross floor area, again we amend the language to incorporate the 7 foot ceiling standard for habitable space in part B. And then we say that parking garages, accessory parking garages in the principal structure, their footage, their area is counted as part of the calculation for gross floor area. Right now that is not the case. Just to call your attention, that is a pretty significant change that will have an impact on the amount of open space needed on the lot. Our open space calculations are based on the gross floor area. So that will increase the amount of usable open space that is required to be provided on the lot. And then moving on to driveways, we propose, again this is in conjunction with consultation with the building inspector, side yards used for parking on paved driveways shall be effectively boarded in suitable planting designed for pleasant appearance in trees, shrubs, grass and whatnot, not more than 6 feet in height. That is just to make sure that if there is parking on side setbacks that it is buffered with appropriate planted materials. We are also proposing a maximum grade for driveways. We have seen some very steep driveways, especially in some new developments. And in consultation with the building inspector as well as with the town engineer, they both support the 15% plus or minus grade standard for driveways. And depending on the depth of below grade garages, that could push, by nature of the amount of slope required, that could push buildings back beyond the front yard setback in some cases. Or discourage below grade garages. Or it could discourage in some cases below grade garages, where there might be really steep slopes required to get into them. Finally, moving on, the final change that we recommend incorporating into the dimensional regulations for, again, R0, R1 and R2 zones is to increase the minimum amount of usable open space as defined in the bylaw to 40% of gross floor area, up from 30% of gross floor area. So that plus the increased counting of the garages will have the biggest impact on the size, the possible size of the structure. And that is the sum of our proposed amendments to the residential portion of the bylaw. Questions from the board? Mike, do you want us to come back to you? Yeah, why don't you come back? Well, actually, so I think the one thing I'd say again is, I just think that these are fairly incremental changes. I think that they wouldn't have a big effect on things, but they are fairly incremental. And I think that one thing is you just, it sounds crazy, but the lawyer in me, I guess, is if you show the red line a little bit more, I just can use the word correctly, you'll see how incremental the changes are, because you're really not changing as many words as what it says here. You're really only changing four foot six to three foot six. You're only changing, you know. So I think it, you know, and there's good reasons for doing that. So I think that's the first thing. I guess the second thing is, so given, and I just haven't wrapped my head around this enough, and I think it's great that we're starting this so early in the whole life cycle of the warrant and everything else. And I assume I wasn't here, so I need to kind of back up a step, because I had to leave early from the last meeting. So I apologize if I'm revisiting a couple things. But my assumption is, you know, what we're talking about potentially doing is putting in some more generic warrant articles in respect to these things, and then coming back to the votes with this more specific. Is that the notion? What do you mean with more generic? I don't like to do more of kind of like to make... Reconfiguration, are you talking about? No, no, no, I'm actually saying that all of this wouldn't be in the warrant. That what we would say instead... I think the warrant should just say, you know, that to amend the cert of the zoning bylaw in respect of, you know, and that type of thing. I'm just gonna take a little bit of a tug on keeping that at a very broad level. Because that's going to be very important as we kind of go through this process over the next few months that we don't kind of back ourselves into anything. Or, you know, what have you. We should keep options on the table, et cetera, as we consider different things. So I think this is great. I just, you know, I also want to start thinking a little bit more about... And also on, you know, what those... I won't call them placeholders because they should be meaningful. But at the same time, you know, we should be able to deal with these things appropriately underneath those. So I guess, like I said, I wasn't here for the last one, but that would be my biggest concern as we start going through this. I would agree with that. That's a wise... We chose to focus on the meat first. Yeah, and that's fine. I think maybe at the next meeting or the meeting after, when the warrant's going to be open, we'll need to talk about those things pretty quickly. Oh, yeah, that's true. It's open now and it closes around the 29th, I think, of January. So I think... So we have two meetings in January to keep sort of refining it and discussing it and changing it. And then, yes, we'll probably put something in that gives us the leeway to keep doing that until the hearing, which will probably be the end of February. Yeah, which makes the most sense. Yeah. So I think that's my biggest thing. Now, as we kind of go through these things, I guess the other thing that would be helpful to me is, you know, we did all... We were at a lot of the different master plan... master planning committee meetings. We heard a lot of the same things. Obviously, we've all heard and seen, you know, the different things that have been happening in town. But from my perspective, I guess, and I think what we'll need for town meeting as we work our way through this is some... I won't call them concrete examples, but we should at least dimensionally try to show what the different changes would mean for folks with different parcels, as well as how it would affect neighbors. And then maybe even go so far as to take something, I won't say that has been built. Let's call it that could be built and say how this would somehow affect that or bring it down. We've actually started looking at that visually with David and with a member of our master plan implementation committee, Wendy Richter, who's an architect. Great. So we started drafting or translating these ideas into visual representations. Yeah. And I think that's great. You know, my own personal view is I wouldn't use an actual specific house. I don't think that's fair to anybody to do, but I think it would be fair to put a couple examples up and say, you know, but here's how this would affect it. Because I think otherwise it's a lot of numbers. It's hard to... Without visualizing it, it's hard to grab what you're... Yeah. And that's kind of what I was thinking as I was kind of walking my way through it. Sure. We've been looking at, you know, the minimum lot required, the 6,000 square foot lot, the typical 7,200 square foot lot. Yeah. And even, you know, the 5,000 square foot lot that can be made. Right. And just looking at how they affect the ramifications. And that would be great. I think that kind of information for us would be really helpful. Sorry. That's what I have right now. Okay. Well, let me stop for a minute. I'm generally very supportive of what you've done here. Great. I think it's a good job here. I'm just going to go through a few minor tweaks. Sure. Okay. And on the first one, Article 2. Yes. You know, you're saying the seller is 3 foot 6 above finished grade, right? Right. Yes. Should we add something like above existing grade, not proposed grade for somebody like that? We've actually... We could do that. We've discussed that at length with the building inspector. Uh-huh. And I believe... Well, I think he said that sometimes you can't avoid changing the grade a little bit when you're building. No, no. I'm not saying you don't change the grade. You have to change the grade sometimes. That's fine. But establishment of what this criteria is should be based off of existing grade. Because you can always play the game of adding diesel and retaining walls and bringing up the grade a little bit here and there and changing things around it a little bit. Sure. And if that's okay, then that's fine. But let's make it such that it's understandable. Okay. One way or the other. I'm not saying one is right, one is wrong. I'm just saying a clear definition of that would be good. Sure. And then my other thing, this may be a little too picky here. On this one here you're saying attic is 7 feet or more measured from the subfloor to the bottom of the roof roof joist, right? Yes. And then over here you say it's ceiling. Okay. So we can make that comparable. So it should be ceiling, right? Yep. Or clear space. So it's always the same nomenclature, right? Right. We'll use the same nomenclature, that's... Welcome to our bylaw. That was uncreated by, you know, over many, many years with no one paying attention to some of it. And then I'm going to sort of say something that Mike said. I think I saw your PowerPoint show that you sent over the weekend. That was a resident. That was very nice. Thank you. Something like that is helpful, okay? And I think Mike's correct. Let's not single out a house. Right. Okay, but let's pick an example of a diagram. And with this change, this will not be loud and this will be doubtless. So you have a better understanding of what this is. Because otherwise, it's a layman, just numbers. We understand. And I think maybe at the next meeting we can have some ground picks. We didn't talk about that last time. We did. And that will be really helpful for everybody to understand real quickly. Yes. And also, let me spawn more conversation. Sure. That's sensory that I have here. Andy. Ted, if a seller is 3 foot 6, or more than 3 foot 6, what if it's a graded site? How do you determine how much has to be? I believe the building inspectors say they average. They take the average at 4 points. The average, yes. Does it say that in here? I know it says that related to a... We can put it in there. We can define it in there. I believe he said that was his rule of thumb, but it's method of operation. It's spelled out in the definition of grade. Oh, okay. Okay. I'll double check that. And if it's not clear there, I'll put it in. Are attics really... Not attics. Seller and basement are probably the same. No. Technically, a seller is a space where more than half of its ceiling height is below ground. Yes. A basement, as defined in the bylaw, is a space where more than half of its space is above ground. Okay. So in other words, let's say you had an 8 foot pole basement, let's say 5 feet would be above ground, 3 feet would be below ground. A seller with an 8 foot ceiling could be the reverse. 5 feet below ground, 3 feet above ground. I thought they were interchangeable. I had a different expert. I thought a basement was something that's accessible from within the unit or within the house. And a seller was not accessible and was only accessible from the exterior. No. That's... Yeah, sure. That might be because some other place is provided. Yeah. By a bulkhead or something. Yes. Right. And that's, I thought, with separation two was what I could do. This is just strictly in terms of the bylaw. Okay. That's how they do it. Yeah. There's above and below. Look at that. Any other questions from members of the board? And then just all weather habitable porches and balconies is different than porches and balconies. Right. That language is unchanged from the existing. Okay. Okay. Otherwise, I think it's good. So what I'll do now is open this up for questions from the public. Please keep questions to only the residential aspect of things. We're going to wait for the mixed use presentation next. Raise your hand. And when I call on you, state your name and address for the record on the cameras. Please. Chris. Excellent. Chris already, 56 Adams Street. Just a couple of questions and comments. I think in general, I think it's a good proposal and I agree it's fairly incremental. What I'm wondering about though, one is on this increasing the gross floor area. I'm sorry, not the gross floor area. Increasing the usable open space. Whether that's really going to make that much difference. And the reason I say that is, I think often what you find is the limiting factor is not the total amount of usable open space. It's this 25 foot dimensional requirement. If you remember the lot coverage, it really is going to stay the same at a 35% maximum, correct? Right. Which means your garage and your house can't cover one 35% of the lot. That leaves 75% of the lot. I mean, I'm sorry, 65% of the lot left. And so what you're saying, as long as you're tripling and covering 25% of the lot, then you already meet that 45%, I mean, 40% level, right? Right. So I'm a little bit unsure about that one. I guess the other thing I wondered about is what I've seen happening is, or I was going to say what you might also want to look at is the landscaped open space. It doesn't look like you're changing that at all. We're not proposing to change that, but we could look at that too. And what I'm seeing, because of the way the town defines landscaped open space, you can have hardscaping. You can have a solid patio that says landscaped open space. And I'm wondering if you want to get into either increasing landscaped requirements or increasing permeability requirements. But I'm wondering just this change of the upping the usable open space to 40% really is going to make too much difference. Well, we're thinking in conjunction with counting the garage spaces gross floor year, which in turn drives the calculation of the open space ratio. We're thinking that it will have an incremental effect, but it will at least make more of the left open. I did the calculation wrong again because the use of the open space requirement is not 40% of the lot, it's 40% of the gross floor area, which now includes garage space. But still that's a huge house. If you've got a 6,000 square foot lot, you don't have a 6,000 square foot house on that lot ever. So I think that even strengthens my point that you've got a lot of land available to meet that open space requirement. I guess the other thing I'm a little concerned about is under problem number two. Question under B. When it says 15% plus or minus, I'm assuming you're not trying to limit driveways that slope a lot upwards. If you're on a hill, how possible you might have a driveway that exceeds 15%? By talking with the engineers, they suggested having a language plus or minus because a very steep upward driving can still bottom out when you come down to a street level and whatnot. So that's why they recommended... We were more concerned with decreasing driveways, but they recommended the plus or minus just to look at the bottoming out issue. And then the only other point I would add is under that same section above an A with this side yard next to the paved driveways. I think I would think about how that is going to play with existing lots. I am in East Arlington, typically the driveway goes right up to the lot high, and you're allowed to build a garage right up to the lot line if it's entirely within the backyard. What this would suggest is that you could still build the garage right up to the lot line, but you couldn't have the driveway going to it because you would need this landscape. We'll look at that for consistency. I think I'd ask you to consider how the Grand Foundry might work with that. That's a good point. Otherwise, I think it's good and I definitely support the direction you're taking. Thanks. Just kind of a curious point. John Balskis, Walliston Avenue, town meeting member. All were the habitable porches and balconies. What makes them all were the habitable? Well, that language is unchanged from the existing bar law. I believe, to be honest, I'd have to check with the inspector. I mean, maybe my situation was unique, but there was an add-on porch that was on cement block pilings with no foundation underneath them, and that suddenly became a foundation when they built a McMansion next to me. And I don't know if we distinguish those situations. I'll check with the inspector buildings about that. They're included in that. Yes. You can't build a three-season portion and say it's within your allowable lower area. No, they're excluded. No, they are. I thought they were in the included side. No, look at me. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm misreading my own language. Sorry. Yes. Including. Yes, you're right. But exclude. Yes, so if you do a three-season porch or whatever, you're included. You can't say it's... You can't count that as gross, part of gross, part of gross. You have to. Despite the fact it's just not... That's why I'm reading, but I do think it'd be good to just clarify that. I will clarify that with the inspector buildings about what technically defines an all-weather porch. Maybe it has to do with the roof over it. Or we should clarify that. Or heating elements. Are there questions? Not John Word and Jason Street. Not exactly a question. It's a point about cellars and basements. I don't know how common this is. It may be the only one I've ever heard of. This fella across the street from me has a basement, which is at grade at the back because of the slope. And under it he has a cellar that's totally beneath grade and has a dirt floor. I don't know what he does down here. That's a real cellar. How much height is down there? Is it a full height cellar? I've never been down there. I wouldn't suggest you do. Just my own view. I prefer his definition. Thank you. Andrew. I think Chris has got a good point about the I mean at least I want to know more about it. How it relates to your test cases. The maximum footprint allowable. As you do these diagrams that show it would help to have that metric on there. We'll definitely bring that next time. We worked on it a bit. We worked on it a bit. We worked on it a bit. We worked on it a bit. But things kept, we kept changing. And we didn't feel quite ready. The nice part is you folks have started so early. I mean this is great. The idea of this is to workshop it. We're comfortable. Right. It has been changing. The idea of what we're looking at. I think that's great. Good. Thank you for your hard work. All right. Thank you. Thank you. So moving on to another large theme that we received a lot of input from in the master plan process. From a number of stakeholders as well as residents in the town. There was broad support for permitting the zoning bylaw in business and in some cases industrial districts to allow more mixed uses to occur on commercial properties especially. And it's a encouraging mixed use development in our commercial districts is a large recommendation of the master plan. So right now it's very difficult to build mixed use because of two primary reasons. One is that a mixed use building has to meet the requirements of both residential and commercial assuming it's residential and commercial mixed use. Including the setbacks and the parking and just a whole host of things that make it almost impossible to build that kind of development right now. And when we embarked upon doing this we also hit upon another recommendation of the master plan which was to encourage new types of uses emerging from the 21st century economy that's developing and booming around the Boston area in terms of creative artistic production and along with artisanal fabrication where you're getting these small almost cottage industry type creations in Somerville and Cambridge and Medford, but especially Somerville you have small workshops sometimes of other below homes or in former small industrial sites that are making small almost bespoke crafts and products for connoisseurs and discerning customers and they're actually doing they're growing and creating strong businesses from them and we think several of our commercial properties and commercial zones could be real excellent homes for those types of new types of uses that we're seeing underutilized commercial properties being converted into as well as the artistic creative production we have our own in volution studios across the street which is a prime example digital media creation production spanning a wide range of skills that touch on digital creation, computer animation, writing authoring and whatnot so to accomplish this we start by proposing some amended definitions or additional definitions to the article 2 of the bylaw we propose to define mixed use development as a combination of two or more distinct land uses such as commercial, lodging research, cultural artistic creative production, artisanal fabrication residential in a single multi-story structure to maximize space usage and promote a vibrant pedestrian oriented live work environment and that's a mouthful but I think it really encapsulates what residents want to see mixed use development being in Arlington and I think we will amend that definition actually to say distinct land uses such as but not limited to that because these are really meant to be flexible developments within a single structure encompassing a wide variety of land uses as long as they're not noxious and they don't impact their neighbors unduly and they still allow the normal business right exactly and then moving on from that definition we borrows from some existing definitions of artistic creative production as creation, production manufacture, distribution, publishing rehearsal, performance, broadcast selling or teaching digital arts, performing arts, applied arts literature, heritage media music, information technology, communications media or digital content and applications or invention, design, prototyping or fabrication, assembly or packaging of parts for further assembly or consumer goods for sale so it spans a wide gamut of activities related to artistic endeavors that include galleries studios physical art studios performing art spaces digital media outfits like Media Electric over in the Myronic Industrial Park or Involution Studios across the street. We're really aiming to capture that whole essence of activity and then similarly with artisanal fabrication we think it should be defined as production of goods by the use of hand tools or small scale light mechanical equipment occurring solely within an enclosed building where such production requires no outdoor operations or storage or where the production operations and storage of materials related to production occupy no more than 5,000 square feet of gross floor area and these typical uses have minimal negative impact on surrounding properties and include that are not limited to woodworking and cabinet shops, ceramic studios jewelry manufacturing and similar types of arts and crafts and also with production of alcohol or food processing so you know small craft breweries small bakeries catering things like things of that nature for example there is a brew pub operating in downtown Walfa on Moody Street they have a production facility and also a bar in a restaurant wrapped up in one so that's a type of artisanal fabrication wrapped up with a retail type of mixed use and there are a number of other local brewery type mixed uses that are becoming very popular around here and then that is the proposed amendments to the definition section moving on to Article 3 the establishment of districts we're proposing to incorporate language within each of the description of the districts so for example in the B1 neighborhood office district we propose to add the sentence mixed use structures without retail space are allowed in this district similarly for B2 the neighborhood business district we're proposing to add mixed use structures are allowed in this district B2A similarly mixed use structures are allowed in this district B3 the village business district mixed use structures are allowed and encouraged in this district the B4 vehicular oriented business district we propose to add mixed use development which is allowed in this district at the very end of the last sentence and then in the central business district description we propose to add mixed use development is encouraged and then such as the combining of residential and business uses that's kind of a twist on what's the existing language there which implies that mixed use development is encouraged there but we make it a stronger link and then finally in the I the industrial district we propose to add the sentence mixed use development is allowed in this district without residential space so for the time being we think that there should be a wider array of commercial activities in our industrial districts but not residential space at this time we think that's an issue that really needs further examination if we want to incorporate residential uses in industrial space or whether certain types of industrial areas are better suited for that than others and that's really we think that more of a long-term question than a short-term question why in B3 do you see mixed use structures are allowed and encouraged and not anywhere else we think that the village business districts which cover most of the traditional commercial districts Arlington Heights and Capital Square East Arlington those are B3 districts and we think they're particularly suited for mixed use development and actually if you look at B4 it's encouraged too it's just yeah and there too I think after B3 it's encouraged the thinking was the B1s and the B2s are lower intensity districts and then moving on in article 4 we propose to change section 4.04 this is mixed use occupancy the regulation for all uses shall apply and are mixed use standards which we define as amended use standards and amended dimensional density standards which follow in articles 5 and 6 so in article 5 we recommend amending the and I apologize this is a long rather complicated section I'll do my best to make it straightforward we propose amending section 5.04 the use tables to in two ways we propose to add the three uses we described earlier in section 2 into the use tables for the business districts artistic creative production would be allowed by special permit in the B1 district and then allowed by right in all the other business districts and then allowed by special permit in the multi-use in the PUD districts and allowed by right in the industrial district and artisanal fabrication would be allowed by special permit because it does involve production and some other factors it would be allowed by special permit in B1 through B5 zones as well as multi-use in PUD and it would be allowed by right in industrial and then mixed use is defined as a distinct use and again we provide examples of the different types of uses that could be combined and then we believe that should be allowed by special permit in the B1 through B5 business zones as well as the multi-use the plan unit development and the industrial zones with the thinking that we really want the redevelopment board to study each proposal on a case-by-case basis and really factor in what mix of uses is best and really apply the EDR criteria to provide the best types of projects for the town at least initially and if depending on the board's experience with these type of projects then maybe consider in the future whether to mix these projects by right in some zones and those are the new types of uses that pose in terms of existing uses right now there are single families and two family homes are allowed by right in several business districts we propose basically that single family and two family homes should be allowed in business districts by special permit only and those are the main changes there for residential so you wouldn't just leave those blank you'd actually put SP in each of those right and that's kind of reinforcing the mixed use and then before I know the next part is pretty complicated this is a great time for questions so a couple things I think you had already hit on including but not limited to and the mixed use development up above and you got to carry that over into 7.5 where it says including two or more you got to say including but not limited to I'm sorry including two you have to play around with the language well I guess you could say including but not limited to two or more of the following uses I guess and I need to kind of think about it a little bit more overall but even on the artistic and creative production I do think there's a little bit of a difference in B1, B2 and B2A than there is in 3 and below and I think we covered that with the respect of the encouraged and everything I think in an artistic and creative production I think we have to be a little bit careful and I'll give you a real life example when we were going over the special permit for the cell towers on top of the motorcycle down here there was a person giving music lessons music studio up in that I don't know if anyone recalls this but it really really really bugged the people behind them and my concern is because it is a broader definition of what includes and I think they're great uses I just don't know if you've got a you know a B2 in between two houses that that's going to be a great use so for consistency sake I think that B1, B2 and B2A even for the artistic creative production makes more sense from a special perspective versus I think I can probably get comfortable although I need to think about a little bit more on the B3 and above so I had that and then I you answered my question with respect to we'd be replacing those yeses in the single families with an SP we wouldn't be just prohibiting an outright with blanks yeah no I was just a little bit more concerned if we were going to leave blanks so you couldn't do it at all that's what I had so far I don't know if anybody else can Andy? I think I did I'm sure I should bring this up it's not really specific to this but I just want to bring it up where I know there's a big thing with Airbnb and a lot of people are doing that more so let's say in Cambridge and Boston okay but how are we treating that and are we encouraging that in some areas and discouraging in some other areas I mean if you're in a residential neighborhood and then all of a sudden someone wants to start renting out his apartment and now you have a different climate well this doesn't address that specific issue I'm not aware of how it's special services is treating that right now in terms of an enforcement issue of course I know there's nothing that completes that in general it's a pretty controversial issue all around anyway there's many cities across the country trying to figure that exact thing out yes I'm just trying to see where we're at I don't think we've done I don't think there's huge demand for it here but I don't know if there's no demand well certainly ask the inspector what he's saying well he wouldn't see it unless it's complaint right I mean it's not I was trying to get ahead of the curve and say we want to encourage that in certain areas and discourage that in other areas is there an attitude for a vision that we have well I know it's I think we have to be a little careful because it's not going to happen in Arlington but obviously in many of the bigger cities it's really hurting the affordable housing because you've got people coming in buying up apartments and what not and using them for that which is just absolutely crushing the affordable housing in the areas anyway it's an interesting point I'm sorry if I prompt someone to bring it up we do that a lot here so okay so moving on we're also proposing changes to Article 6 the dimensional density regulations under Section 6.0 we're proposing to add for each of the business zones named in that table a mixed use line and with some changes in dimensional and density regulations except for B1 to provide an incentive for mixed use development correct in B1 we don't make any changes we keep the existing maximum FAR of 0.75 as well as existing maximum height in terms of stories and feet mainly because we still think that B1 is a buffer zone between commercial and residential districts but moving on into B2 we propose for mixed use projects on lots less than 20,000 square feet the maximum FAR should be 1.25 for projects where most of the space is residential and 1.5 for projects where most of the space is commercial and then the maximum height would be 4 stories or 50 feet now for lots over 20,000 square feet the maximum FAR would be unchanged it would be 1.0 which it is currently and that type of FAR increase is carried on through the B2A and the B3 and the B4 districts so for lots of less than 20,000 square feet if you propose a mixed use project your maximum FAR would be 1.25 if most of the space is residential or 1.5 if most of the space is commercial what is it now well the maximum now in B2A for example is 1.0 in B2 it's 1.0 in the B3 otherwise is that what it is now sorry if that wasn't clear I can make that clear so I'm going to have a question eventually on this so we've tried this before and at some point I'd like to understand what we had recommended before so I think we need to look historically as to what we went for ok yeah in a nutshell there was no differential in lot sizes what we proposed before so for let's say the Brigham site 164,000 square feet total that earlier proposal I think recommended a maximum FAR of 2.0 so on a large site like the Brigham site that could potentially over a lot of additional FAR we tailed this to lots of 20,000 square feet or less for enhanced FAR mainly because most of the parcels along the broadway and the Masab quarters are 10,000 square feet so we're really tailing it to our commercial corridors and the thinking is with a larger sorry with a larger lot like the Brigham site there's enough land there that you can get a good mixed use project without enhancing the FAR that's great maybe at the next meet if we're the next time we talk about this if you could bring the old I guess I guess it was our recommendation to tell meeting that'd be helpful I think even my messy notebook doesn't go back that quite that far at this point so I think it's helpful thank you and again in the maximum height as I said before in the B2A through the B5 would be the maximum there would be 5 stories for 60 feet for lots of lots of 20,000 square feet or less in B5 there are potentials for 40,000 square foot lots you can go to 40 to 60 feet depending on the presence of nearby residential properties so that's a little more complicated so on the stories a couple questions involution that building right there is that four or five I believe it's four and what max height on these what are we changing from there it doesn't look like we can tell I believe that is it four stories and 50 feet on all of them okay I think we may have a central business each of them oh yeah I've got mine well mine's over actually I need to fix mine well I'm gonna ask one quick question these are for lots there are 20,000 square feet what happens if someone goes and purchases several lots and combines them all together well if they come out and want to then if it's over 20,000 square feet then yeah then the FAR doesn't increase the maximum okay yeah it's funny it works against them I don't know what maybe we should think about that fact and whether that's a good thing or a bad thing yeah so our seven is five stories so that's a multifamily residential B3 can go to five stories oh B3 can B4 B4 is three really and B5 B4 is two and a half, three, three, five feet max yeah B5 can go to five in certain circumstances just to finish up since I started so yeah I think I think all this looks pretty interesting and I think as we saw with David David Gamble I think once again a picture tells we're preparing graphics yeah which would be great each of the districts kind of showing what you can do now what this would allow you to do we were aware of that yeah and I know you are but it would be very helpful because I thought when you saw that especially when he was playing around with some of that stuff that makes a lot of sense so I think that's the type of thing that's really helpful if I could just finish up just moving on quickly to the industrial zone we actually don't propose any changes from what the existing development regulations there so a mixed use project coming into an industrial district would still be covered by the max if they aren't 1.5 max height of four stories are 52 feet and similarly with the multi-use and the plan unit development zones we don't propose any changes to the existing density development regulations there for mixed use developments and then moving on I'm going to see the table to Laura because Laura worked on some revised parking standards for mixed use developments are we good with the mixed use let's do the parking and then we'll open it so one of the other incentives that we can provide for developers to do mixed use is to reduce the parking requirement and especially in the central business where you have pretty good public transportation in our Lincoln Center where you have a public parking lot we wanted to give it flexibility and see if that produced any more interest so we would be offering developers by special permit the opportunity to reduce the parking requirement to half of what is required now if they if they employed transportation demand management practices so we've talked about that in relation to other other projects but so what this would do is they would have to apply for a special permit to reduce the parking requirement and then they could also do shared parking when you had a mixed use project you could have the residential and the commercial one would be mostly a day use one mostly a night use that they could they could combine and just provide parking for the larger use as opposed to now they have to provide it for both uses adding together the residential plus the commercial which I think is a serious disincentive for development right now for mixed use development off-site parking we already allow it I haven't changed that you can use if you're within 600 feet 1,000 feet you can use the parking in the public lot 600 feet if you want to share parking with another light and those are in the bylaw now all I do is reference those I'm not proposing to change those transportation demand management if they wanted that reduction from now they can go to 80% of the parking requirement but we would allow them to go to 50% with TDM they would have to provide a plan to the board to look at how they're going to encourage people to employ alternatives to single car occupancy encourage carpooling, provide transit passes bicycle parking and storage, showers in the case of an office for any other means acceptable to the ARB and sort of in the same vein as the artisanal and fabrication is you want to leave it open for flexibility for people to come in with creative solutions because this is a world that's changing very quickly I'm thinking that planning in general is going towards is to provide more density where there's transit and where you want to bring more customers into a business area and more street life into the business district as well so that would be the reasoning behind it and then at the the very last kind of amendment we're suggesting is section 8.07a in mixed use projects where two more distinct land uses share spaces in the structure the first 3,000 square feet of non-residential space is exempt from parking requirements so in other words we have like a very small parcel and you can only build a few storefronts on it with a couple of apartments above the thinking is the street parking should be sufficient for that commercial parking apartment it just provides space for the residential on the block because there are some very small parcels on this out of Broadway in the commercial parcels and those are usually not, those are day time uses where you can park on the street and then that, is it at the very end I list four issues that bear longer range taking via the mixed use allowing mixed uses in the bylaw first is dimensional regulation of residential units Massachusetts law does allow the interior and exterior dimensions of units in multi-family homes to be controlled so we might want to think about if we want any sort of regulation on the unit size or density within these mixed use developments during the mass plan process many residents express the view that many different types the variety of the town's housing stock could be expanded with many different types of units that are in demand in town as part of mixed use development so you could have small flats or you could have you know, age restricted homes above retail space or something in the commercial districts just to speak to a broader array of needs that is currently met in the town and then quickly moving on you know, we need to look at the issue of how we regulate mixed use projects in the future do we just do a special permit or do we move in some districts to a by right capacity that really depends on the board's experience as it moves along and then we have to address do we allow residential uses in industrial zones maybe there some thinking I personally think and other people share the same thought that there might be a case for two types of industrial districts in the future one where residential is more and others where residential uses are allowed still for example the Gold's Gym site or other larger more redevelopable sites that are currently in industrial zones whereas other industrial zones like Dudley Street or Gardiner Street where we might want to restrict uses there to industrial and non-residential uses to maintain their character which many people want to maintain and preserve and then finally what is the right residential mix in our business districts and how we educate that in the future is something they bear in mind so thank you, thank you questions or comments from the board I'll just finish up by saying I think this is really interesting I'm glad I think it's a nice first start as we kind of work our way through this process it's pretty complicated and I think we're I think you're tackling it with a detail that will serve us well so I think that's going to be very important for anything we do in this area thanks I'm very encouraged by this in some of the changes and your attitude toward parking to encourage mixed use in some of the designated areas I think that goes a long ways I see developers seeing this is encouraging the other thing that encourages developers is having a clear definition as far as what is allowed, what's not allowed so it's not ambiguous so someone they do the original pro forma per se they know there's less risk it either works or doesn't work it's not like well we have to see what their opinion is if the opinion is always the same that in itself encourages more development and I think the clear it is the simple way of encouraging development itself great, great show I'm sorry one last thing too especially with respect to parking I think the other thing that could be helpful as we're kind of looking through this is what were some of the things you were looking at as you went through especially on the 50% how did you come up, how did you get to 50% what did you use as models and that type of thing I think as we kind of tease out that specifically that number especially we definitely want to understand what a lot of the thinking was behind it and give us some food for thought on those numbers too because otherwise once again you want to be careful not to look like the dark board yeah I'd like to address that I'm doing also we're contracting to get something called a right size parking study from MAPC, the metropolitan planning council and they are looking at multifamily developments, residential developments along Mass Ave and looking at what the actual parking demand is and the reason that I came up with 50% and that may get adjusted when we get the results of that study is that I have, many people have said to me that one parking space is enough on Mass Ave especially for rentals and because of the transit really more than anything else but we definitely need to have more evidence of that how quickly is that study I think they're going to do the counting sometime in December so we should have something in January oh that's perfect and most of our the way the parking it's like one and a half for a one bedroom apartment and two for a two bedroom apartment so it's pretty much that the requirement is pretty high it makes more sense for single family houses that's good, thank you very much open up to the public so I have a couple questions one on the industrial industrial zone here what, you've got you've got limited retail space and that struck out I guess for that in terms of uses it's a strike out here I think it was just left oh yes, that was from an earlier that was from an earlier so if you have mixed uses not, no retail no residential what are you doing that isn't allowed there now well you might have for example an eatery along with production space wasn't an eatery a retail? I think retail is allowed because that is struck out that does not exist there but retail limited retail space is that inter-out mixed use development is allowed in this district without residential space so that's the only thing retail facilities are already here right, yeah so it's not encouraged that's what it says the other question is more about going over to the table of dimensional regulations increasing the story the height in some of these B, B2, B2, A, B3 quite substantially and those are those districts and you've been kind enough to specify exactly where they are for those of us who haven't memorized the zoning map those are a butter I mean there's the shops or whatever along the avenue and then right behind them it's residential and you're going to put a five-story building in front of these guys windows I don't think that's going to be quite very well well, you know as you know they are one-story buildings many of them are mainly and then the residential behind is two or two and a half stories behind them right but I mean it seems to me going into the center maybe something else sorry, such a mess but up there Brattle Square or up by the heights or even down by the capitol there it's substantially densely single or two-family residential it seems to me you should get some kickback by putting a really high-rise building that's going to be I hear you we can look at that especially in the B2A but mixed use does, you know thrive most when you have vertical height and it's fairly dense so we're trying to strike the right balance but five-stories the main balance in this town is I know we've been trying for a long time ever since they figured out the building, the apartment building the foundation which people are all too young to remember when that was the model apartment building will save us but this town is 95% residential and I think our main goal your main goal certainly our main goal those of us who come here tonight is preserving our neighborhoods and we don't want to you know, we have focused on what they're doing right in the neighborhoods to best them up but we don't want to go up to peripheries and mess those up okay just two things to address that may not be sufficient for what you're talking about but we have in the design guidelines we talk about the upper stories being stepped back a little bit so it's not like five-stories all the way up it will feel the top story will be less visible from the street the other thing to mitigate it is that it's all by special permit so if there's a you know, residence right behind it and especially if the abouters come to the meeting we can take that into consideration I see that point you're going to serve a cigarette 20's thing but particularly on the south side of the avenue you've got the hill going up there you had the avenue and the shops and then you got the hill so that tall building is going to be seen or you're going to dominate the view even if it's even if it's stepped back from the street that isn't the issue so much it's going to be it's not going to be stepped back from some guys halfway up Walnut Street somewhere or one of those streets thank you a couple questions and comments and first on the use regulations yes because someone said I think you need to be allowed in the B1 and to a certain extent the B2 as well remembering that B1s are primarily built as single and two-family houses and tend to be located next to them I would wonder if you really want a brewery or a distillery as your neighbor and it seems to me as I read this that would be allowed if not encouraged right now it is controlled by special permit but yes I know but I think I guess that's a comment I'd like to make basically allow something in the bylaw and I think it's very hard to turn down that use by special permit when you're saying that's an allowed use in the district but if not I would be wanted by special permit and in B2 it's by right so I would just say take a close look at those and really think about what you're allowing in relation to I think it's a good point but it's not by right no I think yeah I think the point is the fact that it's allowed it's a good point we can definitely look at that and then a couple I tend to echo Mr. Warden's comments on the dimensional proposals particularly in the lower numbered districts as I looked at this for example in the three you're going from a 40 foot and three-story maximum to a 60 foot five-story maximum in B2 way from 35 feet to 60 feet in B2 from 35 feet these are pretty dramatic changes and I think particularly when you're getting up to five stories I would ask the board to do some homework and that is next time you're in Harvard Square or Data Square look around and count the number of stories of the buildings abutting the street I don't think you'll find too many that are five stories I think at most typically there are three or less than maybe some of the four and there may be a few that are higher than five but not too many so that's why I question whether you really need to go up to five stories and 60 feet to accomplish what you're trying to do I think it's more realistic and the other question I had about this is in the bylaw currently this is part of the address there's something called the height buffer district and you don't show that here I'm wondering are you proposing to eliminate that not per se we can certainly look at that so it would address if you're going higher we can certainly clarify the connection and to some extent that relates to the setbacks I think that's a really good point about the five story in terms of light and air and we bring up the point on the south side of Massa Avenue what it's really going to do to residences right behind it so do we have any five story buildings other than the apartment building we do have an office building but it is it's fueling part between but at the same time we want to have the ability to in certain spots to get up that high to bring in the right kind of developer that's going to want to how high is the sunset building where the carbines used to be isn't it four stories sunrise I'm not sure if that's four or five and then it relates to this special permit thing because you're right when you cats out of the bag when you have to say no what I didn't really mean I really want to tell you to do four well even five so is there a way to putting the five in was just we could go up to five but we might prefer in many cases do you allow it at the discretion or somehow I think it is hard to do that I think one thing that would be helpful to me anyway in that regard and I have been going back and forth but is to see what it currently is like right next to the dimensions that we're talking about so we can let's think about that one because I mean in the neighborhood office right now you get to go to 35 feet which is actually pretty high but I guess I'd like to understand is what 40 I believe it's about 35 or 40 it's three whole stories above the theater the theater itself is a separate building on the same lot behind the apartments and the shops and that might be 40 feet yeah that probably steps up which shows you it looks higher than the front door but the street front is only about 35 I believe so let me comment on the four five story I'm not I'm saying it's not condoning or approving or one way I'm just stating something that I know is predominantly mid-rise buildings have been four stories because that's what the building code allowed with framing recently the building code has changed when they adopted to go to international instead of the bokeh and five story with frame buildings now are allowed so if you're asking what's why predominantly it's all around it's because of the building codes allowed that limitation I think in the future because the building codes have changed and it's allowing five story buildings you'll see a lot more of those I'm not I'm saying this not condoning the height or anything else or saying or disappointing I'm just stating that that's the reason in four story buildings we see around here now because of the building codes before that's always a reason Massachusetts allows that too that's Massachusetts Massachusetts allowed Massachusetts code was bokeh based before and four story with frame buildings was the maximum height you go since they switched like 22mm it's four over one so it's four stories of wood over one story of concrete five complete stories no, no framing portion is allowed to be used to be four stories now it's five that means they can go to six if they put it out correct, yes five over one is what they're doing these days and one being the parking concrete that's fire proof it's the parking I'm just saying that just because you asked a question and I'm just trying to explain what I know I don't think that is a game further questions, comments comments about I know the Dudley street oh Wendy Richter about old place Dudley street has a lot of existing residential and I just wonder whether that's been addressed where there is existing residential is that grandfather if it were to be replaced once those older structures go away does that mean the residential goes away as well well they're pre-existing non-conforming so if there's to be a fire in one for example you could build replace what is there now but if you scraped it off a lot and took away the foundations and you couldn't replace you couldn't put a new residential use there because it's an industrial zone the whole street is pretty much there's bits and pieces on the edges that are residential mostly it's an industrial zone and many of the what look like residential structures there now have actually been co-opted into commercial use not all of them but some of them thank you great start thank you all for coming appreciate it I actually have a hard time there's something that is interesting to see are you going to deal with our presentation we were going to include that as part of the discussion but not actually present at this evening but we're happy to hear additional comments on the zoning violence presented or the memos presented well I may again John Ward and Jason Street and with me Miss Evans and John Belskis and Crystal Reddy we sent you I trust everybody got it a survey that Miss Evans did of the mansionization problem throughout town with commentary and attached to that was our zoning bylaw proposals and so I'd like to deal first I'd like to make a comment and I'd like to deal with those the comment is in the master plan it talked about one of the ways of dealing with this problem was dealing with FAR and when I mentioned that the last time we were together you said that it wouldn't work not a good idea or something even though it's in the master plan I'd forgotten it was in the master plan but my wife found it so similarly our committee talked about that and decided maybe it was not such a great idea but it is in the master plan so I think it is something that should be at least given some consideration in this connection but getting to the particulars of our zoning proposals and I hope you will take them seriously we spent quite a bit of time hashing over this and they are like that that Mr. Fields just presented they are approaches to getting this various aspects of the same problem and we're interested to see the aspects that have been brought up here many of them have a good deal of merit but let me just briefly review this stuff and these are just in the order in which the present things appear in the by-law they are not in order of importance or anything the building height what we found is that the present height particularly on the graded lots on the slopey lots is measured from the original grade so when you cut away the hill then you get all sorts of leeway to do stuff and we have chosen examples of that so we tried to address that issue the one we had the most I think the most difficulty sorting out was the we talked about this last time the third floor that's no longer the traditional third floor a little space but like a whole story there how do you get after that lowering to 7 feet is maybe part of it we found Ms. Evans found in researching the by-laws of some other communities and did you with those attached to the memo they were not we can forward those particularly Watertown interesting way of dealing with this putting the slope roof business in there the more you think about it the more complicated it gets the the third item is again something that was talked about last time but I don't see that it's been addressed maybe through the open space requirement thing and that's getting space between the buildings and the so what we proposed is leave the side yard 10 feet as it is now but it's got to be at least 30 feet from the next building so that you can't put them in there you see so many you go down almost any other street here's this house here here's this one over here this new one three and a half stories side and the other one is now the fourth one really the main change here and this is this is the biggest the what are you reading? I'm sorry the one called article D yeah but larger digits that's helpful if you say what you're looking at I'm sorry I letter them rather than numbering got it so you're on D now? D, large editions okay what we did is as you know it's a provision as it now stands it's been grossly abused all over town and Mr. Belskas mentioned the case next door to him and it's going on all over the place so the attempt here is to for one thing we sort of tinkered with the definition so that we catch more things and we've taken out we've taken out that huge escape huge escape hole building on the existing the original foundation which has been grossly abused I mean as you mentioned the ports at Saddam cement block so that becomes part of the original foundation so you got two stories in fact but now the little garage that becomes the original foundation even though it's on a slab and that becomes two and a half stories on this side and so on so that would greatly reform that the main thing is taking out that original foundation so I'm sorry but under article D on this handout which part of this has changed I am sorry on D it's not marked so it's hard for us to tell what the differences are which one are we talking about now D 6.08 large edition okay that question was raised in our last meeting and unfortunately I had that because the red line is helpful so we can see the changes you know if I were clever enough to do that maybe maybe one of our other committee members can do that I did have that question was raised in the meeting what did you change I said where is that thing I was looking to the threw it out and the thing is I think I wrote over it so that could be resurrected that as I said is the main thing doing with that original foundation stuff and also changing the definition so it includes more things and I think it's more in the spirit now I was in town meeting when this was when this originally came about because Bob Walsh I remember the board selecting his neighborhood somebody built something humongous addition on the whole other house and tacked it together and he was very upset about this and next year this was enacted in order to want to do one of these big additions you have to get a special permit and well pretty soon the developers taught a game so this is trying to get back to the original spirit of that bylaw but finally the garages now the attack on the slope I don't know what's 15 degrees myself but I hate to shovel it or drive up in the ice or down if that matter what we did here is since one of the big objections that people have and you'll see a lot of pictures of it if you look at our our presentation is the big house with the two big garages staring you right in the face and then you have a maybe they have a double driveway so you've got a great percentage of the street frontage is driveway curb cotton stuff and so what we try to do is do away with that that system and move the garage to the side you've got to back it off you've got to back it off and so we defined it as moving it back 10 feet beyond the front yard setback I suppose somebody had a very deep lot they could still do the same thing but at least it would be 45 feet away from the street so 35 feet away from the street but that was or if they want to do the garage on the side but that's okay what I'd like to do and I agree with you unfortunately we haven't had a lot of time to look at it what I'd like to do is put it on as a formal agenda item in our next meeting which is when January 13th I believe there's no more meetings in December we get Christmas off well I'm leaving town that's why I'll check that out so is it Monday? yes Monday 11th I'm sorry January 11th so in January we're meeting the 11th and the 25th what I request is also to ask if I could discuss a red line so we can see what's being changed so we know what is there what you're looking to change the workshop together and I think we're working toward the same end in a formal discussion to see what's being changed and what's being proposed I think in that particular one there were so many changes I said oh gee, it's time to get through this just here's the way we want to look we'll clean it up for him okay so somebody cleverer than I will have to do that John Belsters again just a comment associated with this group because of what we're on next to me but what I'm more concerned is what's going on in my entire neighborhood in the last three years we've lost at least six or eight quote unquote affordable houses these are starter homes they're relatively small capes whatever but it gives people an opportunity to start into their own home ownership the little cape that sat next to me that went for 450 which isn't a it isn't a real low price but it's somewhat affordable to most people that is now $1,100,000 hanging over my house shadowing it we've gone crazy here this is happening all over the neighborhood and that's not Arlington Arlington was a place where you came as a young couple and started your family and started in a small home what's throwing that away we're also looking at the specter of 40B because we don't have enough affordable we're tearing it down what are you doing to us I actually will comment on one thing because it's actually a passionate mind though I think we have to be a little bit careful not to keep people in starter homes in starter homes because the beauty of Arlington is people want to stay here and you know it's so I'm not saying among us thing or anything else but let's you have to it's a good thing that people want to live in our community and stay here as far as I'm concerned and my biggest concern on how some people perceive some of these discussions is you know nothing can change a community that doesn't change unfortunately I come from one of those and it doesn't do very well and I'm so well I think that's all up for debate and everything else but I'm just giving you my perspective your retired employee fixed income with no cost to living increases my tax bill gets ratcheted up I haven't done a thing to the house nothing to ratchet the value these 1.1 million dollar homes raise the base so my taxes go up automatically it's a good thing but we'll cut some sound things we'll put them together that'd be great the master client does speak about preserving Arlington's residential neighborhoods and we should and I'm not saying that I'm just saying that people want to live here and they like their neighborhoods they want to live here because they've got a lot of huge oversized or they want to live here because we have nice few line streets with modest size I have a feeling we'll be debating this along the way I left Cambridge after living there 30 years because I couldn't afford to stay there we want to do the same thing for Arlington thank you so we'll put that on course for the next few years I'll take another one my October next time I'll give you any comments I actually don't have any I'm only voting on one so I can't do the first one you want to move to the approval you have to say a certain way you just did oh you have to say the 10 so I'll move to approve the minutes of October 19, 2015 second and I am staying because I was on part of those so I'll move to approve the minutes of November 16 okay okay second and I move to adjourn I will do that sorry my bad we're not allowed to talk about new businesses I was in favor of putting that on I absolutely like it that was always my concern you know I like it a lot no but it's great for discussion but if you want to move to adjourn second all in favor