 They're a form change, actually, which is to move the maximum to the left. I'm talking them into moving the maximum to the left, but bringing the minimum advances down to four units of weight. We're moving more. I've talked with staff into it. We can't do it tonight. I see how. Otherwise, we can't do it. And it's one more. There's one more. I had a lot of friends. This is really helpful. No, you're wrong. I had not had time to do that. I am shocked. We can't take those skills. And I think it's just one of those things. I have a couple of things to say. They're turning the JCCC and with the power to a leader disappeared his own. I don't even think it can do that. Even if only the city can do it, And nobody knows it's happening, because you can't relate. I didn't meet your staff about that. That's a win, Steve. Yeah. That's a lie. I know it's true. But I didn't have a whole side. But that can risk. And they basically said they need to go up or down. It also would be a long one, you think? I love it you're there, and there would be no idea that's going to be scrapped. I've seen more. I've seen more. You're already at it. Yeah. I think we can pull a section of the omnibus out and say we'll take that up in a month. Because I don't think stakeholder groups know. I mean, we just had the attorney for a neighborhood association call the staff out directly and the staff's attitude towards NPO's is so hostile, but it's suggested as an alternative. It is. Thoughts and disingenuous. And it's true. And then this wrong thing. Good afternoon. Welcome to the Durham Planning Commission. It's good to have you here this evening. The members of the Durham Planning Commission are appointed by the city council and the county commissioners as an advisory board to the elected officials. So you should know that the elected officials have the final say on any of the issues that are here before us this evening. We have a big agenda tonight. And as you'll see in a moment, we will likely move a few items around on the agenda that will require a vote of the commission. But if you are interested in speaking on any of the issues this evening, please. Go to the table on my left and you can sign up to speak. Make sure you pay attention to which case you're signing up to speak on and you'll be asked to put down if you are speaking for or against the particular item. Each side will be given 10 minutes to speak collectively on each case before us. We do have the ability to allow additional time if a lot of people have signed up to speak. Finally, all motions are stated in the affirmative. So if a motion fails or ties, the recommendation is for denial. Again, I will note that we've got a good crowd here this evening. There are still empty seats, but we have been told by the fire marshal that you may stand as long as there's an empty seat in the room. But if there are no additional empty seats and you're standing in the back, you're going to be asked to get a seat or to go out into the hallway. But at this point, we're in good shape. Thank you all again. May I have the roll call, please? Before I call the roll, I wanted to just announce that the following members have requested an excused absence. Mr. Johnson, Mr. Brine and Ms. Satterfield. Commissioner Alturk. Here. Commissioner Baker. Here. Commissioner Durkin. Here. Commissioner Hyman. Present. Chair Busby. Here. Commissioner Miller. Here. Commissioner Ketchum. Here. Commissioner Hornbuckle. Commissioner Gibbs. Here. And Commissioner Williams. Here. Great, thank you. If we could have a motion for the three excused absences. So moved. Second. Properly moved by Commissioner Miller and seconded by Vice Chair Hyman for excused absences for commissioners Brine, Johnson, and Satterfield. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Great, the ayes have it. We'll move to the approval of the minutes and the consistency statements from our September 11th, 2018 meeting. Are there any comments or changes to the minutes and the consistency statements? Seeing none, we'll accept a motion for approval. Motion to approve agenda and consistency statements as presented. And a second. Second. And moved by Vice Chair Hyman, seconded by Commissioner Gibbs. Staff would ask for one correction, approval of the minutes and consistency statements, not the agenda. Ms. Hyman has said approval of the agenda. So we're asking for approval of the minutes and the consistency statements. Oh, okay. Thank you. Thank you. Great. So this vote is for approval of the minutes and the consistency statement. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? The ayes have it. Before we get to adjustments to the agenda, any updates from the staff? No updates or adjustments from the staff. We would like to add that all public hearing items haven't advertised and noticed in accordance with UDO and state law and affidavits for those advertisements are on file in the planning department. Thank you very much. So as we look at the agenda this evening, we have a few items that may take a little bit of time and we also have recognition for two former planning commissioners. So what I would like to propose and I'm open to friendly amendments from my fellow commissioners would be to rearrange the agenda. I would like to start with recognizing the service of former commissioners gosh and van at the very beginning. And then we can move into our agenda items. We have two items where I know a lot of folks are here for two different cases this evening that is the forced Hills Future Land Use Amendment and the pinecrest development. We have two items that I believe are I believe we always say this and we're sometimes surprised but we have two items that we believe are relatively uncontroversial the shell oil gas station and the West Point at 751 revisions. So I would like to suggest that we would move our recognition of the planning commissioners to the very top of the agenda that we would look to combine the hearings. One one at a time but the force tells future land use and the pinecrest to happen back to back, but we could also look to move the shell oil gas station and the West Point at 751 revisions to the top of our agenda. Did everyone follow that. Yep. So we Commissioner out there. Okay, okay. Is that folks are open to that I would. Did you say move these to the top of the agenda. Yeah, so I will say it again just so we can be clear because there are a lot of a lot of parts here. We would move the recognition of our two former planning commissioners to the very top, okay, followed by the shell oil gas station. Then the West Point is 751. Then the forced Hills flung followed by pinecrest. Then the romp. And then finally the omnibus 12. Okay. And that way we can work through some of the non controversial items. Those of you that are here for two cases in a row will be able to hear those right away. And then we can we can finish with the omnibus 12. Commissioner Miller. Mr Chairman. With all due respect, I don't have any difficulty with recognizing that the two former commission members because that won't take long and I believe they deserve an audience. But with regard and I don't mind moving, putting the two forest Hills related items back to back. But in terms of making everybody in the room sit through the cases you characterize as non controversial when they are probably here for other cases. I think we need to take the business of the of the majority of the people who are here up as close to the top of the agenda as we can. I would rather have a smaller number. So we asked that you actually not have signs of affection during the hearing. But your message has been heard. So I'm open to that as well. So would you like to make a motion to that effect? Commissioner Miller. Mr Chairman, I would like to move that we begin with recognition of former commission members. And then we take the two forest Hills cases. And then we follow that with the rail maintenance facility case and then finish up with the shell station and the West Point is 751 revisions. And then and then finally the the text amendment omnibus number 12. We have a second. Second. I moved and seconded all those in favor of the motion for the revised agenda. Please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Great. Thank you. We will move on with our two recognitions. I'm going to come to the microphone here at the front and I would ask commissioners gauche and van former commissioners, but always commissioners in our heart to come join us. I'm going to read each resolution into the record. We'll start with Mr van. This is a resolution and appreciation of Mr Andre van. Whereas Mr Andre D van was a member of the Durham Planning Commission from July 27, 2015 through August 14, 2018. And whereas the Durham Planning Commission and the citizens of the city and county of Durham have benefited from the dedicated efforts that he displayed while serving as a member of the Durham Planning Commission. And whereas this commission desires to express its appreciation for the public of a job well done. Now therefore be it resolved by the Durham Planning Commission that this commission does hereby express its sincere appreciation for the service rendered by Mr van to the citizens of this community. And that the clerk for the commission is hereby directed to spread this resolution and its entirety upon the official minutes of this commission. And this resolution is hereby presented to Mr van as a token of the high esteem held for him adopted this ninth day of October 2018. Thank you to Chair Busby and Vice Chair Hyman and my colleagues here. And of course I always have to thank Mr. David Harrison because he's one who reminded me about all this great work that goes on. And I'm just privileged for the opportunity to have been able to serve. I'll be moving over to a little city board in preparation for Durham's 150th anniversary. And I want to focus all my energies there. But again, I'm thankful for the great work and I think Durham has benefited greatly from the work of my colleagues here. Those who serve and no best help to serve make this community what it is today. And so I'm appreciative of that. And I thank you very much. And in addition to resolution and appreciation of Mr. Indranil Ghosh, whereas Mr. Indranil Ghosh was a member of the Durham Planning Commission from June 22nd, 2015 through August 14th, 2018. And whereas the Durham Planning Commission and the citizens of the city of the county of Durham have benefited from the dedicated efforts that he displayed while serving as a member of the Durham Planning Commission. And whereas this commission desires to express its appreciation for the public of a job well done, now therefore be it resolved by the Durham Planning Commission, that this commission does hereby express its sincere appreciation for the service rendered by Mr. Ghosh to the citizens of this community. And that the clerk for the commission is hereby directed to spread this resolution in its entirety upon the minutes of this commission. And this resolution is hereby presented to Mr. Ghosh as a token of the high esteem held for him. Adopted this ninth day of October, 2018. Thank you. So I see they got my full name in there. And that's that was I wasn't expecting that yet. I really enjoyed serving on the Planning Commission. Mr. Baker, I think you're sitting where I used to sit. I haven't met you yet, but I did look over your resume and was very impressed with your credentials. And I look forward to the great work that this Planning Commission has done and will continue to do in the future. I see you guys are missing a few commissioners today. Just I'm in the audience. Let me know if you need me to hop up here. Mr. Chairman, if it's permitted, I'd like to move that the Planning Commission adopt the two resolutions that you read into the minutes. That is appropriate. Properly moved and seconded. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Great. That is unanimous. We are moving on to our first case. Again, we've moved items around, but we are starting with Case A18 Quadruple 04. This is the Forest Hills Future Land Use Map. And this was continued from two months ago. And as I was required to do two months ago, I will again ask to recuse myself. I live in the mail zone, the mail notification zone for the Future Land Use Amendment. So I am required by our rules to recuse myself. So I will ask for that vote. And then once that is approved, we will turn the chair to Vice Chair Hyman for this particular case. I will note, because I will be back after this case, is that I do not live in the mail zone for the next case, is Z18 Quadruple 09 for Pinecrest. So I'm in an interesting spot. I have conferred with staff and I am indeed required to vote on that amendment. If I abstained, my vote will count as a yes vote according to our rules of procedure. So I will be back to chair that discussion and I will be voting on that particular item. But I will accept a motion for recusal on this case. Mr. Chairman, I move that we disqualify you from consideration of case A18 Quadruple 04, the Forest Hills Future Land Use Map changes. Second. Properly moved and seconded. All those in favor? Aye. The motion passes. Vice Chair Hyman. Thank you, Mr. Busby. We'll proceed with the staff report for this particular issue. Hello, Rosenberg Planning Department. Staff has no further information on this item, but it's available to answer any questions you may have. Thank you. I do have two individuals who have signed up to speak. Yes. The applicant. Let me see. It's like, I have to adjust my glasses. Is that James Speed Rogers? No, he's against. And then Neil Gauch. Okay. What a surprise. I did promise you all I would be back here in front of you at this podium. I didn't realize how soon. Exactly. Exactly. So good morning, everyone. My name is Neil Gauch. I'm an attorney with the Morningstar Law Group. And we represent the applicant for this FLUM Amendment. I will note that when we filed this application, I was on the Planning Commission. I'm not aware of any rule that would disqualify me from representing them in front of this board now that I'm no longer on the Planning Commission. Since our first meeting at the Planning Commission, we've had an opportunity to meet and work with the developers of the Pinecrest Project, which is later on in your agenda. It's the next item. Through our meetings, we've been able to help shape that project in a way we think... That was quick. We've been able to help shape that project in a way we think will be more consistent with the neighborhood. Unfortunately, while we've made great strides with the Pinecrest Project, we've not had an opportunity to digest all the feedback we got from our neighbors and staff and from you all on our own application. And we recognize that there are some legitimate concerns which have been raised not only by the developers of Pinecrest, but also by some of our neighbors and the planning staff as well. Usually, the Planning Commission is tied to a 90-day window from the opening of the public hearing to make a decision. But in this case, we, the applicant, are requesting to have our application referred back to staff so that we can work with them to amend our application in a way that hopefully they can support and which will address some of the concerns that were raised by other folks. Let me be clear. We are not withdrawing our application and we fully intend to see this through to a vote at City Council. Just as the case that we recognize there may be a need to amend portions of our application in order to gain the support of more people and hopefully of the staff as well. Obviously, when the time comes, we will hope to have your support as well, but for now, we ask that you refer this item back to staff to allow us more time to work on our application. We will be back at some point and I thank you for your time. Thank you. I do have another individual who has signed up to speak and that's James Speed Rogers. Good evening and thank you to the members of the commission. My name is James Speed Rogers. I live at 1007 Drew Street here in Durham. And I am just here to remind you that Durham is facing a housing crisis. We have 20 people moving to Durham almost every day. We have over 900 evictions per month and rents are rising all over the city. We have to address supply issues if we are going to take the displacement and gentrification concerns of the community seriously. We need to increase missing middle housing and particularly need to increase that missing middle housing on transit corridors and close to job hubs like downtown. The flume amendments to my understanding do the opposite. They reduce the potential density of the neighborhood. And, you know, I just would like to ask the commission why we are limiting housing options when we should be expanding them. It is my hope that you will vote against this down zoning. Durham needs more housing. Thank you. Thank you. I do not have other individuals who have signed up to speak on this issue. If there are other people who wish to speak while the public hearing is open hearing none. I'm going to close the public hearing and give the mission members of the commission an opportunity to speak. I'll start to my right. Are there any commissioners who would like to speak. Madam Chairman, at the end of our meeting last month, Commission Member Brian proposed an idea at least to a couple of commission members and I think also acquainted the staff with it as his approach to this idea of a forest hills future land use map change. It was an idea based upon looking at the problem as a question of the text and tables of the comprehensive plan and not so much a change of the future land use maps or the tier boundaries. And I believe that his ideas deserve some serious consideration and massaging by everybody involved and for that reason and consonant with the request made by Mr. Goche. I'm going to ask that we continue our consideration of this request until our December meeting which I believe is currently scheduled for the 11th. Mr. Miller, the applicant actually requested that it be referred back to staff so that they can make the modifications and bring it back. All right, that's what that's my motion is the matter be referred to staff. Can I get a motion to that? That's my motion. Okay. Can I get a second? Second. The motion has been moved then properly second that we refer this item back to staff with some additional adjustments. All in favor of this motion, let it be known by raising your right hand please. All opposed. Motion passes eight to zero. Thank you. Thank you. We'll take a second to transition to Mr. Busby as he walks back to his seat. Thank you, Vice Chair Hyman. We'll move to our next case again. We amended the agenda at the beginning. We next will be hearing case z one eight quadruple zero nine for pine crest and we will start with the staff report. Thank you. Good evening. I'm Jamie Sonjak with the planning department. I will be presenting case number Z one eight zero zero zero nine pine crest. The applicant is pine crest Duke LLC. The project site is generally located at 1050 West Forest Hills Boulevard and it is nine point one one acres in size. It is located within the city's jurisdiction. The rezoning request is residential suburban to plan development residential 6.0 PDR 6.0. The property is located within the medium density residential future land use designation, which is consistent with this rezoning request. The proposal is to rezone the property to allow up to 46 strong units. This is the aerial map and the subject site is shown in red. It is located within the urban development here and within the Cape Fear River basin. This is the existing conditions map and it includes properties 1050 West Forest Hills Boulevard 1010 1010 West would drive 1413 Kent Street a portion of 1409 Kent Street 1401 Biven Street and 1444. I'm sorry. 1044 West Forest Hills Boulevard. Already the site contains mixed hardwood species and pines ranging in size and understory trees to large canopy trees. And this map shows the existing conditions house driveway pools patios various accessory structures a stream buffer no build area existing easements, as well as uses that are adjacent to the site. Included within the staff report are various pictures of the site conditions. As well as area conditions surrounding the pine crest development site are single family homes on a mix of large and small wooded lots ranging in size. From two tenths to an acre to over one acre in size, as well as the forest Hills Park and the nearby Lions Park. This is the zoning context map on the left side is the existing conditions the property is shown in red. And it is shown in the existing residential suburban 20 zoning district. And on the right, it's highlighted in blue with the proposed pdr 6.0. The future land use map shows the area shown in orange as medium density residential which is six to 12 dwelling units per acre, which is consistent with the rezoning request. The next slide shows the proposed conditions. This is the development plan, which highlights site access points project boundary buffers the building and parking envelopes three coverage areas, and the maximum impervious coverage. We're going to highlight some of the key commitments that have been included as part of the development plan. This is a maximum setting a max of 46 dwelling units converting the existing single family dwelling into two dwelling units, dedicating a 50 foot wide Greenway easement, specifying no commercial uses on the property, substituting natural buffers for the project boundary . Stipulating no public streets or public or private drives excuse me and executing utility extension agreement prior to site plan approval. There have been some text commitments that have been reviewed and approved by staff since the posting of the staff report and they have been now been incorporated as part of this application. First being single family detached dwellings and or townhouses shall be the permitted building types. The text commitment number two, which pertain to recessed buildings located along Westwood Drive and Kent Street was removed. Text commitment number 14 was revised to read all new water and sewer mains shall be private and the utility shall not be owned operated or maintained by the city of Durham. Two additional text commitments were included. Common access easements shall be constructed to provide necessary access for fire and and solid waste vehicles in accordance with local and state regulations. Design of utility systems shall meet local and state regulations. A single driveway connection shall be provided at the intersection of Westwood Drive, West Forest Hills Boulevard subject to city approval at site plan stage. So this connection be not approved. The driveway shall be provided at the alternative location shown on the development plan sheet number two. In terms of some of the design commitments that have been included on the plan. The residents will be built in colonial revival federal tutor tutor styles found in the similar to the Forest Hills neighborhood to complement the architecture of the residents. The structures will utilize a variety of building materials and architectural features to complement the surrounding residential development. All residential development units along the existing public right of way shall be prohibited from having direct vehicular access to the existing roadways. And a an additional text graph design commitment was added townhouses shall not be located within 50 feet of any existing public right of way. In terms of consistency with the comprehensive plan and policies the proposed pdr zoning designation complies with the current medium density residential 6 to 12 dwelling units designation on the future land use map. It is consistent with policies 223 a as if approved the development plan would yield 46 dwelling units on the plan. In terms of 231 a the applicant is proposing single family and townhouses. No commercial uses will be allowed. The applicant has added design commitments to address the appearance of the structures to be built to be built in the same styles far far south neighborhood and to complement the neighborhood architecture. Existing infrastructure such as roads water and sewer capacity are sufficient to accommodate the potential impacts. The proposed development is consistency is consistent with policies. 814 b and 1014 f and that the applicant has dedicated a 50 foot wide greenway easement on the development plan to address the requirements of the city's greenway and open space master plan. In terms of policy 814 d transportation had previously proposed adding a bicycle facility along Ken Street. However at that time the neighbors were in support of maintaining the existing on street parking. Since no roadway widening is needed. In this particular development plan. There are no improvements required of the develop required of the developer. The proposed development plan is consistent with 11 one. The policy there is sufficient capacity within the school systems to accommodate the anticipated growth. Staff determines that this request is consistent with the comprehensive plan and other policies and ordinances and I will be happy to answer any questions that you have. Thank you very much. At this point we will open the public hearing for this case and we have 10 individuals who have signed up all to speak in favor of this proposal. Now as I said at the beginning we traditionally our rules have us give 10 minutes to each side 10 minutes for and 10 minutes against. But we can decide to allow additional time to allow people to have time to speak Commissioner Miller. Mr Chairman. Given the circumstances that we have 10 speakers on one side and to make sure that our public hearing works to give everybody who comes to speak an adequate opportunity to get their points across to us. Move that we give all the speakers who have signed up to speak two minutes. Second moved and seconded all those in favor say aye. Any opposed. Thank you very much. So we're going to call you up to speak one at a time if you can come up and speak clearly into the microphone. If you can give us your name and your mailing address and then you'll see there's two minutes on the timer. You cannot miss the beep when it starts beeping. That means it's time to wrap up. We will start with Ken Spalding and then George Stanziel and I'll call up additional names as we go. Good evening Mr Chairman and members of the planning commission. My name is Ken Spalding. I represent the applicant who is seeking to get a rezoning of Pinecrest, which is the estate of Dr. Mary Siemens and of the Duke family. We're seeking to rezone 9.1 acres to have a PDR six. The family wanted this use of Dr. Siemens estate to be developed as a special place in a special neighborhood. We are creating a place respecting the life, the heritage, the legacy and the tradition of the Duke and Siemens family. We also wanted to respect the wishes of the city of Durham through your comprehensive plan and the neighborhoods adjacent, Long Meadow and Forest Hills. We have given our most earnest and sincere efforts to reach these goals. We've had to weigh and juggle our policies and procedures of the city and the county with the needs of the residents and neighbors. Since our last meeting, we have had four different types of meetings with neighbors and residents still trying to work things out. That, you add to the 15 meetings that we've had over a year's period of time as a total of 19 meetings. We have worked extremely hard to be able to come to a consensus on this. And I want to give the Long Meadow neighborhood and the Forest Hill neighborhood credit for working diligently with us recognizing there were some things we could do and some things we could not do. And we recognize there were things that they needed and wanted that we wanted to make sure that we could address and give them. We feel we have created a future place which will be unique to Durham, the Triangle and the State of North Carolina. Wave time. I'll wait my time again. Mr. Schunk, you're waiting your two minutes. Thank you. We've had specific goals of making sure we had proper buffering. We've respected our ecologic and our environmental aspects. We've tried to see that our future houses would be comparable to the existing homes through committed architectural guidelines, which will be a part of the text commitments. We have a strategic array of homes in a strategic location. We are respectful of the estate's natural beauty. We strive to have a preservation of history through the use of some of the existing structures on the premises today. Staff has assessed our adherence to our city's policies, our city's rules, our city's plans and our city's procedures. We therefore respectfully request your approval and support for this rezoning, which is in full compliance. More specifics will be given by our land planner, Mr. George Stanziel of Stewart. Thank you very much. Thank you. Good evening, Mr. Chair and members of the Commission. My name is George Stanziel and President and Director of Design at Stewart, and I live at 115 Cofield Circle in Durham. As a follow-up to Mr. Spalding's very on-point comments, in addition to the 19 meetings we've had with neighbors over the course of the past year and a half, we've worked very closely with the Durham Neighbors Together Group and have reached a lengthy agreement with them on a number of items such as density and residential housing types, boundary buffers, a path along the existing stream, entrance relocation, architectural guidelines, as well as our intention to seek a 20%, up to 20% reduction of density at site plan approval, which will keep us in compliance with the comprehensive plan policies. Our effective density at that point would be 4.17 units per acre and very consistent with surrounding densities in both Forest Hills and Long Meadow, immediately across the street from our project on Kent Street. While we completely understand that DNT does not represent all of Forest Hills, we have listened to all the neighbors and incorporated many of the conditions and requests we have heard from them on a consistent basis. These have been included in our development plan text commitments. In addition, though, I'd like to read into the record three additional text commitments that have been approved by the plan, pre-approved by the planning department. First, single-family homes will be served and accessed by a private access in common area, drives and parking areas. These private accesses in common areas do not meet the city of Durham Street standards. The features within this area are private and will never be eligible for public maintenance. Furthermore, the developer agrees to note this on all site plans. Mr. Coleman has waved his two minutes. Thank you. Furthermore, the developer agrees to note this on all site plans, construction drawings and final plots and include this language in our restrictive covenants prior to recording of the final plat. Second, a maximum five foot wide trail with a natural surface will be constructed along the east side of the stream on site and will extend outside the zoning boundary on parcels PID-201. 1749 and parcels 201750 to connect to Biven Street and Forest View Street rights of ways. Should a greenway be built per the Durham trails and Greenway master plan, the natural trail will be removed and replaced with the new trail. And then thirdly, a 20 foot boundary buffer shall be provided along Westwood Drive and West Forest Hills Boulevard. That's an increase from 15 feet to 20 feet. We're hopeful that you will see that we've truly made an outstanding effort to understand and be empathetic toward our neighbors concerns and feedback and that you will feel that this will be a high quality and unique community in Durham and most likely in the triangle. Thank you very much. Thank you. Our next speakers are Bo Clark, Peter Jacoby, Connie Siemens and I Jarvis Martin. And then finally, John Burnesh and Dan Getz. I'm Bo Clark and I don't need to speak. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening commissioners. Thank you for your service to Durham. I'm Peter Jacoby. My wife Sandra and I live at 19 drive in Forest Hills for 30 years. We strongly support the proposed development of the pinecrest property and the rezoning request by Philip Clark builders. The pinecrest development proposal before you preserves this unique and historic property. It also successfully provides well designed new housing inventory within Forest Hills. Mr. Clark's vision respects and is open to the surrounding neighborhood. This goal would simply not be met by subdividing the property into individual building lots. I also want to thank Durham neighbors together for engaging with Mr. Clark to make this a better development. And for focusing on the future impacts of new urban housing in Forest Hills. In future years, I believe Forest Hills and Durham residents will walk through the new pinecrest with family and visitors. This they will say is the best urban housing development in Durham. Thank you. Thank you. Connie Siemens. Good evening. My name is Connie Siemens and I live at 1514 Hermitage Court. I've been a resident of Forest Hills for 12 years. I'm a cousin to James Siemens, the current owner of the pinecrest property. I'm also a professional real estate broker. You might say she's in real estate, so she's obviously pro development. Well, that's not exactly true. When the pinecrest project was first introduced to us about this time last year, I was a little skeptical and I was concerned. I was concerned for my family, for the neighborhood, for the historical record, and for the property itself. Over many months of conversations and presentations by and with Phil Clark and his team, as well as researching and evaluating many of his previous projects. I've come to admire and support Mr. Clark's vision for pinecrest. He truly wants an addition to our neighborhood that reflects the timeless beauty heritage and architectural details already present in the neighborhood, as well as deliver a level of craftsmanship and construction that are not commonly found a new construction today. Well, the development requires some sacrifice. Of course, change is often hard. The pinecrest project also offers opportunity, opportunity for much needed urban density, the creation of a beautiful residential destination, as well as preservation, preservation of the historic structures, preservation of architectural design, and preservation of green spaces. I firmly believe that the pinecrest project is the best possible development outcome, both for the neighborhood and the city. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Jarvis Martin. Good evening. Mr. Chairman, members of the commission. First, let me say thank you to all of you for your service. I haven't had the opportunity for over eight years to sit where you all have sit on the second Tuesday of each month. I will understand the personal sacrifice and commitment that you give to your service, and it is greatly appreciated because of that derm is a better place. With that in mind, over the years that I had the good fortune to serve, one of the things that all of the commissions hopeful and wish for was that developers would work with and listen to the residents when they came to the developments that they were proposing for our neighborhoods. I can say in this case, based upon the feedback that I have gotten in talking to the development team, that they have put forth a sincere effort to do that. And many of the concerns of the residents have been met, which has been stated earlier before. As a professional, I am a certified state real estate appraiser. I can say that based upon what information I have been shown about the project, that this development will blend very well with existing homes in the Forest Hill community, as well as add a new dimension for folks to consider this as a place that they want to live. Because of those facts, I'm asking you to support this rezoning tonight. Thank you. Thank you. John Burnesh and Dan Getz, please. Members of the commission. My name is John Burness. I live at 1506 Kent Street with my wife Anne. And I believe we probably have the most frontage of any property that is adjacent to the Pinecrest site. I've lived in Forest Hills since coming to Duke in 1990. Typical of Durham. There were many views on this project when it was first presented. And while I was not involved in the negotiations, I'm very glad to see that the neighbors opposed to it were able to gain changes that I think improve the project. And appreciate that the developers were open and willing to respond to many of the community's concerns. Knowing Mary and Jim Stevens as I was privileged to do, I think they would be pleased with the end result. And I urge you to support this application for the Pinecrest development. Thank you. Thank you, Burness. Mr. Burness, and I'm sorry for pronouncing your name wrong earlier. Speaking of pronouncing names wrong, Mr. Dan Getz, how did I do? Thank you. Thank you. Members of the commission. Good evening. My name is Dan Getz. I live at 1414 Shepherd Street in Durham. And I'm here to support the proposed rezoning. For 30 years, I've lived in Forest Hills three blocks from the Pinecrest estate. For those many years, I've biked, walked, and driven around the property whenever headed west. This past Saturday was the first time that I set foot on the property after attending multiple meetings with my neighbors, with design experts, planning staff, and with Phil Clark's team. I've come away respecting the process and thankful for the many chances to interact with and learn from one and all. My conclusion to support the development comes down to three core points. First, trust. Trust that the Siemens family has acted in good faith in engaging the responsible developer, a developer who has engaged with the local officials and neighbors to improve the initial plans. Two, confidence. Confidence that the plan development is consistent with the larger public consensus in Durham, that we need more housing options near the city center to create a more dense urban core. Finally, three, concern. Concern that failure to approve the proposal would jeopardize chances to transform Pinecrest from an outsized and isolated island into a vibrant asset that will benefit the neighborhood and the city. Thank you for your attention. Thank you. So that concludes the speakers who have signed up to speak, but I've seen a lot of folks come in. I do want to give anyone an opportunity if they would like to speak during this public hearing. This is the Pinecrest zoning map change case. Is there anyone else who would like to speak? I'm not seeing anyone, so I'm going to move to close the public hearing and bring it back to the commissioners for any questions or comments. So there are commissioners with questions or comments. We'll start to my right, Commissioner Alturk. Thank you, Chair. I have a couple of questions for staff. One is relatively minor clarification. In attachment six in the last section there, you mentioned an increase of five students. Is that supposed to be nine or I think you had nine in the table? I'm just against it's a minor clarification question. Let me just get to the table. That would be the correct number. Okay. I think the tables has nine. So I'm going to assume that's the. I would go with that. Okay. My, my second question is what does it mean if for a developer to, to ask for a buy right 20% density reduction at site plan? I mean, can anyone do this or are there requirements? Because that has been discussed and George mentioned. So the development plan does not specify any reduction in terms of the 20%. It is a provision that anyone can apply for at the time of site plan. But when you say apply for this, I mean, could they get, could they be denied that request or is that really unlikely? I'm sorry, I apologize. I wanted to clarify that the 20% is actually referred to in the section about development plans that you can do that without that sort of change or that 20% reduction being considered a significant change that would require rezoning. I say it's applicable to development plans, approved development plans. So they would have to put that in the development plan for, no. No, they can do it at some time of site plan. They do not exceed 20% reduction. They would not have to come back through the approval process. Okay. Thank you. And so I guess for George, if you could have a couple of questions for you. So you mentioned that you have an agreement with the Durham neighbors together, right group? And you mentioned three things. I guess some agreement on density, this density reduction, increased buffers or something about buffers and then architectural guidelines. Could you be more specific about those or what exactly you're proposing what you've agreed to? Sure. So what we've agreed to on the density is a number of units. The neighbors were concerned about not only the area that we were zoning, but what would happen on the remainder of the property, which is zoned RS20. On that property, there are two homes, the existing mansion, the main home, which we are going to turn into two flats, so two units. And then there's an existing cottage that is outside of our zoning area, but is part of the pinecrest estate. We will be redoing that cottage. And then there are several other lots that homes could be built on under the RS20 zoning. And we've agreed to build only two more, potentially four could have been built. We've agreed to build only two. So we've agreed to a total of 41 units over the entire pinecrest property, both on and off our zoning area, including the home, the main manor house and the cottage. Yeah, on the density question, that's, thank you. The second one, I forget, the boundary buffer. Right. So there is a required boundary buffer for this project, and it's 15 feet. We've agreed with D&T to increase that to 20 feet. And I forget the third one, I'm sorry. Architectural guidelines. Is that the text commitment already in the development plan? That's one I just read into tonight. And then the architectural guidelines, the neighbors were concerned about, you know, what these homes would look like, what are the architectural features and so forth. We described that to some extent in our design commitments, basic style. But they wanted something further and they wanted it to be, they wanted architectural guidelines that could be recorded with the county and become essentially go with the land. So we provided to them an additional set of guidelines that they've accepted that will be recorded. Okay. I guess my bigger question is what kind of agreement is this? A legally binding agreement that... It's a legally binding agreement between two LLCs. Okay. And if they back out, then, I mean, if at some point they... I guess my concern is, so with the density reduction, I understand that you're trying to fit in with the 6 to 12 units because of the flum, and then at site plan you'll reduce it. But I guess I'm wondering why not commit to the increased buffer and the architectural guidelines in the agreement now, right? Well, we did. We did. 20-foot buffer, for example. We did. Okay. That's one of the ones I read into the record. I see. Yeah. Okay. So what you've read into the record is based on the agreement you have with... Yes. Okay. Sorry. There were a lot of... All right. Okay. And that will be made... That is now becomes a part of the development plan. So those three additional committed elements become part of the development plan. I see. All right. And go with the property. Okay. All right. Well, thanks for clarifying that. I have no further questions at this point. Great. Thank you. Commissioner Miller. I also wanted to address that. So tonight we've learned that this developer has made some agreements that are outside the scope of a rezoning case, the public rezoning case that is the subject of our concern and the only subject of our concern tonight. We should not consider these when we decide whether or not to approve the rezoning application that has been submitted and modified by these several commitments to be included in the development plan. So what we have before us tonight is an application to rezone this property to a PDR to allow up to 46 units. There are a whole bunch of commitments, commitments to preserve historic structures, commitments concerning buffers, commitments concerning design of units. All of those are in there. We've heard about some other agreements that the developers made with his neighbors. These are appropriate and they can range from a handshake to an enforceable contract, but they're not our concern. Even the agreement to request the 20% reduction, which our code does allow all developers to ask for, at site plan times, we build this into the code because when we get a property rezoned and there are commitments in a development plan, you go to site planning and you start working with the staff and you start looking at the site and you discover that you may need a little leeway. Will we build that leeway into the development, into the site plan process? And what the code allows is that as long as the leeway isn't significant, then it's okay, it's by right, it's not something that can be approved or disapproved, but if it's more than a certain amount, then it's a rezoning and you have to start all over again. For housing density, the break point between significant and not significant is 20%, but the case before us is for 46 units and if you are comfortable with 46 units, you should vote for this rezoning. If you're not comfortable with 46 units, then you should ask more questions or perhaps vote against it. For my own part, I am comfortable with 46 units on the nine acres. Now, George also spoke about the developer owns about, if I'm not mistaken, 12 acres, all contiguous, that are the Pinecrest property. The rezoning only covers about 9.11 acres, so there are some other parts of the property which the developer will be able to develop at the existing RS-20 zoning. What happens on those three acres, not before us tonight, not something we should take into account in deciding whether or not to approve this rezoning. I am immensely grateful to the developer and to the neighbors for working through a difficult process and coming up with an elaborate plan, but all the same a very good one, and I believe that when this project is finished, we will have in Durham something, a type of development that will broaden the scope of development that we have seen here over the years to include something that we've not seen before, and I hope the effect of it will be to influence and affect other developers, not only in what they build, but in the way they deal with their neighbors. One of my reasons for being on the Planning Commission is to make sure that the community is fully engaged in the planning process, one that is complicated, one that is expensive, one by its nature is alienating to people. We have overcome all of those things in this case, and so I'm voting for it. The gentleman talked about trust. I'm a person who cuts the cards even when he plays with friends, and we've done that in this case, but still I trust that and am confident that everybody here has acted in good faith and that we will have a really good addition to Durham on an interesting piece of property. So I'm voting for it, and I encourage all of the rest of you to do the same. Thank you, Commissioner Miller. Commissioner Williams and then Commissioner Gibbs. Commissioner Gibbs. Okay. I got all involved in the previous descriptions of things, and I agree with just about everything that's been said so far, and I have been particularly impressed with, I did get to see a plan study, I guess you may could call it design development or something, and I was particularly impressed with that, and Commissioner Miller alluded to that in the latter part of his statement, and the way they have worked, the developer has worked with the Forest Hills residents is very encouraging, but as far as the design of this piece of land, again I agree with Commissioner Miller, it's something that's unique, and it's not going to be cheap housing, it's going to be something that is compatible and would be an absolute great addition to the overall Forest Hill persona, and I think in doing that, it should strengthen its position to maintain its historic status, and I know it hasn't been designated as a historic area, but it would make it pretty dull gone hard for anybody, any other developer to come in and infield develop what's up on the, I call it up on the hill of Forest Hills, and I just wanted to offer that general comment, and I thank you Commissioner Miller for, I couldn't say it as well as you did, but I will be voting for this because I think it sets a precedent and a pattern that I hope to see more of this kind of development, and it can be used for affordable housing too, of course this is affordable if you make a million bucks a year, but anyway, that's all I've spoken enough. Thank you Commissioner Gibbs. Commissioner Williams. I'm utterly impressed by this process and how it has turned out. I believe that the charrette process for this had to be extensive and it really took a collaborative effort and knowing what I know of Forest Hills and the city of Durham, I feel like what you have before us is a very strong commitment and an actual effort to produce something that is to be proud of, and this has come a long way, and I'm smiling a lot because I'm elated from what I've heard and from where this started and where we are now, so I am very proud to support this. Thank you very much. I will echo those statements as well. I think I was at the first neighborhood meeting, and it was a very big one. I arrived a few minutes late and it was already tense, and if you had told me that a year later there would be 10 people speaking in favor and it would potentially be a unanimous vote of the Planning Commission, I would have been very skeptical. Everyone involved has worked really hard, the neighbors, the proponents. I know there have been an enormous amount of meetings. I've been in a few of the meetings as a very strong proposal. Mr. Martin, former Planning Commissioner, I think said it well, these are the kind of solutions that we like to see where everyone listens to each other and works really hard together, so I'm impressed as well. I look forward to voting for it, and in fact this is the appropriate time for a motion, so I will accept a motion for approval. Mr. Chairman, I move that we send case number Z-18-00-009, the Pinecrest case, forward to the City Council with a favorable recommendation, subject to nine proffered items, so I'm going to break these down and ask you to remember them. Five of the items that I'm going to discuss tonight, discussing the motion, were actually proffered by the developer and approved by staff and described by staff in their presentation. Four of them were new items and one was modification of an existing commitment in the development plan. Then later, during the public hearing, Mr. Stanzie Allen, on behalf of the developer, offered three more committed elements, so altogether that is nine the way I count it, and so my motion is to send this forward to the Council with a favorable recommendation, subject to the commitments in the original application plus the additional night items tonight. Second. Okay, moved by Commissioner Miller. We'll give the second to Commissioner Alturk. I do, before we discuss and vote, I do want to make sure that the staff and the proponents are in agreement on the motion on the proffers. That's correct. Okay, lots of heads nodding. Yes, thank you. We'll have a roll call vote, please. Commissioner Alturk. Yes. Yes. Commissioner Baker. Yes. Commissioner Darkin. Yes. Commissioner Hyman. Yes. Commissioner Busby. Yes. Commissioner Miller. Yes. Commissioner Kenchin. Yes. Commissioner Gibbs. Yes. Commissioner Williams. Yes. All right, motion passes, non-zero. Thank you very much. Thank you again to everybody for your work on this particular case. We're going to take just a two-minute standing break just so we can clear the room so that when we begin our next case, we can hear the case in front of us. Was that your affordable housing joke? Uh-huh. Was that your affordable housing joke? A million dollars? Didn't you say that about affordable housing if you make a million bucks? Yeah. That was good. Yeah. Oh my gosh. Well, the parents that we love depends on your definition. The other person will have the real affordable housing. What are you talking about? We'll see, we'll see. Are you saying you're talking about the honestly? Right, right, right. You know, we've got a whole bunch of people involved. We do. We do. And I saw the plans for this, and I would love to move in there. But what needs you to do is just take it to the counselor right now. You know what? Here you go. Right in there. Big check. It's one of those things that makes it off the phone. I think it's good for Durham, man. We need to have that. We need to have that. Hi, John. All kinds of things. What is the goal of this? Well, yeah. The money is going to drive something up to be able to help those who can't. It's a rising tide of folks on folks, right? And I can't believe I'm so kind of thinking of that. We're all holding for it, so you guys can solve it. Well, and dude, I don't think those guys minted. They're not going to try to help you out, but you're right. If you've done right, we all should benefit. Is there any one other question? It is still going to be an uphill straight here, but I think everybody has the right to answer that. I know our church is active in this sort of thing. And it's all the hurdles. Agree. Agree. It's Republican. Agree. Democratic. There he is. Anywhere. Yeah. There's many more in the building. Yeah. Go out and kick the tire. There you go. There you go. Various things. You've never heard of them. Yeah, I have. That's one reason why I asked me that. It's because they have been thrown curveball after curveball, curveball after curveball. Yeah. I know it's true. I know it's true. You know, one thing that happens is that they did, you know, they have changed the route at times, and it's impressive to see that they changed the route to go to NCCU after a lot of people. So, you know, we'll see. Yeah. We'll see. Yeah. We should get a beer soon. We should. I hope we get you out of here. No, it's just going to be. I was going to talk to Cedric, too, because I was, like, in that last meeting. There you go. Okay. I can pull out with these guys. Yeah. I think we can agree on a lot of stuff. Oh. It's a good group here. Yeah. He's going to have to refuse. Yeah. So what I've done is I've opened up your presentation. Oh, just put it there and there. Great. So in the interest of time, we're going to get started again. If you are planning to depart the planning commission meeting, if you're still having conversations, please, we urge you to go into the lobby so we can hear the case in front of us. Once we have a quorum of commissioners, we will get started again. Our next case. Is a comprehensive plan future land use map amendment with the concurrent zoning map change. So these are cases a one eight quadruple zero three and Z one eight quadruple zero six. This is for the rail operations maintenance facility or the romp. And before we begin, I recognize commissioner Baker. I'd like to request to recuse myself from this item. Is there a reason commissioner Baker, do you mind sharing the reason your request for a recusal? Yes, I'm involved in the application process. Thank you very much. We have a motion for recusal of commissioner Baker from this particular case. Mr. Chairman, I move that we disqualify commission member Baker from consideration of cases a 18 quadruple zero three and Z 18 quadruple zero six. We have a second. Second commissioner. All those in favor of the motion. Please say aye. Any opposed. Thank you, commissioner Baker. So we will. We'll begin with the staff report. Again, if we know a lot of folks have signed up for this case, if you have not yet had a chance to sign up the table on our left on your right, please sign up. Give us your name, your address, and if you can list if you are speaking for or against, the folks speaking for will speak first in public hearings and then those against will speak second. Each side will have 10 minutes. In this case, I've heard we have a lot of folks signed up. So we will deliberate and look to extend the public hearing time. So each of you have a fair amount of time and each side will have an equal amount of time available. Ms. Sonjek. Good evening, Jamie Sonjek with the planning department. I will be presenting case number A180003 Z180006. The rail operations maintenance facility also referred to as the ROM. The applicant is Go Triangle. The address is generally located at 4901 Farrington Road on the east side of Farrington. The subject site is pending annexation. The site is 23.418 acres. The rezoning request is residential suburban 20 and, I'm sorry, residential suburban 20 to industrial light with a development plan. The property is currently designated to commercial and office in the future land use map designation and the applicant is proposing an amendment to industrial to coincide with the rezoning request. The proposal is to allow the rail operations and maintenance facility for the overall Durham orange light rail project. The site has a pending annexation petition and on receipt of a recommendation from the planning commission that would be consolidated with the items and the city council would hear the request at that time. This is the aerial map and the subject site is shown in red is located within the suburban tier and within the New River Basin. As mentioned, it's on the east side of Farrington Road across from Ephesus Church Road and adjacent to I-40. This is the existing conditions sheet of the development plan. There are 12 parcels comprising of the site ranging in size between about a half an acre to seven over seven acres in size. The site is vacant, undeveloped land and includes pine and hardwood forests. However, there are a number of existing single family homes. There's an existing telecommunications tower that will remain on site. There are several riparian corridors and isolated wetlands areas. There are existing drainage sewer and utility easements as well as a access easement to get to the existing wireless communications facility. A portion of right-of-way which is Dabney Road runs through the site which would need to be closed or withdrawn prior to site plan approval. And these photos which are included in the staff report depict some of the existing conditions and the properties. In terms of the area, the site is adjacent to the Patterson Mills Country Store to the south, the village at Cope Harbor Residential Development to the west, and I-40 to the east. There are several nearby residential developments. The Glenview Park, Prescott Place are located to the northeast of the site across I-40. It made a veil, Creekside, and West and Downs Residential Development as well as the Creekside Elementary School are located to the west off of Ephesus Church less than a half-mile away. This map shows the existing and proposed zoning as shown on the left. The property is currently zoned Residential Suburban 20 within the Falls Jordan District Watershed Protection Overlay and the major transportation corridor overlay of I-40. On the right, the property is shown in purple with the change to industrial light with a development plan to accommodate for the ROM facility. This is the future land use map as shown on the left. The property is designated commercial and office on the future land use map and they're proposing to change it to purple on the right which is industrial. This is the development plan which shows site access points, the building and parking envelope, stream buffers, project boundary buffers, the existing and proposed easements, the tree coverage areas and a maximum building height of 50 feet. The applicant is seeking to utilize the Falls Jordan District Overlay and high density option and has committed to a maximum impervious coverage of 60%. Through the development plan the applicant is also seeking approval of an encroachment into the MTC buffer for tracks, light rail access and the relocation of some easements. This slide just summarizes some of the graphic commitments that were just shown. In addition, the applicant has committed to a variety of building materials and sloped or flat roofs. In terms of key commitments shown on the development plan, the applicant has committed to development limited to the ROM facility and the existing wireless communications facility. Vehicle, body repair and paint shops are prohibited. There is an added vegetative screen along the Farrington Road frontage. Buildings will be placed a minimum of 75 feet and parking at least 30 feet from Farrington Road. There is a text commitment where lighting would be aimed away from the project boundaries. Also, prior to site clearing the applicant will obtain all required permits and from all parties relative to impacts on wetlands, riparian areas and no build buffers. This slide highlights some of the key transportation improvements along Farrington Road in terms of constructing a southbound left turn lane, constructing the site access easements, revising pavement markings on Ephesus Church Road and modifying the existing traffic signal to accommodate the site. This slide highlights some of the plans that the application is consistent with. And in terms of consistency with the comprehensive plan, the property is currently designated as commercial and office on the future land use map, which is not consistent with the proposed industrial light zoning. As a result, the applicant has proposed to change the land use designation to industrial to coincide. So in terms of the future land use map, the application is consistent with policy 2131. The applicant has voluntarily offered restrictions on the use of property. In addition, the industrial zoning designation will help support new jobs, employment centers and access to non-vehicular transportation once the project is complete. Consistent with 222B, the site is located within the suburban pier and the development plan includes a number of committed proffers to help support the transition between adjacent low medium and medium density residential future land use designations and the proposed industrial designation. The proposed industrial land use designation is consistent with policy 242C as the development plan provides access to Farrington Road in line with the intersection of Ephesus Church Road. In terms of the zoning map designation, it is consistent with policy 231A while the industrial land use deviates from the existing residential development patterns of the surrounding area. The development plan includes a number of committed proffers to help support transitions between the residential developments and the proposed rail operations maintenance facility. The site is also large enough in size to support the proposed use and provide for enhanced buffering along the east frontage, along Farrington Road and to the south. They are consistent with 232A and 812H, the applicant has proffered various roadway and transportation improvements to help address the added traffic associated with this application. They are consistent with 234C, the subject site is buffered appropriately on the development plan associated with the zone map change request. The applicant has committed to additional vegetative screening along the properties frontage. The proposed development is consistent with policy 814D since additional asphalt will be provided along the full frontage of the northern side for future bike lane. The applicant has proffered a number of roadway improvements relative to address the existing conditions along Farrington Road. Staff determines that this request is consistent with the Durham Chapel Hill 2035 Long Range Transportation Plan, the 2040 Metropolitan Transportation Plan, the Durham County Bus Rail Investment Plan, the updated Durham County Transportation Plan, the Durham Orange Light Rail Transit Corridor Plan and a majority of the apical policies in the Durham Comprehensive Plan and the Unified Development Ordinance. I will be happy to answer any questions that you have. Thank you. We will move to the public hearing first and I assume we will likely have some questions when we close the public hearing and we hear from the commissioners. If you just give us a moment, they're going to bring over the sign-up sheet and just to remind everyone, again, we will start with those who have signed up to speak for the proposal and then those who have signed up to speak against. That means I'm out of time. We have... You are not, however. We have over 30 individuals who have signed up to speak. We have 12 individuals who have signed up to speak for and 25 who have signed up to speak against. There are some names who have been crossed out as well, so we will do our best. Everyone will have the opportunity to speak if they would so like to speak. I would recommend, but I'm open to suggestions that, again, we give each individual two minutes to be able to speak. I know everyone has come out. That's going to be a long hearing, but I think it's an important issue and all of you have come out this evening, fellow commissioners. What do you say? I would accept a motion. Mr. Chairman, I move that we give every speaker tonight at least two minutes. Second. Properly moved and seconded. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? So we will work through the 12 individuals who have signed up to speak. I don't know if the proponents had someone in mind that they wanted to have speak first, and if not, I'm just going to go down the list. Is there someone who would like to speak first? Mr. Tomage. Again, to remind folks as well, and this is what was happening in one of the earlier cases, everyone who signed up to speak now, it has two minutes to speak. The clock will tick off the two minutes. You'll hear the beeping when your two minutes is finished. If someone wants to give up their two minutes of time, they are welcome to do so. They can give their time to another speaker. That's what you saw in one of the earlier cases. So just so everyone knows, but I will read off every name. Everyone can choose to have their two minutes to speak if they signed up. Go ahead, Mr. Tomage. Good evening, I'm John Tomage, the Interim Project Director for the Light Rail Transit Project. I'm a Durham resident, and happy to celebrate my birthday with you all tonight. Shall we sing? You get three minutes. Happy birthday. Go Triangle is a regional public transportation agency created by the General Assembly of North Carolina in 1989 and has been providing public transportation service since the early 1990s. Our mission is to improve our region's quality of life by connecting people in places to reliable and easy-to-use travel choices. The Light Rail Project has been, in this corridor, has been more than 20 years in planning and development. And it will serve critical connections between the residents and visitors in our region and the three major universities, the hospitals at UNC, Duke, and the Via Medical Center, connecting people to three of the top 10 employers in the state, creating tens of thousands of new jobs and infusing billions of dollars into our local economy. This project is nearly 18 miles long with the proposed 19 stations connecting from UNC hospitals in the west to North Carolina Central University in the east. The large green dot in the left center of this is the proposed location for the rail operations and maintenance facility. That's the property that was identified through an extensive environmental impact study. We looked at 20 sites during a scoping process, five during the draft environmental impact statement, and this site was selected at that time as having the lowest environmental and community impacts of the five sites. Mr. Green. I'd like to defer my time. I'm back to Mr. Talmadge and also to Mr. Walden. I'm sorry. Could you speak into the microphone? I'd actually like to defer my time to Roger Walden who signed up after me. So Mr. Walden, you may come up and speak. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and good evening to the Planning Commission. I'm Roger Walden. I'm a planner. I've been a planner for a long time, and I'm a member of the development team that GoTriangle has assembled. There are some other members of the team here that might be helpful in answering questions tonight. We have architects, landscape architects, planners, environmental engineers, civil engineers who have all been contributing and working on this project. So that's where we are. And I'm going to talk for just a few minutes about the applications, and then we'll sit down and all of us are here available to answer questions if you'd like. So the staff gave a very good and complete presentation to use. I'm not going to repeat a lot of those things that were said. This package of applications supports the use of this site for a maintenance facility, as we have talked about, and we're requesting the amendment to the land use plan and then along with the rezoning. The staff mentioned outreach, and there's been other discussion about that. There's been extensive outreach over the period of planning for this project, and particularly in the last three years to highlight here. I've had many, many events to encourage people to come out and get information about the Light Rail project and offer their comments and suggestions. This slide is just a summary of some of those meetings over the last couple of years, both along the full scope of the rail, but then also focusing on the site-specific, the Farrington Road project. We've heard a lot of comments, and one of the things that came out of that, those comments, were concerns about traffic. So we try to incorporate a lot of the comments into our plans to make adjustments, and this is one example of people who are concerned about traffic. This project, the rezoning, would not require preparation of a transportation impact analysis, but GoTranco chose to do that anyway because it has been a concern. One of the things that came out of the transportation impact analysis was that the number of car trips per day from this site to and from is likely to be considerably less than would be expected under current zoning, probably about half of what would be expected under current zoning, and also that the development with its improvements that are proposed would result in a level of service at peak hours that is the same as it is today, so no change. So we're pleased to be able to report that. Staff has already talked about some of the commitments that we were having the project in terms of dedicated lanes and widening Farrington Road to allow a bicycle path. We've also heard from the staff about the major transportation core. That's another thing I wanted to emphasize that is along the east side of the property, the boundary with the I-40 right away, there are several existing pieces of land disturbance in that buffer right now with water and sewer easements, and two more will be coming with the tracks going into the site through the buffer and coming back out. As you've heard, we've made commitments to mitigate those buffer impacts to the greatest extent possible. The other commitments staff has got over those, I just wanted to highlight the first one, that the site can only be used for a rail maintenance facility if this rezoning is approved. So we're committing to that, that that's all that would happen, plus the additional commitments that you've heard. We believe that this proposal is consistent with the comprehensive plan, and we have seen support from both Durham City and Durham County for this light rail project. And in conclusion, we are asking for your recommendation to approve these applications. Thank you. Thank you very much. Van Catati. Good evening, commissioners, and thank you for your service. My name is Diane Catati. I used to live on Ephesus Church Road. I live in Southwest Durham off of Old Chapel Hill Road and know this area well. I strongly support the light rail project, and I encourage you all to support this land use change and rezoning. I served on the Durham City Council from 2003 to 2015, during which time we reviewed and visited the rail operations maintenance facility proposed locations. I believe this proposed location is the most appropriate location for the ROMP. I also have visited the Charlotte ROMP, which is surrounded by residential apartment buildings, and it is surprisingly quiet outside. This is a large site at roughly 23 acres and allows for buffering and mitigation efforts to address neighborhood concerns. The rezoning development plan also includes, as you know, additional committed elements, including shielded lighting and additional vegetative screening that I believe also help to address neighborhood concerns. The ROMP, as you've heard, will generate less traffic than other land uses that could be developed under the existing zoning. So again, I urge you to vote to support the land use change and rezoning this evening. Thank you. Thank you. Ed Harrison, just so we can get everyone ready. Good evening, Mr. Chair and members of the commission. My name is Dick Hales. I live at 100 Briar Cliff Road in Durham. I'm a professional planner with 35 years of work experience in Durham, Greensboro, and as a consultant around the state. I'm making comments tonight on behalf of the Coordinating Committee of the Coalition on Affordable Housing and Transit, a community group with 300-plus participants in the proposed income communities with strong transit access for all citizens in Durham, particularly around light rail transit stations. The staff report for this request lists many severe limitations and commitments. You heard Mr. Weldon speak about that. We believe the proposed use of this site as requested is compatible with surrounding properties. The request would only permit residents located on a fairly large site next to a busy interstate highway with a main building having substantial setbacks and buffers with internally focused lighting. Existing buildings and zoning in the area have or allow similar buffers and setbacks to what's proposed. And to be absolutely clear, no other industrial or non-residential uses of any kind would ever be permitted on this site with the proposed zoning. Specific impacts of the proposed development would also be compatible in less than that currently allowed by existing zoning on the site. For example, you could theoretically build 51 single family residential units on the site with the current zoning. These lesser impacts include less traffic, less school impacts, less water usage would encourage larger setbacks, would have similar building heights and landscape buffers to what's found in the surrounding area. Significant on-site stormwater detention and very little noise added to the already significant I-40 highway noise. Is that two minutes? Okay. And finally, I'd just like to ask all persons who are present in support of this case to please stand at this time. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Dan Jewel. Good evening, commissioners. I am Dan Jewel. I reside at 1025 Gloria Avenue. I'm a licensed landscape architect. I've been practicing here in Durham for 33 years now. Usually I'm here before you representing a developer as an applicant for a zoning case, but tonight I'm here as a private citizen asking you to support this request. I have much familiarity with this neighborhood. Among the hundreds of site plans and dozens of zonings that I've been involved with over those many years, I've done several in this area. We did the site plan and use permits for Creekside Elementary School. We did the rezoning for the villas at Culp Arbor and have been working with many of the folks in this neighborhood for more than 15 years now helping with community meetings, organizing design charrettes and doing ongoing land planning to help this neighborhood get ready for the long-planned transit corridor. And I do mean long-planned. I've reviewed the proposed development plan and the text commitments included. By my analysis, it meets or exceeds the UDO requirements for landscape buffering, tree coverage and they are committing to building setbacks that are almost double what the UDO requires for the requested zoning. I know the plan will have some impacts on streams and wetlands, but I've closely reviewed it for years. The efforts to look for a site and hone them down and every site had challenges including environmental and neighborhood impacts. This site though does make the most sense from an operational standpoint and in my opinion has no more impacts than the other sites considered. Once every generation we need to make a difficult decision for the sake of the future of our community. The request before you tonight should be popular to some people but it is the right thing to do for our children and grandchildren. Thank you. Thank you. Ed Harrison. This is the earliest I've ever written on a speaker list in this room for a land use hearing to catch my drift. I live at 58 Newton Drive Durham 27707 that is right at three-quarters a mile from the proposed entry drive for this project. I've lived there for more than 28 years that many years going through this corner of Farrington and Ephesus Church to Raleigh and beyond and a lot of places in between thousands upon thousands of times I have been a student of Farrington and Ephesus Church roads as much as anybody in the world for all those years. Spent 16 years on the Metropolitan Planning Organization Board of Directors I was there as a Chapel Hill Council member and I was there and everywhere else very defensive about Ephesus Church Road in particular because it's how a lot of my friends and for many years constituents got to the rest of the world going east and so for me traffic here traffic is and should be a major concern with any proposal on Farrington Road particularly at this corner and just to note early on in the staff report you're advised that the future land use designation for this property is commercial and office and I interviewed actually transportation staff about the implications for that some months ago and that basically means a strip mall literally a narrow strip and medical office and those are two really high traffic generators so any use is probably less traffic generating but as others have pointed out the really striking thing is is that this proposed use clearly and up zoning produces a major decrease in projected traffic 46 percent even if it's 23 percent having voted on a whole lot of rezoning actually hold the record probably for Chapel Hill I'd say it's a rare opportunity if ever you will get to vote for something that actually lowers traffic and I have a minute on it all unless someone gives up their time it'll take 30 seconds but that's all right we need to wrap up Mr. Harrison thank you very much Mr. Sibbonoman and I I know I got that wrong you know it's okay first of all I want to thank you commissioners for giving me the opportunity to speak and really I'm a professor at NCCU and so can you imagine my students trying to get my name right it's amazing I'm Dr. Burr Professor Vijay and that's how it goes it's fine so as a faculty as someone who's fortunate to be a professor at NCCU which I'm very proud of I'm also a resident in Carborough so I apologize for being an interloper here but that being said I'm on both ends of this transit rail and it's something that I'm actually very very in support of because another hat I sit with is actually serving on the affordable housing in Carborough and so affordable housing is a big deal for me giving access to people is a big deal to me transportation is a big deal to me and for all of these reasons this light rail has been vetted and vetted and vetted to provide all of these things to our community I mean there's gotta be some control around it but I really do believe this gains access it gives affordable housing options to people to work all across this corridor which I think is becoming a more and more dire situation so I also see a value to the students of our community so I serve on a U54 shared grant between UNC and NCCU where students from both institutions do research at the other institution so I'm bringing UNC students to NCCU and vice versa however it is incredibly challenging to get students from point A to point B or to intend a seminar at any of these institutions as it is I mean I get people to go to Duke but I can't park at Duke so it's ridiculous but we have a light rail option that's amazing because that'll give access for our students who don't even go into downtown Durham an ability to get to Durham our students' ability to get to Chapel Hill to get around this area which is a very very big deal so for all these reasons I really really support this I feel like this station has demonstrated all these values I mean it's a budding 40 it's a great situation really it seems that of all situations it's a good opportunity so thank you very much thank you Hi my name is Sue Hunter and I'm here tonight to speak to you as a member of an Orange and Durham County working group that supports the light rail I'm also a former resident of Durham County and Eastwood Park which is just around the corner from this facility and I've been coming to meetings like this for more than 10 years to support this project and I wanted to come out again tonight I voted for the transit tax in 2011 I have a go pass that I used to commute to work in 2013 I moved over the county line to Orange County and I commute from there to the largest employer in your county Duke University and that's what this project is really about and this maintenance facility is really key to having this project work so I respectfully ask that you approve the zoning request thank you and our last speaker signed up to speak for is Isaac Woods thank you commissioners I signed up for because this isn't a bad light rail project it's just not at the stage of where we need to move forward and I say that for three reasons I've reached out to Rob Baker, Ron Erkinson and I'll go triangle my family reside and the property has already been taking the intimate domain where the light rail goes it's seven acres altogether that's right across the street right across the street but I was impressed with the last hearing because the developer reached out to the neighbors and listened to them and said well what do you want us to do this hasn't happened we work for years this has been our family since the end of slavery to get the infrastructure there the water, the sewer easement that you keep hearing them talk about that's for the whole family and I said well what are you going to do about the easement and the sewer no answers from Rob Baker no answers from the old triangle we have attended every meeting that they had but at this time until they can be responsive to the adjacent neighbors on how they're going to take that sewer easement and provide sewer service for us that we work for years even before they had creeks out of school this isn't ready I asked the planning department let me see some drawings of plans the sewer easement no response the next issue is the noise we stay there we work to get this property that's owned commercial that's in my family we work when they brought 40 through to have that property that's owned commercial because the noise will be in the safe for you no input on how are you going to reduce the amount of noise with these trains locking up and taking off no response everybody know that the trains make noise also in regards to they say well what type of maintenance you're going to do there say no hazardous chemicals what prevents them from coming in later and saying well we're going to do some other type of industrial division or some type of other maintenance facility at this time I ask that you send this back for more public hearings because this location did not come up at the initial hearings it only came up at the end and I ask that you send this back for more community meetings for more input from the community thank you for your time thank you B.R. Hoffman that was probably a good transition to those opposed to this proposal so B.R. Hoffman and then Ruth McKinney again two minutes per person thank you my name is B.R. Hoffman I live at 211 Pinot Court with an address of Chapel Hill we live in the Villas of Culpe Arbor we moved here just a year ago and it's a wonderful community and if you drive down Farrington you will see lovely homes greenery trees a wonderful place to live I am not against the light rail I think it's a great idea but I am not for rezoning this for the maintenance facility we don't need more traffic on Farrington Road there is another development right across from the school of like 650 town houses we had 600 apartments built at the end of Farrington Road so that is all going to contribute but is this not a 24-7 facility and so how does that fit in a residential community I don't get it so I appreciate the board I served on the planning board for five years I know how important your job is to see both sides but I ask you to vote against this rezoning thank you Ruth McKinney I apologize I'm going to get some of these wrong but just so you can line up in the interest of time David Cachetto, Lisa Brock, John Von Acker, and Angela Grillo thank you good evening commissioners Mr. Chairman thank you for letting us speak and bring our positions forward tonight I don't want to talk about the pros and cons of the light rail I'm just looking at the zoning issue resident at 5139 Niagara Drive I've lived in the area of this project for almost 50 years I bought my first house in 1977 off of Ephesus Church Road and I have now bought my retirement home at Culbarper because I like that area my first job was as a school counselor at Githins Middle School when it was a junior high school and attached to Jordan which those of you under the age of 40 can't even remember you first compliment the staff in your presentation tonight and in the consolidated report I thought you did an excellent job of representing the residential nature of the neighborhood and showing the area with the Creekside Elementary School what you can't get from the slides and from that report is how quiet it is out there it's beautiful and peaceful you can take walks at night you can take walks early in the morning it's a peaceful, lovely area the major traffic is when parents go to school and home my concern is three fold about the remainder of the report which I think had some omissions I don't agree with the conclusion that the planning criteria have been met my first concern echoes the concerns of the gentleman who spoke I think it's going to be a very noisy project my second concern and there was nothing in the report that addressed noise nothing I read it over and over today was posted online second I'm concerned about the 24-7 potential for servicing that area my understanding again from talking to neighbors is that there will be repairs done at night there will be repairs done on weekends those are times when we're sleeping those are times when we're relaxing that's the time when children are doing homework and it's not appropriate in a residential area thank you I didn't get to my third point but thank you for letting me speak David Cochetto we appreciate all of you staying within the two-minute limit you can imagine if we added one additional minute that would be with 37 speakers that would be a lot of math to have to do sitting up here so we're trying to keep it focused you may go ahead sir understood good evening my name is David Cocchetto I own a home at 5146 Niagara Drive in the villas at Culparbor development adjacent to the property proposed for rezoning 108 of my neighbors and I signed a petition opposing this change in zoning that petition was submitted to members of this commission yesterday we oppose this rezoning for several reasons including the incompatibility between an industrial facility and our residential area the burdens of increase noise and light particularly at night in the residential area and apparent elimination of the greenway that was previously included in Durham's master plan we oppose this proposed change in zoning thank you for your time thank you sir Lisa Brock does this start when I say my name or does it start when I start talking I've never watched the clock closely enough to actually know let's hope I can at least get my address in before you start I brought B R A C H like the candies no I'm not related yes I wish I were my address is 5233 Niagara Drive in the villas of Culparbor and you've already started me and I asked about that so I'm gonna say my piece it made sense 10 years ago when Durham Planning Commission saw the developer whose market was 55 and over who built the villas of Culparbor on Parrington Road after all Creekside Elementary had already grown its capacity so having a development where 90% of the owners had to be 55 or over was a good plan being past their child-bearing years placing a community of retirees along Parrington Road also made sense as you tried to control the traffic congestion which was already at a maximum capacity particularly at rush hour times of day it made sense to develop unused pasture land into homes which brought higher tax revenues to the city of Durham our neighborhood quickly filled with retirees from all over the US, Michigan, New York, Florida, Tennessee, Californians were lured to our neighborhood which is now 500 to a thousand feet away from the properties to be zoned the other middle income neighborhoods which can be affected by this rezoning include Glenview Park, Prescott Place the Enclave, Weston Downs and Morena Place to name just a few what does not make sense is making a zoning recommendation which will restore destroy the very neighborhoods you have managed to create the federal funding for the project for this site is not secured and looking less likely every day what happens if there is no federal funding and you have already rezoned residential suburban land to industrial or industrial life this kind of zoning is drastic it's spot zoning it's against the UDO guidelines ma'am I'm going to have to stop you there unless someone is willing to give you their time in the interest of fate you just got to madam what is your name what is your name? Grillo thank you the kind of zoning is drastic and probably cannot be undone it's spot zoning it's also known as leapfrog zoning and it's against UDO guidelines unless you've managed to change those lately with the closest industrial zone nearly 10 miles away it is typical of spot zoning I plead with you my neighbors wearing these badges, raise your hands plead with you to err on the side of caution rather than crush a decision then rush a decision very nervous rush a decision which has the potential to negatively affect the health safety and quality of our neighborhoods and our lives please do not recommend the rezoning of these properties do not place us at risk for the what ifs that can be placed on an industrial zoned property thank you thank you Ms. Brack and Ms. Grillo for sharing your time do you want the last minute take me there my name is John Von Aiken and I call home 5203 Niagara Drive it's in Culp Harbor my biggest concern is I appreciate all those people who are out there trying to put this light rail together I'm not arguing it's something that's necessary so the commission, the committee to do something about it has to get involved the only problem I'm having is that how many of those people especially those that came here tonight to get it approved live in the area that will be affected it's easy to say it's okay to build something as long as it's not my backyard but when it is and the people that are here show up people get excited because of the additional noise factor that will be on Farrington Road throughout the day and night the extra trucks that will be on that road the extra traffic let alone the fact that as she was trying to mention earlier about the government funding if this does not go through what will you do with the property will you revert it back to residential or will you sell it to some commercial developer who wants to put in a light industrial that it's rated for and start building factories there the anti-local community these are all things I encourage you to think about before it's too late there might be other solutions as far as where you can put the rail yard I applaud you for at least looking into it and considering it and right now since the other gentlemen had the opportunity of saying the people that want this thing turned down I'd like those who will not have a chance to talk stand up and saying I'm against this program you can just stand up but thank you that would violate our rules of procedure I just wanted to make the effect since the other people had a chance to show that they had maybe 15 people here there's a lot more voices to be said and I'm going to get off my time right now I thank the committee do what you got to do but think about it if your parents were living in that facility what would you do thank you very much I'm going to read off a few additional names Carol Balinski if you can come up you're up next but then we also have Chris Booker Bill Post Ann Von Holley James Valentine and many more but if you can just line up that to great you may go ahead good evening my name is Carol Balinski and I live at 214 Culp Hill Drive in Chapel Hill neighborhood the words come up many times tonight this is our neighborhood a retirement community a school of 918 established communities which have been named tonight there is absolutely no reason to rezone our neighborhood with light industrial properties plants or facilities the implications of rezoning are not to be minimized rezoning this area opens up risks to the rural buffer small as it is and to the pastoral setting which is slowly disappearing rezoning is going to impact families, children and the residents who have chosen and who continue to choose to live here the current influx of multi-storied and multi-building apartments has already had an impact on the environment infrastructure wildlife safety and the once bucolic roadway of Farrington Road our neighborhood doesn't need immediate access to commercial businesses such as automobile parts stores mattress stores or strip malls all of which could be all of which are easily accessible now or do we need any other commercial or industrial facilities in our neighborhood we are stewards of our land we need to care for our environment protect the wildlife and wetlands and secure the safety of our Farrington Road and Ephesus neighborhood I urge you to keep the RS-20 properties and you the city planners have managed to create over these years a great place that's why I moved to Culp Arbor at what cost are you willing to toss this aside please do not rezone our neighborhood thank you thank you Curtis Booker I'm not going to be able to give this in two minutes but Chairman Busby did you give out the okay all of you have a copy I hope you will read it before you vote my situation is my situation is unique I live at 5117 Farrington Road I own the full southern boundary of the romp and also until they took it seven and a half acres of the south side of the property they took my property in March deposited money but they put artificial encumbrances on it and so now seven months later I still do not have a penny of the compensation that I am due the there are many problems that I've had and if you think back to Dr. Ms. Siemens property and the neighborhood involvement in that this has been anything but as you can see from the document that I've given you it's just I mean that reads like fiction you can't believe that those things happen but they did so the romp is taking my sewer easement and access which runs all the way from I-40 to Farrington Road through my property and offering nothing so far in terms of how I access sewer the property at the top of the hill above the romp is on the study list for the National Register and they're screening guidelines for that that have not been met so I ask you to reject O-Triangle's application and recommend that the city council postpone any action on this request until these issues have been resolved thank you thank you Mr. Booker and thank you for your written comments as well Phil Post Mr. Chairman my name is Phil Post I live at St. Andrew's Place in Durham County and I've been a 40 year resident of this part of Durham County there's been impressive things said today about light rail but as you know that's not the question before you tonight you've got to make four findings before you can rezone this property number one is this rezoning consistent with land use plans and I would submit to you and I believe that there are no land use plans that indicate there's going to be industrial zoning on the west side of Interstate 40 there's no Durham plan there's no Chapel Hill plan there's no Durham County plan that has any indication there was going to be industrial zoning on the west side of Interstate 40 and there for those of us who have been tested in homes and chose schools on the west side of I-40 had no notice whatsoever that there was going to be industrial zoning in fact up to this very second there's no land use plan that indicates industrial zoning on the west side of Interstate 40 is it compatible with existing land uses you've heard testimony tonight and those of you who have visited this site know that it's surrounded by residential uses in an elementary school 365 day industrial facility that operates 24 hours a day is not compatible with residential and elementary school uses will it have substantial adverse impacts absolutely will have substantial impacts if we understand the site plans correctly about 88% of the trees on this site will be removed in fact it'll be clear cut from the interstate highway to Farrington Road every stick will be knocked down you're going to cross over streams, wetlands in order to construct this site and you'll replace it back with a 20 foot wide planted buffer which I would submit to you as completely inadequate and there's been no comment about how to mitigate those and is it of an adequate size and shape if you have to clear cut the site with a DC buffer and wetlands and stream buffers then you know for a fact that this site isn't big enough or configured correctly to be a reason to industrial thank you sir alright thank you Anne Van Holley my name is Anne Van Holley and I have been living in Durham City Durham County for over 10 years my address is 1158 Bill Fairway I want to start by saying that I am not a foe of public transportation but I would like to thank my children to their preschool in a bike trailer and then taking a bus into work I am here because my two children are now at Creekside Elementary and I do not endorse the prospect of an industrial rezoning and its effect on the school which is around a quarter of a mile away from this site first I am concerned that the zoning report does not mention any direct notification of the Creekside Elementary community in excess of 800 students this past week or two I get the impression that they have no idea what is being proposed at this site there is no zoning sign placed at the intersection of Ephesus Church and Farrington Road the only spot where parents could actually read the information on the sign instead of driving by at 45 miles an hour on the two signs that are up on the property people at Creekside Elementary need to be informed regarding this issue congestion is also a major concern I have been driving on Farrington Road for years to get to Creekside Elementary to take my children there why does the zoning report not mention the intersection of 54 in Farrington in their traffic assessment this is a problem I can only assume this is where the ROMP trucks will go to access I-40 along with all the Creekside families heading toward South Point and RTP neither area to be serviced by light rail and a rapidly developing residential area servicing the school to one south being one example finally does the traffic assessment for this ROMP include the potential for traffic from the 400 plus housing units on Farrington or Ephesus Church Road to be occupied as well as the 190,000 square foot parking garage at the corner of Farrington in 54 if so the traffic assessment in this report is biased downward than what it could be in the next few years even prior to breaking ground into site thank you James Valentine my name is James Valentine I'm a homeowner at 12 Arvitaway in the Mata Valley neighborhood so a couple things that have been brought up already I don't want to keep hitting on but the fact that there have been large expansions that touch Farrington Road and those expansions we haven't seen the impact of yet is a problem with traffic on top of that my understanding is that there was a recent approval to reduce the right of way for possible future expansion of Farrington Road so I'm kind of confused by some of the comments that have come up that we're looking at reducing traffic by zoning this light industrial versus residential so the impact on the land of using the light industrial versus the residential I agree with but when you take into consideration the removal of the right of way to expand Farrington potentially down the road it looks like we're creating a giant bottleneck problem so as others have said I'm not opposed to light rail I think that it's great for the community but I think that there needs to be more study on alternative locations for where this can go thank you thank you Barbara Post and then Denise Hoffman and Kathy Abernathy and I'll keep working on trying to read the next one good evening my name is Barbara Post and Durham County and I've been a Durham County resident for 40 years I strongly oppose the rezoning to build a romp in my neighborhood because important information is missing from the application for example the plan does not show where the tracks will be nor where the overhead power lines will be located with regard to the buffers where is the 20 foot wide 40% opaque buffer will there be a 50 foot vegetative buffer to the south the current application shows a single entrance will there be a gate where is the emergency access what if the single entrance is blocked will the gate cause traffic to back up from the gate into Farrington Road there appears to be a mysterious access to the cell tower as well as a mysterious access to I-40 no detail is shown no turn lanes are shown Go Triangle has mentioned a security fence where and how high will it be and what will it look like a gate house has been mentioned but not shown on the plans what is the so called ancillary structure which is inside the setback how many structures will there be I am a librarian by profession and I feel confident that you will not be able to make a good decision about rezoning without complete information it is my view that because of the lack of information the rezoning cannot be approved and it should not be approved until my questions are answered thank you for hearing my concerns thank you for your time Denise Hoffman if it's easier we can have you come around you don't have to worry about using a microphone we have a microphone coming out I am sorry about that thank you for your patience thank you I am sorry Denise Hoffman 234 Culp Hill Drive and like many of my fellow speakers here I thank the commission for letting us have this opportunity to be heard I also was impressed as all of you were with the pine crest proposal we heard earlier down to details like Greenway and architectural considerations and yet it feels as if there is no consideration for what this is going to do to impact our community in the same way so we would like to see that more be looked at what is going to be done to make sure that we have those same kinds of considerations thank you very much you can feel free to leave the microphone there next is Kathy Abernathy and then Linda and it's me not you I'm just not reading it right but yes you're after that hello I argue here for the denial and the deferment of the zoning and the flume proposals it's our right to be here as citizens when it's a rezoning we've had input for the light rail but this is our opportunity to let you know what the rezoning will impact us please do not let the priority and commitment to light rail persuade you to ignore the American Planning Association professional standards against spot zoning tonight is the first time I've heard of the pro offers we live across the street why am I we heard of what they're trying to do to help us adjust to what's across the street that was what was promised to me when we did not get notices in our mailboxes of major meetings because we were on the wrong computer list environmental reasons are the main reason that I oppose primarily this location the surrounding land is essentially a wetland and it's free standing water pools the Army Corps of Engineers has protected the land and is not widened 54 for decades Lake Jordan is now polluted because I-40 was put in dense development was south of that and then Jordan was impounded that doesn't make sense we are living with that mistake from years ago across the street from this parcel are two non-industrial land uses residential homes this romp is a long long long way from implementation what's the hurry thank you thank you very much hello commissioners thank you for your time I voted for the tax I supported light rail the romp was dropped on us like a bomb there was a letter writing campaign by children to do away with the site near the temple and light rail used to go down 15501 but some of the car dealers said we don't want it there and then they went over to metamon they said we don't want light rail there even though that community was built for that and so all of a sudden it's going down the highway there were a bunch of other sites for the romp and it was dropped on us like a bomb I have been in that community for nine years and one day we weren't on the list and the next day we were the romp so if we're a little bit upset about it please understand I took the bus to work from Duke for four years and I owned a Prius I have no mileage on it I support light rail but not just light rail I support buses for the whole community the romp does not belong in our neighborhood and in Charlotte the romp was built in an industrial area that already had railroad tracks that's fine if the people want to go to the romp they had the choice but they're putting the romp in our neighborhood of over 55 year old people children around the corner wetlands there it doesn't belong and the biggest concern I have and I was strictly going to talk about the romp but I've had to change my text several times because people wanted to say light rail to you and I realized your decision is to improve or disapprove the romp's location but I fear if they build the romp and they don't get the funding they will use it as an excuse to push ahead anyway and put the burden on Durham County tax payers and if you don't mind can you just give us your name and address just for the record as well no that's fine I'm passionate Lynda Spalon 5223 5223 Niagara Drive great thank you very much I'm going to mess up a few more names so stick with me Thomas Stale, Sherry Herdman Mary Jean Ferris Jennifer Hernandez and Tamara Finn Tom Stark did I mess your name up my apologies Tom Stark please come up Tom Stark I live at 105 Coway Drive in Southern Durham County it says Chapel Hill Postman Dunn Cross Center State I guess I represent Colt Parber and the Oaks 3 two neighborhoods that are very concerned about this facility this is 23.4 acres that's currently zoned R20 the report acknowledges that the proposal is not consistent with any of the plans they're asking you to modify the plans there's a historical Patterson Mill next door we have all these neighborhoods around it's a quiet area it tells us that our MTC buffers are working that it's a quiet area but we're talking about cutting a hole in the MTC buffer we're also talking about putting in a facility that will make at least as much noise as the highway or so the report says but for those of us that have lived near a rail yard or a light rail or have used a light rail regularly we know that those steel wheels moving through tight curves make a lot of noise we've talked in this plan about putting lights in and talk generally about focusing them but there's no empirical there's no way to test whether or not that criteria is met the fact of the matter is that this becomes part of your transportation quarter it needs a hundred foot buffer minimum on the outside we spend a lot of time in our zoning ordinance talking about how to make the vegetative buffers dense enough to work the buffers that are suggested for this site don't even address sound and are clearly inadequate this site is not big enough to put an adequate buffer and locate the site at the other end of the line there is room next to rail yards and there's a rail yard just down from the turn in the rail line at the east end and we're going to have to stop you there unless someone's willing to give their time and great thank you you may proceed you have industrial areas sound is heard in context sharp squeaky sounds and remember that this facility is going to do most of its work from 11 at night till 5 in the morning so through the night you have these lights going and the noise going when you're in an industrial area you hear that in context and it blends in when you're in the country or in a residential area it's noisy you've opened up the hole to the highway you hear the tire noise all of those sounds grow and then you hear these high pitch sounds of a working facility an industrial complex you need to put industrial sites with other industrial not in residential areas I know there are a lot of other sites that were looked at along 15501 15501 as it turns north around Duke and also on the east end along railroad lines or even right along main street there's some room between the track there's a great separation between Pettigrew and the track there are places that you can design this thing to work where you don't impose it on a residential community where you disrupt all so my clients would like to see you recommend denial of this proposal and ask that they place it in a more appropriate location remember not against the rail line just against this facility in this location thank you thank you Mr. Stark we have Sherri Herdman and Jennifer Hernandez and Tamara Finn and then we are rounding into the home stretch with just a few more after that hi thank you Durham Planning Commissioners my name is Sherri Herdman I'm president of the Oak Street neighborhood I'm a resident of Durham County I have been for 14 years and I have been a resident as well as the city of Durham I don't envy you in your spot tonight because as you've heard this is really going to make a big change to a lot of people and truthfully you heard GoTriangle say there are all these meetings and all this congeniality but I think if you sent out a survey and told people really what was going to happen I think you'd find that I'm really listically I'm thinking you're going to find 98 out of 100 are opposed to this change in the zoning that's what they're opposed to because it's just going to change their way of life you look at Creekside Elementary it's the largest elementary school in Durham it has all these neighborhoods that are surrounding it that have just been put in there in the last you know five seven years the moms walk their kids to school the other moms and dads are driving their kids so there is huge traffic already around the school particularly at rush hour the other thing that was really in the final presentation was oh by the way there's no light rail to the light rail maintenance so nobody mentioned that but we have a light rail maintenance facility but you can't get there by light rail so all the employees have to take cars then you have all these trucks you're going to have things coming from all over the country and trains and they're going to be loaded on to trucks then they're going to be driven on these very not very well traveled two lane roads they're all two lane and there's only one small section where they're going four lane on Farrington Road so you're going to have a lot of traffic issues with toxic chemicals dangerous materials and this is where the people are walking so okay thank you Jennifer Hernandez I live in the Trenton community which is one I don't think has been mentioned yet tonight it's on Trenton and Farrington so we all have to take Farrington in and out of our neighborhood I personally work in Raleigh 30 miles away so I'm no stranger to being in the car and driving and traffic is one of my main concerns I probably should preface all this with I hate public speaking and I'm not very good at it so it tells you a lot that I feel so strongly to come here and talk about this tonight I have a lot of concerns around the traffic impact and I was very disappointed to hear the impact that this site will have for future expansion not only from a two to four lane as we've talked about but even bike path or a sidewalk I have neighbors that ride their bikes with their kids to restaurants or to the elementary school in the community other neighbors who walk and there isn't even a sidewalk to speak of much less me who's sitting in traffic for 20 minutes just to get on to 40 to then start the rest of my commute especially around the school hours of Creekside and that is not even taking into account the impact of future developments that are going up now so I think a lot's already been said about how this doesn't make sense in a residential area and a lot's been said around the traffic I don't know that a lot's been said around the greenway impact pedestrian bicycles and I think Sherry just touched on it is ironic that it is a light rail site but there isn't really any transportation method to get there even biking so I'm strongly opposed to this I hope you all will consider voting against rezoning this area it just doesn't make sense in the space and I think it's going to have a lot more of an impact to the neighborhoods then has been indicated so far thank you thank you am I the last one no if I led you to believe that I'm sorry there are five more speakers the best for last good evening my name is Tamara Finn and I live at 412 Nottingham Drive which is four streets away from where this facility is proposed to be put up and I'd like to just note to you guys in the front row I don't think you live four streets from this facility I can guarantee you that I want to just say that I am for the light rail I'm just not for it being in my backyard I I grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania which if you know anything about Mr. Rogers neighborhood he has trolleys in Pittsburgh so I grew up around trolleys which look like Mr. Rogers trolleys but now it is a light rail system and it has been for over 40 years there I know exactly what it looks like I know exactly what it sounds like and we don't want any of this near where we live it's very loud there's clanking I've heard somebody else say the screeching of metal on the rails that you will hear that you will hear the ding ding ding of the trolley which sounds cute on Mr. Rogers neighborhood but it's not in our backyard when I watched the fly through video I was very shocked that the man was sitting there showing the video in front of the maintenance facility and all you could hear were those said noises in the background so it's not as quiet as it looks or it sounds in the winter being four streets from Route 40 and there's no leaves on the trees in Route 40 and the proposed vegetation sound screens that you're proposing those will also lose their leaves and we will hear a lot of sounds in the wintertime so all in all I just think that it's ugly it's unsightly and I wish that it would be proposed to be put somewhere else and not in my backyard thank you so we do have five final speakers I'm going to call you all up now Dean Werner, Roger Werner Jeff Prather and John Martin good evening and thank you for being here and listening to us I'm Nancy Davis I live at 117 Donegal Drive which is the Oaks 3 right off Nottingham so I guess I'm five streets away from this facility but two things I need to say first this site is very relative for two reasons other people have already mentioned the storm water runoff I am dealing with flooding for the second time in five years my basement is torn apart I have to take up the hardwood floor I've taken out the paneling and I've taken out the insulation and then I have to figure out what to do about it if it happens again could be as early as this Thursday night now that property that you're considering rezoning for industrial is a wetland ironically I asked the Corps of Engineers for a permit to dredge my pond about seven years ago and they said no we prefer wetlands so I wonder what they're going to do when the proposal is made to them to destroy 80% of the streams that are going through that property and to clear cut 100% the clear cutting the first time I was flooded was about five years ago when new communities had been put in and clear cutting had been approved to take every single tree down to hardscape to put coverage of asphalt and concrete over it and part of the hardscape that they want to do here is a one acre building out of the 23 acres one acre will be one building that's pretty amazing and the rest will be asphalt rails thank you very much there's also an historic reason for not rezoning that area but I wish Mr. Newton would speak to that thank you for your comments Marlene Werner my name is Marlene Werner and I live at 106 Pino Court in the Villalizaco Barber this is an over 55 community directly across the street from the area that you are considering rezoning I have been a resident of the Durham Chapel Hill area for 21 years what attracted me to this area and to my present home was the rural suburban nature of this section of Durham I spent a good part of my life living in New York City suburbs then often felt as if they were part of the city with lots of traffic and congestion I would hate to see this part of Durham become like that in the short year and a half that I've lived in Culp Harbor I've seen the traffic on Farrington Road increase if the zoning is changed to industrial or light industrial traffic will get much worse and so will the air quality there are many areas of Durham that are already zoned for industrial and light industrial please don't rezone our lovely residential area the community I live in is filled with senior citizens nearby is Creekside Elementary School the health and safety of the residents in this area should not be ignored we all chose this area because it is residential quiet and rural please help us keep it that way thank you as Roger Werner comes up to speak we have a few folks who came in who did want to sign up and so if you are able if you would like to speak I would just ask that you see Miss Smith who's in the back with an additional sign up sheet we are going to allow everyone time to speak if you would like to members of the commission together with my wife I am a resident of the villas at Culpe Arbor as you're well aware this is a community directly across Barrington Road from the proposed rezoning area thank you for your time now you are just getting going we'll start it over no worries I'm not going to start from the beginning again you get the drift I do understand that certain circumstances may require unpleasant changes changes that many of us really don't want to endure however this proposed rezoning makes little sense to me for a host of reasons changing the zoning from residential to industrial or light industrial on an already overcrowded street as Farrington Road clearly does not make sense considering the many many areas of Durham that could accommodate this change without burdening the infrastructure of the surrounding area rezoning this area should you move forward we're almost certainly have an environmental as so many people have mentioned already and health related impact on all of the surrounding residential neighborhoods and in this case an elementary school as well a residence is an over 55 community as you know and seniors and youngsters from the creekside school are absolutely at higher risk from environmental concerns very likely to occur from potential industrial plants that could be constructed in the rezoned area or even from chemicals that might be used for example to clean or service rail cars there are so many things that this proposal has not addressed that being significant among them all of us in the affected area and I'm sure I'm speaking for everyone chose to live here this is residential and reasonably rural if additional industrial zoning is needed in Durham to accommodate this rail facility I strongly urge you to consider a different and less affected area than this one on Farrington Road and vote against this zoning proposal thank you for your time and consideration thank you you are worth the full two minutes Jeff Prather and then John Martin and then we do have three additional folks as the public hearing thank you my name is Jeff Prather I live at 108 Wicklow which is Durham County and the city of Chapel Hill I am a retired environmental PE as well as a certified industrial hygienist most importantly I'm the guy that used to have to answer the R-Rate homeowner who called the Air Force base at 8 o'clock in the morning complaining about the noise I don't care what you say captain that plane had to have been flying much lower I know how loud it sounded a couple of points of interest here one nighttime noise levels dropped by around 10 dB above normal daytime you take away the lawn mowers you take away the traffic and so your nighttime noise levels drop interesting scientific fact an increase of 3 dB results in what the human ear perceives it is doubling the sound pressure level so when they say we're doing this at nighttime the reality is that's the worst time because your background noise levels are going to be much lower so any increase in noise level is going to be perceived as that much louder you talk about a 20 foot buffer 20 foot buffer of what new vegetation right now you've got mature trees what are they going to plant you know a few hollies it will take a long time before that 20 foot buffer does anything to attenuate the noise levels believe me I've had to answer for 21 years the irritating phone calls and I've been yelled at I've been called all types of names noise is a significant environmental issue do I have concerns about hazardous materials yes I've done a lot of work on hasway sites and those are a concern but primarily if you look at that the other point I would like to make which hasn't been addressed at all George King Road all the way from George King to I-40 is going to be developed you got the Keenan property already you got Chapel Run all of these are basically residential areas and you're improving an industrial complex right next to it thank you sir John Martin good evening my name is John Martin and I do not live in the Villas of Cope Arbor I live at 401 East Trinity Avenue in Old North Durham I'm about as far away from this as I could get so why am I opposed to this it's really simple I've lived in Durham for more than 50 years and in that period of time I've seen a lot of bad planning and zoning decisions that have very much damaged neighborhoods do I have to mention urban renewal and hay-tie and edgemont just to give some obvious examples but what I would say about those bad decisions is that they were often done with the best of intentions we're going to make things better they said and yet they made a bad planning and zoning decision that's what's going on here tonight light rail may be a very good thing right but putting an industrial facility in a residential neighborhood is a very bad zoning idea let me say that again putting an industrial facility in a residential neighborhood are you kidding me what's the point of zoning if you're going to rezone residential to industrial would you entertain anybody else putting an industrial facility in that residential neighborhood or any other residential neighborhood in Durham I don't believe that you would take the previous case suppose somebody bought the pinecrest property and said we want to rezone it industrial so we can put a cement plant there you would laugh it out of this room because you know what damage it would do to the neighborhood now I would urge you to consider the damages that you will do to these neighborhoods if you go ahead with this that's not against light rail there are alternatives for where to place this that will not do such damage please please think of these neighborhoods thank you we have we ask you not to clap rules procedure three final speakers James Cople, Alex Cabanes, Chris James please come on up let me start by saying I'm sorry we got it right I'm James Cople I live at 216 Galway Drive in Durham County I live with my wife there thank you for a couple minutes you've heard a lot of opinions about why it's a bad idea to put an industrial zoning zone piece of land in a residential area that's I can't add to that should not happen it's not complicated how do I know this first of all I'm sure you have highly talented and competent staff that has been on the property and walked it every square foot of it I'm sure you have you're busy so I don't know that you have about five minutes in a car to understand the conversations that have been going on tonight you don't have to get out you can windshield that thing and you know that somebody had an idea that maybe we could buy a piece of land that's kind of trapped between the interstate and these residential areas and get it at a good price maybe we can put this complex that we need on it I don't know what that story is but it's completely erroneous that it will work here it'll be terrible so I'm almost done when you drive home tonight wherever you live whether you live in a condo whether you live in a neighborhood wherever you live when you get close start to visualize a piece of property being rezoned industrial inhabiting a cement plant or a train yard on it and it's just it's not complicated so please don't do this figure out a plan B it's a mistake thank you you can come on up we've got two final speakers Alex Cabanes, Chris James good evening my name is Alex Cabanes and I live at 27 tenured court anywhere close to where the romp is going to be however I think that these residents are going to have to live with the outcome of your decision GoTriangle says a lot of really nice stories and they've done a lot of outreach but those outreach sessions have not really been substantive you basically have had the selection of would you like this in blue or in green do you want this in Crate Myrtle or Spiria not really addressing the substantive issues that the residents that are going to have to live with the outcome are having to deal with question is what happens if you rezone and the light rail does not get built what's going to get built there instead a cement factory or God knows what else so why are we rushing to rezone when the funding the light rail has not been secured I find it amazing that imminent domains already been used the city still has to annex that territory and they don't have the secured funding yet why why the rush I think that the residents that are going to have to bear the brunt of this rezoning and are going to have to live with the impact of this decision should be given more weight a lot of the pretty pictures and pretty presentations that go triangle and all the consultants give when they can do that in the comfort of their remote home not having to deal directly with the impact of their decisions thank you thank you and Chris James I live at 105 Great Oaks place and I probably have more specific experience in this topic than anybody in this room so I spent 26 years in San Francisco Bay 30 miles north or south of Palo Alto specifically and I saw all kinds of great stuff out there in shenanigans and things that are just problematic so the San Francisco streetcar authority I sponsored a project to redesign the brakes on and I went through their maintenance facility a bunch of times they're loud, they're incredibly loud and you can't turn a streetcar easily it has to be on a turnstile that gets old, it decays, it generates waste at the ground level the problems below the ground level there are problems in different cases I'm pro, like real by the way very pro, just not a facility of that type there at the ground level the disruption to the traffic is easy to demonstrate with math I can do that simply, it's operations research you take a stop light at the other side and there's an interest rate of a certain amount of cars at one point and you interject another stop point every five minutes with indeterminate dwell at that stop and that stop sign it gets through there reasonably if not ever so that's the part that's the ground level, it's a problem with this plant it's a train wreck waiting to happen no pun intended or did I? I didn't intend but last and most important the last house I bought in California in 2000 in Palo Alto in Palo Alto California three blocks from Steve Jobs six blocks from Larry Page at Google across the street from David Packard's son two doors down from a Nobel laureate I had to sign a waiver buying a house on top of a Superfund site it was a Superfund site created in 1981 by Hewlett Packard from a leaky maintenance facility his gas tank that was below the ground with reagent, caustic materials that are all used to clean things that can go through geologic strata if it's the right strata at the right time on a beeline it had gone three miles in ten years it was underneath most of the town of Palo Alto and it still is you can imagine the horror spending the amount of money it might have cost and it says you're on a Superfund site this facility has exactly the same potential of a train wreck that doesn't need to happen and it's really serious let me put it this way sorry to cut you off but we've given everyone two minutes so I appreciate your time I will leave the charge on all the injunctions that follow happily I will leave the charge on all the injunctions that will happen happily we have lots of funding we could use happily thank you for your time so I want to thank everyone for speaking during the public hearing we're now going to close the public hearing and this is the time for the commissioners to be able to ask questions make comments so I will look to my left if there are any commissioners that wish to speak Commissioner Williams thank you everybody for your comments and your very detailed statements about the impact of this I too have concerns about implementing impermeable surfaces and the effects of the runoff that's going to generate in this particular area and in areas going forward I also have concerns about the noise that will be generated from the rail surface being implemented in what is seemingly a quiet community because I live in a not quiet community but before they started widening 147 in Austin Avenue there was a train that came through at about 3 o'clock in the morning and it was a very loud process so I definitely sympathize with you giving the concerns of everyone in here as residents and the considerations that you're looking for I don't think that anything that you're asking for is a far reach but what you're asking for is too much and I think that you have every right as citizens as taxpayers to feel how you feel and I am here to tell you based off everyone that I've heard today as residents but not as an opposition to mass transit but as residents in what you consider home that I hear you just as I have in other cases and as a Durham resident in Hillsborough and Orange County being as close as it is I hear you and I too have reservations that address every concern that you have spoken about this evening and I would like to know further about how these concerns would be addressed and I definitely have concerns about whether or not this is the right area being a Durham native I do know of several instances of implementation where suggestions somewhere else would be more appropriate if you will not wanting to speak out of turn or to overstep my own boundaries but I do want you to know that you have been heard every last one of you have been heard tonight even those that did not speak and you definitely have a voice here. Thank you Commissioner. Commissioner Gibbs Thank you so much for those comments that just about meshes with the way I was going to speak for years I have been a proponent of Mass Transit Regional Mass Transit Light rail is not really connected to anywhere but Durham and Chapel Hill but that's another issue not what we're talking about tonight whatever rail we have has got to have a place to be worked on, adjusted and its impact is probably everything that you have all of you speakers have brought up and that in listening to all of this tonight I I'm wondering we're speaking of light rail it almost seems to me there's been some light communication I may be speaking out of the top of my head but I would like to ask the residents and the developers and go triangle have you all had and had the kind of conversations that I have heard with the comments from the people and others so that you can make some headway it's been my it seems to me that this has been going on for a pretty good while and I would think by now there would be some frank discussions discussions and made it and make it public so that we don't have to argue it and we just pass our our recommendations along to those who will make the decisions so there just seems to be something missing in the communication of this thing and I was had been well I've been for and against this thing I have to admit and right now I'm I I'd like to see some further communication and further planning from from the designers the developers there's just an awful lot of stuff going on that I had hoped would have been resolved by the time this meeting occurred but evidently not and that's all thank you Commissioner Gibbs Commissioner Miller so I have some questions for staff because this is the development plan I had before me is not like any other that we've ever had before we've never had trained facility before not least in my experience so there's a lot to be learned here one of the things that concerns me and again we spent a lot of time contrasting this case with the forest hills case that we also heard tonight this property the development plan maybe we can show this has got three areas of stream buffers I'll let Jamie catch up to me so there's three areas of stream buffers here but as I understand the development plan we've got parking and even the building envelope overlaps the stream buffers we don't let other developments do that how is it that these areas encroach on the stream buffers in this project okay thank you for pulling it up so there is a amendment I'm just finding it on here now that is a caveat that the applicant is going to have to secure all of the necessary permitting requirements through all of the other outside agencies that would be part of the buffer encroachments pertaining to the riparian areas the environmental any environmental encroachments we don't want that but doesn't our UDO say you can't build in the stream buffers where does our UDO say you can have a parking lot or a building in a stream buffer why is this one different than the others good evening Sarah Young with the planning department the UDO does allow instances for encroach different types of encroachments into stream buffers there's actually a very lengthy section with a table with all sorts of different approval process for them I looked at those I didn't find one that I thought matched this but maybe I misunderstood it so in this case they're specifically asking to show some of those on here and get them approved through this method as opposed to some of the other methods so that is why you will see they have depicted the different places where they may encroach through and the reasons for that hopefully we can Jamie may be able to better point out the specifics hang on can you cite me the section of the UDO that we're relying on here thanks Commissioner Miller feel free to continue and we can come back with the answer and the same thing is true with wetlands we've got the parking is right over the top of wetlands and we've seen other cases where the developers procured the opinion of engineers that wetlands as they would be defined by the somewhat old manuals that we use are no longer actually wetlands under the current rules and the same thing happens I guess with streams and stream buffers and their classifications but there's no indication that any of that kind of thing happened here I'm just really concerned that we're treating this development so much differently without the kind of explanation that as a lawyer I would like to see I admit that sometimes I'm confused when I read the code and misunderstand what it means but I would like to feel secure if I recommend this to the city council that we're not actually breaking our rules because we essentially obliterate all three stream buffers and the wetlands this is the first time when I've ever seen a development plan where we are we're being asked to approve that at this point I would suggest that the applicant come up and address your specific questions regarding that because we have had conversations regarding this so I would defer that question to them okay so unlike me tell me what part of the code we're using and if you don't mind if you can give us your name and address again hi I'm Jeff Green my home address is 111 Simmerville Road in Chapel Hill I'm a senior planner and I'm here on behalf of GoTriangle I think one of the reasons that this is unusual is that this is part of a major transportation project of the type that typically does not come before the Planning Commission we are as part of the we had an extensive environmental process that we went through to get to this point between 2011 and 2012 we did what is called an Alternatives Analysis where we looked at various options for the transportation corridor before settling on the light rail as well as various alternatives including four alternatives for a rail operations and maintenance facility after that in about 2013 we did this process called scoping the community showed these alternatives and said what else should we look at one of the items that actually Durham City Council requested was that we look at a fifth site for the rail operations and maintenance facility we then through the process established by the U.S. Department of Transportation and the National Environmental Policy Act entered the environmental analysis we did what's called the draft environmental impact statement as part of that we were required to avoid any impacts to streams, wetlands and open waters wherever possible along the entire transportation corridor and I think over the this is a 17.7 mile corridor with about 18 stations and that's what we've tried to do this site was chosen after that extensive draft environmental impact statement process we're going to look at alternative for the operations and maintenance facility it does have impacts to wetlands and streams and riparian buffers and we are committed as part of our amended record decision issued by the Federal Transit Administration to addressing these impacts on a project-wide basis we are I appreciate all that I just want to know the section of the UDO that allows these facilities I will defer to staff as far as how the UDO applies to give you the background as to how I just wanted the UDO section that's all thank you so staff they have deferred back to you it was our understanding that there is an application for some determinations of the riparian areas and the reason they're shown on this plan is because if they actually are riparian when they go to submit for their site plan they would have to adhere to those standards at that time however they showed in building envelope in case these areas were deemed or there was a determination man that they wouldn't be there's some corners it's not wiping out the entire area it's a couple of corners that they've encroached into we're looking at it's dramatic I'm sorry which ones are you talking about so I'm talking about actual riparian buffers right this is an actual riparian buffer there's the tractor no that actually that exists already so the parking and you can have drives in those areas Mr. Miller if you can come back I know they asked you to point up there but then if you don't mind speaking over the microphone yes it was 8-5-9-G of the UDO allows for driveways in those areas but does it allow parking lots in buildings those particular the two the one on the on the Farrington side and that they've asked for determination on that one if that one goes away that's not an issue but if they don't get that determination by the time site plan comes around they cannot build in that area is that explained on the text of of the development plan it does and if they don't show it on the development plan as presented tonight they would have to come back through the rezoning process again so that's why it's being shown and that's why there's a text commitment that they would have to comply so tell me give me that citation again please is it 8-5-9-G right thank you and we deferred you back to the applicant because I thought maybe they would explain to you if they've asked for the determinations that's what we were looking for because we don't have the ability to tell you where they stand so I understand they had applied for those so I I'm so I'm also confused about how this project can be consistent with objective 4.2.1 and policy 4.2.1a in the comprehensive plan which encourages or requires retention incorporation of unique site features into open space which includes wetland streams etc this doesn't seem to do that how can it be consistent we didn't talk about that in the site plan and I don't see it as being consistent I have to say I was also persuaded by Mr. Post's remark I believe it was Mr. Post that said the site isn't big enough and I agree that it's not big enough I mean we have to invade the major transportation corridor buffer and we have to invade stream riparian buffers and we have to go across wetlands and we have to reduce the right of way of Farrington Road in order to get everything in here if it's supposed to go in here it really worries me these are policy inconsistencies that I don't think that work for me but I will say this we have to build a facility like this somewhere and I understand that we looked at several sites you guys did we have not the only other site that has come before us in my time here is the one that's now having a Ford dealership built on it and I opposed that because I thought it was a better site I have to say it concerns me that this site is not within easy walking distance of a station the Charlotte romp makes a lot of sense and I'm grateful to the applicant for actually showing me some pictures of that facility and helping me understand what it looks like and how it works but this isn't going to work the same way it's in a different environment now I have to say that I was also somewhat persuaded by the fact that once that facility went in the development community the residential complex is right up against it and so it indicates to me that it is possible to have a facility like this in some proximity to residential areas but the one of the speakers said it does make a difference when the facility is there first and residential development comes to it it's a little bit different here where we're putting the facility in the environment that has already been developing according to a different trend I am astounded that we are concluding that this complies with the contiguous development policy 2.3.1a where we put this kind of facility in this area because and I realize it's the ideas that we put buffers but a 20 foot buffer at a 40% opacity isn't much of a buffer not for a facility like this not one that's going to be open all the time lit all the time operating all the time I just don't see how that can make this industrial zoned facility appropriate in terms of the contiguous development policy I mean we're talking about two zones at the absolute opposite ends of the zoning spectrum now it is possible with appropriate buffering in my opinion to work that out but a 20 foot buffer where the 40% opacity isn't enough and I asked the applicants when I met with them and I was grateful for the time that I was able to spend with them whether they would consider increasing the opacity inside the buffer if they couldn't make the buffer bigger and I was told tonight that they had determined that they were not going to do that and I was disappointed so and I have a long list of all your time it's all more the same I did have to say that I looked at the pictures they showed me of the Charlotte facility it's not a bad looking building it had some things in it that I thought looked good it is a building that I would expect to see in an urban setting not a suburban setting but even so I look at the materials list on this development plan and they've limited themselves to concrete and steel and glass exposed concrete the Charlotte facility is clad in brick the Charlotte facility has a sawtooth skylight line which I think adds visual interest and I point that out to say that they shouldn't necessarily all have that kind of thing but there should be if we're trying to make this a good neighbor to vastly different neighbors nearby we should have design commitments in here and they should be design commitments that the community has worked with the applicant on because nobody knows what's appropriate for the community better than the people who live in the community and that obviously has not happened here I get the twice now we've had a litany of the meetings that have been held but they are presented to us by the applicant as they were boxes that they had to check off it doesn't really sound like the level of engagement that brought about a successful conclusion of the forest tools property where actually the people were only this far apart this is harder but we need to do the hard work one of the people who wrote to us at least wrote to me said you know up in the Lee Village where there is a station there is a large acreage up there that's just a wooded lot why is this facility not being considered that place we talked a lot about noise when I met with the folks and I went and tried to look up noise impacts of light rail and I admit that I poked around on the internet and that's not necessarily the best source of information but what I learned was that light rail makes noise when the tracks are worn when the wheels are worn or when you ask the wheels to do to make relatively sharp turns because then the wheel flanges the wheel flanges actually come in contact with the side of the tracks this facility has a very tight loop in it which almost every train that enters the romp building must go through and I don't know how many times you're going to take trains in and out of the building but if it's happening at night if there's going to be loud steel on steel generated noise it's going to happen here and it's probably not going to happen on the long relatively straight stretches of track or those stretches of track where the turns are on very broad cords so I have to say that if this is the best site out of the five sites that were considered during the environmental assessment how bad must the others have been I realize that there's a great deal of anxiety among the folks who are working at GoTriangle who are working very very hard to bring us a good quality light rail transit system and I appreciate that and I believe that they have a lot of things they are trying to pull together at one time they're trying to secure federal funding from an administration that quite frankly isn't necessarily very supportive they are a lot of things have to happen and they don't want delays and they do not want setbacks they do not want to give anybody who might oppose this another reason to argue against it and I don't either but certainly we could do a better if this is going to be the site cannot we work together as a community better to make it a better site than the way it is described on this development plan and is there not time once again to maybe look at some of these other sites and realize folks that wherever this goes there's going to be a community like you that's going to have a great deal of heartburn and I guess part of what we have to do is choose which community is heartburn is the worst but right now this is we're not presented alternatives and I kind of resent that we don't get to choose between several we get to look at them one at a time or just one maybe we'll never be asked to see another one because that's in their power we can't generate the cases they have to generate the case I would like to see a better plan I believe that maybe there could be a better plan maybe there can't though because there's not much space on this site because it is so long and narrow but it could be a better design building it could be a better thought out buffer I'm going to vote no yesterday I was going to vote yes but I am persuaded by what you've told me I am not persuaded this is consistent with our plans I'm not consistent I'm not satisfied that we're treating this applicant likely we would treat another applicant and I believe the rules should apply and the policy should apply to all the projects the same way I realize we're playing a high stakes game here and I do not want to be the member of the planning commission who led the charge that defeated light rail but I'm not talking about defeating light rail I'm talking about making a better neighbor of this facility to whoever is going to live nearest it and that includes you folks great thank you Commissioner Miller Vice Chair Hyman well I certainly have less to say after listening to Commissioner Miller who addressed a number of areas that concern me but my comments are more in line with both Commissioner Gibbs and Commissioner Williams it was my hope that a lot of the issues that were raised here today would have been resolved we've been to this place before where we had large numbers of individuals who had come in and objected to an issue that was being presented yesterday as I listened to both sides of this issue the one question that I asked I wanted to know what the residents wanted and the response I got was they did not want to see it smell it or hear it so I was under the impression that all of those issues had been addressed did not want to see it did not want to hear it did not want to smell it yesterday I felt comfortable knowing that this issue had been addressed today I'm not comfortable and basically I'm at the same place that my commissioners are I can't really support this because so many individuals have not had their issues addressed one of the things I advocate for is that our individuals our residents be heard and right now there are too many of you who have not been heard so those are my comments thank you thank you commissioner Durkin I just wanted to say thank you for everyone to come out tonight I'm excited that there's progress in the light rail plan and I'm excited about yes to this project one thing I think would be helpful is if someone from GoTriangle could just briefly 500 foot overview of why the other sites that were considered were not sufficient why this one is sufficient Jeff Green GoTriangle once again the five sites so this was called the Farrington site we had another site called Lee Village it overlaps significantly with this site the northern end is roughly where Ephesus church road is on the development plan it went a little further south we are a federal we're a project trying to get federal funding FTA the federal transit is managing it and one of the rules that we need to follow is if there's a project that will impact a historic site you can't use it if there's a reasonable alternative that does not impact the historic site and so because of the historic site just south of the Farrington site we could not move forward that's why that site was decided not to move forward another site we looked at is that the same site that you that's the next one the next one was at Patterson Place that Commissioner Miller mentioned it's roughly between that apartment complex that's been there and the new auto dealership that's going in that facility was feasible in conjunction with an earlier alignment of the light rail project that we had proposed during the alternatives analysis in this earlier proposal the light rail went from as it does today from a station at Patterson Place to a station at Martin Luther King Junior Parkway but it got there by making by going straight across New Hope Creek from Patterson Place over to the Martin Luther King Junior Parkway Station basically making a new transportation corridor across New Hope Creek one of the things we heard during scoping and from the city council was people were concerned about the impact that this new crossing would have on the New Hope Creek and so we committed during the environmental process to look at an alternative that once it got to Patterson Place would sort of turn I guess to the left if you're going from Chapel Hill to downtown Durham go up towards 15501 and then cross New Hope Creek within the existing 15501 corridor that's the one we decided to move forward to because it minimized the environmental impacts on the New Hope Creek but one of the consequences of that was the Patterson Place facility was no longer feasible we had a facility at Cornwallis Road it's roughly where the Durham Herald Sun Building the old Durham Herald Sun Building is located there were some operational challenges with that and also some cost challenges with building it it was also adjacent to the existing Levin Jewish Community Center Campus I think there's a school there and some other facilities and it was determined that the impacts it would have to those immediately adjoining neighbors is one of the reasons why along with the increased cost are the reasons why that option was not moved forward with so those were the four our public hearing has closed I appreciate that you all have taken time to speak we're now at the point where the commissioners will ask an individual a question directly and that individual will answer so I appreciate your patience, thank you so those are the four sites that came out of the alternative analysis the fifth one that came out of scoping that Durham City Council recommended was along the existing freight rail line next to the sort of east of Austin Avenue on the site of the Brentag facility that's an operating facility one of the concerns of that there were several concerns first of all putting the wrong facility there would have required closing an existing and operating business we I think our calculation was the number of jobs that the wrong would bring would be less than the number of jobs that would be lost because of the closure of the Brentag facility Brentag is one of those companies that they don't need to be in Durham they need to be on a rail line so if they're forced to move there's no guarantee that they're going to stay in Durham much less the state of North Carolina that's one concern another concern is Brentag has been there for a while there's a risk of high risk of hazardous materials underground and so that was a high risk of really increased cost for the project of the facilities there there were also some challenges especially since we've extended the line with the station at NCCU with actually getting to that site because it's a little bit off of the main line thank you any additional questions commissioner no thank you commissioner Alturk thank you chair and again thanks to everyone for coming out and sharing your feedback I I do think we're in a tough position because I know that grow triangle has put a lot of effort into this and they're trying to as commissioner Miller said there's a lot of moving pieces here and trying to secure funding but I'm ultimately convinced by most many of the opponents that we're not here to hear the merits of light rail we're here to hear the merits of a rezoning case and so I think part of the difficulty is that again as commissioner Miller alluded to we don't get rail transit projects ever right and so we don't have at least for me I don't think any of us are rail experts we don't have any idea of what the real impact of this will be so if a rezoning comes before us and it's a retail project or a grocery store or something we have an idea of what kind of impact that would have we get a great staff report and they tell us what the adverse impacts are on traffic water and schools but as many of you have pointed out there are other adverse impacts that I do not think that at least for me they have not been addressed so I guess for the sake of full information at least I would like some more information I have a few questions for the applicant in one of the text commitments text commitment three you say the ROMF will not include a vehicle body repair or vehicle paint shop so these functions will be performed offsite but can you give us a sense of what will be done on the cars is it again I think we need at least some sense of what's happening there I'm going to ask Dave Charters from our engineering team to come up to help answer that question for you and let me ask a more simple question maybe will this be a 24-7 facility it will yes and what kinds of vehicles will be coming in and out and maybe the engineer can answer but what kind of vehicles will be because we've talked about traffic impact but we need to also know what kinds of a couple of neighbors have mentioned that will be coming in like trucks so can you give us a sense of what kinds of vehicles will be coming in and out on a regular basis I'll turn that over to Mr. Charters but I think the majority of vehicles accessing and egressing the site will be employees coming to work I see okay thank you for the clarification good evening commission my name is Dave Charters I'm managing the design and engineering for the light rail project for Go Triangle to answer the question of what operations are occurring at the facility so there's a few distinct parts to the buildings the southern most part on the site is called the maintenance of way building and in that facility it includes staff locations and maintenance facilities within there to take care of time elements along the track way that need to be repaired whether it's parts of the rail parts of the bridges the ties the different parts of the trainway so it's called maintenance of way because that's the part of the track that's outside along the 18 miles of the project that the staff will have to maintain outside of the building there's a storage area where the stone as you can see in a railroad track the stone next to the rails and the rail is stored so it's really a maintenance function within that building the next part of the building to the north is called the light rail the light rail vehicle maintenance building and that's where there's a couple functions in that building on the second floor is the operations control center it's basically a large room that has computer screens to monitor all of the light rail trains along the 18 mile system to see where everything's at coming in and out of the stations on the second floor there's also administrative buildings, offices for the managers of the operators on the first floor of that maintenance facility is where there are three different tracks that come into the building where the vehicles pull into the building they're cleaned they're relatively light maintenance service to repair elements on the vehicles that are damaged or worn out from service major components of the light rail vehicles would be contracted out to be outside of the building we mentioned as a commitment not to do body work or paint have a paint shop and that was one of the things that we heard from the multiple meetings we had with the community that they were concerned with toxic smells and toxic elements that would be in the building for maintenance so we committed although many light rail systems around the country have that function within the building we took it upon ourselves to commit to the community that we would not do that in the building we would if there's a damage to a vehicle from a car accident or whatever those parts of the light rail vehicle would be dismantled and shipped out of the building to another site whether it's our bus operations or another facility to maintain so within the middle part of the building that's where the vehicles are maintained and serviced a third part of the building is on the east side and that's pretty much the car wash so it's a fourth track that goes through the site where the cars are pulled into an enclosed part of the building you don't see it and they're washed just like a car wash where you pull into a BB gas station or whatever and so those are the main functions of the building outside of the building is a storage lane where there are two tracks that are going to be built initially to store up to 24 vehicles the project at Revenue Service will start out with only 18 vehicles purchased but it allows for later expansion as we hope the project is successful does that answer your question? I guess you said a type of vehicles coming into the site also yeah right so as Mr. Green mentioned most of the vehicles coming in and out of the site will be the operators the workers the maintainers it is a 24-7 operation there will be some delivery trucks that bring in supplies to deliver stone or other parts of the project that need to be maintained thank you so I guess maybe the bigger question is that the thing that kept coming up for a lot of people was the noise has there been a noise study is there any way for us to estimate how much noise there would be at different times during the day? Absolutely so as part of the environmental impact statement that was prepared back in 2015 and 2016 there is a separate noise and vibration technical report that was done for the initial environmental impact statement subsequent to that what happens is we had a record of decision issued by the Federal Transit Administration where they approved the alignment the number of stations the site for the maintenance facility and the FTA accepted the noise and vibration report at that time we've had some changes along the 18 miles of the project since 2016 so we're in the process of updating the environmental document at the end of this month it will be issued for public comment there is an appendix, another updated technical report on noise and vibration that has been done based on the latest design for the maintenance facility and all the things that have changed over the last couple years on the project so that will be available we have an initial noise and vibration report that's available now from the earlier environmental statement and we'll have a supplemental version that'll be part of the public review comment document coming out at the end of the month so we have looked at we have as is existing today, if you go up Farrington Road towards the maintenance facility and Patterson Mill stores on the left, Culp Harbors on Patterson Mill stores on the right Culp Harbors on the left on the Culp Harbors side for part of that length of the development there is an earthen berm kind of a little hill along the side of the sidewalk that the developer has put in to help shield the community from noise we propose to install a similar berm on the east side of Farrington Road again to help shield noise from I-40 because as has been mentioned by removing the tree buffer between I-40 and the development the noise from I-40 can be heard and so a number of mitigation items that we have on the project is to add a berm along the east side of Farrington, the romp side along with the vegetative buffer that was mentioned plus in the noise analysis that will be available at the end of the month that's in the document the building itself acts as a shield to the development because of the height of the building it's blocking the noise coming from I-40 towards the development so there's a number of things that we have on the site that's retaining walls because of the depth of the building so there's a number of elements on the site to block the noise thank you that was very helpful I guess maybe maybe you can answer this for somebody else at this point if a commissioner asks for a specific individual to speak they can come up and speak but we have closed the public hearing. Commissioner Alturk? so in the staff report there's something about lighting here and that there will be source shielding will be used I don't see that in the text commitment I just see that the text commitment 14 says it will be shielded to aim light away from property boundaries right so that's actually a similar type the wording might be a little different but its intent is the same so when all of the light fixtures out in the yard or adjacent to the building the the light elements themselves will have shields that direct the light downward to the facility and doesn't let the light spread like if you're at a highway interchange and you have the high lights around a highway interchange and the light spreads out all over the interchange the lights in the yard are directed directly into the facility and we have copies of what we call photometric studies where there's actually a computer program that simulates the yard at night and where all these lights are and it shows that the light is in the yard it doesn't spill out into Farrington Road or across to the community or even towards I-40 and distract traffic thank you so I guess a follow up to all these questions have these the study you've done on noise this more detailed kind of explanation of light the kinds of repairs that would go on have these been discussed with the neighbors I'm seeing a lot of nodding but I I know there's I would like to ask that applicant of the applicant thank you that's an excellent question as there was a slide in Mr. Talmadge's presentation and the GoTriangle presentation that showed some of the meetings that we've had over the last couple of years for the environmental document and I personally have been at the Culp-Arbor Recreation Center for a meeting with the community and also I've been at Creekside Elementary a couple of times to meet with the community we've sponsored workshops with the community to foster communication on what are the things that are most important to the community that they're concerned with and what are the ways that they have in their mind that they would like to how they would like to address those concerns so we've had those in public meetings we had a public meeting where we had examples of the type of finishes on the building examples of the gates and fences around the site for the community to choose from examples of types of vegetative buffer to choose from so I think we've tried to there's always room for more but I think we've tried to reach out to the community at least three occasions and I'm aware of that I attended where we've offered the variations on the type of building materials the fence materials the railing materials the vegetative buffer materials and asked for their input on how they would like to see those as part of the design thank you that was very helpful thank you you know this is a tough case and I'm still on the fence about this but I ultimately I think that at least I don't feel comfortable voting in favor if I don't have what I at least full information on some of the impacts that would possible impacts and you've helped me quite a bit in getting there but I guess what I'm hearing is and what I maybe I'll reiterate what commissioner Miller was maybe trying to get to is that maybe we can get to a compromise and I do think that we will probably have to put an industrial site somewhere close to a residential area it somebody's going to have to take the burden and maybe this is not the right site I don't know but I would like to see some compromises made maybe a little bit more in two residents and maybe a little bit more input and like some have alluded or mentioned it may not be possible but I think as it stands right now I'm probably going to vote against this because I think there could be more done on this to alleviate some of the concerns with the neighbors and I do appreciate what GoTriangle is doing at the same time thank you commissioner commissioner Kenshin and then commissioner Miller for some additional comments first I do appreciate GoTriangle and the work that's been done and I do appreciate hearing from the residents too my daughter went this quickside for six years from kindergarten through fifth grade so I took 40 to 54 the Farrington Road twice a day 180 days a year for six years so I know a little bit about that trip and about the community over there and I don't know though I'm not in favor of kicking the can down the road I'm not in favor of that but there could be a site that GoTriangle could pick and we have to trust that people have put the time into this and staff has done their job I don't know if there's a site that anyone can pick that folks can come in there won't be a room full of folks saying not in my backyard I just don't know if it's possible so I wanted to ask two questions but commissioner Altoque asked all of them my questions were going to be about the community with this important topic especially about the impacts I wanted to know how much will they see it smell it, hear it and one more I didn't think about was how much will they feel it it sounds like some real work's been done for this but I just think that we can kick the can down the road which I hope we don't do if they pick another site there's going to be a room full of folks saying not in my backyard and I'm just not in favor of that I understand and I understand the fear and I understand the resentment the folks who live there feel I just think there's got to be a way to mitigate the impact I mean driving down the road I can see it things being done to mitigate so that it won't be this awful thing that people can think about it I just would urge my commissioners I mean it's not going to ever be you know you're not going to be in this room faced with picking a site it won't be a room full of folks saying that in my backyard but thanks to everyone I appreciate hearing from you and I feel like we can make this work thank you Commissioner Commissioner Miller so I heard you talk about a berm we talked about a berm when we met yesterday but there's no berm on the development plan are you proffering a berm along the east side Farrington Road at this juncture are you committing to that yes you are committing to a berm what kind of berm are you committing to it's an earthen berm some of the things that we've learned on wait a second I want to make sure staff is listening because sometimes they have heartburn about proffers that happen at this stage so tell us about the berm so on the development plans because of the ongoing design nature we're not always able to put all of the design features and all of the design details on a development plan we have from the 30% design and we're now well past 50% design we've been showing a berm along that road along the east side in order to help shield the noise from our neighbors across the street and that was one of the things that came out of our multiple meetings with the community to understand what their concerns were like as was mentioned they don't want to hear it smell it see it feel it whatever that's what we're trying to do we're trying to hide it with the vegetation we have 8 to 10 foot high berm along the east side of the road to help shield it running from where to where it's from this south property line towards the entrance to the building and actually goes beyond the entrance that's at Ephesus church up around towards the Farrington road bridge so we're willing to proffer that this evening as a commitment and let's just check in with the staff as we usually do when there's a commitment being proffered Grace Smith with staff they did mention a berm in discussions earlier but when they applied and they weren't at the point where they could proffer that when they submitted their application so we would be happy to work with them and our development review team and get that language appropriate for when it goes to city council it probably needs to be worded so that it meets the unified development ordinance standards but we can certainly do that and we would make sure that transportation is involved to be sure that they're driveway we don't need 60 days not for a berm, not for a vegetative type of buffers in the past without a 60 day continuum we have UDO standards that address those so tell me where the berm goes in relationship to the 20 foot wide buffer because that's not shown on the map either although there is a text commitment to that are these separate facilities or is the one inside the other so I'm trying to recall the 20 foot buffer the berm don't worry about the buzzer you can continue that was for me so along Farrington road on the side of the maintenance facility we're including a allocated space for a bike lane allocated space for a sidewalk and then outside of that space for the sidewalk we have vegetative buffer and a berm that rises up towards the maintenance facility but I'm trying to understand how these facilities are stacked is the berm in the buffer a berm if it's going to be 8 to 10 feet tall is going to have it's in the buffer and I'm going to ask one other question I'm done I'm very concerned about your ability to build an attractive building with your materials list and we talked about this yesterday and nobody has mentioned it your concrete steel and glass I mean that's a pretty limited materials list can you build the kind of building that these folks want to live nearby without bricks and without other materials I mean now I look at that you showed me the Charlotte facilities brickclad that's an excellent question one of the things we heard from the community is they were not interested in building in addition to hearing or smelling it so trying to be good stewards of the public's money we are not designing a signature maintenance facility we're designing a functional building that looks presentable and it looks attractive we're proposing it's a precast concrete panels on the building the inside structure is steel to support the panels there is glass glazing windows to let light in the active structure that we would be proud of building for the community but we did not hear from the community that they wanted to see the structure so we did not feel important to us to spend the public's money on something that is more of a maintenance function and not an enhancement aesthetically to the community let me ask you this it's a 40% opacity buffer that means when the plantings you put sure 40% of the view through the buffer will be occluded 60% will be open you will see the building your statement seemed to be inconsistent but that's not a question that's a statement and finally have you met with these neighbors since you filed this petition for rezoning I've asked them we have not we've not had a public meeting okay well thank you we're at the point where we are going to have a few follow-ups and then we will then have a motion and have a vote this evening so Commissioner Williams, Commissioner Alturk could I answer Commissioner Miller for a second one second Ms. Smith may I just I wanted to follow back up with Mr. Miller's statement about the buffer in the barn that would be a language that could be added to the text commitment 13 to clarify exactly what they're going to plant within that buffer and we will work with them on that and make sure that's secured as far as the berm goes but I wanted to make sure that you knew that it would have to be done within the realm of that text commitment yes sir Commissioner Miller did you have any additional questions for the proponents we're going to move on then Commissioner Williams it just hasn't been much that I've heard in favor of this project even gaining new information as far as lighting and the berm is concerned I mean an 8 foot berm is the typical finished floor to finish ceiling height of a residential property so that's not going to help much as far as sound traveling I just have not learned a lot but I do know that the information that the engineer gave I feel confident had that been given to the residents they may have had a better understanding of what they were expecting so I also feel confident in knowing that that probably didn't happen and yeah I'm not not in favor of this project so thank you Commissioner Alturk thank you for the applicant is there urgency in getting this approved now we've heard from some that said you know what if this doesn't go through light rail quite frankly it is extremely urgent to get this approval at this stage for a number of reasons and my colleagues can chime in if I missed any of them for one reason the Federal Transit Administration this is a highly competitive grant program with the FTA they have numerous applicants all over the country that are competing for this funding the FTA has noted that by the end of this year there are at least a dozen critical agreements that GoTriangle has to have executed in order to keep on schedule for a full funding grant agreement by September of next year and the maintenance facility location as I mentioned this is really based on the studies that have been done over the last almost 10 years this is the site that has been located that is viable we don't have another viable site for the maintenance facility we do not have an opportunity to go out and start that process all over again we will not be on schedule to meet the FTA's deadline for $1.2 billion in funding from the Federal Government if we start this process again at the end of this month the FTA will institute what is called a risk assessment on the project the FTA comes to our office in Durham along with their consultant team for a one week workshop and during that workshop they scrutinize this project from top to bottom and identify the risks to the project before they are ready to continue investing over a billion dollars one of the risks to the project that they recognize is the location for the maintenance facility that is why GoTriangle has there was a question earlier about why are we pushing this to be approved now when we don't have federal funding the answer to that question is we have to satisfy the FTA's guidelines and their concerns with the risk to the project if we don't have this site approved that jeopardizes over a billion dollars in federal funding because we would not meet the schedule the requirements in the risk assessment will assess whether we've achieved acceptance for this maintenance facility site and if we do not the FTA will be applying additional contingency funds to the project which will inflate the cost of the project to the whole community so this is extremely important to the project to stay on schedule as you may be aware the state legislature instituted additional schedule constraints on the project we have to have all of the non-federal non-state funding committed by April of next year we have to have all of the federal funding and have an FFGA by November of next year and if that does not happen we lose 190 million dollars that the state is willing to invest in the project so due to the cost constraints the schedule constraints and the guidelines that the FTA has imparted on the project this is extremely important to the success of the project and the viability of the project to get 1.2 billion dollars in federal funding and the success of the project for transportation for the Orange and Durham county residents thank you any follow-up questions I'm glad that the final say on this is not in my hands that it's the city council so thank you this is probably a good point to remind folks we're an advisory body so we will vote this evening and even if we will make a motion in the affirmative but then you can vote for or against regardless of whether we vote in favor or opposed it will go forward to the city council in two cycles in December at some point I will say from my personal standpoint I appreciate everyone's time I am persuaded this is this is the best site even though I'm not I'm concerned about some of the limitations I am going to vote tonight to send it forward to the city council but I do hope in the next 60 days that we do have dialogue better dialogue with the community that we are able to bring forward additional potential commitments that address some of the very valid concerns that we've heard raised here this evening and I think there's enough time to be able to do that to truly be a good neighbor but I do appreciate the time that the citizens all of you who came who spoke tonight and who have written us I think you've raised valid concerns that I hope will be addressed in the next 60 days with that I will look for a motion Mr. Chairman Vice Chair Hyman Thank you Mr. Chairman I would like to make a motion that we send case number and we do both of these numbers together We will actually do individually Case number A 1-800-003 forward to the city council with a favorable recommendation Second That is moved and seconded again We will then have a roll call vote on the motion, the motions are always made in the affirmative No more outbursts please A roll call vote please Commissioner Al Turk No Commissioner Durkin Yes Commissioner Hyman No Commissioner Busby Yes Commissioner Miller No Commissioner Kenchin Yes Commissioner Gibbs Yes Actually it's a tie And it fails So a tie the motion fails We will now move to again that we'll still move forward but with an unfavorable recommendation we'll move to the zoning case Yes I'd like to make a motion that we send case number Z-18-006 forward to the city council with a favorable recommendation Second Okay Vice Chair Hyman Seconded by Commissioner Miller We'll have a roll call vote on this as well Okay Commissioner Al Turk No Commissioner Durkin Yes Commissioner Hyman No Commissioner Busby Yes Commissioner Miller No We're double checking the rules of procedure on the vote just we'll get right Actually when you have a tie the rules of procedure call that the motion fails Yes Just make sure that everybody we want to double check that because it doesn't ever happen Yes this is rare that we have ties here we have a few folks who were excused and we had a recusal but a tie means that the motion fails but again this will go forward to the city council each of us write comments that the council members would like to see I know you will all stay engaged and I hope you will because our council members are listening very carefully on this issue as well again I thank you for your time we're going to take a five minute break I know a lot of you are going to head out so thank you again only other time this is a big important yes these people are just as important we're going to head our vice chair to the corners absolutely they told me that they were interested in all of their issues we went over that as proposed they would be I know and that's what I'm not going to have to say and that's and that's that's sort of a safety net sort of not for us which is we depend on in over lives so he was part of the design team he was I know I'm not in oh it was just today I'm sorry you have a question yeah I don't know this was everybody everybody needs to be here All right, why don't we get going? That's it, that's it. Yeah, I don't want to be there. That's too good. Look, I'm not. Good to see you. You're welcome. Oh. So, I think that was interesting. Nice. Yeah, I'm good. You're very. Reading the screen. I was looking through. Yeah, I think they've said it. They said it's best. Yeah, Well, and I and I at the end of the day, I thought I should vote, you know, to at least Well, not that like my Yeah, you miss a very excited Yeah Yeah No Oh, yeah, it's not easy right? Yeah, you guys got a little work to do Yeah We are going to reconvene And we still have three cases before us this evening. So for those of you that have waited, I appreciate your time Our next case is the case z1 seven triple zero two one. This is the shell oil gas station And we're just gonna go ahead and get started with the staff report. I know folks will be back in a moment Actually, we have the we have a quorum in the room. So You may proceed when you're ready with the staff report Sure. Thank you. Good evening. Jamie Soniak with the planning department. I will be presenting case number z1 seven zero zero zero twenty one It is the shell oil gas station site The applicant is Ash Miller of MLA design group the subject site is 1102 and c54 it's presently split zoned the app the applicant proposes to change 0.65 acre portion of the property which is residential suburban 20 and 1.35 acres of the office and institutional zone to commercial neighborhood with a development plan The site is 2.8 79 acres the development plan associated with this request Expansion of the existing gas station which will allow for a total of eight fueling positions and a pay station building Property the property is designated Commercial and office on the future land use map. There's no change to the office designation The commercial designation is consistent with the rezoning request This is the aerial map that shows the property in red and it fronts at the corner of Barbie Road and NC 54 The subject site is located within the suburban development here the Cape Fear River basin and the Falls Jordan district watershed As well as the MTC I40 overlay district These pictures depict some of the existing conditions on the property. There's the existing gas station And you can see the wooded heavily wooded portion of the site in the background The photos within the staff report and shown on the slides depict some of the area conditions The site is adjacent to the meadows at Southport residential development to the east and the south the South Point Towns Residential development to the north along NC 54 and a vacant lot to the west The property is diagonally across from the NC 54 site that just received a planning commission recommendation For zoning to allow for a maximum of 110 townhouse units The mad that matter is currently scheduled for the November 19th 2018 City Council hearing other nearby uses Include the Greens Pine Glen residential development South Tower to the northwest The seasons at South Point memory care community and other residential Developments as well as a site plan that was approved or a site that was approved for self-storage nearby in Terms of the zoning on the left. You'll see the existing zoning with the property Split between the RS 20 and the oh I zoning district and on the right You can see the portion that shaded in a beige color Is the portion that is proposed to change to the commercial neighborhood with a development plan There's no change that real where the rear portion Of the office and institutional where no development is proposed This is the future land use map and you can see that it is also split Flombed the front portion is commercial that's consistent with where the rezoning is proposed and there's no change to the office In terms of some of the proposed conditions, there's a maximum impervious coverage of 15% on the lot the Development plan provides minimum street yard side yard rear yard requirements Fueling pumps will be at least 15 feet from the property line and Summary of some of the key committed elements there's a Limitation to the use of the site for fuel sales a stipulation of a max of eight fueling positions Dedicated additional right-of-way along Barbie Road and NC 54 for various roadway improvements Additional Graphic commitments specifically show the Location of the payload the fueling stations and site access points and a commitment relative to the building materials for the pay station in terms of Relationship to comprehensive plan policies the proposed CN zoning district complies with the current zoning I'm sorry current commercial designation on the future land use map They're consistent with two three one a as the proposed rezoning seeks to eliminate an existing non-conforming designation And it seeks to enhance an existing development The development plan addresses some of the existing site conditions And also seeks to improve the existing deteriorating building The existing infrastructure such as roads water and sewer are sufficient to accommodate the potential impacts Since the increase in capacity from the proposed zoning trips is less than three percent of the overall capacity of NC 54 And it remains below 120% the proposed rezoning is consistent with eight one two H The proposed development is consistent with policy eight one four D as the development plan commits to additional asphalt for future bike lane on the south side of NC 54 and the Proposed development is consistent with eleven one one B Since the proposed zoning will decrease the number of students generated compared to the current zoning Staff determines that this request is consistent with the comprehensive plan and other policies and ordinances and I will be happy to answer any questions you have Thank you We're gonna open the public hearing and we have two individuals signed up to speak in favor Daniel Dinsbeer and Scott Miller, and you'll have ten minutes total if you need it Thank you for allowing us to come and present to you. I'm just glad we weren't the last case to be honest with you Bill for you guys I just want to thank the the planning staff Jamie Sonjak in particular bill judge has helped us quite a bit in the transportation NCDO T along with him And helping us develop this plan we started this process a couple years ago Of trying to you know determine. How do we improve our situation? It's a tough intersection And so with the help of the staff bill in CDO T We think we've come up with a really good plan that's going to improve the situation quite a bit out there, and so And it's been a long night Scott Miller is our landscape architect and civil engineer and Is are we're available to answer any questions that you may have and Just go from there. That's great. Thank you, and you're welcome. You're signed up as well You're welcome to speak Great, thank you. Would anyone else like to speak on this issue? Seeing none, we will close the public hearing commissioners any questions or comments commissioner out there Thank You chair so right now there are four four fueling positions, okay, and so you're To expand it to eight is that correct and where would these go because I don't think I see exactly where they would go And so what if you were able to see the site right now our current canopy is actually the front of our canopy will line up with the 35 foot of right away that we're giving to the To the city, I guess it would be I don't think that's exactly correct And then what so we're gonna move our whole site back off the road So our our entrance right now is just right at the foot off of Barbie and the intersection Barbie and 54 right so we're moving our entrance down 80 more foot Down to near the edge of our property to get it as far away as we possibly can and then and we're putting a right hand Turn lane in that will allow stacking so those four those fueling positions will be 30 foot I think it's about 30 foot behind the new So then the lineup parallel to North Carolina Highway 54 great now is there an actual Commitment in here to have a maximum of eight fueling positions or no, I think that zoning is a maximum of eight Jamie Sonnyak. So if you look at the development plan sheet to it does show the areas where the fueling positions are located, right? they're sort of in a Rectangular box and there is a there is language regarding The max of eight fueling positions and that is the max within the zoning district I said, okay So there is a text commitment that says maximum of eight fueling positions somewhere I guess it's it's under the site plan data on DP 12. I'm sorry DP to DP to okay great And it's it's not listed specifically as a text commitment. All right. Thank you And why did you go with the CN designation? I mean that In the UDO it says that this should be something that is not Automative automotive oriented that is you know for commercial for the residential Uses nearby for the neighborhood and so it it strikes me as kind of odd that we're trying to reason on this as CN I think the best answer is it's a maximum of eight fueling positions and the commercial would allow more and we were trying to be Restricted that are out of respect to the name group. Okay. Thank you additional questions or comments from commissioners Commissioner Kenshin, I'm gonna vote yes I live near there and I drive past every single day almost probably at least one time and cars always stacked on for before I try to pull in and it's very dangerous. So I'm excited to see that get improved I've been worried about that for a long time. So it's gonna be a big help for the neighborhood So thank you. We we think it's gonna be a vast improvement to the current conditions that are there Yeah, I'll second that when I first heard this was coming I had concerns and then when I saw the plan and saw the traffic improvements and to see the comprehensive look at all the other Development sites because we've had many of them come through here, which I appreciate the staff report addressing it I felt much more comfortable and confident and I think it will help at that intersection because it's a pretty tough Intersection, I think that'll help ease some of the traffic issues and and again I really have to give Bill and Jamie a lot of credit for helping guide us through this situation. We started off Not being so generous in giving right away and we wanted something in that and they really they really helped guide us into this situation where this to make it a better plan for for the for the residents safety everything so So and we you know, you typically don't enjoy a process It's very difficult because you're having to it's a give-and-take, but we do we do really appreciate it It's helped us out. Well, thank you and any additional questions or comments Commissioner Williams. I just want to say thank you I'm a lifer from that area and the gas house has always been a staple. So Watching people try to turn in there showing that you have a dedicated right turn lane into it is Immensely helpful and I was also concerned as to how this was going to expand Given the amount of land drop-off that you have just to the right of the gas house. So I'm very impressed by what has taken place here Seeing no additional questions or comments we could make a motion for approval. I Think he just did mr. Chairman. I'll second it But I will let me do it officially then I will Move that we approve case z1 7 triple 0 2 1. This is the shell oil No, I'm sorry. I'm the wrong one 2 1 your second. I seconded it great Motion made by me seconded by Commissioner Miller all those in favor, please say aye You rather roll call okay, we'll have a roll call then I'm commissioner. I'll charge. Yes, Mr. Baker Mr. Durkin yes, Mr. Hyman. Yes, Mr. Busby. Yes, Mr. Miller. Yes, Mr. Kenshin. Yes, Mr. Gibbs Yes, Mr. Williams. Yes, she unanimous non-zero classes Thank you very much appreciate you waiting We next have case z1 8 triple 0 1 2 This is West Point at 751 revisions Start with the staff report Good evening, Jamie Sanyak with the planning department. I will be presenting case number z 18 0 0 0 12. This is West Point at 751 revisions number four The applicant is Robert Schenck of Stewart, Inc. The location is on the west side of NC 751 south of Interstate 40. The site is 17 a total site is 17.36 acres The property is located within the city's jurisdiction Just as background there was a legacy case that was approved by council With a zoning map change and development plan for this area on April 4th 2016 it's a legacy case Z 15 0 0 0 2 7 This is the aerial map and the subject site is shown you know highlighted in red the staff report had a different location So it's been corrected again, this is the site with the current zoning it's commercial center with a development plan As part of the previous development plan it stipulated a maximum of 120,000 square feet of office 16,900 square feet of retail 16,000 square feet of residential use and a hotel of 271 rooms and this is The proposed condition the applicant is requesting some minor revisions to the text commitments The first is to add medical office and hospital as additional uses to page 213 146 which is the building envelope B That is shown in In sort of the white color there The step the second is to stipulate No south-facing Building signage except on buildings and building envelope B and building envelope D Which is directly adjacent to that the orientation of this map sort of sideways So you're looking north would be to your right There's no other Changes proposed to the rest of the approved development plan, but per text amendments per specifically related to text amendments per the unified development ordinance Any revision to committed elements are considered a significant change and would require a new hearing and recommendation from the Planning Commission before being considered by a City Council This slide just highlights the text amendments, which I've already described Staff review the proposed changes and determined that they're consistent with the UDO requirements as well as the comprehensive plan and other adopted ordinances and Policies and I'll be happy to answer any questions you have. Thank you. We're gonna open the public hearing We have two individuals signed up. We have a Robert Schunk signed up to speak for and ketten Shaw to and I love this. So let me just say I appreciate this for but with conditions or restrictions. So each of you will have Up to 10 minutes, I guess per side, please don't use that much time Go ahead use I certainly will not Robert Schunk 2627 university drive here in Durham Very briefly. We started this week first zone this project in 2008 This building envelope was supposed to was proposed to have a hotel They didn't want to have a second hotel. So we added an office in 2012 and or maybe I think in 2015 and now Client here with me tonight looking to do a medical office building with some surgery Surgery center within side of it. So that's what we're here for Again and also to allow some self-facing signage on that building as well for best better visibility from the entrance All the other applicable ordinance regulations are being followed You know parking and buffers and everything else associated with the UDO. I'm here for any questions. You might have Thank you And kitten Shaw Well, my name is Keaton Shaw. I own the property adjoining to this site 7806 and see 751 The few concerns I've had related to this rezoning case have been satisfied by the The client of this person Robert. So I I'm in favor for it. Thank you. Thank you for your time Anyone else who would like to speak? We're gonna close the public Hearing Commissioners any questions or comments on this case? I think we love a happy ending So this is great that you've been able to work out your your issues if there are no questions or comments We'll take a motion for approval. Mr. Chairman. I move that we approve z 18001 To excuse me the move that we send it forward to the City Council with a favorable recommendation All right moved and seconded we will have a roll call vote for approval Yes Mr. Baker Missioner Durkin. Yes, Mr. Hyman. Yes, Mr. Busby. Yes Miller. Yes Beachin. Yes Yes, Mr. Williams. Yes, and it passes non-zero Um, I hate to inform you, but we're gonna have to backtrack to the last item I think because of the late hour and staffs a little tired we failed to inform you that the chair cannot make a motion and We need to redo that vote Well consonant with the advice that we receive from the chair, I move that we approve I mean that we send case 017 000214 to the city council with a favorable recommendation Properly moved and seconded we'll have a Okay, all those in favor, please raise your hand Thank you Thank you, thank you for catching that I apologize for Thank you all we have one final case in front of us This is the unified development text ordinance TC 18 quadruple 0 to omnibus 12 Michael stock has put in his time tonight. I Was expecting to be here a little bit longer, so I brought a sleeping bag in my snuggie To sleep under my desk, but we're not thankfully it wasn't that long let me Pull up my wonderful slide show And I emphasize wonderful besides slide show So I wanted to again my name is Michael stock with the plane It was a plane department TC 18 0-0-0-2 is one of the favorites of our mayor omnibus text amendments. He loves omnibus text amendments So But I also wanted to present you with just a quick rundown of the quick hits within it doesn't mean that I'm Looking to specifically overlook anything I'm sorry I'm sorry Or I'll click that button. There we go But I wanted to go over some quick hits with it Points that we thought were We're important to point point out and then of course I'd be happy to answer any questions regarding any any of it is not meant to Slight any of the provisions that are being proposed So general highlights and then go over the MPO process revisions and then everybody's favorite mailbox clusters The first first Highlight we wanted to identify was changes to neighborhood notification We're in the 21st century so we can do emails a lot and and do notification a lot better Than when we were first doing neighborhood notifications way back before we even had the UDO It's not so as as indicated This neighborhood notification for public hearings was a policy prior to the adoption of the UDO and then it was codified with the UDO It's not a statutory requirement And in order to receive notification whether you're an entity organization or just Tom Miller who wants to hear about everything You just register with the department and it's free and we we maintain those lists Generally every two years unless somebody emails me and says please take me off the list which does Happen and we try to agree with that and then we get a bunch of bounce backs too So we do have to update it every once in a while for most hearings It's a thousand foot notification buffer, and then there's a letter that sent out for plan or text amendments. It's email notification So the proposed revisions are to make an email notification for all And there will be no distance requirements. So if you're registered with us You're gonna be notified about every public hearing that's going on on at least a monthly basis So it's we feel it's more inclusive No registered personal organization will be feel left out there have been times when Folks were wondering why they didn't get notified. They're part of an organization Maybe they're part of a pack or some other neighborhood organization or HOA and why didn't they get notified by about a certain zoning case Or something and we have to tell them well, you're outside the thousand foot Notification range So and that's a legitimate answer, but this makes it more inclusive if you're on the list you get the notification It also simplifies the process and it makes it actually a less expensive process because we don't have to print out things on paper and They postage and that kind of thing too We're also making some other changes We're making sure that there's consistency with notification distance requirements for or flum and text amendments So we're not sending out one range of notification from one aspect of a project in a different range for another aspect of the project 600 feet is well beyond the minimum statutory requirements for Zonings and and comprehensive plan amendments Statutory requirements are adjacent properties And we are changing the MPO and historic district notifications Down to a hundred feet because those are more unique type of zoning requests that are kind of inward-facing or It gets confusing when you're sending out to 600 feet beyond a historic district request or an MPO request And people are like why are we getting we have to send out two different types of letters generally We still will have to send out a couple different types of letters, but it won't be as cumbersome or confusing We are adjusting the infill revisions. We seem to visit them We like to visit them every time we do omnibus because we love that section We're adding back in corner lot provisions that we took out last time We thought the changes that we made last time. We're gonna help with Corner lots and we realize that the provisions we had in there previously work and it's basically allowing Focusing the provisions to where that If you're developing on the lot the corner lot, it's a choice of the applicant of how they choose to Situate for street yards and then if it's part of the context area You're only counting the corner lot if it's the facing that subject block face We're removing window provisions because they are pretty much in violation of this design and aesthetic controls And they're kind of hard to regulate anyway And we are adding some on-site parking relief for narrow lots when they're in conflict with The required street yards because of infill if you're if you're pulling the building up closer to the to the right of way It's harder to position Parking or driveways on there. So for narrow lots where you don't have the flexibility to to locate the building side to side We're just saying you don't have to require the parking Non-conforming lot revisions. We're actually just reorganizing that for the most part We are adding two provisions in there one is that you can Create a non-conforming lot if you're alleviating other non-conformities such as non-conforming uses It's we're saying that non-conforming uses is probably the worst of the non-conformities non-conforming loss isn't as bad So if you're alleviating non-conforming uses or other non-conformities Then it's okay to Create a non-conforming lot and we already allow that even for non-conforming lots if you're making a situation better You can still create a non-conforming lot And then we're also adding in and this has been an interesting situation over the years Our variance section is says that you can seek a variance on lot dimensional standards And yet our non-conforming lot section says you can't do that So we're just adding in there reiterating that yes, you can seek a variance through the board of adjustment closet judicial hearing on a lot Dimensional standard, so if there's something extremely unique about your development site or something that you need to create a non-conforming lot You can seek it relief through the quasi judicial process And that's usually typical for most jurisdictions. It's a dimensional standard that you can seek. It's not a use Changes for affordable housing bonus we're clarifying how the height restrictions work for applying the affordable housing bonus in the S2 sub districts of design districts. It was just a confusion in wording and how it works. You get the maximum allowed Height if you're doing affordable housing if you're implementing the affordable housing bonus We're not looking to restrict the height if you're implementing that bonus We are there was confusion about how the Standards within the bonus section applied if you're in a compact neighborhood tier and we just clarified that to meet the intent We are increasing the bonus from a one-to-one bonus to a one-to-two bonus basically For the suburban and urban tiers that was a request by From a number of different aspects to try to up that bonus allotment Since there hasn't been any takers on that at all We did that we did a one-to-three in the compact neighborhood tier and that is obviously has been changed But there's been some interest in some affordable housing on the suburban and urban tiers and they and at least the Folks that have met with our department, and I don't know if I'm getting this right or wrong Is that data the one-to-one is more of an offset than really any kind of bonus and a one-to-two is actually getting you a bonus Can you tell me what page you're on? I'm sorry. I Kind of got balls. I'm sorry Do-do-do-do one-section It is Page The top of page 10 where it's six six three suburban and urban tiers and Additionally, we're also adding language to make affordable housing units and marker eight units even less Distinguishable Interior elements and such I read this Other notable we think revisions Based upon direction from JCC PC. We're removing self-storage and allowed use in the downtown design district It's already not an allowed use in the compact design district. So it will be a consistency with that. There are a couple Self-storage facilities downtown or in process But we are removing that as an allowed use We are adding standards for little libraries and Also called blessing boxes sometimes Technically our ordinance prohibits them because they're a fixed object and Placed within yards. I don't know if we've had any specific complaints about it, but it was brought to our attention. So Our director asked us to put in some nominal standards for them We're just we're deleting the additional findings for minor special use permits for fence and walls We're not deleting the requirement If you go through those findings, you'll see that they are redundant with the findings The general findings they are all all addressed through can be all addressed through the general findings Whether the Board of Justice and finds them adequately addressed. That's a different thing, but they can all be addressed through Through them. We're adding mass grading buffers to the list of applicable areas for the compact neighborhood here Since we've changed a number of areas more suburban areas to compact neighborhood tiers currently the mass grading buffers don't apply within compact neighborhood tiers and We felt that that was necessary and we've seen some projects come through that would that grading only projects that would have benefited from At least some mass grading buffers, even if they are temporary in nature We are Limiting driveway widths. Basically, it's you can it sets a driveway width And then it says you can go as wide as you want if you do a site plan or plot plan So we're just getting rid of we're setting we're sticking to the limit of 25 feet wide And this is where you usually just houses and and duplexes and such but Not allowing wider than 25 feet and sticking with the limit that's there and taking away except if shown on a site plan or plot plan We're adding some additional parameters to the edges of alternative streetscape plans within design districts and The really exciting one is adding a definition for a massage therapy It's actually already in there, but it's kind of buried in with adult adult establishment and We're adjusting where the zoning that massage therapy a reputable practice It's getting its own listing So I knew Commissioner Mill we're excited about that You buried your lead Actually, I prefer to kind of blurred Neighborhood protection overlay we are part of this and it's something that we agreed and quite honestly we didn't have to necessarily commit to agreeing to it because we were going to Do it anyway is when old West Durham neighborhood protection overlay process went through its thing we generally as a good standard practices evaluate how it went and part of that is taking a look at the process and since there was a big gap between Tuscaloosa Lakewood that happened in 2007 and Old West Durham which happened in 2018 we haven't really taken a look at the processes At taking a hard look so when Old West Durham went through it gave us an opportunity to see how things worked or didn't work The current MPO initiation process. So so what we're changing is the initiation process at this point Currently a neighborhood would submit an application for lack of a better term where you can just call it a petition to do an MPO And one thing I left it in there because this is what we talked about at JCC PC There there are persons and they're concerned about having a hundred percent or a majority percent support for Or some specific number percent support for an MPO Was that none of them ever had a hundred percent property owner signature? So those applications get submitted with the department we forward them on to JCC PC for their review And then they prioritize them and prioritize as kind of a wonky term if there's one It's either yeah, we kind of like you to move forward with it prioritizing it or some other Thing or or we don't like it in and we're not going to prioritize it Then after that it kind of gets worked in with the work program that the department works with through JCC PC And then ultimately approved by the governing body So that's how it gets kind of initiated by the city city council or board of commissioners if it happens to be in the county Is that they assigned the work program item as a priority? Like do this now kind of thing versus it kind of being down on the list of things to do Right now the proposed revisions are just to clearly indicate that the governing body as the final authority to initiate the rezoning And that's in line with actually historic districts where we take someone's wants to do an historic look local historic district and it ultimately goes through a process gets a recommendation from the HPC and Gets a recommendation for an HPC and then it goes to the governing body city council and they yes go and do it We initiate this this rezoning We're keeping JCC PC in the loop and they'll make the they'll make a recommendation so they'll review the review the applications before it gets to the governing body and There will be notifications that go out for both of those meetings. They're not public hearings But we one of the things that we heard through the process was that You know this whole initiation process kind of happened without anybody really knowing about it or very few people knowing about it Such as just the applicants and such so we will do notifications Consistent with what you would do for a rezoning To make sure people are aware that people are talking about it and seeking Seeking an initiation on it if there is a fee we will charge a fee for just a notification. There is no proposed Adjustment to the fee schedule at this time that I'm aware of but it leaves off the open The option open to charge a fee for at least just a notification requirements We're also clarifying it's it's required, but it's not Intuitively into that section that a pre-submitted meeting before you submit an initiation request You have that with staff that you have a neighborhood meeting before you submit the initiation request We have taken a lot of the guideline Guidelines that have been reviewed by JCCPC and just codified them Their minimum guidelines There is still Some information that need documents that need to be provided that demonstrate neighborhood support So a petition can be submitted, but we're not putting a hard number on that petition We heard pretty loud and clear from JCCPC that they did not want to hear They wanted to take it on a case-by-case basis depending upon the neighborhood Detail the regulatory aspects that current couldn't currently be addressed through the base zoning Any suggested modified list of standards that stuff changes as you go through the process But at least get the neighborhood thinking about what they want to do And then maintaining mass and scale of Possible design guidelines, but other aesthetic guidelines because generally with single family Unless you're in a historic district. You can't do aesthetic controls even with an MPO and Then cluster box units if you did not know the U.S. State's Postal Service will not do house-to-house Mail boxes for new subdivisions anymore So you'll go into if you drive into a friend's Very brand-new spanking new house and you see wow they have some cluster boxes kind of like you'd see at townhomes or some things It's because you know, I say it's postal service mandates that now. So we've Proposed some minimum standards. We've taken a look at what other jurisdictions have done and they're pretty nominal There had to be some handicap accessible parking spaces that go along with these We've added in Mandating pedestrian connectivity to them incorporating them within the development. So you can actually walk to them and not have to walk along the road Or a large driveway And also not be punitive in terms of since this is mandated These are nominal things and they're usually clustered around and a lot of times even put at a community center If there's going to be a community center there But not count against our open space requirements. We're not looking to be Punitive that way they're going to get hit with some stormwater impervious surface standards no matter what but not to be Hit them with hit the developers with counting against our open space requirements And that's all I have Be happy to answer any questions or take down notes for any suggested suggestions Thank you. Why don't we actually have two individuals signed up for the public hearing So why don't we open the public hearing we can we can hear the testimony and then we may I'm sure we have questions for you Afterwards, thank you very much. We have one individual in favor one individual against So we'll start with the individual in favor Robert Schunk and then Ellen plus against Each each side has ten minutes if you so will not take them I'll admit to staff on bad about keeping up with these tax amendment changes and sometimes seem late and But I was making a comment about increasing the percentage of the two unit townhomes Little bit higher than a 20% at least in the urban tier in the compact neighborhoods to a lot more flexibility within like a project Like pinecrest or you know other similar tight sites. That was the only comment I had Okay, thank you this plus You get to be the final public speaker this evening. Thank you for waiting this long to share I'm impressed that all of you have the stamina to do this I don't know if this is your normal running time, but if it is I'm very impressed as a taxpayer My name is Ellen plus. I live at 706 East Forest Hills Boulevard in the Forest Hills neighborhood in Durham As you know, we currently have an NPO Which is in process and was prioritized by JCC PC back on August 1st at that time I had the opportunity to read quite a bit of the language that was being proposed under omnibus changes 12 as it was going before The JCC PC and I'm I guess I I don't know if I'm allowed to ask a question But I might be looking for a bit of clarification Because a great deal of the language that I'm seeing in this version of omnibus changes 12 appears to be rather different from that Which I was viewing prior to the JCC PC. I noticed At that point there was talk about you know retroactive dating going back to the 1st of January 2018. I no longer see that language in here, right? That was based upon the discussion at JCC PC. We took that language out that language was removed. Okay, very good I also basically just opinion appearing in front of you all. I'm not a very good public speaker. I do apologize I Wish to try and drive home though that the NPO as it exists is really the only citizen led tool That is currently written into our UDO and as such it's actually really important I don't need to tell you the Durham is growing like crazy. Obviously, you know that that's your job We citizens oftentimes do not feel empowered with the kind of growth that's happening in our community The NPO is an incredibly important tool made available to us and I would ask that any changes that are made or written into the Rules for NPO is carefully consider that that tool needs to remain easily accessible to our neighborhoods My neighborhood was able to organize and pull together and try to put forward a good NPO application I can tell you it was an immense amount of work It did not happen quickly. It did not happen easily We held many of the meetings that were recommended in the slides that you saw just a moment ago It is not easy to try and protect your neighborhood We're still working toward that as you heard earlier tonight with the flum amendment and everything else Currently we have 16 months remaining on our current NPO application And we eagerly await and look forward to engaging actively with the planning staff to work Productively on that application That having been said I really simply want for people to realize the importance of remaining Keeping the NPO's available to all different neighborhoods within Durham Not politicizing the process too early on By doing so I fear that you remove the process from the hands of the average citizen Please keep the NPO device easily available to your citizenry. Thank you very much Thank you, and I would disagree with your assessment of your public speaking skills You're an excellent public speaker. Thank you for your time anyone else who'd like to speak Seeing literally no one except staff and commissioners. I'm gonna close the public hearing commissioners questions comments Start on the left Mission Williams. Yes. Um, I have a question as far as the blessing boxes or many libraries I think they're called are there design requirements for those to be constructed Do they have to meet a minimum standard or a maximum? There's there's no Building code requirements for them that I'm aware of so they couldn't be like a little she shed on the curb They could be a little she shed on the curb That there are some minimums there's maximum size and I went online just to kind of check out what some standard sizes are and and They're pretty consistent with what you see in different neighborhoods. There's one in my neighborhood now and my other They're not happy. Yeah my other statement is to the young lady that just spoke and I 100% agree with you when it comes to the MPO and That is exactly what I feel like it should be for and how it should remain and if not be an easier process If possible, thank you Commissioner Williams Commissioner Miller. I have a bunch of questions So I'm on page eight And we're adding vertical integration of uses and suburban and urban tiers Give me an example of what you would the invert a vertical integration of Different uses and in these tiers the zoning districts like such as any of those owning districts commercial zoning districts or mixed-use district that allows Residential and commercial Could be an integrated vertical integration. So rather than I have not it's not adding a requirement To be side-by-side right right mixed-use district you could to do a horizontal or a vertical integration just allow for both and there's no restriction Besides the technical dimensional standards for some of the other zoning districts that would prohibit a vertical integration versus a side-by-side So it was just in something that it's not adding an allowance. It's just This section happens to recognize allowances as a table. So I'm on page nine and It's two other zoning districts B. I don't understand the change I'm sorry could repeat that again. I didn't so if you'll go to page nine Yes, I'm there and then down where it says to others owning districts you make a change to be You strike out what was there and you I don't understand the difference. Oh, okay It was just clear wording. It's not it's it's not changing the standard. It's just instead of saying produce them out Permit housing types not already. It's like can utilize only the housing types It's more in the affirmative than in the negative actually when we do regulatory drafting. We prefer the negative Well, it's one we try we try to make it as user-friendly as possible Page 11 And you have a change there to six eight five a two And it says prohibits compliance to the minimum dimension And it should it be compliance with or to I'm I found that grammar a little unusual. I will double check that All right. Thank you. And then on page 12 Down at the bottom development standards 20% are we Mr. Schunk was interested in he told me that he was interested in 25% he and I have actually had a debate about about whether or not What the risk is about having two unit configurations and townhouse projects giving the You know the gravitational pull and most development projects is is more you that's not fewer I don't see a lot of risks For going from 20% to 25% I don't see a developer coming in and building 40 townhouses and two unit blocks Correct We in discussions that I've also had with mr. Sean he had indicated much higher percentages We can't we had come up with when this was first proposed back or discussed back in Spring We came up with this nominal number of 20% Because it was nominal we didn't see a great impact so one out of every five buildings would be a two unit could be a Two-unit building. Okay. Allow some flexibility 25% probably would be just as nominal one out of every four. We're not opposed to that Yeah, I see it only happening in in as mr. Schunk said these constricted properties And I'm really sensitive to the townhouse thing because we're working on that hill and Dale thing where the Where the property is really goofy with? riparian buffers So in part eight I have a lot of problems with this so essentially we're declaring that I'm sorry What where are you again part eight part your page 26 six? It's the NPO. Okay? I Have Some serious misgivings about the legality of declaring at the ordinance level that only the city can initiate a certain type Of rezoning there is no statutory basis for that There is a statutory basis for saying that for certain types of zoning like conditional zoning or or even in special legislation for our Development plan zoning that a certain class of people Can are eligible and and other people are not eligible to ask for the rezoning But this is a statewide legislative process and you're telling citizens that they can't apply for something. I think that's I'm awful well now you can have different standards for Citizens who proceed two ways, but I don't think you can actually tell Have a rule that says that there's a type of zoning without a spit without a specific Statutory power to do it that there's a category of zoning that somebody can't come in and apply for by themselves and not have it be city initiated in other words if I can pull all the The special expertise fighting hire mr. Shunk and and and and Bill Bryan and and a bunch of other people and fashion all of the components of a neighborhood protection overlay and and Apply for the text amendment and the map change and all those things I think this the state statute has to allow us to do that even though it's not likely to occur now if we want to have special Rules that say if you're going if you're not going to do that mr. Citizen or miss citizen and you want the city city to do it for you And you want the city to expend city resources to do it for you here this hoops you have to jump through I think that's what you're getting at and it's based upon the assumption that only That's the only way it's really ever going to occur and you may be right But to declare right out that only the city can apply for an MPO. I don't think that's consistent with state law And it also certainly isn't consistent with the ordinances that I've said the neighborhood conservation overlay ordinances I've read in from other cities who spent a lot of time looking at those in the last year So that is a big change here and what I would like to do is I Don't really have a problem with the rest of this But I would like to pull section 8 out of this and hold it For a little while so that we I can get some answers well and I would actually ask if staff I mean you Commissioner Miller you've made an assertion and I'm not sure that that's how I read this document So I wanted to hear from staff is is that the that you understanding that this is how this would move forward This is how it would move forward. We have not heard concerns about this from our city or county attorney's office But we will reiterate that concern with them and maybe We all overlook something that you're catching So we'll take another look at it I would hesitate to pull this out and if it's if on the advice of our city and county attorney's offices That it shouldn't move forward or should be revised will do either pull it out or Make the revision as necessary that you're suggesting I just have a lot of problems with With this I think we go way beyond the The the way Resonings are supposed to happen as they they are envisioned in our general statutes. It's a lead general legislative process And all citizens stand on equal footing with legislative processes This is not a quasi judicial process or anything like that. This is a legislative process It I mean, I don't have a problem with going to the JCCPC and say Here's what the citizens want the city to do the city the citizens want the city to initiate the zone change And then the JCCPC It advises whether or not they think it's a good use of The municipal and county resources that unbother me at all and even establishing standards For making that request I do have a thing that that to the point that it becomes exclusive I just think it's a problem I understand your concerns and we can definitely look into that and if and Based upon what you say if it's determined that that is exactly the case that that is overstepping the bounds of the legislative authority Then we'll make the appropriate adjustments Well what and the other thing is too is I don't think most of the people in the neighborhood community Aware that that these changes are being proposed I mean they they could have gotten them they could have followed them you haven't kept them a secret But you know I quite frankly Wasn't following along with this either and was surprised when I got this in my packet last week and saw that these changes Were as thorough going as they now appear to be so these were in when I send out when I things go to the JCCPC I send out a review for you do and you do and all those were in there They were in there. I acknowledge a change was the removal of the That retroactive date so that was removed And we did adjust some language about fees so it's not mandatory the way it was wording It was kind of read that it was gonna mandate a fee which was not the intent so as I reiterate We will definitely Well, that's the city attorney in the county. Yeah, we will not move forward with it one of one other point though Ask them also you talk about guidelines Guidelines we either have ordinances or we don't that's what we're doing here. We're codifying those guidelines Yeah, but you still refer to the possibility of there being guidelines No, they're no we're taking away those guidelines. We're taking away those aesthetic Guideline rules you can still do ordinance standards that are for massing and scale We're not taking that away, but we're taking away language that talks about design guidelines Well, no, it says the JCCPC will shall be responsible for review and recommendation of the administrative guidelines If the guidelines are mandatory And that was an oversight of my Not what section are you reading that in I mean on page 26? 2.2.3 C the JCCPC shall be responsible for review and recommendation You've added and recommendation for administrative guidelines See we either we either have rules or we don't have rules but guidelines that can be changed outside The ordinance making process in my opinion are outside the authority of the city I mean in one of the problems that we have all this says is a review and recommendation of guidelines It's not giving them an approval authority. It doesn't make any difference The fact is is that it it says that there will be guidelines that are not ordinances Okay, oh that that's a different that's a different topic. It is a different That's why I wanted to get it in there. I'm sorry. I thought okay. That's all I have mr. Thank you. Thank you commissioner Miller commissioner out Turk Thank You chair. I Have a question about Sorry, I was let me go back to The section on sidewalks What page are you on sir? Page of 16 Yeah, it seems like that whole section has just been crossed out and we relocated it on the next page under D1 internal walkways So internal walkways are the same thing as Sidewalks. No, so so there's difference. We have sidewalk standards. What that refers the section D that's being crossed out Those are along common access drives, which are not public right away. So they're technically walkways sidewalks are public Basically, we classify them as kind of public walkways They're they're the sidewalks they're being correctly Classified and just relocated in different sections. So we're keeping terminology consistent Okay, and it's so that people won't misread it saying that you have to have public sidewalks where it's private facility, correct Thank you, that's why I read it. Thank you, and I I have the same concerns as commissioner Miller and miss plus I so aside from the legal question, I I guess my So let me start with a question. How many steps currently does it take to get from a neighborhood saying we want an MPO to? The staff taking it up currently. I mean number of steps. Yeah, so JCC PC Who I guess the main question is does the governing body at this point review that process before Or the review the request before it goes they do take they do take it in their consideration when they're adopting the work program for the For the planning department. So when Old West Durham was first submitted They were an only submittal kind of like far sales was an only submittal and they were Prioritized just like far sales was only but there was no staffing or resources to do it so it remained as a priority for 18 months and And the work program came up again. There's still no resources for it So it kind of died on the vine and Old West Durham resubmitted again and it stayed on the work and it was still discussed on work programs and finally when there was resources available It moved up on the work program to actually do it Right, that's the process that far sales would be going through now So it's effectively the council saying through the work program and Correct me if I'm wrong Do this or don't do it at this time, but you're asking this is basically Trying to codify that process in a more A clearer way I take Commissioners Miller's comments to point and we'll review that legality aspect of of The mandating only through city council and then if necessary put in that relief valve other way of doing it But otherwise everything that's in here is generally mimicking what the current process is in terms of requirements and such But there are in the form of guidelines That were adopted by JCC PC. So we're codifying those If I could Sarah young I Think to answer your question There is essentially one more step being added which is this formal going to the governing body and finding out whether or not They will prioritize it and we see this actually as a benefit to neighborhoods because one of the lessons We learned for instance with the golden belt local historic district Which is very similar in many aspects to a neighborhood protection overlay in terms of how it's developed and the amount of Community input that has to be put into the development of the district is that that that sat basically for a decade almost Before resources could be put towards it and it finally came to a head when it was brought before the governing body who said oh Wait a minute. We'll give you money to hire a consultant to do this to move this along So this is giving an opportunity to have that audience With the council at a very direct way for them to be able to allocate resources or to say prioritize this over that Without having to necessarily wait till the annual work program comes up and you have a ton of other competing things So while it is technically yes one more step It we feel like it potentially has some benefits But but you are asking them explicitly to review the The application for whether there's substantial level of support from the neighborhood for example, right I Mean you say in here that you know Is there a substantial level of support by residents and so then does that open up a public hearing at that point? Or is it just a it's not a public hearing and I will say that many of the things that are in here They're now codified that were part of the original guidelines were things that the elected officials both originally with the original NPO process have asked for these are the kind of things that they want to know when one of these moves forwards And they're the kind of things that the current council when they heard the most recent one. We're still asking about so The the guidance that we've received so far is that these are legitimate questions to be asked of applicants in order for a decision to be made Okay Okay, thank you. I am a little concerned that that this seems to add Some steps that make it may be more difficult for residents to to initiate this process And I don't think we should be making it more difficult, but Yeah Thanks. Thank you. Any any other commissioner Baker? For the affordable housing bonus, I'm just curious where did where did the two come from? It was just a nominal step up from a one-to-one just taking that next step I think our development review team have been discussing projects with Some potential applicants and they said that it might be more feasible to do it that way And then just one other question 1361 connectivity defined That's on page 18 I'm looking at and really the change that's being proposed here is simply Clarifying a sentence But I just wanted to ask So this provision Benefits a developer who just wants to put a bend in the road So it what's interesting about this is that we had that the crossed-out standard is already there Which talks about a bend in the road and then This standard that we have in there was embedded in the linear block definition Which we're consolidating into just block face because we actually had a linear block definition and a block face Which are generally the same things and there are slightly two different Definitions and they're used differently in the ordinance and one of them had this in here And one of the things that development review had come to us to say is that The 75 degree thing can be gamed There's no Specificity of it is is loose And then when we were so it was like do we keep it do we not keep it that kind of thing And then when I was going through the ordinance and discovered wait a minute We have another way of measuring it which is much more Concrete and they're like yep, that would work and so we just replaced it with that Okay, so but this is just kind of encouraging a bend in the road. Correct. Correct. It's giving credit for a bend Okay, a significant bend. Yeah Okay, well Connectivity I think is really important. So I would I would encourage You know, I think the connectivity index right now is 1.4. Is that correct? I would just encourage maybe maybe looking into in the future considering something a little bit higher Maybe 1.5 or 1.6 But other than that Thank you commissioner Miller. Yeah to go back. I agree with Commissioner Alturk there is when you read these new NPO initiation standards There's a witches broomstick quality to it that I don't that's not attractive to me and so I would like to Figure out some other way And have we looked at I mean Chapel Hill has many more neighborhood conservation overlays than we do Raleigh has many more Neighborhood conservation overlays than we do. How do they do it? They have set numbers and they all turn out to be protection suburban things except for one in Chapel Hill No, but the initiation process initiation process I don't remember the exact initiation process But I have a feeling it goes through the governing body at some point. Well, yeah I don't have a problem with going through the governing body. It's just the it's the the daunting nature of this Gathering information and what have you it seems to me that we have moved to the front end a Whole bunch of standards considerations that actually are part of the final decision-making process not the front end And so we've set a very high bar You've got to show that the houses are at a certain age and the certain number of lots are developed We don't even say what I'll develop the lot is do we and I and I worry about I mean My neighborhood might be able to pull it off Forest Hill certainly has the resources to pull it off But that's not really a very good standard and we and quite frankly my neighbor. It's starting about an NPO too But I don't see it as a is a big issue and and Where we are, but there are other neighborhoods that I think definitely need to have NPS And I look at it and the reason they need the NPO is Because they are getting a little bit shredded. I wonder whether Old West Durham could have assembled the application that you are or have described in this I I'm concerned about it and I would like to delete. I don't want this to go For a vote to city council and board of commissioners. I think we need to talk about it more And if if we can't separate it then I have to vote against the whole omnibus right Any additional questions or comments? I have one Commissioner Gibbs and then we're gonna we are gonna move to a motion even if it's a motion to vote to approve or vote to delay With all of these NPO's Neighborhoods, neighborhoods, neighborhoods applying and being okay What happens when they get so dense they get to the point where it would be better to go To the Durham city county or whatever border They say everything within the city limits is an NPO I don't know if I can answer that I'm not quite sure what you're well. We have I guess it. Yeah, we have the 15 acre requirement. Yeah, I Guess it's sort of cynicism because I don't I I think there should be more restrictive Roles for even having them But anyway, that's understand that's just and I apologize for the cynicism Anyway, thank you. No problem. So mr. Stack if I may What are the implications if there would be a delay on sending this forward tonight? I can't I don't know of any specific implications Beyond the fact that it would Just delay it moving forward The reason I ask is I was at the first JCC PC meeting where this came up and And I was not at the second meeting I was out of town and vice-chair Hyman was was there But my recollection of the discussion was this combination of let's make sure this is a tool that does work for neighborhoods And let's try to build in some level of certainty because what we did here in Old West Durham was and we all heard it at that They the hearing here and were people saying I didn't know about this Some people complained about it took forever and some people said this thing was already baked in before I even knew about it So I see this is putting in some of the guardrails to help deal with that later concern And I think that's important But I do Understand miss plus's comments and my fellow commissioners concerns that we don't want to set the bar too high either though The whole point is that this is the one citizen tool available. And so it does strike me that if we can Pause this for a month or two to get it right if that is helpful That seems like it would be valuable if I could get some clarification as to the specific things you would like to see reconsidered Besides the legality question that commissioner Miller has already raised because one month. I'm not quite sure what we're looking to change We looked at we kept this the current standards in terms of the 15% and that we didn't really Change that we didn't hear that those were a concern. We heard the concerns of yes This was already baked before or notification when they were even just considering it They wanted better notification that kind of thing and then even just clarifying that it needs to kind of go through city council or the board of commissioners depending upon so that's what We did focus on so if we can get a better idea of what the specific concerns are that are That these or that these changes are making that are hampering other neighborhoods from doing it And we can take those into consideration again. A lot of those are larger policy questions that might take longer than The month to turn it around so I would say a month is actually not even Reasonable I think that's right. So I guess the question would be if we did have a two-cycle delay on Having this come back to us specifically to spend time on part eight to make sure that We are not setting up too high of a barrier for the various neighborhoods in Durham to be able to actually use this as a tool It sounds like you're saying that may be Annoying and frustrating maybe for you personally and for the staff But it does not set us back as a community in terms of some significant deadline that we need to meet not aware of that And I'll just say do we want to if we're are we talking about pulling the MPO out portion out entirely and moving the omnibus forward? If we can that might be the better thing at that point if you're looking to really hold back on it Then let's just move the the omnibus forward without that section and then we'll just have it as a separate standalone text amendment I see a lot of heads nodding and I think we all appreciate your willingness to to take that step I've learned and been reminded that I as chair cannot make that motion, but I will happily accept that motion from someone else Mr. Chairman, I move that Michael can I just give you one knit on page 31? You're just missing the extra the second s and states in 17.3. I was wondering when a typo was gonna be sorry Where was it on 31? I'm sorry 17.3 in the definition of cluster box unit. You're just missing the second s and states. Okay. Thank you And with that back to our motion Mr. Chairman, I move that we send case TC-18 quadruple zero to forward to the city council and board of county commissioners With a favorable recommendation except for the several questions and corrections that we identified for staff and except for section 8 concerning the process related to the neighborhood protection overlay ordinance and that our recommendation be that with regard to that section that we Bring it back to the planning commission at the Commission's December 11th meeting. We would just I would just suggest that We'll just pull it out. It'll be a separate text amendment We'll refer it back to staff and we'll bring it to you when I recommend that with regard to section 8 We refer that back to staff and send all the rest forward There is a motion. Do we have a second second seconded by commissioner out Turk? Any discussion? We will have a roll call vote, please Commissioner out Turk. Yes Commissioner Baker. Yes Commissioner Durkin. Yes Commissioner Hyman. Yes Yes Yes Yes Thank you all very much. Thank you. Mr. Stack Anything for next month that we need to know of The list in front of you if you have any questions, let me or the case planner know and I believe the assistant director may have an announcement So real briefly I wanted to follow up with you all you've made several requests about Long-range planning comprehensive projects coming to you earlier having more kind of advanced notice getting to hear a little more about it before even before the informational item that we traditionally do before the public hearing and I have talked with the staff this week and something new that we would like to roll out to you is And I can't promise it'll be every single month We will watch your agenda and do what makes sense But maybe at least every other month have a brief summary at least of kind of pending projects And where they are that gives you at the very minimum a chance to ask us questions And we can kind of delve a little deeper on anything not necessarily formal presentations mind you But the opportunity for discussion and conversations and that will also kind of give us heads up of things that you Maybe more or less interested in that we can then do kind of deeper dives and subsequent meetings So I hope that you all that will kind of meet your needs And we'll give that a try. Thank you for being responsive. We really appreciate it. All right. We are adjourned