 Okay, welcome to the Amherst planning board. Can you wait? Can you hold on just a second? I'm not seeing Amherst media. Okay. They did acknowledge my sending them an agenda last week. So, yeah, they had, they had told me they were here. There they are. Okay. All right. Okay. Thank you, Jack. You're good. We can go. All right. Welcome to the Amherst planning board meeting of June 30, 2021. My name is Jack. I'm second as chair of the Amherst planning board. I am calling this meeting to order at 634pm. This meeting is being recorded and is available via Amherst media live stream minutes are being taken pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021 this planning board meeting include including public hearings will be conducted via remote means using a zoom platform members of the public who wish to access the meeting may do so by following the link down shown on the slide. This link is also available on the meeting agenda posted on the town's website calendar listing for this meeting, or you can go to the planning board web page and click on the most recent agenda which lists the zoom link at the top of the page. No in person attendance of the public will be permitted. However, every effort will be made to ensure the public can adequately access the meeting in real time, be a technological means the event that we are unable to do so for reasons of economic hardship and despite best ever as we will post on the town of Amherst website and audio or video recording transcript or other comprehensive record of proceedings as soon as possible. After the meeting. Board members, I will take a roll call when I call your name. Meet yourself answer firmly and then place yourselves back on mute Maria chow. Tom long. Doug Marshall. Present. Janet McGowan. And Johanna Newman. Here. And Andrew McDougal has called will notify us he is out. So board members if technical issues arise please let him know if necessary may need to pause temporarily to fix the problem, and then continue the meeting discussion may be suspended whether technical issues are addressed in the minutes will note if this public comment. Please use the raise hand function to ask a question or make a comment. I will see your raised hand and call on you to speak after speaking remember to remute yourself. Opportunity for public comment will be provided during the general public comment period and reserve comments regarding items that are not on tonight's agenda. Public comment may also be heard at other appropriate times during the meeting, please be aware the board will not respond to comments during general public comment period. If you wish to make a comment by clicking the raise hand button when public comment is solicited if you have joined the zoom meeting as a telephone, please indicate you wish to make a comment by pressing star nine on your telephone. When called on please identify yourself by stating your full name and address and put yourself back into mute when finished speaking. Residents can express reviews up for up to three minutes and at the discretion of the planning board chair, the speaker does not comply with these guidelines or exceeds their lot of time their participation will be disconnected from the meeting. And Pam I see we have no minutes. Correct. That is correct. Okay, and at this time, we can open up to public comment period. I see one hand up Pam Rooney, and then Dorothy Pam. So Pam Rooney state your name and address please. Hi Pam Rooney 42 cottage street. For the record I would just like to register my unhappiness at the process, which three zoning amendments ended up directly to the town council for a vote on referral. I'm going to borrow a phrase coined by my former supervisor, which is, that is a process foul. And I think it was a huge surprise to have heard, following at your, your June 16 meeting. So that was the in depth discussion that you had about mixed use building definition, and at which point, there was some consideration it was certainly not a done deal one, one planning board member said that it didn't seem that it was ready to go forward to the town council, and that is exactly where the public was left at the conclusion of the planning board meeting. And I think the amendments never even got discussed that night. So I can only speak for myself and for the public that it was a complete surprise and pretty disturbing that the planning board, I have the planning department, excuse me, and I would just like to add briefly to, to Mr. Backelman that there and apparently is opportunity for them to directly send material to the town council for a vote on referral. I think I think it puts you the planning board completely out of that loop. And it was, it appeared to me to be extremely disrespectful to you as a board to have not have had the opportunity to discuss and formulate your opinions about those three zoning amendments. And I am very disappointed. Thank you. Thanks for clarification, Chris. I wasn't. Can you kind of follow up that with, because I, you know I was at the town council for a bit but what, what happened. Things have changed from the way they used to be, and the way they used to be was that most zoning amendments originated with the planning board and the planning board and the zoning subcommittee would work on them for a while and then present them as the potential zoning amendments, and then the planning board would decide when it wanted to hold a public hearing. The select board had a role, but it was a minor role in learning about the amendments and then referring them to the planning board for a public hearing. That has changed and the CRC is taking a much more active role now than had been taken in the past by the select board in the development of zoning amendments. And the planning board I believe was well aware that there was a mixed use building zoning amendment and an apartments zoning amendment that were being worked on. We did bring it to the CRC and they thought it was those amendments were ready to go to town council. The planning board did set aside a separate night, which is July 14 to talk about zoning amendments, and the planning board will be holding a public hearing with the CRC on July 21 on for zoning amendments mixed use buildings and apartments parking that has to do with mixed use buildings and apartments and accessory dwelling units. So those four public hearings will be coming to the planning board on July 21. There will be joint meetings with the CRC. And that is just the way that things seem to be working now. So it's a change from the past and I understand that that's difficult for people to, to what, I don't know, understand, tolerate whatever but that's kind of my explanation for things. The planning board will certainly have at least two more opportunities to talk about these on July 14, and again at the public hearing on July 21. Okay, thanks. I wasn't aware of that. So, we have. I think any of the planning board was aware that I wonder if we could talk about it under old business, because it's not the procedure that we agreed to with the CRC, the flow chart that was adopted by the CRC on May 6 last year and I'm personally completely aware of what happened at the town council that we weren't even informed that these amendments were going to them I don't understand that. So I'd like to talk to that about that under old business or new business I don't know what else is, is anything else coming. Yeah, this is we're going to be focused on archipelago, but we will do that Janet. So that's, we have Dorothy Pam, Pam Rooney, and then Suzanne Amos Brett. Dorothy, state your name and address. Thank you. You hear me. Yes. Okay, great. Dorothy Pam 229 Amity Street. And I am now speaking as a town counselor. I'm a member of CRC. I attend the planning board meetings. I was as shocked as any of you at what happened it was to me it was a complete power grab. The CRC has hijacked the process and I think that our zoning is now illegitimate. The public process is totally broken people come we talk you debate you have ideas, and then in the dark of the night, things are snatched off the table and presented to the town council without much preparation, and all of the things that you spent months on, you know, setbacks, public space, height restrictions, some, some sense of this, these buildings belong in the community, the town of Amherst, all of that disappeared. And there's just this little line that says some design specifications, nothing spelled out. So I am, I am, I am outraged. I am I am on CRC, but let's just say I am the vote against it. I'm on that committee and I agree completely with Janet. This is not the process remember that chart and all the colors, and many of you were taken aback what is this okay that business team chart that isn't being followed. It was just an obfuscation device to make you think there was a process that you were a part of. So I would like to see the planning board, which has you I believe the planning board is empowered by the state to do things. And you have powers and the planning department I would like to see you take back your powers. Thank you. Thank you Dorothy. Let's go to Susanna first can then and then back to Pam state your name and address. Thank you. I'm Susan. I'm a spread 38 North prospect. And while we're talking about the process. I'm also still concerned about the community impact assessment which on the chart is shown as CRC's responsibility. It was to be prepared to inform the planning boards discussion of zoning amendments. I haven't seen hide your hair of any such document. I don't know if you have. But if it exists, it should be made public and not only should it state the CRC's conclusions, but it should also outline the process they followed the various constituents they talked to and formulating their assessments. And how they arrived at their conclusions. This is part of the process that CRC wrote, and it hasn't happened to the best of my knowledge. And I hope if you have those documents you will see that they get made public thank you. Thank you Susanna. And thank you. Hi Pam. Hi again Pam Rooney 42 Cottage Street I'd like to refute what director Brestrup said, and my, my, one of my main points is that the public who bothered to come to the six 16. You know, it wasn't even, and no wrap up of any amendments, and yet, and yet it was portrayed to the town council that there had been some minor discussion and some, and a little bit of back and forth on, on the topics, but that the one member who had actually spoken out you know, and said it wasn't ready had been pulled aside and, and was explained the thing was explained my, my concern and my point is that was not a public process. The public was left thinking that you the planning board would be back to talk about these things it is where we would normally go to hear those conversations and they sure as heck did not happen. I think it was straight to the town council, and I think, I think there should have been from the planning department, at least a notification that you were going to be pushing it forward to the town council anyway, whether or not the planning board discussed it that night, that would have been the appropriate and public thing to do. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. So with that, we have continuation of four hearings, I'm going to just go over them briefly, then Chris is going to speak, you know further introductory comments then I'll read the preamble. So, SPP 2021-03 is by archipelago all these are archipelago. All pertain to well no okay. The first one's 1113 East Pleasant Street, and it's continued from June 2 meeting. So they're requesting a special permit for a non conforming building to be structurally altered, enlarged or reconstructed under section 9.22 of the zoning bylaw for mixed building proposed under section 3.325 of the zoning bylaw. And the second hearing is SPR 2021-07 and SPP 2021-02 also by archipelago at 11 East Pleasant Street continued from May 5 and June 2 2021 joined public hearing to request site plan review approval for construction of a mixed use building containing dwelling units in combination with ground floor retail and commercial, including approximately 1300 square feet of retail space, lobby leasing fitness trash area mechanical space elevator parking and 55 apartments under section 3.325 of the zoning bylaw and to request a special permit to modify dimensional requirements for height, side and rear sit back under footnote a of table three section six of the zoning bylaw. And the third hearing is SPR 2021-09 from archipelago for 15 East Pleasant Street continued from May 5 and June 2 2021 requesting a site plan review approval under section 5.0 of the zoning bylaw for an accessory and incidental use to a permit permitted principal use on an adjacent lot for construction staging and management of 11 East Pleasant Street project. For construction site will be stabilized with asphalt surface and fast. And the fourth is SPR 2021-12 by archipelago for 11 and 13 East Pleasant Street. Excuse me, Jack. Yes, you want to open this fourth public hearing and then they'll all be open. Oh, this is not a continuation. This is not a continuation. Okay, new one. Yeah. Well, do you want to do you want to. That would be with the preamble. Yeah. Okay. Okay, let me do that. And then you can speak. Alright, thanks. Alright. So, and now to open the fourth hearing. Again, it's a SPR 2021-12 archipelago investments LLC for 11 and 13 East Pleasant Street. And I'm going to let you cover some details there, Chris. And it's 650. So we can go ahead and proceed with this in accordance with the provisions of MGL chapter 40 a this public hearing has been duly advertised. And notice there have has been posted and is being held for the purpose of providing the opportunity for interested citizens to be heard regarding the SPR 2021-12 archipelago investments LLC for 1113 East Pleasant Street public hearing for site plan review application for construction of the mixed use building containing drawing units in combination with ground floor retail and commercial, including approximately the square feet of retail space lobby leasing, fitness, trash area, mechanical space, elevator and 90 apartments, including 11 affordable units under section 3.325 of the zoning bylaw. And any board member disclosures is seen on. Chris, would you like to further introduce introduce please. Thank you. Yeah, I just wanted to make a statement because this seems very confusing there are so many applications. And now applications that are open and I wanted to put them in context. So I'm Chris Brester planning director. I just wanted to make some explanation the applicant is proposing a mixed use building in the general business zoning district. This use and type of building is allowed by site plan review with the planning board under section 3.325 of the zoning bylaw. The applicant has filed three site plan review applications. The first is site plan review. 20 2107, which is for a five story mixed use building with parking on the ground floor and retail and 55 apartments, and that's going to be located at 11 and 13 East Pleasant Street. The second is SPR 2021 09. And this is for a use that's accessory to an incidental to the construction on the next door property. And the reason for this application is to give the planning board control over what goes on there. And the applicant is proposing to stage materials and provide access to the building to the building site at 11 and 13 East Pleasant Street. And the third site plan review application which was recently received the most recently received is for a five story mixed use building with no parking with retail on the ground floor that's larger than what was first proposed. 90 apartments, 11 of which are proposed to be affordable. The first site plan review application was reviewed by the planning board at its May 5 public hearing. At that time, the board had many questions and comments. At the same time, the applicant became aware of the pending inclusionary zoning bylaw amendment that would require the provision of affordable dwelling units for most presidential buildings. So the applicant has submitted a new site plan review application which includes affordable units. The public hearings for the first site plan review application. Public hearing, excuse me was continued to June 2 at which time the planning board did not take any testimony but continued the public hearing to June 30. The applicant has requested special permits. Two of them are for dimensional modifications under footnote a of table three of the zoning bylaw, which is in section six, and that special permit, one of them is for side setback and for height. The other special permit is under section 9.22 of the zoning bylaw, which is for alteration enlargement or reconstruction of a non conforming building. There's already a non conforming building on the site and the applicant is contending that he will. He would like to take advantage of the non conformity that the existing building has and use that non conformity to allow the new building to be closer to the rear property line than would normally be allowed. So the public hearing for the first special permit was opened on May 5 and continued to June 2. On June 2 the public hearing for the second special permit was opened and both public hearings for special permits were continued to June 30. So tonight you're considering all five of these applications, and perhaps you'd like to ask the applicant which site plan review applications you should application you should be focusing on. Maybe he'll give you some direction as to which one to focus on, or perhaps he wants to focus on both of them. So that's what I had to say I just wanted to kind of put this in context because there are a lot of moving parts here. Thank you. Thank you for that. So with that said, we already had a site visit. But the applicant can definitely present and kind of clarify. What's moving forward. It doesn't sound like everything can move forward here. So Kyle Wilson and David Williams of archipelago and Mark Bob Rowski is he on your team. Mark's our attorney yet. Oh, attorney. Okay, you should probably be on mute most of the time. Okay. All right, so the floor is yours. Thank you. We are presenting and I think we should focus on the most recent submittal site plan review which is for the building that has 90 apartments, 11 of which are affordable. So I think that our presentation tonight was just to review that review the latest submittal review the drawing any changes between what we presented previously, and try to answer any questions that may come up. I would defer to you if you'd like me to get into that or if you'd like me to wait and have a conversation. Are you going to withdraw the SPR 2021-07 or how's It's, it's my understanding that they will remain open and that we're taking action on the most recent. I see. Okay. Yeah, so Pam, do you have a PowerPoint for them or how are you proceeding Kyle? I defer to you if you guys want me to just jump in and grab the screen and go through the latest, that's fine. Yes, please. Okay. See if I can pull that off here. Get in there. I see your desktop. Okay, here we go. Good. So I'll start with the architectural. So let's see if I can get rid of that. Okay. So the architectural set is very similar to the set we submitted previously. Overall, the footprint of the building almost is identical. The only change is that there's an increase in the setback that we proposed for the cemetery setback. This is the rendering from Kendrick Park. The site plan, the site plan, the revised site plan to show you a couple of things. It shows that the building has been pulled back from five feet to 10 feet at the cemetery property line. It shows that we have removed the propane from the place where the existing building is currently on the south side. It shows that we've continued the planting along the cemetery side and wrap the building. It shows the extension of bollards along the property line. Further to the east. And also shows that other than that, not much has changed. The coverage is building and site. I'm sorry a lot in building have been revised slightly both slightly less because the building has gotten slightly smaller to go from a five foot setback to a 10 foot setback. The first floor plan is where the biggest changes have occurred on the building. We have removed the parking we have introduced additional apartments. We have revised the apartment mix to 90 apartments total. There are studios one bedrooms and two bedrooms exclusively. There's 30 studios, there's 36 one bedrooms and there's 24 two beds. You'll see those spread out over the different plans over the next five floors. We have six apartments that are now on the ground floor. We have increased the size of the retail around the south to occupy that whole head of the building. We've kept the stair and the elevator as they were to make the egress work on the hallways upstairs. We've got an increased back of house for that retail so combined their 2200 square feet roughly. We've extended the lobby and brought the residential entry into that point kept fitness about where it is and then brought the property management storage electrical hot water trash and service onto the north side of the ground floor. So again, these there will be six apartments that are brought onto the ground floor. The parking has been removed. Retail has gotten larger setback has been increased on the cemetery ballards have been increased on the north side. And the lobby extends across connecting the head and the tail of the building, if you will. The floors show the breakdown of the units studios ones and twos spread out around the stairs around the elevator around the trash and electrical and so on. Working with codes to make these work the two bedrooms occupy the corners studios and ones are are spread out in between all five of the fours are essentially identical. And here at at the cut or the gas changes a little bit on four to four but the units remain the same. This is the fifth floor on the previous fifth floor plan this was a resident space this has been changing to a unit. And you can see the units as they break down on a four by four basis. This is the roof plan. A couple of changes to the roof plan we brought up a room on the roof that will house the generator. And that room will, we've used that to assist with breaking down the scale of that north elevation somewhat shifted the site the location of the trash room and the trash you have shifted. Otherwise, most of that has remained identical. The elevations have altered slightly but not much to accommodate the new units spent a bunch of time to try to get these to work with the revised layout. The head of the building on the street side has not changed at all. The north side has changed you can see the by large extending you can see the new doors from the ground floor. You can see the, the change in the elevation to accommodate the different units. You can see how we've tried to highlight the stairwell on the new layout to kind of break up that facade and give a tripartite division on that a little different integration of the zinc access paneling on that east side of the north elevation to further break that up. You can also see the grade on the cemetery side, as we've shown on the civil that has been increased to get closer to the existing west cemetery grade and the trees that are coming along around on that east side. You can see here the cemetery side with the tree planting and the grade that has gotten higher as we pulled the building away from the cemetery. You can see on the bottom the south elevation that shows the apartment unit windows on the ground floor shows the trees along the south side and some slight revisions to the fitness and the leasing. The renderings stay the same, the renderings haven't changed effectively because the building hasn't changed very much. So these views from the street and from how it remained the same. The milling and the construction methodology and the materiality all remain the same. The gash and the zinc and the cedar and the Julia balconies remain the same as well as the brick and the bollards and all of the materials remain the same. I'll show you the updated landscape. This is the updated landscape plan. Again, this is the ground floor plan that shows the larger retail that wraps around shows the apartments on the ground floor facing south shows the trees that extend south and now extend up. We've eliminated the propane. We're going to try to make this building all electric. The biggest hurdle that is hot water. There's a new technology with electric heat pump hot water and the electrification of buildings that we think we can achieve and fossil fuels completely except for the generator, which we hope to use existing versus gas gas for, but this is the updated landscape plan that shows the Armstrong maples the red twig dogwood. And as you'll notice this is not a place that is a circular path there's not going to be circulation that's going to be fostered in this location with the residential apartments on the ground for we wanted to make that more of a dead end. More of a new corridor so you can see from the street you can see West cemetery which you can't see right now because the Piper building but you'll be able to it will not be a place to gather outside of the apartments. I'll show you quickly the revised civil. This is existing. Let me focus in on this a little bit because it'll help with the grading, which I think is is a question. So, you can see here on an SVP plan that we have a grade that we're trying to accommodate that will rise and fall on the backside along the cemetery. So you'll see in photos tonight. There's a big grade change at the five feet between the cemetery and the building by pulling the building back to 10 feet we're going to backfill in there and try to get a higher, try to get up closer to the historic height of the landscape at West cemetery and elevated from the current grading that is the top of asphalt. Let's write on the property there. Other than that, you can see the prop the transformer. The, the propane is gone, the drywall remains because that's where the grade is and that's where the water from the cemetery will continue to run through the site. So we want to catch that there. All the utilities are on the north side at this point by getting propane out of there. In meeting with Western mass electric about the transformer and electricity. It's been determined that the existing transformer that is in the right of way that is eased by ever source that went in as part of the burial of the power lines for the east side of Kendrick park has the capacity with a new transformer to serve the needs here. We do not need to put a new transformer on the site. In doing so we'd also there's currently an existing little plastic light green dog house that's next to the transformer that would be eliminated, and that would go away. So the infrastructure that gets a little bit easier gets a little more refined. Like I said we got rid of the propane. And then what we've also shown here is a crosswalk. That crosswalk has there's been additional surveying that's been done. That crosswalk recognizes the reality of the ever source equipment that is on the west side of pleasant east pleasant street there. Proposes a location that hopefully works for DPW and the town engineer, which I trust that it would, and would, I think, get us to locate a situation where we would resolve the pedestrian crossing between across pleasant street here that otherwise only occurs just north of here on pretty street. And I think I will go back to this if I would if I could and try to, I guess take some questions from here. Okay. So one piece in our packet that you didn't address as a historical commission is that something. Chris, Chris Brestrup is what me to talk about that. If you're able to. Mr Wilson met with the historical commission. I think it was June 23. And they discussed the impact they were focused on what the impact to the West cemetery would be of this new building. They acknowledged that most of the trees along the property line would come down as a result of this new building going in. They requested that the two trees towards the south, which are in pretty good shape and they're on town property. And I believe they're both maple trees that those two be preserved. The historical commission with advice from Alan snow the tree warden has talked about moving the fence down to the property line the fence currently is not on the property line it's the property line is about halfway down that slope that you see in this picture so in order to be able to better maintain the edge of the property. The tree warden and the historical commission would like to have that fence moved to where the property line is so that the town would be fully in control of the town's property, and part of the town's property wouldn't be on archipelagos property. They asked that no trees be planted on the archipelago side of the property line but that archipelago helped the town to plant trees on the cemetery side of the property line because they thought, you know, they'd be better situated there they, the same, the historical commission wants to have trees on their side of the property line and they felt that it would be too much to have two rows of trees back there. What else did they say. I think that covers it. They acknowledge the fact that there would be a great change back here. I was confused by the one line there. So the strong preference for a minimum 10 foot setback. They acknowledge that the required setback is 20 feet. They acknowledge that the previously proposed setback was was five feet and they didn't want to have a five foot setback. That's the setback that was proposed to you on May 5. And so they are willing to go along with a 10 foot setback but they would prefer a 20 foot setback. That's that was the gist of that comment. I think I will open it up to questions from the board. A reserved comment for now. Do you want me to hop off guys, the screen share. Does you have a proper you have a preference. Oh, no, no, you said, yeah, we're gonna need you to answer questions. I'm sure. Anybody want to start. Well, thanks, Jack, and thanks, Kyle, for coming back. I guess I'm my first question is, am I correct that this revised building is a direct response to the, what appears to be an imminent new bylaw that contains the inclusionary zoning. This revised proposal reflects a project that we've been working on for many years and a and our attempts to be able to continue to proceed with that project. Okay, thank you for that. Thank you for that answer. Okay, then I'll just say for the record that I, I think this is a direct response to the inclusionary housing. And I think the, that's pretty clear because by making the changes to the floor plan you've made you've increased substantially increased the number of units. The inclusionary housing bylaw is likely to be to require a percentage of the units to be affordable by reducing the size of the typical unit and probably not changing the number of beds appreciably. You've, you've reduced the number of beds that are likely to be have to be affordable. Okay, so that said, I have an initial question for you. Sorry, just quickly Doug, I would, I would, I would, I think that some of the math on that might be off. Oh really. Yeah. I think that you're making some assumptions I think that the number of residents, you can see from the previous application to the current has gone down. Okay. And the, the attempt to balance everything you need to balance on on a new project is what we tried to pull off here. So the changing the very quick redesign of the building, which included a change of units. Is a global response to, you know, the entitlement realities that we have before us and the housing market that we see. For just for clear, I'm sorry, Doug, but just for clarification with the number of residents. What's the change between the two designs. I believe it was 100 and let me look here. I believe we went from 140 ish to 120 ish. Okay. Sorry, Doug. That's, that's fine. Thanks Kyle for pointing that out. I think my observation was mostly based on the elimination of the four bedroom unit. And, you know, having those replaced with mostly one and two bedroom units. I guess my first question is for the 11 affordable units. How many are, do you know at this point how many are proposed to be 80% am I and how many would be 60% am I. Yes, there'd be nine at 80 and two at 60. And we've got the numbers again are 30 studios. And then we've got one bedrooms. So that's the majority of the building. And then we've got 24 two bedrooms. And the allocation of the 11 is proportionate to the unit. So there's four studios for one beds and three two beds. Okay. And then the 60% are the two that are four. So there's a 60% studio and a 60%. All right. Okay, then Jack. I noticed in Chris's development application report. That there were numerous locations where Chris was recommending that the board ask about certain things. Do we have a structured way for going through that. Those recommendations or do one of us need to lead that discussion. Doug, I welcome you to take the lead on that. If you, if you're up to it. Is that okay, Doug, can you, you want to proceed with that. Oh, there he is. Yeah, I'm sorry. I froze up there for a while. So I invite you to go ahead and address that because that'd be great. Okay. Well, I, you know, I don't want to monopolize the conversation. Okay. So, so I'll discuss through the items that it looked like Chris was making, you know, recommending that we make sure we're brought up. As long as my internet connection is stable here. All right. All right, starting on page four of Chris's development application report. First one is about the outdoor space in front of the building. I'm just wondering if you could talk about the vision for the use of that space, whether it's just circulation or whether it's likely to be a place that people linger in. I just interrupt. Doug, were you. I don't see that in my, my packet. Is it. Well, I have a paper packet. Oh, you have a paper packet. Oh, okay. So we have 47 pages. I think I sent it to you after the, um, after Pam sent out. Oh, I separate division reports. I didn't get it in done in time. Okay. All right. My apologies. All right. But I think it was sent on Friday. If you're looking for it in your email. Yeah, I'm all clear now. Thank you. All right. Thanks. Kyle. So to your question, this. This area here, which is recessed under the building. There's an entry to the retail here and entry to the retail here. So there obviously be circulation that goes through there. It's also trying. This helps us reconcile the grade because this does drop a bit from north to south. And we have to have all the water and egress and everything work all the way around. Um, so, and then this bench right here is seat height. So that, that's that site wall is the height of a bench. It's the height of a bench. So seating would take place here. And then seating would take place back here. As you're coming into outside of the leasing office. All right. So the site wall. At the back of the entry there, the second one, you pointed out. That would also serve to discourage people from walking beyond it. Correct. Yeah. That's a bench here. This is a site wall. Um, obviously somebody can jump up here and run through the dogwoods here. Yeah. All right. Then the second item. I wondered if you could talk a little bit about the mechanical equipment on the roof and the height of the parent, the parapet. So, uh, Doug, let me interrupt you one time. Uh, I saw. Janet's hand is this with reference to the former question, Janet. Yeah. So I'm wondering, um, how it would work for this whole front section and how it would work. I mean, if Doug, Doug could go through Christine's list, then we can come back and talk about this again. But I'm wondering, um, if we're talking about this area, because I had a bunch of questions. I didn't really understand how it would work or who it works for. And I wonder if it's just, maybe you could take a moment and just stick on the subject for a bit and get a better sense of it. Or do you want, does that make sense? Okay. Um, I did have a question. I didn't understand, um, what this other courtyard was for where it says papers and there's like a little. Shape in the middle, like, was that for the tenants to hang out in and was that for. Members of the public or like what, cause I think I work, I think this is new. This year. Yeah. Uh, so this, this is existing. The newness is that is the, you know, is the storefront that would go across here to create the residential entrance. Um, the residential entrance. Um, the residential entrance. Um, the residential entrance. So the intent here is this is the. Residential entrance to the 90 apartments above. That would be used the majority of the time on the south side. So you picture people coming in. Going down. Um, From the, um, south side coming in, walking into this kind of wider area and going into the lobby. Yeah. So if, if you're coming back and you're going into your apartment and you're walking into the lobby, you duck around here, you come past the piece of granite that's set in the pavers. And you come in the lobby right here. And so on the north side where there's kind of a narrow five foot. Walkway with followers. Who's that for? What it seems. Uh, we wanted to have access on both sides, right? We wanted to make sure that that stayed. There was some pedestrian activity on that north side. So we do have a door. So there will be key card access at that. Um, and so anybody that wants to come through here can, if you're coming from the north, you could come walk in and come into the lobby on the side as well. So, so when I look at, um, Wendy's pleasant street and there is a very similar card, Carter with balliards on the north side. It looks really narrow to me. And it would be difficult for two people to pass. Maybe people carrying bags. Somebody with a stroller or, you know, In the winter, there might be some snow. And so when I look at. When he's pleasant, that looks like it looks too narrow to me. And so my, one of my suggestions would to make, to make that wider. Um, so at least people can pass comfortably. Um, and so that, so that, that Carter. And so do you see this space around the granite block as recreational space for the tenants or just kind of a walkthrough space? Cause I wonder if you can make it. If they could do whatever they, you know, I don't, I don't, I'm programmed to be on. Yeah. Cause it to me, it seems like the front of the building still lacks any kind of, um, public. Amenity feel interaction. Um, because it, it's just doesn't, you know, it doesn't seem inviting. And I wonder if you could combine those two spaces, you know, have more space in front of the building. Pull the building back a little bit or at least orient it more, like maybe slanted a little bit. So there's not such a tight. Um, point at the Northwest corner. And that way you would have, you know, a place that is for public, you could have some amenities and benches as more room for trees. And that would fit the streetscape. Um, really everywhere downtown. Um, and then you could have a mixing of the tenants and people using the, you know, going to the store or people just stopping to chat. And so, and that also fits one, you know, a little bit of space. And so it's some outdoor space for the tenants. It's interactive space for the public. It's an amenity. And so I, to me, just that little courtyard just thought, you know, are people going to really use that? Probably not. Why not put that in front and make it more for everybody? I wonder what other. Well, just my comment on that is that, you know, as we've stated previously, um, you know, our BG district is extremely small in our town. It's less than one. Um, but it's a lot of space. Um, it's a lot of space. It's half of 1% of our total land mass. Um, it's very precious. We have to try to deal with the housing crisis that we have and provide housing. Um, we've provided two ways of egress to the lobby. One that is. Plenty wide for multiple people to, there's a access way to the retail. There's access to the lobby. People will commingle. There'll be outdoor space. There's place to people gather undercover. And then there'll be a, um, a school. In the lower to the north side that gives another. Egress option. So I don't think we're. I don't think we're continuing to reduce the size of the building. In this very unique site is. This, um, Uh, Is an approach. Uh, Is an approach going forward. I think that in terms of. What this, you know, how this retail interacts with the street. The intent is there's a tenant in there. And that tenant interacts with the street. It's going to be extremely lively streetscape. They're going to have, you know, it's, it's like, it's all, it's all glass so it's going to be very apparent open any tendency that's in there is going to interact directly with the street and it's going to be extremely, extremely active. I think it will obviously serve the downtown the tenants and then do well for the streetscape. So, I appreciate that. And I just I was just wondering if you can combine those spaces and you know I was looking when you look at the criteria for our various legal criteria in the design review standards it talks about scale and it says the structure or landscape alteration should be compatible with with its architectural or landscape design style and character and that of the surroundings. And this is the sentence, the scale of ground level design elements such as building entryways windows porches plazas parks, pedestrian furniture plantings and other street and site elements should be determined by and directed toward the use comprehension and enjoyment of pedestrians and so. I just see the front of your building could be a lot more could be bigger more interactive and, you know, in one of these pleasant street you do have that kind of covered space and has never occurred to me that that would be public space I always figured that was, you know, the restaurants and so it looks like, instead of repeating that error, what about, you know, making a better, better street better front front and I wonder what other planning board members. We're not in, we're not in the live theater anymore. Right at this time, Doug, if you could afford me one more interruption. I actually forgot to chime in with with Tom long and the design review board. You know outcome, if it happened at all so. It's not happened yet. Okay, all right. We still have two weeks before our presentation I believe it's on July 15, but I will get that date specific and get back to everybody on that in a moment. Okay. All right. So, you know, like to just kind of plow through this I don't know if anybody else wants to talk about the front of the building. Well, but thank you for those comments Janet. And Doug, if he could proceed. Thank you. Okay, Jack. I guess the second point that Chris cited was if we could talk a little bit about the parapet on the roof and the size of the mechanical equipment. And maybe whether the parapet wall is high enough or not. Sure to address that. We have not increased the size of the parapet on this project on this proposal. The 57 feet is to the top of the parapet and that remains. We've used roof screening that is photovoltaic panels on the south side. We've got an elevator over on we've got a generator room. We have proposed a roof screen that that would enclose all of the mechanical equipment. Is the screen at least as high as the equipment. The screen is as high as every piece of equipment except for the generator, which has always stuck up above them because of the curves that they have because of their vibration, and they get tested once a month and they're on the roof. So those always stand up a bit tall so in this case what we've done is we have built a room around it that you can see on the left side of this page here right here. That helps us break up this facade a bit replicates that a little and encloses that equipment completely. Okay. I assume we can come back to any of these topics, you know, either tonight or whenever we continue this. The next item was just a simple question about the landscape and the plantings and whether the landscape area is irrigated. The landscape area could be irrigated. All right, so at the moment you haven't really decided. All right. So the next one has to do with the ambient light and the lighting you've got on the building. All the light fixtures you've given us catalog cuts for our downcast and heavily shielded. I'm sure they're all dark, dark sky compliant. We actually wondered if you've looked or thought at all about the level of ambient light that's coming from the street lights and such, and whether really whether there's adequate light on your site at night. We don't, we take safety very seriously. We don't think it's too, it's not bright enough to be safe. And so, find a lot of buildings are over lit. And we don't want to do that so I think anybody who's been past when he's pleasant at 430 in December has seen that the black downcast lights that we have are pretty, you know, light up the pedestrian space and not much else. And we've tried to continue that. Donnie or will you be doing a photometric plan. Yes, we have done that. I don't know if I can send that to Chris, but I will. Yeah, that would be helpful I think. Okay. All right then the next item. You asked for a waiver on the site and plan. And that we would talk about that at a future date. Do you intend to have at least some signage on the building to indicate the, the address or the, or the name of the building. The address definitely, which we'd work with fire and police to determine best location for that. I think it's probably You know, we're going to be vinyl letters as we've done in the past. We don't know if there's going to be a name of the building somewhere. And that would be TBD and we'd want to do that prior to, you know, the installation of any sign. Again, our, the signs on our buildings have always been pretty subtle. Okay, where we've happened. All right. The next item was under traffic impact. And the fact that you've eliminated the parking. And I guess. What kind of advice do you give to potential applicants about a building where you where we don't, where you don't provide any parking. Do you give guidance about what the town offers or do you are you. You know, mute on that subject. Our property management staff describes these as downtown buildings describes the parking realities and describes what the parking options are for the folks that have cars. Obviously includes a town dog. Would you be able to submit sample leases for, for the retail for the retail or commercial and the residential spaces. All of them. Yes. All right, so if you could send those to Chris. All right, the next item isn't really a question for Kyle, we still need to hear back from the fire department on their comments. Chris came in. All right. Chris, am I correct on that? I haven't received them. And I asked Pam to check on that. And I don't think she's received them either. I understand the fellow who does that work has been out for a while. So we've said to him it's a nudge to submit something. I just want to note that we'll come back to parking. I saw Janet's hand. Okay, thank you. We'll come back to it. I'm sure we'll probably come back to most of these. Yes. All right, the next item had to do with the building height. And whether, whether there are other buildings in the area that are the same height as you are proposing. When he's pleasant next door is obviously very similar, a little bit taller. Kendrick place is almost identical. Okay. And I guess I was. Well, I'd like to come back to height myself later. All right, so I think, let's see. Oh yeah, there were a bunch more Chris you had a lot of recommendations. On the construction logistics. Do you intend to use the West cemetery for any access to the site during construction? I do not intend to. I think the issue of removing trees that are on the property line needs to be understood by everybody that would need, you know, to involve some work there. But otherwise, especially moving the building further back. The intent is to be able to get machinery in there on our property and not have to require any action on the town side. Okay, great. What page are you on? Well, I'm up to page nine. Okay. And Item 14 parking. Chris first has another item about where Penn Park tenants are going to park. But the second one has to do with bicycle parking. I believe that's, you know, you've got a bicycle storage room on the first floor there. Is that right? Correct. And then would there likely be a bike rack out front for visitors to the retail or something. We have not proposed a bike rack out front. I think that as we said last time that this, this town right of way between the property line and the curb is something that we'd like to support in whatever way we could and take guidance from the town in terms of what we could or should put out there. Okay. Obviously reducing there's going to be one less curb cut out there because we're eliminating the one here. We're going to put it into a crosswalk will eliminate the existing curb cut that we've got here. So there's opportunities out here that were we could defer to what the town is seeking out there. All right. Would you be amenable to perhaps widening the public sidewalk along that stretch? Absolutely. I mean, there's an existing some existing public sidewalk here. Yeah, that we'd have to reconcile if we were going to widen it significantly beyond its, its distance here, and then it does need to, you know, somehow coordinate with the north side of this curb cut. But yeah, this could be. We could do a lot of creative things here. All right. So, so Chris had pointed out a couple of things we might think about there. This item is on page 10. Let's see. Oh yeah, the small set of steps you have on the south side that go from this property over to one East pleasant. She was observing that that may need to be a ramp to be compliant with mass access board. Or if, you know, if, if it is in fact, not compliant now, it may need to be eliminated. So, I, we've seen that and we believe we do have a ramp, because this, in order to make up that distance you effectively have to come out out and back up. Oh, I see. Right. There is an accessible way this is just an accessible shortcut. That's everything that Chris had in in the site development report. I'll yield the floor to others. Thanks so much. That was very helpful. We have other comments from the board at this time. Maria please. Yeah, thanks for doing that. Thank you. So, maybe luckily or unluckily we're, we're able to see the impacts of what the inclusionary zoning potential inclusionary zoning bylaw impacts will be. I was always kind of reticent about just because it didn't seem to have a, you know, a sense as far as, you know, how to make building an Amherst attractive and I know a lot of people have said, you know, people always build an Amherst. You know, developers will come and so we've set up another hurdle and so I can see clearly as Doug sort of touched on that in order to meet it and I'm glad that our public appellate and owners are able to make it work as far as just, you know, increasing quantity. They could have just raised the rent and just covered it that way so instead, yeah, they've sort of done a lot of number shifting and I guess my question is, you know, the ones that aren't really appealing are the ones on the first floor but at the second floor out of sight as we've sort of discussed another zoning bylaw things and there's landscaping on the south and you've sort of put a buffer there I wonder if just, you know, those units. Yeah, they're probably of all the units are the least appealing I wonder if you consider, you know, those are tall narrow windows maybe their larger higher windows or something just because it is south facing they could potentially get nice lights. If they're not too shaded by the Jason building. That was just one consideration for those five studio apartments on the first floor. And then the other issue of those was just, you know, maybe there's a little bit more landscaping. Some projects come in front of us where the first floor units are always the sort of like, you know, when they're especially when on the street side or public sides, they're just, you know, they'll end up having their blinds pull all the time and so they're not really ideal. Yeah, so yeah, so this is a way to think about the fenestration a little more for those I mean I like the way they look but I think you know it's just, if they have the blinds up all the time, it's kind of pointless to have them. And I'm still confused about the grading on the east I appreciate that you pulled it back more. But it did seem really steep, and I guess I haven't seen a contour plan or I just saw like two elevations, and it didn't seem like that those two lines would be enough to mediate that huge slope on the east side toward the cemetery. Is there a plan we can look at that shows how that grading and the building, sort of transition, even the elevations it was hard to see. I'll pull up civil quick. And just so you know that the ground for units are on the ground for obviously. They do have extremely high ceilings so they're a little bit wider bigger square footage wise than the upper units because they're not the walls don't have to align because this is still a steel and concrete podium. So we can be flexible in terms of the size of the units. So they're wider and taller in terms of ceiling height to make them as best they can on the ground for, and it's all landscape out in front, which is better than we saw as a, as a better than a curtain. So, if we look at his existing grade. So you can see here, what we're working with this is the existing situation right. So the existing pavement out behind cousins market right now is 291. The existing pavement in the cemetery is 295. So there's a four foot grade change right here between the asphalt and the grade at the cemetery. It is a little better down here at the south side where this is 291 three and this is 293 three so it's only two foot grade change down here. So the cemetery pitches this way and this way. And it's highest it's the biggest delta is right here where you can see all this grade change between the existing kind of pavement and this tree that ever sources took down right here. So, our intent is instead of having this be 291, we're going to bring this up to 293 and a half. So we're going to add two feet of grade to that. And then it'll, it'll have a similar pitch here at the north side of the building. So that when you look at this at the new building from the north side, the grade will be closer to the cemetery side than it is on the existing cousins market side. That's. Yeah, I got it. Yeah, I was worried there was like this gullible water. Nope. Just trying to use the building as a retaining wall. Okay. Right. To increase the grade and try to make it a little closer to what it used to be. And yeah, I guess since we also touched on the front of the building, I actually appreciate the way the front is designed. I currently think that that covered outdoor area and the way it peels back from the street. It can be a really nice activated place and with all that glazing, I mean that retail should have a huge impact on the street so I like the way that there's a appeal back on the second floor which allows for this covered outdoor area. I think if you were to peel back that corner that blue corner, and make it parallel with above it wouldn't be as interesting of a sort of covered area as far as the building form so I kind of like the way it is now but I do the last thing that I forgot was that or Jack brought out about the possibly editing the town sidewalk that's very appealing to see if we can get more space there. And the sort of curb cuts in the landscape patches. So that combined with the overhang you provide I think could be a really nice sort of streetscape. Maybe something will come out of that. As far as the town property and the crosswalk and how it interacts with the front of the building but I'm glad to see this project is still going so I'm sure we'll be discussing more but yeah thanks for your presentation. Thank you. Yeah, I have a small follow up with the historical commission recommending the fence move to the property line. How does that relate to the way the fence situation on one he's pleasant between the cemetery in the building will to be. Is it a straight shot will be like a jog or is the fence on the property line down that one he's pleasant and not here or. Well there's the fence and the trees are entered are obviously connected. Right. Yeah. The definition of the trees as shown here in this image is right on the property line that grew up in the slope. Right. So if we're going to backfill as I was just saying to Maria and increase that grade, we're going to affect the environment that these trees, you know grew up in the fence was placed where it is because those trees were already there. Okay. Right. And so the fence had to go on the town side of the property because there was trees in the way. So if those trees are no longer there, then you can move the fence. If the trees remain, you can't move the fence. Okay. So I think that at the one he's pleasant. Gaylord gate entrance, there's a granite marker that is on the property line. Okay, so the fence is on the property line right when it turns and goes to the Gaylord fence, it deviates from it. It comes through this image here, and it's brought a couple feet off of it. So the Historical Commission did talk about the setback. I understand concerns about where to plant trees. We've obviously proposed planting trees on our side, which we'd like to keep to. Right. I think that if you keep the fence where it is, then you have a little more space to plant trees on this side if you have a fence, you have a little more place to plant trees on the town side. We'd be open to either what we're proposing is taking on the trees that are on the grade, planting new trees on our property and leaving the fence as is. Like I said, we'd be open to whatever the best solution is to resolve the trees and the fence together. Thank you so much for that. Tom and then Janet. So that was actually my question about the recommendation for trees to be on the cemetery side and then Kyle's proposal for trees on their side of the fence I was just interested in Kyle's response to the conundrum there and he just answered that question so I'm okay. Okay. Janet and then Doug. I would, I would like to talk a little bit about what the percentage of retail or commercial or professional spacer is out front vis-a-vis the rest of the building. Because it looks, I know it's gotten bigger, but I don't have a handle on what the footprint of the whole building is do you know the percentage of space available for retail there. Yeah, retail is 2200 square feet. That is this blue portion that wraps to the south now and the back of house which will be bathrooms kitchen back house. So that's 2200 square feet. Okay, but what's the footprint of the whole building I'm sorry, not being clear. So I'm trying to figure out what the percentage is because I think I have from Mr. Bachleman or Christine or the planning department that they're saying it's going to be 13% maybe it's bigger now. And I was comparing it to other recent larger buildings like one university drive south where it's 39% Kendrick place is 42%. I think the percentage of the house pleasant is 35%. So can, can you, I mean, we don't have to answer it right now but I'm wondering about what the percentage is. I would say we have, we have put retail on 100% of our street frontage. Yeah, but you're not actually answering my question. I mean, so, so, you know, one of the, I think, I think that the reality of this site is that it is 80 feet wide and 300 feet long. Okay, I can do that. If there was retail to be placed, we're not going to place retail back on the cemetery, because we're not going to be able to rent it. Mr. Mr Wilson, I don't really want to argue but I'm just asking a simple question like what is the percentage of the footprint dedicated to retail I don't know why. I mean, it's all I'm asking. Yeah, Kyle just so you know, we have this mixed use building bylaw that we've been discussing and we've been talking about like 40% retail on the first floor and some minimum standards so that's why we're kind of hung up on the percentage. And I appreciate that I'm not trying to be argumentative. I'm trying to highlight that when those numbers are, are, are pulled out and try and we're seeking to justify whether it should be 10 or 40 or 70. It has to recognize the existing condition. The areas where mixed use are allowed is BG, BG, the parcels in BG are shaped like this. I don't want to interrupt you but, you know, I just I know all this and, and it sounds like you don't want to increase it and you're giving an argument for why not I'm just wondering what is the percentage of retail on this building. And I'm not trying to be obtuse I just have never calculated the percentage relative to the, the building and I think that per the coverage is, you know this this the square foot footage of the ground for is one thing if you're going to the outside of this wall here. Right, it's another thing if you're going to the outside of the second floor which is, which is, which is larger so I have not done the calculations for those. I mean, look at the building, you know the percentage of the building, I believe not the site of all five floors. I just wanted to say that we have that information, I don't have access to it right now but I'd be happy to send it to the planning board tomorrow. Thank you, Chris. Thanks. Janet you're good for now. You know, so we had talked a lot about this at our last meeting about mixed use buildings and what percentages and I had mentioned in 2016. The planning board had brought to town meeting with the planning department with the approval of the select board, a proof and a requirement of 60% non residential space on the first floor and I read the planning boards report to town meeting and it was very persuasive. So, and I know that more recently the planning department is recommending 40%. And so, I think that, you know, the reason we have a BG, a downtown is basically for business and commercial people to come visit to visit museums to eat and all those things and so the piece of mixed use buildings is, you know you get to do all that on the first floor, at least on the first floor, but you bring in some residential units and the gift that the get is a lot of density that you wouldn't get elsewhere. And so my question is, is this enough and so at our last time we talked about this under, you know, three of the five, you know, permits. You know, it seemed like a lot of the planning board members were thinking it's not big enough. And then we talked about having smaller stores or, you know, kind of a mall, like a little mall or something and, you know, this building itself is replacing I think, at least three maybe five I can't remember little businesses, and the other buildings have replaced 12 or 15 and so we have a decreasing amount of small shops downtown. And to me yesterday who works downtown there's no reason to come here. You know, there's not that much to do and so I'm wondering is, you know, the, the north side of this building has, you know, is, there's people coming back and forth it's near pray street it's got a big facade. There's going to be a lot of people in the building. There's a lot of people, you know, and so the whole idea is, let's give them something to do places to shop and, and know that. I mean, it seems pleasant street hasn't been very successful in renting a fairly large, you know, retail space, but, you know, downtown is pretty all the little shops are pretty full I mean there's very rarely have the problem that north Hampton does so I'm wondering, do we need to see more here could you shrink the lobby or move things are around a little bit more with, and that that's my observation and my concern is, we're just losing more and more places for people to, to have and if someone if someone says retail is dead. I'm going to I have to say yesterday, I drove down route nine from college street motors to reliable or reliance auto and there were 37 businesses there. They're all small. Maybe the biggest is Florence savings bank. All you know there was one empty storefront I think there's, you know, retail is not dead small shops are not dead they just need places to be. Doug. Okay. So Kyle, since you've told us how many beds. This revised plan have I need to just say that I am sorry that in the revision we've lost 20 beds. You know, if, if the inclusionary zoning was in part, a reaction to this. I'm sorry that by gaining 11 affordable units, or we've lost an overall of 20 beds. Then second of all, is it right on that along the east side this building would align with one East pleasant's frontage against the cemetery or not. It would be further back now, it'll be 10 feet instead of 5 feet. So one East pleasant is only five feet back. One East pleasant is correct in the same location that the carer shops were with the existing barrel. Okay. All right, there was a, there was a note on one of the site plans that said align. And that made me think they were the same. And that was the intent on the original submission. Okay. I hope there wasn't a note that was left that still set a line because that's not the intent. Yeah, I thought it did say it on what I'm, yeah, on PR zero dash zero one. If you go back to two drawings. Still has the align pointing to five feet instead 10 feet. So that note is incorrect. Okay. All right, good. That's why it points to the middle of the tree instead of the building. All right. First floor studios since they are on the floor with the highest floor to floor height. Are they loftable or is that not quite the case? I bet they could be loftable. We have not investigated lofting those. There's a lot of building code issues that we have not again. So I think these would, you know, you'd have an 11 and a half foot ceiling. You know, slightly larger studio on the ground floor. I noticed that there's a ramp at the entrance to the hallway with the studios. Why is that happening? Because this grade out here has to be met. And this grade changes as it goes back. It stays pretty level of 288 it goes up to 289. And then back here at the cemetery is 293 five. And that starts to grow up. So the other benefit of that is you kind of go up as you go from the public to the residential. Does that mean that the, let's say the windows sill for those studios is going to be a little bit elevated beyond grade on the south side. So the window sill, the slab height on the ground floor will be higher in the residential than it is in the non-residential. The grade out here on the south side is 293, 292 and a half, something like that. So the grade is higher than the slab in here. But the window sill is I think at 30 inches in the ground floor and then the windows are very tall. All right, well, I guess I was hoping that the grade was lower than the slab elevation. Yeah, and that's just trying to make all the grades work on all four or five sides of this building. Okay. Then my next question, maybe is a question for Chris or Rob. How do we calculate the building height for the purposes of these special permits or waivers for building height? And the reason I'm asking is, when I look at the elevations, the highest elevation I'm seeing is 57 feet. And as I go around the building, because the grade increases as I go from west to east, the height is lower at the east end. And every time that I've had to calculate a building height from a point of view of a building code compliance, we use the average height, you know, all the way around the building. The building height is actually not 57 feet. It's probably something closer to 55 feet. If you use that approach. Yep, we've just defined it through how height is defined in the Amherst by law, which is, you know, street side of the structure. Okay, grade. The bylaw calls for the street elevation as the measurement to use. Right. And in a building where the grade at the street is not the, is the lowest grade on site, then yeah, the building does not measure 57 feet from grade to top a parapet on the cemetery side or back on the south side. Yeah. Okay. But for the bylaws 57. Right. And then I will sort of echo what Maria said I am, I do actually like the retail. And I'm glad to see that there's a large edge. Particulation with the setback that's not parallel to the street. And I'm glad to see that you have somewhat increased the retail area of the building. And then lastly, we saw Chris, we saw some correspondence today from Janet and at least one public member of the public about the reconstruction of the building. And I'm glad to see that there's a large edge. Reconstructing the building and using that as the justification for a setback that's not 20 feet. I wonder if you could talk to us about how historically that section of the bylaws been interpreted. When, you know, when you're. And whether it's historically been consistent that we. And build something entirely new. May I answer that. Yeah, please. So two things. And Rob more is also here in the, in the wings. So he might be called upon to answer too, but. We do have one example that we could immediately bring to mind, which is the zoning board of appeals recently approved. Pretty much the same scenario on North pleasant street. We have a property that had a veterinarian's office that is now being torn down and is going to become a house. And the house is taking advantage of the setback that the veterinarian's office experienced or had. And that is a zoning board of appeals case that's fairly recent. I also spoke to our town attorney Joel Bard this evening about this issue. And he said, this is a common occurrence throughout the Boston area, the Boston suburban area, where there are buildings houses, particularly that are in lots that may not be conforming to current zoning requirements. And there's a sort of, what do you call it syndrome or something like that. I can't word doesn't come to mind, but there's a fact that there are tear downs in these areas and they tear down small, you know, ranch houses and capes and they build much larger houses and in particularly, you know, he mentioned Weston as one particular place where this happens but there could be a small lot where a small ranch existed and the lot is undersized. And the person who purchases the property takes advantage of the nonconformity of that lot to build a larger house. And so Joel Bard thinks this is a common use of this nonconformity I believe it's talked about. I certainly talked about in chapter 40 a and what section of chapter 40 a, I think it's section five, but I'm not absolutely sure and anybody who wants to know can be in touch with me tomorrow about that. So anyway, nonconformities are talked about in chapter 40 a and Joel says that this is a common practice in the eastern part of the state. So I'm going to take advantage of a nonconformity and tear the building down and build something new. So that, that's the extent of my conversation with him. Hey Chris on my only comment is I believe it's 48 section six. Thank you. Okay. Thanks Chris. And then I guess the last thing I'll say. I think maybe we ought to talk a little bit about the street frontage and the public space or the right away in front of this building. And whether we as a board would like to impose some conditions that might talk about the extent of sidewalk reconstruction and whether there's any other amenities, you know, like a bike rack or benches that we might want to use archipelago to install on the right away. You know, I'll just say I would support trying to develop that to be the kind of streetscape we want from in the right away. Thank you. Thank you Doug. What are the board feeling in terms of taking a break here it's it's at eight o'clock. Keep it pretty short. Yeah. I'm going to take a break so 811, we can come back so just turn your video off and mute, and we'll see in five minutes. So, we need Tom, but Pam. Yes, we just reconvene. Yes, it's 11. I don't, I don't see Tom yet, but I see Chris has her hand raised. Okay, Chris. So I just wanted to say that I found the information about the percentage of the building that's proposed at 11 and 13 East Pleasant Street, the percentage that was calculated by building commissioner, based on the drawings that we have. It's probably not, you know, accurate to the exact square footage but anyway, what he calculated was 13% of the ground floor is retail space, proposed retail space. Yeah, I guess, I wonder from a practical standpoint, you know when you have residential and you need, you know, lobbies and elevators and utility things that, you know, wanting it to 40% is a is actually a good number, but I don't know if you want to get into this right now but I can give you some examples of other buildings. One you drive south is 39% non residential 462 Main Street is only 9% non residential. 26 spring street is 12%. 70 University Drive is 2%. The number of buildings I got exactly is 35%. And we think that Kendrick place is 42%. So those, it's a wide range and I can. If you wanted to look at this, this is in a memo that the town manager sent to the town council on well for their, for their meeting that occurred on the 28th of June. So anyway, that's available there and how did parking figure into that. Is that considered that was not including any kind of parking calculation. Okay, leave. Well, it might have been for one East pleasant. Yeah, because one East pleasant does have parking on the ground floor. So I can't say for sure on one East pleasant place because that also has parking on the ground floor. And the draft makes these building how is parking considered is it part of the commercial retail sector or something. It's part of the 60% that's being non residential non resident. Okay. Very good. Doug. Yeah, Doug. Yeah, I just wanted to say I assume we can continue this conversation. We, when we talk about these, the zoning amendments more. Yep. So, you know, I'd love to get into, but I would like to hear from Kyle. You know, I think, you know, we have that building that that is occupied used to be occupied by Barts, where, you know, there's really it's a really deep footprint. And you have to go down the side of the building to access the, the pita pockets place and some of the other things along the side there. You know, if, if we had a 40% requirement, would you would you start running your retail down the north side of this building as an access because because I agree with you you don't want to have a really narrow deep footprint without very much street frontage. So, that's my question. Yeah, I was thinking the same thing, Doug, actually. So, I could answer that briefly. Please. I think that. I think that we have to be cautious of 40% to drive or 60% or something to drive the conversation. I think that's happened in Amherst elsewhere. I think we have empty real, you know, retail, because of it. And I think that it's a, I think that, as I was saying earlier that the very unique sites in downtown in the BG district for them to be successful from a retail standpoint, if they're always dealing with the curb cut for parking, and they're always, you know, dealing with, with other items it's going to be difficult for them to really be successful so if, if 40% was imposed, we would be building retail space that would be very difficult to lease. So the planning board would be saying, please build this retail space that may end up being empty for a while, but it's retail. And I think that's, I think that's that that would be the concern I would have with any bylaw that just puts a blanket amount on it. If the intent of the bylaws to make sure it's not an ATM on the ground floor, I understand that if the intent on the bylaws try to recognize new reality of retail, and I agree with Janet it's not dead, it's just different. And I think there should probably be some more flexibility to it, and, and try to come at it from a way where if you're looking at a site like this that's only 80 feet wide 300 feet deep. And you're saying, could you do something like, like barts, or is that not allowable right now per bylaw, right, is that not, you know with egress and access would you not be able to do that. So, I don't think additional retail beyond the 2200 we've proposed here would be successful retail. Thank you Kyle, Janet please. So, Doug, I'm glad you said that because that reminds me of pita pockets and Pandora East and then also all those funky little stores in the carriage shops that were hard to get to they weren't seen from the street. And actually cousins market isn't the same thing in the nail place like those are places that were really, you know, kind of not easy to see but they were businesses that you know, you know we're thriving Amherst music all those places that I used to go. And so I think that actually is an idea to like to do a little line of shops along that north side, because it's also kind of me that that's a good idea that's all I wanted to say. I wanted to jump back to 9.22 and sadly chapter 40 a section six and so I appreciate the comments from Attorney Bard, but surely he knows that residential, you know, homes one and two family homes get treated differently than non residential homes by the bylaw so that that idea of the tear down and the standards for that are different from what we're faced with here and so I have to say it's kind of interesting to me because Mr. Mr. Burowski I think is on this call is that I have been reading his book. And I've been looking at some of the cases, and I've been reading our bylaw, and I've been reading the state statute and I think this is a really, there isn't really a history of interpretation by the planning board of this. And, you know, I can't speak to, you know, turning a vets office into a home because maybe that kicks off the other section. So I don't want to talk about something I don't have it looked at. I also don't want to offer like a hard legal opinion, but I can't see how it seems to me that either archipelago has to go to the ZBA for a variance, or they have to have a 20 foot rear setback and I don't see how they really get out of that. Well, these are two small buildings that are being completely torn down. They're not being reconstructed in any way. And the pictures that I sent to the planning board and of if Pam can pull those up. You know, I have pictures from the front and from the back. And then when you look at this new building there's nothing left it's not like they rebuilt that funky little cousins market. They're not rebuilding the Piper little sweet little Piper building. You know, there's nothing, there's, I don't know where that those buildings are they're not being reconstructed they're not being expanded. They're not there anymore. There's not even a wall being saved and so I think that. And not only that they're not even replicating the non conformity they're actually pushing it closer to the cemetery and a lot of spots and so I think, I think legally I see them either going to the ZBA with a variance or coming, you know, sticking to the 20 foot rear setback. And here's the benefits of the rear setback is it will buffer the cemetery. And it will, it will, and which is what the historical commission wants. It will provide some more drainage more space for the trees, and it can be that outdoor space recreational space for the tenants that really, you know, isn't being really met. And, you know, so you can be really nice space for everybody, and it will be complying with the bylaw in the state law and so, um, you know, I've sent my my memo around to people. I think this issue, we have to look at and find out more and so I would ask that we need a legal memo from Mr Bard or an outside council or somebody telling us like, what is the law. What are the standards. What is the, what are the cases say, because I'm looking at cases where like, when they talk about increasing the non conformity they're looking at like two more feet on a garage, you know, and they're talking about the percentage you know it's just it's it's very exacting it's very case specific. But if you look at these pictures, which I can't quite see. I can see like the edge of something Pam. Oh no. Oh, thank you. Thank you. I can see that. So, you know, this, you know, the line, the line of non conformity for, you know, from the real line, the court would really look at and we have we need to really look at it. You know, Pam almost seeing is kind of like the, the right hand edge of things is anybody else in that situation. No, I see the whole thing. Okay, see the whole picture. I'm just looking at the cousins. Yeah. And so then it you know so I think there's a big legal issue in here. I don't want kind of a, I think we just need to get it basically a good memo on it that lays out the law lays out the cases lays out the legal standard and I'm sure we're bright enough to apply it to the situation. I just don't see how they get away from it looking at, you know, the cases cited by Mr. Bavowski and his thing I've looked up some of those. I just think they're, that's where we are. Yeah, Janet on that I, I'm just looking at your memo. The other thing is is that the non conformity is you know that little jagged line. If you look at what is it the, the pre and post lot development, you can see why the new building is overall closer to the line. And also when you, when you look at it realize it's going up it's not just one story with this funky. It's like a pipe or you know brick fireplace, it's, it's five stories high. And so that's very significant. It's, you know, the lot, the, the, the line of the building is generally closer than the current non conformity, kind of a big no no. I mentioned the alterations need to comply with the bylaw, otherwise get a variance I mean that's, you know I'm looking at, you know Mr. Barowski's textbook and the cases. So I'm not sure how they get out I mean I think I kind of, you know, I don't know how they get out of this conundrum, but I see the benefits of a 20 foot setback. It would benefit to the tenants will be benefit drainage it'll be better place for plantings. The benefit to me is that we're actually implementing the bylaw and the state law as it's written. And I can't speak to how you know the ZBA might have done it in different case without knowing the facts and the details of that. But I don't, I don't think there's a historical, you know, history of us doing this interpretation, but I want us to do it right. Yeah, I'm just just want to refer to your memo. And it says like section 9.2 does allow a non confirmed building to be structurally blah blah blah reconstructed, which is probably the closest thing that, you know, would align with with the project, provided that the authority that's us finds that that it's not substantially more detrimental to the neighborhood than the existing one and then you can look at the existing situation. Sure, sure, let me finish. Sure, it's going to increase five stories but look, look at at the stat, the state of the buildings right now. Back there it is an I saw. So, that kind of happens. That's what goes through my mind. If it's not reconstruction this building is not being reconstructed. You don't go on. Well what does that mean reconstructed. You know rebuilding it. Yeah, well, that never happened you you build a new building if you're reconstructing it. It's, it's not. They're tearing down two buildings, and they're putting on new construct and trying to kind of say okay we're going to hang on the other non conformity we reconstructed these buildings that we can't see identified we can't see the, any, we don't see the non conformity left. And they're like no no, you know we can, we can do that I just don't see how they get there I don't see the cases and I don't see the law. I see your point that they're kind of junkie. Yeah, of course, but that that's the whole thing they can tear it down and build a new construction but they have to be 20 foot off 20 feet off the residential district. That's it. Doug, you have your hand up. Yeah, I had it up up and then down and then up and then down. I wasn't sure whether I would say anything but you know I think I do wonder though if we took a more narrow view of reconstruction, whether we might end up with people say leaving to leaving the exterior wall along the east side of this property, and then building four stories on top of it. So that you know there's a sort of vestigial remnant of the original building, just to meet the narrow, you know, interpretation of what it means to reconstruct. Maybe if people say you've got to have some of the original building remaining. Well then they'll leave a wall or a foundation or something, and then just build around it. So, and I'm not sure that's really the kind of practical result that we would really want. And so, I mean I agree with Janet we ought to have a clear opinion about this topic before we make any sort of act. Any point Doug. Tom you had your hand up. And then Janet. Sure. My comment was kind of exactly the same as Doug so I took it down in regard to that but you know I mean is the solution is what we want some vestige of what's here now with something added to it or do we are we interested in something that's better for the site and for for the I guess my question was in line with Doug's kind of what's the end goal here in terms of improving a particular place from x, y and z perspective. But I mean I agree I agree with with Doug and with Janet we have to look at it I think in more depth but I also think we need to think about what our end goals are, and that keeping, you know this chunk of wall that we see here with some trash on it and not touching it isn't improving anything in that area. So I think we need to think about what the what the eventual outcomes are going to be great Janet. First of all, nobody has to leave their property with trash on it anyway, but that's that's not the that's not the legal that's not the law like Oh does it look better to be feel better about it. You know I could cite cases where they're like, you know what does reconstruction mean, well, it means what it says is this building being rebuilt, you know plain meaning of the words they're having you know normal applications. And so we might want thinking oh we like this building we want it here. Let's ignore the law, but you know there's case after case after case. And the Supreme Judicial Court is looking at that saying, is this an alteration, you know, and they're literally saying like okay, they reconstructed this and they added some more that's okay. Or no they went to like 60 units from a hotel to something else that's not okay. And so we have to follow the law. And so, if we're end gaming and saying well we want to get to our results so we're just going to twist everything to that. I'm not there. And I don't think the planning board can be there. It's, we can't go there, we have to apply the state law, we have to apply our bylaw. And then even if, even if you said this is reconstruction, then you have to ask the question is, you know, is this substantially more detrimental to the neighborhood and so here we have the Historical Commission saying we really prefer 20 feet. You can look at these buildings side by side and see how they're really have almost no impact on the historic cemetery. And, you know, the people in it the people buried in it the visitors. And then you can look at a five story but what a five story building looks like, and you could say, is that substantially more detrimental, and you could answer that yes. You could have someone come in and say, you know, one story closer line is maybe okay but five stories is not and so these cases go like this over and over and over again and I think I don't want Joe Bards opinion I want him to explain to the planning board. What the law says what does the statute say what are the standards, what are the cases say, and then we can figure out how we apply it. I mean I think we have that muscle in ourselves. And we want to hear from Rob. At this time because I know he was instrumental in the early review of this. Is he is he in the audience is there. Pam would have to move him in to be a panelist if he wanted to say something. Yeah I don't want to twist your arm Rob but he's got his hand up. Okay. He's got to move him. He should be coming over. There he is. We can we have Dorothy Pam and Pam Rooney to mute their microphones because we're getting a lot of sound. They're still in there. Or move them back to the public. It's just Pam that has her microphone. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Rob more building commissioner. So yeah, good, good conversation going on here about what meet what is reconstruction. Both the state law 48 section six and our bylaw don't define that. You certainly can find in situations and bylaws across the state where tear downs and rebuild are addressed in this manner. So that's the word reconstruction. What's interesting is that our bylaw does say that you can add four stories on top of the one story building that's there through this path. So, you know, our feeling has been that reconstruction could be tear down rebuild. We don't have a lot of examples of it. The one that Christine mentioned across the street is the first that I could think of that the zoning board has granted in recent years. There isn't one in two family that isn't say parking lot expansion or a lot coverage or building coverage related. But in any of those cases that we have dealt with. In most of those situations, in fact, the end result is not the same as what the beginning was. So we have it applied in that manner. So I think it's, it's really what you think reconstruction is absent any particular meaning. And my senses is that's what, what the, the, the study from Joel Bart will give you is that, you know, he's pointing the cases in Western, I worked in Western. I know exactly what he's talking about. He's talking about houses being torn down that are close to the site setback being rebuilt, much larger, utilizing that setback that read that reduced setback and that happened all the time there. And I think those are the types of examples that he's going to find, but we don't have, we don't have examples here that we've applied this to other than that first, that first case, North Pleasant Street. What I want, excuse me, one East Pleasant Street where there's a five foot, you know, the carriage shops is also five foot. So it's, yeah, Jack, what's interesting about that one is our bylaws changed in recent years. And there used to be an opportunity in table three with a footnote for the planning board to modify that setback. And that was lost when what a number of the footnotes were removed from table three, and this text and moved into this text. And, and the, the ability to waver modify that 20 foot dimension doesn't exist anymore. And it was there when one East Pleasant Street was applied for. Great. Thank you so much Rob would you hang on in place anybody has questions at Chris. No, I'm sorry. Okay. All right. Looks like we could move on to public comment. I see no other hands from the board. All right. So we'll open up to public comment on this on this. On these hearings, and I see Dorothy Pam and then Pam Rooney, and then Hilda Greenbaum. Yep. Three minutes that your name and an address please Dorothy. Okay, Dorothy Pam 229 Amity Street. I'll start with something nice. I like the corner bedroom apartments. I think that gives a flexibility to the building that some of the buildings don't have, in that it could be a family apartment. I am a little concerned about the side entrance purely from the female point of view. It could be a little bit scary at night, a place where somebody could be lurking to jump at you. But I assume you'll have cameras on that on that spot. I am confused by the big space that you have on the north side because that was originally where you're going to have cars coming in to parking on the first floor. So I'm wondering why you have that much big space so that when Janet said, maybe move the whole building back just a little bit and scrunch up that space. It seemed reasonable to me, but I'm, you know, I am concerned that you have no thought of some space outside of the building for parking. I believe that the policy of town permits. They're not going to be $25 a year very soon. So, that's something that I've talked about by a lot of people on the council. And the question of the 20 foot setback from the cemetery. I think that's really very crucial because there's been just a lot of wonderful things that have been happening with the cemetery and with the town. It's a sacred space in town. And, you know, I the whole reconstruction argument, I can see how that can be played really strangely but I agree, what was there, maybe not as good looking as what you're going to do. But then, if you build something new, you're not reconstructing and then you're not entitled to keeping the non conformity. I mean, of course you can build something new, but the whole ideal was, since there was something that you're not reconstructing that we can keep the non conformity. I think that gets a little bit specious. So, the, the, my, the image I have is, you know, the, at the end of death of the salesman. We've had all these scenes with Willie Lohman in the house and the yard and the boys doing their things. And this is seen near the end where the house is this looks like a little teeny thing, and it's worked by all these big buildings that have moved in and cast shadows on it. And the idea of that kind of happening over the cemetery, being dwarfed and shadowed by the buildings is kind of strong. So I'm really speaking strongly in favor of the 20 foot setback. I think you guys have been really working on improving your design. You know, I really do applaud you for it, but just to, as a gift to the town, don't try to take everything you think you can get, keep the 20 foot setback, and a lot of people will be a lot happier. So that's it. Thank you Dorothy. Pam, please. Pam Rooney state your name and address. You have three minutes. Hi Pam Rooney 42 cottage street thanks very much. I spoke strongly to the 20 foot setback and I would strongly support that. I think that's the appropriate dimension to maintain. I have not heard the archipelago group talk any talk and address any of the issues or concerns that were raised about safety during construction, and just some of the logistics. I would also like to ask people for them to explain how they're going to deal with 15 north of 15 East pleasant street, aka pray street, and how that flow of traffic is going to occur. I would also ask if the planning board can please ask for some pretty decent street amenities and street tree plans because I think we're. I've heard Mr. Wilson say a couple times, we'll do what the town asks for but I would like to actually, let's get a straw let's get a straw man out there so that people can react to it I think one of the, one of the absolute flaws of one East pleasant street is the pathetic street scape and the really subpar landscaping that was put in and I think they need to convince the town that they're doing the right thing on this next project. So I think it'd be really helpful to have something in in writing to show what they propose at least for the curb to front of building. Some of the some logistics some of the landscape plans, and also a discussion by the planning board of how they what they think the best solution is for the cemetery fence the cemetery tree planting and and or the archipelago tree planting and and just get that settled before it goes too much further. Thank you. Thank you so much for your time. Hilda Greenbaum then Elizabeth Verling held a state your name and address please. I held up. negotiating here because the developers are asking for a lot of things held that you just state your name and address just. I'm sorry about that. So I am also several things I'd like to mention but one is, I think the 20 foot set back to the 1713 cemetery is absolutely essential to protect that historic resource. A lot of people come to this town to visit those graves, particularly Emily's grave. There are constant pilgrims that come to leave the stones there. And so I was also at the hearing for the new sign that was made, I haven't seen the sign yet but I saw the designer view board hearing on the side to the cemetery and I was appalled at the weeds and the lack of maintenance on one east pleasant street by the mural. Yes, you did save but it looks horrible, especially for tourists who come here to visit the cemetery. So make sure that I think the 20 set foot set back to mall and back there and cut the weeds down so that it doesn't look so disgusting. And then the other the other big thing given as Jenna brought up the number of small businesses that we have lost. Due to the construction at 1111 and now 13 East pleasant street. I think that those five studios and perhaps even the two bedroom south side of that building which are probably a good part of the year in shadow from the building to the south. And since those look into the garage parking area of the building to the south. I think that really you ought to negotiate that those ought to be rented out for commercial use to give a place to the small businesses that were lost. And I think that you can negotiate that if they want the extra height they want an extra so these are all things that are on the table to fence the trees, those five building five studios there with 12 with ceilings, but very, very easily be small shops. There's a lot of applause that people can access to and I really think you got to do some hot head knocking together and give something that the town could use, and not just people who own, you know, the building from out of town, you know, making their investments here but the investment that benefits us to. And right now there's very little reason for me to go downtown other than I have my head down or have a Chinese meal. That's it. And we need to bring back all these little businesses that used to be drivers of our economy and think what may be a million dollars taxes now if we have more now downtown left people want to go to could actually not be 3 million and two years from now but it could be down to 200,000 if we're not careful how we develop in a 12 month economy that's what I want to say. Thank you Hilda. And Elizabeth Verlum. State your name and an address please. Okay, can you hear me. Okay, yes, Elizabeth Verling 36 cottage street. And I just wanted to address two things that I feel I haven't heard enough spoken about and one was there was a discussion at a past meeting about having conformity of setback from the street. And I note that the way this building is proposed it conforms with setback to one is pleasant and to the people's bank. I think there's been a lot of discontent about the setback of one is pleasant and the streetscape and having a five story building at that setback doesn't really allow for mature shade trees that mitigate climate change etc. And people's bank is only a one story building which is a much different effect on setback. In contrast, if you go further down the street to the spoke, or to the former obtuse the setback from the street is farther, and I would much rather see that be the standard for this setback at this part of town, across from a nice brick, then setback that's right up against the sidewalk. So I would rather see the standard be set for a conforming setback be to the part of cheese and to the spoke for the setback. If we're going to have a five story building, then to one is pleasant, and the little tiny one story people's bank. That I think would allow for a mature street tree that otherwise is not really going to be able to grow in this little tiny space that that's going to be between the sidewalk and the street. My second concern is that no one has talked about parking. We're talking about 114 beds, they're going to sit on and obliterate over 30 parking spaces that are now in the space of that building. And so I would like to understand what the thoughts are about that. So thank you. And I see no other hands raised from the public so Kyle would you like to respond to any of those comments. Yeah, sure I can start wherever you're, you're like I think that the the obviously we think that the 10 foot setback on the cemetery side is the best solution. I think anybody advocating for a 20 foot setback needs to understand that that is fewer units, including fewer affordable units. The 10 foot setback is greater than the one he's pleasant setback to the south, and it is greater in many places than the current existing buildings down there. So I think relative to the street side, you know the current bylaw says there is a zero foot minimum front yard setback which we've been hearing to. I think we're trying to accommodate, you know, the efforts as possible that background for while keeping being able to build as many residential units as the site would allow, because that's, that's what we're doing that's why we are building these buildings is to bring the residential downtown by bringing the residential downtown you have the best shot at supporting the businesses that can thrive in 2021 2022 2025. And I think that the residential, the, the residents that we brought downtown in Kendrick and when he's pleasant have helped support the downtown businesses. I think the residents of 11 these pleasant will continue to do that. And I think that I can, I can answer anything else jack that I may have missed. Yeah, I guess, I mean one thing I hadn't really mentioned was was, you know, the parking. I know that you're concerned about the parking in downtown as well long, long, long range. I appreciate that. But I mean when we did the site visit. We saw, you know, quite a few people coming out of one East pleasant street to get into their car which was parked on the, on the subject parcel. So there's going to be, you know, and we've gotten a lot of different mixed messages from developers. We just had a developer that was looking one to one for parking for some residential style apartments there on on College Street. And we have others that that they don't necessarily that came before us but they, we know their apartments out there they have zero parking and they're, they're all full all the, all the apartments are, are rented. But we are losing quite a few, and you've already removed some you remove some from Spring Street as well. And I'm just, I'm just wondering if there's, there's a tipping point here. There's a short term solution that they could ease or, I mean, it, it, you know, it is a complicated one and it's not just your problem it's, it's, you know, the town's problem. I would, I would say this, Jack, that we're happy to be replacing parking lots with housing. But that's housing is what you need downtown. I think housing long term is the thing that's going to drive thriving streetscape. I think that the parking conundrum is something that communities around the country are dealing with. I think if it's a question of will these apartments be rented without parking the answer is absolutely because the demand is so high because Amherst has been so far behind on the housing production that it needs to achieve. So, parking does not determine if the apartment is rented. I think that I think, you know, the municipal parking district that the town implemented in the 50s was extremely progressive. And, you know, the reason that the town approved town meeting approved a five story building instead of four was that same progressive approach, which is understanding that you need to have some density downtown to make it thrive when your downtown is as small as ours is. So, I think that the parking issue is real. I think that parking across the country is going is being questioned because people realize that adding structured parking increases rents, it increases construction costs. It increases rents, we have a rent issue in this town. We have a house price issue in this town, those are going to continue until we build the new units that we need to build. So, we have to choose do you want parking or units. And I think that what we've chosen on this last iteration is the units drive more economic development bring people downtown and are better for, I think what Amherst is trying to do with the municipal parking district. I don't want to be careful here but I'm just throwing it out here because it's bounced around in my head a little bit I mentioned it to Chris but you, you are paving the pub parcel, and I know that's not a long term vision but and that's not part of this project other than a staging area but just wondered if you had any thoughts about making that available. It's a short term sort of thing. And would that, you know, does that make any sense to you as a developer. I think that we have not thought about making that into a parking lot. I think that it is I think that's probably all I want to say there I don't think it's well suited to be a parking lot I think it works very well for construction staging and allowing us to build a complex project in a unique urban, you know, downtown site. But beyond that I don't see that that little tucked in parcel that is the pub is a optimal parking spot behind the laundromat and behind the bank and next to our building. Good. Doug and then Janet. First question for for Kyle. I noticed you said you were going to have a trash compactor. And, and I was noticing that that trash room. The the exterior facade or exterior wall of it is right next to that very narrow walkway with the fight with the bollards along it. I guess I was just puzzled whether, you know, I'm not familiar with whole building trash compactors but I can imagine that the trash once compacted is actually very heavy and potentially large. And, and how do you get the trash out of that room, and down that really narrow north edge of the building to the truck. The trash would come right out, and it would fit in between the bollards and the building. So the compactors are not it's not like something you'd see at UMass they're, you know, a smaller thing that can get picked up and tossed is not like the big ones that are currently behind the cousin's market right now. So they can fit in that location. All right. So FedEx think was a lot of buildings like this would at least have a place for a delivery van for FedEx and Amazon to to park for a short time when they're making deliveries to the building. You know, have you thought about, I mean your site plan doesn't show any delivery short term parking. Yeah, you know it doesn't show any ADA parking. You know, how do you, how do you comply with those things. Well that's that's stuff we've we've gone through with Spring Street in the past. Right, if you're not, if you're not providing parking. You know what does that mean. I think we've resolved those I think in this case we have an easement that serves this parcel that serves other parcels that is available to us and I think would be our would be used as our delivery and pickup location. Okay. And then last I guess this is a question for Chris. You know, a lot of a lot of the public comment has urged us to increase the setback along the street edge. And, and I guess my question is, would we have the authority to increase to require archipelago to increase the setback along East Pleasant Street, beyond what is stated as the requirement in our bylaw. Chris, you're on mute. Yes, you have the authority to ask for that archipelago is asking you for special permits they're asking for an increase in height. They're asking for a lessening of the side setback on the north side of the building and they're asking for a change to the setback on on the east side of the building so you can negotiate with them about things that you want in exchange for things that they want it's a conversation. And I think that that's perfectly reasonable to do that. Thank you. Thanks. Janet. Doug, I'm super excited by that question. Because when I sent out the, you know, standards, the permit, the zoning bylaw, you know, the site plan review bylaw permit requirements and special permit index design review. So section 10.4 of our bylaw allows gives the planning board the power to impose conditions right we do this all the time. We can change the setback the site in rear yards greater than the minimum required by the bylaw, you know, we can, we can do we can limit the size and the number of occupants the method and time of occupation occupation so the planning board actually has the power to do that and, you know, I think it's probably best practice to negotiate and work it out. But we could at some point just say, you know, you wanted 10 feet, you know, five feet and, you know, and we think that's too narrow. So I'm going to set that at eight feet, you know, on the, you know, the side setback and things like that. So, you know, and obviously you don't want to put something in that's going to cripple the building but also I think we're trying to do is make it a better building with different interests than the developer. But so I just want to say that but actually I have a question that's the first question that Jack asked, which is, I was trying to figure out who owns the building, like who owns it now, and who will own it. I went on to the property card, and it was Summerlin Trust, who is owned, I went on to the state website. And that's somebody who lives on an island in South Carolina which sounds lovely. And then, so I'm wondering if Mr. Wilson could tell us like, so is, is Mr. Summerlin, who applied for demolition permit for these buildings last year and got it. Is he going to own this building? Are you going to own it is, you know, Harrison Street funding this and going to buy it like what, who, who's the owner of the building because you're looking for a permit but I don't know who's going to own the building. Kyle. Well, Larry Summerlin and his family has owned it for generations. Obviously, Larry Summerlin's a fixture in the community has been here for a while and is now down in South Carolina. Pleasant LLC will own the building. And so that's owned by the Harrison Street. No, that, that, that each project has its own LLC that has its own structure, and on every project, every project is a special purpose LLC. So if I went on to the state corporations website they would tell me who the principles are for that then okay. They would once we buy the building, which we Summerlin Trust currently owns. Okay, thank that's all I wanted to know because I was unclear about that. And then the other question I have is probably not a great topic after me bringing up a whole bunch of not great topics. So, I'm one of these pleasant, you have this good restaurant on one side and there was going to be another restaurant on the other side that for whatever reason, didn't open. I'm just wondering maybe a global pandemic. Yeah, I mean, this I mean I look at North Square and I think, you know, could it be worse and so it's not a criticism but I'm just wondering like, is it the pandemic, is it the problem with the location or it's the person opening the restaurant fell through and you know like what's you know what are some options because the space is built out as a restaurant as I remember right now so the space is empty, the space is empty, and the space received a building permit today for a new, a new establishment on the ground floor. Okay, so it was built that as a restaurant at one point. It's not built out empty. Okay, maybe I just maybe I was looking at the wrong restaurant. Okay, thank you. So there is sushi is obviously operating and in operation. So maybe I was peering through the wrong window so that's great so there's something coming in then that's great to hear. That's my question. Thank you. Maria please. Can we talk about that right away. Is it too early in the process as far as discussing the town improvements. Sorry, the improvements to the town property and the sidewall. Maybe that's a question for Chris or Rob, as far as this project and that process. I don't think it's too early now I think this is a good time to talk about it. Okay, so I guess I assume we're continuing because we're waiting on a few things like photometrics and fire department went up so could we request like, I mean, would that be something that archipelago's designers present something or that's something that is a collaboration between the town and like how do we have something to respond to as far as you know the right of way improvements. I think archipelago should present something. I think relying on the DPW at this point they're very busy to come up with a design is not. It's not going to be timely so yes archipelago can present something and you can respond to it. I think I've shown the crosswalk already is that too much of an ask for what next time we meet to get some sort of proposal on on that portion of the project. We, we are obviously more than willing to propose improvements, I think that what we found in the past is that that process of approving those improvements has delayed our building permit which is negatively impacted impacted in the past. So what we've tried to do with this project is say we would love to support whatever improvements need to occur on the east side at the cemetery on the west side at the street and then come up with some vehicle where all of the interested parties that want to climb on that and determine what should go out there and where what does she look like and what height and material and all that stuff can occur outside of the process of us trying to build the building and get a building permit and and proceed with it so I have no problem presenting it we've chosen not to we'd like to continue to choose not to and say come up with some vehicle to say whatever the town comes up with. Build that for you and and be outside of that conversation so that we are not the ones leading that and so that those improvements can occur outside of the critical timing to try and get a building like this bill. If you don't mind, Jack, I think it would be great to call on Rob because he's the one who has to kind of see a project through to the end. And I know he's had a lot of trouble in the past getting developers to do what they say they're going to do, particularly with regard to right of way issues so Rob may have some words of wisdom on this. Thank you, Rob. Yeah, I guess my suggestion or response to Kyle's thought there is that perhaps the conditions that have been troubling for him in the past to have the permit issued the building permits issued. In a, in a timely manner according to a schedule might be the way we address that rather than just saying, let's not include it right now because I think, for at least from what I've heard so far there are issues that have to be resolved. The really small simple one is, where's the bike rack going to go. And if we don't address that now or have the developer address that now, potentially in the right of way. Perhaps there's no choice but to say, make more room in front of your building so that you can put your bike rack there which is what we're designing now. So it seems like, and that's just one of the issues it seems like I'd rather, I'd suggest rather see that the developer work on that area, and we try to craft a condition that doesn't cause whatever problem, the conditions have caused in the past. Kyle, just, I just, I have a side question then you can respond but there's no internal bike storage within the building right now. There is okay I thought so all right. All right, so yeah, you respond wrong. I appreciate that I think if we could resolve it in a way that's not tied to the issuance of the building permit it will allow us to do all things we have to do to get open, I think that in terms of deciding the design that goes out there. Is there some way for us to not be the only leader of that. And so that, is there a bond or something that we could issue that that that says we are, you know, going to pay X number of dollars towards whatever improvements are finalized through whatever committees and conversations and meetings and second meetings and fifth meetings that have to occur to finalize stuff. Probably I would say yeah. Yeah. Robin I can think about what would be an appropriate condition to work this out. And I'd be open to that on the east side as well working with Alan snow and, you know, the, you know what we propose is is now keeping the fence where it is pulling the building back planting trees on our side. And I think that's a great idea to read on that. If there's other opinions that that involve moving the fence and putting plants on the other side we'd like to be able to still be able to proceed with the building and not take have those take number of months to finalize every single question before we were potentially be able to proceed. So may I make a suggestion that Kyle meet with Rob and me to work something out. Sounds good. Um, so I wonder if, like, it sounds like Maria had some ideas so I wonder if maybe if people have ideas of what they think that space could be and like what would activate it so you know having a sidewalk and a strip of grass, not so exciting. You know, when I look across the street I see gardens and benches and you know there's a lot of people lingering around and a place for someone to sell their succulents and so Maria do you have specific ideas of what could be there. I wonder if some of the members might want to sit just jump in with some ideas. Maria. I honestly haven't thought hard enough about right now I. So, I'm welcome anyone else. There were some ideas I kind of like. This is not my field of expertise though. Oh, you wanna off the top of my head. Gardens, benches, bike parking. You know, I think they're there's cool stuff you can do with like creating spaces where people hang out that also have architectural elements. I just I think about where we used to live in Munich where there were these like, we're just like cubes. You know, things would bounce on the cubes and you know I don't know that we want to have that right next to the street but I think there are a lot of cool things we could do. Yeah gardens. You know, like that that space in front of Zana and the toy box like they're beautiful perennial gardens and there's you know I think there might even be a chess board up there now or something so there's, you know, I don't know that that's exactly the right spot and there is a park across the way but I think there are some good ideas. And then being in the right away that the town or the bid would end up taking care of that or would that be who would that go to Chris. Who would that be. DPW would take care of it. Yep. Doug. Kyle I was wondering. Would it be feasible in the space that you've configured for retail that that would ever be a food establishment. You're on mute. There could be yes. Okay, so. And I think it's worth thinking about whether you know a lot of the food establishments in town in the last year and a half have found it advantageous to spill out onto the sidewalk. And you know the way things are configured right now there's not very much room for that to happen I guess. I'm just wondering, I'm just wondering, you know, I hate to set back the retail edge because that decreases the square footage of the retail space. But I guess you've got the side entrance but you know your residents are walking up and down that strip. And this could be identical to the space between the sidewalk and the curb at Antonio's. I mean, that was the big granite things in the chains and, and that gets the public as safe as possible out as close to the road as they possibly can. Right. It's not a garden or plantings, right, but it's, it's a more urban, you know, spill out on the streets post COVID outdoor dining situation. Right, so we're open to that as well. We don't have a strong preference we're open to three street trees and a bike rack if the bike storage inside isn't sufficient. We're open to street trees with a type of benching around it if the seating there is found to be appropriate that close to the street and that close to sidewalk. But we don't want to spend a month trying to design all of those elements and specify the granite curbing and the size of the chain. In order to proceed on the building so I'm trying to just come up with a way to have those things run concurrently and we're open to it like if the plan board said hey we want this to look just like for two cheese. Okay, let's do that hey we want it to look just like the improvements around the roundabout at Kendrick place, you know we'd be open to that as well. Okay, well the main the main elements that come to my mind are a bike rack for for visitors to the building whether it's to the residents or to the retail. And then some effort to start to widen the sidewalk in that strip. You know, just to start to say this is going to be a more inhabited sidewalk than just a pure, you know, passage for pedestrians to be keep walking. I think also that the presence of that crosswalk probably complicates efforts to I think the crosswalk complicates efforts to activate that area for a garden or for sitting, but I guess we'll see. I think the crosswalk, you could the seating you could do either side, you could with the crosswalk in its location is driven by the ever source and you know underground stuff on the west side. You could put tree one tree to the south of the crosswalk and two trees to the north. Right and think about where the bike rack goes within that. The tree trees could be all in pavers and there could be granite posts and the chains if we wanted to go for more of an outdoor dining. Everybody aggregate here type of place with a park across the street. Great. Any other comments questions. Yes. I'm open to meeting with Robin Chris so I can do that I think what it seems like to me might be the best approaches to make some to draw something that is a start that sees that that's close enough to allow us to proceed. Right that may have trees associated with it may have a bike rack may have a bench. And, and maybe I'll take that to the meeting with Robin Chris and we can see if we can go from there. Sounds good. Good good. So, I think, oh Chris, would we take public comment again based on what this discussion it's it's on the. It's on the preamble I don't recall that's protocol but Well you did already take public comment. Yeah. So, you know, I think you could just conclude your discussion tonight and then give the developer a list of things that you'd like him to follow up on and I have something that I need to follow up on Joe hard. And then you could determine that you want to continue this public hearing to a date certain. Okay. So should we, we work on that list we've, I know, you know, Doug went over quite a bit, you know with regard to the preliminary decision, or do you want to do, how do you want to handle that because it's there's there's a lot of things. And I'm not the greatest note taker, but Well, I know the things that I have to do. I have to come up with a potential list of conditions and findings. In case you decide that you want to approve this building. I need to contact Joe Bard and ask him to help us to sort out how section 9.22 will be treated or will either support or not support what's being proposed. So the things that I need to do. I think you've asked the developer to come back with a plan for how to treat the the right of way. Yeah. And some of you have asked him for ideas about how to expand the front the area in front of the building to make it more usable. Yeah. Kind of the potential for more retail on the south side of the building potential for more retail on south side, the rear setback going from 10 to 20. I'm asking him to make the setback 20 instead of 10. Are you asking him to think about it? Think about it. Yeah, I think just think about it. Jack just really quick I just want to say once again that a 20 foot setback means fewer units, also fewer affordable units. We could do a straw poll on that particular issue. But I see some hands up Janet and then Doug. So, in terms of like future discussion I've been sort of not talking about like the building look and things like that and it makes sense to me to save that for after the design review board and that will come back to us. So that's a that seems like a huge issue to me. And I know people will differ. But I really so I just wanted to highlight that. Yeah. Overall, I think we've got favorable responses from the from the architects on the on the board here. Also a follow up that meeting for the public for everybody is July 19. That's a Monday from five to 7pm. The design review board. I just want to suggest, can I just make a suggestion that if people have comments that they wanted to make about the way the building looks it might be helpful to make them now, because it might be a while before you get back together and to have the applicant sort of, you know, coming back after a while and then being hit with other things that are problems I think that's going to be difficult so I would. I guess I would suggest that you, you know, state your issues tonight and then the applicant can go away and consider whether he wants to respond to what you've said or have a reason why he's not going to respond to what you said. So anyway, I'll be quiet now. So I'll let you think about that Janet and Doug. All right. For your list I think we also need to hear from the fire department. And then I guess I am generally satisfied with the look of the building. I am. I think in the last meeting where this was the earlier version was discussed. I had some questions about the durability and kind of how the weathering of that would would hold up over time. I guess I still have those concerns but I assume that if you end up having a building that starts to look bad you might do something about it. So I'll leave that really to you. I like the combination of the wood and the zinc. I think the way the facade has been arranged is sort of interesting and inconsistent enough to be, you know, not so boring and regular so I like that. What I was originally going to talk about was whether, you know, my colleagues on the board if everybody's fine with the building being out at a zero setback from the property line along the street. I think just as at the eastern end if we required a larger setback, if we required a larger setback at the western end that's going to reduce the number of units as well. I think given, given my interest in having more housing downtown and the adjacency of one East Pleasant Street and proximity of Kendrick Park. Probably just fine. I think I would accept those zero setback. I did ask about the restaurant and use and if there were a high likelihood of it being a restaurant. I might feel differently that you needed a little more room out there in the front for potential outdoor dining and for people to kind of meet each other and gather before they went into the restaurant. It's not clear that that's really the way this small retail space would be headed. So if anybody has any other comments about the front setback I think that would be that's not dependent on a legal interpretation as the eastern end is. So, we could we could decide that now, if we wanted to. If we wanted to change it. Yeah, so it's it's a zero offset only on the northwest corner, and then but in its recessed on the while the upper floors are out. Yeah, but okay, so it's the mass of the building that I'm talking about. Okay. Kyle you had your hand up and then Janet. I can wait and grab everything. Okay, Janet. And then Maria. It's hard. It's hard for me to give an opinion on the setback. You know, basically I think it should go back but I also think if we're if the front the sidewalk is being used or enlarged. That's going to change my feeling at that and so I don't I don't have a really strong visual sense of what that could look like. Anyway, I'm just going to say the building, the look of the building and so I don't think it would be a surprise to people to hear that. I think that many, many people in town find the other buildings way too big and imposing. And they kind of loom, and they're very tall and they're kind of very same, like the facades are all very the same. And so, and they're very big in comparison to all the other buildings around and you know in the in the area not just in regard to each other but the buildings that are there and across from Kendrick Park in the neighborhood so at the design review board. Some of the members had talked about the blank wall like this just long wall that you're looking at and on both sides. And, and so that got me thinking about how do you break that up and so you know part of the mixed use building standards and the BL. I can't remember the 40 are all talking about like you know you change the contours of the building. I wondered if the building had two colors, like you know the first and second floor one and just to make it look less big. I think smaller windows, not only would make it look less like the same and giant but actually be nicer for the tenants that they could actually have the windows open and not their entire body scene but I also think if they were smaller it would be kind of more interesting to me and be more fitting into the style of local windows. Steve Schreiber had suggested for North Square that it was actually really big for the area and then putting the top floor into kind of a roof and so that that would sort of make it look in kind of, you know, whatever. So that's, I'm thinking about that idea. And I just think that, you know, the building is kind of boxy and overwhelming. And from the sides it just looks like just, you know, it doesn't look like a New England town, but to also make me wonder about, I know you really like the cedar siding and what if it was sideways so it kind of references clabbered more like something to make it look fit not to fit in with its surroundings and stuff to kind of bring it down to a scale. So if you're in the Kender Park, you know, just looking up at these giant facades, and then you're looking at, you know, these beautiful buildings, you know, old colonial buildings, there has to be some way to integrate that and so I think the Design Review Board will be talking about stuff like that but I didn't want to spring it as a surprise in three weeks or something but there's, I mean, it's a general feeling amongst many people that these buildings just kind of pop out and they're too big. I know this building is smaller. But, you know, it didn't, you know, I, how do you make it smaller or feel smaller. For someone standing on the street or looking across the street. We're actually looking at it from the graveyard, like, I took my friends to the graveyard after we went to the Emily Dickens Museum, my Boston friends, and we just turned around and looked at, you know, when he's pleasant and our mouths kind of dropped open and I think that is part of the thing it's just it's just a lot of building, and it's really big and it looks, you know, it's everything about it is big and the same so and I know I'm not an architect and whatever but I'm just, I'm just getting in there and saying what I hear and some of the things I've kind of picked up looking around at other buildings, so thank you. Jana, that's very impressive for not being an architect, I have to say. Just drive around around looking at buildings, I have pictures. Yeah. Maria please. You know, I got out the tricky thing it's very subjective. There's not really right and wrong. But as far as just thinking about as a planner, I'm not a planner but thinking of it in that way. Seeing the perspectives helps show that, you know what they're trying to continue as the street edge and the scale as far as density and massing and I think they've done a nice job of that. On both the street side as well as the long facades which is always a tricky thing to break up and they've done exactly that with the material changes and with the variations in the windows so. It's always misleading to look at exterior elevations to their very abstract they flattened everything once you get a building and three dimensions of shadows and see sort of what is pushing and pulling as far as the facade. It's a completely different look so these long flat elevations always make buildings look very stark so the three dimensional images really help and what was my point. Let's see. Oh, so as far as recommendations. Yes, yeah, make sure that cedar. I think you cry on one of the earlier meetings mentioned something about a different wood species and staying that you're trying out so that's something that would be great because your detail shot shows really lovely siding that would be great to keep. And I appreciate that you didn't just build another brick and stucco. You know this is a different material and but it keeps the same streetscape so. I personally, I'm excited to see it in reality and. I thought I had a more specific point by forgetting it now so but anyways that I think we just wanted to weigh in. Oh, that I remember now. I don't think that we should be encroaching any more on setbacks because we're trying to, as many people said bring more housing downtown and the more we push and pull this building smaller. The more that's, you know, obviously going away so I think at this point, maybe talk more about streetscape about how it interacts with people at the human scale, but we just need as many units as we can get and. Yeah, increasing the setbacks is definitely not the direction to go in, in my opinion. So I think you were trying to do a scroll poll so that that's why I was chiming in with that. Yeah, I mean I, I'm thinking like, if people's bank wasn't there. You know what would that next property. You know look like would it, you know, probably at that, at that point at some point you kind of really want to do a lot of interesting things. Because, you know, you wouldn't want to study five story wall going from one from Kendrick place to one he's pleasant, but, but we need the housing, you know that they will be multi story building sort of thing but my understanding from what Maria said that this the facade again I'm not an archetype but it's significantly different and breaks things up quite a bit. So I'm just kind of deferring to the other experts here on the on the planning board in that respect. So, what do people think about in terms of you know giving them, giving them a punch list should we do, you know, a straw poll or do they have enough Kyle do you have enough that you can kind of get feedback from the design review board. Personally, I think it's, you know, keeping the cemetery fence where it is seems like a smart smart thing I wouldn't get nervous, going up there digging on the grave on the cemetery property their movement of fence and all that. And it seems like you can achieve the, you know what you need to do back there. If you put the trees on on the on the west end of the fence versus west side of the fence versus moving the fence but that's anybody have any strong feelings about that. Doug. Yeah, I guess I was, I was on board with the proposal that seemed to be the consensus with the developer and the historic commission. To take down the trees that are right on the property line and move the fence to the property line. So that it's, you know, so that the town can fully maintain its property and, and they don't have to access town property through the archipelago property. And I didn't think that was really something that we were revisiting but so I'm your comments surprised me. I'm just listening to Kyle, I mean it. I mean, I think anybody else have a feeling on that. If I can just say one other thing before I give up the floor. I heard Tom right, the design review board doesn't meet until July 19. And, and I think, isn't our next meeting on this before that. Not necessarily you haven't decided when your next meeting is. Okay. I was going to ask the same question. Please. We would have to set a, you know, a continuous. Look at the schedule. I'm going to put it in the cemetery side while Doug brought that question up. And we do not have a strong preference. If there was a preference here to move the fence and give Alan and the DBW more room to work on the west cemetery. That's fine. We think that there should be trees on our property line either way. I think that that's something that, you know, we're willing to plant, we're willing to maintain and pay for. So I think we should put those up on our side if Alan want we, we have no intention of planting any plants on the town's property. So if Alan wants to do that subsequent and create a second level that would be fine. And he would be able to do that if we did, if the fence was moved for our extent, basically from the Gaylord gate piece of granite that turns the corner all the way to the north end of the 11 East pleasant street property. So it is on the Jones property north of here and on the 15 East pleasant, but we can move it on the, on the property in question. Okay, so that doesn't really require for the discussion. So at this point, should we just, I think you have enough material. Kyle and Chris maybe you can help us kind of wrap up. I'm going to turn my notes and send, send something out, maybe tomorrow. Exactly what we talked about following. But I think we've got a pretty good idea of it. Do you want me to talk to you about dates potential dates. Yes, yes. So the planning board is meeting on July seven, and it's already got a full schedule on July seven. July 14 with this specific purpose of talking about zoning among itself. It's meeting on July 21 to talk with the CRC to hold public hearings on for zoning amendments. And the next meeting that is scheduled is August 4. Okay, I would recommend continuing this public hearing to August 4. Sounds appropriate. Janet. Well, Kyle first thing. I would, I would, I would request, if we could be on for July 14, I would greatly appreciate it. Skipping an entire month is very difficult if we're going to try to actually build this project. So, if we could get before the DRB, and get before the planning board for July 14, it would give us a chance. If we're going to be on August 4. You know, the reality is we're probably not going to get a signature until September. If we have a chance to try to dig a hole, it's, you know, there's there's real timing here. And, you know, this is, you know, the original submittal for this has been in for a while here. So if we could, if we could be on the July 14 planning board meeting that would, we would greatly appreciate that. May I say something. Yeah, we got the design review board. So design review board on the 19th. Yeah. And the planning board really needs to talk about the zoning amendments before the public hearing. And that was something that, you know, people talked about in the beginning of this meeting. So I think the planning board does not want to give up that ability to talk about those zoning amendments on the 14th. They're, you know, Anyway, I think the 14th is going to be completely subsumed with talking about zoning amendments. These things go on forever. When we've talked to the CRC about them, and also talking to the planning board and passed about them. It just takes a long time. And we also get a lot of public comments. I believe on the 14th is really not reasonable on the 21st, as I said, we have four joint public hearings with the CRC. It's possible that the planning board could schedule another meeting between July 21 and August 4, which would be July 28. So the planning board could schedule a meeting for July 28 just for this project. If you all are willing to do that. Jack, I'm just looking. Yes, Janet. I can't understand for the life of me why we're going to have a formal statutory public hearing on for zoning amendments on July 21. When we haven't talked about two of them. And I don't know where that schedule came from and I don't know why. I'm just wondering about that after this. Yeah, so I would happily swap the July 21 for talking more about archipelago and moving that to a date when we actually have seen the bylaw amendments and made comments and worked on them or had some information about them. I mean, it's shocking. I'm simply shocked by the 21st. And I can't even imagine doing for zoning amendments that we've just talked about once before two of them once I didn't think we've talked about some of them. So I would happily meet do the archipelago on the 21st and figure out, you know, when the amendments are ready to go or what ones are and what our processes, I think that's in our hands. And at the CRC wants to hold a hearing they can but I don't, I don't even understand how we got here. Well, I think we got here because we've been talking about this. Since January, we've been talking about zoning amendments since January and this is a schedule that has worked out with the president of the town council and the chair of the CRC. And I am sorry that Jack feels like he wasn't on board with that schedule so that's my error in communication but I really feel like it would work to have the planning board meet on the 14th and discuss the zoning amendments and then have a public hearing on the 21st, you can always continue the public hearing if you don't reach a conclusion. It seems like this is the right schedule. Rob, Laura has been working with me on this and he may have some comments or suggestions to make about this but that would be my recommendation. Okay. Doug. I am comfortable with us talking as a board about these amendments for one meeting before we have the joint hearing and whether it's on the 14th or the 7th doesn't really matter to me. I guess what I was also going to ask was whatever the agenda is on the 7th. Could we flip that with, I mean, you know, could we talk about the zoning amendments on the 7th, talk about Archipelago's project on the 14th, and flip whatever's on the agenda for the 7th to August 4. That's all. Well, there's a practical consideration which is I'm going to be out of town. So, the 7th is already kind of locked in. And we have the CVS parking lot. Parking lot and you have greenfield savings bank on the 7th and those two have been advertised their public hearings, they've been advertised, which we have no information on other than me. No data. No background. We've never talked about it. The rezoning you've never talked about that was brought to the town council and referred to the planning board for a public hearing so we have 65 days to hold it and I just don't understand that I just this is a different agenda item but I just don't get it and I'll get how we got here, or why we're here or what the rush is, and why we are talking holding public hearings when we're completely not ready. Well as I said earlier you can continue a public hearing if you feel like you're not ready to come to a conclusion about it. I'm not ready to have the public hearing I don't know if I'm the only person here would like to see and get information and ask questions and discuss things but I just don't get it I don't seem to have just gone off the rails in terms of the procedure we agreed to. I don't know. But I guess we know, I mean I think we could do archipelago in July and move at least up to August it's not set in stone. I think the design review board would have valuable input, and that's the 19th and I mean, how, how locked in is that Tom. It's pretty locked in I mean we did have a date prior to that that we had to cancel. There was a week before, because we wouldn't have a quorum so we had to push it to the 19. It's new information but it's pretty locked in in terms of scheduling and who's available. So, I think I, it sounds like we really, we can't really do it much sooner than than August Kyle sorry you want to speak. Please. I'd like to ask if we could get a DRB before July 19. Please. And seeing that we resubmitted this, this new proposal. You know, couple weeks ago, and first submitted this on in February so if we could do that that would be greatly appreciated. I'm just here to reveal the, the pressures that are on a project like this to try to execute and deliver. It's very real so if we do get pushed beyond the number of public hearings, and we're not talking until August 4, then the likelihood that this project can proceed is significantly limited if we lose a month and a half every time we have another hearing which has been the case here. So, you know, we're trying to adapt into an environment that's changing in terms of the bylaws that affect our building we're trying to keep an existing property owner. We're moving forward we're trying to invest in downtown, but we have to do that in on a schedule, we can't have a month and a half between every meeting. And it's just, it puts a lot of unnecessary pressure on I think a business that's trying to, you know, invest a significant amount of money in downtown. So if we could, if we could meet DRB before and do planning board on the 14th, I would greatly appreciate it. The reality is that we've sent out legal ads for July 21 for the planning board to meet with the CRC about for zoning amendments. I can pull those back tomorrow. But this is really throwing a monkey wrench into the plans for the summer. I mean the planning board the fact is the planning board has a lot of things on its plate. The planning board and the planning department and the building inspector have been working hard on zoning amendments for the last six months. We have to work in concert with the town council and the CRC we can't just, you know, go on our own schedule. And this is the schedule that's been, you know, given to us so I, I'm at a loss to figure this out. I. My recommendation would be to hold a public hearing on to continue this to July 28. But maybe, you know, we'd have to find out who's available then. So, I don't know. I think of the design review board can can do something. I don't think they can. I really don't think they can I think Maureen has tried really hard to get the design review board together in the month of July. So I think what we can come up with is July 19. So, I just, I don't know, Rob, do you have any suggestions. Just to, you know, confirm that I mean I did speak with Maureen earlier today and, and I know she it took her a while to get dates available with the DRB to have a quorum and the 19th was the question that we asked for the soonest date that she could get together, you know, we asked for the soonest date. And I just add that, you know, we have to give her a reasonable amount of time to prepare the recommendations to deliver to the planning board so, you know, meeting on the 21st will not give her enough time to do that. I would have to say, Kyle, the planning board has been very amenable in terms of meeting as often as is required to, to help this initiative with the zoning bylaws and, and then, you know, we've, you know, you, you changed your design and that's I think it's, it's great that they did that but it's, you did that not us and so that was a month and a half there. But I don't know what to say. I mean, it looks like the August. When you say July, July 28, do you want to take a struggle to see this available on July 28. Yeah, because that is that's not a scheduled day for us so we'll be meeting every week in July basically. That's right. So, Doug and then Janet. I believe I could be available on the 28th, although I'd be calling in from wherever I'm vacationing. I guess I was also, I raised my hand to say, should we try to do a marathon session on the 21st and start at, say, 430 and go give ourselves an hour before dinner with archipelago and then, you know, do the regular agenda after dinner. So, but it sounds like but it did sound like Rob didn't think that would give Marine enough time to collect the comments from the DRB. I didn't did the DRB not meet on the original proposal. They met on the original proposal and they gave their recommendations to Kyle and I think they also, I'm not sure if they gave them to us or not. So I guess part of the, I guess I can ask, is this proposal so different that the DRB comments are likely to be significant. I think it's going to be a different level of detail that we're going to be focused on this time and last time it was much more of an open discussion. More of a feedback cycle this time we're going to be going line by line through the design guidelines and how and criteria and how this building meets or does not meet those. So I have a feeling there's going to be a lot more detail involved in this particular phase of the process. So, again, I know it puts a lot of extra work on Maureen and the planning board planning department to squeeze that into two days. I think Maureen can get comments to the planning board by the 21st. I believe she's going on vacation after the 19th anyway. So, if the DRB meets on the 19th, and we take Doug's suggestion of having a marathon night on the 21st, starting early, I don't really think we'll get a break though because the zoning amendments are scheduled to start at 630. So, can I? Oh, Janet. I think I don't see any urgency in having a public hearing on the parking bylaw revisions I don't know what the urgency of that is anyway. We haven't talked about it in any detail. We have no data on parking needs at mixed use buildings versus townhouses versus apartments. There's no urgency to revise the apartment stick definition we haven't done any analysis of where apartments could be how big they could be how many people you know the whole thing. How does that interact with changing the parking requirements? We have no analysis and I can't imagine that on the 21st we need to talk about that and we'll talk or we can and talk about it intelligently. It's not going to take pressure off the planning department. We don't have any information. We haven't done any of this work. So I would just lift those two off. I'm sure we can talk about mixed use intelligently we started we had a good discussion of it we didn't come to any conclusions. I don't know why the town council is sending this to us when we have, you know, I don't know how we got here but I don't know what the pressure is for parking bylaw revisions or apartments definitions that we haven't discussed. I mean, really no information so I would just take them off. I don't want to meet every week and meet for four or five hours on this schedule that I didn't even understand I didn't even know what's going on. Yeah, well we might as well I mean might as well talk about this right now because I mean I thought we had some valuable suggestions on the, you know, mixed use buildings, healthy discussion. And I thought you, you know, you took that in. So if we continue our hearing with the CRC are they. Are we going to be ignored. Are we actually going to stop the process of we continue. Why do we have to do this we don't have to meet we don't have to have this hearing we can decide as a board not to have it yet if CRC wants to go ahead. You know, I this this, you know, somehow on Monday, it was represented to the town council that we were on board with these three bylaws revisions that we have never voted on to which we barely looked at I don't know how we got here. And why we're here. They're not done. The mixed use building we were talking about how it wasn't done it wasn't ready and on Monday they were presented to the town council. And suddenly I'm on, you know, I just don't I don't understand this process and I'm not going to keep on saying four or five hour meetings every week, pushing, and we're not going to get the information we need we're not going to do the analysis we need we're not going to do our jobs and we're not under this time pressure why are we here. You know, so where's how about hearing hearing from some others on the planning board about this. Johanna Maria. Do people know about the. I guess I'll say. It's, it's surprising to me, but I also understand the urgency. I don't think we started this in January I think we started this in November. And I think CRC feels urgency I think we all feel urgency to get this work done. That was kind of my sentiment at the last hearing which was like you know what I think we're pretty close on the mixed use bylaw. Let's have a meeting in July and get to the point where we can move it forward. So my guess is that CRC also feels that urgency and that's part of why they're trying to move quickly and so you know I'm Chris I don't know enough about like, you know Janet's point of have we done all the analysis I feel like there's there's a lot of analysis out there we have really talented planning staff. You all are getting ready for these hearings and are going to have things to say I'm sure we'll have questions but you know I I kind of look to you to help guide us in this situation. Thank you, Johanna Maria, your thoughts. Chris, yeah. Thank you, Chris. I think we've done a lot of analysis and we're not really changing that much particularly with regard to apartments and and we've taken out a lot of things that we had in previously that we're wanting to talk to our consultant about because we're going to be hiring a consultant to deal with design guidelines so that have to do with design design guidelines and that are specific to different zoning districts we've taken those out of these two to really zoning amendments and the parking portion of it really just has to do with parking for mixed use buildings parking for apartments and parking for accessory dwelling units so those are the three zoning bylaws that we've been studying a lot in the last few months. And so it's not it's not an overhaul of the parking bylaw completely it's just parking having to do with those three uses and and I feel like we're ready. I really feel like we're ready to move on it so, you know, with one discussion on July 14, I think you can certainly have a public hearing on July 21 and as I said if you're not ready to vote on July 21 then you just continue the public hearing and, you know, have a have a good discussion at another night. So that's my recommendation. Maria please. Yeah, I really trust the planning staff building staff department staff to tell us what's best and like everyone's been saying this is not like the end this is sort of beginning of a conversation so I have no problem. I don't feel like this is like voting on it to approve it and that's done. I think that there's going to be a lot of work still ahead but at least we're getting the gears in motion. As far as the 430 to 1030 thing on 21st. I will be remote for most of the last few weeks of July and so I hope that if we can get material early enough I can review it and send my comments to Chris that's why I emailed about being away because the time zone difference is just too big so I'm trying reading material and sending it and I hope that we can do this big push because the problem was, you know, 2020 everything stopped as far as building and now everything is trying to get through the pipeline and so the, you know, the more our town, you know, get back on speed, I think the better so I really appreciate the board you know putting in these extra hours every month. And I plan to, you know, send my comments or possibly stay up in the wee hours and join in if I feel like it's critical but I think we should push, you know, July and August are hard a lot of people on vacation so as much as we can do for this critical time and our sort of transition from getting out of this pandemic, I think that's for the best. So, Kyle, can you, can you live with the 28th of July for I correct me if I'm wrong but the 21st is what was most recently being discussed. We have a joint hearing that's Chris we can't really change that at this point, plus we were just saying now. There's, you know, huge initiative to get through the bylaws. I'm just trying to advocate Jack for a project that has been in, you know, a long term land ownership for 50 years that we've been working for many years to get across the line that we waited for leases to run out that we were in a pandemic. The bylaw is changing as we after we've designed the building we're trying to accommodate. We're trying to proceed forward so we can have a chance to open this thing on a schedule that works. We're going to have a schedule that we're an active project that will pay real estate taxes and invest millions of dollars in downtown. If we could get in front of some conversations that could occur at a later date. I would greatly appreciate that it would allow us to, you know, have a better chance of pulling this project off on a timeline that would never work. Why don't we ask who's available on the 28. Doug thinks he is. Johanna. Tom. Are we meeting every Wednesday in July, is that what we're committing to. Yes, Janet, not Marie, Maria, are you back by then no. Andrew, population. Andrew, he's already had his vacation, he's got to get back to work. That's right. So six of you are available to meet on the 28. I think that's what we should do. So, we'll do our best, Kyle to make sure that we have everything. And so hopefully we can close the hearing. I appreciate that. Like I said, I'm just trying to advocate, obviously the 14th would be better for us for this project that we're trying to bring for the 28 is the best and we're a month between each project, each meeting and it is what it is. And so I, I think that's all I'm saying. Okay. Thank you. Thank you for understanding. All right, so so many emotions to continue to public hearing for all of these four public hearings to July 28. That's whatever 630 635. Yeah. Second. Second, Doug. Who's Tom Tom moved and Doug seconded. Any discussion. How about we just raise hands. Good. Is that six. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, thanks. Kyle. David. Thank you. Appreciate it. Have a good night. Thank you very much. You too. So going on to the next topic, old business, we've already kind of broached it a little bit, but. I'm trying to remember all these bylaws that makes a bit. I just, you know, the planning board has. You know, skilled people. And I would think the CRC would want to get some, some input. Prior to, you know, Sending everything to it to, you know, join hearing. I'm a little shocked by that, but. I don't know. It is what it is. So we've kind of talked Janet. I mean, we've kind of talked this out already. I mean, I don't know what it is. I don't know what it is. I don't know what it is. I don't know what it is. I don't know what it is. Yeah. Because it isn't what it is. It's what we were planning board and we can make decisions. Last Friday or Thursday, I talked to you. About how I felt like, you know, we had 18 zoning bylaw amendments. We had taken care of two or three. The planning department was putting some forward. We just started talking about them. I felt like if we need to get a schedule together. We had a meeting with the city council. We had a meeting with the city council. We had a meeting with the city council. And we were kind of asking the same questions. And you thought that was a good idea. I sent that email to Christine. Saying, let's just put it on the agenda and let's get our handle around this. And then unbeknownst to me, the planning department and the town manager were bringing three zoning bylaw amendments to town council. That I didn't even know what they are. I don't know what was brought to them. And the representation night from what I've heard, I don't know what they are. I don't know what they are. But I just don't want to discuss these things. I think that was said, but then I retracted that. It was said by somebody else. And this is not the process that we agreed to with the CRC. And like Chris, didn't you think we might want to heads up? Like that we'd like to know as a planning board that this is happening. And then why do we have to schedule the, we have 65 days. What, what is going on? I just, I don't. there for a couple of years and why wouldn't you tell the planning board what you were doing? Yeah, I mean, the problem is we didn't get through the agenda. I didn't even know what the amendments are, what was taken out and I just I put a lot of time into this. And I know everybody else is holding down jobs and kids. I have the most free time and I'm overwhelmed by this. And I don't want to make decisions or hold hearings. It's not just holding a hearing, we have to make a recommendation. What possible recommendation can I make on a CVS parking lot? But I know almost nothing about it. And how did that get scheduled without the planning board knowing? And the only reason we saw the bylaw, it's not even a bylaw, it's like a, you know, it's a paragraph is because I asked for it. I don't know, are we part of the process? We're we, you know, what what is going on that no one's including us? Well, that came, that one came to the town council, it bypassed us. It came right to the town council and the town council referred it for a public hearing to the planning board, to the planning board and you get it. Well, what day was that? They referred it on May 24. To hold a public hearing. And you sent it out. After I asked for it, because I'd heard about it from someone talking about it. And we have 65 days to why is this an urgent rescheduling? Like, what, why is this on our schedule? I have no information on a meeting of the hearing in seven days. Why weren't why isn't why aren't we part of this loop? Like, why didn't you say this when I was sending my email? I don't get it. Like, look at everybody. We're all here all the time. There's, yeah, there's a lot that's happening. You know, if you want to know, I'm here almost all the time. I'm here at night. I'm just there's just so much going on. And I apologize if I didn't communicate well enough with the planning board. I, I guess I was thinking that you were kind of paying attention to what's going on with the town council and the CRC, but maybe that's not a reasonable expectation. And I tried to I think I did let you know as soon as you questioned me about that, you found out you may have found out right after the referral for the CVS parking lot. And then you reached out to me and I sent it out. And I think I sent it out to everybody at that time. And we did meet with you on apartments and mixed use buildings. I can't remember the exact dates right now, but it's been those things have been evolving since March. So I don't feel like this is coming out of the blue. The the latest version of it may be, you know, the latest version that the CRC tweaked instead of the latest version that the planning board tweaked. But it seemed like it was those three things. No, those two things, apartments and mixed use buildings were particularly mixed use buildings were bouncing back and forth between the planning board and the CRC. And the planning board and the CRC had different opinions about them. So the feeling was that it was really time to get the planning board and the CRC together to talk about them. And the way to do that is to have public hearing. And that's what you'll be doing on the 21st. So Chris, so we know, so we, we tried to do this on the 16th and we got bogged down with the mixed use buildings, lots of good ideas, though, discussed. So we punted on the apartments and the parking. But you're saying that these are relatively easy lifts compared to the mixed use buildings that like inclusionary zoning that we went through and I think it's very easy. There are hardly any changes. One of the changes So that's that there's an upside there, I think, Janet. But anyway, it's 10, it's past 10. You know, maybe I can I can try to reach out to Mandy and kind of see what's going on and Mandy, Joe, and just kind of get a feel for what's going on with the what you know, the CRC is being, you know, is facing. But at this point, can we I don't think we're going to accomplish anything more on this. So let's just finish our agenda, I think, and I know I got a lot of work tomorrow. So new business. No new business. Okay. Form A and RS of the vision application. You'll get one next week, I think. Okay. And the SPP SPR SCZ. No, we don't have any. Okay, I have actually, we do have a new one. We have a parking lot down on Bay Road, which is just a small parking lot for the Oh, that's right. trail. I think I might do about that last time. Yep. So the liaison reports, committees, I have nothing from Pioneer Valley Planning Commission. CPAC Andrew's not here. Ag Commission Doug. Yeah, exciting news on the Ag Commission. Last month we had him a quorum and I told you we we voted a new chair. Earlier this week, our new chair resigned from the commission. So the turmoil continues. Wow. And Tom, you're meeting the 19th. We know Yep, we did have a meeting about the sweet Alice trail, which we're going to talk about the trailhead I think next week. And now I'm actually blanking. I didn't get a chance to look at my notes with the other project we looked at Robert Chris remembers, but I'll share notes with that next meeting. And we've talked about the CRC already. I mean, I will I'll reach out to Mandy and if I can kind of get some feedback and find out what the rationale was, but I know we did not, you know, we did not contribute. Can you talk to her about the process chart that we spent meetings talking about with them and what happened to that? Okay. And I'll send it around to the rest of us. So I can report that the CRC talked about the BL zoning district and the BL overlay the last time they met. And the last time they met was June 8th. Is that right, Rob? No, June 22nd. They met on June 22nd and talked about the BL overlay district. So they're wanting to move ahead with that. And Mr. Marshall has his hand up. Doug? Yeah, I haven't looked at the flow chart that we worked out with CRC in a number of months. But my recollection was it started with town council receiving a proposal and then referring it down for hearings. No. No. Well, well, there's multiple way, there's multiple ways that a proposal can end up with town council and they don't all go through us. So this could happen again. Yes. Whether it's a citizen initiative or it comes from planning department or it comes from a town counselor, they can, they can receive things that we've never seen and that their next act is to refer it to us for a hearing. I understand that. And I understand that's what happened Monday night when the planning department and town manager did that. But if you look at the the chart that we agreed to a CRC, that's not the process that we're how we work together and and how the planning department is supposed to go to the town council, discuss an issue, send it to CRC planning board, we talk about it, we go back and forth. And then we go to we go back and it goes to hearing. I mean, it's just it would be nice if we followed that chart. But if we're going to get like a new I mean, one of my questions was like what's coming next week and we can't do it. We're doing it. We're going to do a crummy job on this stuff. I mean, we don't have the information like changing apartments from 24 units per building to an unlimited number. Taking away parking spaces. This affects the RG. It affects every district that apartments are, you know, I mean, it's just this is like what is it going to look like? We have no design standards. We can just have a lot of boxy apartments all over town. Wouldn't we like to know that? And I know the planning department can give it to us, but not under the conditions that they're functioning under and I don't understand why. I mean, I don't I don't want to make Chris work every night. I don't want us to meet every week. There's some kind of urgency. It might be an election, but that's not my urgency. And I don't think it's the planning boards, you know, let's do a good job on what we have. And take our time with it. I mean, and everybody has jobs, you know? Yeah, well, I mean, again, I think it may not be as bad as we're making it out, Janet. So we'll just. You know, stay with the program and just and, you know, and if it's if it's, you know, a ridiculous proposition, then I think at that point, again, we could continue the hearing and take the time that we need to understand it and give our feedback. So they could also hold the hearing without us and we can have a separate hearing. I don't think that's inconceivable. True. Doug, is your hand still up? No. Okay. All right. So let's let's adjourn here. We'll report to staff. I mean, you have anything too much work, right? Anything's going on? Yeah, that's all. Okay, well, everyone have a great evening and then we'll see y'all next week. And thank you. Thank you. Where's my hand? There it is. Good night, Jack. You want to stop clobbering? What?