 Okay, Mr. Marshall. I see 636. I see a quorum of the board. Amherst media is with us. You are a co-host of this meeting. I do believe we're good to go. Okay, thank you, Pam. You're welcome. Welcome to the Amherst planning board meeting of February 21, 2024. My name is Doug Marshall, and as the chair of the Amherst planning board, I am calling this meeting to order at 636 p.m. This meeting is being recorded and is available live stream via Amherst media minutes are being taken pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021 and extended by chapter two of the acts of 2023. This planning board meeting, including public hearings will be conducted via remote means using the zoom platform. The zoom meeting link is accessible on the meeting agenda posted on the town websites calendar listing for this meeting. Or go to the port planning board web page and click on the most recent agenda where the zoom link is listed at the top of the page. No in-person attendance of the public is permitted. However, every effort will be made to ensure the public can adequately access the meeting in real time via technological means. In the event we are unable to do so for reasons of economic hardship or despite best efforts. We will post an audio or video recording transcript or other comprehensive record of proceedings as soon as possible after the meeting on the town of Amherst website. Board members, I will take a roll call when I call your name, unmute yourself, answer affirmatively and return to mute. Ruth Colvin. Yeah. Jesse Meagher major. Thank you here. Janet McGowan here. Tara and winter. Here. Fred Hartwell. Here. And we know that Johanna Newman is absent this evening. And I Doug Marshall and present. Board members of technical issues arise. We may need to pause to fix the problem and then continue the meeting. If the discussion needs to pause, it will be noted in the minutes. Please use the raise hand function to ask a question or make a comment. I will see your request and call on you to speak. After speaking, remember to remute yourself to the general public. The general public comment item is reserved for public comment regarding items not on tonight's agenda. Please be aware the board will not respond to comments during general public comment period. Public comment may also be heard at other times during the meeting when deemed appropriate by the planning board chair. Please indicate you wish to make a comment by clicking the raise hand button when public comment is solicited. If you have joined the zoom meeting using a telephone, please indicate you wish to make a comment by pressing star nine on your phone. 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 their views for up to three minutes or at the discretion of the planning board chair. If a speaker does not comply with these guidelines or exceeds their allotted time, their participation may be disconnected from the meeting. Okay, so the time now is 640. And the first item on the agenda is the minutes from November 29, 2023. I believe those were not included in our packet. Is that correct? And they were emailed to us later. That's correct. They are posted in your packet now, but they were not included when we sent the packet link to me. Okay. Before, did anyone have any comments on those minutes? Did everyone get to review them? I guess we'll start by. So I see a couple of hands raised. Janet, your hand is up. Is this the meeting that I didn't attend? I'm trying to, was I not there? Janet was there. It was the meeting at the very end of November, right after Thanksgiving. And it dealt with primarily with university drive. It was one of those extra meetings. Okay. It was in person and I was tardy in getting these minutes to you, but they're timely since you're going to be talking about this topic tonight. Okay, I read those. Thank you. All right. I think I lower got my hand up. Okay, so sounds like pretty much everybody read these minutes. And that being the case, did anyone have any edits or changes they thought should be made to the minutes as drafted by Chris. All right. I'm saying two hands, Bruce, you got hit there first. I'll move to accept the minutes as presented. Thank you, Jesse. I was just going to second. Oh, I got balloons. Yeah, if you put your fingers up, some versions of zoom will make you celebrate. I'll try to turn that off. Okay. Well, at least you're you haven't turned into a cat's head or something. Okay. Great. So we have a motion to approve and a second. Because anyone have any further comments? All right, so then we'll go through a roll call vote. Starting Bruce with you. I approve. And Fred. I approve. And Jesse. I approve. Janet. Hi. Karen. Hi. And I'm an eye as well. That's six in favor and one member absent. Those minutes are approved. Okay. Time now is 643 and we'll go on to public comment. So I often read the names of the people I can see in the public at this time. So I'll start with that. I see Alexandra Hill, George Ryan, John Kennedy, Jonathan Salvon, Mara Keen, Stephen Kramer, Ted Parker, and Tom Reedy. And so members of the public do any members of the public want to make a comment at this time on something not on tonight's agenda. I know a number of you are here for the Amherst Hills conversation later. Okay, I am not seeing any hands raised from the public. All right, I guess we will conclude that no public comment for this meeting this evening. Okay, time is 644 and we will go on to the third item on the agenda, which is the Amherst Hills subdivision request to accept the public roadways in accordance with Mass General Law chapter 41. Okay, so 81G through 81I review of the layout plan to accept Hawthorne Road, Concord Way, and Linden Ridge Road, excluding the cul-de-sac as public ways as referred by town council. Yes, I was thinking maybe you should make an introduction to this since this has been a long running saga and a number of the members of the board are new to this. Yes, I have an introduction prepared so I can go ahead with that if you would like me to. Yes, I would. Okay, so good evening. I'm Chris Brester, Planning Director. And I just wanted to give you some words of introduction about this topic. I'm asked by the developer Tafino Associates to accept as public ways the subdivision roadways that were built as part of the Amherst Hills subdivision. The residents of Amherst Hills are in support of this action. Amherst Hills is a neighborhood located off station road in Amherst and old Amherst Road in Belcher Town. So that's in the eastern part of the town of Amherst. The roadways that the town council has been asked to accept are Hawthorne Road, Concord Way, and Linden Ridge Road. There's a cul-de-sac at the end of Linden Ridge Road that has not been completed and is not part of the acceptance request. Pam, can you bring up the map? Yes, that's what I'm trying to do. Great. Okay, so then you can see where this is in relation to Belcher Town. It's coming. It's coming. It takes a minute to load sometimes. There it is. And I just sent it to you today. So thank you very much for having this available. So you can see that the dark line that goes down the middle, kind of the middle of this page, is the town line. And everything to the right of that is in Belcher Town and everything to the east of that is in Amherst. So the town is being asked to accept Hawthorne Road, Linden Ridge Road, and Concord Way, and to not accept the little cul-de-sac that sticks up to the north, that little lollipop looking thing. Pam, if you can just scroll down a tiny bit. The other way. Yes. So that little brown lollipop thing that is, it sort of looks like a thermometer, actually. So we're not being asked to accept that because that hasn't been completed. And you can see where this is in relation to Amherst Woods, which is just to the left here. Trillium Way, Larkspur Drive, Wildflower. Many of you have friends and acquaintances who live over there. So that's where this Amherst Hills is located. The subdivision was begun by Jeffrey Flower in the late 1990s, and it was purchased by Doug Cole of Tofino Associates and Cole Construction sometime after that. And the roadways were constructed in the early 2000s with a base coat of pavement only. Then there was a multi-year economic downturn beginning in 2008, and then in 2010 developer Doug Cole passed away. So these events delayed both the construction of new houses and the completion of the roadway paving. The developer, Tofino Associates, had constructed the roads, installed the utilities, and put down the base course of pavement. And at that time, the town had a policy of not wanting the top course to be installed until most of the houses were built, because the top course would deteriorate as a result of heavy construction equipment driving over it. However, the subdivision took an unusually long time to complete, so there was time for the base course to deteriorate. Lots were sold and houses were continuing to be built, and in 2020 it was determined that much of the base course of pavement had deteriorated beyond repair and needed to be removed and repaved prior to the placement of the final top course of asphalt. The residents of Amherst Hills asked the planning board to become involved during this period between 2015 and 2020 to try to facilitate a solution to the problems. At that time the town was reluctant to consider accepting the roads in such a condition, but the residents were eager to have their subdivision roadways accepted. In November of 2020, Tofino Associates hired Warner Brothers to remove and replace the bad sections of base pavement, and then to place a top coat of asphalt on all three roadways, but the exception of the cul-de-sac. So Warner Brothers made repairs to catch basins and holes and other pieces of the infrastructure that had been noted by the town engineer on a punch list. Some of you will remember, particularly Janet, I'm not sure, and maybe Doug, I think Doug came in about this time, and we took a tour of the subdivision, and at that time the pavement was in really bad shape, and there were collapsed catch basins here and there, and other infrastructure problems. But even after the 2020 work, there were still some lingering punch list items to complete, including woody growth in and around stormwater detention basins. But since that time Tofino has completed all of the outstanding punch list items identified by the town engineer, including cleaning out the stormwater structures and removing woody growth in and around the stormwater detention ponds, and most of the lots in the subdivision have been sold and developed, with the exception of those along the uncompleted cul-de-sac. So the town is being asked to accept these roadways, with the exception of that cul-de-sac, and the town is also being asked to accept the associated wastewater pumping station on Station Road, as well as all cross-country sewer and drainage easements associated with this project. A homeowners association is going to be formed and will be responsible for the operation and maintenance of the two stormwater detention basins once the roadways have been accepted by the town. The town will assume responsibility for the stormwater pipes leading to and from the stormwater detention basins, and the town will also assume responsibility for maintaining the roads once they are accepted by the town. At its February 5, 2024 meeting, Town Council voted its intention to lay out the roadways in the Amherst Hills subdivision as public ways. So that's the first step in accepting the roads. And they referred the matter to the Planning Board for its recommendation, which is in accordance with Mass General Law, Chapter 41, Section 81G through 81I, which you have in your packets. The Planning Board has 45 days from the date of referral to offer its recommendation, and after that the Town Council can vote without a recommendation. The 45 days from the date of referral is March 21st. So if you'd like to make a recommendation, you need to do it before then. The Planning Board's recommendation is non-binding and the Planning Board is not required to make a recommendation. So the Planning Board's meeting tonight to discuss this matter and determine a course of action. And the Planning Board might consider the following actions. Discuss the request and hear from interested parties on the matter. Schedule and conduct a site visit to view the completed roadways. And then have another meeting, a subsequent meeting and discuss their observations about the roadways and hear from interested parties again. And then discuss and vote on a recommendation to Town Council on the adoption of roadways in the Amherst Hills subdivision as public ways. Now that the repairs have been completed and the top course has been installed, the Superintendent of Public Works and the Town Engineer are in support of the town accepting the roads as public ways. So that's the end of my statement. And I think Ted Parker is here and I noticed that there are some residents of the Amherst Hills subdivision who are also here in attendance. Jim Master Alexis, who's kind of been spearheading this effort on the part of the residents was not able to attend tonight. But there are other representatives of the of the residents here. So thank you very much. Great. Thank you, Chris. So, as I understand it, the residents of this subdivision are in support. Town Council has indicated a at least some level of support. The Town Engineer and the Director of Public Works have all expressed support. Chris, is there anyone who does not support this that you know of. I haven't heard from anyone who's not in support of this. Okay. Thank you. Bruce. I read the minutes from the period I guess slightly less than two years ago. And it seems that the heavy boosting has been done on this. And the, but it's taken a while for the motions and action items that were arose from those meetings of two years ago to be completed and so forth. So, I guess I'm do we I mean, rubber stamping is not something that I'm imagining that one does without I mean rubber stamping without looking at anything seems a bit odd. But it almost seems as though this is a perfunctory exercise. But so the question is, are we, what is the, is the expectation that we would make a site visit. Well, and so forth, or is, or is this really that perfunctory that it's that all basically there's this is just water that's running out the head wall and into the into the river. Bruce, you know, I think, I mean personally, I think this is a situation where we probably can decide to rubber stamp this, or we can just take a pass, but it seems that this is, this has been a long time coming. A lot of people have worked hard to make it happen. And I think, you know, everyone's in support of it. So, and as far as making a site visit conveniently Janet McGowan has stopped out there recently Janet why don't you tell us what you saw. Thank you Doug. I think this is my fourth site visit I think I might, I think I'm the only person on the board that's been there from the very beginning. And so, so I went and looked at the first and so the top coat is on the roads look excellent they're probably amongst the nicest roads and Amherst right now. And the only thing I went, I didn't visit both detention ponds because 1, I don't know where 1 is, but I visited the 1 closer to station road and it was it clearly had that they had sort of heavy woody growth. It's cleared out, but it's getting like new woody growth. So I was hoping that that would be cleared again, maybe before the form so they have kind of a clean slate. But you know the roads look really good. And you know I'm sure everybody is feeling good about that. I came home on old town road that was old farm road that was just a hot mess I'm hoping that was just like, you know a comparison that was kind of just shocking but the roads look good the work is done. And so I would, I would recommend myself that we vote to have the town except roads. But the planning board has been kind of involved in this I don't think it's just rubber stamping. Well it's been a rotating cast of planning board members since 2004 or whatever. So. Anyway, Bruce. The only there was some contention about fencing the detention or retention area and and the discussion that was reported on from over the even before the two years ago. I fully support the idea that 20 and 30 years ago it was seemed to be necessary to fence these detention basins, because they really were ugly ditches and and they had steep sides and things like that but the change in the way these things have been designed so that they're much shallower and so forth. And fences are ugly. They really do make it difficult to maintain a cluster of vegetation around them and they make the place usable so. But I didn't. I read through there and I didn't see in the minutes from two years ago a resolution about that fence someone of the residents felt argued that the fence should be there. Ted Parker made all of the more updated arguments as to why it shouldn't be. Because the the sway was relatively shallow. I would say that we should affirm the lack of need for a fence or at least question whether everybody is also in support of that because that was the only thing I can see that they seem to have been a resolution positively on. Chris, do you know if how this fence was resolved. The planning board took a position on the fence but the town engineer stated that he didn't think it was necessary. I know from my memory of the site visit we took a couple years ago. You know the one storm basin that I saw which I think is the same one Janet was talking about close to station road was pretty gradual it was not a was not a space that I felt we needed to fence for public safety or anything. So it is it is pretty gradual and there was kind of a stream of water that goes from like one side to the other. And that looks like it's pretty steady and so I thought I was assuming animals would be using it to drink from and I did see some coyote tracks in what little snow there was there so I didn't think it was a danger I mean if it was completely full. But it would be as dangerous as any water body that you know you could find anywhere in Amherst. So I don't see the need for the fence myself. Okay. So I think the first question is, does the, does the board want to schedule another site visit. And come back at a later meeting to discuss and decide whether to make a recommendation or not. Or do people feel like we could just proceed this evening, make our make a recommendation and put the issue behind us. The third option is that we make no recommendation at all. Are there any members who, I guess, why don't why don't I ask, is there anybody that would want to make a motion in one direction or another, Janet. I'm ready to make a motion but do we want to hear from members of the public if there's some people from the neighborhood. I thought that I would ask for that. Okay, I think we can do that after we have a motion if we could do it now. I mean that's fine. I'm supportive of letting it, making no motion either way, because the two of you and particularly Janet have reported that everything seems to be in order. The minutes that have been supplied to us and that I've read and presumably others have indicate the same. And it's, and there's no obligation on us to make a recommendation and it's non binding anyway. So it seems that it's unnecessary. We don't have to declare ourselves and I frankly prefer not to declare myself because I only know it's a somewhat vicarious position and given that my judgment is that we don't need to do anything. I would support not doing anything. Okay, Fred. I would disagree with that because if we don't do anything, my understanding would be that the statutory period of time has to reel out until the time comes beyond which the planning board's viewpoint is not recordable. And that may defer unnecessarily any further actions on the part of the council and so forth. There's, you know, and I would I don't see any reason to introduce that amount of time delay. All right, so you would support a motion to to take a stand of one sort or another this evening. I think we should do that. Okay. Chris is it likely that our if we decide not to take to make to make any sort of recommendation that we would in fact delay town council. Are they likely to pick it up like at their next meeting, if we know what their schedule is. They would be reluctant to pick it up before March 21st if you didn't make any statement. Right. Okay. Well, I guess I'm in that point in that case I'm going to go ahead and offer the public a chance to comment on this at this time. So members of the public, we are obviously talking about Amherst Hill subdivision. And if any of you want to comment, this is the time to do it, at least in this meeting. And you would are likely to have three minutes. So when we bring you in to the panel for your comments, please state your name, your, your address. And we will bring you in one at a time. The first hand I see Pam is John Kennedy. Hi everybody I'm John Kennedy I'm at 36 linen Ridge Road. First I would. Can you all hear me. Yes, welcome. Yeah, well I just want to thank this board because as Christine knows and Janet know we've engaged with this board a number of times. It's been a long course of this saga and the board has been helpful in moving this thing along. And I would just be concerned if in fact you don't take a position on the acceptance of the roads that it may in some way be perceived as a as a negative. And I would also just suggest that, although not all of the folks who are on the board now are on the board over the course of the time that we engage with the board that this board has been active in this process. And we're also heartened by the fact that the town engineer has fully inspected the roads, the roads, at least in our understanding meet all of the specs that have been laid out by the town. And I think that you have a neighborhood that has been dealing with this for quite a long time. We've been engaged with the with the with the planning board and with to Fino on this matter since 2019 but even before that. And we are very, very pleased that this thing is about to get resolved in some way or the other. And again, I just think that this board again has been a big part of helping move this thing along. And as somebody said on the meeting, these are some of the best looking roads you're going to see in Amherst. And so I would just, you know, humbly beseech you to take this on make a recommendation and help us get to a speedy resolution here. Thank you. Thank you, John. Okay, next we have Jonathan salvan. Please give us your name and your street address. I had to unmute first surprise the Jonathan salvan 48 Lyndon Ridge Road in Amherst. I will not be as eloquent as John Kennedy, but I would just like to concur. Thank you for your efforts of working with us over time to resolve this. And again, I would like to encourage you to take a position and take a positive position so that this moves as expeditiously as possible. I think someone did mention the, the notion of the, of getting the attention basins. I think it was Janet mode again I believe that is in fact the case it's part of our settlement with Tofino that they will get mode one more time and then it becomes the Association's responsibility. I think that's it. Thank you. Thank you for your support. Thank you, Jonathan. Okay, the third hand raised is from Steven Kramer. Steven. Please unmute yourself and give us your name and your address. There you go. Now we hear you. Yes, my name is Steven Kramer. I live at 96 Lyndon Ridge Road. And I'm really, I'm just going to concur with what John Kennedy and John salvan. He said, we are, we've worked very hard to get to this point and we're anxious to get to some resolution. I will also mention that you were talking and you had asked about the the fence around the detention pond. And I believe the residents have have agreed to go with the town engineer's council. Okay, thank you, Mr Kramer. Okay. So we had a couple, someone member wanted us to take no position tonight and at least one member sounded like he did want us to take a position. So I will entertain a motion if anybody wants to raise their hand. I guess before that I see one hand from the board and one from Nate. Nate, do you have anything you want to say before we go further? Yeah, I looked at the memo from KP law and Fred's correct that the council can't act until the planning board report, or the 45 days have lapsed. The planning board doesn't, you know, if you would like to have it, you know, an action be taken sooner than you need to have a vote and recommendation. And then, you know, we can put that in a report for the council. Okay. Bruce. Based on comments, I'm no longer of the opinion that I voiced about 15 minutes ago. I suppose that could be followed by a motion to recommend motion to recommend adoption. Recommend adoption to the town. Recommend. I think it's acceptance. We're going to recommend acceptance of these roads as public ways. So moves. Okay. Thank you, Bruce. Karen. Second. All right. Okay. Board members. Anybody want to talk about this topic? Comments. Concerns. Okay. One last opportunity for the public to comment if there's any other members of the public. Okay. So we have a motion and a second, I guess we will now have a vote. And a positive vote is to recommend acceptance of these three roads. As public ways. By the town council. Okay, we'll start with you, Bruce. I approve. And Fred. I approve. Jesse. I approve. Janet. I approve. Karen. I approve. And I approve as well. Six votes in favor. One member absent. Well. So we can. Not have that on our, on a future meeting agenda for the first time in 20 years. Okay, Chris. I just wanted to say thank you to everybody for spending so much time on this topic and finally bringing it to a resolution. I'm really happy at the outcome. Thank you. Okay. And thank you to all the. Residents and other members who. Kept the pressure on and hopefully everything works out from this point forward. Okay, so the time now is 712. And we'll go on to the next item on our agenda. So this is number four. University drive potential housing overlay zone. Where we continue discussion regarding concept for an overlay zoning district. To allow more housing with a mix of apartment buildings and mixed use buildings and ideas for streetscape design. So I believe it was sometime this afternoon that Chris, you sent. Some material to the board in preparation for this discussion. My guess is it came from Nate, or originated with Nate. So. Chris or Nate, do either of you want to lead this discussion. I would love to have Nate lead this discussion. Thank you. Thanks. Thanks everyone. I'm Nate. Yeah, the documents that draft. Amendment staffs also looking at it. So, you know, this is something that. You know, hopefully the board can respond to and we can have comments on. I just wanted to say that, you know, we're proposing an overlay zone. And so. The base zoning remains in place. So the office part limited business. There's also a second overlay. So, you know, we have a lot of discussion development on the west side of university drive, which. Can remain or we could vote, you know, if we wanted to remove it. And so. In any, in any case, I think it's important because. There's been some comments saying, you know, there's concern about the loss of say. There's a lot of things and so an overlay zone would allow all those uses to occur. Right. So we've had the R and D overlay in place for years. The other zoning has been in place for years. And we're not taking it away. Unless someone wants to. That's the benefit of an overlay. You know, we think that we want to leave the existing zoning the base zoning in place. We can. An overlay is in one of the comments that came in a few say that, oh, it's getting complicated, but. The other thing is, you know, pretty standard way to zone. You know, for instance, if we were to change this zoning and say, well, typically you'd use what you have in elsewhere in town. And so if we're saying the limited business doesn't work, you know, is it then BBC or general business, you know, it's downtown. So we wouldn't, you know, it's unless we create a whole new zone district for this area. And so to me an overlay is really the appropriate tool. And then, you know, with that, we can have different standards and conditions and definitions. Then what we have elsewhere and so it only applies in the overlay. That's another nice way to go about it because if we change the base zoning and we want to have say apartments without caps on the units. We can't do that, you know, unless we have a whole new definition of apartments specific to that zone and it really has ripple effect. So, again, an overlay zone, we keep the base zoning in place. It's a, it's an, you know, a voluntary use of it. And so, you know, someone can choose to use the overlay or not. And so I think that's the benefit of using it. I'll share my screen. That's it. The as was kind of voted on previously the overlay would just be south of Amity Street. The properties outlined in black here on either side of University Drive to North Hampton Road. So it wouldn't include, you know, south of this, this map hasn't been updated, but so really it's just this area that's zoned office park unlimited business along university drive. And so, you know, the, when originally proposed, you know, I said I'd like to see 2000 beds and a lot of housing. I'll repeat that as well because I think this is a really important place where we could have density and infill maybe, you know, 2000 beds is too much but, you know, I don't lose sight that there is an opportunity here to have, you know, development and hopefully relieve some pressure elsewhere in town right so we need housing for all types of demographics household sizes and different types and so this overlay is really, you know, can help achieve that. And so that what was proposed. We'd insert this in section three in the zoning bylaw and so it's really written in kind of the format that's there so there's a general statement. You know, really we're saying that it's super impo it's an overlay super impose over the areas we just described. It's only apartments and mix use buildings would, you know, would be applicable in this overlay district. It has its own dimensional standards conditions and design guidelines. And the purpose here, you know, there's a number of things written here. And, you know, we can modify this I think this is where you know it's been tweaked a bit saying it's for economic development and expand housing opportunity. And so really you want the purpose of an overlay to be pretty clear you can expand upon it but that helps. You know, legally if your purpose is then reinforced by say the dimensional standards or standards and conditions you want all those to be somewhat consistent. So we're saying this is to encourage economic development and expand housing. You know the design standards and guidelines are really to you know, you know, says intended to foster development that enhances pedestrian experience along the street allows for street trees and stormwater management, provide spaces for commercial and retail uses and results in architecture that maintains a scale and character appropriate for an entry into the town and university. You know, I even say the access drive on the west side of university drive is envisioned to be discontinued for vehicular use and become a multi use path. And so, you know, this can become a bullet list or different narrative but really kind of outlining the purpose of the overlay establishment of it here. You know, again refer can refer to the map. And then we get into kind of the nuts and bolts of it with dimensional standards. And so we're saying that in this overlay we're not going to refer to table three, we would use what's here. We're saying there's no provision to waive the standards so there's no footnotes or anything. You know, we're saying there's no minimum lot area requirement for additional units, you know, 2500 square feet or 4000 whatever. And what we'd rely on then is the building coverage and lock coverage. Right so we're proposing a maximum building coverage of 60% and lock coverage of 85. You know, a lot area or frontage there hasn't been any determination. What that could be. That's not something that could be discussed. You know, for setbacks, they're pretty similar. But really, you know, if we're having taller buildings and you'd like to maintain room for pedestrian space, you know, we're proposing, you know, 20 to 25 foot front setbacks. You know the side yard is 10 feet rear yard is 10 feet. You know, and sometimes in zoning districts, you might have a minimum building height or a maximum. Right now we're proposing a maximum of five floors and 63 feet. It could be maybe 60 feet is probably sufficient. Honestly, with some of the newer buildings we see that are five floors. They're, you know, 57 to 58 feet. They asked for a waiver from what is our current height and feet by, you know, a foot and a half. And we allow that. And so, you know, it's, you know, we can consider how we want what we would want a maximum height to be. You know, and for the building and lock coverage, we looked at the other zoning districts in town. You know, and some lots may have more lock coverage actually than 85% and they would be considered pre existing non conforming to a point where they could still, you know, extend beyond the 85%. For standards and conditions. But the building commissioner has recommended that we not reference the 3.323 or the mixed use one and actually just say this is a new definition. And so we're saying that apartments would be allowed by site plan review in the overlay. They're not allowed within a certain distance of the intersection right now says 300 feet. There shall not be located closer than 250 feet measure from building to building. There's no limit to the number of dwelling units in an apartment. There could be multiple ones on a property. And then right now we have this requirement for additional minimum landscaped areas in the as a standard condition in the in the use chart and we would not have that apply. And then we have this requirement here. We still want the mix of bedroom sizes and then, you know, with additional provision of 10% being three bedroom units or larger. And so, you know, we talked about maybe having apartments be special by special permit, or trying to limit them. And so, you know, the building commissioner thought and we, you know, we had mentioned this a few times that maybe this distance requirement is a way to do it as a post that would be a special permit really, you know, we want to encourage housing here, and it can be apartments or mixed use and so if we're limiting it. This can even be like 500 feet from the intersection. This could be 300 feet but we could have some distances so that you know, depending on where the first one is permitted. You know, then it limits the number of apartments in the overlay. And this is a way to do it as opposed to saying let's make it a special permit and not restrict where it can be. Especially if we're trying to get density here, it would seem strange to have it be a discretionary permit. Mixed use buildings. We, you know, some of these it's similar to what's already in the bylaw site plan review, we do have 50% gross play area. It's like half and half right so 50% of the first floor should be non residential use. It should be a commercial retail some some use other than parking. And it should be distributed. It can be a long distributed along any floor as long as most of the ground floor facing the street is not that that non residential use. So without saying a depth of 30 feet we're saying that a majority of the streetscape, the street facade on the first floor has to be a non residential use, and at least 50% of the floor area has to be that so someone will work with the numbers at man up being more but it can't be less than 50%. And again, kind of the many buildings on a property and this provision of 10% of dwelling units signs. We might strike this language because we just use the current sign provisions in the bylaw. And so we don't necessarily need to mention this project open space. But a number of things here to talk about, you know, usable open space for residents in the public, we're saying right now, you know, 20% of the building footprint should then be. That's the calculation that would be required product open space. And most of it needs to be designed as a courtyard or plaza. We're saying that the front setback on the west side of University Drive is meant to encourage the multi use path, and we'd want that to be 10 feet which could also be part of this product open space. You know, I think there's some things here we're saying, you know product open space can include landscaping but not 20% of the total area. You know sidewalks and plazas are also required and so some of it would be. You know, we'd have to run some numbers to see you know what does that mean really so for building is 10,000 square feet or 5,000 square feet and you know there's so much product open space and then some of it can be landscaping and you know what does that mean. But it's really trying to require some open space. I think this is important because right now I think the planning board struggles with, you know, how do we, what do we do with the build, you know, so if you have a maximum lot area and a maximum building area, and what's left with the rest of the space. And so, you know, it's hard to say with our current bylaw that we want, we're acquiring plazas or usable space and I think in this overlay we want to have some language that we want that. Some of these bullets could be modified but it's really allowing the permit granting authority to say you know what we're. It could just be really if we could just have a few bullets but I think it's really important to say we there is some provision of a requirement of it. Maybe we don't say how much exactly but if we if we at least have this first bullet here. We could allow the planning board or whatever whoever the permit granting authority is to say what is that space and how usable is it and so we don't really have a provision like that in the bylaw. I'll just walk through this and then we can always go back to it parking. Yeah, yeah, that's good. I think we're saying 7.000 for dwelling units including apartments, we're saying that in this district there's a minimum of half a space per unit, but then all other provisions of article seven apply. So, you know, landscape and design standards. You know, I call this out specifically because we have, we have standards for the number of parking spaces for retail and office use and so, you know, if we're, if we want 50% of a ground floor to be mixed use and we require 3.3 spaces for every 1000 square feet. And then all of a sudden we have so much non residential space we're then having, you know, some provision of certain a number of parking spaces and, you know, then, you know, that's just something to consider so, you know, and then we have a half space here so someone can run work with that and then determine okay if I have 80 units and so much square feet of this. And then how much parking do I need, and it may be that, you know, the parking them will, you'll have to reduce the size of the development on the property because of the parking requirements and so, you know, I think that's what happens now right we have parking requirements. We do allow the board to waive this if you know this version of half a space if there's reason to write so in the bylaw we allow that that that provision to be waived. Inclusionary zoning has been modified to say for projects with a net increase in units of over 21 that an additional 8% of the units be affordable to households earning 150% am I or less. And so the current inclusionary zoning bylaw says, you know, for this size development 12% of the units have to be affordable, you know, some that's 80 no more than 80% and then some at 60% am I. And I'm saying let's add another 8% unit count on to it up to 150% am I 150 is nice because it's calculated by HUD in the same way that 80 is and 60% am I is. If we had some other number in there, it then becomes a calculation on the town, and I'd rather use an outside source to do that and you know we're trying to have to calculate it every time a project comes in. And, you know, I think this is a way to get units that are not capital A affordable they're not going to be on the town subsidized housing inventory but, and it's something that we would have to monitor locally. But I think it's something that's important. And, you know, people may say that this would deter development but we could, you know, see what happens 150% am I is pretty generous and we can get those numbers. But it's something that you know it's probably less than what the market is doing right now so you know it couldn't be, you know, $2,000 for a little studio. That wouldn't be you know that's not going to qualify for 150 am I. And then we have a number of general design guidelines. And some of these picked up on, you know, the comments that have been made so you know, Doug and Jesse Bruce, the public have all provided comments. And after writing this I, you know, try to incorporate kind of ideas and what we'd want and some of this came from the BL overlay that we had proposed a few years ago. But you know we're saying that majority of the front facade should be located along the front setback line to reinforce this edge. We limit the number the linear feet of blank facades along the street. So you can't just have, you know, a really expansive wall. There would be overhanging awnings and projected canopies between the first and second floor and a horizontal sign ban. You know, if a building facade is over 100 feet in length, then it has to, you know, have a six foot change every 80 feet. And so, you know, I, you know, again, some of these numbers could be modified but it's trying to get at how to articulate a building. And so, you know, a developer may propose something that has this kind of articulation but some might not. And so really this would be allowing the board to use this. We're saying the fifth floor should be stepped back from the front facade. And I don't, you know, again, you know, we're saying 10 feet from the front. You know, parking lots would not face the primary streets and be located behind buildings or to the side, but at least 30 feet back from the public way. So that if you did have parking along the side of the building, it would still have to be 30 feet back, you know, from the, from the public way. To the extent possible parking lot should be consolidated so you know they're shared parking to minimize pavement and curb cuts. And so, you know, I don't think it's, I think it's hard to require there's a maintenance to it. I do think it's something that we could have as something we'd want to see. And then, you know, rooftop mechanical would be set back and screened. Other things not visible from public way so louvers and mechanical systems would not be visible or located in areas that are visible. And, you know, this became apparent on 133 southeast street, the newer apartment building, when they were putting the meter bank on the building they first had you know 60 meters right on the corner facing the street. Right. It was just like, you know, or it could have been very visible and it was changed and so it's not but, you know, as we were seeing more buildings that are all electric. You know, where do we have the utilities for those and maybe it's okay if it's on a corner but we really want you know 100 meters, you know, occupying the front facade somewhere. And so, you know, I think it's just something we have to be more conscious of for any project. And maybe we start to have some guidelines about that here in the overlay. And so that's that's it. You know, I think some of it's in the, you know, what does all this mean. You know, what are the lock coverages mean what are the setbacks mean. You know, when we looked at when I determine the setbacks, you know, so on Amity Street 20 feet allows space for sidewalks 24 feet on University Drive allows for that access drive to be, you know, or to have the space to have it be used for multi use path, you know, I think we could make it bigger if you made it any smaller. You're basically eliminating the possibility of saving the trees along the road and keeping you know having a pedestrian path step back from the road. Same with Northampton Road. The five college realtor building is closer than 25 feet or it's about 25 feet right now I think it's maybe 20 feet. And you know, and if you want a taller building I just think it's you know it's again becomes really close to the corner there. So anyways, these setbacks are pretty generous, given the height of the buildings. You know side setbacks are minimal to have some open space. And I will share one more thing Bruce had asked about you're looking at aerial imagery and so if we look at University Drive, this is from mass GIS. The, the outlines in green are wetlands identified wetlands by mass DEP. So, you know, if you they have to be ground troops but you know if you're looking here's the corner of the University Drive and Amity on the west side. So going south, you know, this is this wooded area you can see a stream here but you know this is all wetland area. And so, and it may even extend beyond that. And so you know you're going to you, there's limited development potential here really what you'd be doing is redeveloping the paved areas. And so, you know we, in terms of lock coverage or required open space, you know you're not going to have a wall of buildings because of the wetlands. And so there's a keep going south you know wetlands also come. Here's 101 University Drive so here wetlands also come down here and they're across the street. They're on the east side as well and so, you know I think the, the setbacks could might seem or the lock might seem generous but then you know there's also other constraints to the development potential of these properties and so if you have wetlands and stormwater management and what we have here. You know you're still not going to have the ability to have full build out so you're the post office right here you know this property looks like it's probably like 90% lock coverage, right. The areas up here are still really high lock coverage, you know we're proposing less than that just because that's that is a lot of pavement. It actually, you know, the owners by benefit from it now because you couldn't do this, you probably couldn't do this today with the wetlands. So you know this is just this is a 21 aerial image. And so you know the overlay would come down to, you know this intersection and cover these properties. Again it's, you know, two uses are allowed in the overlay, it would encourage some infill, you know it's not trying to say that this would be, you know something would be demolished. You know it gives the incentive if there is a possibility to have increased density and so, you know it may not make sense for some property owners to utilize this but we're, you know the idea would be that some would could take advantage of it. Thank you, Nate. I, there's a lot to chew on there. And I think I'm happy to have a fair amount of discussion about it this evening but I want, I think I want to end up with, you know, we'll all go away and we'll be able to review it at our future and send comments to Nate, so that he can come back with the next iteration. And I also, I know we've got members of the public here who are probably interested in this topic. So I will want to have a period for public comment to. So, let's just go on in with with board comment. And see where it goes. I think I will try to break around eight o'clock as we usually do so we'll have about 20 minutes or so 25 minutes of comment to see before the break. Yes, just quickly, I guess I would say, sorry, just a few things. Yeah, board members make changes I think we sent the document and word so you could track change or make the changes a parent so it's easy. The second thing I was going to say staff has asked a local architect, you know, if they would, you know, do some, some build out of a few properties using the overlay so if we like the dimensional standards, you know we'd want to engage in you know this professional firm we're looking at you know we're developing a scope of work and you know it'd be for a fee but you know pick a few properties and have that be developed with some mock scenarios and so you know to the level of detail where you know it makes sense right so it's not just kind of a blocky sketch up model but something that's a little bit more refined and, and, you know, using better graphics so that the board can understand what what all the what all this means in terms of the setbacks and design guidelines so we think that for a, you know, some some small fee it could be really helpful to have that and you know what we, you know, if we think that the standards seem okay tonight in terms of the dimensional standards and things we could start getting a scope of work together just to see what a cost estimate be to have that. Okay. And then sorry then they would come to the board probably two times maybe we're thinking a few times at the beginning and then at the end present the concepts and then go back and refine them. The idea would be to have something, you know, try to have this worked out in the next, you know, three to four months right so to have something I mean I think it'd be great to have something by July. And these comment these concepts would be one way in which those guidelines could be interpreted by, you know, an architect. There couldn't be every possible permutation that someone could come up with on every site. Right and so it could be that if they have three sites one might be the mixed use building. One might be an apartment, one might be a site that has two mixed use buildings and they've developed it a little differently. You know, but just to see what what does it mean if you know we have, you know, this setback and as many stories and we have that this kind of facade articulation. The idea is we rely on the architects to kind of use their expertise and working with other developers so what do they see right so they might have long facades but most buildings are probably not more than 65 feet wide. If it's a double, you know, double load of corridor right so maybe one building has, you know, is smaller or maybe 100% of the ground floor is commercial and it's a smaller building but then the second building on the site is a bigger mix use building in the back or something so you know they would have some kind of freedom right to show what what's possible, given the overlay right so it's. Yeah I don't want to mislead the board of the public and say this is what we'll get with the zoning right and so it's just to help visualize what could happen. Okay, yeah I just wanted to be clear that, you know, if particularly if you take a concept too far it starts to look really real. And it's like this is what we're going to get. Yeah, yeah, years ago, when we the hills lost or rezone to neighborhood business there was a plan and elevation showed at town meeting and I think everyone thought oh we're going to get a Greek revival building. But it was just to again an idea of what could happen if the zoning change and I don't, you know, I don't think it was. You know, some people may say wow that's what we're getting but that's really what not what it was just an idea. Okay. All right, we got a lineup of people who want to make comments here so Janet you've got your first. The first quite the first thing is I had two questions. Were you proposing the overlay district for all of university drive between Amity Street and route nine or were you taking some some parcels off I couldn't tell I think you said it sounded so the so so the medical buildings and all those things are would be part of it. Right. Okay, I just thought like some different thing. And then. Yeah, oh yeah, sorry, let me just share my screen quickly. It was confusing to me. The overlay would be in everything outlined in black, you know, north of Northampton Road and south of Amity so. Okay, okay, I just let it look like for some reason it looked like the OP was pulled off. Okay. And then, so, and then there would be an inclusionary zoning requirement of 20% over a certain number of units, so. Right. Okay, that's that that was okay. So, that helps me understand. I thought we had sort of take I thought we had agreed that we didn't really want apartments only on university drive because. I think we should go to four floors and not five we're already giving extra space, you know, in terms of lot coverage and increased height but if we go to five stories apartments I think we're going to see five story apartments on university drive. And this is a office space district it's a, you know, it's BL it's for businesses. And, you know, I think we've seen buildings with barely any, you know, commercial space people just, you know, developers just want to build apartments so I think that she isn't that why we had the spacing requirement in there. Yeah, I just think that people could just build a whole series of I think we should just take apartment buildings off. If you have a five story building unlimited units, no requirement of front space that's what we're going to get. And so I think if we want it to be a vibrant commercial area state of mixed use you can put as many units as you want. And, you know, the first floor has to be at least 50% commercial retail something that somebody some kind of business of some sort and so I would really, I think we shouldn't go down the apartment. I thought that I thought I thought that was actually what the board was talking about the last meeting but I might not remember that. I think we should stay to four stories if we go to a fifth story, I think we should really up the inclusionary zoning requirement, or require that they be condos or something, you know, that will, you know, long term residents we can have the whole town be filled with rental units. I think we should stay at four stories. We're giving developers have more incentive and if we go to a fifth story I think we should really ask for something. In terms of parking, our current parking requirement is so flexible I'm not sure why we have to go to point five parking spaces per unit I have no idea what the basis for that number is other than people liked it. So there's no, I have no data to support that that would be enough or too much. And, you know, our current parking by law says, if you can justify the numbers you can get what you want and so I think we should stick with that. I would love to see more details and roofs and not just to have a bunch of buildings with flat roofs. I do see a lot of goodness and it's, it really appreciated like seeing it on a piece of paper, but I do need more time to look at it to some. Thank you. Thank you, Janet. Next was Fred, and try to keep your comments to three minutes. Okay. Thank you. I like five stories and I have to ask, you know, if you looked at the Gazette earlier this week, we find Barry Roberts in front of the ZBA apparently asking for a variance that would allow five stories on the north end of this space. It almost looks like he was attending the planning board meetings. And I have to ask to what extent because the that article in the Gazette gives you a really good idea of what might be possible here. It's a five story proposal. He's asking for a variance. I am a little surprised that this, I don't understand how this meets the statutory requirements for a variance. But I'm wondering whether he's been in contact with the planning department about what he's coming to the ZBA with and whether the way we're going here might be something that he could, you know, pursue by right as soon as we get to an end point here. So, I am very curious about that. Thank you. Okay. Before Chris or Nate, I ask you to respond to that. I do hope that the conversation continues to be focused on the, this overlay and that we don't get into a discussion about that project that was publicized. So Chris and Nate, do either of you want to comment or respond to Fred. I would say that the zoning board is taking that matter up tomorrow. And if a variance was granted it might come to the planning board as a, you know, through a regulatory process and so I don't think we should be focusing on that project. You know, after, you know, tomorrow night it could be discussed, but, you know, I think that, yeah, I think that's, I think it's more important to look at, you know, what, you know, what's the intent of the bylaw, the overlay and you know what do we think we want with it and so, you know, we can't you know, I guess I think this is will take a few more months and then we can talk about what's happening on certain properties or projects. Yeah, I wanted to say that I think these two things are happening on parallel tracks. Obviously, Barry Roberts knows about what we're working on here with the planning board and we in the planning department know what Barry Roberts is working on because he's going before the ZBA and we support the ZBA's work, you know, we help the ZBA do their work. But there's not a, how should I say this, we're not like promoting what Barry Roberts is doing through this zoning amendment, we've been working on this zoning amendments and sometime. Well, we started thinking about this last spring. It's slowly evolved into talking about university drive. And the fact that they're both happening at the same time doesn't mean that they're into critically related, I guess is what I want to say parallel tracks. Thanks Chris. Next comment from Bruce. I can't help saying that Karen and I are on the local historic district commission. I'll just make this brief before I get to what I really want to ask. And we invited Kurt Schumann to come and talk to us about what his ideas were because he thought that the developers might advance our position. And I'm not averse to, in the form of time to contemplating inviting Barry to help us think through this and others if they're willing, but that's another matter. But that's just what we have done in another town town. I generally think that most of this is fine. I'll make a bunch of detailed comments. I mean, the one thing that really doesn't, I don't understand here is the maximum building coverage and this might relate to that spreadsheet that I created. But it seems to me that you don't need to have the maximum building coverage any more than it currently is or allow it to be many more than it currently is, which I believe is 35%. Because if you're adding twice as many stories or let's say more stories, two more stories, the number of square foot of development possible, the number of housing units that you can develop is quite considerable. And if you've got a even a small parking generation requirement of half, you can't really put the building coverage at much more than about 35% before you find that the consequent parking requirements unless you allow it to become offsite or something. Because the parking generation requirement at half a space per unit is going to generate about twice the site coverage that the building coverage would be. So it's the only way you can satisfy or if you if you wanted to get anything approaching a building coverage at 60%, you would be necessarily constraining yourselves to three stories. So it seems to me that that number is at odds with what we're trying to achieve or what we're allowing folks to achieve. And that's why I was to check things like that that I that I created that spreadsheet, because I wanted to see just where what what what happens if you made certain assumptions and that was one that seemed to me to be fairly clear. I didn't think you could fit very much more than half of parking space per per per units on these sites and it turns out that that's as far as I can tell from the spreadsheet that I created is probably true. So I wanted to find out whether I'm missing something about the the the thought to dramatically increase the allowable building coverage. Nate, any thoughts. Yeah, I mean if we're trying to get density I think 35% is too low and so you know this would be an opportunity where a developer might say, you know I don't have any parking because there's public transit if it's students they can go to the university people can bite you and they don't need as many parking spots here and so you know I don't want parking spaces to be the back door way to say no to this right and so ideally I would say we have no parking requirements, zero for everything, no parking We could do that, and the developer would propose what they want they want to put a restaurant they put as many parking spaces as they need. And so you know I know some developers want one parking space per unit some might want to some might want a mix and so you know I think the parking space ratio is is kind of an archaic thing that's been around and zoning, thinking that everyone wants or needs a you know two cars per unit I don't think that there's necessarily a right answer and I actually think that down here it might be that a developer could propose that they don't need anything. Right there's not a lot of streets nearby to have on street parking so maybe they want them but maybe they say you know my tenants and my leases will actually restrict vehicles. So then you know, they might need 50% lock coverage for building, or 50% building coverage because they don't want to have all the surface parking. There's the ability to put parking under a building. But I just think that 35% building coverage is, you know, that's really small so if we're thinking about having this be a denser area if we looked at what we have in, you know, say downtown or something that's, you know, we're trying to balance what you know, to allow in other districts and so 35% just seems, you know, too little if someone really can have something without much parking. But it seems like, you know, if that's if that's the approach then then we definitely need to look at the parking ratio, and because that sounds like that's actually the governing surface demand. What are Bruce's calculations. It can be, I think, you know, these are also maximums and so the idea would be that, I mean, looking at the map there are a few properties that are probably about 50% building coverage right now. And, but yeah, you know, someone's not going to build just a massive square building that's, you know, 200 square feet by 200, you know, you know you just need an air flow you need windows and so to me it would be, it'd be odd to have someone say maybe a footnote if you needed it, you know, so to me I'd rather have standards that are, that's what they are, we're not going to have footnotes or the provision to wave them or modify them it just it would seem strange to, you know, to have all these that those provisions and so, you know, maybe 6% is is too much in a, the preexisting loss that are over 50 if we have 50% then they can still be over 50 if it, you know, but I'd like to think that we want to encourage people to go and, you know, a bigger coverage. Alright, Bruce anything else before we go on. No, I'll hold off for the moment I think the answer I'm hearing from Nate is that you need to add you need to go up from 35 if you want to allow for less than five and listen for no parking. And that retaining 35% would basically be driving or anticipating that they would always be some parking and I guess if that's not true, then I can understand that you wouldn't want to do that. But my basic point to repeat it is that, if we're, if we're adding two stories to the provision, we're certainly adding density over even the existing, the existing coverage you can get a lot of stuff on there. But I hear what you're saying Nate and I understand that that was the answer I was looking for. Okay Bruce, we can certainly come back to you. Thanks Doug. A couple questions and just clarification really for now. So Nate that that image you just showed with the wetlands that was really helpful. Could you share that with us as we think about this more. Not not right now on the screen necessarily just could you send that or put it in the packet as well. Yeah, yeah. Because that actually made me feel a lot better about some bigger buildings looking at how that's going to limit essentially what's going to become paved and built right. And Nate isn't it true that the green boundaries you showed was the actual wetland and that any conservation commission review is going to require or limit the amount of building within what is it 100 foot setback from those lines so it's actually greater you know in terms of what's not going to be buildable. Right. Yeah, so that's really helpful just to look at and think about this. So question about the access road. So that's actually owned by the lots. It's not it's not a real street. Is that correct. Right. So, yeah. And then as you've written a lot of the details here. So the language you're using is encouraged or should be stuff like that. Is there a reason not to have stronger language and things we feel strongly about like street trees or like the multi use path. Can we require those rather than encourage them. And what are the downsides in your view of doing that. Yeah, that's a good question staff some staff had pointed that out. Yeah, I, I don't think it's, I think. I think some areas we could require I think sometimes it's hard to say you know requiring pervious pavement or something. But maybe in some others, we could the, I think with the, the access drive it's hard because there's easements over those are privately owned and then their multiple properties share the easements so they can access them and so, you know, some owners that they could probably say we'll make another curb cut and then extinguish the easements but at some cases it might be tricky legally to have, you know, a number of property owners agree. So I don't know if we can require that that be reused as a pedestrian path but so, you know, the requirement for street trees right we could say that. You know, we could, you know, my hope would be say for that access drive to encourage it to become a multi use path, and we have the setbacks to do that and then you know the town or probably have to negotiate some easements there that you know for it but I think it you know it's hard because it's outside the right of way. The right of way in university drive is really wide but most of it is off the road on the east side, and it's pretty close to the curb edge on the west side and so you know if we had a generous right of way with, then we could have you know get up some different language but I think because it's on private property I have right, you know that kind of encourage or the, not the requirements that it be so. Okay, Karen. Yeah, so I agree with Jesse seeing all the wetlands made me realize that we really haven't got. I mean it was daunting in a way because it made you realize that the density that we're going to get there is not is limited and another sense, we're going to have enough open space because of all these wetlands. I've been looking at five stories as opposed to four stories going to Northampton counting the, the five stories next to the four stories and seeing that the five stories often are recessed and I also think we should allow five stories we really want to get as much density in as possible and then if you have five stories that allows the developer to do to have more open space to kind of make it more attractive. Tonight, you sent these design guidelines that were developed by the consultants that we hired for Milton, and I started to read that and I was especially intrigued and impressed with one of the concepts which was developed first, the pedestrian way. The idea of how you're going to have the flow of the pedestrians, have that be a prime thing to start off with, and then go from there because I think that that's what we're all aiming for is to have density in a place where we really have encouraged pedestrian bicycling. So that's one of the first things we should think about is how are we going to really have this be a prominent feature, and it already is with with the treescape. Yeah, so, and as far as the parking concept I've changed a lot that to I read that book Paving Paradise and there's going to be that conference in Boston that I'm hoping to go to. I really opened my eyes to the fact that we have to get off of this idea of mandating a lot of parking that the less parking that you provide, the more you're really, I mean there's, it kind of forces the kind of infrastructure that we want to develop and a university, you're a town where you're so close to things you could have. I mean if there's a real problem getting around you could so quickly put pressure to have some trolley going back and forth. I think it's really is a good thing to have to limit it the requirement to point five if of anything I kind of agree with Nate, maybe we should get rid of the parking mandate all together in this particular place. Thanks. Okay, Karen. Janet. So just quickly on the parking front. I would not, if we want families and, you know, working adults to live in this area have the opportunity to do to do that. If there is no parking, there will be no families and I don't know anybody. I don't know anybody who doesn't have a car in the valley that can afford one. What I also think is, you know, at night, the big white parking lot is available. Same thing is true for the university. I don't know if it's the urgent care on university drive there's a lot of a parking that's available at night and that our current bylaw talks about shared parking. And so I really think that our current serve at the cat, the current provision of the bylaw gives a lot of flexibility but it's not, it's not like this idea like oh we don't want anyone to have a car but I have one. I mean if everybody wants to give up the car and the planning board and see how that goes for them. That's fantastic but I just don't think we can take an ideal and attach it to zoning. The interesting thing is, you know, you're kind of like, I'd like to get rid of parking altogether. Why are we just let them build a 20 story building on university drive like you can't argue for the zoning you like, and then say well let's throw it out here it's I think these are sort of things that we have to really consider and think like how do people live what do they need. There is nowhere around here for people to park other than on Amity Street and that's where they go. And so I think it's possible to share parking there's I'm very flexible on it but the idea of like, oh, let's get rid of parking. We're not Manhattan, you know, and how people live and what do we want to encourage, you know, so anyway that's the first thing. The second thing is, I have a question about the wetlands and several people have talked to me about this recently. And that map that you showed. There's, this is, this is probably an area that probably was just a giant wetland and probably should never have been developed right and so I think, you know, Nate sort of alluded to that so I'm wondering. Now, like what is develop like if if we are these what will these wetlands be mapped differently or is there a way that development around them has to happen in a way that takes care of them or there's like best practices and I was wondering if we get more information about the wetlands and I was kind of wondering if Aaron Jake or somebody could look at this and say, you know these current lots could be built on or, you know, looking at what we're looking at. Maybe not. And I know Barry Roberts in his application was saying there's a high water table there's more wetlands. And also it all looks very different so I just kind of feel like we need more information on that I'm not sure how to get that. But I think if we're going to proceed with an idea of density in an area, can the area support that, or are there constraints. That's great, Janet. I guess I feel the need to say, Janet that I don't think we're talking about getting rid of parking. We're talking about getting rid of parking requirements, which would leave it to the developers to decide how much parking they wanted to provide. Why not, why have any setback, why don't we just let them pick the setback they want or the heights they want or the lot coverage they want, like why have zoning. I mean, we're trying to create a livable place for people. And we're thinking, oh, it's good to have space in the front and shopping in the front and we're going to require these things. I just don't have people pick and choose but I think you should pick and choose on, like, what's going to happen in 20 years or if you want an apartment building filled with students or people but what are we looking for. All right. Well, okay. Yeah, on the wetland piece, you know, most of this would be a redevelopment project so they couldn't expand the existing pavement or, you know, pervious areas or disturbed areas. And then you know with the groundwater, so stormwater management becomes, you know, kind of a, an engineering exercise and so, you know, to me what that means is redevelopment is expensive here and so you possibly want a five floors and greater density because there's no incentive to spend the money dealing with all that if you can't, you know, get density, right. So if you're going to spend a lot of money trying to manage stormwater with a new project and, you know, you can only get two stories and, you know, 20% building coverage. I don't think many property owners would do that. And so, yeah, so I think we can have Aaron do some more but, you know, I was going to share my screen again. So for instance, on say if we zoom in on this property, you know, if the edge of pavement is here and here, you know, what they, I can annotate here. If this is edge of pavement, you know, that's that's the extent of what can be redeveloped. Right. So they're they, they can, you know, if say this were all green space there's a little bit of green space here they can then pay that because it would be within the wetland buffer but they can use whatever is already disturbed. The difficulty would be then how do you manage stormwater, you know, pre and post stormwater so here's different right so here's green space and so the difficulty would be if you're proposing building here, you know, what does that mean in terms of wetlands, you know, your buffer your impact and your stormwater management, you know, it could be done it just becomes a lot more complicated than if we were already paved. And so, you know, if we, if we move down on the site you know the site down here, you know, again it's what's already disturbed, and what's the limit of that disturbance and how does it you know what's the wetland boundary and so that becomes really kind of the guiding, some of the guiding factors and we could have, you know, Aaron maybe write some bullet points up but yeah I think that becomes a really big piece there. Okay, Nate. Bruce or Chris actually, do you want to interject anything that's been said here. I do. I wanted to say that the map that Nate is showing is a state map, and it's not based on on the ground surveying of wetlands. And I know for a fact that there are more wetlands than are shown on that map and I know Nate knows that too. The approximation of where the wetlands are anytime that there's a project anywhere near wetlands within 100 feet of wetlands, we of course have to involve the conservation commission so that's kind of a limiting factor on all of these properties and I don't think the zoning needs to accommodate the wetlands. The wetlands are accommodated by very strict state regulations and town regulations and those will come into effect when a property is being considered to be developed and they're all considered differently. As Nate was describing properties that are already disturbed are considered differently from properties that are not disturbed so it's it's really impossible to predict anything about the wetlands, unless you have mapped the wetlands on the ground and you know exactly where they are, and know what category of the regulations you fit into so in my opinion. Yes, we can involve Aaron in this conversation, but I don't think that we should let that the fact that there are wetlands here limit what we're trying to do in terms of zoning because it will be limited by the conservation commission. Thank you. Thanks Chris. Bruce. Why don't we, I'm going to let Bruce and then Janet and then we'll take a break. Okay. I think I've ended in conditions starting at the halfway down page to I, I think I now understand that there are apartment uses, and there are mixed use buildings. And I think in my general understanding as we've been talking about this for the last six months. I guess I have to confess that I had really only ever had in my head mixed use buildings. And, and so I think I now understand that I didn't realize that this mouse was crawling under the door here. Because I guess, because I've got all sorts of things and questions about these apartment uses, but I hadn't really read and registered that it was a whole different type of use. So I guess my question is, why do why not just allow mixed use buildings here. And in fact, because it seems that's that gets us everything we want, including, including a commercial retail presence on the first floor at least 50% of it and at the front which we've repeatedly said, I mean multiple people here are repeatedly said so everything that we repeatedly said seems to drive multi mixed use buildings. So I just, I just don't understand why we've got apartment uses in here is there a reason that we have apartment uses in here. How does that not frustrate what we've basically been describing is what we want to have here. All right, Nate. Yeah, I actually think that we'd want some apartment buildings because we want residential units. I think if you know what we're doing with mixed use buildings is we're getting the space for uses. It doesn't mean it's going to be filled right so I think there's some developers who will work hard to find uses for to fill those that 50%. I think there are other developers who would take it like happens now in the space will be vacant for three years. And so the zoning isn't saying we're going to get, you know, an ice cream shop or offices or restaurants it's saying we're going to have the space, set for that. And, you know, if we have those dimensional standards in terms of you know cannot be allowed within so many feet of each other or maybe it's 500 feet of the corners. You know we can go through an exercise and say I was just doing that during the meeting if, if it's 500 feet from the intersections if we say that we change it and we say okay this property is developed. And I'm getting maybe two apartment buildings on the west side of University Drive. To me two apartment buildings is fine. I don't know why we need all mixed use buildings I think having, you know, different building types is is, you know, is okay that actually would add to the vibrancy, you get the density and the number of people so that the mixed building spaces, then can actually have uses in them. And so I actually think that, you know, if this were in place, the first few projects might have mixed use buildings, and maybe no uses until all of a sudden there's enough residents that someone's like you know what, I actually will put a restaurant in here, but maybe the first you know they're going to wait till you have the density and the number of people to support that and so I think apartments is you know if we want this to be actually housing I think we want apartments. I don't agree with you Nate, because basically, you've got four and a half floors of housing in the mixed use development and the front half of the first floor, if it is open, if it is vacant for a long time it eventually becomes, as you say, a restaurant or whatever you know when the when the critical mass is achieved. And over the lifetime of what we're trying to do here the first five or 10 years is not in, well, the first two or three years is inconsequential. I strongly disagree. I think that this is probably going to be some predominantly housing because that's, I mean, that's probably what's going to happen but it may not. And that wouldn't be terrible because this is predominantly a commercial district now and we're trying to imagine how a preponderance of housing can arrive there. And I think the mixed use formula gets that and gets it in spades and the fact that it gets it to 85% and not 100% really is not a problem for me in fact it's a problem if it goes that way because I think now you know, we want to preserve some fractions of that or the length of that street for retail commercial use and that vitality and then having blocks of residential apartments right on the street is kind of for me. There's a certain level of alborance I hate the idea of that I didn't like it at all and I so I anyway so you can work to convince me on that but basically I would strike the apartments. Sure. I was also going to say that if we require every building to be only mixed use buildings. We've had a few cases where they don't actually have a lot of frontage but we're acquiring so much of their ground floor to be non residential space and so you have, you know, a narrow building that goes deep into the lot and now we're saying half of it has to be non residential space and has not much frontage and so to me you're limiting kind of the creativity that could happen on a product on a property you're actually be limiting. How many buildings you'd have because you know, on the back of a property you might just have then the whole street lined with buildings that are mixed use but then the back of it where you could maybe have an L or a second building. Someone's not going to do it because they're not going to want to put 50% you know, have mixed use building space behind off the street and so I think requiring only mixed use buildings could actually limit what kind of creativity and development we see down here. Unless you have some, you know, some provision that if it's a mixed use building in the back is to reduce square, you know, square, you know, percentage on the first floor or something. Well, this is certainly your wheelhouse and not mine. But I have got, I've got a whole bunch more arguments to throw at you and no doubt you've got a whole bunch more to throw at me. And maybe now it's not the time. But, but this this is, I'm, I think you're going to have a hard time convincing me that apartments are a good idea here, notwithstanding all that you've currently said. Okay, okay, Bruce. Jana, your last and then we'll go to a break. I thought at the last meeting, there was consensus amongst the planning board that we wanted mixed use building. So, I kind of feel like we're going over ground that we talked already. And so, I mean, I'm assuming this overlay district is our recommendation or this is our kind of concept piece. And, you know, this will be shopped around to different stakeholder groups and things like that. But I do think. I do, I agree with Bruce. I just, I, you know, it's, so I just, I think if you, if you allow apartment buildings, you're going to have five story apartment buildings everywhere you could find it. I do have a question though about getting back to the wetlands. So, I know those delineations that that little green line isn't like scientifically exact. Is that the delineation of the wetlands or the wetlands plus the buffer. It's just, it's just the, it's an approximation of the wetlands, not any. Okay, so I do think I'd like Aaron jakes to take a look at that because I know that sometimes, even when you have a paid parking lot, you know, one of the wetlands goes right up there that maybe the conservation commission would want to buffer so I just think it'd be great to put in terms of like, what's the land's capacity to do this or what, you know, we are lots could be shrinking or not, you know, because things change but I just think it'd be great to use her if you know, get her input on to the board in some way. Okay, Janet. Karen, can it wait until after the break or not. Absolutely. Okay. All right. Thank you. Time is 818. We'll take a five minute break and come back at 823. Thanks. I'm done. Yes, Janet. I am probably going to sign off after we finish university drive. And then I have only one question about the, the design guidelines, which was like, what was SK 12 and three but I could just ask Chris that some other time on the on the flow chart I just didn't understand what that was. But, you know, I'm still getting over my coven which seems almost permanent at this point. So, sorry to hear that. But my days of glory and activity seem to be over permanently. That's too bad. It's okay. It's okay. It's just, it's, you know, I have to sort of pace myself. Okay. All right. Well, I'll try to notice when you bow out and we'll try to note that time. I haven't forgotten you, Karen. I put my vest on it's cold in here. Excuse me. You're always outdoors, Chris. That's good. I just asked Bruce and Nate. There's Bruce Bruce. And I don't really want to continue this conversation without Nate so see if he wants to come back and get more comments from us. Sometimes he has to wrangle his dog while we take a break. That's right. I remember last time that happened he was late back because of his dog. If I can while we're waiting, I'm not sure that my spreadsheet is going to be that important for discussion. I wonder whether it couldn't just be sent around and people can figure it out for themselves and figure out whether it's useful. Yeah. I mean, I, you know, I'd be happy to show it, but I don't want to take up time. Since you sent it out to Chris and Nate and me, you know, I thought you'd at least want to share something about that investigation. Oh, absolutely. I think it was very, it was helpful for me to to to figure out how these variables were. And I felt that I felt that that could be done without drawing it. I felt it could be done simply using numbers. All right. And then Chris, you know, I think you could take Bruce's email with his spreadsheet and just send it around to the board. You are muted, but I think I know. And then you'll tell me when, whether, when you want me to put it on the agenda. Is that right? It sounds like Bruce is not sure we really needed on the agenda. Well, it's in my, in my architectural partnership, we had three of us and and one of us was called numbers, one of us was called words and one of us was called pictures. And we realized that in any given moment of design process or communications, one of us was better suited to making the case. It would have been numbers, which was not me, it was Mark, but it seemed to me that numbers was an important way of getting some broad understandings. And that's why I also wanted pictures, which was the, the image that that nature, which I'd asked for, because I thought that would be helpful. And so in a similar way, I think numbers would be helpful. We've spent most of our time with words. I've provided numbers and they did a picture and I guess we're going to do more pictures with King Riddle and whomever. But you can take this spreadsheet and you'll see that there are different cells that are yellow and those are numbers that can be adjusted. And if you adjust them, the numbers in blue in other cells will change and you can try various assumptions. And you can change from one parcel to another. You can put in different parcel areas based on the property data that's there available. And then try, for example, what happens when you have different assumptions relating to parking generation or units or numbers of laws and all that sort of thing. And you can see whether you learn anything. All right, I appreciate the time you spent on that Bruce. Well, let's see, maybe, I think maybe last time I did this. Oh, here's Nate. Nate, did you, did you get your dog taken care of? It's my dog and my daughter. Well, I was just about to suggest we go on to a couple of our routine things later in the agenda and then come back. You know, I was, I was here, I heard Bruce. Okay, yeah, he was, he was talking about his spreadsheet. Yeah, I was gonna say I think that when we work with the architect, the hope is that they bring, you know, they have, you know, we'll have all the plan a site plan with some metrics and they'll kind of use, like I said, their expertise to generate what could be a concept design in terms of, you know, number of parking spaces open space and then you know building footprint in size and so I think the difficulty is, you know, we've, you know, we took what were dimensional standards and staff and we'd say, Well, here's what a typical building might look like. And it becomes like a rectangle on a plan but you know, a developer might not really use that model, right, they might come up with something else depending on what kind of use they want or parking or how they envision it and so I understood what Bruce was saying, it's really hard to visualize and to understand what is the dimensional standard mean in terms of the built environment and I think that's where, you know, working with the architect can help. You know, we can also come up with different models and thoughts but it's really difficult. I mean, you mentioned potentially having them do two or three different parcels. Right. But you could also look at it as doing one parcel under two or three different assumptions about, right, you know, the number of parking requirements or the, you know, the lot coverage and so that we can see how the numbers we put in produce different physical results. And, you know, that might be equally, I might be even more useful than looking at three different parcels I don't know. So, I promised Karen, she would be next. So, Karen. There you go. So, I have a question. If you're proposing this to be apartments and mixed use. Does that mean that the developer gets to decide or then then we have no control. I said over, maybe everybody just going to put apartments in. How does that get decided. On the other hand, I really do understand that there might be pieces of land in this difficult wetland area that an apartment or an attractive apartment building would be desirable. And, you know, one of the goals is that we want to encourage families also to have a place in Amherst that can't afford houses. Plenty of places where where young families love living in apartments and create an apartment house with that. That's affordable. That isn't a house. That's a wonderful place for young families to live. And so, I think we shouldn't just completely rule out the suggestion that some of these areas might be preferably to be all apartment houses. But my question is, how do you, how do you then limit that this isn't all going to be apartments. Nate, you know, without, I guess I'll put words in your mouth. Isn't that what the distance requirements were to, to limit the number, the frequency of apartment buildings. Right. So if we, you know, if we said that on, you know, say 400 feet from the intersection. Sorry, I'm in my draw tool. You know, so then these two properties say these, they're this, these two properties could can only be mixed use buildings. And then if we had a distance requirement of, you know, a few hundred feet, then all of a sudden say this one property can be developed as an apartment building. And then with the next distance requirement, you know, in the wetlands, all of a sudden it becomes, you know, maybe this property. And then it, you know, and then maybe, you know, one other property. And so that's how the distance requirement would work. Right. And then if you can't be within so many feet of the other intersections and you so really, you know, the inner, the distance from the intersection would be the, the first parameter. And then it's really about what is the first apartment building developed. And then you'd have these buffers around it. And so, right. I mean, I think, and there's a few different ways that that could happen, but that's how that would work. Right. So if we follow that scenario down, maybe you'd get three apartment buildings on the West side. University drive. Yeah, I mean, 70 university drive is already all apartments, right. It has a very small mixed use component. Oh, really? So it's a mixed use. Okay. Okay. Bruce. I was going to ask whether we would consider eliminating the side yard setback requirement. Because I thought, but I see it's only 10 feet. So it probably, and you certainly probably be getting cars through there. So, and then I look at the map and the wetlands and so forth. And I think that I've just done a site design in my head. And I think it's irrelevant. So, but the idea of getting buildings close together and pretty much attached along that. Strip, particularly if we've got. I'll say what I was going to say the. The mixed use would put a lot of people in have in a residential habitation along that along that strip. And a healthy once it evolves retail commercial presence on the first floor would begin to vitalize the street and I was thinking that we might want to close that up as tight as we could. So that there weren't gaps between it. And, and I, I was thinking that it was 25 feet, but I was getting the front and the side mixed up. And I know we probably need to have powers coming through. So you could probably eliminate the side yard setback to zero, but you would still effectively have penetrations that would be gaps in the frontage. So, I think my. My aspiration wouldn't be achieved by eliminating the eliminating the side yard setback. Well, Nate, I thought you had somewhere in there about consolidation of sort of parking between adjacent properties. What about allowing zero setback on one side or the other, in which case you could have a pair of buildings by two different owners that could be a budding. They'd have to give up the air, the windows on those sites. But, you know, that might be a way to reduce the number of vehicular access breaks along the street. Janet, go ahead. You are muted. So you're saying there's three apartment buildings that could be built on the West side. How many could be built on the East side because, you know, and also considering like redevelopment because I kind of worrying about the nursing home. I know it's not exactly an industry that people make a lot of money at. And so if you did the same analysis on the East side of the street, how many apartment buildings could go in there. Yeah, I mean, I haven't, you know, I can't say threes the definitive number I was just saying if you look quickly it seems like with, you know, say 500 feet from the intersection and 300 feet from apartment buildings, you know that it limits that number. You know, potentially if it's the same length of street then it's kind of the same kind of the same metric right. It really depends on like I said where that kind of first unit goes in and then what are the land use constraints and so but Nate that that buffer goes in all directions right. Right. So if there's a building on one side of the street will force the same spacing on the other side of the street. Right. What why wouldn't you want apartment buildings on corners for close to the, the corners. I think typically that's where you'd want to have, you know, stores or vibrancy on the first floor and so, you know, if you want to get people in and, you know, have have activity on the streets it would be at the intersections and you know, maybe mid block is where you could have an apartment building. I think, you know, actually my only question is like what, you know, I think we're, these are good discussions but I think my question is like what are the next steps because we haven't talked to any property owners or businesses in that area, or the many residents around there, including the residents of places like the arbors. And so I wonder, you know, it's not maybe next time but you know, we're coming to a thing that we think we can support and I'd like to know think about next steps to bring it. To the larger immediate community to get their feedback and ideas to before we, you know, go any further. I also, you know, I, I, you know, I know we're doing this downtime design standards thing with Dodson Flinker and I've seen a bunch of their work. And, you know, it's very specific and it's very specific, like saying like this kind of door works this kind of door doesn't work. And I'm wondering about the timing of, you know, these design standards or guidelines are very general and I'm just wondering, you know, we, I think the key thing is, and I've said this since I moved in Amherst, I don't think people care that much about a building is if it looks good. You know, I said this when I lived in Porter Square is like you could build a monstrosity and everybody hates and you could build a slaughterhouse that looks beautiful and people aren't going to care what's going on inside so much, or maybe not anymore. But I just think that increased density, increased heights. It's got to look good and these design standards aren't super specific like if Valley CDC could design every building I'd be fine because they understand that what makes their buildings acceptable. You know, in neighborhoods is that they look really good and they fit in and so I'm wondering, like, we're going to have this very long lovely process for design guidelines. For Amherst Center and then are we just going to patch something together for University Drive or we can we benefit from that but my real question is like so what are the next steps and I really do want to, as the board or the planning department to reach out to the, the stakeholders, the people who live there work there, or own business own buildings there. All right. Nate, do you have any thoughts about that? Yeah, I think next steps can be, you know, send comments. And, you know, in addition to what we've discussed tonight, you know, we can have revisions to the bylaw or, you know, have different ideas that could be discussed at the next meeting or meetings. In terms of design guidelines, I, you know, I don't, you know, downtown I think is different than here and so I think, you know, if after that process we like some of the standards that has been developed for downtown we could apply them here but, you know, I don't want, you know, my point is that we need not to have this become overly prescriptive in terms of, you know, window style or door style. This isn't a local historic district and it's, you know, and so I'd want to see what, you know, we do reference the design review standards that are in the bylaw and that talks about window spacing patterns. I think the board could be empowered to use to say something doesn't meet those right now I don't think that's been done, but I think it could be and so maybe we have some stronger language in the overlay in terms of that but I don't want to say well we have to have every building and we have to have, you know, symmetric windows or whatever right I mean I think that we want to we could have some design guidelines but I don't want to say it has to look just like you know the Hastings building all down university drive that's you know it's that's kind of that's not what I'm envisioning as a possibility there and so but you know if Dawson has some ideas for what are good you know is it kind of discussions of proportions or things but like I said I think that design review principles already have that and so you know just trying to use those for review here which could be important. So, the only time I've seen the design review standards really used is in the Spring Street building. And, you know we had the same developer we have three buildings four buildings by the same developer. And the only time the design review board stood up and said, you know, like the building that is across from the bullwood in, and they really changed it they change the roof, they change the everything about it and it's really the most attractive building that Archipelago has built that hasn't incited you know revolution amongst the residents. And so, you know, you know, it's great to say these things but nobody is pushing back and we have these buildings downtown that a lot of people don't and university drive can come become a whole series of boxes and then we can just sort of say hey, we built apartments bulky apartments were housing. You know we did our work but I think we can do better because we're offering developers and property owners, a huge economic gift, and we can ask for something in return and loose standards means no standards and if we don't apply the design standards, they don't, they don't get done and that was a kind of a rogue board. I think from, you know, my 20 years in Amherst and they got a great building out of it. Okay. I agree. I think we have to make certain that this is attractive and not just a bunch of blocks that house a lot of people. It's important for the whole town, regardless of where it is. All right, I don't see any more hands at this point. I guess so at this point I will ask the members of the public who've been patiently listening. There are still eight members of the public that are at least showing up on my screen. Do any of you want to make a public comment at this time. You can have up to three minutes. I see one hand Pam, I want to bring Claire Bertrand over. And then I now see a second one. Hello Claire. Hello, thank you for having this conversation and for considering housing density. Give us your street address. Okay, Claire Bertrand. I'm at 610 Bay Road. Thank you. And Pam, could you restart the timer? There we go. I visit university drive regularly, as I'm sure we all do. And I feel like it's a really ideal location in town to see housing density proximity to university both for students and grad students families and staff. Of course, housing is needed as well. And there's easy access between the distances is reasonable the bike path makes it alternate to the car is so good. And I think it's, it's a space where height, height of buildings will is welcome. You've got both the sense of space that comes from a very long straight street. And you've got your kind of lower down from the climb that goes up into town or the stretch out to nine I feel like height would work well there. And just one other suggestion I have besides generally encouraging this and I really value hearing all of you chew on a lot of this that that Nate and staff have put together to make it better. Thank you because you're working hard at this and and it's needed. I would just encourage you to consider other possible zones that like this street, our road are perhaps underutilized of other our office park or PRP zones that perhaps could use the same kind of intensity zoning, so that we could see housing built in other areas. So, thank you again. All right, thank you Claire. All right, Pam, let's bring over Elizabeth viriling next. Elizabeth, please remind us of the of your address. Elizabeth, can you unmute yourself. Yes. Sorry, not delay. We can hear you. All right, great. Yes, Elizabeth viriling 36 cottage street. And I want to thank you for having this discussion I think it's really important that it continue, and I really appreciate listening to it. And I just wanted to support the idea that all buildings in this overlay be mixed use buildings in agreement with Bruce. This seems totally logical. If we want to build community and limit car use we want to have as many services available within walking distance as possible. If we build mostly apartments I think we're essentially creating a different type of sprawl that still right requires everyone to get in their car to fill all of their needs. I also do not understand the concept that all commercial needs to be on the street. For example, right now my tax attorney is on the corner of Amity and university but back behind the street, you know daycare doctors business offices etc don't need to be on the street. Good services will be used even if they aren't seen from the street. Finally, I'm concerned about the concept of not specifying some type of parking requirement. I agree with what was said about families, families with children aging parents are hard pressed to run their lives without cars. And as much as I would like to see car use limited. There would have to be a major change to public transportation for this to be realistic, which is not seem to be within the time frame we were dealing with here. I'm also concerned about the goal to transition to more electronic vehicles, which is not compatible right now with on street parking. So I just think these are things I would ask you to also consider as the discussion continues. Thank you. Okay, thank you, Elizabeth. Let's see. I'm going to move on to Janet Keller. There I see your hand raised. And you've already spoken so I'm going to hold. Okay, the hand went down. So let's bring over Janet. Hi Janet if you would remind us of your street address you have three minutes. Sure. 120 pulpit Hill Road. I also greatly appreciate the board's discussion of key issues here. I'm glad Nate met the wetland. We photographed some of those wetlands and tried to put together a slide show for you today. But I had trouble with the computer and, and a new phone from which I was switching the photographs so I'll send those as soon as I get them in order. I think in addition to many of the other items that folks have discussed. I'm with the board members who have said commercial on the first floor would be lively or I would really like to not have blocks of apartment buildings. And the main thing I wanted to say is that I hope that and I didn't hear your earlier discussion I came came in late tonight. I hope you are in deep discussions with the wetlands administrator and the conservation commission because, as we all know this is the wetlands are extensive as Nate's map shows and the warmer wet wet wet or whether we're having due to climate change will make that critical. So appreciate your work and looking forward. Oh, the final thing is the design is critical. It makes it makes a living in a place much, much better and makes attracts people and I hope we can ensure that the designs are top notch. Thank you. Okay, thank you Janet. Next up is Tom reedy. Hello Tom. Hello Mr chair. I think you're an Amherst resident you'll have to give us your street address if you are not an Amherst resident but we do maintain an office at six southeast street. Thank you. So to two quick points, ultimately in support, you know I really appreciate the conversation that the boards having and all the work that staff has put into it. I'm very pleased to hear that they're going to be working with local design professionals to take a look at what actually could be built, you know because I think in a lot of the pieces of the overlay district are are very smart. It's just how they apply to the actual land that you're looking to apply them to westerly side of University Drive. As Nate had pointed out it has some small posted size stamped lots, what could actually be done there so I think once you start to look at what could actually be done and I work with plenty of developers very included we're always happy to have a conversation with staff or the board to talk about the way that developers are looking at this. So, I know there'll be more conversations but but we're more than happy to have those as well. And then second is just really from my practice, permitting across the state. At the time, I found a well written and successful zoning bylaws where the board here the planning board would give itself discretion in the future. And so instead of having some compulsion where there's no wiggle room and somebody's coming in for a variance or trying to get a zoning amendment, allowing discretion for either this planning board or a future or based upon the circumstances of the site or the project or society at that time is just really good planning so just to keep that in the back of your head. And that's it for me. Thanks for the work. Okay, thank you Tom. And Pam looks like we have one more George Ryan to be all set George. I just done you to myself I hope. Thank you. Thank you for letting me speak and tonight I speak as not as a member of town council, but as a 36 year resident of the town of Amherst. And someone who actually lives just two blocks from university drive. And I salute the planning board for taking the time and taking on this issue. I think it's important. And I think university drive is the perfect place to begin to look at encouraging development development, which can both meet our critical need for housing and also help us expand our tax base, which is also critical. And I really hope that you will keep this to very much in mind. I appreciate the comments about aesthetics. I appreciate comments about look and they're not a material. But I think for many people in this town, it's the need for place to live. And for many taxpayers, it's some relief in the tax area and in expanding our tax base. I also think it's proximity to you mass makes this an attractive place to start. So I hope as they say that you will move with all deliberate speed. And I also hope this will not be your last exploration. I want to echo something that was said earlier. I think there are other areas in town that could be looked at that might provide appropriate places for this sort of dense development, particularly mixed use development. So I appreciate very much the work you're doing. I hope you'll keep in mind the very critical need for housing and the importance that that plays in helping us expand our tax base, especially through mixed use development. And please keep up the good work. Thank you. All right. Thank you, George. All right. Time is 857. We've been at this for what two and a half hours. I'm sure there'll be more to come. And I don't see any other hands. So I'm wondering whether we're kind of spent for this evening. And whether we should just leave it at that and please, please send your further comments to Nate and Chris. So that they can consider them when they come back with another round of drafts for this. Any objections to moving on. I know Janet you're probably headed out. Thank you for joining us. All right, so time is 858 Janet has left our meeting. And we'll move on to the next items on the agenda. And thank you, Nate for your work. It's great to see stuff on paper. And, you know, give us something to react to even if it's not all exactly what we would have written. And I'll send my comments along. Probably over the weekend. Okay. Next item on the agenda is old business. Not reasonably anticipated 48 hours in advance. Anything to report Chris. Sorry, I think the next item on the agenda was downtown design guidelines. Yeah, I saw too. Yes. I made him jump. Okay. Item five downtown design guidelines. Chris go ahead and tell us where we're at and or Nate, I don't know. Yeah, hi everyone. I think the. Yeah, we Dotson would like to get moving. It's already, you know, third week in February, but they're hoping to start this month with stakeholder groups and a working group. And so, you know, in the packet there was a timeline and it, you know, shows like an 18 month calendar and it really does build on itself. So they're, you know, they're hoping to, you know, have a pretty intense public outreach. Kind of visioning phase, and then work on these iterative standards and involve the public at, you know, a number of points, whether it's through, you know, the working group or through public events and meetings, they'd be coming back, you know, almost the planning board and others. And so, you know, I think what kind of the big piece is, you know, they like to have a working group of 25 to 30 people that could, they meet with five to six times throughout the process at key points to get feedback. And so this working group would be, you know, we're reviewing products by Dotson and then providing feedback in the meeting. And it'd be open to the public. They wouldn't necessarily be, you know, a public meeting per se, but there'd be, you know, be open to the public. So would this be like the solar bylaw working group? No, that was, that hits a little different on that it was appointed to the town manager and the working group there was then making a recommendation to the town. This working group is really just working with Dotson. And so, you know, and then there's stakeholder groups. And we're looking at, you know, a number of stakeholder groups with, I don't know, five to eight to 10, 12 people in a group. So one might be, you know, we're looking at having downtown property owners and business owners, board representatives as a stakeholder group residents as a group. And we'd like to get those meetings going in the next few weeks to have Dotson meet with those individuals. We're trying to put names down on paper and come up with this stakeholder group. And that would just be an initial meeting where they would ask questions. The idea would be would be in person, probably a town hall. Staff wouldn't be in attendance. It would be really just the groups in Dotson. And so, you know, we're hoping that it would be, it would allow for kind of open communication. And so, you know, we wouldn't necessarily have comments attributed to this specific individual, but really just generally from the working groups so that if, you know, say developers are there. They're willing to share thoughts in terms of what they think works or doesn't or what they see downtown, you know, what a residents think or feel. So, you know, that's kind of the first step. And then we can kind of keep it going. And so, you know, like I said, I think the planning board will be involved in a few different ways members can be part of the stakeholder groups and the working group and then you're, you know, you're formally a part of the process at key intervals to review the products so. All right. So you will be reaching out to us about people who are interested in being part of that. Right. Okay. Chris. I think Karen and Janet have already indicated that they're interested in being part of this. So others are interested too. They should speak up. Well, I'm, I'm certainly interested. You can put me on that list. And I'll say that. Well, I forget now how we are what we decided it was Dodson of the town would host a website, you know, a webpage with information. And you know, there'll definitely be ways for the public and you know board members provide feedback whether it's you know in a formal group or not so it is that everything would become available online and you know, can be comments can be submitted any anytime. All right, do you need anything else from us this evening. All right, so it's just an update. All right. I think it's now safe for me to move to the next time, which is the old business. Time is 903. Chris any old business Pam. I just report that the, the meadows subdivision went to town council the same night that the Amherst Hills subdivision did, but there were difficulties because the planning board had recommended to town council that there be a three party meeting with the town, the developer and the residents each paying for part of getting the road up to, you know, proper status. But it appears that there was some information that was missing during that conversation, and that information is kind of being circulated now. I'm expecting that the meadows will be reconsidered by town council before too long, and that you, you probably won't be getting a referral, because you it was already referred to you a number of years ago, and you made this recommendation for the three party agreement. I'm just sort of bringing you up to speed on what's going on, and we're hoping to get some sort of resolution soon. So, just wanted to let you know about that. Moving on to new business, not anticipated. Anything. Okay. Form A and our subdivision. I could report that there is an A&R that's part of the Ball Lane Valley CDC comprehensive permit. And because of the way a comprehensive permit is processed, the zoning board of appeals is going to step in and act in the shoes of the planning board to sign that A&R plan. And the A&R takes advantage of being part of the comprehensive permit, because it won't need to comply with the building circle requirement or the lot area requirement. It will be a flag lot that has appropriate frontage, but the other two requirements will be waived by the comprehensive permit. I believe if the zoning board actually agrees to this plan. So, I just wanted to let you know about that because people may ask, well, why was the zoning board signing that plan and not the planning board? And it's because it's part of a comprehensive permit. Okay. So they can all meet you behind Town Hall to sign the A&R instead of us. That's right. Well, I hope they enjoy it. Okay. Upcoming ZBA applications. I don't have any new ones to report on. I'm not sure if my colleagues are aware of something that I am not. I think we may be able to report on them next time because several have come in and I'm not aware of what they all are. Tomorrow night, the zoning board will be considering a variance on the property at the corner of University Drive and Amity Street. And that relates to some degree with what we're talking about doing on University Drive. The zoning board of appeals meetings are not on television. If you wanted to attend it, you'd have to go on the website and find the link to the meeting, just like you would for any other meeting. But then you could attend it and listen to their conversation. Okay. Okay, upcoming SPP, SPR, SUB applications. We have the application for the property. That includes Hastings. I may have told you about this last time. And so it's a mixed use building and it will be coming to you on March 6. Okay. All right. Time is 9 08. We'll go on to planning board committee and liaison reports. Bruce, anything on PVPC. Well, yes, there was a quarterly meeting. They, there was some not regular kind of business done and they voted the allocations. And so we know Amist contributes $7347. Some of the town allocations are really small because they're small towns. It's quite interesting to see how how small malls and stuff is in some respects. The organization though gets funds from all sorts of places and the annual budget of the corporate PVPC is about $7.5 million. So they'd all adds up. But most of the time was spent on a presentation related to the proposed affordable homes act. That's something that's moving through the legislature. The deadline both well in late July, which if it's not taken, I guess they have to start all over again. But there was a fairly thorough presentation given about what the bill proposed as and its coverage and so forth. I won't go into it in any particular detail except to say that I do have the presentation. It's a, and I could, I could, I could send it to Chris I could make it available if folks are interested in the, in what is what is to be provided or what is proposed to be provided in this proposed new legislation. I think that would be great. Okay, I will. I will send that. I mean it's a huge thing a housing bond bill of about four over $4 billion. So I mean this is a lot of a lot of money and a great number of whether they're thinking about 160,000 housing units in various ways, which it could have some impact I think. Okay, I will do that. Okay, thank you. I have nothing to report for CPAC tonight. Karen anything for DRB. No, we're going to meet again on Monday. Okay. And Chris for CRC. I have no reports. All right. I have no report as chair. Chris any report as staff. I have no further report as staff. No. All right. I just jumped in quickly. Yeah, sure. Staff is updating the open space and recreation plan. And the planning board is required to review and, you know, I'll say approve it or recommend it to the state and so the hope would be to have a draft in the spring, April, May. Okay. So we have a survey online right now for residents to complete and then that'll help inform kind of the goals and vision and action steps that are incorporated into the plan. So that's something that'll be coming before the board. The other thing is there's a property owner in town who has reached out to staff saying that they might want to remove their land from chapter from chapter 61. So that would be the first refusal and that would come to the planning board. And then may, you know, it may, it may come. And, you know, it, it seems like it seems likely and then the planning board has, you know, so many days to act. And so that could be, you know, March or April that the planning board would have to, you know, would, could, would review this right at first refusal. And this would be where we recommend to town council to exercise the right or not. Yeah. So similar to the road acceptance would be a recommendation to town council to either, you know, purchase the property or do something, you know, what kind of actions to take. Right. Okay. Right. Anything else from anyone. All right. Thank you all. I guess our next meeting is in early March. Correct. It seems like six. What a surprise that we're already into March. All right. Good night everyone. Time is 912. Have a good evening. Thank you. Good night. Bye. Good morning.