Land Use

1 LAND USE COMMITTEE EDWARDSVILLE PLAN COMMISSION September 10, 2015 PRESENT ABSENT Beth Schlueter, Chairman Veronica Armouti, Vice Chairman Jill Buford Larry Miller John Mullane, PC Chairman Paul Pitts Mark Rabe Ben Powell Scott Hanson, Staff Cheryl Porter, Staff Lisa Schneck, Staff Craig Louer, Alderman Ward 6 Justin Venvertloh, Thouvenot Wade and Moerchen Inc. Kevin Jones Walt Blotevogel. Blotevogel Associates At the regular meeting of the Plan Commission's Land Use Committee, the following was discussed: Case 2015-26: RIDGEVIEW MANOR – Preliminary Plat Developer: Paul A. Darr Trust Engineer: Blotevogel Associates Scott Hanson gave a quick overview of the proposed project. There is a regulation which would allow for a final minor process unless there is a variance. This contains a flag lot which is a variance item. The new lot will be comprised of approximately 3 acres. It is located on Ridgeview Road about 225 feet South of Marine Road. The lot is undeveloped at this time. The City is in the process of extending water to the North from Leslie Drive on the East side of Ridgeview Road. There are a couple of variances requested. 1. Flag Lot. Staff has no issue with the flag lot. 2. Sidewalks. Currently there are no existing sidewalks along Ridgeview Road. Staff is also okay with this variance request. The applicant has requested to buy out the greenspace requirement. Walt Blotevogel added that the location of the house will be at the end of the “flagpole” because the width of the flagpole will be 95 feet. This will look like a normal lot with 3 acres but it still meets the definition of a flag lot. Hanson explained the reason for not requiring sidewalks along Ridgeview Road. Ridgeview Road was improved within the last 6 years or so. The City was in charge of acquiring the right-of-way but the County did the improvements. At that time there was not enough right-of-way acquired to meet the requirement of sidewalks. Louer asked if there would be the possibility of the 3 acre lot being subdivided again. Hanson stated all lots have to have street frontage. If they would want to subdivide it again, they would have to go through the same process as they are going through now which would have to be approved through Council. RECOMMENDATION: Forward to Plan Commission without a recommendation due to the lack of a quorum.  2 Case 2015-27: EDWARDSVILLE TOWNE CENTER – Preliminary Plat Developer: Kevin Jones / Scott Plocher Engineer: Thouvenot, Wade & Moerchen, Inc. Hanson gave a quick overview of the Preliminary Plat. It is located on the Southeast corner of Governors Parkway and State Route 157. It is the current location of Madison Mutual. There will be 3 entrances onto State Route 157 and 1 entrance onto Governors Parkway. Street 1 will be a public street which connects Governors Parkway to State Route 157. The connection onto State Route 157 will be right in / right out and fully signalized at Governors Parkway. The next entrance south, which is the existing Mutual Court, will be partially redesigned and already signalized with full access. One more entrance to the South will also be full access but intended to be truck access only. The proposal is 26 acres. It is partially developed with Madison Mutual and the rest of the lots are undeveloped. The City will provide sanitary sewer, water, fire and police protection. Gas and electrical will be provided by Ameren. Details about all sidewalks on the site are still being reviewed by staff. IDOT has indicated that, according to Federal Highway requirements for access controlled highways, sidewalks cannot be installed per their regulations along Governors Parkway. Justin Venvertloh stated he had just gotten word from IDOT they approved a 10-foot shared use path along Governors Parkway in the right-of-way. The site plan will be adjusted accordingly. Schlueter stated she feels there are too many access points on Governors Parkway now. It seems staff does not have a problem with it though. The access points were already established when Governors Parkway was developed which was prior to the purchase of this property by the petitioners. It is out of the City’s hands of whether to allow the access points. The developer and the City have worked really hard to come up with access to the site. All access points were justified by a traffic study. Variances requested for Land Use and Plan Commission to consider: 1. The entrance along Rte 157 (right in / right out entrance) was granted previously by IDOT. The distance from this entrance and the main intersection does not meet the minimum distance according to the Land Development Code so a variance has been applied for. 2. The existing Mutual Court and the new entrance at the Southwest corner do not meet the distance requirements. This also was a variance request. 3. Reduced width of Street 1. Staff has indicated to the developer’s engineer that no parking will be allowed along “Street 1”. This would allow for the street to be reduced from 37 feet wide to 26 feet wide. The extra width could then be applied to the 10-foot wide multi-use path on the south side of Street 1. Venvertloh stated right turn lanes will be installed at the proposed entrance to the south, the entrance to Mutual Court, and also on Governors Parkway. They are proposing 12-foot wide lanes with 2-foot curb and gutter. They are asking for a variance of 1-foot of pavement width per lane only to install the shared path and barrier curb. Hanson pointed out that the proposed Preliminary Plat includes a significant area that is presently IDOT right-of-way. While a land transaction is anticipated between the developers and IDOT, should that transaction not take place, this Preliminary Plat will not be valid. Jones stated that they have done the preliminary work with IDOT for approval but the official hearing is  3 only held once a year. It will not even be approved by legislature until December of 2016. If there was a real concern, it would have come out during each agency’s review. It was discussed that a variance may have to be approved for an extended time for the Preliminary Plat. Staff will look into the time period allowed for Preliminary Plats in the Land Development Code. Venvertloh explained water is available along Route 157. There is plenty of flow to serve the development without any booster pumps or underground storage tanks. Sanitary sewer is existing through the site which will be reconfigured with the improvement plans to serve the 9 lots. There are 5 different watersheds on 26 acres. There will be both above ground and underground detention on site. Parking and building setback variances were requested which will be heard by the Zoning Board of Appeals. The zoning code requires 950 parking spaces. The developer has proposed reducing the parking spaces by 100 to 125 spaces. Why create all the parking spaces if not all the spaces will be needed? This would be helpful for stormwater drainage purposes. But on the other hand, there would be no place for addition parking in the future if the parking is not adequate. Venvertloh stated there is an option to do “shadow parking”. This area would be developed as greenspace until future parking would be needed. It is also known as “phantom spaces”. These spaces are located on the map behind buildings B through F. RECOMMENDATION: Land Use Committee informally recommends approval with the variances requested and added variance of time for the Preliminary Plat to Plan Commission. REMINDER: PLAN COMMISSION MEETING: Monday, September 21, 2015 at 7:00 p.m. at City Hall, City Council Chambers, 118 Hillsboro Avenue.