Planning Commission Regular Meeting   6/11/2024

It is six o'clock.

We're going to call the Albemarle Planning Commission to order.

The opportunity for the public to access and participate in the hybrid meetings are posted in the Albemarle County website on the Planning Commission homepage and the Albemarle County calendar.

Participation will include the opportunity to comment on those matters for which comments from the public will be received.

Yes.

Mr. Firehock.

Here.

Mr. Bivins and Mr. Missel are both absent.

Thank you.

And our consent agenda.

I need a motion.

Oh, yes.

Is there a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented?

All right.

Ms.

Firehock?

Aye.

Now we have deferral.

If there's any matters from the public not listed in tonight's agenda and the public input, including the consent agenda, you can come up and speak now.

Hearing none.

That's correct.

Chair, I motion to defer item AFD-2023, many zeros one Ivory Creek District Review and AFD-2024 for many zeros two Hardware District Review to defer both items to the requested date of September 10, 2024.

Second.

Second.

Mr. Murray, Mr. Clayborne, Mr. Carrazana, Ms.

So we can hear the opening of the public hearing for ZMA-2023-00015

1928, Scottsville Road.

Great.

Good evening.

My name is Sid Schoff.

I'm a senior planner with the Planning Division for Albemarle County's Community Development Department.

Tonight, I'll be giving staff's presentation on zoning map amendment application, ZMA 2023-151928 Scottsville Road.

This is a proposed rezoning for a 1.32 acre lot from R1 residential to R10 residential.

The subject property of this rezoning is located south of the city of Charlottesville between Avon Street Extended and Scottsville Road.

The tax map parcel is 90-24.

The location is 1928 Scottsville Road.

It contains a one-story single family dwelling unit and an existing detached garage.

The property is currently zoned R1 Residential as shown as green on the map.

The parcels to the north and south are also zoned R1 residential and contain single-family residential.

To the east, across Scottsville Road, it is a zone of rural areas and to the west, across Avon Street Extended, it is a zone planned residential development.

This is the Avon Park II subdivision and it contains 28 townhouses and two single-family detached houses.

Lastly, the subject parcels within the entrance corridor and it's also in the airport impact area overlay district.

The subject property is within the Southern Western Urban Master Plan.

The future land use designates this parcel for neighborhood density residential, which allows for residential units between three to six units per acre.

For this application, the applicants requesting to rezone the entire 1.32 acre parcel from R1 residential to R10 residential.

If the rezoning were to be approved, this is a concept plan of what the future site could look like.

The applicant is proposing to construct a proffered maximum of eight single-family townhouse units for a density of 6.06 dwelling units per acre.

The primary access to the site would be from Scottsville Road via Research Way.

The eight townhouses would front on an internal street, which would also provide future inter-parcel connectivity to the parcels to the north and the south.

Additionally, an emergency access lane is proposed from the internal street to Avon Street extended as shown as green.

Furthermore, the proposal includes two street guest parking spaces, open space, a recreation area, and a stormwater management area.

The application is also proposing pedestrian bicycle facilities, which includes a pedestrian pathway along Scottsville Road, a 10 foot shared use path along Avon Street extended, sidewalks within the site, and a Class A primitive path along the emergency access way.

The applicant has also provided a proffer to develop the property in general accord with the concept plan, which includes the following five major elements.

This is also in your staff report.

In sum, there are two factors favorable.

The first is the request is consistent with the land use recommendations of the Southern and Western Urban Neighborhoods Master Plan.

And the second, the request provides transportation improvements consistent with the recommendations of the Southern and Western Urban Neighborhoods Master Plan, including a new shared use path along Avon Street Extended and a pedestrian path along Scottsville Road.

Staff recommends approval of zoning map amendment request, DMA 2023-15, 1928 Scottsville Road.

and I'm happy to answer any questions from the commission.

Commissioners, is there any questions?

Start.

Thank you for the presentation.

One quick question around affordable housing.

Okay, that's the magic number.

Yeah, so there was a letter received regarding ACSA, future ACSA seabird and water connections to the site.

We received that letter over the weekend, so the applicant could probably go in more detail.

What's the couple of things about the emergency access?

The applicant could probably provide further detail, but fire rescue commented that it needed to be at least 20 feet wide.

I'm not sure what the material would be.

And I just, I know we've got a lot of pedestrian pathways and shared use paths that start and then stop at the beginning and end of a parcel.

And this is really more of a bigger picture question that you all might as staff have some knowledge about.

I'm just curious, do we have a plan to actually connect these ever?

Well, that's a very good question.

And a question that I've certainly finally get the staff to focus diligently on.

In this particular area, you do have a shared use path that occurred farther up Avon Street on the same side of the road as this one.

Commissioner Firehock.

No, I don't have any questions for our staff.

We can bring the applicant that want to provide their presentation.

Hello, commissioners.

My name is Amy George.

I'm with Radha Bush and Gail.

I'm a representative of the owner of this property.

Sorry.

Thank you.

Do you need to repeat that?

My name is Amy George.

I'm with Rout of Bush and Gale.

I am the representative of the client that's asking to rezone this property.

Drag it up.

There we go.

Okay.

Sorry.

Oh, shoot.

Yes, I'm sorry.

I wanted to give a little overview of the neighborhood that is actually in.

We are on the southern side of the southern neighborhood.

A lot of the developments that have been happening around the area are townhouse developments.

One of the design considerations we had, we wanted to kind of match into the existing neighborhood, take into account the surrounding areas and what the development has kind of already been doing in the area.

And we wanted to take into consideration and honor the existing site topography, which is

a pretty big factor in this property itself and the small size of the property.

There's approximately, there's over 30 feet of grade change between Avon Street Extended and Scottsville Road.

So we wanted to take that into account and like build something that would, you know, allow us to build into, I guess, grade into the site without taking too much of the site away.

Probably walk out basements along Scottsville Road and a lot

on facing Avon Street, it would be more like units that would come out onto the first floor above the garage.

This property is about 200 feet wide, like I said, it's a very small property, so we are only asking for eight units.

We opted to ask for the emergency access to Avon Street, just based upon the fact that the poverty fee itself.

But we also wanted to reduce the possibility of cut through traffic.

It was kind of a big deal when we were laying out this property that the school buses were kind of redirected in here.

And there was a lot of cut through traffic in the surrounding neighborhoods.

And that was a concern for our client.

So that was one of the options that we took into place.

I did want to address the extension of the water and sewer lines.

The sewer line itself is like we're going to connect into a sanitary sewer manhole that is located on the north side of Spring Hill Village.

It is approximately a little over 1,300 linear feet of sanitary sewer at this time.

We have only done like preliminary

kind of a concept layout.

We are dedicated to work with ACSA and VDOT to try to minimize as much of the construction, like the easements, the demolition or anything like that to the surrounding neighborhood.

Missioners, do we have any questions for the applicant?

We should have more, sir.

On the concept plan, it looks like you say it's consistent with a lot of the other

Townhouses that are going up in the area, and I appreciate the presentation.

Thank you.

I was just looking at Emma Beth Lane there, which I presume is named after someone, but it sort of terminates on either end.

Presumably, some other future developer on either side may want to extend and connect neighborhoods there.

We kind of cited it kind of in the middle of the site to kind of, it was like the middle of the grade.

So you kind of balance the top and the bottom.

The existing, I guess like the existing grade on Annabeth Lane at both ends is flush with existing grade.

Yeah, thank you so much.

Yes.

I like how you put your stormwater management facility there.

We've given consideration to probably a biofilter, and we will be adding landscaping to the biofilter, like a lot of the biofilters in the area.

Yeah, I'm pleased to hear that because I think it definitely adds value to the neighborhood to have something more than just a big muddy pit that you can have something, you know, attractive native plants and also provide benefit to biodiversity and stormwater quality, not just quantity.

So, good job.

I just have a simple question.

Can you say more about what you're planning to do with the open space in terms of like improving it or making it more useful for the residents or will there be just a path through it?

At this time, it was honestly just the path through it.

Oh, yeah.

And, you know, you probably know I'm like Miss Nature, so I'm really into that.

But I guess I was also wondering, like, you know, you're in your townhouse, you don't have a yard.

Okay, that would be like your kind of community gathering, fire pit, whatever it is.

Yeah, exactly.

I just have one quick question.

So in lot eight, I think, it's hard to see on the screen, but I think it's lot eight.

It's going right up to your property lines.

But there will be required to maintain a setback.

Yes.

That makes sense.

That one is that one.

It seems to be one of the wider ones.

So that's all I had.

Any other questions?

You have any other comments?

No, we're going to open it up for public comments.

I only have one person that signed up.

I don't know if we have anyone online.

Roger.

Check and Dance.

Pick and Dance.

Hi, I'm Roger Shickadance.

I live at 1858, Scottsville Road.

Thank you for letting me speak tonight.

You have the letter that I sent previously.

I'll try and summarize quickly.

Ten years ago, I was faced with the same situation with Spring Hill Village.

We're planning to put in their townhouse development and there was going to be a right-of-way cutback for VDOT to provide a turn line.

And so at the time, I was concerned that the stone stair that predates the right-of-way that goes from my house down about six feet to the road to allow me to cross to cross route 20 to my mailbox that is an old stone structure and that would have had to have been removed.

And so, fortunately, to cut the story short, that was all avoided because VDOT retracted the need to heth the turn lane and Spring Hill Village along with myself, we were able to convince the county to remove that requirements and the proffer was removed from the final

approval at occupancy.

So now I'm faced with the same situation all over again, where instead of turn lane, we've got a water and sewer line coming through that will be a quarter mile from Spring Hill Village.

And it was good to hear that confirmed tonight that's the plan.

So it's not hypothetical as I presented in my letter, but it's what they're planning to do.

So that will, again, cause

Some kind of disruption to the stair, the sidewalk leading to it, the apron of my driveway, there's stone pillars that are just on the line between the right of way and my property that will be affected

by construction.

I don't know what ACSA will require.

They may need regrading.

There may have to be retaining wall.

So I really just want some protection that through all this, that I have something behind me.

And that's why I'm asking for this pro for because it's not an easement that wouldn't be negotiated.

It's in the right of way.

but these are pre-listing structures and there's a precedent for having done this as a pro-fer in the past with Springhouse Village.

I feel like it's legitimate to ask for another pro-fer in this case.

Just one last thing I'd say, I've been happy with the way the green buffer has been protected all along Route 20 with Galaxy Farm, Stone Creek, Spring Hill has trees.

Those trees will have to be removed now to allow this water and sewer line to go through.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Do we have anyone else from the public?

There's no one online.

I would like to respond to the fact that at this time, there is no water line proposed to go along Route 20.

We're planning to get the water from the high side of the site, Avon Street.

And of course, the low side of the street is Scottsville Road.

So that is kind of where the sanitary sewer has to go.

We are committed to looking, like I said, working with ACSA and VDOT to find a solution that everybody can live with.

Thank you.

That will close public hearing.

I have a question, Mr. Chair, if that's okay for staff, like, based off what I'm hearing, if a project disrupts or damages someone else's property, isn't it automatic that it would have to be repaired or that property owner has to be made whole?

Well, I'm not entirely clear on where the right-of-way limits are.

Obviously, a utility can't build on property that's not in the right-of-way or that's not its own.

And I'm not familiar enough with the exact right-of-way line to know whether the historic stairs are within the existing right-of-way, whether they require additional acquisition on the part of VDOT or the utility.

But that would be something that would be worked out between that particular property owner and either VDOT or the utility.

to ensure that all improvements were within existing public rights of way or within right of way that the utility acquired.

And I think I'd add on to that, that, you know, the stone pillars, which you referenced, which are on this property, I think that Andy's guidance there is probably straightforward as relative to, you know, impacts that we're associated with those.

The stone stairs that are in the right of way, that may be an interesting scenario.

They probably aren't under VDOT permit.

I don't quite know how they would be handled.

I'm just puzzling with whether there's something we, if it's in the right away, the word right implies that VDOT can come in and do what they need to do or the utility company can do if they have that utility easement.

So I don't know how we can write a condition that they would have to put something back to similar quality and material, but it would be nice if we could.

Well, it's a right of way across someone's property, right?

I think what I was hearing is the desire to maintain the ability to safely cross the street to access the mailbox is pretty important.

So that's why I was asking that question.

Well, keep in mind that this is a zoning map amendment.

So there's really not conditions attached to it the way that there would be for a special use permit.

Obviously the applicant can make proffers and the applicant has made proffers in this case.

It's not appropriate for additional proffers to be required.

Right.

But we can't request profits from the dais.

Right.

So we could just make it known that we think it would be a nice thing to do to try to maintain the integrity and structure of the existing features there.

Right.

I mean, I'm sure that message would be well received at ACSA based on my time on the board there.

The staff doesn't go around trying to tear stuff up.

But at the same time, I do understand that, you know, in this case, it's if not literally on historic register somewhere, you know, it's old stone stairs that are, you know, one of the kind.

I think that memo could probably be sent.

No, I don't have any.

I agree with all the comments that have been made so far.

I mean, I will say that this corridor is one that's highly used by cyclists who are coming.

You actually use it coming all the way from the rural area all the way up that road.

So I'm pleased to see the pedestrian improvements there.

I think it's anything we can do to continue to improve the pedestrian access there is

really positive.

We just have to continue them.

You know, in the legislative agenda of the Board of Supervisors, I mean, I know it's out of scope here, but I wish we had the ability to have a fund that we could require people to donate to instead of having green space improvements necessarily be on site, because we could have a lot of improvements that could be made if, you know, if we could do it by virtue of contribution to the fund, just like, you know, we have contribution to an affordable housing fund, I think

Yeah, exactly.

There's no other comments.

Is there a motion?

Can't miss us on the closest.

Sure.

I'll make a motion and then I'll add some points for to forward on to the board.

Thank you.

After the motion, like after we have finished the voting.

Oh, sorry.

I'm like over there.

I'm over here.

This won't move.

Okay.

Second.

Second.

It's a discussion.

Miss Firehawk.

Aye.

So that moves on to the Board of Supervisors, but I'd also like to add into the minutes that we recommend that the applicant work with VDOT and utility companies, if they're involved, to make every effort to restore the anything that's disturbed to its former quality and integrity, the stairs, the columns, the retaining walls, so that we can maintain the historic character of that beautiful road and the residence.

Thank you.

Next item on the agenda is ZMA-2023-00005, Burke Bar Flats.

Thank you.

Good evening.

Appreciate your patience with the staff change at the seat.

I'm Rebecca Ragsdale and I'll be presenting this item.

And it is a rezoning.

So I will walk you through the particulars of it and its location and our recommendation.

And as you know, we have some updated materials that you've received.

This is Berkmar Flats.

It's highlighted in yellow.

And then some other developments are labeled for context.

It's between Woodburn Road and Berkmar Drive.

Just to the south is Berkmar Overlook, which has developed Byrite with about 52 units.

And then Victorian Heights is also Byrite has approval, I think, for about 88 units.

And then nearby, you may recall that we had a rezoning

for Woodbrook Apartments.

In this neighborhood, nearby, of course, is Agner Heard, the SPCA, and then some commercial uses between Berkmar and 29.

And then Woodburn Road is the dividing line for the rural area and the development area.

This is just another look at the neighborhood.

It's an older, well, tried to get the most recent pictometry, Victorian Heights.

There's grading that's occurring there now.

And then Berkmar Heights, or excuse me, Berkmar flats, hard to keep them straight, is adjacent to Berkmar Overlook, which has been constructed.

This is the zoning map.

The request includes the 3.62 acres that is already zoned R6.

The proposal is to rezone from R6 to R15, which I believe is what you'll see Victorian Heights zoning is and then to the south is

R6 as well, the white being the rural area on the other side of the development area, and then the red is highway commercial.

This is the land use plan and we recognized in our analysis that the Places 29 land use plan doesn't recommend residential as a primary use.

It contemplates it as a secondary use.

It doesn't indicate a density, but we also acknowledge that this is an area with a lot of by right

zoning and has developed under its by right zoning and not been rezoned or transitioned to what was contemplated several not sure how many years ago and the place is 29 master plan.

So that's certainly something that's being considered during the comp plan update.

But in terms of the specifics of this proposal, we mentioned it's 54 units.

They, at the same time that the rezoning is going through, they have also been pursuing their by right options with a site plan of up to 28 units.

There is the primary entrance from Berkman Drive and then

This is the updated concept plan that we received June 10.

So what has been updated is providing a full connection to Woodburn Road that would remain and not be converted to an emergency access.

and there will be sidewalks along Woodburn and then there is the provision for an additional interconnection over to this parcel, Victorian Heights, or no, there's another parcel between this one and Victorian Heights and then of course the primary access had been proposed from Burk Mar Drive.

You noticed in the packet there is the constraint over here with the 20 foot

I believe it's RWSA easement that makes it challenging to make that connection to Swede Street.

And then this is R6, excuse me, R15 with proffers.

They've offered to proffer the concept plan and make a commitment to this general layout in terms of building orientation and location and location of parking areas.

We're happy that they are relegated and some commitments to

the size and location of open space and the proffers

dated June 10th have been updated.

So there is no longer the proffer that would convert Woodburn Road, the Woodburn Road entrance at the 29th CO from emergency access or from a regular entrance to emergency access.

There are also provisions for 15% affordable housing, which could be for sale or for rent.

That was consistent with the policy at the time, this rezoning.

was initially reviewed.

So our recommendation has changed from the original staff report based on the now provisions for interconnections, which was our primary concern.

So we are recommending approval based on the updated June 10th proffers concept plan primarily and the proffers.

I haven't compared what was presented just now with what we had in our packet yet.

So it's slightly more open space?

Is that right?

The only changes are for interconnections.

It's just the connections.

The open space remains the same.

Yes.

Mr. Cleaver?

Yeah, so currently this is, in the plan, this is designated for commercial, right?

For commercial industrial.

That's what... Yes.

So does staff have any more thoughts about, like I know in your consideration about, you know, I know that we have very limited commercial industrial land.

We didn't have any concerns as 3.6 acres.

I know that every bit of it is precious, but I think we recognize we need to revisit this area and look to other parts of the county if we're trying to offset that acreage.

We didn't do any sort of analysis balance sheet, if you will.

I had a quick question sort of about the interconnections that seems to be the big thing has been a little flurry of emails and revisions here lately.

And I was just curious sort of what or if there are guidelines for when it triggers additional interconnections.

because I noticed like in the last proposal, we only had like seven or just a handful of units, eight units rather.

And so, you know, emergency access, cool, but one is plenty for that number of units.

But then I noticed just sort of south on Burk Mar between Burk Mar and Woodburn in the existing neighborhood, there's really only one way in and out with about 53 units, except for an emergency.

So I was just, I mean, here, I know we have some new proposals with more interconnections.

Well, there is the provision to look for interconnections and acquire them based on where it makes sense to provide them with site plans, regardless of emergency access.

I think you might, I think Berkmar Overlook has only an emergency access from Woodburn, so that plays into it oftentimes in terms of the

the required emergency access that may lead to additional entrances.

I think there is the desire to be setting up interconnections and not to lose any opportunities as these developments come through, especially when we're seeing how things could connect through with multiple ones coming in at the same time.

We've seen that in a few places, so we try and look for those opportunities

We don't have, you know, some sites may have constraints or they may not be able to make it work.

So we really have to look at that in terms of where we're establishing them on the application plans.

I ask that as somebody, it hasn't been clear from past meetings, who's very, very fond of and in favor of more neighborhood interconnections, our suburban model of, you know, one pocket of houses here with one road in and out, another pocket of house here with one road in and out, is not a model I like at all.

But I noticed with the Berkmar Heights, is that right?

Berkmar Flat, not the flats, the one just to the south.

Just that it's access to Woodburn is emergency only and

I said Heights instead of Overlook.

Thank you.

I had a couple of questions.

One is with the RWSA right away.

So what is the pediment to make the connection over that right away?

It generally is too flat.

It doesn't rise up to the adjacent property lines or to cut into the slope.

And what we're having a problem here is it's six or so feet above the existing grade of the property we're talking about tonight.

and to make that grade, you'd have to drop the grade of the subject property we're talking about now to meet that lower grade of the adjacent property.

And service authority is not interested in us disturbing that.

It's a, you know, the principal water line coming from the water plant and it's sort of impractical in some respect.

So we, I think it was, I think we should own that, that probably it was maybe of an oversight when we were looking at this adjacent property.

probably should have made that road come up higher during that site plan process and we didn't.

So it may be an opportunity for the interconnection that's lost.

Appreciate that.

And so I had a question on, so it's the affordable housing there for rental units.

and Reunits for Sale, but has that determination been made or when is that determination made?

They have the option for either.

Okay.

Any other questions?

will open it for public comments.

Ask the applicant to come present.

Absolutely.

Thank you so much.

Let me just let my presentation for you.

Good evening, Vice Chair Carrazana and members of the Planning Commission.

My name is Kelsey Schlein.

I'm a planner with Shimp Engineering.

I'm here tonight representing Third Mesa, who is the property owner.

And here with me tonight is Justin Shimp, the project engineer, and also Whit Graves, who's with Evergreen Home Builders, a local home builder who's partnering with the property owners on this to develop this project.

So thank you for the staff report and, you know, providing the updated materials to the Planning Commission, Rebecca, I appreciate that.

And so going into just a little bit of site context, this Berkman Drive is very much

a very active development corridor at the moment.

So you can see our 3.6 acre site here, just south is Berkmar Overlook, which was recently completed in recent years.

To the north there's a parcel with an existing duplex and then just north of that

is Victorian Heights, which has 88 units.

And south of our site, there's a hotel and self-storage building under construction.

And over on this site here is a flow automotive development.

So the Burke Mark corridor, especially in recent years, is very much having a changing character.

And I think a changing character

from what was potentially imagined almost 15 years ago when the Places 29 master plan land use designation was first put on this property for office R&D, flex light industrial designation on this property.

I'll get into that in a little later on in this presentation.

Going into

Some specifics of the request.

So we're looking at a 3.623 acre property comprised of three separate parcels.

We're requesting to rezone from R6 to R15.

We do have proffered conditions submitted with this request that relate to our concept plan and some major elements of that plan, as well as affordability.

The R-15 residential district permits up to 54 units maximum on this site and the current zoning district R-6 with bonus factors could permit up to 32.

We currently have a site plan under development for or under review

for 20 units by right in the R6.

So I just wanted to kind of bring out that the difference in rezoning here is an additional yield of 22 to 26 additional units from what we're talking about for the by right condition, with nine of those additional units being designated as affordable.

So looking at the comprehensive plan, which was adopted in 2011 and was last amended in 2015 can see this purple swath here is the flex R&D light industrial designation.

Do you want to note that we do feel that the Comprehensive Plan and the Places 29 Master Plan does offer some language specifically for the Flex R&D Light Industrial District where we do feel we're very consistent with that and the specific language relates to the fact that these designations should be viewed

Holistically with adjacent properties subject to the same zoning district.

Not every recommendation needs to take place or land use recommendation needs to take place on every single parcel.

Residential is a secondary use and secondary uses are identified as necessary to support the primary uses on the property.

Within this designation, we all, we, you know,

We have better living across the way, a more light industrial user.

We have self storage and hotel coming across the street.

And so we do feel about this residential kind of contributes to, you know, the character of this district, but also recognizing

the context that we're in in 2024 and how that might have come about and shaped a little differently than was imagined 15 years ago.

And so this is just an overlay where you can see the Burkmaar Overlook development.

We dropped in the Victorian Heights site plan here.

You can see that we just have a 3.6 acre parcel

kind of in between and that development of this as a higher intensity residential is kind of a very logical next step for this site and also just a very efficient use of land in the development areas.

And so just pulling out some consistencies with the comprehensive plan, promoting

density within the development areas to create new compact urban places and promoting infill and redevelopment that is compatible with surrounding neighborhoods and uses.

We do feel that we're consistent with those with those items identified in the comprehensive plan.

So looking at our concept plan here, we've identified a few major elements in the proffers.

And some major design elements are that we have building envelopes, fronting on Woodburn Road and fronting on Berkmar Drive to establish a streetscape and a street presence on both of those property frontages.

We also have a proffered central amenity space, which is proffered as a minimum of 3,000 square feet, where required to have

8,000 square feet and so that will be realized usually in the central space as we continue kind of to program and define the site and the site plan process or you know it might be kind of scattered a little more incrementally throughout but we just wanted to make sure that there was a larger contiguous area that exceeded kind of the minimum top lot requirement area of 2,000 square feet that that would otherwise be required by the ordinance.

So this is just kind of a more detailed illustrative plan.

And so you can see our inner parcel connection here with with the properties to the northeast connection off of Berkman Drive and Woodburn Road, and focusing on the connectivity and I just want to provide a little explanation of why we

Put this in this location, Rebecca touched on this briefly.

We're aligning ourselves with the interpersonal connection that was proposed on Victorian Heights, two parcels over.

And so that's the reasoning for the interpersonal connection, approximately that location as we have shown on the plan.

looking at connectivity here.

So we do provide a continuous connection from Burk Mar Drive to Woodburn Road.

We're also establishing a sidewalk along Woodburn Road, which would be an urban street section.

And continuing the urban street section, that's going to be first installed by Victorian Heights to our north and then to our south, I believe, will be considered with their continued with the Woodburn

Multifamily Development that was approved by the board a few months ago.

And this is the just calling out the section on Woodburn Road.

So we'll have our landscape strip and sidewalk.

and looking at just the site's context and proximity to transit.

So the property does have an existing sidewalk along its frontage, along Burke Mar.

We're very close to an existing bus stop.

and opposite of Berkmar, our opposite of Berkmar Drive from this site is a proposed county funded shared use path construction and so this site is really well-cited to be to support more density and to have direct access to multimodal transportation and also to transit options as well.

I'll point out that we're

just under half a mile from Adner Hurt Elementary School, and there's a continuous sidewalk all the way to Adner Hurt.

And there's the option to access elementary school through Woodburn Road, which clearly with the development on Woodburn, the trips will increase there over time.

However,

as that urban street section just kind of continues down Woodburn Road.

You know, I think the hope is that one day there'll be a complete pedestrian connection, but the time being there's very limited trips on that road.

And so a bike to school, a bike ride to school, it would be, you know, very, very possible to get to Adnerhurst.

touching on the Sweet Street connection.

So I'm going to go into a few details here, kind of more focused on the engineering side of things.

So Sweet Street is a public connection.

What we're looking at here is the profile of the road of Sweet Street.

The purple line that you're looking at is the portion of the road

that is constructed.

The purple dotted line is the portion and the profile of the road that was designed to then be carried on to our property, which you'll see is delineated by this red line.

The green is where the existing grade is.

And so the road is constructed, comes right into a steep slope, and then the terrain continues up into our property, past the property line here.

This blue dot is the approximate location of the existing RWSA waterline.

And so as you can see, if we were to continue the road, we would have to drop the RWSA waterline.

just wanted to make sure I at least made it through those specific details.

And I thank you for your time.

Just a very quick finishing comment on screening, because I know it's very important to the to the neighbors.

I just wanted to call out an attention to that screening of parking lots is a requirement in the ordinance.

Wanted to make sure that I called out attention to that.

Thank you.

I don't know whether any members of the commission might have had any questions for the applicant.

The Suisse Street diagram is one that unfortunately hit me like a punch in the gut because we just heard from staff that that was going to be the interconnection back in the last Burke Mart overlook was planned and to see that it's basically just ends in a wall of dirt is really unfortunate.

because, yeah, on the map from here, it's like, boy, why don't we just make Sweet Street connect with Woodburn Road rather than having to make a whole new exit to Woodburn Road?

And I don't know what the cost would be of doing that.

It certainly would be preferable looking at it and sort of the simplicity of the connection, but an inner connection between neighborhoods.

That's more statement than question.

I don't know how to...

and, you know, say as Mr. Barnes noted, typically RWSA for their water mains.

It likes us to stay off of them.

Very limited grading.

They're very restrictive about what is and what isn't permitted in their easement.

Like, obviously anything can be constructed.

However, in this case, this is a 12-inch water main that ties into a 30-inch water main.

And dropping that would, dropping that

Yeah, absolutely.

So at this phase, we're required to do a conceptual analysis.

And so we provided that to staff with our initial concept.

But all of that in more detail will be worked out at the final site plan stage.

Yeah, so I also have concerns about that really steep slope.

Really steep slopes like that are big contributors long term to sediment.

And we have, you know, we have a reservoir right nearby.

It's kind of ironic that, you know, the RWSA has this pipe that's causing us not to be able to fix the grade of that slope because that sediment's going to go right into the reservoir.

So, well, it is, I believe it's a three-to-one slope.

And so, although it's a steep slope, you can grow vegetation on those slopes.

So, I mean, that slope, I think I might have a good photo on it.

It's steep.

This isn't the best photo.

It's still being planted.

But I mean, it is vegetated at the moment.

But this was, you know, I think to Mr. Barnes' comments just about

I think from a planning perspective and looking at the development next door, I can understand why they designed it the way they did and why they had the stub outs where they did and to meet the interpersonal connections.

The other thing, too, is that's a heck of a lot of pavement right there.

Yeah.

You know, I think we have to meet the the minimums provided in the ordinance.

I think ultimately, the number of parking spaces that we have shown might be a little less than what's shown on this concept.

Originally, this proposal was for 70 units at a time when kind of a after a zoning determination had been made that but were

by the BZA that there was a point in time where bonus factors could have been used on this property.

That's not the case.

The ordinance has changed.

But this was originally designed and kind of laid out for a higher number of units.

So I'll say kind of my initial response to your comment is we're probably, you know, I think we're still kind of parked for what we would have imagined for about 15 more units.

And so right off the bat, we're probably going to lose some of that.

But

The other thing is too, since we're talking about taking a property that could be

could have been used for commercial use, and we're converting it to residential use.

Yeah, absolutely.

So I don't have those numbers kind of off the top of my head, but I know that, so if the, if adenar hurt is half a mile, less than half a mile, because that measured that recently, and then just kind of south of adenar hurt is proper that you can get through from Woodbrook.

You know, especially with, I think, Walmart and Kroger and the vicinity that you could get to any place with less than a mile, I would think.

So that's the thing.

Honestly, that's the first time it's been brought up.

I mean, I can say, you know, we go to Old Trail quite a bit.

We don't live in Old Trail, but we find that one of the things that makes Old Trail very livable is that little commercial spot, like right in the middle of Old Trail, it makes the difference between that being a very livable community and not being livable.

And so just having the fact there's some doctor's offices there, there's a restaurant there, there's a physical therapist office there.

There's those little tiny things like that I think make a community a lot better and particularly since this is surrounded by you have an automobile dealership nearby you have some other industrial uses.

It just seems like something there that could serve the residents within the development or maybe in the adjoining developments would be an asset.

and then, as I said, you're really close to the reservoir right there.

I would almost prefer to see instead of these sort of like tiny little scattered blobs of green space, almost prefer to see the green space, more green space on the, you know, on the woodburn roadside, just to provide a little bit more buffer to that rural area side and against the reservoir.

Thank you, Ms.

Sline.

I have a comment and a question and a comment.

It's more along the lines of what Commissioner Murray was just sharing, but I'm curious as I look at this as an architect, the first thing that jumps out are these small little green spaces.

Yeah, and from a desired outcome perspective, I would love to see a more usable green space.

Certainly won't tell you how to design it, but I don't know if our architect drew this or not.

I suspect no, but it'd be nice to see, you know, if some of those orange buildings, maybe they're re-rotated or some way to allow it to happen, especially since we're not going to connect to Sweet Street to the left.

It could be an opportunity there just to evaluate that, but absolutely.

mostly would prefer as a desired outcome, more usable green space.

And then my question would be around the affordable housing.

Yeah, so I mean, we haven't gotten to that point where we've identified what units will be affordable.

I think you probably know my comment that's coming is I prefer just for the sake of our citizens not to have it all in one unit.

Nobody should be able to tell if it's an affordable unit or not from an aesthetically pleasing place.

So I'll put that as a comment as you all carry on with your design moving forward.

Yeah, I have similar comments about the green space.

I mean, there's this, the funny finger, you're coming off Burkmark Drive and there's this finger that sticks out.

And so in some ways, I guess that's supposed to buffer.

I'm not sure.

It just, it just feels like a series of leftover scraps.

And I feel like if you, if you played with this, even if you had the road going through the middle from one end to the other,

You would maybe splitting up the two buildings in the middle of the drawing and having that be a road, you would be able to shift some things to the left and get rid of that road on the right.

that you could make this a much bigger park on the right-hand side on my, you know, looking at it that way.

Because otherwise it just seems like it, there's just, it's a lot of asphalt and I know density is important, but I also think creating livable communities that don't degrade in the future because they just become

too hot and too paved and you cannot go outside.

A quick question for you.

The orange is obviously the building footprints.

Is that light green color?

Is that like backyards or little spots?

What is that?

Is it usable?

Yeah, absolutely.

It wouldn't be any type of hard surface kind of as we've imagined it.

and, you know, I kind of have heard the centralized, you know, expanding the centralized green space comment echoed so we'll definitely, you know, consider that we're kind of balancing it with also having that connection between Woodburn and Berkmar and

You could affect some of that by putting some curves in the road.

If you look at the development just to the left, I can't figure out my directions, but the one to the left, you'll see they have the curve.

When you go on Google Street View and you put the little man down,

which I did while you're talking.

It actually looks more curved than what it looks like on that drawing because there's also the elevation.

So it's kind of curving around and up and it is a traffic calming feature to not have just straight lines.

So I just think you guys, is the illustration that you provided, is that like that is the proffered layout that you would have to meet?

So we have a general accord, development within general, general accord with basically with this concept.

But then the major elements of that plan are buildings fronting on Woodburn, buildings fronting on Burkmaar with parking relegated to the rear.

and then a central green space minimum 3,000 square feet.

So this is the general accord plan and design, but then we've called out the major elements which are establishing streetscape on both frontages and having a centralized green space.

And so I think perhaps, you know, a consideration for us to take is we have a minimum of 3,000 square feet.

Yeah, I mean, because it's nice to also break up that long stretch of buildings to have smaller little human scaled blocks.

That also means that there would be potentially more windows.

I just think you could make this feel more like a neighborhood and

I just want to get my pencil out and re-sketch it.

I'm not going to irritate Justin Schiff too much by pretending to be an engineer.

But looking at the grade, I just think you could do more to make that green space feel connected.

Instead of just kind of random scraps that, you know, they feel like leftover spaces and it doesn't feel like, oh, I want to walk from one to the other.

So it's not in our purview to redesign your plan.

We're just looking at the density, obviously, and the basic fronting.

But I just really like to see something a little more creative.

And if you played around with it, I think you could make it feel like a green thread through the development.

Absolutely.

Thank you for making some of the changes that were made.

Well, so we removed, we had a requirement that required the wood burn entrance to become a emergency access only.

So you're making it a full access?

Yeah, yes, exactly.

Yes, we struck the requirement for it to become emergency access only after the 29th C.S.

It remains full access.

Because it's originally our phase one site plan that is currently under review is for the units that front along Woodburn.

And so their primary access will be from Woodburn.

And so I did want to echo what several of the commissioners said here.

There is a lot of opportunity.

I think even within that concept that you've shared, there's opportunities on how you begin to think about it, not having that connection to the South should help you rethink some of this layout.

And I agree with the

and the recreation space that's surrounded by parking and streets.

versus, I mean, just by splitting the buildings and putting the buildings there, that can probably even help you with your topography, right?

And how you're making that turn, because it's what is it, like a 40 foot difference between Burkmore and Woodbourne, right?

Yeah, so it's a challenging side from a topographical standpoint.

So I do think that there's opportunities here to make some changes that would also help

the people that are living there, children that are playing by the streets.

So I echo what's been said and hopefully you guys can take a little bit more time with this layout and think about the people that are going to be living there.

Yeah absolutely thank you for that and I mean I think the comments you know particularly for us to kind of take away at this rezoning phase is to look at you know if we can commit to making that centralized green space bigger in the proffers as far as

working this through and making it a nice attractive place for people to live.

That's the goal.

We want people to enjoy living here and I think it's kind of the dynamic between presenting a zoning concept that's general and then bringing it to the site plan that's very specific.

Thank you.

A couple questions.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And now I can open it up for public comments.

I jumped the gun earlier.

So if there's anyone from the public that would like to speak on this.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak.

You'll have three minutes.

Okay.

Okay, thank you.

I live at 720 Empire Street in Burkmore Overlook.

So my property backs up to the Burkmore Flats property.

and I'm speaking to express my opposition to this proposal, to the proposal to rezone that from R6 to R15.

Even with the modifications that they've made, they're going to eliminate all the trees on that property.

And I, well, we all oppose any proposal that's not going to leave at least some of the trees and especially a tree line between the Berkmar Overlook and Berkmar Flat.

Those of us who live on Empire Street, I know you all were talking just a few minutes ago about the hill that comes down from the line down to the properties on Empire Street.

And we do have a drainage problem.

In spite of having plants all along that hill, we still have water draining

all on our patios every time it rains.

And if they get rid of all the trees up there, you know it's going to be worse.

Another problem that I can foresee is the power.

We have a big problem with power outages.

Every time it storms, we lose our power.

Sometimes when it just rains, we lose our power.

Sometimes when the sky is clear, we lose our power.

We've lost our power more in the last two years that I've lived there than I did in Albemarle County on Pantops in 10 years.

So I don't know.

I guess I don't know if the lines aren't buried, but you add another

Development with a bunch of units crammed in a small space with the same other same sort of power grid.

It's going to be disastrous.

So lastly, you know, I also looked at the Places 29 master plan and the neighborhoods offering a variety of housing choices.

connected by an attractive, efficient, accessible, multimodal, transportation system, urban style development, parks, open spaces, sense of respite and contribute to an overall quality of life.

the state, your name and area residents and you'll have three minutes for your comments.

I'm Janet Call and I live in Berkmaer Overlook.

I know that you have received

from the HOA, an objection with a number of reasons.

And I just want to make sure that you do review those because it does reflect what the residents in Berkman overlook, many of them that I've spoken to think.

But I just want to stand up here for a minute

as a 70-year-old new resident of Virginia, Charlottesville in particular, and I took on a 30-year mortgage in Burkmark Overlook, which is insane at my age.

But I did it because I thought it was going to be this wonderful, perfectly located, green, exquisite place to live.

And it started out that way.

But already, the traffic is incredibly dense.

The drainage is ridiculous.

The beautiful trees are gone.

There's dense housing many places along Berkmar Drive.

And here's this little patch.

with some wonderful green space and the reservoir and a good look and a good feel to it.

And it's going to be destroyed.

And some of our residences will now be backed right up to asphalt.

That isn't how they presented it to us when we moved in.

Now with the hotel every day, the hotel is rising and blocking out the view.

So I'm just talking from my heart that this is not how it was represented.

I don't think it's in the best interest of Charlottesville.

You've got an opportunity to keep that good look to preserve the green space.

And I agree with what was said previously.

Power outages are constant.

The drainage is a problem.

And I just would like to have that put into the record.

Thank you.

No, I have some people online.

Two people online.

All right.

Stacey, please unmute yourself.

State your name and your general location.

Oh, okay.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Oh, great.

Great.

Yeah.

I'm Stacy Tanner.

I actually live next door to Claire Calli.

I'm at 722 Empire Street, right next to Tweed Street.

That wonderful slope, by the way, it is not vegetated.

It is barren.

And I'd like to add on to what everybody else has said.

I am in complete agreement.

But however,

The I only see one entity that is benefiting from this, not Charlottesville, not the community, but only the developer.

He's going to come in, do what he wants, get his money, and then he's going to be gone.

And the people there aren't going to have any green spaces or any quality of life.

Yes, they'll have a roof over the head, but that's about it.

There is no walkability.

Speaking about the walkability, this gentleman brought up earlier.

You cannot, there are no crosswalks going across 29.

So any of that, all the restaurants and everything over there, you cannot access unless you get in your car and join all the traffic, the increased traffic that's along Burke Mard Drive now.

And so, yeah, it's a good, you really can't walk to anything in that neighborhood.

So in closing, I would like to just say in summary, I am opposed

vehemently against this rezoning it.

It should stay at the smaller density so that way you can enjoy more green spaces and keep some of those trees.

Thank you.

Naomi, you had originally had your hand up.

Would you like to speak or no?

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Thank you.

I took my hand down because these other ladies have very nicely covered everything that I was going to cover.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Yeah, absolutely.

Thank you for the opportunity to respond.

I think first I'd just like to touch on who would benefit from this.

22 additional households would benefit from this than what could be built by right.

I think the comments about the location and just the

Access to Conveniences in the Development Area while also having the rural areas nearby as some reasons for desiring to live here.

I think this creates some additional opportunity for people to live on the site and it's a great location for efficient use of land in the development areas.

and you know I think just kind of touching on some additional comments and informing the design on this and I'll let Justin weigh in as well if you have some follow-up comments but you know we do have and I was looking at the grading and a little more detail where kind of instead of 30 feet grade change across the property we're a little closer to like 40

and so another kind of just design consideration with the layout is making sure that we can traverse that terrain and get from a connection point on Burk Mar to another connection point on Woodburn while meeting, grading requirements for parking lots, travel ways, fire rescue and various engineering design standards.

Is there anything you would like to add to that?

Justin Schamp, I'm the engineer for the project.

For the record, I would never be offended by constructive criticism about my designs.

That happens, and that's, you know, part of the process.

This one, I think, looking at it, you know, this drawing doesn't do any favors in a sense in that it shows

like the 70 unit sort of layout that was originally proposed with this.

It became 54.

So it's over parked, I think.

The other thing we've changed, there's a site planner review right now, the buy right site plan.

The units in the top of the face, well, we're actually have garages in the back.

So that sort of large parking lot there is reduced in half, essentially those parking spaces are going into units.

So

There are some positive changes like that that come out of this.

The little strange little hook, why it doesn't kind of go into a central space is exactly as Kelsey says.

The grade is such that to make a connection that you can drive, that meets standards, you have to come in and do this little fish hook.

I don't really like it that much either, but to meet the standards, to cover 45 feet of grade change, that's what you have to do.

and then I guess there was a comment that the water line, yeah, that water line just to follow up earlier serves as like one of the principal water lines, a really high pressure line serves many, many customers.

I think if we plant like a tree within it, they'll come and cut it down and that's just what it is.

The last item is, there's a comment from folks about being R6 versus R15.

I can assure you in these kind of developments, if it's R6, all the trees could cut down also.

It's a matter of what size housing goes in, how many affordable units are in here.

The change here from the buy right, I think Kelsey pointed out something like we get nine more affordable units.

out of there.

So that added density increases your affordability.

And this is a good location for density, but it does not affect the quantities of trees, say, if you'll see these developers, you have to inherently site this much grade, cut the trees down, regrade and replant new trees.

And I think the county has a good landscape ordinance that you see neighborhoods like Old Trail, for example, that you walk into now is urban, but there are trees there.

It's very attractive that people in the trees can live well together if it's built from the start.

And that's what we aim to do with these.

So those are the only comments I had.

Thank you, sir.

I must have missed another graphic, but it sounds like there's something else floating out there.

That's a plan that shows less asphalt.

Corey.

So it's not part of the zone, is it?

So we have a by right site plan underway for the units that face up on Wellburn.

And so the site plan is very much similar to this.

But in our design changes, we eliminated the parking row that's adjacent to those units, and they have garage instead.

So the layout, you come in the center of Welburn, those units on both sides.

It matches the zoning plan that you're having to review.

And frankly, it's just a little better plan than the sketch you have in front of you.

So this was sort of an early iteration of a zoning concept.

And I think I can go up.

on the right sheet.

You know, that's the zoning plan there.

The site plan level, we get into where our garage is, where our landscaping, I do think will hold true to one of the things we liked about this.

As you see, there's a lot of kind of green space around the units.

With this layout and the spacing, people will have some yard space around them.

I'll be at small, but little balconies, little porches, spot to sit out in your own yard.

for clarification that the light green space that committed to Firehawk was referring to earlier, particularly the ones that are up by Woodbourne and actually also by, but you don't have any of the light green on there for that can be landscaped, right?

I understand there's grade changes, but... We'll be required by the ordinance to screen any kind of parking lots.

Again, not shown here.

There'll have to be some sort of screening fence or shrubs on top of this hill between our parking lot and the adjacent, and we can't plant them in the easemouth to put them

on our site.

Yeah, so could you flip back to the diagram that shows the water pipe and the slope?

I'm just wondering, I mean, obviously there's an area that you can't do anything about, but I'm just wondering if there's any way to work with the RWSA to fix at least some of that slope, to make it a little bit better than it is now.

There seems to be a lot of soil over top of that slope.

So I think the slope in question actually is off our land.

I think part of that, and Kelsey made a point, if the bond was released and that should be fixed, the bond may not have been released.

We were not involved.

I don't know.

It may still be under a county review.

But I do think this will help a little bit.

One thing, so contour maps, these gray lines here, contours.

This is indicating water is flowing this direction right now.

We'll have to intercept that and actually take and pipe it down the road.

So there may actually be a little bit of mitigation in this case.

It's not always, but in this situation, I can sort of see the neighbors issue in that from the top of this road, the water flows straight down to their property.

Our stormwater plan will require us to intercept that and discharge it to an adequate receiving channel, which would not be their backyards.

So in this situation, there may be maybe the drainage from the other plan didn't quite take into account the offside.

I have no idea.

But I would say that looking at this map, and that is likely to be will be improved by our station.

We would not be allowed to make it any worse as part of our design.

We'll have to evaluate the runoff in this direction.

But inherently, we're going to have to capture it all and take it down the street to meet the requirements.

and just to get back to the landscaping on.

So even though that RWSA, yeah, there were not going to allow you to plant trees over the waterline, but you can have shrubs and you can have ground cover.

So you could potentially mitigate any kind of runoff, even if it's not on your property.

The part that's not on your property, which is the steepest part, but there's a lot that is on your property, right?

So if you could do some ground cover on that,

and the right type, it certainly would help mitigate.

So, yeah, that's true.

I encourage you looking at, not just keeping that buffer as, you know, that you can't do anything on it because you certainly can do some improvements with landscape.

Any other questions for the applicant?

Thank you.

Thank you.

We'll close the public hearing.

If I may, I wondered if it would be possible to see the current site of the 28 townhomes that's under review.

Since this is replacing that design, the applicants got an application in and they're requesting to exchange that for this design with the 54 multifamily units in townhomes.

So I have that in the slides.

OK.

I mean, but this, I understand this plan was designed with this other phase in mind.

But and I don't have, am I not sharing?

I don't, you know, I hastily plopped this sheet in there.

I don't have a grading sheet.

just shows you what Justin and Kelsey were describing in terms of the, okay, sorry.

Okay, going too fast here.

I know it's in here, I just had it.

But basically the townhouses are, you know, the rows of them fronting on woodburn with the parking behind it.

I'm just feeling, take a second.

And I can make it wanted to delete it.

Just my luck, something always happens, but it's there, we can see it.

Okay, so from current slide, let's hope it cooperates.

It's now a ghost slide.

There we are.

There we are.

Thank you.

Happy.

But like I said, I don't have the grading plans.

I just pulled this just to show you where they are.

I mean,

So are these 28 units because they're stacked townhomes?

Is that how we get to 28?

Okay.

All right.

So that's, so we get more, we get almost twice the density of the new, with the new plan and we get some affordable units.

Right.

Sure.

Okay.

Understood.

All right.

Thank you.

You can take it down.

I just wanted to see it.

We just all discussion here.

Well, I had a question that's sort of for.

this process.

So I guess the question of staff, the rezoning just gives sort of like a by right rezoning, like it's just a straight up rezoning request.

But then does this map that we're looking at, the conceptual grading utilities attached to that, or is this just sort of what we're, does this bind future building and rezoning in any way?

And it is, in general, a cord.

It's the earlier sheet.

Yeah, fronting.

It showed you the frontage.

Yeah.

on the roads and the rectangle in the middle.

With an interconnection to the north and to the west.

And what I'm hearing from some of you all is that the green space, the recreational zones, would be nice if those could be consolidated instead of just a big fat orange blob in the middle.

I understood what the applicant said about that funny green finger and having to go in this curvy way to try to get up to create a through road that met grade requirements for emergency vehicles.

But on the other hand, I still think you could connect the green space better.

I guess where I'm left is

Is this better?

Is it, is it, is it Albemarle County's desire to, I'm not asking all the answers, but is it our county's desire to have density, density, density is always trumps everything else.

More units is always better.

You know, we need to get as much density in the urban ring as we can.

And then kind of a little bit, not worried too much about the neighborhood itself.

Yeah, I mean, when I look at the comprehensive plan and sort of what it talks about, when you look at places 29 or sort of the principles that are behind a lot of those ideas, you know, a lot of it talks about livability, right?

And this, this in my mind fails pretty poorly on the livability scale.

So, I mean, to me, it's less important about where the green space is.

And I don't want to architect there.

They're planned here, but how do you make this more livable?

This right here, what's the concept that's shown here is not particularly livable, and particularly we're talking about giving up space that's quite a premium in terms of our commercial

commercial space in the county, which is revenue positive.

Everyone, the residential space tends to be revenue negative.

We spend more money in supporting residential areas than we get and tax revenue typically.

So the commercial spaces are very important to the county.

I will say that, and I don't, I want other people to be able to talk besides us, but I will say that we have rejected other applications on Avon Street, for example.

I'm not talking about today, I'm talking about past, because it, it did not.

Meet the level of quality that we expected to see in exchange for the developer getting these additional units.

They're getting more profit and there's benefit for the developer.

Obviously society needs housing, no doubt.

But I think that it's our job to try to make sure that the housing that we do get is quality and long lasting.

because whatever goes here is probably not going to get redeveloped or changed for another 60, 70 years at the minimum.

So it's a pretty lasting footprint.

And I guess that's my question.

Is this good enough to justify the rezoning?

I think density can be done beautifully.

I think you can fit a lot of people in and still create green welcoming spaces.

I'm not feeling that with this development.

I'm certainly happy to weigh in.

First, I want to, I guess, just applaud the proposal, at least for the respect that we have respect for the attempt to design on such a topographically challenging site.

I think the part that concerns me is that

designing to the general core of the concept plan that's been put forth.

And I have the same questions.

That's why I've asked, you know, the applicant to kind of share about, you know, the community and whether or not we can get more green space.

And that's the part of a truly question.

So this is this is a tough one for me.

I've got a few thoughts and comments on this.

Echoing Commissioner Clayborne, I think, you know, it's a good attempt to put a design on a small, weird, challenging site.

And, you know, that's kind of what we have mostly left, because we haven't expanded the development area at all.

And we've got more people moving in.

We need homes for people.

and trying to find a way to do that on these small, weird little sites is going to be limited in scope.

So we're kind of trimming around the edges when there's a need for a big.

housing push.

So that's a big conference of plan conversation.

I'm also not sure market alone is going to do it.

I think we need to fire every error in the quiver we've got, but that's another story for another day.

I do think the site is ripe for some robust infill development.

It's near schools, it's near groceries, it's near public transit, it's near all the semi-urban amenities.

We all agree on that.

And I'm not, I think Christian Murray and I might disagree just a little bit, just given how the rest of this road has developed, I'm not terribly tied to it being used for commercial and industrial, even though I also do agree that we have scant few of those options for for businesses and to go in and operate.

Den's housing, I think, does tend to pay more for itself than single-family homes.

I mean, undoubtedly single-family homes don't pay for themselves in infrastructure, but that's, we'll talk about that.

And as for the commenters, I do feel for the people who get used to treat hillsides and pretty spots near their townhomes and hearing birds and going out back and having your coffee, and you're sold on a certain vibe for the area that you're buying into.

and then there's a proposal for a bunch of houses behind you.

I don't know how we can communicate this to everybody in the development areas that other properties that we don't own can change.

Things can get built on them for people and families who move into those new neighborhoods.

I don't know how to let everybody know that.

If you want 20 acres out in the countryside where you can pee off your porch, you got to go to the rural area for that.

And I don't know how that can be conveyed more clearly and more widely, but I don't mean that facetiously.

I really don't because I get it.

I get used to my backyard being a certain way too.

But it's the way the development area plan is and has been for 40 some years.

So anybody who sold you on that not changing sold you on, you know, some squishy facts.

Anyway, you know, I think there's a big fundamental question here.

How do we build homes for the people who live here and the people are moving here?

And when it comes to this one parcel, it does, I mean, I don't have a problem with the density.

I don't have a problem with over-unders.

It is an odd design, and I do wish it was one that included more possibility for kind of like community space and community green space in a way that's not super duper present here.

But I don't know if that's enough for me to say, you know, no, I pose it, but I think it could be improved in a site plan design.

I think one of the things about this though is that there's a lot of design considerations.

There's a lot to be given on.

I mean, in terms of the county parking requirements, I don't care if they meet the county parking requirements.

If they want to put a whole lot less parking, I'm great with that.

If they, you know, if they didn't, if for some reason relegated parking was an issue because the site constraints, I would give on that.

I think, you know, the question for me at the end of the day is, you know, how do we make this more livable.

And I just feel that there could be something to be done here.

whether it's improving the green space, adding some commercial features that residents could actually benefit from.

There's any number of ways that this could be a more livable design than it is.

It just doesn't, for me, meet that bar.

And so I completely agree that this is a great place for density.

I totally support density.

But I think it's very important for that density to be livable because otherwise, you know, people aren't going to want to be there.

And, you know, even if we are providing affordable housing for people, it's important that we make that affordable housing a place that, you know, from an equity standpoint, a place that people would want to be in.

So I'm going to try to summarize what I've heard here, and I agree with a lot of my colleagues' comments, particularly with taking advantage of some commercial in this site.

There's very little on that side of Berkmar that's being developed.

I didn't see any in the other two developments that are the one that's been completed just to the south and then the one to the north is being built, no commercial.

And currently, it's zones that you can have some commercial in there.

It's happening across the street, which

then begs the question, well, there's going to be people driving to work.

Can they take advantage of some amenities?

What are we doing from a community standpoint?

Are we helping to build a community or are we just looking at one site to another, to another independently?

Which obviously that's not our job, that's not the staff's job.

So I do think that this leaves a lot on the table.

I've heard livability.

from the applicant heard we're over parked.

So I think these are opportunities that the applicant has to make a much better, not only layout of, and I think we've heard density, right?

We all agree with the density and it is a great location, but the application leaves a lot to be desired in my mind as well.

Mr. I don't know whether you might want to hear from the applicant, whether the applicant has any requests at this point.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak.

We really appreciate all the comments and all the feedback that we've heard tonight.

A general deferral.

Thank you.

So if the commission is interested, that would require a motion from a commissioner.

I was going to move to accept the deferral to a future Planning Commission date.

Discussion?

I really appreciate that request.

I want to see the project be successful.

It's just, I feel like it's not ready for prime time right yet.

I agree.

I do too.

I think it is a site for infill.

Absolutely.

And Nathan's exactly right.

All the things we're going to be getting are going to be those harder sites that that's why they weren't developed until now.

and so they're all going to come with these difficulties.

But even so, I think I think more attention to better design, human scale connectivity.

I think we can come up with something great.

I know the applicant has the chops to do it.

I would second that.

There's and I appreciate the deferral as well.

I think I think one it's there.

seem to be listening to the comments.

And I do think that there's a lot of opportunities here, not letting the grading, which huge challenge, I understand that.

But the grading is driving everything in this layout.

given that no date was specifically requested.

Thank you.

Yeah.

You ready?

Yes.

Okay.

Ms.

Firehawk.

Hi.

Thank you.

Hi.

Just asked to Ferd.

Thank you.

Well, I could defer to the PC members if they want to talk first and then go first.

Well, I'll just then go back to you.

Yeah, fair enough.

I'll thank you.

So the Board of Supervisors meetings, since we last met, we've had two Board of Supervisors meetings.

The first was on May 29th, which was actually a work session, a retreat for the Board, where they were talking about how they work as a unit and the vision for the county.

June 5th was the other one that they had.

One of the matters that came in front of you was Holly Hills.

which was the extra townhouses and apartments that is located between, so 29 North between Ashford Boulevard and Holly Mead Drive there.

The board reviewed it very quickly and approved that rezoning.

Also on that June 5th agenda, there was a consent for a resolution of intent

on the consent agenda for resolution of a tent for clean bill and earth and inert materials.

So there's a zoning ordinance text moving its way through to be able to advise us.

Is there a AC44?

Thank you.

Appreciate you asking that.

Thank you.

Does anybody have any committee reports?

There were no committee reports.

So there was nothing to say.

Sorry, I missed that.

I'm sorry.

Did we have something that we didn't resolve last time that we want to bring up against?

Barnes and I had a brief discussion as they're working through this AC44 and obviously there is some impact on the schedule here.

We're going to be doing a lot of work through the summer.

How they bring it back to us and want to make sure that we don't lose some of the cadence that we had and how we were coming back in certain moments that

We did a lot of work before you got here.

There was a lot of work that there's nobody else left here.

I brought that up in our call that we were just getting bombarded with three major issues.

Well taken, thank you.

Mr. Chairman, I do have one question on old business and Mr. Barnes, we can get an answer next time.

I don't want to catch you off guard, but the zoning ordinance, I think that works to be done by a Berkeley group.

We hadn't seen that in a while, so I'm just curious when that might be coming forth.

Bring it on, because I got an answer.

Yeah, now we actually, we're coming back.

So the zoning ordinance,

A bigger picture.

A lot of what's going to come out of your zoning ordinance is going to be driven a lot by the conference and plan.

What kind of districts do we need and changes to land use?

But the staff has been working on some of the more administrative stuff, nonconformities.

I think they brought that to your work session.

They're bringing that back to you for final work session.

Our next meeting, we're actually meeting at four o'clock to talk about that.

So please be sure to realize that you have a four o'clock agenda item.

Oh, well, I can tell you, we actually had a really great meeting last week on Thursday.

We put the solar ordinance out there, received a lot of comments.

And interestingly enough, a lot of the comments were kind of like,

A lot of people sort of are on the environmental side of things.

It's like the YMB group who wants solar everywhere and under no regulations and sort of a, YMB is too strong, but you know, people who are concerned about lots of other environmental issues, soils and stuff like that.

So we decided to have like a meeting of these two groups, which we had on Thursday and invited six or seven different groups.

It was everybody from People Environment Council, I think Sierra Club, well not Sierra Club, but Southern Environment Law Center was invited, didn't come, but it was Farm Bureau, C3 was there.

We had UVA professor who's pretty well.

Okay.

What was great about this thing is we had a lot of facilities.

Bill Fritz and I were sort of responding a little bit to the concerns that were in that we picked up from the

Public Outreach.

effort done by our CAPE department.

They did a great job of having these folks in the same room talking.

We went from two to five o'clock.

I meant to kick people out.

They wanted to keep talking.

But it was, I think a really good consensus came out of that discussion.

So we hope to, I don't have the answer for you today.

I'm pushing Bill to try and get revised schedule ASAP.

I would assume September, August timeframe will be revised ordinance and we made a promise to the folks in the room that we would release that with at least two, two and a half weeks of review.

It's supposed to normally, you know, be released with the planning commission.

I don't like every sentence everyone said, but just some kind of summary of what you heard.

Okay, we can do that.

No, I understand.

I didn't bring this up on our committee reports because the Natural Heritage Committee is not, I'm not a representative of the Planning Commission on the Natural Heritage Committee, because we don't have an official representative anymore.

But in the Natural Heritage Committee that solar ordinance did come up, and there was there's consensus that the 21 acre, the proposal of 21 acre by right solar was problematic.

and one of the other things that was brought up, there's strong consensus too that there should be avoidance areas.

And because in the, you know, currently in the biodiversity action plan, we do have areas that are designated as high quality biodiversity areas of large forest blocks and also special sites that we know contain special resources and that those should be explicitly avoidance areas in respect to the

I agree.

They were actually represented at the forum the other day.

There was a representative on the woman's name who was there.

Yes, Commissioner Murray is sort of like sort of illustrated one of the

So essentially our attack on this is to try and to look at this as a land use issue.

Oftentimes, solar is couched in sort of how many megawatts are being generated by the site.

So we're looking at the land user area and looking about impacts of associate properties and trying to create something that is some charity for those people who want to develop a solar field to sort of understand what hurdles they're going to face.

We're welcome to add other defining components, you guys referenced a couple.

But I think the idea was in the rural area, what is when something doesn't become

residential.

I mean, what does it become agriculture?

It's with a 21 acre lot.

That was kind of a millennium standpoint.

So that's why we picked that number as anything under 21 acres to be defined with future parameters, whether that's in the fenced area or the whole property.

I don't can't tell you right now, but broadly speaking,

that was what our goal was and then to allow anything above that would have to come to especially use permit.

So the idea was to try and create something.

I know we don't have to get into all this tonight necessarily but like he's referring you know there's a lot of work done to model the highest value habitats and there's certain corridors and connectivity points that

We've already prioritized these areas as a county, so it's adopted as part of the biodiversity action plan, which is part of the comprehensive plan.

Yes, we would like to see more attention to that work.

Yeah, I think I don't want it to be like here we've worked it all out and here you go.

Yeah, exactly the point.

Have a work session before we have a final plan that's like

I think there will be a continuing to be some.

And then the question will be at that level, by right, especially use permit, which ones you're trying to avoid, size of area, things like that.

So we will be bringing that back to you.

There's, you know, I have a very I have the largest district and it's very rural.

So there's a lot of potential for solar there.

So I'm getting stopped all the time and asked about it.

So I just wanted to be able to say something.

I won't like draw a line in the sand and say it's exactly on September 7th or whatever.

Thank you.

Sure.

Thank you, Mr. Chairs.

One final question for Mr. Barnes before we adjourn.

I'm curious, have there been any projects submitted for review that fall under that new housing policy of 20%?

Everything we get right now is kind of grandfathered in.

Just curious, have you seen any come in that fit the new housing policy yet?

We've had several pre-applications on ones that would.

Okay, cool.

With that, we are adjourned until June 25 at 4 p.m.