Architectural Review Board Meeting   7/1/2024

in 2024 meeting of the Albemarle County Architectural Review Board to order.

Yes.

Here.

Today's meeting is a hybrid meeting.

The public may access and participate in the meeting electronically.

Instructions for doing so are posted on the Albemarle County website at the Albemarle County calendar.

The public has real-time audio-visual access to this meeting over Zoom and real-time audio access over telephone.

Both is provided in the lawfully posted meeting notice.

This meeting is being recorded and will be made available on the county's website.

This meeting is a public record and subject to disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act.

All speakers, when it is your turn to speak, please first state your name for the record.

Applicants who are making presentations, note that your presentation is limited to a total of 15 minutes, which you can divide among your team members.

Staff will let us know when the 15 minutes are up.

If applicants in the meeting room have team members attending virtually who will need to present, please make that known when you come to the podium.

Everyone who is participating virtually, please mute your microphone until it is your turn to speak.

Do any ARB members have anything to disclose?

No.

No.

Me neither.

All right, great.

We do not have any consent agenda items today, and we do not have any work sessions today.

So that brings us to our one and only regular review item, which is ARB 2024-43 Three Notched Center.

I do.

Good afternoon.

My name is Mariah Gleason.

I'm a senior planner, urban designer, and community development department.

This presentation is for, as you said, ARB 2024-43 Three Notch Center, which is a minor site plan amendment.

The subject property is a single parcel with two buildings located at 5368, 5370, and 5383 Notched Road, just west of Music Today and Star Hill Brewery.

The site is located just less than a mile east of the downtown Crozet area.

The ARB reviewed the preliminary architecture plans for the proposed building earlier this year at the meeting on February 5th.

Recommendations from that meeting, including submitting

We included submitting a minor site plan amendment to coordinate the site plan with updated building design and other proposed site changes, which the applicant has now done.

The proposal is largely consistent with what was reviewed during the February 5th meeting.

Slight changes have been made to refine the footprint and design of the multi-tenant building and provide more detail on associated site changes such as parking, landscaping, and lighting.

Renderings provided to the right show the proposed design.

The new building will be approximately 22,000 square feet, which is a correction to the staff report.

Overall, it's a slight reduction to the square footage.

There will be 16,500 square feet available on the first floor and 5,500 square feet available on upper floors.

And I should say that the renderings provided here include two additional trees that are not actually on the site plan.

along the front of the building.

Elevations show that the proposed design remains consistent with the historic structures nearby and within the county and is also compatible with the industrial character of the surrounding area.

The use of articulated rectangular forms, one to two story building heights and proposed materials promote a coordinated and attractive appearance along the corridor.

Changes to the design include replacing transom windows located above the canopies with siding that is coordinated with other proposed materials.

However, new angled exterior lights is shown in these locations.

The locations for the lights imply that they may be used as external lighting for future signs, but more information is needed to assess whether these lights meet the guidelines, including an updated photometric plan, what they are illuminating and a comprehensive sign plan.

Issues in the landscaping plan were also identified in the staff report.

Recommendations include meeting the tree caliper size requirements for street trees, interior roads, and around parking areas.

There are also recommendations concerning existing trees that will remain on site.

There are existing trees that need to be included in the plan and more information is needed about whether these trees will be retained as some of their locations conflict with new plantings.

Other issues identified in the staff report include providing details for window glass, revising minimum light levels so they do not exceed 20-foot candles, confirming that rooftop equipment will not be visible from any vantage point along the Route 240 entrance corridor, including a detail for the dumpster pad on the site plan, revising notes and labels, and meeting grading requirements.

Lastly, after the staff report was written, we heard from the applicant that they would like to make a change to the proposed brick and grout material.

A sample of the new brick has been provided and is behind you.

Overall, the new brick and grout are similar to those previously proposed.

The new material remains consistent with the historic and local character of the area and promote an attractive appearance along the corridor.

Staff is recommending approval with conditions.

The full set of recommendations and discussion topics are provided here.

I have a slide with a list of possible ARB motions should a member of the board like to have them on hand.

Otherwise, this concludes staff's presentation.

All right.

Thanks a lot.

Thank you.

Tara?

Thanks, Brian.

I appreciate your presentation.

I was just wondering, is there a typo on number 8A?

OK, great.

Thanks.

Frank?

I don't have any questions.

Thank you.

Thanks for your presentation.

I don't have any questions either.

Good afternoon.

My name is Kevin Shaffer.

I'm with Design Develop here in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Thank you so much, Mariah, for the thorough staff report and that introduction.

I'm just going to

address the recommendations and the conditions that staff have proposed in this staff report.

Regarding the site plan considerations, and I'm sorry, I forgot my sheet that I printed out here, so I have to look down on my phone.

I'm actually going to

Skip the comprehensive sign plan discussion and follow that up at the very end.

I think that's probably where we warrant the most discussion.

We are very sympathetic and understanding of that comment and that recommendation to submit a comprehensive sign plan for ARB review with the next submission.

Just want to understand that process a little bit more and have that discussion.

Regarding the

The building sections, providing the building sections, which is item number three, we have supplied those here on this slide, cutting the building sections in a number of different locations to show that we really don't believe that the mechanical equipment will ever be visible for a couple of reasons.

The first is that the minimum parapet is 15 feet high.

Obviously in the two story locations, it's much higher.

We also are locating the mechanical equipment in the central of the building, which is from a functional perspective, but also to eliminate its visibility.

And then the third is we do have varying parapet heights along the elevation, the minimum being about 30 inches, the maximum being I think up to four feet.

And so with that in mind, we really feel like the visibility of this mechanical equipment would be screened from all vehicular and pedestrian perspectives.

But we are happy to provide these additional sections and more so if needed in our next submission.

The dumpster pad, I have talked with Roudebush, who is our civil engineer on this site, and they will include this enclosure screening detail, which is condition four.

That's certainly not a problem.

Regarding the lighting plan on

Condition 5A and 5B, I think there may have just been a linking or a reference issue when we hit the plot button.

We do have a PDF from our lighting consultant that is legible when printed full scale, so we are happy to provide that.

We do need to make adjustments with the 20-foot candles, which we're happy to do so, primarily through the reduction of

those canopy can lights.

One of the things I did want to talk about is we did run the photometrics with the gooseneck lighting as it's shown on the elevation.

Those gooseneck locations happen where there is always a canopy.

They are angled at the face of the building and they did not influence the photometric plan, which I was surprised about.

So I called the lighting consultant and confirmed that that was

indeed the case and he said that it was, but we will provide clarity on that fixture on the angle as requested by staff and show maybe photometrics in some way from the top of the canopy or something if that is desired.

Regarding item six, we'll move the lighting note as requested from sheet 16 to 17 and provide the full text.

Again, in coordination with Roudebush, we will revise the existing condition sheet to show that existing tree in the southwest corner.

It's currently shown as new here.

I believe that was the area that Mariah identified.

We were on item eight.

Adjusting the calipers of the planting for the street trees is no problem and will be accommodated.

So that is A.

B, same response.

We will address those.

For 8C, we were looking for a little bit of clarity, but I think that staff may have just provided it.

The area of concern is existing trees here.

Is that correct?

Okay, so we'll make sure that those existing trees and those new trees are coordinated.

We weren't sure if maybe there was a conflict at a utility that we weren't aware of or something like that.

We will be happy to address D as well, 8D regarding the number of maple trees, as well as 8E, as discussed, 9, a similar response, as well as 10, happy to address those comments.

Regarding 11 and the contour line discussion,

Our civil engineer did request a little bit more clarity on the 10-foot minimum radius where that was found in our ordinance and what the intention was there.

Understanding that the idea is to make it blend in with the existing conditions, but just wanted a little bit more guidance on what was the intent there.

And then 12 is we're happy to accommodate item 12 to providing tree protection on the existing trees as noted.

So with all that in mind, and I apologize, this is a little bit challenging to read here.

Let's see if we can zoom in.

The comprehensive sign plan discussion was something that I touch base with

County staff on just regarding the hydraulic and Georgetown application as well as the Ivy proper.

And then this in lieu of that are kind of as the next step of that discussion.

And I do understand the request because it does get challenging to have a separate CSP hearing.

We talked with the building owners at this time and they were

There's an idea of where signs are going to go based on tenant locations, but until there's a better understanding of the tenant, they were hesitant to put forth a true CSP until, you know, maybe permit review is completed and things like that.

So we offered up some sign locations and

County staff is correct in that the gooseneck lights indicate where we intend to have these sign locations.

And so these show areas where they previously were a clear story glazing.

That was going to be impractical for a number of reasons, structure and mechanical units in the way we were looking at spandrel glass up there, additional cost, and then the limited functionality of spandrel glass above canopy sort of pushed us towards making these sign locations.

The owner really

likes the cohesive look of the project on 250 next to the market and it's an antique store and I don't know the name of that but that signage plan was where they said can we start to take some cues from this where it's a very cohesive and thoughtful signage plan with gooseneck lighting on it as well as kind of some

some standard channel letters on a separate material.

So that's what we started to drive this discussion, but we weren't quite ready to put forth a CSP that was completely ironed out, but we wanted to get those gooseneck lighting in front of the board for their review.

So a long kind of backstory on where we are on the CSP.

What we'd like to request is that that comes back to you at a later date and not

necessarily hold up this application, but what we thought is by showing these locations, and I understand they're a little bit challenging to read on this screen, but maybe this could be enough information to kind of understand the thought process and where we were thinking.

Essentially, it's centered above entrances and it's on the corners of the buildings.

A similar approach to some of the other CSPs we've put forth.

See, this was just to show the gooseneck location with signs here, as well as on this corner here.

And so with that, I think I'll just

to conclude the presentation and say thank you again for the staff report.

All right, thanks for that presentation.

Not for the applicant, but maybe just a question for staff.

We usually recommend that the comprehensive sign plan is done before the final architecture is approved just to make sure that there is sufficient space for the signs on the building and it also makes the review and approval of individual sign applications more efficient.

If we wait until the first sign application is made then that sign application is going to sit for at least six weeks until the comprehensive sign plan gets to the ARB for review.

I think in this case you do have the, you've seen that there are locations set and it looks like there's enough space for the signs so it's really up to you whether or not you're comfortable waiting until later after the architecture is approved.

Thank you.

Let's see.

I guess just one question about I guess the sign location shown at the corners of the building.

I don't know if you can pull that slide up.

Couldn't quite tell.

So they are pushed all the way to the corner.

Would it be acceptable to perhaps justify them over the apparent bay and the brick below?

Yeah, absolutely.

That was the only question I had.

Thank you.

I don't.

Thank you.

Tara?

Could I just clarify, the gooseneck lighting is only proposed in the locations it's shown in the plans, or in the drawings, so if

There's a sign in that location that David was talking about, for instance.

OK. All right.

Thanks.

All right.

Thanks.

I don't have any questions.

That's a no.

So the ARB will now go into discussion.

Yes, I think the application, I appreciate the thought that was put into the presentation.

I don't have any particular issues with this proposal and as far as the question about the comprehensive sign process, I feel like we have a decent idea based on what's been indicated in this presentation.

Thanks Frank.

I agree with Tara.

I think this is a great example of architecture that really adheres to our guidelines and I think this will be a

A great asset on this entrance corridor.

I think it's very responsive to the context, what's surrounded.

I think it's a great project.

And I agree on the comprehensive sign plan.

I also agree with Frank and Taro and think it's a very nice application, a nice project for the corridor and similarly with the general indication of the locations for signage, feel comfortable proceeding without that sign plan in hand.

Thanks, and I'm in total agreement also.

I think it looks like it'll be a great addition to that corridor, and I think there's enough kind of gesture in the materials that we have towards what the signage, or at least the signage locations that I would be fine breaking out the comprehensive sign plan.

So I guess if we could

The recommended action is a motion for approval with the conditions listed in the staff report.

I guess I'll just run through and see if anyone has any particular comments they'd like to revisit or look at.

Tara?

I guess the only one I had a thought on actually, now that I'm going back, is number three.

We saw the sections from the pedestrian perspective.

I don't have a strong

I'm trying to remember what the vehicle experience on the entrance corridor is like over there.

I don't think there's a lot of grade change.

Would it be possible to just provide

We can provide that.

To answer the question, the mechanical units are on in all of the renderings.

We don't do it with the aerial on and then turn them off and then re-export or anything like that.

So just wanted to provide that clarity.

The elevation is relatively flat along this stretch of road.

It may rise slightly to the west and fall to the east, but we're happy to provide those additional renderings and we're confident it will not be visible.

I don't have any edits.

I don't either.

Sure, yeah.

All right, thanks.

I'll second that.

All right.

Thanks a lot.

So we'll move on to other business.

First is approval of the June 17th, 2024 minutes.

Does anybody like the minutes enough?

So moved.

I'll second.

All right, thank you.

All right, thanks a lot.

Do any board members or staff have any additional items?

No.

No.

Sounds like we're good until our next meeting, which is scheduled for July 15th, 2024.

Are there any members who will not be able to attend?

I think I'll be able to attend.

I'm planning to attend.

I plan to attend.

Yeah, me too.

All right.

On that case, this meeting is adjourned until our next meeting on July 15th, 2024.

It's 128 by my watch.

Thank you.